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Kei has grown up angry. He just has. People are shitty and annoying, and he wakes up feeling done with the world most days. He's been this way since he was a teenager, and it only got worse when his words showed up. "A pretty face and a filthy mouth, what a lethal combination." A pretty face, his ass. He's got an average face at best, always has, as anyone who's ever seen his words has pointed out to him. So he figures that the first words his soulmate says have nothing to do with him. Which is- it's fine. Who even cares about soulmates anyway? He's gotten this far through life without them, why would he need them now anyway?
Also, college is kicking his ass, so, he definitely doesn't have time for any of that shit. The college Library has absolutely failed him. Every copy of the reference book he needs for this paper are all checked out and wait-listed. He normally does his homework in advance so that shit like this doesn't happen, but again, see the above ass-kicking this semester is handing to him.
It means that he has to trudge a few neighbourhoods over to find a tiny, dismal, local library, and hope to hell that they have what he needs. He's been in the library for about 3 minutes and he hates everything about it. It's dark, dusty, and the bookshelves are completely overloaded. There's stacks of books as tall as him spilling into every narrow walkway. He feels like if he breathes in the wrong direction everything will come tumbling down.
When he asked at the counter about the reference book he was met with a judgemental stare and a gnarled finger pointing to a bleak looking corner. He'd asked again if they could look up if they had it in, and he'd been told that kids needed to learn to use their eyes instead of their technology. To make matter worse, once he finds the reference book section, nothing is in alphabetical order by either title or author on the shelves, much less the stacks of books on the floor. It's going to take him fucking ages to figure out if they even have this damn book or not.
He's two seconds from calling it quits and going to go buy the damn book, his finances be damned, when he hears a voice from the next aisle over.
"Thank you, Mina-san!" A deep voice calls.
"You're a good boy, Tetsurou. Take your time!" The gnarled bag at the counter calls back.
Kei sighs. He doesn't have time for this. He stands up from his crouch where he's been trying to scan the books. Right as he's standing, a person steps into his aisle with far too much speed. Kei steps back, knocking lightly against the bookcase behind him, eyes on the others body as he twists slightly to fly past Kei. When Kei thinks he's in the clear, he glances all the way up, surprised that the other man is nearly the same height as him, and then startled again by the look on his face.
The other man has dark hair, messed up and falling over his face, a total bedhead. His eyes are completely focused on Kei's, and they widen when their gazes meet. He opens his mouth, but then he must catch his foot on one of the piles of books. He trips, falls, smacking into the bookshelf, which wobbles hard, starts to tip.
Kei instinctively reaches out to steady the shelf, having missed his chance to help the other boy, who's now on the ground, eyes somehow still on Kei.
Kei's grip does nothing to stop the shelf from tipping, dumping half it's books out onto the floor and on top of the other man who puts his hands up to block the books, and then quickly moves to help Kei steady the shelf before it can totally fall.
"Hey!" The angry librarian yells, storming over. "What did you do!?" Her gaze is only focused on Kei, of course, before she focuses on the other man, who's slowly taking his hands off the shelf. "Are you okay?" She whips back to Kei, "You could start by apologizing!"
What the fuck? Kei is absolutely not dealing with her. He turns his back on her, looks at the man who's half sprawled on the floor, wide eyes still on Kei.
Kei is seething. "How the fuck is it my fault that some asshat knocked everything down?" The librarian gasps.
The boy on the floor's jaw drops for a second and then he's suddenly grinning, sharp and wide. "A pretty face and a filthy mouth, what a lethal combination." He drawls.
Shock goes up Kei's spine at the words. Words he's known his whole damn life. His soulmarks. He schools his surprise and scowls instead.
Bedhead finally pulls himself off the ground, grabbing Kei's wrist, tight like he could see the flight instinct on Kei's face. He looks around Kei.
"Mina-san. We're very sorry, we'll pick up the books, okay?"
Kei fixes his gaze somewhere over the others shoulder and refuses to turn around or listen to the librarian's pandering. She leaves after a moment and another reassurance from the other boy.
"So, Glasses-chan. Can I let you go, or are you going to run away?"
Kei's eye twitches. "Don't call me that."
"Then you better tell me your name, gorgeous." Oh great, Kei's soulmate is a flirty asshole.
"Forget it." Kei snaps, trying to twist his wrist away. "Let me go."
"Not a chance of that. We need to clean all this up."
"We should leave it, it's not like that old bag will notice in the rest of this dumpster fire."
The other boy snickers, "At least it won't take long to slap the books back on the shelves, it's not as though there's a filing system."
Kei narrows his eyes at him. His grin is almost blinding. "Fine."
Bedhead finally lets go of him and they both move around silently. Kei picks the books off the floor and hands them to Bedhead, who shoves them on the shelf while only caring that the spines are out and are upside right.
"Oh." Kei says, staring at the book he just found.
"What?"
"This is the book I was looking for."
"Lucky. Put it somewhere safe so you don't lose it again."
Kei sighs but takes the advice. It's true enough.
All in all, it doesn't take them long before the aisle is back in some semblance of order.
"We should have put these back alphabetically, just to fuck with anyone who comes in and knows that this place doesn't work like that." Bedhead says, standing back and looking at their shoddy work.
"Shitty prank. Too much effort, no reward."
