A Breath of Fresh Air
Word Count: 4700
Fluff, Romance, Light Angst, College AU
Summary: Hajime Iwaizumi's life has gone pretty stale compared to his friends. He's in need of a breath of fresh air, and it comes in the form of Hitoka Yachi.
Here’s my story for the Iwaizumi Big Bang! Me, using a Haikyuu!! bang as an excuse to write a new rarepair? Nahhhhh! Anyway, please go give my partner’s beautiful art lots and lots of love!
Have you ever been somewhere, knowing that you’re physically there but yet feeling so far away at the same time? Like you’re having an out-of-body experience or are a ghost, even, watching from outside your own body as it goes through the motions? It wasn’t a feeling that Hajime thought he would ever grow accustomed to, but he had. He’d quite mastered it, really, pretending to be present in front of his friends when he was really struggling to keep himself tethered to reality. They were none the wiser as they all sat around his living room, drinking beer and laughing like they always had.
One would think that Hajime would find comfort in routine. It was only natural, wasn’t it? However, it was routine that was turning Hajime into an astronaut of his own mind. His life at university had become muscle memory, a rinse-and-repeat ritual—learn the material, study it ad nauseum, take an examination, pass it with flying colors, and meet up with his high school buddies afterward. The strange thing was that the regime in itself didn’t bother him; he only experienced this strange dissociation from himself at the tail end—
when he had to listen to his buddies gush about their girlfriends for the whole weekend.
“Hellooooo? Earth to Iwa-chan?”
Tooru’s voice yanked Hajime back into his body. Hajime blinked while he reacclimated to the sensation of being in his own skin, staring owlishly at the man sitting next to him but not really seeing him. When Hajime finally did return completely to reality, it was to find that Tooru was pouting petulantly at him.
“What?” Hajime huffed and took a swig of his beer. He grimaced; it had long since gone flat. How long had he been sitting there spacing out?
“See? I told you he wasn’t listening,” Issei smirked from his seat in the armchair.
“Iwa-chan, how could you?” Tooru cried indignantly. “You said you wanted to hear all about my anniversary date with Hanaka, but you didn’t even bother to listen?”
Did he say that? Hajime honestly couldn’t remember. Ignoring Tooru, he squinted into his beer. Seriously, how long had he been zoned out?
“All right, all right, I see what’s happening here,” Takahiro piped up suddenly. The tone of his voice made Hajime’s gaze shift from the amber-colored liquid in his red plastic cup to the man’s smirking face. Takahiro sat up from where he had been lounging on the loveseat to point emphatically at Hajime. “Hajime’s feeling left out!”
“Left out?” Tooru echoed, then looked at his best friend with wide eyes.
“Of course!” Takahiro nodded. “Just think, guys, all we do when we come to see him is blab about how things are going with our girlfriends. When’s the last time we actually asked Hajime about how his life was going, huh?”
It was true, but Hajime didn’t want them to know that. He pursed his lips against the heat rising against his cheeks while he flopped back against the couch cushions.
“I am not feeling left out,” he groused. “I’m just tired. I just took a shit ton of exams, plus you know that alcohol makes me sleepy.”
“Hajime, you haven’t taken two sips of that beer since we got here three hours ago,” Issei pointed out.
Hajime frowned back at his cup. Shit, three hours? No wonder that shit was nasty. Sniffing, he leaned forward to set the drink on the coffee table, then sat back up and crossed his arms.
“Seriously! I’m not feeling left out!” he insisted, but he couldn’t make himself meet any of their eyes; his gaze bounced around the room, from the coffee table to the corner of the ceiling to the reflection of his blushing face in the flat-screen television. “Stop making it sound like I’m lonely or some shit!”
“You said it, bud, not us,” Issei snickered and raised his glass. Hajime growled, snatched up one of the throw pillows from behind him, and lobbed it at Issei’s stupid sneering face. Issei ducked the projectile with a mischievous cackle.
“Whatever! I’m going to get another beer,” Hajime snapped. His friends began to chorus apologies, but they rang hollow since they were stammered out between giggles. Hajime just ignored them and stomped out of the living room into the kitchen. He hoped they couldn’t see how red his ears were as he left.
“‘M not lonely,” Hajime grumped to himself as he flung the refrigerator open. He ripped a beer from the plastic rings and popped the tab; the air burst out of it with a hiss, followed by a stream of pale brown bubbles. Hajime immediately brought it to his mouth to sip, but the bitter taste didn’t drown out his frustration. Still sipping at the beer, he walked over to the counter and dug his hand into an open bag of chips. He shoved a few into his mouth.
