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You hurled me into the depths,
into the very heart of the seas,
and the currents swirled about me;
all your waves and breakers
swept over me.
I said, I have been banished
from your sight;
yet I will look again
– ☾ –
When Hinata is a child, his mother shows him an old animated film—American, dubbed over in Japanese—about a little wooden boy who dreams of becoming flesh-and-bone. Young Hinata doesn’t really get it, didactic themes about the price of irresponsibility sailing over his head, and, by the time he’s an adult, most of the movie is a childhood blur, colorful frames lost to the recesses of his memory.
But one scene sticks, vivid, wherein the puppet boy lights a fire within the belly of a whale, a desperate attempt to save himself and his swallowed father. The smoke billows up, and the whale sneezes them out into the vast sea, a daring escape from a fantastical prison.
This is the only version Hinata knows, and it exists as a vague echo in the back of his mind, a formative experience that occasionally resurfaces in strange, unexpected ways.
What he does not know is this: the old movie is based on an even older book, a fairy tale written for children, in which the whale is not a whale, and no fire is started. The little wooden boy simply reaches out his hand and, with tremendous courage and love, carries his father into the light.
Hinata Shouyou, at age twenty-two, is, for reasons he can’t quite explain, reminded of this moment as he sits in an izakaya with the Japanese men’s national volleyball team, watching his friends and cohorts get thoroughly, irrevocably blasted.
Maybe it’s the imagery of all that liquor sloshing around in a stomach, ready to burst alight with the flick of a match. Or maybe it’s the ever-growing dread that he’s about to be cornered on all sides by drunk men in desperate need of saving.
Or, more specifically, one drunk man. A 188-centimeter, 82-kilogram man with terrible resting bitch face and hands made of gold, who just threw back what can only be described as a sixth, deeply ill-advised shot, locked in some sort of competition with Hoshiumi over a bottle of soju.
Nobody else is paying attention to their showdown, let alone concerned about it, so, with a deep sigh, Hinata resigns himself to Kageyama-savior duty for the night. Being the greatest friend who ever lived is tough work, but somebody’s gotta do it.
He leans his elbow against the table, resting his cheek in his palm, and watches Kageyama take a seventh shot. “Yo, Kageyama; you good over there?”
Kageyama looks up, a warm flush spread across his cheeks and ears. His eyes, usually dark with focus and competition, have gone glassy, like a pond frosted over. “Never been better,” Kageyama says, and, to his credit, his voice is remarkably steady.
“Another!” Hoshiumi shouts across the table. He and Kageyama have been going shot-for-shot for a while now, and they’re reaching the bottom of their second bottle. If someone doesn’t intervene soon, things might get ugly.
“Guys, maybe it’s time for a break?” Hinata offers gently, sliding the table’s glass pitcher of water over to them, cold droplets of condensation clinging to the pads of fingers.
“Ha!” Hoshiumi grins, lips pulling up and around sharp canines. “Need Shouyou to come and save you, eh, Kageyama?”
“No,” Kageyama automatically replies, moving to pour another shot.
“Uh, Kageyama, I don’t think–” Hinata begins, but he’s interrupted by a large hand reaching out, plucking the bottle from Kageyama’s grasp.
Ushijima Wakatoshi stares them down, countenance statuesque and presence ever intimidating. “Water,” he says. “Both of you.”
And he’s not the captain yet, not technically (though Hinata has his own predictions about next year’s Olympic lineup), but the deep resonance of his voice leaves no room for debate. It reminds Hinata a little of Daichi, back in his first year of high school; how a look and a barked order would make Hinata’s spine automatically straighten, shoulders back, a loyal soldier awaiting commander instruction.
Hoshiumi slumps, but obeys, grabbing the water pitcher with muttered complaint. Kageyama only stares down at his own hand, as though he can’t fathom how something was taken from him. He flexes his fingers, closes them into a fist.
“Kageyama?” Hinata asks, concern edging its way into his voice.
Kageyama’s head snaps up, seeming to register Hinata’s presence for the first time. He looks around the table, eyes scanning each team member carefully, before returning to Hinata.
Kageyama motions him over with a little wave of his hand. “Hey, Hinata, c’mere,” he hisses.
“Hm?”
“Closer. I have a secret. For you.”
And Kageyama’s eyes have such an unabashedly mischievous glint that it takes everything for Hinata not to instantly break. Via herculean mental fortitude honed by years of volleyball task focus, he manages to keep a neutral expression. “Oh, wow. A secret for me?” Hinata leans in, angling his face toward Kageyama’s.
Kageyama’s mouth stops maybe an inch away from him, his soft breath tickling the shell of Hinata’s ear. Kageyama opens his lips, air pushing through vocal chords to speak…
And nothing comes out but a giggle. A giggle, from Kageyama Tobio, Japan’s strongest setter. At this point, he very well may be one of the best volleyball players in the world. And he’s tittering like a schoolgirl in Hinata’s ear, drunk off his ass at an izakaya.
In fact, he keeps giggling, each one hiccuping violently out of him like he’s never done it before—which, knowing him, may very well be true.
“Someone take a video and send it to Power Curry,” Atsumu calls somewhere behind him.
The laughter is starting to grow, and it’s infecting Hinata now, too, until the two of them are just sitting there, giggling at nothing.
“What–” Hinata gasps out between laughs, “What could possibly be so funny to you right now?”
“Th–Their hair,” Kageyama manages to get out, wheezing. Are those tears in his eyes?
“Whose hair?”
This question launches Kageyama into another bout of hysterics, and, seemingly unable to speak, he weakly motions in the direction of Bokuto and Hoshiumi.
