Chapter Text
Practice was nightmarish. If morning practice had been bad, this was infinitely worse because he wasn’t allowed to do anything. His prohibition on activity unfortunately didn’t affect his energy levels at all. They were ridiculously high, but what else would he have expected. He spent six days a week with Bokuto. He knew how things were.
But it was infinitely more annoying to succumb to fidgeting than to watch someone else fidget. He felt an intense sense of guilt for every impatient thought he had ever had on the subject.
“You know the rules, Bokuto,” Suzumeda lounged next to him on some gym mats, “you’re not allowed to play for three days after you twist that ankle. If you’d just wear a brace, like coach tells you to, this wouldn’t be–”
“I can’t jump right with that thing on!” he whined defensively. He really couldn’t. The brace was a tradeoff: stability for agility. He and Bokuto had discussed it over several weeks of extended practice. Bokuto had even demonstrated. The eventual decision had been that Bokuto would go to a physical therapist. He’d learned exercises for his ankle that he did at home, as well as proper stance, and they had helped. Until Akaashi managed to undo all his hard work.
“Sure you can’t…” Suzumeda took a long sip of water.
“’Medaaaaaaa!”
Akaashi was so sick of speaking like this. He was tired of half the teaching staff either condescending to him or treating him like he was incompetent. He was weary of talking constantly, of being surrounded by people who felt he owed them his attention. Friends, enemies, whoever, each conversation participant had an elaborate dance of their own. Cruel, kind it didn’t matter, just a series of intricate steps that he had to learn. One that was different for each person.
Akaashi danced the conversational equivalent of a simple waltz. With everyone.
All this was bad enough, completely exhausting on its own. But given the over-the-top emotional reactions that he had only somewhat adapted to, he was worn to the bone. The day wasn’t even over. He’d have to go home to the Bokuto family. He’d have to pretend there as well, smiling and eating with them even though he didn’t want to smile. He just wanted quiet.
But Akaashi had come to realize that there was only one quiet place in the life of Bokuto Koutarou, and that that place was him.
His earlier anger started to boil again, as he watched Bokuto flub up the fifteenth toss in a row. They were in the middle of a practice match against Shinzen, and “Akaashi” looked like a complete and utter ass in front of other players he respected. Bokuto was shredding his dignified life into tiny little pieces.
Not to mention other things.
He felt like an absolute idiot. This unrestrainable brain had forced him to consider things he did not want to think about. That much was understandable and though it was frustrating, he couldn’t resent Bokuto for it. But as a result, he had spent the entire morning thinking about nothing but Bokuto. What their relationship really was. Were they really best friends? If so, what did that mean? He even considered where things between them might go, a pillowy, sugary feeling that was now lumpy and sticky.
Because what kind of a best friend kisses girls in said best friend’s body after being specifically told not to? Perhaps the same kind of individual who doesn’t even tell someone he’s his best friend in the first place.
He had to calm down. It was profoundly difficult to separate emotions from reality in this brain, but Akaashi dug fingernails into his wrist and focused on the pain. Bokuto had not kissed Sato-san in any sort of calculated way, he told himself. Even with Akaashi’s brain he wasn’t like that.
But he’d still done it.
“What are you doing?” Suzumeda asked, looking pointedly at his hand.
“An experiment,” he said through gritted teeth.
“You’re so weird, you know that?” she snorted.
“You shouldn’t speak to your senpai like that,” he said, immediately regretting his flat tone and word choice. Bokuto would have whined. Or yelled. Or whine-yelled.
Suzumeda started, and gave him a look, “You okay, ace? You know we all like weird, right? Have you talked to Saru for more than two minutes? That guy is out of his mind. This whole team is crazy.”
The sound of a whistle broke their eye contact.
“Speaking of crazy, this is the worst game Akaashi’s ever played in his life.”
The match ended early because Yamiji-san’s wife had gone into labor. Everyone was too excited after that to play another set. Akaashi had the best conversation he could manage with Shinzen’s captain as they packed up for the train. He even made a few ridiculous jibes about Komi’s girlfriend as the rest of the team left. It was the captains’ responsibility to lock up, but Bokuto was still in the locker room.
He had a strong desire to never speak to him again, which was irrational and ridiculous, especially considering their current predicament. Also, of all the people in his life Akaashi could or would cut out, Bokuto was probably the last.
But that was hard to remember as he pushed open the door.
Despite looking different in Akaashi’s body, dejected mode was obviously more a function of Bokuto’s psyche than his brain. He was standing facing the lockers, running his fingers over his knuckles almost in mockery of Akaashi’s nervous habit. Everyone was gone, there was no longer any need for artifice. But he doubted Bokuto even thought about what he was doing. That abysmal fidgeting was probably just muscle-memory by now.
The list of Bokuto’s weaknesses was fifty-three items long, and the first item was “Shuts down after consistent failure.” Akaashi had originally labeled it as the original “dejected mode” but it turned out that the miserable state was a result of many other things, so he’d become more specific. Currently Bokuto was teetering on the edge. At least, as far as Akaashi could figure since none of the physical tells were clearly present. Were Bokuto in his own brain, he probably would have shut down halfway through the first set, but he had powered through three, probably due to Konoha’s backup more than anything else.
Akaashi, on the other hand, had completely drained his emotional stability just by sitting on the sidelines. Suzumeda had been no help she’d just laughed at him.
“We need to leave, Bokuto-san. Everyone else is gone.”
Bokuto nodded. “Can I have a minute, please?” he asked. His vivacity was replaced with a cold flatness that Akaashi recognized immediately.
“You don’t have to talk like me for the time being.”
Bokuto turned and tripped over his own feet before he sat down on the bench. “Sorry. I just’ve been doin’ it all day,” he heaved a sigh that was enormous enough to be mildly offensive.