Stale. Just like his life, apparently. Because that’s what happened with a family-size bag of chips—you couldn’t eat them all by yourself, and they’d go stale. Loathe as Hajime was to admit it, he was lonely. He craved what Tooru and Issei and Takahiro had, and that’s why he had to fly away in his mind every time they came around. Because they had it and he didn’t. They had their breaths of fresh air, and all Hajime had were stupid stale chips and flat beer.
But it’s fine, he told himself while he stubbornly chewed on the chips. I’m fine. Maybe he was a little lonely now, but it would pass. And he had plenty of time to find someone. It wasn’t like he never would. Right now, he just couldn’t go out of his way to find a girl. He had an education and career to focus on.
It’s fine, he told himself, even though the tough pill of beer and stale chips wasn’t easy to swallow at all.
Oh. It’s spring.
It had taken the entire commute to campus for Hajime to notice. The warm wind gusted into him as he walked into the liberal arts quad, bringing a cascade of cherry blossom petals with it. Of course it was spring; it was the beginning of a new semester. He paused on the sidewalk to pull a few of them from his hair, plucking the little silken ovals from his head before dropping them. They fluttered down, down, down until they joined the carpet of discarded blooms on the concrete. Hajime wasn’t really the sentimental type, but the sight brought a tiny smile to his face. He breathed in deep—
“Um, excuse me?”
Hajime whipped around. The perfume of cherry blossoms filled his nose right as the petite blonde girl behind him filled his vision. A breath of fresh air, he couldn’t help but think. And a familiar-looking one, at that.
“Are you… Hajime Iwaizumi?” the girl inquired. When Hajime narrowed his eyes with an intent stare while he tried to place her, a bright pink blush rose to her cheeks. She timidly hugged her textbook to her chest and began shifting her weight awkwardly from one foot to the other. “Y-you probably don’t remember me; we didn’t even go to the same high school, after all,” she babbled nervously. “But my name is Hitoka Yachi; I was the manager-in-training for Karasuno High School Volleyball Club when you were a third-year.”
A hazy memory floated to his mind. Yes, he could dimly recall a small blonde girl sticking to Kiyoko Shimizu’s side like glue during his third-year matches with Karasuno. That was it, though; he honestly couldn’t remember saying two words to the girl, ever.
He dimly recalled Tooru making some crude comment about how adorable she was, and for some reason, that made bitter jealousy burn in the pit of his belly. Even weirder, he was pretty sure that he’d felt the same way back then, too.
“Oh yeah,” he smiled politely. “I’m surprised you remember my name.” He immediately cringed on the inside; he’d basically just admitted to her that he basically had no idea who she was. No girl wanted to hear that, especially not from someone they bothered to remember. Wait, why did he even care? So what if Hitoka was a little disheartened by that? But he did care, and that’s why he continued with an awkward chuckle, “A-anyway, so, you must have just started university here, yeah?”
“That’s right,” Hitoka confirmed with a nod. The hue of her cheeks turned a little bit brighter, and she looked shyly down at the shiny white plastic of her flats. “I’m studying art and graphic design. I-it’s been nice so far, but, um…” She fell silent, her cheeks reddening more with each passing second. Finally, she grabbed the corner of a piece of paper sticking out of her textbook and yanked it out to thrust it out to him. “D-do you know where this building is? I can’t find it anywhere, and class is in ten minutes!”
Hajime took the piece of paper with an amused smile and turned it over to inspect it. It was a printout of Hitoka’s weekly schedule, complete with the class names, abbreviations, and locations. He skimmed over to the appropriate time block and squinted at it, trying to associate the building name with his admittedly incomplete knowledge of the campus. Why bother memorizing places where he would never have to go, right?
Luckily for Hitoka, he was quite familiar with the place she was searching for.
“Oh, I know exactly where this is. Matter of fact, I’m on my way to a class in there now,” he smirked and handed the schedule back to her. “It’s a small building just off the backside of the literature department’s building. It’s really hard to find on the map, so it’s no wonder you had trouble. I couldn’t find it either my first year. After walking into the wrong class for the third time, one of the faculty was finally kind enough to point me in the wrong direction,” he laughed, blushing a little at the embarrassing memory.
Wait, why did he even tell her that? Sure, he guessed he didn’t want her to feel bad for not being able to find it, but why mortify himself in the process? Thankfully, she didn’t seem to think one way or the other about his own previous bungle. Instead, her face lit up with a smile.
“Well, it’s a great thing that I ran into you, then!” Hitoka sighed with relief, pressing the paper to her chest as she did so. “I don’t know if I would be so calm, walking into three different classrooms only to find out I wasn’t supposed to be there! You really are something to have been able to still go to class after that.”
