akisaeko/tsukkiyama 10 things I hate about you au... and akiteru is Kat and saeko is patrick and I may have to do a little personality altering but I need some tskym... and maybe Kuroo as Joey but less of an asshole because I love him and he's silly and he gets with kenma eventually... guys how do we feel...
Hello, everyone! I am excited to present my story for the @hqbb! My partner isn’t ready to post quite yet, but very soon I will be able to share some sweet art to go along with it. Enjoy!
Akiteru breathed in deeply, his honey-gold eyelashes fluttering as the frigid winter air flooded into his throat. Snow flurries danced around him and settled on the black fabric of his thick winter coat. Above his head, the sky was nearly as pure white as the thick blanket of snow blanketing the ground and smothering the pines surrounding them. Akiteru closed his eyes and tipped his head up, enjoying the tickle of the snowflakes against his skin, until the peace was shattered by an absolutely earth-shattering squeal.
Akiteru turned his head just in time to see Shouyou leap from the tiled roof of their rented log cabin and cannonball into the thick snowdrift piled against the front corner of the building. Ryūnosuke and Yū hung out the small window of the third-floor attic, hooting and hollering. After a second, Shouyou’s head popped out of the snow drift bearing an absolutely sunny grin, and he shook his head vigorously to dislodge the clumps of snow clinging to his tangerine hair. Akiteru exhaled wearily as the boy clambered out of the snow.
Maybe I shouldn’t have agreed to be a chaperone…
The Karasuno volleyball team, after a stunning performance in the qualifiers for the spring tournament, had been given a trip to a ski resort over the winter break by a local well-to-do. The boys had all jumped at the chance to escape from the humdrum with a week of winter fun— so eagerly that Coach Ukai had anticipated that he and Coach Takeda would have a bit of difficulty managing the crowd of energetic young men. As such, he had approached Akiteru about chaperoning the trip.
Akiteru had agreed. It totally wasn’t because Saeko Tanaka had also been asked to tag along as a chaperone because Akiteru totally hadn’t been crushing on her for months. Nope, that definitely wasn’t it, no sirree.
Yet he couldn’t help but stare dreamily at the woman as she walked out of the cabin, tucking her blonde hair behind her ear while she smiled at the wind skipping across the porch. It ruffled the gray scarf wound around her neck and made the little white pom-poms on its ends bounce against her shiny, black, form-fitting parka. Akiteru’s shoulders sagged when he heaved a wistful sigh, watching the wind play with her pretty blonde hair and the faux fur lining the hood of her jacket.
Okay, so maybe Saeko had a little bit to do with why he agreed to chaperone the trip, but he was also looking forward to skiing!
“Akiteru!” Oh, her voice was so pretty, especially floating on the winter wind. He had to struggle to keep his neurons focused as she came down the steps. The snow crunched under her boots as she walked up to him. He noticed that her cheeks were already a bit pink and chapped from the insistent wind, and he had to physically suppress the urge to cup her face with his mittened hands to warm her up. “While the boys are all settling into the cabin, would you like to go check out the snowboarding slopes with me?”
Akiteru frowned thoughtfully at the sky; with it eclipsed by the thick, cottony clouds, there was no way to tell how far off they were from sunset. In fact, they’d planned to spend today simply traveling and hadn’t scheduled to hit the slopes until the following day. However, Akiteru knew that he was snared when she batted those long eyelashes at him and gave him a little wiggle of her shoulders. Oh, she had him wrapped around her little finger.
“Okay. We can go check it out,” he agreed with a smile. Saeko clapped her hands together in delight, and his breath stuttered in his chest when she jumped forward to give him a quick hug.
“Yay! Let’s go!” she cried, and before he could recover, she grabbed his hand to start dragging him down the snow-plowed path toward the ski resort’s main buildings. His brain felt like a toaster in a bathtub, sparking and overheating, but thankfully his body was able to work well enough. He stumbled after the excited girl, his face shining pink against the biting wind. All he could focus on was the fact that Saeko was holding his hand, she was holding his hand. He resented the thick fabric of their mittens getting in the way, because he would love nothing more than to know if her skin was as soft as he’d always imagined…
Despite the hour, there were still plenty of people populating the slopes near the resort’s main building. They careened down the slopes on skis or snowboards with excited whoops or relaxed on the gondola on the slow and scenic ride back up to the top of the mountain peak. Saeko gawked at the snowboarders decked out in full gear, their goggles reflecting the blue of the sky they couldn’t see, and the colorful design of their sleek boards. Akiteru thought they were just coming over to look, so he was shocked when Saeko hauled him over to the rental counter.
