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For people like Hinata Shouyou, it was a pain to keep his wrists hidden 24/7. It wasn’t as though he was embarrassed about the names scrawled underneath the sweatbands he wore at all times, more like he just felt as though he didn’t need to let everyone know, unlike some people who loved to show off the names littered on their skin. Hinata had two names, one in green, signifying the person he’d have a lifelong friendship with, the human he could ultimately trust with anything, not as strong as a platonic soulmate that usually manifested in black, nor the red mark that Hinata was expected to receive in the next year at most, but still someone he knew would never betray him. The name scrawled in neat girly handwriting underneath the green was in black, Hinata’s platonic soulmate.
Neither were exactly the people you’d expect, but in regards to the green name, upon meeting, Hinata and his green soulmate had become close friends, even without anyone really knowing. Hinata was pretty grateful to have the italic handwriting of Kunimi Akira on his wrist in green, and the Aoba Johsai player was equally satisfied, not that he’d admit that. Hinata and Kunimi had become frequent texting buddies after meeting, and the quiet, lazy teen found Hinata to be one of the few people he could tolerate, other than his own Platonic Soulmate, Kindaichi Yutarou. Around Kunimi’s wrist was both Hinata and Kindaichi’s name, and yet, the teen knew no other name would ever appear, due to the thin purple line that wrapped around his entire wrist, like a bracelet.
An irregular .
Irregular’s weren’t that rare, but they were still usually looked down on. Basically anyone who didn’t have a romantic soulmate gained a purple line around their wrist, and while they could still have green and black soulmates, no red ink would ever appear on them. Hinata knew of two people with such a mark, Kunimi being one.
There was other instances similar, where people didn’t gain a green or a black name, but instead of gaining an almost wristband-like mark, they simply gained a star in the colour of which soulmate they would never receive. Kageyama had a little black star on his wrist, that he loathed.
Hinata was rather lucky, he had no purple lines, and both his platonic and trust soulmates had appeared on his lithe wrists back in middle school, when the small teenageer had no idea of either name. Still he figured it was probably some mad stroke of luck that he found both of them in the practise match Karasuno had with Aoba Johsai in his first few months in high school.
Oikawa Tooru was printed in a neat black font, under Kunimi’s name, on Hinata Shouyou’s wrist.
No one knew until they had met.
“What did you say your name was again?” Oikawa had asked, interest piqued after Sugawara had called Hinata’s name.
“I’m Hinata Shouyou!” Hinata had beamed proudly, and Oikawa flashed a knowing grin, one of the few rare smiles to litter the third year students face.
“I’m Oikawa Tooru.”
“Oh.” Hinata mumbled, letting the information sink in before giving a small smile of his own.
“Oh Ho! If it isn’t Tobio-chan~!” Oikawa added, taunting the setter who gave a click of his tongue in annoyance, and a scowl to the opposing setter.
“Oh still so mean! Look how mean he is to me Iwa-chan~!” Oikawa taunted and pointed a finger, feigning hurt. Iwaizumi simply rolled his eyes and covered his wrist with a hand, the same neat font on his arm, as was on Hinata’s, except in a bright obvious shade of red, above two more names, in green and black.
Oh.
“Anyway! It’s nice to finally put a face to the name, Chibi-chan!” Oikawa grinned, holding up a wrist, where Hinata Shouyou was scrawled in black, in Hinata’s messy handwriting, sandwiched between Kentaro Kyoutani in green and Iwaizumi Hajime in red.
“Though your handwriting is simply dreadful !” Oikawa added, and Hinata turned red in embarrassment before raising his hands.
“I-It’s not! You want to fight?!” Hinata asked, knees shaking slightly in betrayal.
“Him?” Kageyama shouted in anger and eyes swiveled to the dark haired teen who seemed absolutely livid at the scene which had just transpired.
“Oweh is Tobio-chan jealous~?” Oikawa asked, and Kageyama muttered something angrily under his breath in response, stomping out of the gym. Oikawa simply gave another cheerful laugh. The two had exchanged numbers after that, but Hinata was hesitant around the tall brunette, who just seemed to have something about him that reeked of fakeness and danger.
