Rin doesn’t notice you at first. you almost wish he never did. he’s leaning ,absent minded, against a vending machine on the far side of the train platform, half shaded by a pillar, bathed in flickering fluorescent light. one earbud in — his bag was slung lazily over his shoulder.
he looks the same. maybe a little paler. maybe not. his appearance wasn’t what you were focused on. in fact — you weren’t really meant to be focused on him at all, ever since he blocked your number.
four days, since he told you you should “just be friends.”
it didn’t feel real then, still doesn’t. though you hoped thought maybe it was some kind of panic on his end. maybe he would text again? maybe this was just rin being rin — quiet, avoidant, and mad at himself. you thought he needed time. but now he’s here. and he hasn’t seen you yet. so you walk towards him.
your fingers twitch at your sides, chest hollow, aching with something too cold to cry over. shoes tapping softly against the concrete floor. every step felt heavy with awaiting mistake.
by the time your heart sinks deep enough to weigh you down with regret he sees you a second too late to disappear, “rin” he doesn’t say your name. doesn’t settle his gaze on you, more so slides past your face and down to the floor, anywhere but your eyes. there’s a quiet between you, not tension but absence — standing where a person used to be. “what happened?” you ask, suddenly, yet no answer falls from his lips. “Rin? did i do something wrong?” … “you just left. you didn’t even…” — “you said to me that we were okay.” still nothing, but his jaw visibly tightens. “so what was all of it to you?” you ask a little smaller.
he won’t meet your eyes, your words fall on deaf ears. it just feels like you’re speaking into an abyss shaped like someone you used to know. “you didn’t even give me the decency of a real goodbye” a train passes on the other track. neither of you move.
then finally — without even meeting your eyes : “i never loved you.” it’s almost too soft to hear. but you do anyways, and the worst part is… he doesn’t sound cruel. or angry. he just sounds… empty. he doesn’t wait for a response either. doesn’t linger. doesn’t look back. he just walks away. like it never meant anything, just like he implied.
you don’t cry, not here. you just stand there, blinking into the space where he used to be. trying to remember the last time he ever really looked at you. he never even answered your questions. you never actually got the real ending — and worst of all, you never even knew if he meant it.
this is the day you found out itoshi rin was never yours to begin with.
a/n :: hi! sorry i had to start of so strong aha 😇 i was gonna say something else but i forgot wait i remembered now!! gonna make like 5 chapters before i actually release this just to experiment xx
After picking up a job at the local pet shop, you learn very quickly that your coworker is a pest you can’t shake all that easily. When he grows to believe he could have you wrapped around his finger if he tried, he’s even bold enough to make a bet on it. Unfortunately, he won a long time ago.
TETSURO KUROO X F!READER
𐔌 . ⋮ CONTENTS ◞ smau hybrid, implied to take place in the summer after grad, friends to lovers, I’m not in college so likely inaccurate descriptions, miscommunication, probably somewhat ooc, (light?) angst, reader has parental issues, reader jumps to conclusions (she is me), they’re all just really stupid like I’m pissed off and I haven’t even written it yet, alcohol usage, crude humour, foul language, individual chapters have specific warnings, 🏷️ denotes written parts
MOODBOARD | PLAYLIST
𐔌 . ⋮ MEET THE EMPLOYEES <- [collective intros]
◞ YN LN :: fuzzy socks, late nights spent staring at the ceiling, Things to Do by Alex G, loving like a cat, humming lullabies to a loved one, a wardrobe filled with everyone’s clothes but your own, indirect displays of love, whispering “I love you” when you think they’re asleep, caramel, everything or nothing
◞ TETSURO KUROO :: messy hair, teasing, car rides, cheesy singing and using a hairbrush as a microphone, lying your head in your lovers lap, playful boasting, the sidewalk rule, looking for them in a crowd, sparing others emotions at the cost of your own, becoming a mentor to everyone you meet, determination
⌗ CHAPTER 00 | kitty cat
⤷ let’s take it back to the beginning…
⌗ CHAPTER 01 | kuroos out the window 🏷️
⤷ the new beginning… of the end?
⌗ CHAPTER 02 | son in law
⤷ he’s got a brain worth killing for, that’s for sure.
⌗ CHAPTER 03 | common beggar 🏷️
⤷ …or maybe not.
⌗ CHAPTER 04 | plotting
⤷ kuroo is a protein bar dealer..?
