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“Where’s the rest of your stuff?” Atsumu asks.
Hinata blinks as their hotel room door softly clicks shut behind him. He turns around, showing Atsumu the backpack slung over his shoulders. It’s small, one of those every day type bags guys use when they’re going out for the day. “We’re only here for one night?” Hinata says, the pitch in his statement going up into a question toward the end.
“They told you to bring a suit, right?” Atsumu asks, stunned. The backpack doesn’t even look full. He’d not given it much thought earlier, when Hinata had gotten on the team bus at the crack of dawn, figuring he’d just placed his luggage into the side storage like everybody else.
“Yeah, it’s right here!” Hinata says proudly, pulling out a rolled up jacket and pants made up of soft fabric, in dark enough colors any wrinkles wouldn’t be too obvious.
“And the shoes to go with that?”
“Got them too!” Miraculously, Hinata pulls out a pair of nice black shoes from the backpack too. Hinata doesn’t look like he has small feet, but Atsumu’s starting to wonder if the backpack’s magically bigger on the inside somehow.
“You fit everything in there?” he asks again, eyes wide.
Hinata laughs. “Well, I mean, I only got another shirt in here and something to sleep in, and an extra jersey if I do end up playing later or tomorrow. What else do I need?”
Atsumu hasn’t ever thought of himself as a heavy packer. He got on with just a small roller bag himself with what he thought were the essentials: a few shirts, an extra pair of pants, shoes, the suit for formal press events in its garment bag. His toiletries. “Wow,” is all he manages to say. If he could whistle, he would. “You’re pretty low-maintenance, aren’t you, Shouyou-kun?”
Hinata’s lips quirk, his eyes sparkling. “I can’t tell if that’s a good thing or not coming from you, Atsumu-san.”
“It’s just an observation,” Atsumu notes. He nods toward the suit. “You sure that’s ready to wear? We’ve got to head to that interview in an hour.”
Hinata wrinkles his nose. “Maybe a little bit of steaming,” he admits.
“Alright, then let’s call up the lobby and see if they can help us with a steamer or something,” Atsumu says. “Can’t have you looking scruffy on your first press appearance as a member of the MSBY Black Jackals, can we?”
“How did I do, Atsumu-san?” Hinata asks in a whisper once the reporters head over to talk to a different player. He’s smiling mildly, like he had been for the cameras and microphones, but his eyes are sparkling brighter than they did earlier.
“Not bad, Shouyou-kun,” Atsumu decides, patting him easily on the shoulder, swinging his arm around to pull him closer as he guides them both toward the locker rooms. “Not bad at all. You know, for someone who’s not on the starting lineup today, they ate you right up. You’re gonna be a media darling, I can tell already.”
“I’d rather be on the lineup,” Hinata says. His smile is still there, but there’s a tightness in his voice that Atsumu recognizes all too well.
“It’ll be any day now,” Atsumu tells him because he’s seen Hinata in practice. He knows it will be. “Coach knows you’re working hard.”
Hinata nods. “I’m not going to waste my chance on the bench either,” he says. “I’ll learn, Atsumu-san.”
And he does. The game they play that afternoon—a 3-2 win against the Green Rockets—is a hell of a season opener, but Hinata’s bright and eager when they return to their hotel room that evening, ready to go over the plays that worked and the ones that didn’t and the things he noticed about the Green Rockets that even Atsumu wasn’t able to catch in the middle of the game.
They’re deep in their conversation when Atsumu’s phone rings, and he realizes where he’d usually be going over almost this exact same thing with his brother by now, he’d instead spent the time dissecting the game with Hinata.
“You guys won today, so you can’t possibly be moping,” Osamu says by way of greeting when Atsumu picks up, excusing himself from Hinata to take the call out on the hallway.
“Aw, you do care,” Atsumu can’t help teasing. Osamu has always said that Atsumu needed to find one of his volleyball-obsessed teammates to talk to, because Osamu quit volleyball already, because he’s busy, because just how much volleyball does Atsumu need to live when he’s already breathing it day in and day out, anyway?
