Summary: In the midst of all the junior's tears, on this graduation ceremony day, it seems that someone is missing; which doesn't escape Kirino.
Tears ; the pain of the heart, of the soul. Deep affliction, undisguised sorrow, intimate pain that flows on all these cheeks, like those salty pearls. This distressing spectacle could have seemed unusual, singular, yet it was not so; every year, on the same date, it used to take place. Every year, on this last day of school and graduation ceremony, teachers could witness the same moving farewells, the same touching embraces, the same teary faces.
The third-grade students were parading on the stage to get their certificates, while, as mere spectators, the younger ones simply watched the scene, most of them with burning furrows on their cheeks. And among them, Tenma was probably the one who hid his sorrow the least, to such an extent that when the ceremony ended, as soon as they arrived in the club's changing rooms, he jumped on all his senpai's neck, his face deformed by tears.
"Shindou-senpai!" he sobbed, not wanting to let go of his senpai, who did not stop a smile on his lips.
"What will we become, without you!" added a tearful Shinsuke by his side, clinging to Shindou's leg, while Hikaru cried silently.
The complaints mingled in the room, and it didn't take long to bring tears from almost all the elders, from Hamano to Kurama, through Shindou. Only Kirino, his eyes however moistened by emotion, had not yet let the slightest furrow come to decorate his cheeks. His curious and confused gaze had first wandered over the entirety of the people in the room, before starting to constantly watch the door, as if someone was about to join them.
"Kirino?" Shindou called, to his side, probably the only one who knew him well enough to be able to see the disappointment that was drawing his features. "What's going on?"
"Shindou. Nothing important, don't worry, it's just that I thought he-"
"Say! Why wouldn't we have one last match, all together?!" asked Tenma aloud, cutting Kirino in his sentence without even realizing it.
The enthusiasm that flowed from this proposal was such that the defender finally preferred to leave his words in suspense, while the outline of a smile took place on his lips. Maybe Kariya was going to join them because of the call of football, after all.
Their uniform on, they joined the field. With the club's growing popularity, there were enough of them to make two teams, while the tears had been replaced by sparkling smiles. But once again, only Kirino remained disturbed, and his azure irises roamed the horizon absently.
"Tenma," he started, also catching the attention of some of their comrades around them. "Do you know if Kariya will join us?"
"Um...," the captain thought. "I doubt it, he said he was going home."
"Ah?" Kirino frowned. "He didn't even say goodbye…"
"He did, he came after graduation," replied a thoughtful Hamano who had followed the conversation. "You didn't see him?"
Kirino's face, which had tingled a little with annoyance, at the idea that his friend going home when it was their last day to see each other, relaxed a little under the effect of surprise. If he had well seen him, sitting next to Hikaru, before going up on the stage to get his certificate, he had not had the slightest opportunity to cross his path after that.
"No...," he murmured, lost in his thoughts.
"It's weird, yet he came to say goodbye to us one by one…"
Kariya had taken the trouble to greet all of them except him, before quietly returning home. No matter what the concerned faces of his comrades were, in front of him, no matter what order of words they were trying to put together, to be a little tactful; the facts were there. Wasn't he even worth it enough to make him stay five more minutes to see him too, after all they had been through together?
This simple thought alone stirred the defender's anger, who didn't wait a second longer to run towards the school's exit.
"Play without me!" he threw behind his back to his perplexed teammates, without waiting for an answer.
His feet crashed on the ground with rapidity, and each sound that reached his ears would exceed him even more. If he'd hurry, he could probably catch up with him soon. And he better do so, because he had to admit that, although they had done a part of their way back to school together more than once, he had no idea where he lived...
Curious faces turned in his direction as he ran through the entrance doors of the establishment, without him paying attention. A quick glance at the green traffic light and he had already crossed the road, to follow the river. In the distance, that so familiar blue hair that he had searched everywhere finally became visible in his field of vision, and Kirino felt a strange knot of apprehension forming in his belly.