“Are you being for real right now?” Hinata asks, delight straining his cheeks.
“It’s just, how–” Laugher takes over, stealing Kageyama’s voice yet again.
“What was that?”
“How do they keep it up so straight?” And Kageyama says it like it’s the most important question in the universe, like answering it will solve war, poverty, and hunger, all in one fell swoop.
Hinata cannot believe this is the same man who delivered a perfect, out-of-system back set to him from the baseline a mere few hours ago. Alcohol really is the great equalizer, he thinks, able to reduce even the toughest allies and opponents to puddles of emotional goo. He wonders if, in that respect, it isn’t a little like volleyball.
“Yo, is Kageyama laughing at me?” Hoshiumi asks, looking a little too willing to start a bar fight at the slightest provocation.
“Uh, ignore him. He’s gone all loopy.”
“It’s just, like, straight up! Like, wheeeo.” Kageyama demonstrates this with his hands, shooting invisible geysers to the ceiling.
“I’m pretty sure it’s just hair gel, Yama. No mysterious secret.”
But drunken Kageyama seems unconvinced, and his laughter has faded, replaced with a frown and furrowed eyebrows. This expression, at least, is familiar. “No… no, there’s definitely something weird going on there. I can tell.”
“Ah, I see. Super special setter instincts.”
“Exactly. I know when something’s off.”
“Of course. Kageyama Tobio, master of intuition and subtext.”
Kageyama turns to him, settling the full force of his gaze on Hinata. “Are you making fun of me?”
And, well, he was, but he’s a little afraid of admitting that to this strange, emotionally volatile version of Kageyama. Maybe best to play it safe. “Of course not. This is very serious business.”
“Yes. It is. Good.” And Hinata expects that to be it, but Kageyama continues to look at him, silent, stare intense.
“Do you… need something?” Hinata asks warily, warmth creeping up his neck.
“Wanna spike some tosses?”
“Wh– are you crazy?”
“You always want to practice.”
“Not when my setter’s drunk, thank you! That’s just asking for some stupid, season-ending injury, and sober you would be pissed if I let that happen.” Kageyama’s eyes widen, mouth open just slightly. “What?”
“...Your setter.”
“Huh?”
“You said, my setter.”
“Oh.” This shouldn’t be news to Kageyama; they’re on the same team—what else is Hinata supposed to call him? Despite that, Kageyama’s looking at him like he’s hung the moon. Weird. “Well. You are, aren’t you?”
“Mm. Yeah. I am.”
“Still. No volleyball ‘til you sober up.”
“I’m sober.” And, well, that’s definitely not true, but Hinata knows better than to argue with a drunk person about how drunk they are.
“Fine, then no volleyball until I’m sober, yeah?”
“Then you’ll play with me?” Maybe Hinata is starting to get messed up, because he swears there’s a raw edge of desperation to Kageyama’s voice when he asks.
“We practice together almost every day.”
“I want a two on two. Me and you versus Miya and Hoshiumi.”
“Oh? Might as well make it a beach match, then.”
Kageyama pouts, and Hinata remembers all the sleepovers they had growing up, when fatigue would set in and make Kageyama more prone to a strange sort of expressiveness, soft features at odds with his acerbity. Cute, Hinata thinks, sipping his beer.
“That’s hardly fair,” says Kageyama.
“Why? Because you’ll fall flat on your face again?”
“Shut up.”
Hinata laughs, bumps his shoulder. “C’mon, Yama. You gotta learn to make friends with the sand. Plus, you’ll have me on your team, so I can pick up some of your slack.”
Kageyama, unexpectedly, doesn’t take the bait. Instead, he looks across the table at where Atsumu and Hoshiumi sit. “We’d crush them.”
“Trust me, I know.”
“Think we could do it on the sand?”
“Huh?”
“You know.”
He does. “The freak quick?”
“Yeah.”
Hinata doesn’t even pause to think. “Of course we could.”
“Wind might make it tough.”
“So what? We take a couple plays to readjust, get into our groove. I mean, how many times have we done that quick over the years?”
“Thousands.”
“Exactly.” And Kageyama looks very pleased when Hinata says this, all smug and content.
It’s a good look on him, an easy sort of swagger only developed when one’s cockiness is backed by over a decade of hard work and vicious skill. Not that Hinata would ever tell him so.
Then, strangely, Kageyama’s expression shifts from pride to something else, something serious. It’s the face he makes when he won’t repeat himself, not now or ever. What he’s about to say is important. Listen, Hinata can almost hear him saying, the tether of their on-court telepathy momentarily snapping into place.
“I’m glad we’re here, together, playing in Japan,” Kageyama says, voice solemn.
And most of what he’s said tonight Hinata can chalk up to sentimental drunken babble—the ravings of a madman. But this moment is startlingly sober, crystal clear in its intention.
“Me, too.”
Kageyama’s mind must decide it has hit its maximum capacity for coherency, because he gets that same drowsy look from earlier, losing a shade of his corporeality. He begins to tip back, as though to lie down, but Hinata swoops in, hand steady against his spine.
“Nuh-uh. No lying down here. Lying down is the devil talking.” The last thing he needs is Kageyama throwing up all over himself in a public space.
Kageyama blinks at Hinata, looks down at the arm supporting his back. “You’re strong.”
And, yeah, he’s a professional volleyball player—it’s not a compliment so much as objective fact. But still, something flutters in Hinata’s chest. A swell of pride, probably. He’s worked hard these past seven years for this body. It’s his weapon and his livelihood.
Still. Feels nice to be appreciated. “Well, duh! I’m a pro athlete, too, y’know.” And if Hinata preens a little as he says it, well, that’s his business.