“That didn’t take long,” Hinata says once Atsumu walks back. He’s got the game on his phone, it looks like, and is already going through the tape again. “Was everything okay?”
“Yeah, we just usually chat after matches,” Atsumu explains. “He’ll be closing down the shop around this time, so it’s easier to catch up then.”
Hinata nods. “My sister’s the one who calls me up, usually,” he offers, before grinning sheepishly. “When either of us remember.”
“Really? Even when you were abroad?”
“Especially then! The timezones were so hard to keep straight!”
“I bet they were,” Atsumu says with a nod, realizing he hadn’t talked to Hinata much about what that had been like. Not the teams or the adjustments needed for a similar but different sport—that had come up often during practice, whenever Atsumu noticed Hinata doing something different from what his hitters usually did, or when a little bit of Portuguese would slip out from Hinata. But the actual experience of moving all the way to the other side of the world—Atsumu knew many Japanese players now were putting in their time in the V.League with a goal of making it international, but that had never really been something Atsumu wanted to do.
“Do you mind if I take a shower now?” Hinata asks, pulling Atsumu out of his thoughts.
“Sure, sure, go ahead.” Atsumu doubts Hinata’s the kind to take an hour in there anyway, and he probably needed to give his ma a call too. “Take your time.”
“Thanks, Atsumu-san!” Hinata says, grabbing his pajamas before he heads inside. The door’s barely shut behind him when he squawks, loud and sudden.
“Shouyou-kun?” Atsumu asks, jolting up. “What’s wrong?”
“Atsumu-san!” Hinata shouts from inside the bathroom. “How did you bring a whole salon in here!”
Atsumu had roomed with Meian during his first year on the team. It was a Black Jackals tradition, after all, having a veteran player show a rookie the ropes as they went on the road during the season. It was meant to build camaraderie, sure, but culture, too, as the more experienced roommate helped guide the newer one through things the Black Jackals way.
Meian had been intimidating, even back then. He was already the captain and Atsumu the brash upstart signed right out of high school. But Meian had been much more chill than Atsumu anticipated, quiet and easy-going, and Atsumu learned enough from him that he’d happily roomed with him for the next couple of years too, until he was considered veteran enough to start taking on rookie roommates of his own.
Hinata is a surprise, in more ways than one. That Atsumu would ever have seen him again, sure, considering the way he disappeared after high school—to train in Brazil, as it turned out, a morsel of gossip Bokuto had let slip during practice one day. That he’d come join the Black Jackals, yeah, absolutely. There was no shortage of teams in Japan that Hinata could have joined again—and Kageyama Tobio played for the strongest.
That he’d end up assigned to room with Atsumu? There were only two rookies that year, so it was fifty-fifty. And Atsumu had secretly been hoping to get Hinata, if only because Sakusa didn’t seem like the sort of guy who’d be as easy-going as Meian had been.
Even then, though, he would never have expected to have such an easy time with Hinata.
Sure, he wakes up at god knows what time in the morning for his daily meditation, but Atsumu brings his own earplugs and sleeping mask so he’s never woken up because of it. And okay, he’s a bit of a health nut in a way that makes Atsumu feel a little bit guilty about not eating nearly as many fruits and vegetables as Hinata piles on his plates from the team menus (“That plate doesn’t look balanced enough, Atsumu-san!”). And yeah, deep down, there is something about the way he just simply rolls out of bed and washes his face with water and hotel soap and comes out looking radiant as the sun that has Atsumu and his ten-step skincare routine wondering what kind of deal Hinata has struck with a demon to get such flawless skin and perfect, fluffy hair.
But other than that? Everything is a breeze.
They roll into their room and Hinata takes the spot closer to the windows, because he likes waking up with the sun, while Atsumu’s content to stay next to the wall. Atsumu carefully unpacks his ironed shirts and garment-bag-protected clothes before they steam Hinata’s rolled up suit and pants. (“This material is incredible,” Atsumu marvels, knowing full well he likely won’t be able to pull off anything as unstructured as that fabric, at least not in the way Hinata does.)