Akaashi sat down too so that they were back to back. There was no point in straining his ankle more than he needed to. There was a long space of quiet between them that would have felt very nice if it weren’t the calm before the inevitable storm of self-doubt.
“Akaashi?”
“Yes, Bokuto-san?”
“How long has everybody kinda… just put up with me? Like, they all talk to me now, or well, you, like I’m this big pain in the ass that you have to take care of. And I can even see it, you know, the way they act around you cause they think you’re me. So, I’m feeling kinda sad I guess? I thought we were all friends, but now I sort of feel like everybody is just taking care of me. Especially you.”
There had always been someone raw and dark inside of Akaashi. A bitter, angry, terrible creature who stayed locked away because he was someone Akaashi did not ever want to be. A little boy who had spent most of his childhood with busy adults and grew up as sharp as the pottery shards he’d played with because toys were too heavy to pack. A little boy who had grown up with a vicious manipulative disposition. A person that Akaashi would always keep behind walls of steel.
But Bokuto’s brain could not contain him.
“I can’t believe how blind you are,” he said, as quiet and cold as his new voice allowed.
Bokuto turned, making a startled noise very close to Akaashi’s ear.
It made perfect sense, why Bokuto felt this way. The day must have been incredibly painful. And of course, he didn’t understand. Akaashii huffed out a breath, struggling within himself, trying to say what was necessary without cruelty.
He failed.
“Of course you need handling, Bokuto-san!”
Behind him Bokuto made a noise like he’d been kicked. Akaashi didn’t want to be so close in this situation. He stood up and started to pace along the bench. The words were a pressure at the top of his throat, like he’d run too long and too hard and had to breathe. He couldn’t hold them back.
“You’re the most vulnerable person I’ve ever met. You put every issue of any sort of importance out for everyone to see. All the time. You allow opposing teams to witness your frustrations and weakness. Then other players, the ones like me, can exploit them. And believe me, they try.”
Bokuto didn’t respond, he just collapsed into himself. Akaashi’s irritation grew into fury. How could Bokuto not understand that, good or bad, people actually felt something about him as a person? As opposed to a well-organized pretty face that they could use to enhance their social standing or academic success.
“Do you have any idea how many people care for you?” he shouted, standing still while climbing to the top of his toes. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this loud, but he knew well enough that the habits he was enacting were those of a child. “You inspire something in others, you idiot! They adore you, they want to keep you safe! Not just the team, but your classmates, some of your teachers–”
Bokuto turned. He was crying, big fat tears that looked disgusting and vulnerable on Akaashi’s face. It wasn’t clear if he’d understood that what Akaashi was saying was a twisted form of kindness. Why couldn’t he ever be kind? It didn’t matter if he was in the brain of someone gentle and guileless, he was still, at heart, a cold, cruel, calculating–
Akaashi kicked the lockers as hard as he possibly could. Which dented the one he made contact with almost all the way in.
“How dare you?” he asked quietly, looking at his feet. “How dare you assume we don’t care. That… I don’t…”
“Kaashi, I–”
He spun around and cut him off, “Do you know how many people in your class referred to me as your ‘best friend.’ Nearly everyone you’re friendly with, and yes, I know that is hardly all, but it is so many. The people who like you, like you so very much. And yes, that includes the team.” That was enough. He could stop, and calm down. He could explain to Bokuto quietly, evenly, that the team adored him.
He couldn’t.
“But your best friend?? You’ve never called me that, or told me how you felt about our interactions. I’ve never known with any certainty what I am to you other than someone who gives you what you want and keeps you under control.” The last part was terribly cruel. He wouldn’t blame Bokuto if he just left. And that wasn’t even what he meant, really. But how could he explain the desire to balance. To lift yourself up by keeping someone’s feet on the ground? He hadn’t even realized that was…
All of this… whatever it was, it was just so much. And he needed someone, something to ground him, like the cold shower. His head started to fill with a boiling darkness.
Bokuto did not leave.
“But you are my best friend!” he insisted, standing up. Much more quietly, with his head turned to his shoulder he added, “I just… figured you wouldn’t wanna be.”
“Perhaps not, if I’d known you were the sort who would use my body to kiss Sato Aya,” he spat, too far gone to stop.
Bokuto rounded the bench. He was angry now and they were standing face to face.
“She kissed me, Agaashee!” he stood on his toes so their eyes were even.
“You didn’t stop her, Bokuto-san,” Akaashi replied icily.
Bokuto threw his arms out. “I didn’t know how! I’ve never been kissed before!”
“Well neither have I!” Their faces were so close, and the idea that maybe they could, right then, kiss each other, was a thought that Akaashi could not ignore. It rose to the top, over anxiety over the future, over the chaos, over everything.
But Bokuto could not read his mind.
“Sorry, Akaashi, that everybody wants to confess to you, but I haven’t been confessed to ever so I didn’t know what was happening or how to stop it.”
Was he being sarcastic?
“Are you jealous?” he demanded with a desperation that Bokuto was certain not to notice.
Bokuto spun around like he was done with the conversation, took a step away, then spun back as he changed his mind. “Course I am! I mean, all these girls who’ve got the guts to confess to y–”
The look of dumb shock on Bokuto’s face was one that Akaashi swore to never make if he ever got his body back. But he could feel his own jaw drop as well.
It was a comment on Bokuto’s inherent athleticism how smoothly he jumped over the bench in a body that wasn’t his, how effortlessly he grabbed his bag as he flew, and how quickly he dashed out of the locker room. Akaashi tried to follow, but his ankle wrenched again and he fell against the lockers.
No one heard the terrible noise of frustration and anger he made, so it didn’t really exist.