⌗ CHAPTER 05 | alternative strategies
⤷ tetsuro kuroo (23) 🌽⭐️
⌗ CHAPTER 06 | home depot
⤷ maybe he isn’t completely oblivious.
⌗ CHAPTER 07 | right side of the sidewalk 🏷️
⤷ get an umbrella and stop being in love. ew.
⌗ CHAPTER 08 | maurice
⤷ STOP RUNNING WITH SHARP OBJECTS ALL OF YOU
⌗ CHAPTER 09 | hips don’t lie
⤷ I thought your people skills were better than this?
⤷ @adoresia @kawoala @sahrii @angeleilee (<- asked to be tagged. Extended taglist will not be tagged on the masterpost.)
General tags (only for mlist): @sh0ot1ngst4r @azinniyaa @kashee-h @fiannee @lizbix @aldebrana @laaalaaaloooppppsiiieeeee
❝ Made up a game . No pain, no gain . Until you break . Make no mistake . I will pull it together . You can love me . Forever and ever ❞
a/n — FINALLY. been in the drafts since the Kilby girl masterlist was first posted and it’s been staring at me longingly ever since, i could feel it. I did project on this one a lot haha… haha… sorry
P.S. Posting schedule will be worked out in the future <3
꒷꒦ LUNE DE MIEL masterlist ... 500 follower special !
꒷꒦ hunny pot ... bachira meguru x gn!reader, childhood friends to lovers, fluff, sleepy reader and bachira, confession, library setting, mention of bullies (just the first paragraph) @adoresia
꒷꒦ ... will today finally be the day you say yes?
BACHIRA is a persistent man.
crazy thing: you've basically known each other for half of your lives. another crazy thing: he's had a crush on you since day one. since that day you "saved" him from bullies – "saved" as in you cried while trying to stand up for him and dragged him along while running away from them.
no, it's not like you gradually figured it out over time. he's made it obvious and said he's liked you multiple times, at least once every couple of months. even recently, he just drops it as if it was normal, as if it doesn't drive you crazy every time he does.
actually, why are you even saying no? pride? embarrassment? because none of those explain why your face burns like fire every time you hear those stupid words...
i like you.
you huff as the thought drags you back into reality, and you immediately set your sights on the buzzing bumblebee sat across from you.
"good morning." bachira muses, a lazy grin stretched over his lips. "finally snapped out of it, huh?" oh, right. you two were supposed to be studying. and look at you, dozing off while daydreaming about dating him.
with a tsk, you wave your hand, sluggishly picking up your pencil again. "you're barely awake yourself." you chide. the little jump your heart made at the sight of his smile was so stupid. you felt stupid feeling like this.
he chuckles, stretching his hands above his head before slouching over the table again. his arms lay crossed over the surface and he cradles his cheek over one of them. "but i was busy watching you." for a moment, his eyes close, but his gaze soon focuses on you again. "this is your fault."
your eyebrows furrow as your weak attempt to seem annoyed. "weirdo."
"you like it." was his simple response, resting his eyes once more.
"i don't."
"you do."
"don't."
"do."
"don't."
"don't."
"do. wait–" your eyes widen at the sudden slip up. "dang it!"
"gotcha!" his laughter echos throughout the empty library without a care, though slightly muffled from how he was positioned. "so you do like it. i knew it." only a grumble left you, too sleep deprived to bother arguing back. you've always lost in the end, after all.
now that you think about it, the two of you are awfully close. your knuckles would occasionally brush against his arm, though he would always shift closer when you try to give him space; your legs were closed in between his, trapping you in whenever you tried to move away. was he trying to do something?
but alas, the dreariness was inevitably catching up to him. you could tell by how his muscled relaxed and his eyes naturally falling shut, eyelids slack and unforced. it would only be fair if you had a little nap too, considering you were equally as tired.
he mumbles something that sounds like your name, and you hum, letting him know you're listening. he pauses, taking a moment to breathe before his words come out as he exhales. "i like youuuu..."
you sit up, taking a peek at him, but he doesn't move. he's not even giggling. maybe this time... he was saying it seriously. "i like you too." you murmur back, your head resting by his once more.
"really?"
