Archive of Our Own ^beta

It’s weird that what tips him over the edge is realizing that Hinata doesn’t have any acne. 

There were probably a thousand more dramatic moments that could have made him spiral like he was about to. When he missed his last float serve, nobody had even pretended to wince or complain. There was something substantially worse about people not reacting, as if it was what they had expected. Kageyama and Hinata had both gone off on a three and a half minute, eye-contact riddled monologue that ended with them standing a little too close together, and Yamaguchi had just had to stand there and watch. Kageyama, in general, was awfully complementary this evening, that sick, obsessive glint in his eye. Hinata was the hero, the passionate beam of direct sunlight that was blinding them all. If Yamaguchi had wanted to be jealous, there were a million things that could have made him jealous. 

And yet, none of those push him past his limits. It’s not until Hinata is taking a water break, and the streetlights have come on, that Yamaguchi notices how perfect his skin is. Clear, smooth, free from any blemish save for a little scar under his lip that Yamaguchi hadn’t noticed until he was studying him so intently. 

He lifts a hand up to touch his own face - his skin feels uneven, sore in some places. They were really trying to get his own acne under control. He’d even started going to the doctor, using creams that no longer counted as “over the counter.” 

That made him special, right? In a bad way. 

And there was Hinata. Not only the apple of everyone’s eye, but probably going home to a bathroom sink that was free from the endless clutter of cleaning products and ointments and serums. 

Yamaguchi knew he was a jealous person. He’d always been a jealous person. Jealous of the way the bigger kids took up space, jealous of the way the cool kids never let anything bother them. Jealous of Tsukki, for his height and his smarts and his good looks. 

Tsukki also had near perfect skin - but that had never bothered him. Just another thing to brag about about his best friend. 

Hinata, though. 

Sweat drips from Yamaguchi’s forehead, Hinata puts his water bottle down and heads back over to where Kageyama was, somewhat impatiently, spinning the volleyball on his finger. 

“Can we go back to doing digs?” Hinata asks - he’s talking to Kageyama. Yamaguchi is technically practicing with them, but for the last thirty minutes he’s been an afterthought. He thinks about speaking up, but doesn’t bother. It’s not like he can compete with their overwhelming personalities. 

“You suck at those,” Kageyama says. 

“That’s why I wanna practice them,” Hinata replies. 

Kageyama hums for a moment, and Yamaguchi has a moment to wonder when they had crowned him de-facto coach of these long sessions. Probably about the same time he was cursing them out for being terrible. 

Kageyama glances over to Yamaguchi. 

“You can hit a standing float, right?” he asks. It makes Yamaguchi’s heart cinch in on itself, an unspoken message in the question: he can’t hit a jump float. And Kageyama isn’t really sure about anything else. 

“Yeah,” Yamaguchi calls. 

“Mind tossing us a few? Might be good to get used to receiving them, they can be nasty.”

“S-sure!” 

Kageyama tosses the volleyball up, setting it over to Yamaguchi. He’s thankful all he has to do is catch it - his muscles feel torn, but he can’t stomach the thought of telling them he was tired. Where their endless energy came from was beyond him. 

He wants to go home.

He wants to be better at volleyball than he is. 

He wants his acne to go away. 

He wants to be admired. 

He’s so tired. 

But he’ll power through it. Another long session of practice that wore him down to the bone. Maybe if he copied them long enough, faked it enough, it would change everything else about him too. Maybe Hinata’s secret to clear skin is in his volleyball routine. 

“Hey!” 

Yamaguchi turns around, before he could resign himself to hitting a thousand more float serves. Across the field, back on the sidewalk, Tsukishima appeared from the now rapidly shutting down Karasuno building, one hand lifted to get his attention. 

Yamaguchi feels a stab of relief running through him. Tsukki would save him from this - Tsukki didn’t care if Kageyama and Hinata looked down on him or condescended him or thought him lazy, he’d just take it and roll his eyes and make them look foolish for caring. 

“My project is wrapped up, are you coming?” 

“Oh-”

“Tsukki!” Hinata shouts, bouncing on his heels. “Come join us for some practice-”

“We’ve already practiced today,” Tsukki shouts back, annoyed. 

“Yeah but you missed all the extra practice! What were you even doing?” 

