Ushijima Wakatoshi x Reader
masterlist.
writer’s block is a THING and instead of powering through the royal!au like i should, i listened to this song on repeat and wrote soft, mildly OOC ushijima. do i love this - no, but i do love the idea of a soft ushijima so here it is.
word count. 6.4K
Looking up, way up, your eyes closed as an expression of glee morphed its way onto your face. Your lips pulled into a blinding grin up at him and Ushijima wasn’t sure what was brighter, the setting summer sun or your smile.
It wasn’t obvious to most people but as far as boyfriends go, Ushijima Wakatoshi was at the top of the list. He was attentive, understanding, a bit clueless when it came to some things but willing to admit his mistakes and almost always made up for them. It took some time for the two of you to get together, having class with one another your first and second years of high school. It came as a surprise to most of the school population when the first day of your third year came around and you two were seen walking across campus holding hands.
He had just returned from a weekend trip to another prefecture for a short training camp. You had offered to greet him as he got off the bus so the two of you could grab a quick drink at the cafe down the road before curfew rolled around on campus.
Ushijima had an arm wrapped around your shoulders, holding you close to his chest as he looked down at you with that subtle smile he seemed to have reserved just for moments like this with you. Oblivious to the rest of the team still piling out of the bus behind you.
“Wakatoshi-kun~” The melodic sound of his best friend’s voice came from behind you. You flitted your eyes over to the side to glance at the red head, goofy grin still gracing your features. “(Y/n)-chan, your boyfriend promised to bring me back that purple tea they have!”
“I’ll make sure he remembers, Tendou.” You pocketed the money Tendou had been holding out to you and then returned back to your boyfriend with an expectant look.
Ushijima never used to think that being in a relationship was important. After his parents divorced he certainly never gave thought to it, then you sat next to him on the first day of your first year of high school and he suddenly started thinking about these things a little more.
The feeling had been unfamiliar to him for the first year he knew you. Ushijima performed at the highest level of high school athletics and hardly broke a sweat, but when you looked at him with your bright eyes his palms felt clammy and his neck would get warm. It wasn’t until about halfway through his second year when he brought it up casually to Tendou that he was informed that the feelings he was having were in fact romantic.
You had been surprised but thrilled on the day that you and Ushijima got together. It was awkward at first because you had been sure that he was the one who was confessing to you, but somehow you had done all the talking.
You didn’t mind though, because months later you were sitting at a table in a small cafe sipping on your favorite drink as the dark-haired boy across from you spoke softly about his time away. His olive eyes caught in the light of the setting sun, flashing brightly as he looked down at you when he was describing a part of the weekend that was particularly amusing to him.
-
Even with a professional sports team having their home base in town, it wasn’t every day that you saw someone well over six feet tall wandering around the local market. His height caught your eyes first, but what made you double-take was the familiar look of concentration etched into the handsome features as they debated between what head of lettuce to pick.
“Wakatoshi?”
Few people in his life actually called him by his given name, and even if that weren’t the case he would recognize your voice in a crowd of people. He hadn’t thought about you in some time, but the idea that you were there - right there - was enough to make his normally steady heart flutter just the slightest bit faster than normal.
Ushijima looked down at you, eyes widening ever so slightly when he recognized you. Your hair was different, shorter maybe. He greeted you with a shallow bow of his head. “(Y/n), hello.”
You still had to crane your neck way up to look at him. The smile you flashed up at him, your face pinching in what he hoped was excitement, was a familiar sight for him and he hoped the tingling at the base of his neck wasn’t enough of a blush for you to notice.
“What are the chances, huh?” You adjusted your grip on the shopping basket in your hands, a few of the items shifting around as they were jostled.
“Are you living in Miyagi again?” He asked, setting down the food he had been choosing between to have all his focus on you. Ushijima always gave his full attention to anyone who he was with, so it was a little easier to adjust to his intense gaze since you knew it was coming anyways.
“Oh! Yeah, just last month actually.” You waved absently in the direction of the doors to the store. “My dad needed some help with the house so I put in for a transfer for work.”