She’s cute, Hajime thought reflexively, and he hastily turned his back to her so he could hide his raging blush behind a hand. Ugh, was he so desperate now that he was catching feelings for the first female to say more than five words to him? She’s just happy that there’s someone she knows here, idiot! Don’t go confusing the situation for something it’s not!
He told himself that, but when he peered over his shoulder to see her smiling blissfully at him, his heart completely disregarded his brain to somersault in his chest.
“A-anyway,” he coughed into his fist before straightening up a little. “We’d better get you to your class. Mine is in the same hall, so I’ll walk you there.” He started walking without waiting for her answer but made sure to keep his pace to one she could keep up with.
“Really? You’re so nice!” she chirped and skipped forward to fall in step with him. Ugh, even the way she walked was so adorable that Hajime’s heart started playing his ribs like bongo drums. His head was swimming, intoxicated by her mere presence, and it was a struggle for him to keep his feet on the ground. So this is what they meant by the phrase “walking on air.” Only the acute realization that it was totally out of line for him to be head-over-heels for a girl he barely knew was keeping him tethered to the ground.
Come on, dude. Just bring her to her class and leave it at that. All that shit from the other day is just getting to your head. You’re not lonely, especially not enough to latch on to the first girl you see like some fuckin’ leech!
He should just walk along in silence. But of course, his stupid mouth had other ideas.
“Why do you sound so surprised?” He knew what the answer would be, but he still found himself nearly floating away when Hitoka pressed her hand to her bright pink cheek with a shy little laugh. That damn little giggle was the most beautiful sound he had ever heard, and if he didn’t keep a handle on his wits, he was going to start doing incredibly stupid shit to try and get her to do it as many times as possible in the next ten minutes.
“Heh, this is probably gonna sound a little silly, but… I guess I was just a little intimidated by you!” she admitted with an airy laugh. Oh, that should not have made his chest swell with some sort of sick pride. “I mean, my only interactions with you were in volleyball, and I’m sure you’re aware of how… intense… you were. It’s hard to tell if that’s just someone’s personality on the court or all the time.”
From the way she was averting her gaze and trying to turn her face to distract him from her blush, she liked intense guys. Hajime wanted to show her just how intense he could be if it meant she’d keep being this fucking cute. Literally, he had to swallow a fucking growl like he was some kind of feral animal when she peered out of the corners of her eyes at him with this coy little smile. And the worst part about it was that he knew she was totally oblivious to the effect she was having on him. She was just basking in the relief of being able to have someone she vaguely knew in this foreign world, and that was all.
Unfortunately, Hajime was in the goddamn stratosphere right now, with all his common sense left somewhere on the sidewalk a few yards behind.
“Intimidated, huh?” he purred. Holy shit, he didn’t even know his voice could rumble like that, but somehow it did. He must have also had some sexy smolder on his face or something, too, because when he smirked at her, she giggled and held up her textbook a little to try and hide herself. Hajime was sorely tempted to just say fuck their classes and spirit her away somewhere, somewhere where he could have those sweet little quirks of hers all to himself.
Another fuzzy memory bubbled to the surface of the back of his mind. He didn’t even remember when it was; some post-match party at Tooru’s house. Somehow they’d gotten on the topic of the cutest girls from each school, a frequent conversation that Hajime had usually refrained from participating in. Even back then, girls had just been some future endgame that seemed secondary to all his primary aspirations.
“You’re all wrong,” he’d grunted as the conversation was coming to a close. Tooru and Issei were bickering about who was hotter, Kiyoko from Karasuno or Yukie from Fukurōdani. The room had immediately gone silent, everyone within stunned that the normally disinterested Hajime had suddenly offered such a polarizing opinion.
“Oh?” Tooru had sneered in that infuriating way of his, the one that made Hajime want to suck the words right back into his mouth because he knew the guy was about to get under his skin. “Has a lovely lady finally caught Iwa-chan’s eye?” When Hajime had declined to answer, just pouting while playing with the strings of his tennis shoes, the bastard had squatted down to get in his face. “Come on now, don’t leave us in suspense! Who do you like the best, Iwa-chan?”
“Pfft. Don’t misconstrue what I’m saying,” he’d huffed, even though Tooru was right on the money. But Hajime had been prideful then, too, maybe even more so. “You’re all arguing about the cutest manager, but you haven’t even mentioned her. It’s obviously Hitoka Yachi from Karasuno.”
