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It starts the day that Kei kisses him while he’s half-asleep at 8 in the morning, the day that the strawberry waffles taste insipid compared to the delicacy of the other boy’s touch — the day Tadashi feels the love stored in the chambers of his heart finally peeking out into the light.
After that, though, life is busy. January arrives in the blink of an eye, and Tadashi cannot believe they’re back in the Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium, that they’re back with him as Karasuno’s captain at Nationals.
It’s all so thrilling, if not a little terrifying. He bites his lip, refraining from letting himself chew on his nails. Maybe Kageyama will let him borrow his nail filer.
They’re leaving the waiting room for their first game. The seconds on the clock accelerate to the beat of the players’ footsteps. Somewhere next to him, Hinata ruffles the first-years’ hair, telling them to get excited in his typical sunny voice. Kageyama and Yachi are going over gameplay on a clipboard.
Tadashi is nervous, shit. He slows his footsteps to fall behind the rest of his team.
“You okay?”
Tadashi looks to his left to find Kei walking beside him, looking straight ahead. His expression is unreadable, but Tadashi has learned over the years that Kei’s questions are embroidered with care.
He smiles a little, despite himself. “It never gets easier, does it.”
“Mm.”
“But we’re ready! We’re so ready.” His teeth press a little harder into his lip as he lowers his voice. “ I’m ready.”
The other boy is quiet. Ahead of them, the bouncing of volleyballs on the gym floor grow louder, the soles of shoes on tile ever so slightly squeakier. They come to a halt as they approach the crowd of other teams lined up at the door. Coach Ukai says something from the front that Tadashi can’t decipher.
In his periphery there’s a person leaning in, and before he can even process it, there is a kiss on Tadashi’s cheek. He feels blood rush to his face immediately, as if the lips had pushed some button to activate his blushing. Kei shuffles forward, a flush of pink on the back of his neck.
It was almost too quick for Tadashi to catalog — but it was definitely there, right there, below his eye and above his chin, it was there.
And it felt natural. Another line in their daily dialogue. Shut up, Yamaguchi. Sorry, Tsukki. The holding of hands. A kiss on the cheek.
Tadashi thinks he might start floating.
“Come on,” Kei says, skin scarlet but voice steady. “Let’s go win.”
The crowd starts moving forward. Tadashi brings his hand up to his cheek and ghosts them over the place Kei has just left.
Wow. He’s never going to wash his face again. Well, ew, Tadashi, that’s gross, and a lie; he’ll just ask Kei to kiss him again. Tadashi absolutely beams at the thought.
“Aw, man. It has a collar.”
Tadashi scratches the underside of the orange cat’s chin. It purrs and leans its head further into his palm. A small golden tag hangs from a maroon collar around its neck, engraved with an address and phone number.
“What were you going to do if it didn’t have a collar?” Kei stands next to Tadashi, earphones jingling from where they hang out of the neck of his shirt. “Take it home with you?”
“Maybe. Little orange cat here could’ve been my new sibling.”
“You’re cute. Is it lost?”
“No, the address is the same as the home right here.” You’re cute, too, Tsukki, Tadashi thinks. You’re so, so, so cute. He hums and pats the cat’s head two times before standing up again. The cat stares at Tadashi’s ankles for a second, before walking away from the two boys and toward the front gate of their home.
“So,” Kei says, slipping his hand into Tadashi’s. (They hold hands all the time now. The ease of their physical contact makes Tadashi tingle all over, as if all of his limbs have fallen asleep, but thank god he isn’t sleeping, he isn’t dreaming.) “What are you going to do for the rest of the day?”
“Mm, I don’t know.” Without volleyball practice, Tadashi’s days feel stretched out, a blank canvas, a film strip unused and unraveled. He enjoys walking next to Kei in the daylight, though. Lets him see Kei’s face better. “Do homework, look into internships maybe, eat dinner, do the dishes, call you, sleep. You?”
“Same. I’m stilling looking at the museum jobs I told you about.” Tadashi feels Kei’s thumb dance lightly on the outside edge of his index finger. “Dishes again today? I thought you only did them on Fridays and the weekends.”
