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That day, Kuroo wasn’t as cheerful as he typically was. Indeed, the ten years-old boy had been wandering around a hospital all day, trying to peek through the doors. He always ended up getting chased away by the nurses after a few minutes, though. His grandfather’s health had been rapidly deteriorating and his parents had been chatting with him for about two hours by now. Knowing his grandparents, Kuroo assumed they most likely had gotten lost in their train of thought and started babbling about everything and nothing. Good thing the young boy wasn’t in the room with them, or he once more would’ve been the unfortunate victim of his grandma’s never-ending questions.
Unexpectedly, he noticed that, not too far from where he was seated, a door was creaked open. Not missing the opportunity, Kuroo sneaked in and slowly closed the door behind him, silently hoping the patient inside this room wouldn’t be another old lady trying to teach him how to knit a scarf. He had already had decent training with his own grandmother. By now, he already knew how to knit scarves, socks and slippers.
Kuroo cautiously looked around the room he had just entered. He discerned the form of what seemed to be a short boy swaddled in bed sheets. The kid had dark brown hair and his huge amber eyes were riveted on him. He somewhat reminded him of a frightened owl, with only the top of his head timidly uncovered from the blankets. Suddenly, Kuroo noticed the thick cast surrounding the kid’s ankle and toes and rushed forward.
“Wow, how did that happen?” The black-haired boy exclaimed, excitingly pointing at the plaster. “Looks like you hurt yourself quite badly.”
Surprisingly, the owl-looking child sat up on his bead and beamed, proudly puffing his chest. “I was too short to reach the cookies, so I climbed on the drawers and fell on my ankle,” he declared. The way he said it made it sound so heroic; Kuroo couldn’t help but be impressed.
“That’s hard-core! My name is Kuroo Tetsurou, by the way. I’ve been all alone in this hospital for two hours and I am so bored,” he sighed, running a hand through his already messy hair. It was pleasant to finally talk to someone his age. They were on spring break and his childhood friend, Kenma, had gone on vacation with his parents. He had been starting to feel lonely, all by himself.
“Mine’s Bokuto Koutarou. Why are you in the hospital if you’re not sick?” Bokuto inquired as his new friend settled down on the edge of the bed.
“My grandpa isn’t going well, so my parents are visiting him,” he answered and smiled.
They didn’t know it yet, but that had been the beginning of an unbreakable friendship. The two boys would click instantly, surprised to discover that they had so many things in common. It was like they had found their cosmic twin, here, in this unwelcoming hospital. Indeed, they both had the same humor, along with the same music and movie taste. They played volleyball at their school, although they weren’t especially good at it yet. Also, they both loved dogs, fantasy novels, the feeling of the sun or their skin and the sound of birds during spring.
After an extremely long conversation about how thrilling a certain sci-fi manga was, Kuroo heard a nurse call out his name in the hallway. It turns out his parents had been frantically looking for him, but he couldn’t care less. The only thing he was thinking about was his new friend, whom he had promised to visit again the following day. Of course, they had exchanged numbers in case Bokuto would leave the hospital earlier than planned.
The next day around midday, Kuroo’s mom shouted his name, telling him someone wanted to talk to him.
“Hello?”
“Hey hey hey, Tetsurou! This is Bokuto Koutarou from yesterday.”
Bokuto then invited him to come play at his house for the day, since had would have to use crutches for at least four weeks. The shorter boy was extremely annoyed at that fact, since he normally enjoyed moving around a lot. Kuroo and he ended up talking the whole afternoon, exchanginf good book recommendations and drawing terribly ugly portraits of the other’s face. At such a young age, they didn’t need a lot to develop a meaningful friendship.
Several months passed and the two of them grew closer through time. They became best friends, confidants and partners in crime. They were always staying at each other’s houses; so much that Kuroo’s parents nicknamed Bokuto their ‘second son’. They kept losing sleep over conversations that they wouldn’t even remember the day after. They never seemed to be bored of what the other was saying. Being together always was an exciting and surprising journey.
Kuroo’s eleventh birthday arrived sooner than they had thought. Of course, Bokuto had planned everything out with Kenma. The two boys had slowly become buddies, by dint of always running into each other at their common friend’s house. For weeks, they had been saving up money to buy him a new skateboard, since he had broken the only one he had while trying to impress them with complicated moves he hadn’t mastered. They had finally chosen the one, merely a week before the date of Kuroo’s birthday party. They had both signed their names under it, hoping their friend would have better luck next time he tried to show off his mad skills.