"just sleep."
he giggles one last time, snuggling himself closer to you until your heads were touching. "okay..."
as an apology for the delay in writing requests and such, I would like to present liv’s very own matchup event. send me an ask and receive not only a fictional matchup, but the fictional couple’s dynamic I think suits you best.
status: open (march 19 - march 25)
tagged #love’s multiverse
valuable info; basic knowledge before submitting.
in your ask, state the universe you meet in (media you want a matchup from) from haikyuu, jujutsu kaisen, or attack on titan.
tell me a bit about yourself! personality, culture, likes and dislikes, favourite activities — hell, even your nervous habits. anything you see fit, which can include looks if you’re interested in that.
tell me about your type. things you need in relationships? major deal breakers? ideal preferences and viewpoints? would you bicker, or would you be sappy? hold hands or kiss sloppy in public (please don’t)? tell me as much as you’d like. the more you say, the easier and more precise your results.
before you enter.
if I see anything morally incorrect (children, viewpoints that may cause conflict on my blog, etc) they will be deleted.
anons are accepted, but it is advised you select an emoji.
please be patient! i’m learning to train diligence rather than rushing things and feeling like they sucked, and I know that it leaves people happier even with a bit of a wait.
please stick to one per person.
this will mostly be male characters, but if you would rather a woman let me know !!
also, forgive me if the dynamics get a bit repetitive — I have not watched an infinite amount of movies.
what you will receive.
matchup
fictional couple to match your dynamic
elaboration on this dynamic, therefore including a few headcannons and such.
notes ... crack, fluff, rin buys the reader lipstick/the reader wears lipstick, playful banter, rin is WHIPPED, i was thinking about a shadow/sonic dynamic but i failed, a tiny tiny suggestive mention on one of them
boxer!kuroo loves having a shared interest of boxing. doesn't matter he got you into it or the other way around, because he knows you're both as equally as passionate about the sport.
he loves testing his strength by having you hang on one of his arms. he loves watching you shadowbox because you manage to look cute and hot at the same time. he loves being your number one supporter and being the first person you celebrate with when you win. plus, he can't deny his eyes get a little distracted whenever he watches you fight in the ring. gosh... how could they not? they're attracted to pretty things, after all.
and boxer!kuroo knows how pissed off you get when he goes easy on you when you train together. you can't improve if things are too easy, and he always makes it a little game for himself; how much can he push you until you snap.
once again, you both step back, taking a breather as you think back to your feeble attempts to block only seconds earlier. "again." you huff, wiping off your forehead with your forearm. "show me that combo again." your competitiveness is showing and you hate that, knowing he's going to have way too much fun messing with you.
only taking a tiny glance up, your gaze is immediately pulled in by his, taking in his cocky expression that for some reason really seems to spite you. "yeah?" kuroo circles you slowly. you could tell that he was getting ready to throw you off guard – it was just a matter of when.
in turn, you move in time with him, your stare not straying away for even a second. "and do it harder. i can't feel a thing."
"why should i?" and you almost got caught in his trap, but you dodged his hook just in time. 'impressive...' he mumbled to himself as if you couldn't hear a thing, but he quickly regains his composure. "you're not trying either." as if to mock you, he places his hands on his hips, his position now laughably relaxed.
your eyebrows furrow more than they already were, keeping your focus. "i am." you're not, but! that's only because he's not.
"uh huh..." he nods, making quick work of overwhelming you with a flurry of attacks (by your request a week earlier since it was something you wanted to accurately defend against) and you counter with practiced precision, then landing a good hit on him to finish off. his face scrunches up with both pain and satisfied delight, shaking his arm while simultaneously checking for a bruise. "well... that's more like it."
that was basically his way of complimenting you; a secret little language that only the two of you knew. you breathe out a chuckle, hiding your flustered smile behind your glove. "just shut up."
wc 1.4k, reader is shorter than tetsuro but not specified how much — he’s 6’2 so I think this applies to almost everyone, I CANT DO SMAUS KILL ME, sorry this took so long I was procrastinating whether I do smau or not, I wrote this whilst listening to champagne coast if that inspires you to listen to it, not proofread
series mlist | gen mlist
your personal favourite part of working was clocking out.
surely, this was the case among your coworkers as well as widespread numbers of employees alike, but the part that made your fondness particularly yours was the reason as to why. although it was a nice additon, the love you had for swinging the door open, hearing the bell chime with your departure and stepping foot onto the busy street, was not derived from the embrace of solidarity that awaited you. it was not the anticipation of slipping off your shoes and sinking into the plushness of your bed. it was not what awaited you after, but the immediate event that was tetsuro kuroo.