He’s expecting a snarky retort, maybe an annoyed shove. Instead, Kageyama goes completely rogue, veering off-script from their usual combative banter. He reaches over, hand outstretched, and grabs Hinata’s bicep, squeezing the muscle with his fingers.
And. Um. Okay. That’s… different.
Hinata’s whole body flushes, skin going hot-cold. He’s pretty sure Atsumu wolf-whistles, but he can’t really hear anything right now. This is. Not normal. Kageyama is stoic, and grouchy, and—most importantly—repressed. A very hands-to-yourself kind of person. He has never, to Hinata’s knowledge, randomly decided to feel someone up at a bar.
Hinata just watches, frozen in shock, as Kageyama continues to prod his bicep, muttering something about “stupid muscles” and “stupid Brazil.”
Thinking back on it, has Hinata ever seen Kageyama drunk? After a beer or two, maybe, but, no, this is the first time he’s ever been three sheets to the wind in Hinata’s presence, and he’s gone from silly to serious to touchy all in the span of about fifteen minutes. Hinata’s starting to get a little worried about what’s coming next.
“Uhhhhhhhh.” He’s not sure what to do, what to say. Usually, any physical contact from Kageyama is playful aggression or sportsmanship—team huddles, slaps on the back after a good play, elbows to the side when he says something stupid. In those cases, answers are easy: when positive, reciprocate; when violent, retaliate. They’ve come a long way since their teenage years, but Hinata would be lying if he said they hadn’t had the occasional… physical altercation since reuniting in Japan. It’s just how they work—when one pushes, the other shoves, and so balance in the universe is maintained.
This isn’t like that. Hinata doesn’t know what it is, but, looking down at Kageyama’s face, zeroed in completely on his target, feeling the warm grip of fingers around his skin—he also doesn’t think he wants to stop it.
Huh.
“Oi, Tobio,” calls Atsumu. “We know yer obsessed, but let the poor guy breathe. He looks ‘bout ready to combust.”
Does he? There are no mirrors around, and Hinata is still too shell shocked to check on his phone camera. He kind of feels like he’d dissolve if someone so much as breathed on him too hard, though, so maybe that’s what Atsumu’s getting at.
“M’ not obsessed,” Kageyama mumbles, but releases Hinata for the time being.
Alright. Okay. We’re so back. Without Kageyama’s hand around his arm, Hinata can start thinking clearly again. He’s mostly thinking: what the hell.
Kageyama’s drunk and acting a little silly. It happens. This should not be some crazy, world-shattering moment.
So why is Hinata having a hard time catching his breath?
“Hinata…” says Kageyama, voice snapping him out of his reverie.
“Yeah?”
“I’m tired.” He looks tired, eyes heavy and face relaxed.
Still. “You can’t lie down in here.”
“I know. You told me. But I’m tired.”
“Wanna rest your head on my shoulder?” Hinata offers without thinking.
He mentally kicks himself; hey, remember the last thing we’re still freaking out about? Can we resolve that little issue before plunging back into the fathomless, roiling sea? But it’s too late; Kageyama almost immediately dips to the side, laying his head on Hinata. Soft, ink-black strands of hair tickle his neck and jaw. It’s kind of nice, if he’s being honest.
“This okay?” Kageyama asks, so quiet Hinata can barely hear him over the din of the izakaya.
“Yeah, Yama; you’re all good,” Hinata replies, voice low, matching Kageyama’s pitch.
When Hinata glances up, his gaze meets Atsumu’s, who’s looking at him across the table, eyebrows raised pointedly.
Hinata squints his eyes back. What? he silently asks.
Atsumu doesn’t say anything, picks up his phone and begins typing furiously.
A second later, Hinata’s own phone vibrates on the table. He quickly picks it up with his left hand (his right arm is currently trapped beneath Kageyama) and unlocks it. He has one new text message.
(23:48) 👀👀👀👀 ????? !!!!!!!!
wut? (23:49)
(23:49) lookin rather… cozy over there 🤨🤨
he’s drunk leave him alone !! (23:50)
(23:50) wasn’t talkin bout kags 😶
huh?? (23:50)
(23:51) playin coy i see aight…
(23:51) but i got eyes on u shou.. EYES!!!
whatever weirdo :/ (23:52)
(23:53) u just tell kgyma 2 get his ass in gear or next time its gunna b ME sittin next 2 u at the bar wasted n pitiful…
Hinata shakes his head, clicking off his phone. He never has any idea what Atsumu is on about. He has more pressing issues to deal with anyway, like what he’s going to do about the behemoth currently sleeping on him.
“Kageyama,” he says gently, lighting jostling him. Kageyama makes a couple little noises, but doesn’t budge. “Kageyama-kun.” A little louder, a slightly more aggressive wiggle.
“OI, TOBIO!” Hoshiumi shouts across the table, and Kageyama startles, finally blinking his eyes open.
“Mrmm. …Huh?”
“You fell asleep on me.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
Hinata rolls his shoulder back, shakes out his hand. “It’s okay; my arm just started getting numb.”
“My bad,” Kageyama says, then promptly tips his head back against Hinata’s shoulder.
“Y’know, I do need this thing to spike. I’m not just a Kageyama sleeping bag.”
“Mmm. You can spike with your left side,” Kageyama says, but Hinata doesn’t miss the slightly annoyed edge to his expression.
“Still hung up on that?”
“Completely ridiculous… You can’t just go to Brazil and decide to become ambidextrous.”
Hinata laughs, and Kageyama grunts when it causes his shoulders to shake. “Stay still.”
“Sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt naptime.”
