Chapter Text
Setting down the last of the small collection of boxes holding his possessions, Wakatoshi is reminded of the day he moved into the Shiratorizawa dorms when he was twelve. That day had unfolded quite similarly to how this one has: him unpacking and making himself at home in a new space on his own. The most his mother had done was drive him and his boxes to the Shiratorizawa campus and remind him not to prioritize volleyball over his academics. This time, Wakatoshi rented a car and drove to his university in Tokyo on his own. The companionable silence between himself and the road was preferable to the tense quiet of his mother’s sedan.
There his thoughts went turning ungrateful again. Wakatoshi sighed, shutting a drawer of shirts. He mustn’t think like that. It was thanks to his mother and his grandparents’ money that he even got an on-campus apartment to himself.
He glanced around his spacious and utterly empty apartment. It was move-in day and he already knew that come nightfall he would be missing his late-night conversations with Tendou that led nowhere productive but were entertaining nonetheless. In the morning, he would make breakfast for himself instead of eating with his team before their first class of the day.
How funny. On his first day at Shiratorizawa, Wakatoshi would never have imagined himself missing someone as much as he missed his team. Whenever he thought back to his high school graduation in March, he chose to remember their last moments together as a team under one school. He, Tendou, Reon, and Semi posing for photos amongst the cherry blossom trees, and Tendou poking him in the side to get him to smile for just one picture, Waka-Waka! Come on!
He didn’t like to remember his mother, hair neatly combed and dress perfectly ironed, standing away from his friends’ families as they snapped pictures. Her face had been stoic as always but her eyes were impatient to get to dinner with his grandparents for the occasion. He doesn’t blame her for keeping her distance from them that day. She had never really spoken to his friends’ families anyway. Wakatoshi had thought she must not have known what to say.
He didn’t like to remember the dinner after the ceremony. How when he asked his mother, allowing himself to hope just this once if his father had any plans to fly to Japan to come to see him. If he had even called.
“No,” his mother had said simply before continuing with her meal.
Truthfully, Wakatoshi hadn’t expected him to come: living on an entirely different continent must make traveling difficult anyway. Still, would Utsui Takashi not even spare a day to see his son graduate? Or spare a minute to make a phone call? He said as much to his mother who dabbed at the corner of her mouth delicately before speaking. “Perhaps if you had brought your team to nationals he would have cared more. Volleyball seems to be the only thing that matters to him, is it not?”
Wakatoshi hadn’t responded. His grandparents and mother took that silence as an opportunity to rake his father’s name through the mud once more as they often did at least once a day since Takashi’s departure almost a decade ago.
Wakatoshi had excused himself from dinner early that night.
Looking for a distraction in the form of productivity, Wakatoshi sorts through the books he brought with him as he sits on the single sofa in the living room, arranging them by genre and then alphabetizing them by the last name of the author. He had the foresight to have his furniture brought in the day before with the university’s permission or else sitting around and pulling things from boxes would have been a lot more tiring.
Wakatoshi paused at a manga magazine at the bottom of the box. He hadn’t packed this. He flipped through the magazine to a page bookmarked with a bright pink sticky note. A page of nothing but advertisements and a message written in glittery gel pen greeted him. Thought you might want some light reading. I even bookmarked your favorite part! — Satori <3
A snort slips past Wakatoshi’s lips. He could never understand how people can look at his best friend and call him creepy when he did such thoughtful things like this. Thoughtful for Tendou, at least.
Wakatoshi finished arranging his little bookshelf and got up to fix dinner, the magazine displayed standing on top of the shelf.
Wakatoshi skipped orientation. He didn’t see the purpose in it when he already learned the layout of the campus after a tour of the school months before he graduated. None of the clubs listed in the complementary brochure that had been shoved into his hands when he passed through the quad interested him. Besides, classes and volleyball practice would take up much of his time anyway. He definitely didn’t find the established groups of friends laughing and mingling around club booths daunting at all.
