Rating:

Mature

Category:

M/M

Fandom:

Haikyuu!!

Relationship:

Kindaichi/Kunimi

Tags:

None

Stats:

Posted on:

2015-10-06

Words:

2,056

There are two other first years when Kunimi joins the middle school volleyball team. One of them has flat black hair and is slamming the red and green ball against the wall. The other is on the bench, tying his shoes. He has hair that reminds Kunimi of a shallot.

“Oh,” says the other first year, when Kunimi joins him on the bench. “Hi.”

Kunimi mumbles in greeting.

“I’m Kindaichi Yuutaro,” he says. “This is my first time joining a volleyball team. You’re a first year too, right?” He squints. “I think the other guy used to play volleyball before. He’s good.”

“Kunimi Akira,” Kunimi says, adjusting his kneepads. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Kindaichi says, again. “Have you played volleyball before too?”

Kunimi lifts a shoulder. “No,” he says.

“Good,” says Kindaichi, though it’s friendly and he runs his hands over his thighs. “Then I won’t be the only inexperienced first year. We can be inexperienced together.”

He looks at Kunimi, as if expecting a response. Kunimi watches his palms dig into his skin.

*

Kageyama is annoying, but Kindaichi seems to like him so Kunimi puts up with him. Kindaichi had found Kunimi in the courtyard for lunch, and they whinged about their fruit cups together. Then Kageyama had walked by, clutching his bento, and Kindaichi called, “Hey, Kageyama!”

Now Kunimi is pressed between Kageyama and the edge of the bench, because Kageyama has no sense of self-awarenes and is taking up most of the space. Kunimi glares at the ground.

Kindaichi chuckles and says, “Oi, Kageyama, you should move a little and give Kunimi more room.”

“Oh,” says Kageyama, and shifts only a centimeter, maybe two. “Sorry.”

Kindaichi laughs about it later when it’s just the two of them. Kageyama is funny, sometimes, even though it’s hard to pin down his sense of humor. Kunimi adjusts his backpack. Kindaichi laughs at everything, because an idiot, shoulders shaking when Kunimi makes a dry comment about their teacher’s voice. Kageyama isn’t in their class.

“He talks about volleyball a lot,” Kindaichi comments. “Kageyama. Doesn’t he have a life?”

Kunimi snorts. “I doubt it,” he says.

“He’s really good though.”

Kunimi shrugs.

Kindaichi elbows him, and Kunimi goes, “Ow.” Kindaichi ignores him.

“C’mon, you know he is. He’s like, really good. He could be the next Oikawa-senpai.”

“Don’t let Oikawa-senpai catch you saying that.”

Kindaichi rolls his eyes, nudging Kunimi again. This time it’s less hard, and he’s grinning. “Do I look stupid to you?”

*

It’s easy to get lost in people, though Kunimi’s never really experienced it before. He checks his phone for Kindaichi’s texts, feeling a rush when he does, sending quickfire messages when he gets them. Sometimes he forgets to respond, but Kindaichi never minds.

Kunimi invites Kindaichi over to his house two months into their friendship.

They walk back, and Kunimi’s stomach is turning. In a good way, he thinks, careful not to step on the sidewalk cracks. Kindaichi is listening to his mp3 player and muttering the words under his breath. Kunimi pretends not to hear.

Then Kindaichi takes an earbud out and says, “D’you wanna listen?”

“What?” Loud music is blaring from the earbud, and it looks a little oily. Kindaichi wipes it on his shirt. “What are you listening to?”

Kindaichi shrugs. “My mom’s music.”

“Is it any good?”

“Not really.”

Kunimi takes the earbud anyway. The songs are kind of shrilly and nonsensical, but they have good beats and Kindaichi nods along to them. Kunimi doesn’t, but he doesn’t take the earbud out the whole walk to his place.

At his house, he tells Kindaichi that he can help himself to food either in the fridge or the pantry. Kindaichi does. He comes back to the living room, eating a packet of Kunimi’s favorite candy, and Kunimi watches him. Kindaichi presses the caramel to his tongue, lets it sit in his mouth until it melts. The bulge in his cheek wanes down over time.

