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The smell of lemon-scented floor cleaner mixed with dew filled his nose. The darkness of his room crept up on him and he checked his wrist, not expecting much. Most people didn’t get their soulmarks until they were in their 20s or 30s. The window that was left somewhat ajar spilled tiny droplets of water onto his bed, the cool breeze blew the curtains ever so slightly. He was turning 14 in about five minutes but he was still curious, what if he was meant to meet his soulmate within the next three years? Even if the chance was ever so slim his curiosity was burning and he wasn’t going to take the risk.
The clock was ticking, there was only two minutes left until he was officially fourteen years old. Two minutes until he could possibly learn the name of the person who he was destined to be with forever, the anxiety in the pit of his stomach heightened as the time only continued to count down. Even if he wasn’t completely sure the fear was paralyzing, what if they didn’t like him? What if they found him annoying? Questions spun in his mind digging deeper into the pit of anxiety. He tried to shake it off, fate couldn’t be wrong, it was destiny itself tying you to the perfect person! The what ifs still floated around in his mind though, like a weight that never seemed to go away.
5
4
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1..
June 21st.
He was officially fourteen years old. He looked down at his wrist, he didn’t expect much but there it was. Written in stark black lines, the kanji clear as day. His soulmate's name. His first thought was excitement, he would be meeting the person who he was destined to be with forever sometime before he turned 17! This was great, not many people met their soulmates that young. His second wave of thoughts were filled with anxiety, what ifs about the person who he was destined to spend the rest of his life with. The third wave of thoughts he had were a realization.
Wasn’t their first name commonly a girls name?
This could not be happening. Fate could not screw him over this badly, he was gay, he had known that for the past two years. There was no way that his destiny was a girl. This could not be happening to him, what was he going to do? He didn’t like girls! Sure they were nice and all but he wasn’t attracted to them whatsoever. Yet here was the name written in kanji, clear as day.
Maybe there were other names that had the same kanji used for them, he looked it up and searched. The majority of the names were often used for girls and others were androgynous.
He looked back down at his wrist, there was other writing there this time. Romaji right underneath the kanji spelling of his soulmates name. Kaori.
Shouyou groaned, there was a 99% chance his soulmate was a girl.
“Can’t believe fate itself is homophobic.”
He giggled a bit at the sheer ridiculousness of this. Then he sighed, this was going to be the person he would be with for the rest of his life.
The solid black lines of the kanji remained unmoving, sealing his fate for the rest of his life. This was the person who he would end up with, and he longed to one day meet the mystery person behind the stark lines that were his destiny. It's not like he could just snap his fingers and suddenly be attracted to women. Instead he just ignored the name that held such a stronghold on his life, he would cross that bridge when he got there. Maybe his soulmate would be understanding, but they were still stuck together.
孤爪 香
Instead he chose to focus on volleyball, the feeling of the ball hitting his arms over and over again distracting him from any thoughts of soulmates. He ignored it when people brought up wanting to meet the person who would love them for the rest of their lives. Anytime someone would ask he just said he would focus on it when he got his soulmark, even if he already had it. No one else needed to know that, it wasn’t their business.
He formed a volleyball team at his junior high school. Although they never got to play a proper match. All thanks to the damn King of the Court. It didn’t matter to Shouyou, except it did. He practiced harder than he ever did before. He was absolutely determined to beat him in high school, his new rival. Kageyama was from Kitagawa Daiichi which meant he was most likely going to go to Aoba Johsai. Shouyou was going to Karasuno, the same school as the Tiny Giant, his idol. He wanted to become just like him, after all he was also far shorter than most people who played volleyball and he could also jump incredibly high.
His fifteenth birthday came and went, he still hadn’t met the girl he was destined to be with. He still had two years, so he wasn’t concerned. In fact he wanted to delay it as much as he possibly could. He also entered high school that year and he was shocked to see the King of the Court at his high school, trying out for the same team. He hadn’t gone to Aoba Johsai like Shouyou had hoped and now they had to play on the same team as each other.
They argued and they bickered and they fought but Kageyama soon grew to become Shouyou’s best friend. He trusted Kageyama, granted he hadn’t told him about the dilemma he had over his soulmate, hell he hadn’t even told Kageyama he wasn’t straight. He was sort of terrified that Kageyama wouldn’t want to be friends with a guy who was attracted to other dudes.
Although he did notice one thing about Kageyama, he wore long sleeves a lot. Almost as if he was hiding something on his arms. Who could handle wearing long sleeves for the entirety of summer? It was really strange.
While they were practicing volleyball one day over the weekend Kageyama's sleeves were slightly rolled up and Shouyou noticed something.
“Kageyama what's that on your wrist?”
“It's my soulmark.”
“Woah!! Have you met them yet?!”