“Hmph. Guess I can forgive you. Maybe.”
“So stingy!”
“You’re stingy. I’m just looking for a place to sleep.”
“There’s no place that isn’t my body?!”
“You’re the one who offered it.”
Oh, shoot. He did, didn’t he? That’s a little embarrassing. “How are you too drunk to keep your eyes open, but you still manage to argue with me?”
“I dunno. Muscle memory?”
“Can you move right now, or am I going to have to carry you home?”
“Home…” Kageyama cracks open one eye, interest piqued. “Home sounds nice.”
“Yeah? How about we get you to bed?”
“I thought lying down was bad.”
“Lying down on the ground is bad. Bed is good.”
“Mmm…” Both eyes are open now—progress! “And you’ll take me home?”
“Yep. Can’t risk you trying to walk back like this alone.”
Kageyama rolls his eyes. “I can take care of myself.”
“Oh? So you want to go without me?” Hinata won’t let him even if he says yes, but he’s hoping the bait works to save him the grief of another argument.
Sure enough. “...I didn’t say that.”
“Then c’mon, Yama. Up we go.” Hinata slings Kageyama’s arm firmly around his shoulders and stands, helping him up.
This, at least, is returning to familiar territory. Their second year of high school, Kageyama twisted his ankle digging a ball in the third set against Date Tech at the Interhigh qualifiers, and Hinata, after violently shooing everyone else away, was the one to help him off the court. This is kind of like that, except about ninety percent less sweaty and stressful.
All eyes at the table have turned to him. If any of the team happened to miss sloshed Kageyama, they’ve certainly noticed now, wrapped as he is around Hinata, head barely able to stay up on its own. “Okay, guys, it’s been fun, but I need to go babysit this giant.”
“Oh?” Atsumu says, with that annoying look back on his face. “You need to go take care of him?”
“Are you offering?”
Atsumu puts his hands up defensively. “No, no; not lil ole’ me. Wouldn’t want to interrupt.”
“Interrupt what?”
“Oh,” Atsumu waves his hand around vaguely. “This and that.”
“Ahem. Goodnight, Hinata-kun, Kageyama-kun,” Ushijima nods to them politely in turn.
The rest of the team choruses their good nights (Kageyama doesn’t respond; Hinata worries he’s gone catatonic again). With a man half a foot taller than him draped across his shoulders, he carefully makes his way to the exit. For most, the combination of cumbersome dead weight and obstacle-ridden terrain would prove deadly. Luckily, there are few people in the world who’ve trained their body’s balance more than Hinata Shouyou, and he makes easy work of the trip, deftly navigating himself and his monster around tables and groups of people.
“Sorry,” Kageyama softly murmurs, face close to Hinata’s. Good—he’s still alive.
“No apologies needed,” he says, and means it. It’s weird to hear Kageyama apologize for anything that isn’t a set tossed slightly off trajectory. “Y’know, you spent a lot of time pulling my weight around when we were younger. It’s about time I return the favor.”
As he reaches for the door, he hears Kageyama mumble something into his shoulder. “Hm? What was that?”
Kageyama angles his head so his mouth isn’t speaking directly into fabric. “I said, you don’t owe me. It was fun, turning you into something deadly in high school. Made me feel like I could do anything.”
“Well, now we make each other deadlier than ever.”
This makes Kageyama smile—a small, prideful thing. “Yeah. We do.”
With that, Hinata pushes the entrance door open and helps Kageyama step out into the cool spring air.
– ☾ –
Here’s the thing.
Hinata Shouyou doesn’t get drunk. He barely even drinks.
This is because, at age sixteen, he pushed his body past its limits. He collapsed on the court, in a city far from home, right as Karasuno gained momentum in their third set, and, because of him, they lost the game. Because of him, his team didn’t get to keep playing.
People can call him arrogant, or selfish, or self-important. He doesn’t care. If he had been there, they would’ve won. He knows. He knows it so deeply and truly he can almost taste it. He knows because he would’ve sold his soul for it.
Unfortunately, no devils were around to offer a deal. Instead, a literature teacher looked into his eyes and told him to learn, to never do it again. To take care of himself.
Hinata’s weapon is his body, and he keeps it sharp. Water, food, rest. Positivity, routine, discipline. All requirements of a good athlete. Hinata throws himself against the grindstone of life over and over again, relentless, until he has filed himself down to a perfect, deadly point. It is, after all, how you become the best.
And he knows this, knows what makes the strongest athletes, because he learned from the master—or, more precisely, the king. Kageyama keeps his nails in perfect order, journals religiously, jogs daily, has the same morning and evening stretch routine, every day, no matter what, because he knows that habit and discipline are the razor edge dividing the good from the great.
These are all true, honest facts. They are also the reason why Hinata is experiencing some cognitive dissonance at the moment, watching the embodiment of self-control lose himself completely.
It’s just… weird. Something isn’t quite right. Kageyama is old enough—mature enough—now that he wouldn’t have gotten baited by Hoshiumi into a drinking competition if he didn’t feel like it. So, what’s up?
Hinata looks over at him, the neon lights of Tokyo casting multicolored shadows across his delicate bone structure. “Hey, Kageyama?”
“Hm?”
The cool night air seems to be helping; he’s a little more alert, a little more coordinated than he was in the warm glow of the izakaya. If he gets home without collapsing, it’ll be a win in Hinata’s books. “Are you doing okay?”
Kageyama shrugs one shoulder. “Fine.”
“I’ve just never– I mean, you don’t usually drink like that.”