Then they head down to practice, to interviews, to play the game, and in the evening after the team meetings and video reviews they return to their room where Hinata’s sister or mother will call while Atsumu uses the shower, coming back out to whine at Osamu while Hinata takes his turn getting ready for bed. Osamu’s still on speaker by the time Hinata’s done showering, grouching at Atsumu’s complaints even though he doesn’t hang up at any point in time, so Hinata will say hi and Atsumu can explain to them both, again, why steps five to ten of his evening routine are important and not just vanity, actually, if they can just stop judging him for a second!
There’s usually another game for them to play the next day, so Hinata gets up first, bright and early to meditate, and heads back to their room just in time for Atsumu to have already come out of the bathroom after brushing his teeth, two cups of coffee ready for both of them to enjoy. They sip it with the fresh fruit Hinata always insists they have to have for breakfast, doing a little debrief about their previous game in order to come up with a game plan for the next one, so by the time they need to head down to practice they’re both awake, refreshed, and ready to play.
They’ll head right out to the bus after the second game of the day is done, freshly showered and completely exhausted, Hinata once again picking the seat next to the window while Atsumu plops down next to him. In the first few moments as they make their way back to Higashiosaka, Hinata’s fired up for volleyball talk, but depending on how long their bus ride is—and it’s usually at least a few hours long—he’ll eventually drift off mid-sentence, his head bobbing gently onto Atsumu’s shoulder as he falls asleep.
Atsumu doesn’t fall asleep nearly as easily, but that’s about the time he puts his headphones on and plays some of his favorite music, the rhythm of Hinata’s breathing next to him oddly soothing, so that even though it’s often past midnight by the time they get back home—or at least back to the Black Jackals’ home arena, which is their usual pick-up and drop-off spot for the bus—Atsumu’s feeling pretty well-rested.
“Hey, Shouyou-kun,” he calls out once he picks up his roller bag from the side of the bus, catching Hinata before he could get to where his bike was parked.
“Yeah, Atsumu-san?”
“You know, it’s really pretty late,” he says, not the first time he’s pointed this out. The city’s quiet this time of night, and Hinata’s an experienced cyclist, but— “You sure I can’t drive you home or something? I mean, your place is on the way.”
Hinata declines, usually, politely but firmly. Atsumu doesn’t understand why he keeps offering even though maybe this part is habit now too, but there’s a flicker of hesitation in Hinata’s eyes when he opens his mouth to respond, glancing at the keys Atsumu holds in his hand before he nods, the first time he’s done so, and says, “If it really is okay with Atsumu-san. I don’t want to trouble you.”
“Really now, Shouyou-kun,” Atsumu tells him, surprised but pleased. “It’s no trouble at all.”
They fly out to Sendai for the Black Jackals’ first game of the season against the Schweiden Adlers and Hinata’s official debut in the V.League.
“You seem excited,” Atsumu manages to say when he sits down next to Hinata on the plane, unable to keep himself from grinning at the way Hinata’s squirming in his seat, his phone lighting up with messages from his old Karasuno teammates. There was supposed to be a reunion after the game, Atsumu remembers vaguely. Black Jackals and Adlers included. “Playing at home’s gotta be special.”
“It’s been a while since I’ve seen everyone,” Hinata agrees, his wide beam faltering when he looks up at Atsumu. “You look a little pale, Atsumu-san.”
“Bit of a nervous flyer, to be honest,” Atsumu admits, cringing a little. It doesn’t come up often, especially since he’s playing for a team less than an hour’s drive away from home, but he thought he’d done a better job of hiding it over the years. They do occasionally fly to other prefectures in the course of a season. “I’m not a fan of turbulence, that’s all.”
“I won’t tell,” Hinata says, solemn in his promise. He even holds his hand out, palm flat on the armrest between them. “You can grab onto me anytime you want, Atsumu-san.”