Ushijima nodded as he listened, a memory flashing in the back of his mind of being at your childhood home once. You had invited him to the weekly dinner you went home for with your dad, Ushijima remembered how excited you had been for him to join since it was the one thing you looked forward to most weeks. You and Ushijima had bonded early on in your relationship about your parents being divorced, it was how your friendship began in the first place.
“He is still so disorganized about some things, it’s a wonder he even - ah, oh boy.” You chuckled as you interrupted yourself, catching Ushijima shift his weight from one foot to another as he continued to listen to you attentively. “I’m rambling and you definitely have better things to be doing.”
“That’s not true at all.” Ushijima was quick to interject, but not interrupt. His expression was still pretty stoic, but his eyebrows raised just barely enough to animate his face. He looked at you with such honesty, such reverence, you were sure that he really did want to hear everything you had to say.
You continued to smile at him for a beat before reaching out a hand, fingers wrapping around his upper arm with a gentle squeeze. “It is really good to see you, Wakatoshi.”
The feeling of the soft skin of your hand left a sparking sensation to rush up his arm. Ushijima wondered if your heart was beating at the same rate his was, loud and heavy in his ears. He hoped you didn’t notice.
-
You chewed at the inside of your cheek, lips pursed off to the side as you sat on the steps that lead up to your house. Your dad was inside gathering the last of the things you’d need for the trip to move you into your college dorm, allowing you a bit of privacy as you prepared to say goodbye to your boyfriend of almost a year.
“I don’t believe it would be fair to make promises or commitments,” He said, his voice steady, as if he were speaking to his teammates about their next round of drills. “I don’t want to disappoint you.”
“Disappoint me,” You sniffed a little, the sound almost bitter as you spoke. “You could never disappoint me, Wakatoshi.”
He looked over at you. You sat with your legs pulled up to your chest, arms wrapped around them as your chin rested on your knees. He shifted, enough to make you glance over at him and notice that he was moving to wrap an arm around you to pull you in closer to his side. You leaned into the warmth, head falling into the juncture between his arm and chest.
“I’ll never forgive you for breaking my heart,” You teased, moving to wrap your arms around his thick torso to settle into one last comfortable embrace. He knew you were joking, knowing you well enough to tell when your tone wasn’t too serious, and he let out a soft, breathless chuckle. “But you can make it up to me.”
“And how is that?” He let out a content sigh, rubbing soft circles into your arm.
“Win,” You said plainly. “Make it worth it.”
The simplicity of your request made Ushijima look down at you in adoration, although you didn't notice since your focus was on the cars passing in front of your home. It wasn’t surprising that Ushijima stayed quiet after breaking up with you, he had reached his limit on emotional strain for the day and was content to just sit with you in his arms one last time.
“You can also get me tickets to the olympics,” You added with a sad smile, letting go of the grip you had on his waist and giving the taught muscles on his abdomen a few solid pats.
“I’ll do my best,” He chuckled, actually chuckled, and gave your hair a slight ruffle.
The door behind you opened, revealing your dad as he haphazardly shoved a few papers into his travel bag, pushing his glasses up his nose to get a better look at the two of you. He smiled fondly at Ushijima, obviously having no idea the heartache you were currently going through - mistaking your tears for simply being sad to say goodbye.
Ushijima walked you to the passenger side of your dad’s car, one hand resting on the roof and the other holding the door open as you tossed your bag onto the floor. Neither of you really had it in you to say goodbye, so you settled for a sad smile while Ushijima simply nodded before shutting the door.
Too busy wiping the tears that immediately fell from your eyes, you didn’t notice the way he waited at the front steps of your house until you were completely out of sight. Ushijima had never felt such a pain in his chest like that, but he would tolerate it since he knew it was for the best.
-
“Medium soy latte please, no foam.” You rummaged around in your purse for your wallet, phone in one hand making it more difficult than it needed to be.
“Still avoiding dairy.”
It was more of a statement than a question, but you still whirled around with a flourish at the voice that came from behind you. You knew it, even if you hadn’t run into him just days earlier, you’d always know it.
“Wakatoshi, are you following me?”
