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Fingers plucking the strings delicately.
It’s the first time Tobio has heard such bright, calming music coming from an instrument before. The gentle hands of the music envelop around him, just like the hug of his grandfather, the one who is playing so elegantly, with eyes closed, as if he is one with the music. The sound fills Tobio with warmth, and an urge–his fingers twitch as they follow the rhythm of the music. He smiles as he watches his grandfather move the ji, bridges that Tobio likes to call the wings of angels who fly to heaven.
As if he is floating on the clouds, his grandfather plucks one of the strings loudly, with resonance, telling him that everything is alright, that even if their parents are gone, him and his sister Miwa will always be alright.
Amazing, he is playing The Holy River of Isuzu with so much care and technique, he hears the people around him say.
Tobio is very proud of his grandfather and his passion for playing the koto. Whenever he is feeling sad or gloomy, his grandfather is always there to hold his hand, guiding him to a room in their home and sitting him down on one of the old, wobbly chairs. There, he watches his grandfather get into a trance, as if possessed by the koto itself, and as he starts plucking with his tsume, Tobio sees his grandfather sway like bamboo trees. A serene tune starts to embrace the whole room, and every bad feeling somehow goes away. All Tobio can hear are the koto strings and all he can see is the moonlight reflected on a lake, a light that washes away the darkness.
In return for all the love and care his grandfather gave him, Tobio picks up the koto. Without knowing anything about this warm instrument, he plucks a string using his soft fingers, and with a smile, though the music sounds off and there is no rhythm that resonates, a fire lights up inside his chest.
He has never let go of the koto ever since.
***
You are too fast.
Why don’t you ever match up to anyone?
The King of the Koto.
Tobio plucks the strings with his tsume, his fingers aggressively creating a dissonant sound, and he is still alone. It’s been years since his grandfather has stopped playing the koto, the heavens claiming him before he can ever play his very last summer performance. A cruel fate, as many people say, but Tobio doesn’t agree with them. Somewhere, deep down, he can still hear his grandfather’s fingers, his strings, the sound that has made Tobio feel like he was never alone.
But as he is playing right now, alone, he hears nothing but his own fingers ravaging the koto strings, and his tears falling on the strings, glinting at the moonlight outside his bedroom. It’s late at night, and on his bed lies the rejection letter from Shiratorizawa Academy. The tune harshly echoes across the room–it’s nothing like the embrace he used to hear from his grandfather’s strings. As his fingers glide, the light collapses, and the room around him shrinks. The sounds of his koto strangles him, his chest tightening and his breaths harmonizing to the music, and as he finishes the last part, he slumps on his chair and stares at the ceiling blankly.
The koto has left him.
***
It’s not a hug like his grandfather. But it feels like summer rain on a winter’s evening. The sound that reverberates from the koto strings of Hinata Shoyou, the one who declared himself Tobio’s rival. His fingers produce a refreshing sound that lights a fire inside Tobio’s chest, and though he doesn’t want to admit it, Hinata has potential. His technique is sometimes way off, and he tends to lose himself too much in the music, lacking the elegant touch and care that his grandfather has always committed to. But his music is warm, not like Tobio’s koto strings.
When it’s his turn to perform for the club audition, Tobio chooses the first song his grandfather has ever played to him, The River of Isuzu.
Unlike the warmth and serenity that captivated the audience when he saw his grandfather play for the very first time, Tobio’s fingers glide carelessly, as if following his shadow. He grits his teeth as he plucks the strings, and the technique is perfect, his hands following the rhythm well. But the message, the sound of the koto strings mangled by his fingers, Tobio hates it to no end. This is the right answer. Nothing he is doing is wrong. But the sound is still off and Tobio doesn’t know how to fix it.
“I don’t want to admit it, but you are really amazing,” grumbles Hinata after Tobio finishes the piece. “’I’m going to defeat you and be the core of this team!”
Tobio scowls at him. “I won’t let you beat me. You suck at playing the koto anyway.”
