Seventeen’s a sweet age and Oikawa’s pretty fond of it, being on the cusp of pseudo-adulthood—the calm before the university storm that he knows his parents are waiting to unleash on him. He purses his lips thoughtfully as he sprawls out on the green, the grassy lawn right outside of their school building, occupied by students scrupulously measuring each minute of their lunch period.
He folds his arms behind his head and uses his hands as a pillow, gaze glued to the sky in uncharacteristic pensiveness. There’s an untouched volleyball right by his elbow and he wonders, distantly, if Hanamaki and Matsukawa will have time today.
“Iwa-chan,” he calls out suddenly, expression deceivingly unassuming as he cranes his head ever-so-slightly to get a glance of his best friend, “do you know what you’re doing after high school yet?”
It’s an unarmed question, one Oikawa isn’t sure he actually wants to know the answer to. They’re nearing that time though, the teachers growing restless with sifting through the grades and test results of their third years to try to set them on the right path. He isn’t really sure what his right path is yet; he just knows that it might be nice to be on it with Iwaizumi.
The confession rings in his ears and he forgets how to breathe, how to think. This—this isn’t what he wants. This can’t be what he wants. Oikawa’s selfish, sometimes exceedingly when it comes to Iwaizumi, but he’s sure he doesn’t want to ruin whatever it is they have by taking that step he’s absolutely terrified of.
He could do it; he could hurl himself off of the ledge of the path they’re walking on right now, leap through time and go back before he made the stupid decision to bring up Hanamaki and Matsukawa dating out of nowhere.
(So he does, and his chest burns, gasping for air as soon as he jumps and his body hits the grass, the rocks. But when he comes back to his senses he’s walking next to Iwaizumi again at the very beginning of the pathway, just before they parted with Hanamaki and Matsukawa.)
“Literature is getting harder, huh?” he says a little too quickly. “It’s even hard for a genius like me so I can’t imagine how hard it must be for you, Iwa-chan!”
The grin on his face is forced but he does his best to brush it off. He won’t mention romance, won’t mention dating—he won’t mention Makki or Mattsun. He’ll do it right this time.
“So you do time leap.”
The number on his arm means nothing to him right now, in this moment. He’s too stunned, too terrified, too damn exhausted to even formulate a proper, witty response to write off Iwaizumi’s question as something silly, something trifling.
Everything around them is frozen and Oikawa, he feels frozen too. He can’t even see Iwaizumi properly, can only manage to catch the lingering cadences of his voice.
“Iwa-chan?” he calls out, voice nearly cracking. “Can you stop—can you stay still?” His voice is growing a little more desperate, hoarse, strained when he can’t even see anything but the top of Iwaizumi’s head weaving in and out of the crowd.
He doesn’t know why he’s terrified. It’s nothing, there’s nothing to be worried about. Iwaizumi—he’s just like Oikawa. They’re both jumping back and forth in time and that’s it, that’s the only conclusion to be made.
It’s just, Oikawa doesn’t know why he feels like he’s made a mistake.
“It’s funny! I really can’t keep secrets from you--can I, Iwa-chan?”