“Ah.” Kageyama looks away, back at Hinata, away again. This close, it’s easy to track the movement of his eyes. Kageyama, off the court, is a relatively still person. A structure of a man. But he’s always watching, observing. Hinata noticed this about him back when they were both fifteen. Nearly a decade later, not much has changed. “Got a little carried away,” he murmurs.
“No kidding.”
“I’m not that drunk,” Kageyama says, defensive, before promptly tripping over the sidewalk.
“You stressed about the VNL?” It’s the only answer Hinata can think of; Kageyama’s general mental state is nearly always tied to volleyball.
A long pause. Hinata looks over to make sure Kageyama isn’t starting to nod off again, but his eyes are wide, reflecting the city lights. He’s staring at him intensely. Hinata can’t shake the feeling that there’s something he’s missing, something important. “No. I’ve been to the Olympics.”
“I know that, stupid.”
“Then why’d you ask?”
“You didn’t play Oikawa-san at the Olympics.”
Kageyama clicks his tongue. “There’s no guarantee we’ll play him at the VNL, either. Argentina’s not in our pool.”
And Kageyama could be lying; it’s not outside the realm of possibility. But Hinata’s instincts are telling him there’s no deception going on here—Kageyama is not spiraling over their upcoming matches. What, then? Hinata thinks. What is going on in that head of yours?
They leave behind the narrow rows of shops and restaurants, entering a more residential side of the city. Tall, concrete apartment buildings loom over them, a far cry from the large, traditional homes of rural Miyagi.
They wind their way to their shared neighborhood, their respective apartment complexes across the street from one another. Hinata punches in the code to Kageyama’s building, numbers memorized, and leads them into the lobby. It’s late enough that no one is at the front desk, so Hinata at least doesn’t have to worry about some administrative worker leaking news of Kageyama drunkenly stumbling home with a teammate to the press.
He manages to muscle Kageyama into the elevator and hits the button for the eighth floor.
“Where are your keys?” Hinata asks.
“Dunno.”
“Wh— what do you mean you don’t know.”
“Pockets, probly. Don’t remember which.”
“Are you so drunk you can’t check your own stupid pockets?”
Kageyama’s eyes flash, and his hand curls tighter around Hinata’s shoulder. “Maybe I am.”
“Stupid-yama. Making me do everything,” Hinata grumbles, momentarily tossing Kageyama’s arm off to instead face him head on.
Without bothering to be bashful, Hinata plunges his hand into Kageyama’s front left pocket, then his right. It’s awkward, especially when Kageyama has two perfectly functional arms, but Hinata’s starting to get too tired to really care. When he doesn’t find keys in either pocket, however, he frowns.
“Check your back pockets.”
“Can’t. Arms are too heavy,” Kageyama says, with a straight fucking face. Hinata hates him sometimes, just a little.
“Are you serious?”
Kageyama shrugs and turns around, presumably so Hinata can check the back pockets of his jeans.
Hinata can’t believe his life. Of course he has to be best friends with the weirdest guy on the planet, and of course said guy gets somehow even weirder when he’s drunk. With a roll of his eyes, Hinata slips a hand into Kageyama’s back pocket, and, thank god, his fingers close around a familiar metal ring.
Hinata pulls out the keys and turns Kageyama back around, jangling them for emphasis in front of his face. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were trying to get me to feel you up,” he says with a laugh.
Kageyama doesn’t reply, just leans against Hinata as the elevator doors open on his floor.
They make their way to Kageyama’s apartment, and, on the third key Hinata tries, the door swings open with a click.
The inside of Kageyama’s apartment is neat, if sparse. The walls are undecorated off-white, but the floor is hardwood, and the appliances are new. It’s a nice place, even if it’d drive Hinata crazy to live in a home with so little color.
What limited personality exists in the apartment is almost entirely the result of Hinata. He sees souvenirs sent from Rio, old high school photos in frames, and a cobalt rug he insisted Kageyama buy during their most recent thrifting adventure. It’s nice, to identify the little ways he has left his mark on Kageyama’s life, the breadcrumb trail of memories and influences.
They shuffle to Kageyama’s bedroom, Hinata maintaining a steadying hand on Kageyama’s back as they go, strangely silent. There’s something about being in someone else’s home, late at night and not necessarily invited, that makes Hinata feel like he’s not quite allowed to speak without instigation.
In his room, Kageyama immediately sheds his shirt and flops onto the bed. He’s even more built than when they were in high school, shoulders broad and abs magazine-model perfect. Hinata is surrounded by buff, half-naked men on the daily—a perk of the job, if he’s being honest—but there’s something about Kageyama’s familiar, lithe strength that never really gets old. It might come from their shared history, from Hinata’s fond memories of him as a gangly young teenager and the knowledge of all the years of work it took to arrive here, in peak physical condition.
Kageyama looks up at Hinata from where he’s draped across the covers, blue-black eyes wide and unsure. It’s a strange look on him; not one of the dozens of common Kageyama expressions that Hinata has mentally indexed and cataloged, neatly labeled with the emotion most likely going through his head.
Kageyama mutters something, unintelligible.
“What?” Hinata asks, standing half in the dim room, half in the brightly lit hallway.
Kageyama looks away, huffs. Is he embarrassed? “Come here.”
“Come… there?” Hinata doesn’t see anything in the room that warrants his attention, but he takes a step forward anyway, in the habit of moving when Kageyama asks and figuring out the rest later.
“That’s what I said. No—” Kageyama sounds frustrated, “Not there, here.” He motions toward himself.
“I’m already here,” Hinata says, standing at the edge of the bed. “Are you so drunk you can’t see?”
Kageyama sits up suddenly, reaching out to curl a finger into the collar of Hinata’s shirt.