A clap distracts Tobio as he is about to chew Hinata out. He turns around and sees a golden-eyed boy wearing glasses, with his mouth curved upwards, and something tells Tobio that this person is bad news. “As expected of the King,” he starts, looking at Tobio with disdain as his mouth curves into a fake smile. “You really play better than us peasants.”
“King? What’s up with that nickname, Kageyama?” prods Hinata, curious eyes staring at him, making Tobio feel like he is suffocating. “And who the hell are you? Why are you bothering Kageyama?” he adds with a glare.
Tobio stays silent, his koto strings haunting his ears as he closes his fists tightly.
“I’m Tsukishima Kei. Nice to meet you,” replies the boy without a hint of emotion. Then he turns towards Tobio with a mocking smirk. “Heh, I saw your performance last year. I have never seen such a bad koto performance before. Your group members were all harmonizing beautifully and yet you had to ruin their rhythm on the stage.”
“Huh, what does that even mean?!” yells Hinata.
Tobio can’t help but grab Tsukishima’s collar, desiring to wipe that smirk off his face.
“Can’t say anything, can you?” adds Tsukishima. “Because all you’ve ever done is play alone.”
That night, Tobio unleashes on his koto strings the words he couldn’t say. His screams of indignation, his cry for help, and his hatred for Tsukishima’s truth, that he plays alone and always does. Ever since his grandfather stopped playing forever, Tobio can’t find that kind of music anywhere anymore. A room cascades on his periphery, and it’s dark and cold, and nothing like the summer warmth that his grandfather’s koto strings exude. It’s small and cramped, just like him and his koto strings. He plays until his fingers get callused, until his heartbeats are the only sounds that he can hear.
It's strange how he can play so perfectly yet produce sounds that are imperfect.
Tobio hates how his koto strings sound. He doesn’t know if he’ll ever like them again.
(He still can’t ever let them go, no matter how harsh the sounds are.)
***
The koto has thirteen strings, and all of Hinata’s strings sound like a meadow filled with greeneries and laughter. They blend well with the dark, empty well of Tobio’s strings, and he finds that matching Hinata’s bright, colorful sounds with his technically perfect, almost robotic like sounds, add more depth to their duet. It seems like a masterpiece, although only Tobio can tell that his strings still haven’t returned to him. Though lacking technique, Hinata’s sound fills people with emotions while Tobio’s sound, when alone, fills people with despair.
“It sounds really good,” says Yachi, clapping for Tobio and Hinata excitedly as if they are the core of Karasuno’s koto team.
Yamaguchi nods. "I like it a lot. How abou you, Tsukki?"
Tsukishima just clicks his tongue but stays silent.
Daichi pats them both on the back. “We can work with this. I’m proud of our team’s progress. We can seriously aim for Nationals now.”
But while Tobio’s koto strings somehow get masked by Hinata’s sound, harmonizing with Tsukishima’s koto strings just make his strings sound even worse. Tsukishima’s sound fills Tobio with anxiety, like a looming grim reaper over his head, heart-wrenchingly waiting for its prey to leave the house and meet its end. It’s dangerous, to match Tsukishima’s strings, because it makes Tobio’s strings sound even more in despair, the sound that he hates the most.
“Make your tone brighter!” yells Tobio frustratedly.
Tsukishima scoffs. “So my peasant ways are not good enough for Your Majesty after all.”
“Ugh, can’t you hear how bad our strings sound together?”
“Why is that my problem?” Tsukishima stands up and glares at Tobio, leaving him alone once again. It aches in his chest, just like the bruises and calluses on his hands. “You’re the one playing aggressively fast. We’re not matching our rhythms at all.”
“If Hinata can – ”
“You know what, I give up,” replies Tsukishima, taking his koto carefully and placing it back to his bag. “You can go have a duet with Hinata for all I care. After all, he’s better than a peasant like me anyway.”