It would be much easier to talk with people on the volleyball team anyway, he tells himself. They would have at least something in common. He had always had an easier time interacting with people on his team, or even just people who played volleyball in general. Shared interests were always a great start to a conversation, he found. He could talk about volleyball for hours on end and had . It was how he befriended Tendou and the other third years (well, ex -third years).
Not to say it was smooth sailing from there; volleyball could only interest a conversation partner for so long, unfortunately. But at that point, someone else would carry the conversation and he was content to give his input where he thought was necessary. Even outside his team, he was on friendly terms with the other captains he played against. At least when they were off the court, that is.
Well, not all the other captains.
Oikawa Tooru was an enigma that, in all his six years of knowing him, Wakatoshi had yet to solve. And god had he tried.
On the last weekend before graduation, Reon borrowed his family’s truck and all the third years on the team drove out to the middle of an empty field to watch the stars far out of reach of their town’s light pollution. The little white lights millions of miles away glittered above them, a canopy the four of them could sit under together one last time before they would be seeing the same night sky from different universities in different cities.
Tendou took to recounting their best moments as a team on and off the court with Reon and Semi adding their two cents about a story as they remembered it. There was the second-year overnight trip to Kyoto where-in some students were suspected of sneaking alcohol into their rooms at the inn they were staying at which prompted the teachers to spontaneously check every student’s room in the middle of the night to look for “illegal substances”. Tendou could barely get through the part where one of the teachers mistook Semi’s portable phone charger for a vape pen. A red-faced and embarrassed Semi had to convince their teacher that it was definitely not what that was while Tendou had tried to convince the teacher that it definitely was. It took another teacher validating that it was in fact just an innocent phone charger for the matter to be settled.
“Seriously, how could he not tell?!” Semi had said, the memory and the beer they brought with them making his face flush. “And you definitely weren’t helping, you shit!” He pointed an accusing finger at Tendou who cackled in response.
“It was a little funny,” admitted Reon with a laugh. “People were talking about it for weeks. It even got around to Seijoh, didn’t it?”
Semi groaned, tossing his empty beer bottle to the side which Wakatoshi silently picked up and placed the bottle back into its cardboard box to discard later. “Don’t remind me,” griped Semi. “I didn’t need Oikawa making jabs at me about it on the other side of the net. If anything, at least I’m not gonna miss him after high school.”
“A constant thorn in our side, that Tooru,” Tendou remarked wistfully as if he were recalling a fond childhood memory. “Formidable opponents to be sure, but not so much to defeat the great Shiratorizawa!” he gestured grandly with sweeping arms as he leaned back over the bed of the truck. He didn’t come back up for a while. Wakatoshi guessed Tendou had preoccupied himself with watching the stars from that angle and Wakatoshi was content to let him for a few more minutes before he would worry about the blood pooling at his friend’s head.
Throughout the night, Wakatoshi was happy to sip his beer and take in the quiet of the field juxtaposed with his friends’ buzzed reminiscing and chuckle along when he found something amusing. The usual.
At the mention of Oikawa Tooru, however, he felt compelled to speak up for the first time in a couple of hours.
“Do you think…” he began and whatever talk there was instantly fell silent, even Tendou leaned back to sit correctly to give his attention. Despite no longer being captain, Wakatoshi still had a voice, however monotone it could be, that would make anyone stop and listen. “Do you think Oikawa does not like me?” he asked. “Genuinely?”
Reon and Semi shared a look. Tendou looked like he was fighting the instinct to laugh, unsure if this was his best friend’s clumsy attempt at a joke. When Wakatoshi continued to stare at the three of them expectantly, they knew he was being serious.
“Well,” Reon was the first to speak up, “he was never the most. . . . uh, amicable with our team. Especially when it came to you, Cap.” He was trying to put it in the kindest way he could while still being straightforward to make sure Wakatoshi understood. He didn’t know if he succeeded in that when all Wakatoshi had to say in response was a quiet “oh.”