there were days when you were lucky enough to share a shift with him, lucky enough to embrace the freedom of the ring that signified your days end. the echo of his laughter would follow you from the interior of the building, all the way down the street, and into your dreams as the night commenced. the picture of his smile was a haunting presence, burnt into every cavern of your mind and lingering in every crevice — embedding his being into the root of your very own. he did not inhabit your wallet, despite the many instances where you had insisted that was the case. that big, humorous dork had coiled around your heart, restricting every beat and keeping it as his own.
a voice cut into your thoughts just as the days damp, rain contaminated air hit your face, laced with affectionate tease. "hey, pretty."
the wall of black fabric that was his abdomen invaded your vision before you had fully acknowledged his presence. you did not have much time to think about that, though, because it was only a beat before he was leaning down and pushing his face into your direct line of sight. black tufts of hair curtained his face, concealing all but a fond grin. you ignored the cockiness that accompanied, instead focusing on the gentle look in his eyes that made your chest tighten euphorically.
"leaving without me?"
a playful scoff tumbled from your lips, a poor attempt at appearing unbothered by his term of endearment. tetsuro was an affectionate guy, it was just a part of who he was, but hell did it mess with your head. you adjusted the strap of your bag, fixing it steadily on your shoulder.
"i prefer to call it getting a head start," you said, the corner of your mouth curling up mockingly.
he rolled his eyes, radiating ironic annoyance. "yeah, yeah. whatever you wanna call it. head start or not, you abandoned me."
his tendency to exaggerate was, although you were reluctant to admit it, entertaining. the banter seemed to flow between the two of you in a consistent stream, alight with chemistry and words that were not for personal gain, but excitement to hear the response of the other. kuroo always looked at you as if he was waiting to hear the next thing on your mind, just desperate to unpack and analyse every part of you. though he was sure he had done a good job already, there was always more of you, an endless list of attributes and thoughts that he was yet to know. he was determined to gain knowledge of every bit. he liked it that way; he always strived for a purpose. earning your affection definitely sufficed.
"you're so dramatic, tetsuro."
"whatever, traitor."
you smirked, eyes flicking to his figure, watching his swift movements as he walked by your side. biting back a comment about how desperately he had to have missed you to react in such ways, you hummed passively. peeling your eyes away, you stared at the pebbles littered along the sidewalk, but that commitment was doomed from the start. the gentle pitter patter of precipitation against concrete had nothing on the sound of his voice.
he eyed you, his attempts to be discreet only unnoticed because you were equally as enamoured. gazes avoided the other like twin magnets, one bouncing away just as the other reached for it. he watched the way you looked amidst the gray skies, the way you lit the air with vibrance around you. not exactly akin to the light of the sun, but a dimly lit star that only the keenest of eyes sought to appreciate. the rainfall was light, a few drops collecting on the expanse of your face. he watched the water run over the bridge of your nose, silently envying the way the substance got to caress the gentle parts of you. you looked upwards at the clouds, and a memory flickered in the back of his mind.
"you like the rain, don't you?"
you jerked your head with a slight nod, internally appreciative that he had remembered the miniscule preference.
he smiled. he found it rather fitting, the way you admired the gloomy things. the quiet, solitary bits of life that he felt you personally embodied were naturally a favourite of yours, and the simplety of the truth was comforting. a crumb of predictability that he could rely on to keep himself sane.
tetsuro's eyes shimmered brighter than the glistening beads of water, even as they grew in size and number. no amount of mother nature's tears could amount of the emotions he was feeling in that moment. his staring was painfully obvious, as was the tenderness he held for you — at least to anyone else. passersby looked upon you and saw every concealed secret, hidden poorly in the windows to the soul. but your cowardice prevented eye contact, leaving the both of you blinded by repudiation.
warming cheeks betrayed your true feelings, any hope to feign obliviousness to his admiration of your features drained from you as quickly as the clouds rolled in. headlights cast over the two of you as you quirked your brow, the passing car the only earthly noise invading you aside from the beating of your own heart. "what is it?"
his lips parted, initially to sputter, but quickly morphing for the purpose of words. "nothin', just-"
splash.
the headlights faded out, dimming under the lens of distance, but leaving two sopping wet teenagers in its wake. it seemed that the puddle settled into its previous calm as quickly as the tires had disrupted it. the only difference was that now, half of the liquid covered you, blanketing the both of you in damp frigidness. there was a moment of silence, the rapid pitter-patter against the ground serving as the only noise outside of your cluttered mind.
your lips parted. you glanced at tetsuro, and upon seeing that he looked just as bewildered as you in his saturated glory, you just crumbled. curling into yourself as your body shook with laughter, the ridiculousness of the comical situation building up until it spilled from your mouth in a series of chortles. the boom of kuroo's laughter enveloped yours, and for a moment, you formed an occapella of unity and bliss, voices drifting away from the misfortune of the physical world and creating song of a dimension made only for the two of you.