“Happy birthday, Tetsurou!” They shouted as the feted walked into his house, unaware of what had been plotted. Kuroo enthusiastically hugged his friends, playfully ruffling Bokuto’s hair as he threw his arms around his shoulders. He was extremely glad to have friends like them. Not everyone had the chance of having such wonderful people in their lives.
That night, after Kenma had gone home, Kuroo and Bokuto had decided to pull off an all-nighter. Obviously, they had given up in the wee hours of the morning and had started dozing off. They fell asleep in the blink of en eye, side by side, arms and legs tingled together.
When he woke up, the black-haired boy was confused. He could feel his best friend’s warm breath on his neck and his strong arms wrapped around his chest. Flustered, he wondered why he was enjoying it so much. Kuroo often felt odd fluttering inside of his stomach, as if thousand of butterflies where trying to escape from his insides. Strangely, it was a nice feeling, but he only experienced it when Bokuto was around him. He had sought it in the most casual moments; in the faint brush of their fingertips, in the uncontrollable laughter of his companion, in the way he always hugged him after a good volleyball match.
Of course, he had heard some girls from school chatter about an unusual emotion overwhelming them when they were around their crush, but Kuroo was a boy. He was supposed to feel this way for girls, not for his best friend. He remembered his grandma asking him if he had gotten himself a cute girlfriend during the summer. His answer was also no; he had never understood why other guys his age felt intimidated when girls came talk to them.
He felt Bokuto’s body move and, suddenly, he wasn’t being hugged from anymore.
“Sorry, Tetsu! I always clutch to the thing closest to me when I’m asleep…” Bokuto stuttered, a pink blush rising to his cheeks.
“It’s okay, I’m always cold during the night, anyway,” Kuroo responded, hoping his friend would do it again next time he stayed at his house. He longed for that strange feeling in his heart.
When Bokuto’s parents came to pick him up, later day that, Kuroo still felt like he was missing out on something. Lost in his thoughts, he bumped into his mom, who immediately noticed that something was wrong. She was an extremely observant person and her kid’s happiness was the thing that she took to heart the most.
“Is everything okay, honey?” She asked, placing a reassuring hand on his shoulder.
Her son hesitated a moment, but he decided that she probably was the best person to talk to about this sort of thing, after all. “Mom, how do you know that you love Dad?”
She smiled indulgently. “Love isn’t a simple thing, but I’ll try to explain it. At first, I didn’t especially like your father. It took time before my feelings started to grow. My heart beat faster and my stomach felt like it had been turned upside down every time he smiled at me. However, the thing that really made me realise that I loved him was when I imagined myself in twenty years and saw him there, by my side.”
Kuroo opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He didn’t know what to say. For him, the future had always been a thing he had taken for granted. He visualised himself playing in a strong volleyball team, surrounded by his family and…Bokuto. His days were so incredible when he was with him; it was only natural to want him to be there for the rest of his life. If everything was amazing with him as a best friend, would it change things for them to love each other in a different way? He didn’t think so. Life would still be great and they would still laugh as much, but they would always be together, and Kuroo thought that this was an awesome idea.
“Does that mean I need to marry Bokuto?” He whispered, forgetting his mother’s presence.
“Only if you want to, sweetie,” she answered, hugging him lightly before she heading back to the kitchen.
That night, Kuroo went to bed trying to bear in mind all the things he had learned about marriage. Since he didn’t remember anything, he guessed he would have to create his own ceremony. It would certainly be better than stealing ideas from others.
A week later, Kuroo had called Bokuto and told him that they absolutely needed to meet in front of the forest in front of his house. The shorter boy had tried to interrogate him, but it hadn’t worked.
“So, what’s our next adventure going to be, Tetsu?” Bokuto asked with an excited smile on his face.
“This is going to sound strange, but let me finish. I thought that, since we are such good friends, we should marry each other! I mean, it would be so fun to be with you forever to explore the world, laugh until we cry and talk about everything we want to. We’re the best friends ever, but if we were married, we would have an undeniable connection!” Kuroo exclaimed proudly, smiling widely. He apprehensively looked at Bokuto, waiting for his reaction.
There was a brief silence before the brown-haired boy talked. “This is the best idea you’ve ever had! I saw somewhere that you need to pick the most beautiful flower and give it to the one you plan to marry. Then, you need to kiss them. I’m not sure it this was a scene from a marriage or simply a dream I had, but that’ll do,” Bokuto declared. Kuroo hugged him, happy that he felt the same way. They were probably too young to understand what love was, but they still wanted to be with each other forever.
It’s not every eleven years old boy who can say that they married their best friend in the dark woods in front of their house. However, it’s also not every day that two souls fit together as perfectly as Bokuto and Kuroo’s.