“Yes.”
“How come you never told me!? Can I meet them??”
“No, we aren’t together. We don’t even talk to each other, we aren’t exactly on the best terms.”
“Whaaa how come you guys aren’t together?! Or talk to each other??”
“They don’t like me and I don’t like them either, just because they’re my soulmate doesn’t mean we have to be together.”
“That's a thing you can do?”
“Yes dumbass! Now let's go back to playing volleyball.”
Kageyama looked clearly agitated by the conversation, it was probably the reason he always had long sleeves on. Shouyou however, had just had an amazing revelation. He didn’t have to end up with his soulmate, he would just have to tell her that he was only attracted to guys. It was perfect! He could go on and date whatever guy he wanted to and she could go ahead and see whoever she wanted.
“Hey Kageyama?”
“What is it now idiot?”
“I don’t want to be with my soulmate either.”
Kageyama raised an eyebrow, “Why not?”
Shouyou looked down, “Because they’re a girl.”
“So?”
“I’m gay.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
“Well my soulmate was a guy so it's fine if you like guys.”
“..Thanks.”
“So what’s she like?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know? You know her gender right?”
“That's cause she has a girl's name.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
“Can we go back to playing volleyball now? Your receives are still shit.”
Shouyou was grateful that Kageyama didn’t seem to care about his sexuality at all. He hadn’t brought it up since that day and he treated Shouyou the same as he always had. Things were okay.
What wasn’t okay was when he looked down at his wrist four weeks after that conversation and it didn’t have the name it previously had but had a fucking buffer symbol.
“WHAT THE FUCK?!”
Shouyou spent the next 5 hours googling trying to find out what the actual fuck this meant for him.
Nothing. Absolutely Nothing.
He groaned, flopping down onto his bed. The anxiety gnawing at him, was it because of his realization? Did something happen to his soulmate? Even if he didn’t want to be with her doesn’t mean he didn’t want her to get hurt. He eventually fell into a restless sleep.
Three days. There was a buffering symbol on his wrist for three days. Shouyou couldn’t focus as the anxiety kept on building in the pit of his stomach. He checked his wrist again when he woke up, assuming it would be the same as it had been for the past few days.
Instead, there was a new name, and they had the same last name? What the fuck? Did he just weasel his way out of being in a relationship with his soulmate and instead with his soulmates brother?! What the fuck would his soulmate think, what did her brother think?
This was far too weird and stressful.
孤爪 研磨
He had to look up the first name again. The kanji meant polishing. The romaji under the name read Kenma. There was no guarantee that his soulmate was a guy but why else would the name change?
At least whoever his soulmate used to be was probably okay. I mean it would be weird to assign him her sibling if she was dead. Could your soulmate even change at all? This was such an odd instance it almost didn’t feel real.
That started another googling spree, this one far shorter. The answer was a no. This should not have been possible, and yet it had happened to him. Maybe this was destiny’s way for apologising, maybe it had made a mistake and this was his actual soulmate. Not a girl but someone else.
Eventually Shouyou began to refocus on volleyball, it did take a bit of time but soon he was right back on track and no longer being always distracted by the worries he had about his soulmate. Although the buffering incident still lingered in the back of his mind, it was almost an afterthought at this point. He devoted all of his mind to volleyball. Even if they did fuck up the Interhigh Tournament they would make it back during the Spring Tournament. Him and Kageyama practiced every single day, over and over again. Their attacks only continued to get stronger and Shouyou’s defence only continued to improve. Granted he wasn’t great in the first place but he was only going to get better.
So when Takeda announced that they were going to have some practice matches with Nekoma, their former rival, Shouyou was over the moon. This would be perfect, going up against a much stronger team would be great practice for him, and in the days leading up to going to Tokyo he was practically bouncing off the walls.
The team went on a run afterwards, and as he and Kageyama were racing Shouyou realized he was lost. He really should have paid attention to his surroundings, but in front of him was a boy and he didn’t look like he was from Miyagi. He was wearing a red jersey, you didn’t see those around Miyagi. He had dyed blonde hair and stark black roots. He was also really really pretty.
“What are you doing?”
The boy looked a bit startled but quickly went back to having a neutral expression on his face.
“Um.. I’m lost.”
His voice was really soft and angelic almost.
“Are you from out of town?”
“Yeah”
He hopped right in front of him and the boy jumped a bit back.
“Is that thing fun?”
“Not really.. I’m just passing time.”
“Do you play Volleyball?!”
“Huh?”
“Those are volleyball shoes!”
“Oh. Yeah.”
“Are you in high school?”
“Yeah.”
“What year are you in? I’m a first year!”
“I’m in second year.”
“Crap, you’re older. Pardon me.”
“Don’t worry. I don’t really like that status stuff.”