About ten minutes down the line, Kunimi had overheard Oikawa’s eccentric actions and speech, directed at the small ginger on the Karasuno team, and had questioned who exactly he was.
“Oh that’s Oikawa’s platonic soulmate. I think his name's Hinata Shouyou?” Kindaichi replied, Kunimi’s name inked in black on his wrist.
“Oh? Really?” Kunimi asked, holding out his own arm, the green chicken scrawl writing spelling Hinata Shouyou.
“Lucky you.” Kindaichi muttered, looking down at the green star on his own wrist, beside Kunimi’s name.
“I guess?” Kunimi replied, hesitant as to what kind of person Hinata must be, to be able to befriend him of all people.
“Excuse me.” Kunimi had cornered the small ginger after their match, and the smaller middle blocker tensed in surprise, before turning to face Kunimi.
“Wh-what?” Hinata asked, hesitantly, eyes darting around to see he’d been cornered away from anyone, trapped with only the taller teen, whose face seemed a little scary.
“You’re Hinata Shouyou?” Kunimi asked, monotone voice making Hinata flinch slightly.
“Y-Yeah- but why-”
Kunimi wasn’t exactly the best with words, so he simply tugged up his sleeve and presented Hinata with his wrist, causing the smaller to gape. Finding two people in one day must have been a shock to him, or at least that’s what Kunimi liked to think was the cause of Hinata biting his bottom lip and tugging him into an awkward hug, knocking his wristband up his arm.
In reality, Hinata was just a tad overwhelmed by emotions and he’d always had a little more sympathy than others for people with irregularities, maybe it was pity, something no one with an irregularity wanted, but either way, Kunimi awkwardly wrapped an arm around Hinata in return, and the ginger gave a small smile.
“It’s nice to meet you finally, Kunimi!” Hinata gave a smile, tears in his eyes. Hell it was probably because Oikawa was so odd that Hinata hadn’t been able to do the same with him...plus he was at least 30% sure Iwaizumi would have killed him for an action like that.
Kunimi gave a small choked laugh.
“Likewise, Hinata.”
“Shouyou! You can call me Shouyou if you’d like!” Hinata replied, faint blush apparent on his ears and Kunimi nodded.
“Thank you.” Kunimi replied, taking a second to take in the marks on Hinata’s wrist, the girly writing of Oikawa, and his own name in a stark green. That was it though.
Hinata must have noticed and caught on, because he quickly dragged his wristband back down to cover them up, the action slightly hurt Kunimi but he didn’t show it.
“I don’t have a red one yet...I mean I figure it’ll be red..but then will it? I mean erm- like I don’t know...My parents both had purple marks, and my little sister has a black star so I mean I figure I’ve got to have some bad luck too? I’m rambling...sorry…” Hinata muttered and blushed, Kunimi shook his head.
“Not at all, from what I can tell lots of people would be lucky to have your name.”
Hinata froze, before a few more tears threatened to spill from his eyes, before nodding in gratitude.
“Thank you!”
The two exchanged numbers and spoke for a good while, before Issei Matsukawa found them and dragged the Aoba Johsai decoy away, and Hinata returned to the Karasuno team, Kageyama still fuming for the rest of the day.
From then, Hinata had made extra sure that Kageyama never saw Oikawa Tooru on his wrist. In fear of angering the boy, and as such, Kunimi Akira’s name never saw the light of day.
The second person Hinata knew to have a thin purple stripe around their wrist was Tsukishima Kei, who made no attempt to hide the mark signifying his lack of romantic soulmate. In doing so, he displayed his other names in plain sight, Kuroo Tetsuro wrote in bright green, much to the blonde’s annoyance, who had a rather...banter-y….friendship with the Nekoma captain, and above which, Yamaguchi Tadashi was wrote in black, though that was no surprise to anyone, since the two were practically always side by side. Equally, on the wrist of Yamaguchi Tadashi was a small green star, and Tsukishima’s name. Oddly enough though, neither of the twos’ black ink had manifested until after they joined Karasuno, years upon years after the two had become friends, so nothing really changed when the names appeared.