“Excuse us! We’d like to rent two snowboards, please! Our tab should be under ‘Karasuno,’” she breathlessly told the attendant.
“Saeko!” Akiteru protested with a nervous look at the sharp slope just yards away. “I thought we were just—”
“What?” she said jeeringly and tossed a sultry grin over her shoulder. “You aren’t chickening out on me, are you? Can’t handle a little snow?”
“Th-that’s not it,” he mumbled and shuffled his feet as he looked down at them. The last thing he wanted was to look uncool in front of Saeko, and surely just one or two trips down the slopes couldn’t be too bad. “Fine, I’ve always wanted to try snowboarding.”
“That’s the spirit!” she cried, and the attendant rang them up for two snowboards.
After directing them to the nearby snowboard racks, the attendant piped up, “We’re monitoring reports of an incoming storm, so please be back within the hour for your own safety. The mountain is dangerous even on a good day.”
“Thank you!” Saeko chirped before dragging Akiteru over to the rack. She cooed delightedly at a black, gray, and white board patterned with multiple criss-crossing stripes. She plucked it off the wall along with a pair of goggles and dashed towards the beginning of the slope with the board hefted over her head. Akiteru chose a simple blue-and-black one with matching goggles and followed her to the launching zone, where she was already strapping the board to her shoes.
“Have you ever done this before, Akiteru?” she inquired.
“No, but how hard could it be?” he smiled as he set the board down in the snow. Strapping the board to his feet was simple enough, but when he straightened up, he found that he might be in for a little more of a challenge than he initially thought. He pinwheeled his arms as he leaned back a little too far and nearly lost his balance. Saeko giggled as he swung his body back and forth trying to regain his equilibrium, and when he finally righted himself, he smiled sheepishly up at the pretty girl. “Okay, so it might be a little hard.”
“I think you’ll do fine,” she hummed. “At the very least, it’ll be entertaining for me,” she added with a smirk, then pulled the goggles down over her eyes.
Before he could respond, she tossed him a wink and then hopped off the launching zone onto the slope. Her giddy laughter floated on the wind behind her as she zig-zagged down the flat expanse of icy snow, weaving around the pine trees to vanish within the forest. With a gasp, Akiteru yanked his goggles down and pushed himself off to follow, wobbling on the board as his speed picked up. It took him a minute to figure out that he needed to lean his body to turn; he screamed as he rapidly sped towards a fir tree, and he only just managed to lean to the left to avoid it, though a low-lying branch smacked him over the head.
He spat out pine needles and looked up to see the snowy trail of Saeko’s board drifting over the wind, fluttering alongside her giddy squeals. He could only catch wisps of her form amidst the flurries; she flitted in and out of the white powder like a fairy, her smile brighter than the white snow surrounding them. Her jubilation made Akiteru’s heart flutter in his chest, as he was reminded of just how much he loved that big ol’ grin of hers.
Okay, so Saeko had a lot to do with him agreeing to chaperone this trip, and as a matter of fact, he was using it as an excuse to finally confess his feelings to her. Of course, he couldn’t worry about that right then because he was too busy trying to avoid plowing face-first into the pine trees littering the slope.
She might be the death of me in more ways than one, he thought with a wan smile. He supposed there were worse ways to go out, though.
“Akiteru!” Her giddy call brought him out of his thoughts, and he lifted his head to find that she had slowed a bit so she could snowboard beside him. She beamed eagerly as she coasted around his left side, waving a gloved hand at him. “You’re pretty good at this!”
Akiteru went to smile, but he forgot momentarily to pay attention to what was in front of him. Another low-lying branch smacked him right in the lower jaw. His yelp was muffled by a mouthful of thick, hard-packed snow spilling into his mouth. He pinwheeled his arms as his upper half bent backwards, and for a second, all he saw was the cloudy gray sky above. Somehow he managed to right himself, and over the sound of him spitting out the snow and pine needles, he could hear Saeko cackling hysterically.