Tobio does not mean it like that. He knows Tsukishima is a great koto player. He knows that their koto strings sound too similar to harmonize, and he knows that their tones are both dark and empty, that Hinata is different from Tsukishima. He believes in Tsukishima’s strings. But he doesn’t know how to say that properly. He has been playing alone for too long to know what it means to match his strings with someone else, much less someone whose strings make Tobio sound more of what he hated.
“I don’t want to give up,” he declares challengingly before Tsukishima can step out of their club room.
Tsukishima looks at him and scoffs. “I don’t believe you.”
My strings are telling a story, he remembers his grandfather say. Tobio’s strings are telling nothing at all. Though he wants to say that he believes in Tsukishima, his strings have no way of reaching the other. It’s too empty and filled with nothing but void. The room around him is cruel, and so are Tobio’s strings. No one is hearing what he wants to say. And this sound, this never-ending journey in a dark desert, holds none of the words that Tobio has always longed to tell people.
I wish they could just hear me once, he wishes.
Yet his koto strings do not hear his plea.
***
“What do your strings want to say?” he asks Tsukishima once he has finally calmed down after another argument with him.
Tsukishima stares at him suspiciously. “Why are you asking that?”
“I don’t know,” he grumbles. ‘Didn’t you say you want me to match your strings?”
Tsukishima looks at his face strangely. “Is the King having a fever now? Are you – ”
Tobio groans. “Can’t you just take me seriously for once? I want to try matching with you.”
Tsukishima sighs and plucks the strings of his koto gently. The sound cascades into something Tobio can’t put his finger on.
“I play the koto much more slowly. I take my time in plucking the strings and breathing life to music. Whenever you play, I feel like my death is looming even nearer. It just sounds awful, King,” says Tsukishima, honestly, and Tobio feels a little bit of gratitude that Tsukishima has started to take him a bit more seriously now, although he doesn’t appreciate the use of the nickname.
“I see,” replies Tobio. “Can I see you play the koto by yourself?”
Tsukishima stays silent, looking like he wants to get out of here. But then he sighs, his tense posture loosening a little, and then he positions his fingers on his koto, and starts.
This is the first time that Tobio has properly heard Tsukishima play. While he has already felt like there’s a grim reaper around whenever Tsukishima plays his koto, he is surprised to discover that there’s a hidden element that he has failed to hear before. As Tsukishima gently plucks the strings, the sound never resonating loudly like Hinata’s or Nishinoya’s, he can feel someone, him, walking on a path that leads to something unknown, or to the grim reaper as Tobio has deduced. It makes him feel unsettled, like he is caged to the floor, his body numb and unmoving. Hearing Tsukishima’s music fills him with dread, and as he observes Tsukishima even more, he can see the same dread on his face.
Music makes him trapped, he realizes, and suddenly, he realizes why Tsukishima’s strings never mesh well with his.
Their strings make their sounds reverberate more emotions, accentuating each other’s dark tones, and it causes the negative feelings to implode, making them both feel worse. There’s no chemistry with their strings because the chemistry leads to both their deaths. Hearing Tsukishima’s strings make Tobio tremble, and he has to struggle staying on the spot despite the impending tears threatening to fall down.
Once Tsukishima finishes, both of them stay silent, looking at each other.
Tsukishima’s eyes are golden, but they look dark, and empty, like a shell waiting to be thrown away. He’s sure his eyes reflect the opposite, a look of confidence that masks the loneliness that could end up consuming him anytime. Tobio has many words he wants to say right now, but he can’t find the right one to express how much Tsukishima’s music affected him. Unlike Hinata’s strings that bring him a warmth that is similar to his grandfather’s, Tsukishima makes him feel even more alone when he plays.
But he needs their strings to work together. They have to make it work before the day of the joint practice session with Nekoma arrives.
Tobio doesn’t want to give up. Even if every string that Tsukishima plays hurts.