He startled back slightly at the joking claim, taking just longer than a moment to catch your smirk before the corner of his mouth curved up ever so slightly. “I’d like to think I would be more subtle.”
Your eyes widened when he retorted, pleasantly surprised that he was playing along. “Toshi, you’re about as subtle as a gorilla, but keep dreaming big guy.”
He let out a soft snort of laughter, glancing back up at the menu before placing his own order with the barista. “And I’ll get hers,” He nodded his head at you to indicate for the cashier.
“You don’t-“
Ushijima held up a hand, dismissing your protests as he handed over a few bills and dropping the remaining change in the tip jar. The two of you moved out of the way of the other customers, standing idly by the pick up area until your orders were called.
“I have a few minutes, do you want to sit and catch up a little?” You asked, blowing on your drink through the small hole in the to-go lid. “If you’re not busy that is!”
Ushijima nodded his head, letting you know he had nothing going on and leading you to a table by the window of the cafe. It was as if muscle memory had taken over his body, one hand guiding you by the lower back to the very same table that the two of you used to sit at as teenagers.
“This brings back memories,” You laughed as you took your seat. Ushijima’s face was blank, not seeming to understand what you meant. “This table? It's the same one we always used to sit at in high school?”
It was like he woke up from a dream, shaking his head slightly at the realization. His eyes widened slightly then his expression shifted into one of more ease, “I didn’t even realize where we were.”
“Classic Wakatoshi,” You joked, taking a sip of your drink but stopping yourself to make a correction. “I shouldn’t say that, you were always very attentive.”
Ushijima twisted around the drink in front of him, not entirely sure what to do with his hands at the moment. His eyes trained on your face, admiring how many of your expressions had stayed the same even though your features had matured. Your eyes still narrowed when you were teasing him, your nose scrunched up when you were thinking.
“How is it being back in Miyagi?” He asked, finally diverting himself away from just staring at you. “I always thought you wanted to get out.”
You sighed with a shrug of your shoulders in an almost noncommittal way, “I did.” You started. “But when dad got sick he needed help… and Kyoto wasn’t really all it was cracked up to be.”
“I didn’t know your dad was sick,” Ushijima said. “I could’ve helped.”
“Wakatoshi, how would you have known?” You half laughed, sending him an admiring smile. “We haven’t talked since high school.”
“...Why is that?” He asked, blunt as always, getting right to the question that he had been wanting to ask for the last few days since running into you again.
“Well,” You paused to take a sip of your drink. “After we broke up, there wasn’t really any reason to talk, you know? I don’t think it would’ve been fair - to either of us.”
Ushijima nodded, having to agree with what you said. A lapse of silence fell over the two of you, but not necessarily something that was uncomfortable. You found yourself admiring him from across the table as he looked out the window of the cafe. The way he had grown into the mature features he always had as a teenager, finally seeming to look his age. His dark hair was a little shorter but still styled as simply as it always had been, his olive eyes alert as they glanced around - landing on you and catching you staring.
“Things are going well for you, Toshi?” You asked. “I haven’t been good about keeping up with volleyball lately.”
He nodded, going into surface-level detail about his volleyball career and what was going on with his team. He appreciated the way your eyes widened and jaw dropped when he told you he was playing on the same team with the setter from Karasuno, a flood of words spilling from your lips as you interrupted him to ask more and more questions. When you seemed satisfied with all the answers, you slumped back into your chair with an awed expression.
“You seem like you are doing well.” Ushijima wasn’t sure what the feeling in his chest was - he was glad to see you looking happy but at the same time he also wanted to know what - or who - was making you happy.
“Yeah, you know I really thought things were going well for a while there.” You said, shrugging your shoulders up to rest your elbows on the table in front of you. Your chin was propped up in yours hands as you gazed at Ushijima, his attention unwavering. “But being back in Miyagi, being here? Things kinda feel better.”
Ushijima had to agree - although he never really left, having gone professional right out of high school for the hometown team. Having run into you the last few days made the stress of his everyday life, the pressure he put on himself, more bearable.
“Uprooting your life couldn’t have been easy.” He said. “I’m sure you left special people behind.”
“Nah,” You shook your head with a slightly crooked smile. “No one important.”