“Let’s hope I don’t have to,” Atsumu says with a thready laugh, but he does feel a little better knowing he’s got the option to, if it comes to it.
It’s late when Hinata returns to their hotel room that evening, after the match against the Adlers is done and he’d gone off to his mini-reunion with Karasuno and what sounds like half the Miyagi volleyball scene from high school, plus a few random Tokyo teams. (“Why are you invited too?” Atsumu had asked Bokuto, who’d puffed his chest out proudly and declared they were his training camp friends too, of course he was invited!)
It’s late, but not nearly as late as Atsumu thought he’d be. “You’re in a good mood,” he notes, smiling at the way Hinata’s humming some random song under his breath. “Had a good time?”
“It was so much fun, Atsumu-san!” Hinata says, eyes bright and sharp as he takes in the plethora of skincare products Atsumu had laid out on the hotel room desk. “Sorry, am I disturbing you?”
Atsumu shakes his head. “There was just more space here than in the bathroom,” he explains, catching the quirk of Hinata’s lips and adding, “I know, I know, but it’s a process, okay, and it’s worked for me all this time, so—”
“It’s fine, Atsumu-san,” Hinata says with a laugh, waving Atsumu’s protests away lightheartedly. He ducks into the bathroom for his shower to let Atsumu finish his skincare ritual, emerging a few minutes later just as Atsumu’s in the last steps of his routine. “You work on your hands too?”
Ah, that’s right—Hinata wouldn’t have known what Atsumu’s routine entails, exactly. “Gotta keep these as volleyball-ready as possible, don’t I?” Atsumu asks, the corner of his lips lifting when he meets Hinata’s gaze. “Especially when I have to send a ball over to my most demanding spiker from a nearly-impossible angle.”
“Your most demanding spiker wouldn’t ask if he didn’t think you could toss from there, Atsumu-san,” Hinata says innocently, taking the seat next to Atsumu to take a look at the way he removes the tape around his fingers to massage moisturizer into them. “These aren’t trade secrets, right? I can look?”
“Just as long as the information doesn’t make it to enemy territory,” Atsumu warns him. “Aren’t you friends with half the setters in this league?”
“Just a couple!” Hinata protests, laughing. “So, walk me through what you’re doing, Atsumu-san.”
“Oh, now that it’s about volleyball, you’re interested,” Atsumu says, but he does show Hinata which moisturizer he’s found best for his hands, and why he makes it a point to check the state of his fingers after each match. A couple of digits are feeling pretty stiff, for example, but it’s nothing a little massage can’t loosen up.
“May I?” Hinata asks, holding out his hand to reach for Atsumu’s. His own hands, once he’s got Atsumu’s in them, are rough and calloused like his own, but much warmer than Atsumu’s. He slides firm fingers down the center of Atsumu’s palms, through each finger as the cream works its way into Atsumu’s skin. “I know how to do a little bit of massage, but I don’t really pay as much attention to my hands.”
“They’re some of your more important assets in volleyball,” Atsumu points out. Maybe it’s just because it’s someone else exerting the pressure on his hands, but the repeated stroking of Hinata’s thumb up the lines of his palm is soothing, the pull on his fingers more effective than whenever Atsumu did this himself. “And in the pros, when we’re all so evenly matched, any small advantage helps. You’re really good at this, Shouyou-kun.”
“Is it helping?” Hinata asks.
“A lot,” Atsumu says, letting Hinata take his other hand for a turn. “Want me to do yours after?”
“Wouldn’t that just undo all the massaging I’ve done?”
Atsumu laughs. “I think I can manage, Shouyou-kun.”
They don’t have a second game scheduled the next day, and the flight’s not until the afternoon, so in theory they have a rare couple of hours of free time before they have to go.
Yet, somehow, Atsumu finds himself waking up before his alarm, just as Hinata’s stirring from his own bed.
“I’m sorry, Atsumu-san,” he’s quick to say. “Did I wake you?”