Kunimi steals a piece of his own. Kindaichi smiles. They start their homework.

*

Neither of them are regulars, but Kunimi is glad for it. They’re only first years. Kindaichi grovels as Kageyama practices with the second years.

“We’re not the only benched first years,” Kunimi points out, glancing to their side.

“Yeah, but Kageyama—” Kindaichi huffs.

“He didn’t ask to practice with them,” says Kunimi.

“The coach plays favorites, I just know it.”

You’re my favorite sits at the tip of Kunimi’s tongue, but he swallows it back. Kindaichi hasn’t stopped glaring, though it’s mostly at nothing. Kunimi puts his left hand on Kindaichi’s right, and twines their fingers together.

Kindaichi’s cheeks redden and he stares at their joined hands.

Kunimi says, “Jealousy isn’t attractive on anyone,” and meets Kindaichi’s eyes. Kindaichi is still staring at their hands, before he lifts his eyes up to meet Kunimi’s. Kunimi steadily holds his gaze.

Kindaichi drops his, disentangling their hands. “I’m gonna see if I can practice with the second years, too,” he says, and then stands up. “Coach!”

*

Kunimi’s phone is open on his bed, screen still burned with the words Sorry, labeled at 4:52PM. It makes Kunimi’s gut twist even more to see it after the words Kindaichi Yuutaro and Kunimi twists to his side, guilty. The clock at the top of his phone now reads somewhere in the eight o’clock hour. Kindaichi is probably eating dinner right now. He has a family and other things. He can’t come to Kunimi’s all the time.

Kunimi shoves his hands into his shorts despite himself. His hand does one job while his mind doees another, summoning up images of Kindaichi, the texture of his fingers against Kunimi’s from all those weeks ago. Kunimi shifts and adjusts the angle, trying not to let his actions and his thoughts connect.

Kindaichi laughing at his jokes. Kunimi’s middle finger runs over the tip. Kindaichi bending his head down, tongue sticking out between his teeth while he’s finishing his exam. Kunimi remembers that day; it’d been bright and sunny and he’d finished his own exam early, like he always does. He’d been resting his head on its side on the desk, and he’d caught sight of Kindaichi and hadn’t been able to look away.

Kindaichi sticking the back end of his pen into his mouth. Kindaichi cheering Kunimi on from the side. Kunimi comes with a shudder into his shorts, feeling stupid and young. He lets it dry stiff under his clothes, before he lifts himself up to head to the washroom.

*

“C’mon,” says Kindaichi. “Don’t you like Yamato-chan?”

“Not particularly,” Kunimi answers, without reacting. He is lying horizontal on Kindaichi’s couch while Kindaichi had been copying his homework. Now Kindaichi is tugging at the fabric around his ankle, trying to get him to sit up.

Kunimi does not give in. Kindaichi sighs and sits on the couch with him. “You should go out with them,” he says. “Karaoke is fun.”

Kunimi peers down at him. “Aren’t you going?”

Kindaichi shrugs. “Only if you do,” he says, and Kunimi almost smiles. But Kindaichi continues, “I don’t really have anyone else to talk to—well, I do, but I’d like it better if you were there, probably.”

“I suppose I should be touched,” says Kunimi, rolling his eyes. He shifts to his side so he’s facing the back of the couch. It’s terrible: the fabric is scratchy and there are tiny wisps on it that look like cat hairs, even though Kunimi has never seen a cat around here before. It’s all for the better, anyway, since he’s allergic. He doesn’t sneeze when he’s on the couch, but he doesn’t particularly want to know what the wisps are.

Kindaichi puts a hand on Kunimi’s side and wriggles him a little. “Kunimi,” he insists. “Come on. Kageyama might even end up being there.”

“Wow,” Kunimi says. “What a persuasive argument.”

When Kindaichi begins lying parallel to him, Kunimi is so shocked by the extra warmth that he does not react. Kindaichi says against his neck, “Do you just plan on sleeping on my couch all afternoon?”

“If I can help it,” Kunimi says.