"Kariya!" he called, so loudly that the few people around them all turned towards them.
Kariya immediately stopped his slow walk, his eyes wide open. For a second, the possibility that this voice was only an illusion, a bad prank of his conscience, crossed his mind, so much so that he hesitated before turning around. However, when he did, Kirino was standing in front of him, a few metres away. His frowned eyebrows and accusatory look made him swallow, realizing that the possibilities of subjects were limited.
"You already left ?" he asked. "What about the others?"
"And what about you?"
Kariya frowned. He had certainly not expected such animosity through these four miserable words. However, the reproach was there, he felt it fly in the air, slip on his skin, browse these beautiful blue eyes that faced him.
"I wasn't feeling very good, so I thought I'd better go home," he lied, before turning, ready to go back on his way.
"Was that a reason to say goodbye to everyone... except me?"
Maybe Kariya's heart had just missed a beat, in front of the unspoken pain that these words had brought. And maybe he'd never admit it. As if to drive the nail in, and unaware of the boy's face, which was getting more and more tense, while he could only see his back, Kirino continued:
"It was probably our last day all together, and I thought our relationship was worth enough for you to take time to…"
However, his sentence had no end, and the words simply died in the air. Fugitive, ephemeral, a reflection of the sadness that probably prevailed in his midst. And it did not escape Kariya, whose fist clenched by reflex, before the atmosphere of the moment took over these feelings that he was trying to repress:
"You don't understand...," he murmured, before letting the silence fly between them for infinite seconds. "Celebrating a departure, two paths that separate and may never meet again... This is a farewell, isn't it?"
Kirino's face, which had in turn suffered anger, misunderstanding and then sadness, now took on astonishment, a completely visible mask of surprise, before his features receded.
"You didn't want to say goodbye to me because... you didn't want our paths to separate?" he risks, not totally sure of his interpretation.
Silence answered him, and a sweet smile appeared his lips. Kirino was about to take a step forward, when Kariya's voice rose again in the air:
"What will I do, if you're not here?"
The words slammed in the air, to come and violently strike the soul of the older one. He hadn't seen this coming.
"If you're not here to scold me in the morning when I'm late? If you're not here to yell at me when I shoot others in their back without them noticing? If you're no longer here, to just be with me? If..."
His hands, clutched to the hip of his bag as if it could determine his survival, were trembling, as did his voice, which broke even more with each word that crossed the wall of his lips. He sniffed loudly, and Kirino didn't need much more to understand that he was holding back from crying. And yet, unable to break the invisible bonds that prevented him from taking the slightest step, the graduated teen remained motionless.
"If you're no longer here to help me study the program you understand better than I do, when you did it a year ago?" Kariya continued, articulating more and more slowly. "If you're no longer here to defend the goal with me..."
It was too much. Tears were now running down his tense face, which he tried to hide as best he could, keeping his back to his Kirino's. His cheeks, reddened by the tears that came to trace their hot furrows to die in his neck or on the corner of his lips, were burning him. Despite all his efforts not to let it show through, Kariya could not ignore his own shaky shoulders, the few sniffles that escaped him despite himself; so much so that when Kirino's hand landed on his shoulder, he stepped forward to free himself. There was no way he could be seen like this.
"Kariya...," the older one whispered in a soft voice, as his face had completely calmed down. "You know, just because we're not in middle school together anymore doesn't mean we'll never see each other again."
Silence welcomed his words, yet Kirino only had to look at his friend's hands, which slowly fell down his body, to understand that they had hit the mark.
"We can always meet outside, after school or on weekends," he continued. "I'll have to come and see all of you sometimes. Who's gonna scold you after that, otherwise?"
Yet another sniff, much louder – and classless – came to answer him. However, the younger one did not move a single millimetre, as if he was waiting for a follow-up to these words. But sometimes, words simply couldn't match all the emotions that were too difficult to express.