Atsumu shakes his head, feeling less groggy than he usually does when the alarm drags him out of slumber. “Just woke up, I guess. You’re meditating even today?”
“I always meditate,” Hinata replies, blinking at him. He picks up a loose shirt from his bag and pulls it over him, ruffling his bedhead hair to try and smoothen it out. “It’s good practice to get you in a good mindset for the day.”
“Even if you’re not playing a game that day?”
“Especially then,” Hinata says, grinning at him.
“Where do you usually even go?” Atsumu wonders. Hinata’s told him before that he used to meditate out on the balcony of his apartment in Rio, but their hotel rooms don’t often have those.
“I know a good spot around here,” Hinata says. He tilts his head at Atsumu, watching him curiously. “Do you want to come with me?”
“Doesn’t that defeat the point of meditating?” Atsumu asks with a frown, though the question does make him sit up and consider Hinata’s offer. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I’d love to show you how!”
It’s kind of early, and Atsumu’s not sure he can sit in quiet for however long Hinata meditates. But then again, he wouldn’t have thought Hinata could, either. And now Hinata seems excited about the prospect of it, so—
“Alright,” Atsumu says, relenting. He shoves off his blanket and swings his legs to the ground, picking up one of the shirts he’d dropped on his side of the hotel room. “But I’m not gonna be here to make coffee, so we’re gonna have to find somewhere to get breakfast.”
“That can even be my treat, Atsumu-san,” Hinata says.
Atsumu laughs. “Even better,” he decides, following Hinata out. “Wait—can we at least try to get pancakes on top of fruits this time?”
“Did something good happen? You look proud of yourself,” Hinata wonders. It’s deep in the season, a little about halfway through when the weekly grind of traveling for weekend games and practicing during the week starts to take its toll on the team.
Almost all of the team.
Hinata’s persistent drive and fierce hunger for playing hasn’t abated, and even now, at almost five in the morning when most of the Black Jackals are lightly dozing in the bus, he’s alert and wide awake, curious and attentive gaze on Atsumu’s eyes.
“I’ve figured it out, Shouyou-kun,” Atsumu tells him, holding up a large travel tumbler he’d picked up from the Black Jackals’ storefront recently. “Green juice!”
Hinata looks at the tumbler with mild alarm. “It’s definitely very green,” he says, his nose wrinkling cutely. “What did you put in there?” he wants to know, his eyes growing wider with every ingredient Atsumu lists down.
“Why do you look so horrified?” Atsumu asks with a laugh, elbowing Hinata in the side. “You’re the one who’s always telling me I need more vegetables in my diet.”
“Yes, but—can you even drink this?” Hinata wonders.
“Well, I put in some milk and honey in there to sweeten it up,” Atsumu admits, because none of the recipes he’d seen had included anything nearly sweet enough. Apples aren’t always sweet! “Shouyou-kun?”
“And how much milk and honey did you add in there, Atsumu-san?” Hinata asks, eyebrow raised.
“You look like you don’t think this is a good idea,” Atsumu says, pulling up the tab covering the tumbler.
Hinata puts both hands up to cover his eyes, leaving space between two fingers to peek. “Well, I’m not the one about to drink it.”
“Honestly, Shouyou-kun—” Atsumu starts, taking a big, healthy swig of his drink— “Oh my god!”
Hinata breaks out in peals of laughter just as Atsumu covers his mouth to force himself to swallow the vile, disgusting, foul concoction he’d made for himself—turns out no amount of milk or honey could mask the gross bitterness of kale or spinach and all of those recipes were definitely lying to him about the drinks being delicious at all.
“Are you okay?” Hinata asks later, palm warm on Atsumu’s back as he hunches over in his seat, trying his best to wipe the taste off his memories and tastebuds.
“Lesson learned,” he says with a deep sigh. “I really don’t like greens, Shouyou-kun.”
Hinata rubs his back soothingly. “I know, Atsumu-san.” He at least sounds sympathetic. “You know, Natsu doesn’t like them either, but my mom made really tasty curries and quiches and got her to eat them that way. I still have the recipes. Do you want to try them at some point?”