“I have more time now without volleyball, so I told my mom I’d do it every day from now on.”
“Makes sense.”
“ Oh, did I tell you, Tsukki? I put these stickers on my water bottle, right, and while I was doing the dishes and cleaning my bottle yesterday water got on it, obviously, because water drips down the side, and then it made two of my stickers bleed! Two! Tsukki?”
Kei’s stopped walking, the pendulum of their arms coming to an abrupt halt. Tadashi turns toward the boy next to him, who has taken Tadashi’s other hand so that their arms form a valley between them. He stares down at their interlocked hands while Tadashi stares at his face.
“Tsukki?” he says again, quietly this time.
The valley of their arms steepens. Tadashi feels Kei’s breath against his nose as the boy leans down, leans in. His eyes flutter shut; the butterflies in his stomach flutter open.
“Is this your new way of telling me to shut up?” he asks as Kei pulls away. The weight of his lips lingers like an aftertaste.
The boy in front of him smiles. Tadashi wants to frame it. Tadashi wants to kiss it. “No. I like hearing you talk. Just wanted to kiss you.”
Tadashi is going to incinerate. He’s going to curl up in a ball and roll down a hill and jump into the cold, cold ocean. Tadashi takes his hands and brings them to his face, doing his best to cover his beet-red cheeks. “ Tsukki. You can’t just say things like that.”
There’s a groan, and when Tadashi peeks out from between his fingers, he sees Kei mirroring his position, head in hands. “I cannot believe I just said that. Who am I.”
The butterflies in Tadashi’s stomach burst. He giggles, laughs, guffaws into his hands. I’ve got it so bad, Tadashi thinks. “You’re such a romantic, Tsukki.” You are going to be the death of me.
“And you are so bad for my reputation.”
Tadashi laughs more still. And Tadashi knows Kei well, so he’ll work through his embarrassment first. He’s determined to stay one step ahead of him, if only for Kei’s comfort.
He leans up on his tippy toes and kisses him again. The other boy follows through. Kei’s lips feel calm, soft, like the falling of the sun and the calling of dusk.
Or maybe his lips feel daring, because there’s a small nip against Tadashi’s lower lip, and a pull of Tadashi’s jacket into an alleyway, and a stumbling of shoes and hands and bags and teeth. Kei leans into him, tacit desire; Tadashi giggles and kisses his best friend into oblivion.
to: tsukki [19:17]
have u eaten dinner
from: tsukki [19:17]
just finished eating
to: tsukki [19:17]
can i come over
from: tsukki [19:17]
yeah of course
from: tsukki [19:18]
is everything okay?
to: tsukki [19:18]
hhhhnsmfnjkhfjhdjfh
to: tsukki [19:18]
just need to escape my house rn
from: tsukki [19:19]
yeah of course
from: tsukki [19:19]
meet halfway? in front of the convenience store
to: tsukki [19:19]
yes pls thank u <3
Kei is holding a paper cup whistling with steam when Tadashi spots him. He detaches himself from the wall and smiles at Tadashi, holding the cup out to him as he gets closer.
It’s warm against Tadashi’s cold hands and the soft March air. He brings his lips to the lid and kisses it.
“So,” Kei says as they start walking toward his house. He doesn’t say anything more this time, leaving space for Tadashi to color in the lines.
“I don’t know.” He takes a sip of the drink; it’s green tea. He smiles at the familiarity, the knowing, and blows softly into the lid. “My parents were fighting again.”
“Mm. What was it this time?”
“Something about scraping the bottom of a new pan.”
“Yikes.”
“It’s not even that big of a problem, but they’ve been going at it for half an hour now.” He takes another sip. Water collects in the corners of his eyes. “I’m just tired.”
“Yeah.”
“They aren’t bad parents, and this isn’t a divorce situation or anything.” Their steps echo off the street walls, the dull lamppost poles, the small marigolds beginning to bloom through the cracks of concrete. “It’s just been getting worse lately. I wish they’d learn to apologize to each other.”