“What the hell, Kageyama?”
“You’re not listening to me. Closer.”
“How much closer can I even get?!”
In response, Kageyama tugs Hinata down and kisses him.
Within the span of roughly a second, Hinata Shouyou realizes a few things:
- Kageyama likes men.
- Kageyama likes him, specifically. This is, to put it mildly, earth-shattering. Reality-altering. Brain-combusting.
- Kageyama has almost certainly been flirting with him the entire night—in his own, weird way—and some things Hinata had written off as bizarre drunken antics are beginning to make a lot more sense.
- Kageyama’s lips are softer than he expected, warm and pliant. It sends a thrill down his spine—which is… something. He’ll return to this thought later.
- Hinata is very sober. Kageyama is not. This, unfortunately—is it unfortunate? Too much is happening too quickly for Hinata to decide—means the kissing can’t continue, as per the rules of basic human decency.
Hinata pulls away, hand instinctively raising to rest on his heartbeat, which feels a bit like a coked-up hummingbird got set loose in his ribcage.
“Uhhhhhhhhhh,” Hinata says, ever the poet.
He’s really hoping Kageyama will say something, anything; give him some direction here, please. But he seems to have gone mute, glaring at a section of wall just past Hinata’s shoulder.
“Okayyy. Ummm.” Hinata takes a deep breath. This is a morning problem, his brain helpfully supplies. Nothing needs to be done right now—not when Kageyama isn’t thinking straight. “So. Um. That was crazy.”
Kageyama gives no sign he heard Hinata, expression frozen in place. Great.
That’s probably his cue to jump ship, at least for now. Doesn’t seem like he’s going to get another word out of Kageyama tonight. “I’m going to… go. But we’ll talk tomorrow, okay?”
No response, as expected. Slowly, Hinata turns and leaves the room, eyes averted from Kageyama, trying not to worry too much about the very real possibility that he just broke team Japan’s superstar first-string setter. He has bigger, more imminently pressing metaphorical fish to fry, and he pointedly needs to be outside of Kageyama’s home to do so.
The walk down the street and up four stories to his apartment is a blur, his brain a broken-record litany of what the fuck. Holy shit. Oh my god.
Once Hinata is safely tucked into bed, teeth brushed and face washed, he stares at his whirling ceiling fan and, finally, allows himself to think.
Kageyama likes him. Kageyama likes him. Or, he probably does. Technically, there was no verbal confirmation. But Kageyama, as far as Hinata knows, isn’t the type to go around flirting with and kissing random people, no matter how drunk he might be. This means something. It has to.
The question is, then: what does it mean for Hinata?
The kiss wasn’t… unpleasant. Kind of the opposite, actually. It was weirdly nice, just like Kageyama’s fingers around Hinata’s arm earlier in the night.
It’s a similar feeling to when he hits one of Kageyama’s tosses, quick as lightning and delivered expertly to the palm of his hand. A full-body electric thrum, like he could power all the lights in Tokyo if only he tries hard enough, moves fast enough. It’s something he’s never felt with another setter, not Oikawa or Atsumu or anyone, that sense of being superhuman, godlike, on top of the world.
Invincible.
Oh my god, he thinks, realization hitting him with the force of a freight train. Do I like Kageyama?
– ☾ –
At 6:15 the next morning, Hinata loudly knocks on Kageyama’s door.
He’s never been good at passively waiting; he’s a doer, a force of nature, and once he decides something—something like, for example, wanting to give kissing his setter another shot—he crosses it off his to-do list post fucking haste.
Kageyama’s schedule is burned into his brain, so Hinata knows he goes for his morning run at 6:30 sharp, every day. Knowing him, and knowing that it would require an imminent cataclysmic disaster to break his routine, a nasty hangover probably won’t change this.
Or maybe not. Hinata stands at the door, frowning when nobody comes to answer it. He knocks again, and again once more a minute later.
Alright, whatever. It’s 6:20. Only ten minutes until Kageyama’s run. Hinata isn’t above staking out an exit for a little bit.
He sits in the hallway, opens Instagram, and waits.
His feed is the usual—selfies, volleyball, artfully plated food. But a post from Atsumu catches his eye, simply captioned team drinks ♥ followed by a string of incomprehensible emojis. It’s a series of photos from last night, beginning with a nice, respectable picture of team Japan at the izakaya’s table, smiling at the camera. Each subsequent photo gets increasingly bizarre and chaotic, ending with an incriminating photo of Bokuto, shirtless, asleep in a bathtub filled with what looks to be an astronomical number of multicolored orbeez.
What grabs his attention, however, is the fifth image: Kageyama, red-faced, passed out on an equally flustered Hinata’s shoulder. It’s far from the most scandalous picture in the set (their PR team is going to have some choice words with Atsumu later today, he’s sure), but it makes something flutter in his stomach. Without thinking, he screenshots the image. He likes it, is all. Nothing wrong with that.
The click of a lock and turn of the nearby doorknob signal that, as expected, Kageyama’s adherence to routine is the universe’s one, merciful constant.
Hinata stands, quickly leaning over, and meets Kageyama’s eyes.
He looks like death walking, face pale and eye bags dark, but he’s in his usual running getup, and wet bangs stick to his forehead. When he sees Hinata, he freezes.
“What are you doing here?” Kageyama’s tone is its usual shade of brusque, but there’s something else beneath the surface. Something that sounds a whole lot like fear.
“You didn’t answer when I knocked,” Hinata says, purposefully positioning himself so that he’s as wedged in the doorway as possible, preventing Kageyama from slamming the door in his face. “I need to talk to you.”