"well, shit," he breathed through gasps of cachination. he shook the wetness from his hair like some sort of canine and sniggered at the way you sneered.
"smells like wet dog."
his eyes narrowed, nudging you with his elbow as you straightened from your previously folded posture. "i could push you into that puddle right now," he said, a smug expression contorting his face.
you retorted, the quip snarky and all too fast. "but you won't."
he let out a huff of a chuckle. "yeah. not today, at least." his hand met your shoulder, warm and steady as he urged you to resume walking as you had been before the universe's abrupt interruption. "for now, let's just get you home."
and he laughed and teased and joked with you all the way, but all that truly mattered was the fact that he did not leave your side until you were through your front door. warm eyes trailed after you, lingering on the blank surface even after you disappeared from his sight. the air of your presence lingered, and that alone was enough to bask in. what left tetsuro's witty lips was not of importance, only his firm footing to the left of you and the tender edge to his voice every time he filled the silence you lived in. he was cold and wet and damn near shivering but his blood ran with the fulfilment that the sun itself cowered from, and he knew that as long as he had that, he was okay.
he was going to say “just that you’re pretty,” before that fuckass car got em btw
this chapter is dedicated to lina because i’m a man of my word 💞😊
stiff ass writing sorry, been off my grind
kuroo ran into his apartment and soaked that entire place up yo
akaashi is SO sick of him
he was sentenced to mopping for a week he was so mad.
both yn and kuroo were sneezing to death the next day yeah losers stop being in love get inside. get an umbrella. 😒
you hated missing osamu miya. what you loathed even further was him being just out of reach.
a request for my 700 event from @cherrysurf but I got a little carried away and decided to format. exes to something anew. sort of hurt/comf but not entirely. not proofread. first time writing for osamu. word count of about 1.1k.
a/n: okay now I work on mattsun texts and school work.
missing osamu miya was the most agonizing thing you had ever had the misfortune of experiencing. what was once a sunny world, filled with rapid heartbeats and the nearly imperceptible smell of cooking that seemed to cling to the cotton of his t-shirts, was now a dreary nothingness filled only by the aching of your heart. it was louder than any sob you had allowed to tumble from your lips, those that were once pressed to his but were now left in solidarity. you did not let yourself cry over him, no, choosing to grasp desperately to the last crumb of composure you had access to, but the wails of your soul rang louder in your ears than any verbal expression. the yearning was a wicked spirit, seeping into your skin and invading your nerves with messages that chanted his name. that and some other profanities directed at yourself for causing it at all, but that was not the most haunting sensation.
thanks to the curse that seemed to have doomed you from the very beginning, you had a rather awakening discovery: missing osamu miya was agonizing. having him close was much worse. as you sat in the passenger seat of his car, the cool press of leather on your bare thighs the only piece of you that was not burning up in pure shame and self-loathing, this was more prominent than it had ever been. it baffled you, the mere concept of hurting even more when he was right beside you than you did the first moment he was not. disoriented, you were, but aware nonetheless.
the ache in your chest drew attention to itself, leaving you defenseless to withhold as the words tumbled from your lips. “i’m sorry.”
each syllable cut through the moonlit ambience of the vehicle, burying deeper and deeper into the silence until it shattered under the pressure of unresolved turmoil. his eyes flicked to you, and they looked more gray than you had ever seen them — or were you forgetting his face already? that was a thought you were unready to face head on.
“don’t be,” he murmured, the simple, withdrawn answer packing more material onto the wall that had risen between you. he was silent again. he was always, as restricting as it was, always silent. his fingers flexed around the steering wheel, the action such a subtle display of tenseness that you would not have noticed, had you not felt the exact same way.
he paused as you came to a halt, the crimson glow of the red light casting over his features. softer than those of his twin, worn by taste tests and his deep rooted love that led him to his career, but alluring all the same. “why’d ya’ call me?”
barely a whisper, as if he could not resist asking. you felt embarrassment pump through your veins as you tried to think of an explanation that seemed at least relatively normal. any sort of answer that was not sorry, it was late and I knew you would be up because you watch television on fridays as a treat for yourself or I simply remember your routine, because I used to share it with you, and remembered you were in the area. instead you said something far less extravagant, but still lacking the nonchalance to cover up the meaning.