“Um.. do you like volleyball?”
“Not particularly, I just kind of do it. I don’t really like getting tired. But my friends play, and they probably can’t do without me.”
“I think it will be more fun if you get to like it”
“I don’t care, it’s only while I’m in high school.”
“What position do you play?”
“Setter.”
“Really?! You’re a little different from our setter! He's a lot more intense, I’m a middle blocker!”
“Wow..”
Shouyou smiled sheepishly, “Do you think it's kind of weird? It is a position for tall guys.”
“I guess.. but I don’t think that. I get told a lot of stuff when I go to matches. They say ‘The setter is the position for the most talented player? So why him?’ Because I’m not very athletic.”
“Oh.. is your team good?”
“Well I heard we were good a long time ago, but we fell into a decline. Recently though, I think we’re pretty good.” He turned to face Shouyou and gave a small smile. In that moment his heart almost gave out because this boy was absolutely beautiful. His eyes were a pretty darker yellow, and he almost looked like a cat. His small smile was absolutely adorable and his eyes gleamed with happiness.
“What’s your school?”
Suddenly he heard a shout, “Kenma!” It came from the other side of the street, from a tall boy with black hair and an extremely.. odd hairstyle.
The blonde boy put his phone away, “Oh, Kuro.”
“Bye, see you soon!” He said, waving at Shouyou while the taller guy gave him a weird glare.
“Don’t go wandering off by yourself.”
“Sorry.”
As the two of them walked off Shouyou had two thoughts.
One, see you soon? What did the blonde haired boy mean?
Second, a more scary realization. Didn’t the black-haired guy just call him Kenma?!
Shouyou stood frozen in place, and when Suga called out for him and asked him why he was frozen in place he didn’t say anything.
He had just met his soulmate. And even worse, he didn’t think that he knew they were soulmates.
What the fuck was he going to do?
Shouyou’s anxiousness only got worse after his meeting with Kenma, his soulmate, the person he had to spend the rest of his life with. While he had to admit Kenma was probably one of, if not the most beautiful person he had ever seen, he also didn’t know what to expect. Wouldn’t Kenma hate him because of what happened with his sister? That type of thought muddled his brain and once again he was practically out of commission in volleyball for the next few days. He was not prepared at all for their practice match with Nekoma. On top of that his playing was driving Kageyama absolutely nuts.
“Dumbass! What's wrong with you? Pay attention!”
He just ignored that too, his worries making his playing worse and worse.
Of course Daichi and Sugawara noticed and were increasingly getting more and more worried for him. I mean it wasn’t like it was a big deal, he was just being stupid. I mean obviously his soulmate would like him! Right? But then there was Kageyama and his soulmate (ex-soulmate? Shouyou didn’t know what was appropriate) and that really threw things in a loop because he really wanted things to work out with Kenma.
The practice match with Nekoma was in two days when Shouyou finally snapped out of it and put his all into volleyball again. It was distracting from the thoughts that muddled his mind and he was absolutely determined to win. Not even his soulmate could distract him from that. Him and Kageyama practiced their prized quick again and again. He also had to do a lot of receives. Far too many for his liking but he really could not receive for the life of him and Daichi wanted them to be as prepared as they possibly could be.
Needless to say he was incredibly excited on the day they were going to Tokyo. Mixed with his usual nervousness, hopefully he wouldn’t throw up this time or he was sure Kageyama would murder him when he wasn’t paying attention. Just the thought made him more nervous which was not helping whatsoever.
When they finally got off the bus, Shouyou saw a sight he was not prepared to see at all. The boy with pretty blonde hair, his soulmate heading inside to the training camp. His feet were moving on their own at this point as he ran up to him.
“Kenma!! You’re with Nekoma?!”
“Oh. Yeah.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” He said looking somewhat dejected, he would have had time to mentally prepare if he had known he would see his soulmate again so soon.
“Because you didn’t ask..” Okay, to be fair, Kenma had a point.
“But you said ‘See you soon!’ you must have known something!”
“Your t-shirt said Karasuno High School..”
“Hey, hey, hey! What business do you have with our setter?!” This voice came from another member of the Nekoma team, and oh god he looked scary. Although he had a really weird haircut.
Kenma looked annoyed, “It's fine.”
Shouyou backed away a bit, “sorry sorry!”
As Shouyou backed away he bumped into Tanaka who looked equally as terrifying as the Nekoma guy. “You too! What business do you have with our first year?”
And then they tried to intimidate each other, Kenma looked kind of annoyed while Shouyou was somewhat terrified.
Suga shut down Tanaka within seconds, he was probably used to this sort of thing. Another member of the Nekoma team did the same thing with the scary guy but Shouyou was absolutely terrified regardless. Who knew his soulmates teammates could be so scary? This was going to be hard.