Well, girls love guys that can make them laugh, right? Yeah, that wasn’t very convincing. He wiped at his mouth with a pout and looked over to her. Tears were leaking out from underneath her goggles and freezing on her rosy pink cheeks, and as she held her belly against the body-shaking guffaws that wracked her frame, she still managed to jerkily avoid the obstacles before them. She’s much more a natural at this than I’ll ever be, he thought with a smile and a shake of his head.
Still… He had to admit that it was nice, coasting over the snow like water down the mountain slope. He gently tilted his body to maneuver through the barely-discernible paths in the snow, using the feel of his board to guide him down the path of least resistance. All around him, snow flurries and Saeko’s squeals of delight danced in the wind. Yes, right now, there was nowhere else on Earth that Akiteru would rather be.
They snowboarded down the mountain several times, using the gondola to make the slow ascent back up. Up in the air, Akiteru could really appreciate just how beautiful the landscape was; the snow blanketed everything for miles, and the snow-dusted pine trees stood like stoic soldiers against the wintery backdrop. However, as they approached the half-hour mark of their revelry, Akiteru began to focus less on the scenery and more on the worrisome shade of gray that the sky was beginning to turn.
He looked up at the sky once they’d made it down the mountain again. It had been snowing the entire time, but he felt like the snowflakes were coming down faster now, almost like thick rain. As the wind whipped up, tugging insistently at his clothes and nearly wrenching his beanie off his head, he turned to Saeko.
“Hey, I think we should head back,” he advised. He clamped his hand down on the top of his head as his beanie slipped lopsided a little, exposing his honey-colored hair to the fierce wind. “I don’t like the way this weather looks…”
“Eh? But the lady at the booth said we had a whole hour,” she frowned, but when she looked up at the sky and the thick, roiling clouds, her pouty expression turned pensive. “It does look kind of ugly… You’re right, we probably should turn in our equipment and get back to the cabin.” She hefted her snowboard over her shoulder and set off in a march toward the gondola station, wobbling left-and-right as her boots sunk down into the crunchy layer of top snow. Before following, Akiteru took one last apprehensive glance at the heavens and prayed that the weather would hold out.
Apparently, Akiteru had made too many prayers recently, and the gods of course decided to answer the one that would provide them the most entertainment.
The walk to the gondola station was a mere five minutes, but that’s all it took for the weather to get downright nasty. The wind turned into fierce gales that whipped up the snow and ice all around them, clouding their surroundings with white and silver. The wind’s howls and shrieks filled their ears. It shoved at them, making them toddle across the snow in their already unbalanced state. After the fourth time Saeko bumped into him, he decided just to wrap his arm snugly around her waist and tug her close so that they could push through the storm together. The weather was only worsening, and he wouldn’t want to lose her in the whiteout.
“Akiteru…” she said in a small voice, and he could just barely hear her over the wind’s insistent wails. She was using her free hand to cling to the back of his parka, and her grip tightened each time the fierce gales tried to yank her away. He couldn’t see her eyes through the tinted material of the goggles, but he had no doubt they were wide and fearful. He pulled her a little closer, trying to seem confident despite his heart stuttering in his chest.
“Don’t worry. The gondola station isn’t far. In inclement weather like this, they’ll have staff on snowmobiles to take us to the top,” he reassured her. He’d read that on the ski resort website somewhere, or at least he hoped so. Still, the comment had its intended effect— Saeko made an appreciative sound and snuggled a little closer into him.
He bit down on his bottom lip as his heart jumped against his sternum. Even with just his arm wrapped around her waist and so many layers, she felt so… soft. Not ever a word he thought he would use to describe a girl as feisty and bodacious as Saeko, but he could help but think of it at the way she so easily molded against him. Like she belonged there at his side.
Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, Akiteru, he scolded himself, closing his eyes and smiling pallidly against the raging icestorm. There’s the matter of this blizzard, after all! He cracked an eye open and was greeted with just a hazy white cloud being tossed around by the shrieking wind, with the shadows of the tall, skinny pines just barely discernible. He was grateful when the boxy silhouette of the gondola station took shape, too, and he hastily tugged Saeko toward it.