“No.” Kageyama tries to retreat into his apartment, registers that Hinata is blocking the door from closing, and frowns. “Move.”
“Okay.” Hinata takes a step closer.
“Not that way!” But it’s too late; Hinata is already three-fourths of the way inside.
“You know, you should really just let me in. Save us both the grief.”
“I don’t need whatever this is.”
“Oh?” Hinata leans forward. “And what is this?”
“Fuck off.” Kageyama’s voice breaks on the second syllable, wiping the smile off Hinata’s face. This isn’t their usual needling; Kageyama’s upset, and he looks a breath away from crumbling.
“I have something important to tell you,” Hinata says, tone grave. He needs Kageyama to know he’s serious, too, or none of this is going to work.
“I get it, okay? I don’t need fucking… verbal confirmation. Save your goddamn pity, or whatever the hell you’re trying to do here.”
“Can you like, chill out with all the weird assumptions, first of all?” Hinata’s trying to be nice, he really is, but having a crush on Kageyama does not, unfortunately, make him any less of a pain in the ass. Hinata’s jaw clenches, molars grinding. “Just give me a couple minutes.”
Kageyama is silent for a moment, eyes roving over the planes of Hinata’s face. It makes him hold his breath, this sensation of being dissected alive, like Kageyama might rip out his entrails and scry meaning from their curvature, a modern sibyl. But whatever Kageyama sees there must convince him he’s not getting Hinata to budge anytime soon, and the fight drains out of him with a breath, shoulders slumping.
Kageyama turns, walks deeper into his apartment. “Fine. Make it quick.”
Hinata scrambles after him, closing the door with a decisive click. Not for the first time, he has dived headfirst into the belly of the beast, confrontation preceding thought, and there’s no turning back now. It’s just Hinata versus the cavernous stomach, his only hope flint and steel and prayer.
Kageyama leans against his kitchen counter, morning light from the window softening his face, smoothing the usual shadows and angles. He does not look at Hinata.
“Well, get on with it, then.”
Hinata shuffles, trying to think. He was so focused on talking to Kageyama, he sort of forgot to figure out what, exactly, he wants to say. He was kinda hoping they might just go right back to kissing.
“So. Last night.”
Kageyama groans, runs a hand across his face, clearly already regretting his decision to let Hinata inside. “It was fucking stupid.” I was stupid, is what he means but doesn’t say.
“Yeah, kinda, but not like… bad stupid.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
Hinata inches closer, slowly, like he’s trying to befriend a skittish stray. “Most of the time, when you’re stupid it’s like… raaah, you know?”
“No.”
“Like, you’re not aware of things, or you’re being an insensitive jerk and not realizing it.”
Kageyama’s mouth draws to a thin line, nostrils flaring. “Okay,” he grits out, voice tense. Hinata can practically hear him restraining the impulse to grab Hinata by the throat and throttle him.
“But yesterday, you were all…” Hinata flutters his hands around, hoping to catch the word he’s struggling for floating in the air.
“All what?” Kageyama spits out, reaching the end of his patience.
“You were, I dunno, like, cute, I guess.” Hinata cringes even as he says it. He’s never heard anyone call Kageyama cute, not even Miwa-san, and he’s afraid he might’ve just stumbled onto a verbal minefield.
The following silence confirms his fears. “Not in a weird way!” Hinata scrambles, feels the proverbial rocks slipping beneath his feet. “Just. In a. Um…”
He trails off as Kageyama finally looks over at him, expression stony. “A weird way. Right.”
“No!” Hinata runs his fingers through his hair, tangling the curls and pulling on the strands, self-soothing. “This isn’t coming out right. I’m trying to say… you didn’t do anything wrong. Like, it’s all good. We’re good.”
This, at least, eases some of the tension in Kageyama’s shoulders, but he’s still shuttered, shackles raised. “Alright.”
“Yeah.” Hinata is only about two feet away from Kageyama now, distance slowly but surely eased.
“Is that it?”
“What?” It absolutely is not. Hinata hasn’t even gotten around to his (very important!) kissing business yet.
“Can I go for my run, now?” Kageyama moves to step around Hinata, but his path is immediately blocked, Hinata stubbornly holding his ground. The two are now very close, close enough for Hinata to see where the skin of Kageyama’s lip is raw from biting, and, oh, dammit, he’s staring at his mouth.
“Don’t be an asshole,” Kageyama growls, reaching out to forcibly relocate him, but Hinata grabs his wrists before he can make contact, gripping tight.
Their eyes meet, and all the air leaves the room, oxygen sucked away into the ocean's depths. Hinata isn’t sure whether he’s freezing or burning up, but he’s hyper-aware of the sheen of sweat coating his body, droplets coalescing at his hairline and dripping, slowly, down the back of his neck.
It’s make-or-break time, the moment of truth—belly of the beast, he’s reminded. Seconds are ticking, and he needs to light a proverbial fire, or pray to god, or do something, quick, or else die slowly and painfully via whale peristalsis.
“So, um. This whole kissing thing,” Hinata says, fingers still locked around Kageyama’s wrists, because being fluent in four languages doesn’t mean he ever learned tact in any of them.
Kageyama scoffs, but Hinata can feel how warm he is beneath his hands. “Forget it. It’s whatever.”
Hinata rears back in surprise, releasing Kageyama. “Whatever? It’s not whatever! It’s… it’s…”
And now Kageyama’s eyebrows are furrowed, face pinched in confusion. “What are you talking about? You just said that ‘we’re good.’”
“We are good!” Hinata shouts, volume control slipping through his fingers along with all his other cognitive functions. “But we could be even better!”
“I don’t have time for your weird fucking riddles.”