“Parents are stubborn.” Tadashi hears the rustling of Kei’s hands in his jacket pockets. “We all are, though.”
“Yeah. I guess we get that from them. But at least we know how to say sorry to each other.”
Kei pokes his side. “ You say it a little too much.”
“Sorry, Tsukki.” He grins up at him, blinks. The collected tears slip down the window of his cheeks.
Kei slows his walking, stops, turns toward Tadashi. Returns the smile with a fondness that Tadashi wants to wrap himself up in. He reaches up and swipes his thumb under the apples of Tadashi’s cheeks; Tadashi closes his eyes. “It’s okay.”
Tadashi knows Kei means those two words in more than just the given situation. He has more to say, too, more that’s bothering him: the upcoming uncertainty of college, his simultaneous anxiety and nonchalance toward the future. To vocalize all of that right now, though, would be too much.
It comes out in waves rather than words. And as always, the moon is there to pull in the tide.
Cold hands take the cup from his grasp, and warm lips brush against his forehead. Kei wraps his arms around Tadashi, and Tadashi burrows himself into Kei’s chest.
His tears dry on the corduroy of the other boy’s jacket. Not vaporized, but soaked in. Kei always takes all that Tadashi gives.
“Do you wanna watch a movie?” Kei asks him when they finally separate and start walking again, now linked at the hands. “I can make popcorn.”
Tadashi hums. The tea is bitter on his tongue but the night is sweet. “We can rewatch the Arctic one? We never ended up finishing it.”
Kei clicks his tongue. “Sounds good.”
There is something about dating Tsukishima Kei that makes Yamaguchi Tadashi feel normal.
He’s read so many stories, watched so many onscreen relationships where the couples cling to each other, live under the honeymoon, miss the other as soon as they go away. There was a time where Tadashi felt that way, before he fell in love with Kei. Back when he didn’t feel stable without Kei by his side, back when the room after Kei left was a decibel too quiet. Back when the thought of Kei leaving his side felt like a not-too-distant reality — a mountain too far from the moon.
But there is no regret now, when they kiss and inevitably pull away. There is just enough gravity when Kei pulls Tadashi in for a hug and wishes him good night before walking down to his own abode. There is no dread, and no excessive giddiness (although Tadashi is giddy, of course he’s giddy), because this is a love he knows he’ll see again tomorrow.
Tadashi is enamored with Kei, Tadashi is in love with Kei, and it is normal. There is no better love than one committed to out of habit. Tadashi folds his wings in just as he does his laundry, to wear again tomorrow and love all the same.
The bus rattles through the quiet of the evening, through the road’s small hills and the city’s waning vivacity. Tadashi’s head lies on Kei’s shoulder, the earbuds they’re sharing squished slightly between his cheek and Kei’s jacket. Instrumental music plays from the earbuds, from some radio station Kei likes and has found access to on his phone.
“I’m tired.”
“Mm. Me too.”
“Going to knock out as soon as we get to our apartment. I have an 8am class tomorrow, Tsukki. An 8am. ”
“Ha. Mine’s at 2.”
Tadashi slaps Kei’s chest drowsily. “You suck. Why do you get to sleep in after our date night but not me.”
“Maybe you should’ve chosen other classes.”
“I hate you.”
“Mm, I love you too.”
An automated voice rattles off the name of the next stop, first in Japanese, then in English, then in Japanese again. Tadashi’s eyes are droopy, the bright bus lights blurring into a swampy aurora borealis.
He feels Kei lift his hand up from where he slapped his chest. There’s a soft press of lips against Tadashi’s knuckles that feels refreshingly cold, like a soda can pressed lightly to his skin. His hand is lowered again, and squeezed tight.
Tadashi smiles, openings his eyes just wide enough so that he can turn his head and leave a proper kiss against Kei’s neck, before leaning back into the crook where he’d been. The lights in this bus are so bright. Tadashi is tired. He is in love with Tsukishima Kei.
This love is simple; Tadashi lets it consume him.