“Maybe.” Atsumu’s not sure his broken trust in ‘delicious vegetable recipes’ will ever be restored. “I guess I can have a taste.”
Hinata laughs. “Well, I’ll let you know next time I make them, then, and you can come over and try it. Okay?”
“That sounds like a plan,” Atsumu agrees, putting the lid back on his tumbler and stuffing it in the pocket of the seat in front of him. Next time maybe he’ll try a little bit of it first before he shows Hinata.
“You tried, anyway,” Hinata says. “By the way, one of my friends sent me this travel pillow. Do you want to try it?”
“Me?” Atsumu asks, taking the pillow Hinata gives him. It’s unlike the usual C-shaped pillow he expects, instead formed more like a rolled up towel that unfolds into a rectangular-shaped thing. “How—”
“I guess you’re supposed to wrap it around your neck and sort of use the edges of it to support your head when you sleep?” Hinata says, demonstrating on Atsumu. “How does that feel?”
“Weird,” Atsumu admits. “But, not too bad, I guess? You said your friend got it?”
“You know Kenma, right? The gamer? He gets sent products like this from sponsors and sometimes he gives them away if he doesn’t need them, but he wanted to know if this worked or not before he endorses it. He’d fall asleep anywhere anyway and so do I, so I told him you might be able to try it,” Hinata explains. “You don’t usually sleep when we’re traveling, do you?”
“Yeah, it’s a little harder for me to get comfortable—wait, how do you know?” Atsumu asks. “You’re usually asleep the whole way through!”
Hinata laughs, cheeks pinking. “I don’t stay asleep all the way,” he admits. “I’ve noticed I’ve never seen you sleep on the road, that’s all. And you have your sleeping mask and earplugs when you go to sleep, so I thought maybe it was a little harder for you or something.”
“Or something,” Atsumu echoes. He scratches at his cheek, laughs a little at the weird, tingling feeling blooming behind his ribs. “That obvious?”
“I guess since we spend so much time together on the road?” Hinata offers.
“Yeah,” Atsumu agrees. That’s probably it.
The injury, in the aftermath of it, is minor: a grade one ankle sprain that will take one week, at best, three at worst, to recover from.
The injury, the moment it happens, feels less so. Atsumu shifts the weight of his momentum over from one direction to the next, his instinct moving so much faster than his own body could properly catch up to that the next thing he knows, his center of gravity’s tipped sideways and the edge of his foot is sliding on the floor and he’s staring up at the bright stadium lights overhead, Hinata’s shock of orange hair silhouetting it like sunrise peeking behind a mountaintop.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Hinata had asked then, moments after disaster struck and Atsumu had to be assisted off the court, their trainer checking his ankle to see what the damage was. He asks the same thing now, though Atsumu can’t see if the worry etched in his hazel eyes is the same as before. It sounds close enough.
“Could be better, but it’s barely a twinge by now,” Atsumu tells him. He shifts the phone to his other ear while he pulls open the fridge to see what he can scrounge up for food. “They put you up with anyone tonight?”
“Coach didn’t add anyone from the second string to this trip, so I’ve got my own room, I guess,” Hinata says. Distantly, Atsumu can hear him plopping down onto the bed. “Feels weird.”
“Does it?” It does to Atsumu too, even though he lives in his apartment most of the week. But it’s the weekend, and by now he’d be getting settled in the hotel room like Hinata, laying out his clothes in the closet while Hinata wonders why he even needs to do that for a one-night, two-day stay. He picks up a pudding cup, grabs a spoon from his drawer, and hobbles back to his couch with a sigh. “Wish I were playing today.”
“The doctor said you could be back next week if you stay off your feet,” Hinata reminds him. “So you should do your best.”
“I will, I will,” Atsumu promises. “I mean, I am, too. Hey, are you guys staying at that hotel next to the public bath?”