“Ah! They’ve already gone?” she exclaimed in dismay when they made it to the building to find no snowmobiles waiting. If they had been there at all, their tracks had been swiftly covered by the thick volume of snow raining down from the heavens. Unfortunate as it was, they had not the luxury of time to mope. The temperature had plummeted considerably; Saeko had been shivering for the last two minutes, and Akiteru’s face was long since numb and chapped from the biting wind. He tugged her over to the door to the building to grab the doorknob and give it a sharp twist. He was grateful to find it unlocked, and though the frost was beginning to creep over its surface, it hadn’t yet frozen shut.
He hurriedly bustled Saeko inside and then followed, shutting the door firmly behind them. Although the snow could pile up and block them inside, it was better than it spilling into their small shelter. The wind whistled through the cracks and the air vent in the wall, as if lamenting the loss of its prey.
“We should be sheltered from most of the cold in here,” Akiteru said. Though it was still a bit chilly, it was nothing compared to the freezing temperature outside. He walked up to the wide window facing the mountainside and used his glove to wipe away the frosty condensation, creating a small bubble to look out of. Though visibility was near zero, he could see the shadowy box-like shapes of the gondolas whipping back and forth on the thick wire lines. Occasionally, the corners of two would clank together to fill the air with a loud, echoing clonk! The gondolas definitely wouldn’t be in service until the weather improved, and there was no telling how long it would be until the storm passed.
“So… We’re stuck here,” Saeko said, slowly sinking down onto the small bench lining the opposite wall. Akiteru stepped away from the window while he nodded. He pulled off his goggles, hanging them on the edge of the snowboard before leaning it up against the wall next to Saeko’s. She pulled hers off too, revealing apprehensive eyes, and slowly set them down on the bench.
“Hey,” he said soothingly, walking over to sit next to her. He waited a second, then scooted a little close, his knee bumping against hers. She didn’t seem to mind; in fact, she gave his knee a little bump right back, the hint of a smile tugging at her slightly pale lips. “We’re gonna be just fine. We’re sheltered from the cold and snow here, and it’s ventilated. All we have to do is wait it out. When the storm clears, either someone will come find us, or the gondolas will start working again and we can coast right back to the resort.”
She giggled suddenly, making him raise an eyebrow. He didn’t intend to say anything funny.
Seeing his confused look, she said between little snickers, “Sorry! It’s just— you’re such an optimist that it’s hard to believe you’re related to Kei.”
“Ah, yeah,” he said with a lopsided smirk, tilting his head as he thought of his chronically grumpy and pessimistic little brother. “Sometimes I wonder if the only thing we have in common is volleyball. Not like you and Ryūnosuke, though. You guys are two peas in a pod.”
“You think so?” she asked with a delighted smile, and he nodded. Ugh, it was such a relief to see that pretty smile of hers. Subconsciously, he snuck his arm around her back, resting his hand on the bench next to her hip. If she noticed, she didn’t say anything. In fact, after a second, she tucked her head against his shoulder, right in the crook of his neck. The action sent a warm flush through his whole body, and it was a nice temporary reprieve against the chill beginning to settle into his bones. He just barely caught her whisper over the blood roaring in his ears: “When we get back… I’m gonna give him a big ol’ hug.”
“Heh,” he said, shifting his hand to cup her hip so he could tug her a little closer. “I would try to do that with Kei, but he’d probably push me away.” She snorted quietly in laughter, and then her eyes fluttered shut. She fell into a quiet doze against him, and Akiteru listened to the gentle sounds of her breaths. After a while, he tipped back his head; he couldn’t see the sky, only the thick concrete ceiling with the long, fluorescent light flickering against the cold.
Well, gods. I’m grateful you finally got me a moment alone with Saeko, but this wasn’t quite the divine intervention I was looking for. Of course, he didn’t get an answer, but he could surmise their response— “beggars can’t be choosers.”
Akiteru was just beginning to nod off himself when Saeko suddenly stirred, a low groan falling from his lips. He looked down at her in concern as she squirmed and groaned again.
“Saeko?”