“figured you’d be awake,” you replied.
“ah.”
it was the truth. you needed a ride, and the convenience of calling osamu was your only source of reasoning. not because you wanted to see him.
another gaze that seemed to bore heart shaped holes in your head, and you were starting to wonder how long it would take for the light to be green. was traffic always this slow so late at night?
osamu took a breath, the air pouring into his lungs and filling his chest for a long moment. the subtle movement was not lost on your eyes, for despite being fixed on the road ahead, they simply could not resist analysing him.
“i’m glad you called me,” he said.
for someone so steady, so calm, he had a way of taking you by surprise. there were many things you had expected him to say to you. you expected him to lecture you, to bring back the sorrowful memories of how things had been — actually, you had not expected to find yourself this near to him at all.
“you are?”
he nodded, a strand of hair falling into his eyes and curtaining him in gentle shadows. he had let it grow out, never really bothered to follow up with his barber as often as he once had. he looked good, really, just… tired. as though he could not be asked to care anymore. “yeah.”
you let out an exhale. you had been almost sure you had misheard him, but the confirmation made something content and nostalgic bubble in your chest.
for the first time that night, you lifted your eyes from the dashboard and looked at him. really, truly looked at him in the flesh. it was a refreshing change from the fuzzy lenses of your memory, contorted by longing and the dread for the next day set to be lived alone. he looked much more real like this, much more human. his eyes met yours and there was something that clicked, the tension in the air fading and melting into blissful nothingness. a clean slate, possibly.
he hesitated before he continued, but decided to go for it, and chalk it up to exhaustion in the morning. “missed seeing your face.”
a small smile pulled at your lips, and you had to bite your cheek to refrain from letting the satisfaction bleed any further into your face. “did you, now?”
he shot you a glance as the car began to move again, unimpressed. “don’t push it,” he replied, but there was a hint of fondness concealed beneath the stubborn command. in truth, he was just happy to see a bit of your spark again.
he let out a small huff of amusement, breathing into the car and ridding it of any tethers to the past. the crushing pressure weighing down on your frail heart seemed to lift, eased by the simple sound of his voice. every passing streetlight felt like a step closer to something different, something more right than fleeting moments and the knowledge of the end. it felt familiar, and yet entirely new at once.
missing osamu miya was agonizing. having him close felt worse, but ultimately, was all you had ever yearned for.
grieving you was the most difficult thing tetsuro kuroo had ever done.
there were days where he found himself turning to his left when he thought of something funny, only to be met with aching silence and the whisper of a presence that is no longer to be. as he walked in the streets, his fingers twitched with the urge to reach out, but his conscious stopped the muscle memory from acting on itself under the recognition that your presence was nowhere to be seen. the warmth radiated from your being no longer enveloped him, no longer smothered him in the affection that came with basking in the light that was you. there was a dooming emptiness that followed him everywhere, nothingness that never had the capacity to speak up yet still embedding itself into his heart and expanding within until it was a hollow shell of something that once beat for you.
his skin shed the familiarity of your touch, the way soft hands had once cradled his face and smoothed over the ridges etched into him by years of being strong. he no longer felt strong. the composure had been torn from him the moment your eyes fell shut for good, as if you had desperately grasped to him yet only brought with you his ability to remain who he had thought he was to the other realm. the dips of your palms, those that had felt personally carved to slot against his bone structure, were a mess of lines and plush flesh that seeped so deep into his skin he could no longer recount it off the top of his head.
he remembered you. he promised himself he could do that, and he was always confident in his ability to memorize things. after all, you had been his most cherished subject. but there were days where it simply was not enough; the unfulfilled love he no longer had a place to deposit consuming him from the inside out. and although the steady rhythm of your heart was engraved into the song of his soul, it no longer beat, and that was agonizing. what had once been a melody of bliss and youth had turned to the blues, a soft tune telling the story of tears shed over a life meant to live, but left abandoned.