“Huh? Yeah, was this the same one you stayed at last time you guys played in Matsumoto?”
“Yeah, it was,” Atsumu says. “There’s a park across the river if you head that way. Might be a good spot for the morning when you meditate. I jogged past it last time, so it’s not too far.”
“I’ll look it up,” Hinata promises.
“And there’s a Family Mart around the corner that’s got a fruit vendor next to it, if it’s still there,” Atsumu adds. “Not that you can’t find your own fruit without me—”
Hinata laughs. “I appreciate it all the same, anyway,” he says. “Hey, Atsumu-san?”
“Hm?”
“If you’re still awake later—after the game, I mean—would you mind if I called you?”
“Are you kidding? Yeah, of course, it’s not like I won’t be watching the game anyway.” Atsumu grins. “Can’t miss our post-game debrief, can we?”
Hinata’s quiet for a moment. Atsumu’s not sure if he didn’t hear him, but then he speaks up. “Yeah. Of course not.”
“Alright,” Atsumu says, his mood much lighter than earlier. “Call me whenever, Shouyou-kun.”
“I will.”
“Sorry, was I interrupting something?” Osamu asks, closing the door to Atsumu’s apartment shut behind him. He walks in with a bunch of food for Atsumu, as their ma had asked him to do while Atsumu’s recovering, but this time instead of his usual reluctant scowl (“He’s a grown man; can’t he order food in himself?” “That’s not how you treat your brother, ‘Samu!”), he’s smirking at Atsumu, wearing a smug little cat-canary grin that often gets on his nerves.
For some reason though, Atsumu isn’t really bothered this time. “What?” he just asks, immediately distracted as his gaze falls to the containers and wrapped food Osamu has brought with him. “Did you get me any noodles today?”
“God you’re such a spoiled brat,” Osamu mutters, but Atsumu sees a couple of noodle dishes from his favorite Chinese place. “Why don’t you ask your Shouyou-kun to dote on you while you’re this insufferable?”
Atsumu rolls his eyes. “He’s out in Matsumoto, remember? I’m the one stuck here while my ankle gets bette—what?” he asks, looking up at the choking sound Osamu makes.
Osamu, if it were possible, somehow looks even more smug than before. “So, if he weren’t in Matsumoto,” he says, enunciating each word carefully and slowly, gaze holding Atsumu’s own, “he would be doting on you?”
Atsumu snorts, the insinuation beneath Osamu’s words just so wild and absurd—he hadn’t even heard that part of what Osamu said earlier, what does he think—
“‘Tsumu.”
“Of course not!” Atsumu shoots back, feeling the heat creep up on his cheeks. Why would Osamu even think— “We’re not like that,” he adds, shaking his head. “He’s not like that.”
Osamu just snickers. “Of course you’re not,” he says, tone dripping with sarcasm and condescension. “The two of you are practically joined at the hip, and you can’t even last a weekend without him.”
“I was just bored,” Atsumu mutters, turning away so Osamu can’t try to put any more meaning behind anything on his face. His cheeks are hot from embarrassment, that’s all! It’s embarrassing to be told you’re co-dependent on a teammate, no matter how good a friend he is. Yeah. That’s exactly it. “You know I get restless when I can’t play, and besides, Shouyou-kun’s—”
“—called you every single day since you’ve been ordered to stay here and rest,” Osamu points out. “Remind me: how many times does he call his ma and sister, again, unprompted and of his own volition?”
“He’s just telling me what the team’s been up to,” Atsumu says after a moment’s hesitation. “He knows I’d like to know.”
“Sure like hearin’ it from him more than, say, Bokuto, yeah?” Osamu asks.
“Well, Bokuto’s—”
“—also a good friend, ain’t he? And he’s been your teammate longer.”