Kindaichi’s breath is hot.

*

They go to karaoke the next time Yamato-chan invites them out, because she smiles and twirls her hair when she asks Kunimi and Kunimi is not stupid. Everyone likes Yamato-chan; Yamato-chan likes Kunimi. So he says yes.

Kindaichi comes with him.

Kunimi does not sing, but Kindaichi tries to, and the rest of them laugh, though good-naturedly. Kindaichi is a terrible singer and Kunimi smiles into his wrist the whole time.

When he’s done, Kindaichi comes over, forehead lined with sweat and grinning. “My parents hate it whenever I sing in the shower,” he says.

“I hate it, too,” says Kunimi. Kindaichi is taking his jacket off and throwing it on the bench. “Warm?”

Kindaichi nods. “Singing takes a lot of energy out of you,” he says, sitting next to Kunimi. “Not that you’d know.”

Kunimi shrugs. Yamato-chan had tried to talk to him earlier, goad him into singing, but Kunimi had declined and has the will of an ox when it comes to dignity. He thinks Yamato-chan might be sulking. Maybe she’d taken it as a rebuff. Good.

He reaches for Kindaichi’s jacket on the bench. He starts slipping his arms through the sleeves and Kindaichi doesn’t react.

“You made a good choice,” Kindaichi says, “deciding not to sing. But it’s fun just being out here with other people, isn’t it?”

His cheeks are flushed from the adrenaline and his jacket is kind of smelly and broad around Kunimi’s shoulders.

“Yeah,” Kunimi says.

*

Kageyama is annoying, and not in the cute way. After they lose the Spring Finals it’s just school, and then after that is graduation. Kunimi decides to apply to Aoba Johsai for volleyball, and when he mentions it to Kindaichi, Kindaichi does, too.

They both get in.

It’s the natural road for most Kitagawa Daiichi volleyball students. Kindaichi is the one who jumps in his seat at the games, is eager to be a regular. Kunimi finds it’s not so bad, either. Sometimes when he can’t go to sleep at night because his afternoon nap ended up being five hours long, he scrolls through the messages on his phone, rereading Kindaichi’s exclamation points and kaomojis against his pillow. He’s tired when he wakes up, but then Kindaichi is waving to him from the entrance of the school, beaming.

When Kunimi had kissed him for the first time, it’d been on one of those mornings, snaking a hand to the back of Kindaichi’s head and meeting their lips together. Kindaichi had pulled back right away and said, “Kunimi,” but not in a bad way, sort of exasperated and smiling. Kunimi just kept kissing Kindaichi and Kindaichi made a choked noise in his mouth, but he kissed back until they heard the sound of Oikawa-senpai going, “Ooh,” and both pulled away at the same time to see their seniors grinning at them.

“Young love,” said Matsukawa, and Oikawa cackled.

They aren’t different when it’s just the two of them; but, it’s always been the two of them in the first place. On Mondays when they don’t have practice, Kunimi goes to Kindaichi’s place and they study together. Kindaichi tries to gossip, sometimes. Other times they kiss.

Kunimi is tired, because he’d had another five hour nap yesterday. Today he might, too, but Kindaichi’s fingers are playing with the hem of his shirt and that’s distracting. Kindaichi is a heavy breather, between Kunimi’s shoulderblades.

“Hey,” Kindaichi says. “You know, I’ve never heard you say that you liked someone before.”

Kunimi rolls his eyes. “Stop fishing for compliments, Kindaichi,” he says, and jabs him in the stomach with his elbow.

“Ow,” says Kindaichi; but he just burrows further into Kunimi’s back. “I’m not fishing for compliments. I’m just saying.”

“Okay,” says Kunimi.

Kindaichi is quiet again, but not in a waiting way. Kindaichi can be like that, because he can just start talking out of nowhere, or he can wait to conjure up something to talk about. Kunimi likes that. Kindaichi doesn’t expect much from him.

“I like you, Kindaichi,” he says to his pillow.

Kindaichi’s hand runs along the side of Kunimi’s waist, warm and solid. “I know.”