It irked Tsukishima to no end, that someone else would have Yamaguchi’s name printed on their wrist in red, and not him, but there wasn’t really anything he could do, and that irked him even more.
The rest of the team were composed of slight irregularities too, well more or less anyway, Daichi had a little green star, like Yamaguchi and Yachi, while Kageyama had the same but inked in black. Funnily enough, the only two members of the team that had three names on their wrists were Nishinoya and Asahi, their names upon each other's wrists in a stark red.
While Noya had an interesting couple of names below it, Asahi’s names didn’t drift from the Karasuno team, having Tanaka’s name donned in green, and Suga’s in black. Noya on the other hand, might as well have joined the Ryunosuke family at birth, having the two siblings names on him, Saeko in a calm mint green, and Tanaka’s in swirly black writing. The two practically included him as one of their family.
There was only two other players on the team inked in red, and funnily enough with one another's names. Sugawara and Daichi.
The two had met in their first year at Karasuno and instantly become a trio of friends with Asahi, though the two had a much closer bond to one another, and by the end of their second year, both were inked with each others names, only furthering the bond they had already established. The team knew, Daichi being the only one Suga could order about, and Suga being the only one Daichi couldn’t intimidate, the two were a strong pair and an even stronger Volleyball duo.
“Did you notice that decoy at Aoba Johsai had a purple mark?” Tanaka asked, on the coach back to Karasuno, and Noya nodded enthusiastically, in response, unintentionally causing Tsukishima to mute his music and listen in, with feigning still having it turned on, through his headphones.
“Yeah I saw! I saw! But he had the other two didn’t he?” Noya replied and Tanaka shrugged.
“I didn’t really pay attention, I never got a proper look anyway, I reckon one was the turnip guy anyway, he was like the only person he spoke to.” Tanaka replied and Noya nodded again.
“Yeah!”
Hinata shifted uncomfortably in his seat.
“Didn’t he seem really...bland though? Like a bit boring? And quiet?”
“Might be a trend for people without red ink…”
Eyes turned to Tsukishima who glared back, until heads looked back away. Hinata clenched his teeth in anger, already brimming with loyalty to his new friend.
“Who knows, still I’m glad I have you~!” Tanaka and Noya pulled each other into an overly dramatic hug, which caused Tsukishima to scoff and Yamaguchi to give a faint tsk.
“Anyway get you Hinata! Platonics with the super setter~”
Hinata froze and tried to duck down into the seat more, feeling Kageyama’s sudden intense gaze.
“G-guys shut up...Are you trying to get me k-killed?” Hinata stuttered and the duo looked at Kageyama’s sour expression and broke into a fit of laughter.
“No, no...it was just surprising!”
-
It was a while later that Yachi Hitoka appeared in red on the wrist of Yamaguchi Tadashi, Tsukishima swore his heart froze over at that point… and then shattered into a million pieces.
The two fell into a relationship pretty quickly, much to the jealousy of Tanaka whose unrequited love from Kiyoko was..well, unrequited .
-
Still time passed, and red ink never made any indications that it would appear anytime soon on Hinata’s wrist, much to his annoyance, and lack of patience.
-
After the prelims for the spring tournament, word reached Karasuno of Bokuto’s and Aakashi’s names appearing on one another, and days later ink appeared on Tanaka, much to his joy.
-
Still nothing came for Hinata.
“Shou-chan, it’ll come, don’t worry!” Kunimi reassured him one Saturday night, when the two had gone to the cinema together, with Kindaichi, and the four Aoba Johsai third years. Hinata was pretty comfortable around them all now, and while he didn’t interact a lot with Oikawa, despite their marks, the two did seem to compliment each other with their personalities and love for Volleyball. Kunimi was another story, the two had gotten really close, and Kindaichi met with the two often to go places together.