Semi immediately jumped in, “Don’t take it personally, Wakatoshi! He’s just sore that his team never beat us. He’s probably the kind of guy to keep a petty grudge like that.”
Wakatoshi hummed in reply, swishing the dregs of his beer lightly, watching the alcohol flow this way and that in contemplation.
“Maybe it is a little personal.” Wakatoshi looked up from his swishing to meet Tendou’s gaze. His eyes were half-lidded and he was leaning his head on his knee, looking sleepy and sluggish from the beer. “Didn’t you used to tell him he chose the wrong school? That he was wasting his time and talents in a team like Aoba Johsai?”
“Satori—” Semi started to scold him but Wakatoshi stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. Wakatoshi knew his best friend, knew that those words were not coming unfiltered off the top of an inebriated mind. Tendou was just as alert as he was, and a point.
“You’re right Satori,” he conceded. “Neither Oikawa nor I were as cordial as we should have been, even as opponents. We were not friendly.”
Reon tilted his head at Wakatoshi in curiosity. “Is that what you wanted? To be friends with Oikawa?”
Wakatoshi leaned his head up against the back window of the truck, turning his gaze back up at the constellations patterning the sky. He absently wondered if Oikawa Tooru was with his own team, relishing in one last night among friends before the start of the rest of his life.
“I wanted him on my team,” he said finally, softly. “I wanted to be close to him.”
Coach Washijou’s influence did not leave Wakatoshi after graduation. Even on the days before practice was set to begin, Wakatoshi would start his days stretching in his room before setting off on a run around campus. He found the exercise helped not only warm up his body but his mind, and he didn’t mind waking up at five in the morning to run if it meant he could do his best in his classes. He did, however, make a note to look into scheduling classes later in the morning. Sleep is also important for the body and mind, after all.
Running and weight–lifting in the university’s gym were great and all, but the first day of volleyball practice could not come soon enough. Wakatoshi was antsy enough to set foot on his university’s court for the first time that he was the first newcomer to show up to practice. Actually, the only other people there were the coach and the third-year captain.
“Might you be Ushijima Wakatoshi?” says the coach, an older man with a head of gray hair and sleepy eyes, like he had just gotten up from a nap to be here. Despite this, he looks much younger than Coach Washijou and a lot more laid back. Wakatoshi never understood how a man as old as his former coach could have so much energy to yell and flail at his players as often as he did. He would not be expecting his new coach to be any easier on his team just because he seemed more subdued. This was university; things would only be more challenging.
Wakatoshi walks over to where the coach and the captain stood and bows. “That is me,” he says and straightens. “Thank you for selecting me as part of the team. I will continue to work hard to earn my place here.”
The captain, with his shaggy black hair tied back away from his eyes, looks pleasantly stunned. “Oh. Wow! Kind of intense for a first-year, but I like the determination!”
“You shouldn’t be surprised, Dai-kun,” chuckles the coach. “This boy was Shiratorizawa’s captain. He’s at this university on a sports scholarship.”
“Well, look at that!” The captain smacks a hand on Wakatoshi’s bicep with a laugh. “I’m the captain, as you probably could tell,” he gestures to the 1 displayed on the jersey under his open team jacket. Wakatoshi eyes the color scheme: red, white, and gray. “The name’s Hamada Daisuke. Good to have you on the team, Ushijima.”
Wakatoshi nods and thanks him again to which the coach chuckles once more. “I like this one already,” he says. “Very courteous. Unlike some of our players. I’m Coach Nakamura. Dai-kun, here, and I were just discussing some things before the start of practice, but we weren’t expecting anyone to come in this early. I still have some paperwork to get through so, as long as you’re here, why don’t you help Dai-kun set up the court?” With that Nakamura waves them off and disappears through a door to what Wakatoshi assumes is an office.