kuroo was always the shoulder to lean on, the rock in the midst of raging tides. but now he found himself collapsed on the floor of a bedroom you had shared long ago, chest constricting with a phantom pain and breaths rapid as if the oxygen was not enough to keep him going. his shoulders shook as the sobs racked through him, each one crawling up his throat more painful than the last. what was he supposed to do when his rock was the one that had been ripped out from under him — was the reason his soul had been corrupt at all? for once, he felt lost. the memory of your voice had begun to fade no matter how many times he replayed old videos, and he could no longer find it in himself to imagine you guiding him through it. every word twisted with the shudder of death, and each time he pictured your face there was a swirling darkness in the horizon that reached out to you and snatched you away all over again. a blade of grief had been punctured into the tender bits of his soul — or was it just that he could not bring himself to deny the very thing that had once held you, too? the cool metal had once relished in the sweet embrace of your warm blood and, no matter how far into the afterlife his dreams brought him, that was closer to you than he had ever been.
every bit of his being ached, bones worn and chipped. he still wore his signature grin every day — maybe to put up a front and maybe because he knew the way it brought your mood up seeing him happy — but he was growing increasingly exhausted with pretending his future had not shattered and cut his hands as he sought out the shards. that grin was pulled into a straight line now, lips parting with a cry far too often. no matter how hard he bit down on his cheek, they just could not stop. he felt empty and sorrowful, a cocktail of dizzying negativity, as though his soul was so distraught without you he did not even know how to grieve. this was not the way he wanted to figure out soulmates were real. if he was so intertwined with you, why was it that he was left here, wrapped up in someone that ceased to exist?
why was it that he was here and you no longer had the privilege? what made him worthy of life more than you were, and yet doomed to eternal suffering? why was he the one left tracing your face in tear stained polaroids as if somehow, memorizing you a little further could bring you back to you?
seeking did not always lead to gentle findings. no matter how much tetsuro sought out the euphoria of having you breathing, he would only ever be met with dusty recounting of the millisecond it stopped.
loving sae itoshi is quiet. it is longing glances shared across the room while his manager drones on about him needing to remedy his public appearances. it is heated looks after sae scores, as if telling you that this is your man: that he is all you could ever need. it is those long cat-like blinks he does in consecutive threes. a silent i. love. you.
loving sae itoshi is behind closed doors. he keeps a hand on you, looped over your hip or tucked into your back pocket; but not much more, when out. however, the moment his apartment door clicks shut, his nose is pressed into the crook of your neck, lashes ticking against your skin. he lets out a quiet groan as he coaxes you onto the couch, practically draped over you like a blanket.
loving sae itoshi is annoying him to no end. sae has a special ringtone for you, to get him to actually answer the phone. but it doesn't bring him that same joy when it's blaring in his ear from beside his pillow at two in the morning. nevertheless, he answers. only not because it's you...
loving sae itoshi is making late night snack runs. he answers your call only to find out you're parked outside his apartment and want fast food. he hates that processed garbage, thinks it's the worst thing someone can do to his body. still, he drags on a shirt and shimmies his way down into your passenger seat.
loving sae itoshi is cracking jokes in the solace of just the two of you. you rest your hand over his thigh, one hand on the steering wheel all leant back in your seat. that's how sae drives. he doesn't even say anything, just snorts and clasps his hand over yours: thumb running along your knuckles.
loving sae itoshi is being spoiled. even if you're the one driving, who had woken him up and so rudely dragged him from his precious sleep. his card is wordlessly shoved into you hand when you get to the window. sae would never let you drop a dime if he was around.
loving sae itoshi is trying new things. even though he hates fast food, when you dangle a nugget dipped in your sauce of choice in front of him: he takes it. he can feel the extra laps he'll run tomorrow over this singular bite, but he'd run himself dead to see you smile like that.
notes ... crack, profanity, jealousy (guess who...), isagi slander, karasu is a pro at going off topic, our diva chigiri!!!
nagi pov...
your pov...
> you and chigiri eventually took the time to make a plan during lunch, but you ended up getting side tracked.
> hiori is a bit worried for your wellbeing. he's happy that you're trying to find happiness, but he's not happy that you seem to always get cheated on or ghosted.
> bachira indeed visited isagi again today. luckily, none of you go to isagi's school, so nobody knew.
> in nagi's eyes, reo was oddly pissed today. he kept glaring at every person that even came close to him (except nagi, of course) and was pretty much on edge. huh. what a mystery