“They’re not riddles! I don’t know how much clearer I can be!”
Kageyama’s fists ball at his sides, jaw setting. “What do you want from me? An apology? For me to grovel at your feet? Well, guess what; I’m not—”
He’s cut off as Hinata curls a hand around his neck and kisses him, diligently and hungrily, like he has a point to prove. Like Kageyama is his one-way ticket out of the dark, his homecoming and his prophet.
They break apart as violently as they collided, Hinata gasping as he watches Kageyama’s eyes glaze over, brain short-circuiting in real time.
Hinata’s chest heaves, and he feels his face burning, the way it would when he’d stay out on the beaches of Rio for too long without sunscreen. Kageyama blinks at him, eyebrows higher than he’s ever seen, and the expression would be comical if the world wasn’t being knocked off its axis, sending all of reality and coherence careening into the murky sea.
Hinata reaches out, tentative, and traces a shaky knuckle along Kageyama’s jaw. “Whoa.”
Kageyama shudders at the touch, movement disrupting his catatonic state. He looks at Hinata, intense. A beat. And then. “Why did you do that?”
“Huh?” The question is so unexpected, it snaps Hinata out of his reverie. “Uh, because I wanted to?” Kageyama should know better than to ask, really—desire is, ultimately, the driving impulse in Hinata’s life. He’s grown a lot, in many ways, since age fifteen, but his hunger is a constant.
The words are obvious to him, but it must mean something more to Kageyama, because Hinata blinks and he’s being kissed again, large hands curling around his waist and pulling him in closer, deeper.
He melts into the touch, moving on instinct, and the noise Kageyama makes when Hinata slips a tongue into his mouth sends electricity coursing through his vertebrae, his body prickling with potential energy, wanting to twitch, to move. Hinata channels this into his hands, skids them across the muscles of Kageyama’s neck, shoulders, back, arms, feeling them shift beneath the ministrations of his fingertips.
Kageyama pulls back, hands still curled around Hinata, and stares at him, no noise in the room except their exhalations and the distant whirring of a fan. “You like me.” It’s not a question.
It’s also not an argument, but it’s close enough to an accusation that Hinata’s defensive shackles raise, habit forming the shape of his words. “Well, you liked me first!”
“Maybe.”
“Ha!” Hinata puffs out his chest, triumphant. “So, I win!”
“That’s not how it works.”
“It definitely is.”
“Fine. Then I get a point for kissing you first.”
Hinata hums, deliberates. “Alright. I can agree to that.”
“Yeah?”
“Mhm,” Hinata says with a smile, stealing another kiss—shorter this time, sweeter, like sugar-spun punctuation. “Look at us, compromising. We could have, like, the strongest, healthiest relationship ever. The relationship to end all relationships. No other couple stands a chance.”
Kageyama raises an eyebrow, but he’s not even attempting to fight off a rare, non-volleyball grin. “Relationship?”
“Yeah! First, we conquer the volleyball world, then—the dating world.” And the competitive glint that alights in Kageyama’s eyes makes Hinata feel like he could topple empires and build them anew, all on the strength of Kageyama’s attention. “Wait, does this mean I can call you Tobio?”
“Only if I can call you Shouyou,” Kageyama answers, as though this is something that hasn’t always been on the table, Hinata famously unconcerned with overfamiliarity.
“Kage—” Hinata catches himself, pauses, smiles. “Tobio, you could’ve called me by my given name when we were fifteen, and it would’ve been fine. I definitely don’t care now.”
“Oh. Well. Ditto, I guess.”
Hinata laughs, tangles his fingers in Kageyama’s hair. “Y’know, I thought about it, but I always figured you’d bite my head off.”
“I wouldn’t have,” Kageyama says, earnest enough that something warm flickers in Hinata’s chest.
“Man, you must’ve had it real bad for me, huh?”
Kageyama shrugs, looking away, embarrassed again. “You were different. It was—” he cuts himself off, swallows nervously. “You had this complete faith in me, from the beginning. Total trust. I hadn’t—or, it had been a long time, since I’d felt that.”
“So, what, you fell for me because I trusted your tosses?” Hinata tilts his head, amused. Another option had never occurred to him. Kageyama was the best setter, and Hinata wanted to spike; there was nothing else to it.
“No. There were other things, but…” Kageyama clears his throat, somewhere between pleased and mortified. “But it didn’t hurt.”
Hinata can’t stop looking at him, fascinated by this new side of Kageyama, and suddenly all he wants is to make him look like this forever, tender and bashful. “Wow. Have you been a secret softy this whole time?”
“No.”
“Uh-huh.” Hinata is unconvinced. “So. When did you realize you were hopelessly in love with me?”
“Alright,” Kageyama says, pushing Hinata’s laughing face away. “No more questions.”
“You’re no fun.”
“Maybe, but you’re…” he trails off.
“What?” Hinata asks, challenging.
And Kageyama must not be able to decide what Hinata is, because his answer is pulling Hinata in by the belt loops and kissing him again.
Hinata humors it for a minute, mouths warm and wet against each other, until he leans back, question on his lips. “Are you still going running?”
“Huh?”
“It’s, like, almost 7. You’re half an hour late for your morning jog.”
“Oh. Maybe. It depends, I guess.”
“On what?”
Kageyama hums, swipes an index finger across Hinata’s lip, collecting moisture. “On whether you decide to stay.”
And just like when they were fifteen and Kageyama tossed to him for the very first time, there’s only ever been one option, one answer.
“Of course I’m staying,” Hinata says, hands on Kageyama’s chest. “I’ll stay for as long as you’ll have me.”