“Thanks Aki...I hope so…” Hinata whined, looking down at the wrists of the rest of the group. The four Aoba Johsai third years all wore red ink, Oikawa and Iwaizumi sharing one another's names, and Hanamaki and Matsukawa doing the same. At least Kindaichi was still waiting too, or else Hinata would have felt even worse.
“Don’t worry Chibiiii~ If no one appears you can join us two- OW- Iwa-chan don’t kick me under the table!” Oikawa pouted and Iwaizumi scrunched up his nose.
“I don’t share .”
“Oho Oho!? Iwa-chan!” Oikawa exclaimed and faintly blushed, causing the third years to all smirk in response, all three of them enjoying toying with Oikawa.
“I’m okay...I’ll pass!” Hinata added and Matsukawa and Hanamaki burst out laughing.
“Ah man you’re getting slain.”
“I know!” Oikawa pouted again, making an insanely cute face that Iwaizumi couldn’t resist.
-
It did eventually appear, the red ink, the night before Karasuno’s match in the finale of the Miyagi prefecture, not that Hinata noticed until the morning.
The name stared back at him, as he’d reached to grab his wrist band that morning, in stark red, against his pale skin, screaming to be noticed.
Hinata’s eyes widened in shock, a few strangled words escaping his lips before rushing to show his mother in happiness. It was no exaggeration to say Hinata’s mother was wholly pleased for her son.
Hinata had probably never rode to school that fast in his life, not out of excitement for their match, but to see them, to see if they had his name on their own wrist yet.
When Hinata reached the gym some of the team had already surprisingly gathered, Daichi, Suga and Asahi stood talking, and Kageyama leant against the wall, eyes closed.
Hinata felt all the words escape his lips when he saw him.
“K-Kageyama.” Hinata spoke, called the same name that was printed in blood red on his wrist.
Kageyama Tobio.
Kageyama opened his eyes, and took a step forward, to stop from leaning on the wall, eyes moving down his wrist, to the wrist band that still remained hiding his marks. Hinata did the same in returned, noticing the last few letters of his name, peaking out from the confined of Kageyama’s pockets, where both his hands were stuffed.
Kageyama met his eyes, questioning silently and Hinata nodded, before the move bounded forward to one another, Hinata forgetting his surroundings and jumping.
Except Hinata forgot to reduce the power, and went flying up, before falling onto Kageyama, knocking the two to the ground, Hinata sat on Kageyama, whose face turned red from both anger and embarrassment.
“Dumbass!” Kageyama snapped, hands cradling his head, Hinata’s name now fully visible.
“Bakayama!” Hinata retorted with a grin, before reaching to wrap his fingers around Kageyama’s inked wrist, fingers lightly tracing his name, before Suga, Daichi and Asahi reached them.
“What were you doing Hinata- God- if you’d have injured yourself before the match!”
Hinata muttered an apology, as he and Kageyama made it to their feet. The trio moved back over to the door of the gym and Hinata gave a small chiming giggle that had Kageyama freeze, before pinning the smaller boy against the wall, Hinata’s hands held above his head, Hinata only laughed again, though a tiny bit shaky, from panic.
Kageyama’s fingers traced down from Hinata’s hands, to his wrist, before edging the accessory further up his arm, revealing the three names now inked on his arm, at the very top Kageyama Tobio in a beautiful font. Kageyama let out a smirk, finally better than Oikawa at something, before moving his head down, to kiss said suspended wrist, causing Hinata to let out a small gasp, before the two realised where they were, and pulled apart.
Both turned a deep shade of red and Hinata let out a splutter.
“Ba-Bakayama- that was-”
“So-sorry.”
There was an awkward silence before Hinata gave a small smile, perching on his tiptoes, to plant a quick kiss on Kageyama’s cheek, tips of his ears as red as Kageyama’s face.
“It wasn’t bad…” Hinata muttered and Kageyama just gave him a light punch to the shoulder, and a nervous chuckle.