He’d said it like it was a simple fact, trying to deflect them from the truth—that Hajime Iwaizumi, for once, had actually thought twice about a girl. He hadn’t really been sure what he’d been looking for when he’d said it. Affirmation? Reassurance? Encouragement? Whatever it was, he hadn’t gotten it. They were just dumb kids, after all—so easily distracted by things like young love and attraction. Hajime had been forgotten in the wake of the reignited conversation, his momentary interest in the shy little manager-in-training buried as nothing more than a passing fancy.
It was Hajime, after all. He wasn’t looking for anything right then. Maybe he had gotten lonely sometimes, hearing the other guys talking about how much they got flirted with or gush about the girls they dated (for the few months they were together, anyway). But that would pass, he’d told himself to ease the bitterness trying to take root inside of him. He had plenty of time to focus on that later; graduating and getting into a good university was more important. And he’d told himself that every time he saw Hitoka after that, beat it into himself until he believed that instead of the terrifying fear growing inside of himself.
The fear that there was something wrong with him. That timing wasn’t the problem and no amount of waiting for his life to be settled was going to make a difference. That no matter how badly Hajime wanted it, that he was inherently broken in some way. That his life was just going to be stale chips and flat beer. And that fear had grown and grown and grown in the darkness of his own mind, and now, it was threatening to take him over.
“Hajime?”
Hitoka’s voice snatched him out of his spiral into the past. Though his mind had been in another world entirely, his feet had remembered the way, carrying him into the building and up the stairs to the second floor. He’d stopped short there, though, and had apparently just been staring off into space. He turned his head to see Hitoka looking at him, her eyebrows knitted in concern.
“Are you all right?” she asked.
He was still a little rattled from the jarring transition back into reality, so he just dumbly asked, “Aren’t you going to be late for class?”
“I still have a few minutes,” she said with a shake of her head. She hugged her textbook tightly, then asked quietly. “You seemed to be thinking pretty hard about something… and you looked… kind of sad.”
Hajime just laughed dryly and ran his hands over his face. He hadn’t realized he’d broken out in a sweat; in so doing, he smeared lines of perspiration from his forehead to his jaw. When he’d woken up this morning, he hadn’t expected to go on this intense emotional trip. His head pounded and ached, like he’d literally gotten whiplash jumping from his powerful infatuation with Hitoka to his earth-shattering revelation. Fuck, now he was tired, too—so tired that it felt like his eyelids had ten-ton weights hanging from them.
“I just, uh, got a lot on my mind,” he answered evasively. What was he supposed to say? “Hey, nice to see you again. You’re the first girl to ever give me any sort of attention so I’m immediately captivated by you in a way that’s definitely not healthy. Wanna go out? Totally no pressure, but if you don’t want to, I’ll probably want to die for a few days because it’ll totally confirm there’s something inherently unattractive about me.”
“I’m sorry,” she blurted suddenly, and she sounded so distraught that he immediately whipped around to gape at her. She had averted her gaze and was chewing anxiously on her thumbnail. “I’ve made things awkward, haven’t I?” His mouth opened to refuse, but the words stopped short in his throat when tears began to bead up in the corners of Hitoka’s eyes. “I made it totally weird with my obvious crush on you. I mean, what kind of girl immediately falls head-over-heels for someone, even if it’s someone they’ve met before?” she laughed bitterly. Hajime could only stare stuporously as she knocked on the side of her head as if she force the feelings out of it. “I mean, you barely know me. Of course you’re gonna be weirded out—”
“I’m not weirded out,” Hajime interjected. Hitoka stopped mid-sentence, just gawking at him with her mouth hanging open. Hajime was keenly aware of the heat growing in his cheeks, but he still repeated. “I’m not weirded out. In fact, I kinda… felt the same way about you.”
“Really?” Hitoka asked, a tiny smile growing on her face. Ugh. She really did look too cute, peering bashfully at him over the top of the textbook while trying to hide how elated she was.
“Yeah,” he nodded. He smirked shyly and reached up to rake a shaky hand through his hair. “I was all lost in thought ‘cuz… I’m not really good at the whole romance thing, and getting such intense feelings all of a sudden…” He trailed off, unsure of what he really wanted to say or how he wanted to proceed. After chewing on the inside of his cheek, he decided honesty was probably the best policy.
“I’ve been, uh, feeling pretty lonely lately.” He coughed after the words came out; they burned in his throat and on his tongue, but despite how mortifying it was, it was still nice, having them out in the open now.
“Yeah?” Hitoka said softly and reached out to gently run her fingers down the length of his upper arm. A comforting touch but also a flirtatious one, a sign that Hitoka was receptive to what he was saying. It was so much of a relief that he almost burst into tears right then, but he managed to reign his emotions in enough for there just to be a small tremor in his voice.