The two of you talked much longer than the spare few minutes you had mentioned having. Before you knew it, the sun was setting outside, street lamps were lit, and the cafe workers were counting the registers. They were too polite to ask you to leave earlier than absolutely necessary, plus they had a bet going over who exactly you were to the professional athlete that had gone to the private school down the road years ago.
You mentioned, offhandedly, that you had been coming to this cafe again after work every day - out of habit from high school or from simply looking for a way to fill the hours of your day. Ushijima took note of that, and after ‘running into him’ at the same time for the third day in a row, you started to look forward to your tomorrows a little bit more.
-
“Semi Eita, did you have to wear a bow tie?” You scolded the boy standing in front of you, his chin raised so that you could better see what you were doing. The silky, pink fabric of said bow tie slipped around in your fingers until you finally managed to get it looking just right.
“Tendou insisted it matched his aesthetic,” Semi’s date, a second year and his sister's best friend, rolled her eyes from her spot next to you. The two of you had matching stances in your dresses, hers a soft pink and yours a deep maroon, both your fists propped against your hips as you continued to scold the third year.
“It was the only thing that would match!” Semi wailed, throwing his hands in the air. “Some of us have to dress up a little more to look good.”
You had to suppress a giggle at his anguish, turning to see how he was pointedly looking at your boyfriend standing a few feet away. Ushijima did dress up nicely, being much bigger than your average high schooler he filled out the suit he wore well. As attentive to detail as he always was, he had made sure to ask you well in advance what color your dress was so that he could get you flowers to match.
“The guy isn’t even wearing a tie and he still looks like a model,” Semi continued to gripe as the group came together again.
“Ties are uncomfortable.” Ushijima responded, earning a deadpanned look from everyone around. Ushijima Wakatoshi may have been raised proper, but if he wasn’t comfortable in a tie he wasn’t going to wear one.
You had to laugh at the reactions of your friends, Tendou joining in with his own howl as he lazily draped an arm over his own date’s shoulders for support. You twisted your own hands around Ushijima’s left arm, beaming up at him as you always did.
This was the third time you’d gone to this dance as dates with Ushijima, the first as a couple, and the last as high school students. You were determined to make as many memories as possible, starting off with an excessive amount of pictures taken before. All the guys had rolled their eyes at your insistence of meeting in front of the dorms before heading over to the gymnasium where the dance was being held, but after a while they had warmed up to the idea of posing in their suits and soon they were requesting more pictures than the girls were.
“(Y/n), let me get one of you and Ushijima!” Semi’s date smiled at you, waving her phone around in her hand. You nodded and tugged on your boyfriend's arm to pull him over to the side where the ivy was twisting its way up the wall and served as a perfect backdrop for a picture.
You shuffled around a little bit, your dress getting caught in the heels of your shoes as you stood in the grass. Ushijima noticed and bent down slightly to grab at the layers of your dress, fluffing and straightening out the fabric so it lay behind you in delicate waves. He glanced up at you from his spot on the grass, kneeling just enough to not get his suit dirty. You had twisted around from where you were facing, reaching an arm back to cup his chin gently, puckering your lips in an air kiss with your eyes closed.
Ushijima twisted his head ever so slightly and pressed a soft, chaste kiss to the palm of your hand before standing up to his full height to stand next to you again. From a few feet away, Semi and his date glanced at one another from behind her phone. The constant movement of the camera shutter flickering was silent, but the actions between Ushijima and you were caught in still moments forever.
-
Ushijima sat on the floor in the middle of his apartment, surrounded by boxes of memories. Everything from old volleyball jerseys to worn coloring books were all jammed into organized boxes, labeled with their contents. He was going through the box labeled high school when he came across a large envelope that looked like it was stuffed as full as it could get.
When he opened the envelope he felt the corners of his mouth twitch ever so slightly. Dozens upon dozens of pictures were stuffed into the envelope, even without looking at many of them Ushijima could feel the memories piling on his brain. Glancing at the clock on the stove in his kitchen, Ushijima realised it was nearing the time when he would need to leave if he wanted to catch you at the coffee shop again.