Atsumu shuts his mouth. Rethinks his approach to this conversation, even as around him, the world shifts. Not seismically. Just a little. Just enough for the Shouyou-shaped figure in his life to fall out of the friend-shaped space he’d never quite fit into, just so it could lock onto this other empty space that Atsumu has been adamantly pretending didn’t need filling. Just enough that Atsumu—
Osamu’s gaze softens. “‘Tsumu—”
“‘Samu!” Atsumu whines, snapping out of it. “My ankle is sprained and I can’t play and I don’t know why you keep interrogating me about Shouyou when you could be letting me have my noodles in peace!”
Osamu rolls his eyes, but is kind enough to let it go. “Such a brat,” he says again, the bite long gone in his words. He pats Atsumu on the shoulder, hands him the bag of food. “Eat up, then. And when you wanna talk about it, guess I won’t be blocking your number just yet.”
Atsumu doesn’t want to talk about it.
Not during the rest of Osamu’s visit that evening, and not the next day when Atsumu calls him up for their usual chat over the phone. Not after Hinata calls, like he said he would, and spends over an hour catching up with him while the team is on its way back to Higashiosaka. Not while he lies in bed late into the night, turning things over in his head and then shoving those thoughts away and then taking a reluctant peek back at the things Osamu had poked and prodded at so knowingly.
Atsumu’s still not in any mood to talk about it when his phone rings again, at past midnight.
“Shouyou-kun?” he says, a tightness in his chest like he’s suddenly run out of breath. “Is everything alright?”
“Oh, you’re still awake,” Hinata says, and his voice sounds awfully young on the phone like this. Not at all like it sounded earlier. “I hope I didn’t wake you?”
Atsumu shakes his head, realizing belatedly Hinata can’t see him. “Still awake,” he says. “What’s up?”
“We just got back home,” Hinata says. “I mean. The bus dropped us off at the arena a while ago. I just got back home.”
“Yeah?”
“I had a bunch of vegetables in my fridge,” Hinata explains, though Atsumu isn’t sure how that’s relevant. “I didn’t realize how much. I thought they’d go bad soon, so I ended up cooking them all.”
“I’d have gone straight to bed if I were you,” Atsumu says with a low chuckle. “You aren’t tired?”
“I slept a little bit on the bus, so I wasn’t tired.” Hinata’s quiet for a moment. “I made a lot of curry instead,” he says, laughing softly. “Remember when I told you my mom made really great curry with lots of vegetables?”
Atsumu smiles. “Of course,” he says. “You gonna let me come over and try some of that, Shouyou-kun?”
“Well, the thing is—” Hinata says, breaking off a little, his voice sounding muffled and far away from the phone, like he’s moving the speaker away from him. “The thing is,” he says again, just as someone knocks on Atsumu’s door.
Atsumu sits up. “Shouyou-kun?” he calls out, but he’s not sure if he should be speaking to his phone or at his door. He pulls himself up to stand and heads over to answer the knock.
“Hi,” Hinata says when Atsumu opens the door. He’s got a huge container of curry in his arms, his cheeks red and his orange hair a little damp with sweat. His bike helmet’s still plastered on him. He hangs up on the call. “I thought maybe I could bring the curry over now?”
“It’s past midnight,” is all Atsumu can think to say, helpless, even as he can’t help grinning. “Shouyou-kun—”
“I just—I just also really, really wanted to see you,” Hinata confesses, and maybe, just maybe, Osamu’s right about some things after all. “Is that okay?”
“Yeah, of course,” Atsumu says. He opens the door wide to usher Hinata in, keeping his gaze on Hinata’s back as he admits, “I wanted to see you too.”
“Really?” The tips of Hinata’s ears, when he takes off his bike helmet, are red. The back of his neck is, too. It’s cute. It’s so cute. It’s always been cute. Atsumu’s a fool for not realizing this much, much earlier.
“You should come eat the curry with me.”
“It’s past midnight,” Hinata points out, but he’s smiling, and it feels like a mirror of Atsumu’s own dopey grin.
“I know,” he says. “But maybe that just means you should stay a little longer.”
Hinata laughs. “Maybe I will,” he says, just like that, easy as anything.
But it’s always been this easy with him, hasn’t it?