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Sakusa didn’t care for the ocean. He didn’t care for most things, really, but the ocean had always been a constant source of disdain, even when he was young and everyone else seemed to have an unexplainable sense of intrigue for beaches. Sakusa thought they were disgusting; the beaches, not everyone else, although he could make a pressing argument for that, as well. On any given day at the height of summer, thousands of people dipped themselves into the water and left their sweat and spit and piss behind. It was a cesspool of filth brewing in warm, salty water. Sakusa had never set foot in the ocean. He’d technically never set foot on a beach, at least not a bare foot, because he didn’t trust the sand, either. Even now, when he was an independent adult who recognized his personal issues and could often take steps to circumvent them, he wore tightly laced sneakers as he walked the beach, keeping close enough to the water that he could stay on the compact sand, but far enough that there wasn’t a chance the tide would swell a little too high and lick at his ankles.
It was dark out. Midnight probably, although he hadn’t checked the time in a while. The moon was full over the black void of the ocean, and the breeze rolling in was just cool enough that it was a relief. The rest of his team had been out here all day, whiling away the time with swimming and shouting and overall idiocy before their tournament began the following morning. Sakusa had spent the day inside the hotel, appreciating the fleeting silence. That’s where he should be now, trying to get some rest before early warm-ups. But he knew that even if he was, even if he’d crawled into bed two hours ago like a responsible man in his position would have done, he still wouldn’t be sleeping. He would be staring at the ceiling instead of midnight ocean waves, trapped in a room with at least three of his teammates, because when they were traveling for games, privacy became a foreign concept. But he had it here, now, on an empty beach with the white noise of the waves washing out the most barbed and sharp-edged of his thoughts.
Sakusa didn’t care for the ocean, but even he couldn’t deny that there was something peaceful about it. The ebb and flow of the tide was constant, expected. There were no surprises, nothing to catch him off guard or make him stumble. It was predictable. Sakusa liked predictable. It was easier.
Sakusa should have predicted that he wouldn’t be alone on the beach, not for long.
He shoved his hands in his pockets and stared out at the dark vacuum of the ocean. There was movement at the corner of his eye, but he didn’t follow it. He didn’t have to. He knew who it was, but he couldn’t guess what they wanted, not exactly. He wished it was that easy.
“I said I was taking a walk alone.” Sakusa’s voice sounded odd, washed out by the low roar of the ocean. He sounded small, insignificant, and maybe he was.
“Yeah, I heard you.” Atsumu sounded the same as ever, loud and bold and always teetering on the edge of obnoxious. He stepped up beside Sakusa, maybe looking at him, maybe gazing out at the water. Sakusa didn’t know. He didn’t check, didn’t care.
“And you didn’t listen,” said Sakusa. “That’s typical.”
“I listened. I just heard what you didn’t say, too.”
That didn’t make sense. Nothing about Atsumu made sense, including Sakusa’s feelings toward him. Atsumu was one of those unpredictable, capricious things that Sakusa hated. He made Sakusa’s life more difficult, made him question everything he did or said or felt. Sakusa didn’t like it. He’d tried to avoid it, for a while. And then when he didn’t, things may have gotten worse.
“D’you wanna talk about it?” asked Atsumu, his voice dipping a little quieter, something weighty in his tone that Sakusa didn’t try to decipher.
“No. There’s nothing to talk about. Go back inside, Miya.”
Atsumu laughed under his breath. It was dry, humorless. “We’re back to that, huh?”
“I said I want to be alone and I mean it.”
“Yeah, well I don’t want to be.”
“I didn’t ask what you want.”
“I know. You never do.”
Sakusa hated him. He hated the feelings Atsumu gave him, somewhere deep in his chest that was meant to be hollow but was now inhabited, invaded. He wanted to choke out everything he felt and leave it all for dead to be swept away by the waves.
“Omi?”
Sakusa hated that too, the way Atsumu butchered his name and shaped it with his lips until it tasted fond, almost intimate.
A hand touched his shoulder, lightly, a question unspoken.
Sakusa turned away and pressed more footsteps into the sand, leaving a trail of sneaker tread that would be smoothed into nothing by the tide.
He hoped it would be enough, that this rejection would be enough.
There was no more talking, no more “Omi”, and Sakusa felt a strange, choking blend of relief and disappointment. He wanted the relief to win out. This was what he’d asked for. This was easier. Still, the pressure in his chest was conflicting, and it only grew worse when he caught a glimpse of bare feet splashing along beside him, toes sinking into wet sand and leaving hollow footsteps of bubbles and tidewater behind.
Sakusa stopped, and so did the footsteps. He made himself turn, forced himself to look at Atsumu although he only wanted to flee. Atsumu looked back, and although they were in midnight darkness with only the flush of the moon overhead and the distant, sporadic pop of bright hotel windows, it was enough. Sakusa could see him, more clearly than he would have liked.
Atsumu’s hair was pushed back, crested by a pair of sunglasses in pale tangles. It was the middle of the night. It was ridiculous for him to have them on. Sakusa nearly said so, but swallowed the sharp words back and kept them to himself.
“Omi.”
“Stop it.” Sakusa meant for that to snap, but it was too quiet, too much like the breath of the tide.
Atsumu reached out again. He touched Sakusa’s shoulder, his hand lingering, warm where it landed. When it fell away, Sakusa told himself he didn’t miss it. Atsumu stuffed his hands in his pockets, mirroring Sakusa, and glanced out at the ocean. Even with his head turned, his voice was clear. “I’m not sayin’ I’m sorry.”
There was a twist in Sakusa’s gut, an unpleasant one that felt like guilt. “I wouldn’t expect you to, considering you’re not.”