“‘M cold,” she mumbled sleepily, and he blushed when she slipped down to bury her face into the cottony fabric of his parka and hooked her leg over his lap, grinding against him a little in her effort to chase his body heat. If she kept wiggling like that, it would develop into a very embarrassing situation. He quickly cleared his throat to get her attention, and she looked up at him with bleary eyes.
“Can… Can I try something?”
She nodded wordlessly. Taking a hold of her hips, he kept her still while he maneuvered himself until his legs were stretched out across the bench and she was straddling his lower lap. He shook his bangs out of his eyes and then slowly laid back, shifting slightly to get himself comfortable before presenting her a meek smile.
“Lay down?” he offered.
Saeko blinked at him. Then, slowly, she lowered the upper half of her body down against his. She kept her legs hooked around his waist instead of trying to tangle them with his, using her thighs to hug against his body. She rested her cheek against his chest, a hum rumbling in her throat, and Akiteru couldn’t help the shaky smile that bloomed on his lips. She felt so nice, so warm. “Better?” he asked quietly.
“Mhmm,” she answered. He expected her to go back to sleep, but instead she tilted back her head to gaze at him with chestnut eyes. They were still a little hazy from drowsiness, but there was a twinkle of lucidity in those warm brown eyes that had Akiteru reflexively wetting his lips with his tongue. “I’m glad I got snowed in with such a gentleman,” she joked.
“Heh, well, my mom did teach me to respect the ladies,” he said back, his smile widening. One would think he would be freaking out right now— there was a girl laying on top of him, for crying out loud— but he was strangely… calm. There was just something about Saeko that put him at such ease; there was something about situations like this that just seemed so… right. Familiar, maybe. Is this what people who believed in soulmates were talking about?
“You’re cute when you get lost in thought,” Saeko said, snapping him back to reality. His cheeks flushed pink when he processed what she’d actually said. He tried to play it off, give her a quirky little smile, but there was no doubt that she could feel the way his pulse jumped at her words. She adjusted herself on top of him, now laying chest-to-chest with her chin propped up on her crossed arms. She gazed at him through lidded eyes, and though he could tell she was thinking about something, he had no idea what.
“Can I try something?”
He blinked at her parrot of his earlier words. Struck speechless by the entire situation, Akiteru could only nod.
A foxish smile spread over Saeko’s face, which got his heart thump-thumping against his sternum again. Her arms slipped down to worm into the small space between his body and his arms, and she used the leverage against the bench to slide herself up a little. He couldn’t stop a small breath from leaking out as she moved up his body, pulling the hem of his shirt up a little. She smirked mischievously when she came nose-to-nose with him, fluttering those pretty eyelashes demurely despite the absolutely vixenous look on her face.
He breathed it out before he could even think about stopping himself: “You’re so beautiful.”
She turned shy in an instant. Tucking a stray chunk of her blonde hair into her beanie with a shy, “Yeah?”, she balanced above him while Akiteru just stared. He didn’t know what else to do besides immortalize this moment in his mind. After a few seconds, she clicked her tongue and tapped her index finger against his cheek a few times.
“You’re spacing out again.”
“Sorry,” he smiled apologetically. “But how can I when I’m in this kind of situation with an absolutely gorgeous girl? It’s enough to turn any guy’s mind to mush.”
She laughed at that, and that pure little laugh made his heart flutter in his chest. Oh, the gods had been gracious to him, indeed.
Saeko looked back down at him, studying his face with a slow and purposeful gaze. She paused when she reached his lips, and he didn’t miss the way she sucked in a breath. Her gaze flickered back up to his eyes, a silent request for permission, and Akiteru only answered with a widening of his smile. As much as he just wanted to grab her and kiss the rest of her breath away, he didn’t want to steal her thunder.
Saeko didn’t waste any time, of course. She leaned down to gently press her lips to his, and both their eyes fluttered shut at the meeting of their mouths. Her lips were as soft as the rest of her. Akiteru gave an appreciative squeeze of her hips before tilting his head, unable to resist sweeping her up into a series of sweet kisses. It made his head swim, how perfectly her mouth molded to his, and his fuzzying mind once again considered the fact that they could be made for one another.
They pulled apart, only a few centimeters, and opened their eyes to look fondly at one another. A thousand words they could never speak passed between them then, a mutual understanding established in an instant. Akiteru opened his mouth to speak—
and was interrupted by a deafening bang against the metal door of the gondola station.