You had sworn that today you would pay for the drinks, but if he beat you there and was already ordered then there was nothing you could do about it - right?
After changing out of his sweats and into something a little more presentable, Ushijima was almost out the door to be on his way when he glanced back at the pile of memories. His eyes landed on the envelope filled with pictures and made up his mind to grab the one picture he had pulled out and tucked it into his back pocket.
“Ack! Wakatoshi!” You wailed as you shuffled through the front doors of the cafe, cheeks flushed as you pushed your hair out of your eyes. “I was supposed to pay this time!”
He simply chuckled as you dramatically plopped yourself down in the chair across from him and attempted your best glare. Ushijima shuffled around in his own seat, leaning off to the side so he could reach into his pocket and pull out the picture he had brought with him.
“My mom is moving and dropped off some old boxes,” He started, setting the picture on the table and sliding it over to you. “I found this.”
You tilted your head to the side slightly as you took a sip of your drink, shifting your gaze down to look at what he was handing to you. Your eyes widened considerably and you quickly set down your cup to slip the picture out of his hands to get a closer look.
It was a picture from the last dance the two of you went to in high school, a candid moment you hadn’t even known was captured on film until now. You remembered that night perfectly; what the two of you wore, the music that played, the jokes that were made. The longer you stared at the picture the more Ushijima could see your eyes starting to lose a little bit of focus, almost like they were welling up with emotion. He knew there were two things you were looking at in that picture that would make you feel that way: the way you looked down at him as he fixed your dress, and the way he looked up at you as you held his face.
“I…” You started, looking up at Ushijima then back down at the picture, doing your best to snap out of the short daydream you had fallen into. “I uh, didn’t even know about this picture. That was such a fun night.”
“I think it got shuffled around when all of them got printed.” He explained. “There’s a few more from that night too.”
“You have more?” You asked, eyes lighting up significantly.
“There’s a whole package of them,” Ushijima told you. “I can bring them some-”
“No!” You interrupted, catching him off guard. “I mean, yes I want to see them but why don’t we go through them together?”
“Yes,” He nodded, continuing what he was going to say before and not entirely catching what you meant. “I can bring them here next time-”
“Wakatoshi, no.” You chuckled. “I mean together like together, over dinner… or something.”
Ushijima paused, watching you as you lifted your eyebrows expectantly. “That would be nice.” He said, calm and collected as always which was the opposite as you felt when you responded back to him.
“Okay great,” You nodded, sitting up straighter but leaning forward a little bit and narrowing your eyes at Ushijima so he understood what you were about to say actually meant something. “I’m asking you on a date, you know that right?”
Ushijima had not known that, and he really hoped the shock he felt in his stomach was not evident on his face.
Always cool and collected, had you not been studying him so intently these last few days of getting together you might not have noticed the way Ushijima’s jaw clenched ever so slightly or how the very tips of his ears looked just a tiny bit pinker. He nodded slowly, not saying anything as he took a sip of his own drink. You were immediately brought back to that day before your third year of high school when he had asked to meet you to confess his feelings but ended up saying at most five words in total.
You were glad to see that Ushijima Wakatoshi hadn’t changed that much over the years. He still got flustered when you were forward with him.
“I’ll cook,” You added after a few short, silent moments. “I owe you for all the drinks you’ve bought.”
“You don’t-” He started, but cut himself off when you held up a hand to silence him, insisting.
-
Ushijima was not entirely thrilled to hear his good friend tell him he sucked at volleyball. He knew it was with good intentions, and not anything serious, but it still made him stop to think.
Tendou continued to ramble on through the phone, rattling off question after question. “What else is bothering you?” He asked, the background noise of wherever he was coming through the speaker.
“I don’t think anything else is bothering me,” Ushijima said.
“I don’t know if that’s true,” Tendou said in a singsong voice.
“Please help me understand.”
“Well,” Tendou started over the phone again, his voice slightly muffled as he was moving around. “It doesn’t take a genius to know that you still miss her.”
Ushijima froze slightly at the reminder. “Of course I miss her.”
“Wakatoshi-kun,” His friend’s voice was almost scolding at this point. “You made the decision to end things!”