Somehow no one actually noticed the red ink littering the two first years wrists… maybe it was the pressure of today’s match? Or the distracted thoughts and the worry and the nerves? Who knew… either way… when Karasuno sent the last ball slamming over the net, winning the fifth set, it was hard not to miss that fact, as Kageyama couldn’t help himself from tugging the short ginger into a hug, raising the small spiker off the ground. Hinata wobbled for a second before catching his balance, and wrapping his arms around Kageyama’s neck, both leaning forward, until their foreheads touched and eyes locked onto one another. Somehow, in the spur of the moment, the joy of winning, the overwhelming emotions of the day, everything that had happened, the two closed the small gap between their lips. It didn’t even matter if the match was being televised, if they were in a gym full of spectators, or their team, or rivals… nothing else mattered to them but each other. Someone gave a wolf whistle, but neither knew who...though they could hear Tanaka’s shocked splutters, and even Tsukishima lost his composure for a second after noticing the two.
“Get a room!”
Hinata and Kageyama broke apart, blushing deeply, Hinata still held tightly in Kageyama’s arms.
“S-s-sorry!” Hinata squeaked and Tsukishima gave a quick, before Kageyama let Hinata back down onto his feet. Somehow the entire team ended up in a big heap of tears of joy, exclamations of relief, and happiness, and it was in such a pile, Suga managed to catch Hinata’s flailing wrist, and give a small smile to the young boy, who displayed a splash of red the third year hadn’t seen the day before. The name Kageyama Tobio stared back at the setter who simply elbowed Daichi in the fray of the team pile. Hinata wasn’t even aware his wrist was under observation until Daichi clapped him on the back.
“It looks like we have double the celebration today?”
And that was how the rest of the team found out… if kissing each other in front of a gymnasium of people wasn't obvious enough…
“Eh… I kind of see it…”
“Two idiots… perfect for each other….”
“Hey- who’re you calling an idiot-”
“Still, we need double the celebration!”
“I still can’t believe it!”
Maybe it was some kind of sense… something to do with being soulmates? Either way, throughout the entire game, Hinata could feel the eyes of Oikawa, watching from the stands, his platonic name observing the match. While he could lie that he was only there to see the loser… Hinata knew otherwise, after all the two of them were actually growing closer as friends, into an expected platonic relationship.
What Hinata didn’t expect was Oikawa to be accompanied by Kindaichi, Kunimi, and the other three Aoba Johsai third years. Maybe his friendship with the players was pretty strong after all.
In the end, they’d ended up bumping into one another.
“Aki! Aki! Did you see?” Hinata exclaimed, jumping up and down in front of the meek teen, despite being exhausted, moving only off the adrenaline, the excitement of victory.
“I saw Shouyou. You were pretty amazing…” Kunimi gave a small smile and Kageyama gave a few blinks of shock, having hardly seen the decoy smile during their time as teammates in middle school.
“Aki? Shouyou? Oy Oy….”
“Yeah! Aki is my friend!| Hinata pointed, before holding up his arm, pointing to the names.
“Eh?!”
“Two Aoba Johsai players?!”
“That’s crazy…”
“Mh! We met at that first practise match! We’ve hung out lots since then, with most of his team! They’re all really cool, and gwah!”
“EH!?”
“Chibi-chan rejected my offer to join me and Iwa-chan if his red mark didn’t appea- OW Iwa-chan! How mean!” Oikawa blurted as the other third year punched his shoulder in mock anger.
“Still, looks like he doesn’t need that offer anymore…” Oikawa gaze a lazy point to Hinata’s arm. Kageyama smirked. He’d beat Oikawa even if Oikawa hadn’t seen it as a competition.
“Good luck as Nationals~ You better win after kicking our asses…”
And then they departed. Hinata had texted Kenma in excitement after the match, on both their victory and the name that had appeared. Kenma seemed pretty happy for him, or as happy as Kenma could sound through a text, and Hinata awaited the results of the Nekoma v Fukurodani match from the setter, with high hopes.
Basically things were looking pretty good in Hinata’s world... for now.