Captain Hamada is a friendly and quite chatty man, Wakatoshi found. Through the process of bringing out the nets, securing the poles, and rolling out the cart of volleyballs, he always had something to say. Most of his little monologue was about the team, about how they were like a real family, Ushijima, you’ll love it here. Sometimes he would go off on a tangent if he recalled a particular story involving one of the players; a lot of these stories involved the boys in his own year. He had tales of drunken nights getting into shenanigans, high off the freedom of being young adults on their own for the first time in their lives. He recounts a particularly hard night of partying that left him and his friends severely hung over for morning practice. He laughs as he remembers the smirk on Coach Nakamura’s face when they all tried to play off their headaches and nausea to get through practice, but of course, their coach could tell the second they stumbled into the gym.
Wakatoshi listens politely and hmms when he’s amused. It reminds him a lot of setting up for practice with Tendou who loved to regale his friend with any and all thoughts that came to him at the moment. He is pleased that Hamada, like Tendou and his other friends, is not offended by his silence and is happy to take the reins of the conversation.
When everything is set up Hamada tells him, “We still have time before practice starts if you wanna warm up with drills or whatever you would usually do in Shiratorizawa.”
Wakatoshi nods and heads over to one of the ball carts. He’s faintly aware of people entering the gym and Hamada greeting them warmly. His upperclassmen, Wakatoshi guesses and pays them no mind. He can meet them all properly when practice officially starts.
He picks up a ball, the weight of it comfortable and familiar in his hands. He steps to the end of one side of the court and tosses the ball up. His gaze never leaving the ball, Wakatoshi begins his approach. Just as the ball drops out of its arc and beings its descent, Wakatoshi springs up and sends the ball slamming onto the other side of the court. The impact makes a resounding SLAP! as it hits the linoleum floor.
One out of one hundred serves down. As is the Shiratorizawa way.
He repeats this drill a few more times and is aware that some of the upperclassmen have gathered together on one side of the gym to watch before the meeting starts. He doesn’t mind, just continues sending the balls over the net.
On serve twenty-three, he turns to get another ball out of the cart and hears a sharp gasp. He looks up at the double doors of the gym’s main entrance and sees the person he never thought he would ever see again after Spring High. Standing there, clutching his gym bag in a white-knuckled grip, is Oikawa Tooru. His big brown eyes are wide in shock and his mouth is a stunned, thin line on his face.
For a moment, it is like neither of them can decide what to do other than just lock eyes and stare. Wakatoshi knows his expression must be as impassive as always—perhaps a little surprise might show through in his raised brows—but his mind is reeling. Out of all the universities in all of Japan, they both ended up here.
“Oikawa,” Wakatoshi starts, realizing belatedly that he should say something. They know each other after all, it would be rude otherwise.
But as soon as Wakatoshi opens his mouth, Oikawa’s eyes narrow into a scowl and his mouth twists into an angry frown, an expression Wakatoshi is all too familiar with. Before Wakatoshi can say anything else, Oikawa spins around on his heel.
“Nope. No. Absolutely not ,” Oikawa mutters under his breath, just loud enough for Wakatoshi to hear. He stalks out the door and out of sight. He returns a moment later, practically dragged back through the door by Captain Hamada who is smiling pleasantly. “Where do you think you’re going, Oikawa? Practice is this way.”
Hamada catches Wakatoshi’s eye, who still standing there holding a volleyball and feeling rather dumb for still doing so with every passing moment. “Ushijima!” he says brightly and points to Oikawa who looks like he is trying to find to quickest way to exit without alerting Hamada. “Shiratorizawa’s in Miyagi prefecture, right? Do you know Oikawa Tooru, here? He was the captain of his own team, too!”
Wakatoshi finds he is having trouble keeping his eyes off of Oikawa while Oikawa is doing his absolute best to look anywhere but him.
“Yes,” he answers, “we knew each other.”
“Great!” Hamada beams. “You two should get along just fine, then!”