Ushijima stayed silent as Tendou continued to reveal truths about him that he hadn’t even realized were present. He moved to stand up from sitting on the edge of his bed, feeling suddenly restless.
“Do you want to know what I think?”
“Of course,” Ushijima responded truthfully to his friend’s question. He valued his opinion and would have ended the conversation a long time ago if he didn’t.
“I think you have two choices to make,” Tendou said, voice raising slightly at the end. “I think you either need to hop on a train and go to her, OR you need to stop sending flowers and move forward.”
“How di-“
“You are a creature of habit, Wakatoshi-kun.”
Ushijima knew Tendou was right. He wasn’t particularly happy or pleased with the abruptness of it, but knew that in order to be fair to himself and to you that he had to be much more clear about things than he had been.
A week had passed, and while you’d never admit that you were waiting on a certain delivery, you came to find yourself disappointed when one never came.
“No new flowers from the secret admirer?”
You looked over at one of your roommates as she pointedly looked at the empty space on your desk. Since the beginning of the school year, almost every week a new floral arrangement had arrived to be admired by anyone who saw it. They were never big arrangements but they were timely and a constant thing, so it was easy for the new people in your life to take notice.
You brushed it off with an awkward laugh, returning back to reading the magazine in front of you while your roommates chattered on again.
“-mentioned getting tickets to the Rockets game but I don’t feel like spending the money.”
“Who are they playing? If it’s a good game I’ll go.”
“I think the team from Miyagi, the Adlers?”
Your ears perked up at that name.
“Oh yeah!” One of your roommates turned their attention towards you. “(Y/n), doesn’t someone from your high school play for them already? Did you know him? What’s his name…”
“Ushi-something?”
“Ushijima! That’s right.” Your roommate snapped her fingers when the answer came to her. “I hear he’s amazing. Did you know him? You had to have known him.”
“That’d be so cool,” Your other roommate butted in, already searching through her phone for details on the professional game that was a few days away. Not that you were checking. “Would you want to go, that’d be fun to see a familiar face right?”
“Um,” You started, looking over again to the empty space on your desk. You felt that it was a sign. Had the flowers shown up, with their typical message telling you to have a great week but no name telling you who it was from - although you always knew - you might’ve agreed to go. To see him.
But you couldn’t help but think that maybe now was the time to really let go. You didn’t need to see him, he certainly didn’t need to see you.
“Maybe next time?” You finally answered, turning from your empty desk to look at your friends. “I’m going to be swamped with work and homework, so I should probably lay low this weekend.”
“Ugh I know,” Your roommate dramatically flopped onto her bed and began a long rant about how much her professors were piling on.
Your avoidance of their questions was soon forgotten and even you managed to stop thinking about your high school boyfriend - you were moving on.
-
You quickly set down the spoon you were using to stir the meal on the stove when you heard the sound of knocking on your apartment door. Slightly flustered, you did your best to brush the hair away from your face and took in a deep breath before opening the door to a waiting Ushijima.
“Hi,” You greeted, slightly breathless.
“Hello,” He responded. After a moment of staring at one another, you stepped to the side to let him in, motioning through the doorway with your hand.
You happened to glance down and see that he was holding something in both hands. One had what looked to be a very stuffed envelope and you assumed those were the pictures he had been talking about a few days earlier. The other hand was extending towards you, a slightly jerking motion as if he just remembered what he was holding when Ushijima saw you looking down.
“These are for you,” He held out the small bouquet. It was mostly greenery with just a few flowers in the middle. It was very simple and very beautiful, something that you wouldn’t just notice off the street but definitely something you had to search for.
“Oh!” You smiled, pleasantly surprised at the gesture. “You didn’t-”
“This is a date, right?” He said, actually interrupting you which was very out of character for him. “I always got you flowers on our dates. This just seemed… appropriate.”
Your smile softened at the thought, remembering back to your time in high school and how the desk in your dorm room third year was never without some kind of floral arrangement for the entire year that you were together. “It’s beautiful,” You told him, beaming up at him and catching his gaze. “Let me go put it in some water.”