“Yeah, um… Ever since I was in high school, I guess… I saw how easy it seemed for all the other guys, and it made me feel like something was wrong with me. I just put it in the back of my mind, but… guess it finally came back to haunt me,” he smiled ruefully. He looked down at her hand, still resting on the bulge of his bicep, and then reached up to timidly lay his hand over hers. She didn’t flinch or try to pull away, and that made his lips curl up in a teensy smile.
“I didn’t want… I didn’t want all the shit going on in my head to cause me to do something unfair to you. You’re the first girl to really give me any sort of attention, and that made me really happy… But I didn’t want to act on that happiness for the wrong reasons.” He flushed and ducked his head, barking out a dry laugh, “God, that sounds so pathetic…”
“It’s not pathetic.” Hitoka slipped her free hand under his chin to gently lift his face. Hajime didn’t want to look at her, not when tears of self-loathing and frustration burned in his eyes, but she wasn’t going to let him not. She smiled sympathetically at him, then murmured, “It’s not pathetic to be kind.”
“Kind?” he repeated hoarsely.
“Yeah,” she nodded and tipped her head to the side as her smile widened. “A lot of people aren’t that considerate of other people’s feelings when they have the chance to make themselves feel better.”
“A lot of guys, you mean?” Hajime snorted. He knew that Hitoka didn’t want to insult him, but come on. He was a dude. He knew how shitty they could be.
Hitoka just giggled, dropping her head again. Damn it all, he still loved that giggle, and he still wanted to keep hearing it over and over and over.
“Whatever,” she laughed when she tossed her hair out of her face and looked up at him again. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with you at all.” When he just gave her a doubtful look, she laughed again and dropped her hand from his face to hit him firmly in the sternum. “Really! I think that you’ve just always known deep down that you want a real, meaningful relationship, and you didn’t know how to get that. And you were scared that you would never figure it out, so you just tricked yourself into thinking that you just couldn’t have it at all.”
It made sense. Too much sense. A scary amount of sense.
“Do girls just… know stuff like that?” he whispered in awe. Seriously, Hitoka had just rocketed to the most amazingly smart person ever in his eyes. She tipped back her head to laugh, then smiled in amusement at him.
“We’re sensitive to those kinds of things because we talk about them,” she shrugged. Well, that made a lot of sense. Hajime and his friends had never really talked about stuff like that, just… everything besides the mushy stuff. His consternation with it all must have shown on his expression because Hitoka giggled again. “Anyway, don’t sweat it, okay?” she hummed soothingly, smoothing her hand down his chest before giving it another soft pat of reassurance. “Now you know.”
“Now I know,” he repeated in a soft murmur. They fell into a comfortable silence, both of them just drinking in everything about the other. In the distance, the clock tower chimed the hour. Neither of them was particularly concerned about missing class now. “So,” Hajime said before sucking in a breath. “You got any advice on how I can go about getting what I want?”
Hitoka’s eyes glimmered mischievously, and she bit down on her bottom lip.
“Well,” she remarked in a slow drawl, her eyes glued to Hajime’s chest as she slowly ran her hand back up toward his shoulder. “You could start by asking me if I’d like to go to get coffee.” Her eyes flickered up to meet his, and the way they gleamed with expectation made a pleasurable tingle run up his spine.
“All right, then—we’re already late for class, so what do you say we ditch this place and go get some coffee?” he smirked.
“I say that sounds lovely,” she answered with a growing smile.
Hajime offered her his arm, which she took gladly. He spun on his heel to begin leading her down the stairs, but when they got halfway down, she tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention.
“Okay, so I have to ask. How is it that you have never gotten attention from a girl?” she huffed. When he just shrugged and gave her a shy grin, she insisted, “Um, excuse me, but you’re hot, Hajime.”
“I dunno!” he protested with a chuckle. He used his free hand to rub at the back of his neck, then looked down at her with an impish smirk. “Guess they all found me intimidating.”
“All the better for me, I guess,” Hitoka chortled. She squeezed his arm, then stood up on her tiptoes to prop her chin on his shoulder so she could fix her playfully sparkling eyes right on his. “Now I’m the one who gets to go out with you!”
Hajime just pushed her off his shoulder by jabbing two fingers against her forehead. She couldn’t hold her indignant pout for long and soon broke down into girlish giggles. Hajime began to get that floaty feeling again, but this time, he didn’t try to resist it.
He wanted to enjoy this breath of fresh air to the fullest.