Atsumu’s shoulders shifted, curving inward, as if he was bracing himself against a nonexistent wind. “Don’t be like that, Omi. That’s not fair.”
Sakusa looked at him, really looked, now that Atsumu wasn’t watching him. Atsumu had no shoes while Sakusa wore sneakers; shorts instead of pants, a bare chest instead of long sleeves. There was nothing similar about them, except maybe their apparent need to do everything wrong when it came to their relationship.
Atsumu turned back and Sakusa glanced away from him, preferring to stare into the distance at nothing.
“You’re the one who said it,” said Sakusa, because he refused to say he was sorry, either.
“You know what I’m tryin’ to say.”
“No, I don’t.” Finally there was an edge to Sakusa’s words, sharp like a knife between his teeth. He embraced it, wielded it. “I never do. You talk in circles and expect me to know exactly what you mean. I don’t, Atsumu. I never have. You’ve never made sense. Just stop it and say what you mean for once. I’m so damn tired.”
Atsumu watched him, and Sakusa watched the waves.
Atsumu’s voice was as soft as the moonlight. “Tired of me?”
That struck something in that spot in Sakusa’s chest, the spot that should have been empty but wasn’t. The violence bled out of his voice and he said, “Tired of this .”
Atsumu exhaled. Sakusa couldn’t hear it, but he saw it in the heave of his shoulders. Atsumu said, more quietly than before, “You want me to go?”
For once, Sakusa knew exactly what he meant. Atsumu wasn’t talking about right now, about leaving Sakusa alone on the beach and resuming this conversation later, tomorrow or the day after. When he said go , he meant away , he meant for good .
Sakusa did want that.
He also didn’t.
There wasn’t a good way to answer so he stayed quiet, watching Atsumu watch him, the breeze in his hair and his heart in his throat.
“Omi.” Atsumu took a step closer, but only one. “I’m tryin’ here. You know that, right? I’m really tryin’.”
Sakusa did know. He’d seen Atsumu give up on things before, and it looked nothing like this. When Atsumu was done with something, he was done.
Atsumu looked up at him and the flash of his eyes, even in the dark, proved that he wasn’t done.
“I don’t know what to say to you,” said Sakusa, with more honesty than he would have liked.
“You don’t have to say anything. Not about that.” Atsumu glanced away, eyes tracking from the sand to Sakusa’s shoes and back up to his face again. “Just tell me you’re still tryin’, too.”
Sakusa didn’t know if he was. He didn’t know if he should be. It would be easier not to. His life had become a difficult, complicated thing since he’d met Atsumu. Sometimes he wanted to go back to the way it was before, when he could spend days at a time speaking to no one and only had to care about himself.
But back then, no one had cared about him, either.
“ Omi .” Atsumu was closer, more tangible. “Okay. Okay, I’m sorry, alright? I’ll say it. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything. Don’t… don’t let it go like this. Not now.”
Sakusa’s chest was a cavern, brimming with everything Atsumu had ever made him feel. It was a lot. It was too much. “It’s hard.”
Atsumu forced a laugh. It was tight, uncomfortable. “Of course it’s hard .” He tried to push a hand through his hair and knocked his sunglasses askew. He caught them before they hit the sand and tried to hook them into the collar of his shirt, only to remember he wasn’t wearing one. He shoved them into his pocket instead, probably bending the frames, maybe breaking them. He was clumsy with his possessions, at times; his cellphone, his apartment keys, Sakusa’s heart. “You think it’s easy, dealin’ with you? You’re a fuckin’ nightmare, Omi. It’s awful. But you know what? I wanna do it anyway. It’s worth it. You’re worth it, and I’m not gonna stop tryin’. But it only works if you’re tryin’, too. You’ve gotta meet me halfway. Shit, not even halfway. Like, a quarter of the way. I need that much from you, at least.”
Sakusa wished he was still alone on the beach, without this conversation, without the feelings in his chest that were salty and tumultuous like the tide, without the hurt but determined way Atsumu was looking at him, begging him and daring him all at once.
It would have been easier. Everything was easier, on his own.
But not everything was better.
“We’ll just end up here again,” said Sakusa, looking at him, through him. “Do you really want to keep doing this?”
“Yeah,” said Atsumu. He didn’t hesitate. “Yeah, I do.”
Sakusa didn’t understand why. He never did. Atsumu was the one who’d apologized, but it should have been Sakusa. He’d been the problem this time. He usually was, even if he never admitted it, even if Atsumu never called him out on it.
Atsumu could have found better ways to spend his time, someone better to spend it with. Sakusa knew that. He’d always known.
But as long as Atsumu wanted to waste his time here, with him, Sakusa would let him.
“Okay,” said Sakusa. It was only a fraction of what he should have said, of what he wanted to say, but it was all he could offer.
“Okay?”
“Okay.”
The wind blew. A salty breeze touched Sakusa’s lips, just before Atsumu did. Atsumu kissed him like he was something to be cherished. His hand was warm on Sakusa’s neck, fingertips gentle, always careful when stepping over the meticulous boundaries Sakusa had built around himself. Atsumu was the only one allowed inside those boundaries, the only one who ever would be.
Sakusa touched Atsumu’s face, tasted his mouth, and the tension in his chest eased. The anxious howl in his head dimmed to a hum. Even when they stopped kissing, Atsumu didn’t back away, and Sakusa didn’t ask him to. They shared their space, their breath, and Sakusa wanted to apologize like Atsumu had. He knew he should, but he’d never learned how, couldn’t find the right words.
He said, “Why do you have your sunglasses at midnight?”
Atsumu laughed, and held his hand as they walked down the moonlit beach, and Sakusa thought to himself that this time, maybe he could try a little harder.