Ushijima followed you through your home, noting the subtle decorations that he knew mirrored your personality so well. You ended up not living too far away from where he was currently living, so it was a wonder the two of you hadn’t run into one another sooner than just a week ago.
“Dinner is almost ready,” You said as you set the arrangement on the edge of a window, a place where you could admire it every day. “I tried to make it less spicy than normal, I just couldn’t remember if you liked spice or not-”
You continued to ramble on, whether from nerves or just to fill what would otherwise be silence. Ushijima didn’t mind though, your endless commentary was almost soothing to him as he sat on one of the barstools at the counter in the middle of your kitchen. You offered him a drink and poured one for yourself as well, sliding the glass over to him and cheersing them together.
“I’m really glad you came over, Toshi.” You grinned, leaning forward against the countertop as the food simmered behind you. Resting on your elbows, you played with the glass in front of you to keep your jittery hands busy.
“I am too,” Ushijima responded, taking a moment to glance down at his own hands before looking back up at you. “I was actually very surprised when you asked me to come over.”
You made a confused face, jerking your head back slightly in reaction. “Why would you be surprised?”
Ushijima shrugged, an uncharacteristic sign of him not really being sure. “We hadn’t talked in so long-.”
“Are we just ignoring all the meetings at the cafe?” You laughed, taking a small sip of your drink and smirking at him over your glass.
“No, I suppose not.” He said. “After everything that happened, I just assumed you wouldn’t want anything to do with me again.”
You sighed as you stood up a little straighter, lips pursing off to the side as you thought through how you wanted to respond to him. You’d been imagining this moment since long before you ran into Ushijima in the supermarket that day.
“Toshi…” You started, pausing to make sure he was looking at you as you spoke. You had a feeling that you wouldn’t be able to work yourself up to say these things again, so you wanted to make it count. “You were… my great romance. The love of my life… I can’t imagine a life where I want nothing to do with you.”
Ushijima stared at you, processing the words you spoke in his mind. The moment seemed to stretch and you started to feel as if you’d maybe said too much, that you had maybe overstepped the boundary and all the recent time you had spent together wasn’t as you had felt it was.
“That was too much,” You said, hoping you weren't cringing as much on the outside as you were feeling on the inside. “I’m sorry, I just kind of felt-”
“(Y/n),” He stopped your rambling. You looked up, afraid to meet his gaze but knowing you had to. “This last week has been very nice being with you again.”
“Why do I feel like there is a but coming,” You sighed, getting over your mild embarrassment but still feeling like something in the pit of your stomach was about to drop.
Ushijima actually chuckled at that, “But.” He almost exaggerated the word as he set his hands palms facing down the countertop before him. The look he gave you was serious and made you straighten your back, unable to turn away from him or his olive gaze. “I want things to be clear where we stand.”
“Right,” You nodded. “I totally understand, I overstep-”
“I’d like to give this another shot.”
The two of you had spoken at the same time so it took your mind a moment to register what all he had actually said. You startled slightly, your head tilting and eyes widening significantly as he looked at you with his very typical calm and collected demeanor. Your mouth opened and closed a few times as you tried to process and think of the right thing to say back to him in your surprised state.
“I thought you didn’t want to make promises,” You remembered the words he once spoke to you, the first time you’d gotten your heart broken. “Or commitments outside of volleyball.”
“I never meant any of that.” He said, his tone confident, as if you should have always known he felt that way. “I do not like leaving things unfinished and I feel as though this past week has told me that you and I are not finished.”
You had to contain the beaming smile that was threatening to split your face and instead looked at Ushijima before you with a slightly teasing smirk. “Wakatoshi, you are being very romantic right now. I’m not sure how to handle it.”
“I remember you appreciating subtle gestures of romance,” He looked down away from you as he smiled softly. The gentleness of it all made you have to bite down on your lip to hold in the squeal of glee you’d otherwise let out. “I hope I’m not being too forward with this.”
“Not at all,” You answered confidently.
The two of you stood in a comfortable silence for a short while after that, the familiarity returning as you gazed at one another - both lost in your own minds and not knowing you were feeling and thinking the same thing. That you were falling again, quickly and unafraid.