Both of their heads snapped to the door, which, once again, heaved under a powerful force. Ice chipped in the small crack between it and the doorframe, clattering to the ground like crystal shards. After one more large heave, all the ice broke off and the door swung open with so much force that it bounced back all the way on its hinges and slammed into the wall. Asahi and Coach Ukai barreled into the room shoulders-first, their momentum carrying them all the way to the opposite wall. Asahi smacked chest-first into it and recoiled with a yelp, while the coach managed to catch himself with his hands.
“Ugh,” he grunted while rubbing his shoulders. “Are you kids all—” he fell silent when he looked at the two of them, and his eyes immediately blew wide.
Oh, right. Saeko was still on top of him.
“Nee-chan?” came an absolutely betrayed cry, and the two young adults whipped their heads back to the door to see Yū and Ryūnosuke crowding the small doorway, their jaws nearly on the floor in incredulous shock. Ryūnosuke rubbed his eyes vigorously and then looked at them again while blinking rapidly, as if he were trying to make sure it wasn’t some kind of illusion. Then, he slapped his hand over his chest and pointed at them with the other, sucking in a horrified gasp.
“How dare you!” he accused. Kei chose this moment to look into the doorway to see what all the fuss was about. He took one look at his brother, perched beneath Saeko with his hands on her hips, and his face curled up in disgust.
“They’re clearly fine. Let’s go,” he snorted and disappeared from the doorway, and Akiteru let his head flop back against the bench with a groan. He definitely wasn’t going to live this one down.
“I can’t believe this!” Coach Ukai griped, and they looked back to him to find him pinching the bridge of his nose and shaking his head. “We were worried sick about you two, trekking all through the snow, and you’re in here— ca-ca-canoodling?” he cried, spitting it out like a curse word.
“Hey!” Saeko whined back. She sat up and crossed her arms over her chest to glare at him, and Akiteru just laid there. Maybe if he tried hard enough, he could forcibly expel his soul from his body. “We were trapped in the blizzard, you know! The canoodling… kind of just happened in the last couple minutes.”
“So you were canoodling?” Yū whined. He flopped forward in a depressed slump, arms dangling and lips poking out in a pout as his eyes watered.
“Hey! Stop saying ‘canoodling’!” Akiteru complained loudly. “We were just— you know, sharing body heat…”
“And that involves lip-locking?” Daichi teased as he poked in his head, wearing a mischievous grin. Akiteru flushed pink and looked away. God, all these kids were such smart-asses!
“Hey, Ryū, does that mean you have to call him ‘Nii-san’ now?” Shouyou piped up, squeezing his head underneath Daichi’s armpit.
“Oi! There ain’t no way in hell I’m calling him ‘Nii-san’!” the boy fumed back, stamping his foot angrily. “Over my dead body!”
“No one said anything about Nii-sans!” Akiteru wailed. He flopped back against the bench again. All the energy was suddenly drained from his body. And to think, now he had to endure a whole week with all of these hooligans! Ugh, he would never survive, not with their incessant teasing. He looked pitifully up at Saeko, who just gave him that sweet little grin of hers that never failed to make his heart melt.
Well… He supposed he could get through it, considering a nice, proper date with no high schoolers waited on the other side of his torture.
Still, he couldn’t help one more prayer.
Gods, give me the strength!
Enjoy this oneshot? Feel free to peruse my Table of Contents!
Okay so I know it's probably never going to happen but imagine if Akiteru and Saeko got together and had a kid. Like, there are so many possibilities.