***
Tobio asks Tsukishima to watch him play. He has words he wants to say to Karasuno, to the whole team, but he doesn’t think they’ll understand him. So, he starts with Tsukishima.
Reluctantly agreeing, Tsukishima sits in front of him, removing his headphones as he watches Tobio sit down in front of his koto. It’s strange to see the two of them meeting outside practice, muses Tobio, but this will have to do. Ignoring his discomfort under Tsukishima’s scrutiny, he places the tsume on his fingers. He counts a few times, his fingers pressing slightly on the string, and then he starts to pluck.
The koto strings wrap around his neck, choking him, and it helps because he really doesn’t want to burst into tears right now. He doesn’t know why this sudden burst of courage prompted him to show Tsukishima his strings, the ones he hated the most. But right now, there are words that he wished someone could hear, anyone. As he looks down at his koto strings while he moves the multiple ji around, he grits his teeth, the sound chaining his fingers to the strings like thorns. His fingers bleed with the void, and Tobio realizes at that moment that he has underestimated how lonely he actually felt.
There are strings that grasp at Tobio’s chest, making it harder for him to breathe. Some strings tie his hands up, rendering him immovable and isolated. As he plucks each one of them, he hears their messages, that they also hate him. It hurts, the feeling that the koto has already let him go before he could ever do such a thing.
Tobio is searching for his koto strings but he doesn’t know where to find them.
As he presses on the string aggressively, he moves his fingers swiftly, and glides it on the last note. Once it ends, the last note doesn’t stop ringing on Tobio’s ears. The sound hasn’t changed one bit–it makes Tobio’s skin crawl.
Tobio looks up and sees Tsukishima make another strange expression on his face again, with a slight frown on his mouth.
“What do you think?” he asks cautiously.
Tsukishima glides his finger on Tobio’s koto strings. “Is that an original song?”
Tobio nods. “I made it.”
“Do you want to play that in the joint practice session instead?”
Surprise fills Tobio’s face. “Why do you ask that?”
Tsukishima shrugs and looks away. “It sounds better than our initial piece at least. What’s the title?”
Tobio sighs. “His Summer,” he says, looking down at his koto, cheeks pink.
“Who did you write it for?”
Tobio looks up and his eyes flit towards the picture frame that is nestled on his bedside table. Studying him, Tsukishima looks at the same direction, and a look of understanding begins to form on his face. He doesn’t press on, letting the silence linger as Tobio’s eyes never leave the frame.
‘We’ll play the piece,” affirms Tobio after a moment. “If you’re willing to play it.”
“I can play it.” Tsukishima coughs a little. “It sounds similar to my tone anyway.”
(It takes them exactly thirteen rounds of arguing and thirteen hours of practice to learn that piece, just like the strings of their koto that are covered in sweat.)
***
The koto strings want to sing like summer in the piece that they chose to play. But Tobio’s strings are nothing like the vast meadow of summer, and Tsukishima’s strings glow in the pits of the darkness. Summer is bright and colorful and happy–it’s the joyful laughter of the koto strings that reflect the heart of his grandfather. But Tobio’s summer is cramped and dreary, a prison amidst the vast desert night, and he is walking in chains. It’s harsh and tedious, just like the sounds of his koto. And Tsukishima’s summer, it’s a whirlwind that suddenly appears in midday, destroying every house, and a walking figure that has resigned to its fate, with the grim reaper holding a scythe, ready to strike it.
Summer brings light and a warm hug.
But as their koto strings mix, Tobio looks at Tsukishima, their fingers gliding on the strings on opposite ways, his is careless masking as careful while the other is too careful, and he finds that his summer, their summer, is walking towards the darkness–but with each other, this time, the strings blending like a march of death, with two people walking, but not alone.
Tobio is in the darkness, with his koto strings crying out in despair, but he is not alone anymore.
As they finish their duet, with huffing breaths, Tobio’s eyes meet golden irises and a warmth starts embracing his chest.
(He is not alone with his koto anymore.)