The other laughs, it's more of a cackle really, a truly ugly sound, that causes Kei to have to choke back on his own laugh at just how ridiculous a sound that is.
"Here." The other says, holding out his hand. Kei scowls at him on principle. He cocks a crooked grin. "Your book. I'll put it on my library card. You don't have one for here, or really want one, right?"
Begrudgingly, yeah, that's all accurate.
"You'll be on the hook if I don't return it then."
"Are you planning to not return it?" He asks, seeming genuinely curious but obviously not worried at all.
"... No."
"Then it's all fine. You'll just have to give me your name and number so you can get it back to me."
That was... Admittedly, smooth as fuck. Not that Kei has to admit that.
"Fine." He hands the book over. The other is cocky and sure, but also has this absolutely delighted look on his face, like he can't help but show his true emotions. He's charming in that asshole-type way that really works for Kei. Shit.
"Mina-san! We cleaned up the shelves for you, and I even found the book I was looking for!" He flounces over to the counter and Kei drags himself along behind. The other boy makes small talk with the librarian who still manages to take a break from talking to Kei's soulmate to glare daggers at Kei. This sucks, his skin itches with the need to get out of here.
At the same time, he watches his soulmate with an endless sort of curiosity. Now that the shock of the whole thing has worn off, he's realizing that there's a lot he wants to know about the other boy, starting with his name. Bedhead wraps up his conversation and gestures with a nod for Kei to follow him out into the warm afternoon. They walk wordlessly down the street, Kei helpless but to follow the other wherever he happens to be leading them right now.
Finally, they reach a fork in the road, where there's a small green space nestled between the different roadways, not quite a park, but a quiet corner. Bedhead turns and looks at him. He doesn’t say anything, but his gaze is heavy, considering, and Kei can only tolerate it for a minute before he feels like he'll break out in hives.
"What?" He snaps, finally, causing the other man to start to grin instead. Kei tsks and looks away. "What's your name anyway?" Kei asks, letting loose the painful curiosity within him.
"I don’t think so."
"Hah?"
The others smirk is wicked, his body loose and relaxed, but eyes so, so sharp. "You've made me work hard to get your name. You really think I'll just give you mine as soon as you ask? Like it's easy? After you've been such a pain? I don't think so."
"I can walk away any time, you know." Kei threatens, but he can't and he's pretty sure they both know it.
Bedhead waggles the reference book in between them. "But you need this for Professor Stien's class, right?"
That weirds Kei right out. "How do you know that?"
"I took that class, as did most freshmen at some point. It's not like the curriculum has changed that much in two years."
"You study at the university?"
"You trying to get to know me?" His tone is teasing, grin bordering on delighted.
Kei looks away, this guy is so difficult. What an asshole. "Not really."
The other boy throws back his head in an ugly laugh. "You're so cold! Brutal to your soulmate."
"Well, maybe if my soulmate wasn't an asshole, I wouldn't need to be."
He grins, "Pretty sure you would be anyway." Kei narrows his eyes, trying to think of anything to refute that, but it's true enough. But then the other sticks a hand out between them, easy as anything. "Kuroo Tetsurou."
Kei glances from him to his hand, feeling that that was too easy, but reaches out to take it anyway. His hand is large, warm in Kei's, where Kei's hands are always cold. It feels surprisingly nice. "Tsukishima Kei."
"See? Not so hard, is it?" Kuroo's smarmy expression is annoying... and sadly, still nice to look at. He's unfortunately really good looking.
"Guess not."
"See, pretty soon you'll be giving me your number, and then agreeing to get dinner with me."
Kei grimaces, "I'd maybe be tempted to say yes, just to see if you'll crash the first date as bad as you did our first meeting-"
"It wasn't that bad!" Kuroo immediately protests.
"You nearly took out half a library and both of us with it."
"It wasn't that bad!" He's pouting now, and Kei feels himself grin, feeling like he won that one.
Kei gets back to the point at hand. "Anyway, I'd think about agreeing- If I didn't really need to finish that damn essay."
Kuroo laughs, "I know, mid-semester essays suck. Give me your phone." Kei hands it over easily, watching as the other makes quick work of inputting his info and calling himself with it before handing it back. "Give me a call when this you're through with the essay and when you want to return the book."
"I expected you to be really annoyingly persistent, somehow."
Kuroo cackles, shrugs, "Well, I understand having a course load that’s overwhelming. And it's not like you can get rid of me now. We are soulmates after all. We don't need to rush."
That's true isn't it? They don't need to rush, they have forever. They're soulmates. That's... Surreal.
"Plus," The other continues, smirk back on his attractive lips, "I have your number now, so I can spam you with messages any time I want."
"Ugh. I will block you."
"No you won't." He says with an absolute kind of confidence. And he's right. He won't.
He won't now, and he won't in six months when they have their first big fight and Kei storms out of a date. He won't in any of the years following as they learn to navigate what it means to be together as people, not just as soulmates.
Being soulmates doesn't mean that everything will work. They still fight, Kuroo still pushes too far sometimes, and Kei still uses an offense of barbed words as his first defense when things go wrong. They have to learn to communicate, to respect each others sensitivities and boundaries. With time and work, they come together and they learn to love and support each other, the way they were always meant to.