Akiteru teaches the kid to play volleyball of course, and he’s a really good, patient teacher who is proud of them no matter what. (Also I can 100% see him being a stay at home dad, taking the kid to school and keeping the house running in an orderly fashion)
Saeko teaches them how to play the drums from a young age. Thanks to her, their kid always has the coolest outfits to wear (although Akiteru does have to veto some of the fashion choices because, Saeko, you can’t wear matching studded leather jackets to my cousin’s wedding). They often sit around the motorcycle shop while Saeko works and watch in interest
Tanaka and Tsukishima (aka Uncle Ryuu and Uncle Tsukki) compete over who the favorite uncle is. It only started out when Tanaka kept claiming to be the kid’s favorite, at which point Tsukishima- who already doted on the kid anyway- really turned on the heat
The kid loves both of them for different reasons: They love watching Tsukishima’s matches (and getting to go to the museum, where Uncle Tsukki shows them all the cool dinosaurs!!!), and Tsukishima teaches them how to be a little shit and the two of them often gang up on Tanaka together
On the other hand, Uncle Ryuu has the best hugs and the best jokes, and always tries to find the time to come to as many of the kid’s events as possible. He always cheers way louder than any of the other kids’ families, and it’s embarrassing but also encouraging
Nishinoya somehow suddenly becomes the favorite uncle whenever he visits and it pisses them both off
“He’s not even here half the time”
“He’s not even related”
Noya takes offence and tells them he’s practically the third Tanaka sibling
The kid just adores him because he always has cool stories and brings back awesome gifts from the various places he’s travelled to
Tanaka and Tsukishima band together to win back their shared nephew’s affections (mostly through gifts and day trips)
Saeko and Akiteru are exasperated because, come on guys, it’s really not a competition, and Kei we do not have room for any more dinosaur plushies in our house please take that back
One time Saeko and Akiteru are both super busy and Noya is around so they ask Noya to run the kid to Ryuu and Kiyoko's place for babysitting so they can make it out on time
"No stopping off anywhere"
"Sure"
Noya and the kid roll up at the Tanaka's home two hours later with matching sunglasses, milkshakes and a volleyball plushie
Kiyoko is the cool aunt. She and Saeko actually become really close because they love sports and are generally quite chill in that they’re both good at getting along with different kinds of people. They take the kid for walks together sometimes, and the kid is so proud to be seen walking with the two most awesome women they know
They also love to race Aunt Kiyoko because, even as an adult who hasn’t raced in years, she’s very fast. She shows no mercy
When the kid was really little Tsukishima tried to teach them to call him Uncle Kei but Yamaguchi kept coming to visit because he’s still really close to the family and plays volleyball with Akiteru’s amateur team and he teaches the kid to say Uncle Tsukki
Also the kid loves Yamaguchi’s freckles and one time, when Akiteru mentions that Yamaguchi is coming to visit, they draw freckles on their own face (with marker pen). Yamaguchi wants to cry
Once when the kid was really young, like a year old, Kiyoko and Tanaka were babysitting and Yachi had come down to visit, and Yachi is alright with little kids but she has no idea how to handle babies so there’s this one super awkward photo that they always bring up when they see Yachi, of her sitting there with the kid on her lap and a panicked look on her face
With all of the influences in their life, of course the kid loves volleyball
They want to be a wing spiker
Tanaka takes it as a win
But it’s really because their parents watch all of both Hinata and Kageyama’s games on TV and their favorite players are Hinata and Bokuto. They really like Ushijima too but Hinata and Bokuto just have such chaotic energy that it’s inspiring lol
They follow the MSBY Black Jackals to Tokyo one time to watch a game as a family, and meet up with Tenma, who gives the kid tons of tips
The kid just hero worships Tenma for some reason, even he doesn’t get why. Hinata is like, same. Akiteru and Saeko shake their heads because they are not prepared for their kid to declare that they’re going to be the next Little Giant (and with the trend of heights in their families they know it’s not very likely)
Nishinoya feels threatened, his position as favorite uncle is being challenged
Hinata is always happy to chat away to the kid when he has the chance, and he joins Yamaguchi in convincing the kid to say Uncle Tsukki
They’re all just a big happy family and Akiteru and Saeko are so happy that their kid is growing up with so many loving adults in their life
im more of a ukai x saeko girlie but!!! i can enjoy akiteru kissing saeko too 🥰 they'd be cute together and akiteru needs a hottie like saeko in his life 🤭💕 like she is absolutely there to bring on the excitement and drag him into new shit 🙂↕️
Akiteru just wants to hold Saeko's hand. It looks so small and dainty, but he knows her palm is rough and calloused through multiple drumming practices. Akiteru's hand is rough, too, and he thinks about how her hand would fit so well in his, and how it's so warm and small and nice. Kei shoots him a dirty look from across the table and turns to their mom. "Kaa-san, nii-san is so smitten it's disgusting." -Moss anon.