“How come you know that guy?” Kageyama asked, coming up behind him.
“..I met him coincidentally when we were doing the town-run,” and then a quiet, “also I’m pretty sure he's my soulmate.”
Kageyama looked somewhat confused, “I thought you said your soulmate was a girl? Also have you told him yet?”
“It’s a long story I’ll explain later, and no I don’t think he knows either.”
“You should tell him.”
“I will don’t worry!”
“Lets just go inside already, no point in waiting out here, you can explain to me what happened after the matches.”
“Woah!! The ceilings are so high!”
“This is normal.”
And then they were on the court.
“Hey!”
Kenma was calling to Shouyou, he really should tell him his name otherwise this could get confusing.
“I told you we were a strong team, but that's not because of one player, it's us as a team that is strong.”
And then the match began.
Kageyama and him scored the first point using their superfast quick.
“That was amazing. I’m shocked.” Shouyou grinned sheepishly, Kenma was absolutely adorable damnit. How the fuck was he going to keep his shit together when he said stuff like that?!
“Nice Shouyou!”
“Thank you!”
Kenmas eyes widened a bit at that. Well fuck. This was really not how he imagined his soulmate finding out that they were soulmates.
They ended up losing to Nekoma although it was a close match, especially with a team who had been to Nationals before. Except Shouyou now had a new problem, having to talk to Kenma and tell him that they were soulmates.
“Shouyou.”
Well fuck.
“Oh heyyy.. Whats up?”
Goddamnit he was too awkward for his own good.
“We need to talk, come on.”
He followed Kenma through the empty linoleum halls, and heavy uncomfortable silence filling the air. He had no idea what to say to Kenma and he looked even tenser than Shouyou did. Should soulmates feel this uncomfortable? I mean if they were first meeting maybe it would be like this? Every step, every second felt like it was pushing him closer to the ledge. What if Kenma was homophobic? Maybe he didn’t want Shouyou because he made his sister sad? Once again Shouyou was on the verge of throwing up. Damn his anxiousness, this was ridiculous!
Shouyou ended up following Kenma to the courtyard. It was really quiet and the sun was setting so it looked either romantic or like someone was about to get murdered. Quite frankly Shouyou would rather be murdered right now because lord this was awkward.
“I think we’re soulmates.” That came from Kenma and honestly Shouyou had figured as much but he was still a tiny bit shocked.
“I know you might not believe me because you probably have a different name on your wrist but I can explain why.”
Okay what the fuck? Shouldn’t Kenma know that his sister's soulmate changed too? This was just confusing. He had Kenma’s name now but Shouyou was incredibly confused so he continued listening to what Kenma had to say.
“I’m transgender, my birthname is Kaori, but my actual name is Kenma. I’m sorry if you’re bothered by that.” Kenma looked incredibly upset, looking away from Shouyou’s face to avoid looking him in the eye, and in that moment his heart cracked. Why the hell would be bothered by that? He was just happy his soulmate was actually a guy.
“Oh so that explains the buffer symbol.” Those should not have been the first words he said, oh god oh fuck.
Kenma turned his head back, now wearing the same confused look Shouyou was a few moments earlier. His head tilted slightly to the side and his nose scrunched up a bit with his eyebrows slightly raised. Adorable.
“The buffer symbol?”
“Yeah, a few weeks ago the name on my wrist was just a buffer symbol before it became, well, your name.”
“Oh, I got my name legally changed a few weeks ago..”
‘Oh! That explains it, I just thought you had a sister or something.”
Kenma nodded, in a sort of understanding.
“Can I see my name on your wrist?”
Shouyou held his arm out where his soulmate's name was written, where Kenmas name was written.
Kenma smiled softly, then frowned slightly.
“You aren’t upset about me are you?”
“Of course not! I’m just happy my soulmate is a boy since I am gay.”
Kenma flushed a bit at that, he looked happy, with his eyes slightly crinkled and a small smile on his lips. It was a beautiful sight. Goddamnit he was in too deep, he barely knew his soulmate and literally everything he did was slowly driving Shouyou crazy. Was this how it was for everyone? How could people handle this?
“What's your number? I’ll add you into my contacts.”
“Oh! Its..”
Kageyama poked him slightly in the ribs.
“So how did things go with him?”
“They went well!”
“Okay great so explain yourself.”
“Well um.. Like four weeks after I had that conversation with you the name on my wrist started to buffer and then it changed so uh yeah.”
“Oh thats lucky for you, although I have never heard of that happening before.”
“Ah yeah, I’ll explain more if Kenma lets me.”
“Alright. Do you want to practice some more tomorrow?”
“Hell yeah! We’re gonna beat Nekoma next time! I swear by it!