It was in this state of mind that Kirino broke the short distance that separated them from a simple stride, before wrapping his arms around him. A soft, warm embrace, which carried in its bosom this wave of feelings that he could not manage to externalize.
Kariya was crying. The simple idea that they were about to separate was enough to distort his face, to flood it with all those tears that did not deserve the slightest contact with those delicate cheeks that he guessed red. How else could he have answered that, after all?
The youngest's eyes widened when this body simply touched his back. His mouth opened and closed several times, a sign of the indecision of his words as well as his astonishment, and it was thus Kirino who took the floor first:
"I could still help you study, if you need it. My schedule may be a little busier, but I should be able to fit you somewhere in it," he explained with a smile on his face.
"But..."
"Goodbye does not necessarily mean farewell, Kariya," the older cut him off. "We often say goodbye in the evening, and then say hello the next day. And, a year goes by quickly, we'll also be able to protect the goal together again, after that.
Without thinking for a second about the situation nor his tears that he had tried to hide, Kariya emerged from the embrace in which he was caught to turn around. Kirino had a soft, soothing face like he had never seen before, and that was enough to make him understand that he had not just imagined the implication behind these words: he said that on purpose.
"Protecting the goal together next year means... in the same high school?"
Still with this warm look of him and a simple nod of the head, Kirino approved.
"The school where senpai goes is not far from where I live," Kariya thinks, as if he had already forgotten the events of the few minutes before. That would be the main reason," he added, turning his head with that proud look he wore every time he felt embarrassed.
Kirino let escape a sight laugh, but didn't add any comment. He used to be able to read in Kariya, although he had difficulty being honest with his feelings. But after what had just happened, he certainly wasn't likely to believe in that high school near his home excuse.
"Come, we're going to join the others. Would be a shame if I missed this last match with all the junior!"
"Ah? I remind you that I was coming home before you came in like a fury!"
"Yes, yes," the pink haired boy replied the boy, placing the tip of his finger on the reddened cheek of the youngest, which started to ignite at this simple contact.
Seeing the amused smile on his senpai's face – before he turned around –, Kariya uffed out his cheeks. Why on earth would his body have to react in spite of himself and blush on his own?
"I guess I'll also get bored and miss you, this year," Kirino whispered in a barely audible voice, looking up at the azure vastness of the sky.
"What did you say, senpai?"
"Nothing. Come on, let's join the others!"
Without waiting for the slightest answer, the slightest grumbling, Kirino grabbed his teammate's wrist and dragged him into his race. He also may have feared this separation for long, too; but if Kariya was as reluctant as he was to cut this bond between them, he probably had no reason to worry about the future.
I’m sorry for the delay it took me to answer this sweetness, I just suck at using tumblr fjbfdkdbx but omg thank you very much, I’m so glad you liked it !!
Whenever Fudou felt that crimson look on him, it was easy for him to guess what it was screaming. After all, he didn't need to see them to guess the veil of emotions that flew over the surface of those scarlet eyes.
And each time, he enjoyed it.
I love the way you hate me
Every aggressively spoken word was like a bulwark that he could build between them. And every sketchy smile was, however, like the imperative need of his soul to demolish this invisible concrete block.
If the hatred he guessed behind those goggles was divine, the adrenaline that flowed through his veins as they both ran on the field made him, each time, feel even more alive. And just for that, he would keep acting as he always had. As they always had.
When his feet slipped on the dirt floor of the ground, nothing mattered. The deprecatory glances did not penetrate his field of vision; just as the accusing words that flew in the air wasn't important enough to reach him.
You say I'm a freak
I say I am free
Things had changed a lot since their first meeting. Since their second too. Fudou could not say for how long now their relationship had taken this turn. The tension that charged the air at the beginning of Inazuma Japan, when they were confronted, had given way to a very different tension. To a tension they were the only ones able to perceive.
Or maybe it was because the air could look so abruptly sweet only when they were alone.
"Kidou! Fudou! We'll be eating soon, are you coming? You're the only ones missing!" Endou's voice echoed from the steps leading to the ground.
They both considered themselves for a short second, before Kidou spoke, in a voice as powerful as the goalkeeper's. "We'll stay here a little longer, we'll join you later!"
He did not need to question Fudou about his willingness to go back eating or to stay. He knew it. Because that was how they were, after all.
Few words. Few acts.
Many acts?
"Do you plan on keep being lost in your thoughts for a long time?"
Fudou's words had the merit of snatching him away from these futile thoughts, allowing him to realize that he had remained motionless, one foot on the ball.
"Is it a habit of yours, Kidou-kun, to daydream like that?"
His brows furrowed behind his goggles, while a thin smile appeared in the corner of his lips. This smile, though not warm, which broke every time the bulwark that Fudou was trying to build.
Take another shot at me
I love the way you hate me
Once again, the air had been covered with this magnificence that they both loved and hated at the same time. This tension charged with feelings which they could not put the slightest word on.
Fudou would probably always enjoy the clenching face of his teammate when he approached too close to take the ball. Enjoy how much his lips told him to back away, while his soul screamed, asking him to stay, to come closer. Enjoy shivers that he guessed slipping on his body when their hands touched despite themselves in an innocent and involuntary contact.
You say I'm insane
I say you're afraid
Once again, Kidou's face started to wear this delicate – and yet almost imperceptible – pink hue that he loved so much. Fudou did not need to let out a single word nor to ask any questions to understand.
Few words. Many acts.
Too many acts, probably. And not enough words.
The memory of lips looking for each other, out of sight. Of hands that finds their way and clutch together with both delicacy and envy at the same time. Of repressed, not assumed eyes contacts.
Those red cheeks were definitely just as divine as this hate hidden behind goggles.
Disturbed by the tension that was flying around him, Kidou missed the ball which was shot with the same ardor as what his teammate's feelings contained, and soon it drove further away from the field. Fudou's lips stretched in a thin smile in front of this sight.
It was only when the strategist left the dirt ground to go looking for it that they both realized that the darkness of the night was now swallowing the place. The lampposts posted all around the field had allowed to hide the slow disappearance of the sun, while they were too focused on the ball and the presence of the other to notice it.
After seemingly endless seconds while Kidou, drowning in the darkness, still wasn't coming back, Fudou began to walk slowly in the direction he had previously taken.
"Kidou, you bring it or what?"
A groan of discontent reached his ears and, although dubious, Fudou went in its direction. His eyes, soon finally used to the night, distinguished the silhouette he was looking for, actually illuminated by the soft whitish light of the moon. Kidou seemed to let his eyes slide across the horizon absently, looking for the missing ball.
"You find it or what?" Fudou said, his hands in the pockets of his shorts.
"No, why did you shoot with this strength?"
The brown hair boy shrugged his shoulders as a response, before breaking the few meters that separated them with long strides. Kidou made a slight recoil, and the pale rays of the moon allowed Fudou to see him frowning a little.
"You're not even looking for it, you're just running away from me."
"And why would I run away from you?"
Hands avoiding each other.
Eyes dodging each other.
I'd rather be a freak than be a fake
Ground hiding under feet.
Bodies finally being like magnets.
Tell me I'm a freak
Tell me I'm a creep
Skins touching each other.
Breaths asking to merge together.
Lips looking for each other.
Hate me
Burning skins.
Mingled breaths.
Inseparable lips.
I get stronger from the pain.
Breathing, feverish breaths.
Time seemed to slide at a crazy pace, as if to match the rhythm of their heartbeats. Far away, it seemed that Endou's voice was calling their names, without a doubt because of their absence at this late hour of the evening.
They should go back. Probably.
Then, one last time, Fudou revelled in the taste of these lips in front of him, just for a second. In the smile that slowly stretched them. In the sight of those flushed cheeks that crashed on his retina – but at this very moment, he could guess he may be the same, after all.
And tomorrow, again, they would act as if nothing had existed.
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