Tsukki scoffs, crossing his arms. “I’m on an advanced academic tract that requires me to do extra projects throughout the year. Something I imagine you two can’t even fathom.”

Hinata hummed about this, before leaning over and muttering to Kageyama: “Falthom?” 

Tsukki is looking back at Yamaguchi now. 

“Come on,” he says again. “Let’s go home.” 

“I… I should stay,” Yamaguchi calls, only because he knows Tsukki will let him have the best of both worlds. He always does - let him declare loudly to Hinata and Kageyama that he intends to keep practicing, and still get him out of there without having to submit to a fourth hour of this. “I’m working on my float - and they want to practice receiving it, so…”

“Dude it’s like nine at night,” Tsukki says, exactly like he’s supposed to. “I’m not sitting around here waiting for you to be done, come on, let's go.” 

Yamaguchi looks back at the others, giving them an apologetic smile. “Sorry, I should get going.”

“What, afraid to walk home alone?” Kageyama scoffs. 

“No, but if Tsukki arrives home without me, my mother usually sees him walk past and freaks out and she’ll make a fuss, so…” 

“Whatever,” Kageyama replies. 

“We’ll… fathom it tomorrow,” Hinata says. 

Yamaguchi decides that Hinata’s lexicon is not his problem, and gives them both another apologetic nod and tosses the ball back to them, before turning to jog off on exhausted legs, to catch up with Tsukki. 

“Thanks for that,” he says, turning around to wave goodbye. 

“Thanks for what?” Tsukki replies. 

“Nothing, it doesn’t matter.”

“Alright.” 

Tsukki is impossibly cool, Yamaguchi is fairly certain. As they settle into their walk, Tsukki lifts his hands to put his headphones up, but the silence is nice. On occasion, their paths move closer, and they bump shoulders, and Yamaguchi thinks, for a few seconds, that everything is actually okay. 

And then he thinks about Hinata’s face.

His stupid, perfect face. How does a fourteen year old even pull that off? What, is he half elf? It didn’t make any sense! Didn’t all teenage boys get acne? That’s what his mom said - that’s what the doctors said. Natural. Normal. 

Not for Hinata Shoyo, it seemed. 

Yamaguchi finds himself touching his face again, fantasizing about being double as fit as he was now, with clear skin, being considered hot and cute and desirable - being the ace of a volleyball team, showing up to practice and seeing the fire in everyone’s eyes light up just for the chance to play with him. 

But there was nothing he could do. No way to change himself, to be someone he wasn’t. 

But just for a week, god, just one week, a vacation from his stupid, acne-riddled body, to feel what it’s like to be that… everything. 

Without warning, a hand suddenly enters his field of vision, and Tsukki’s fingers have gently taken Yamaguchi’s hand, pulling it away from his face. 

“Hey,” he says, even though he knows Tsukki can’t hear him through the music. 

“You’ll make yourself bleed,” Tsukki replies, even though he hadn’t heard his protest. 

Yamaguchi almost manages to smile, feeling the pressure of Tsukki’s fingers against his palm for a second before he pulls his hand away. 

“Do you think I’m attractive?” he asks, since he knows Tsukki can’t hear him. 

Tsukki must hear a mumble of some kind, because he turns his head over to look at him with a frown. 

“Sorry,” Yamaguchi replies. 

Tsukki pulls his headphones off. “I’m listening to music.”

“I know. Sorry.”

“Did you need something?”

“No. Did your project go well?”

“Haven’t gotten the grade back.”

“I bet it did though. You’re so smart, I can’t imagine you doing a project badly.” 

“Shut up,” Tsukki says, scoffing slightly as he put his headphones back on, as if annoyed he’d been briefly coerced into being complimented. 

Yamaguchi smiles to himself, for a moment, before putting his hands in his pockets and turning his attention outwards, to the long street they were walking down. The yellow of the streetlights barely staves off the night, and if Yamaguchi stayed real silent, he was almost able to convince himself he could still hear Kageyama and Hinata fighting about receives and digs and whatever else they got up to. 

Should he have actually stayed? 

He wished he was the kind of person that could practice indefinitely. He wished he was like them, but he already did three full hours of extra practice! And that was on top of their morning and their afternoon practices, and he’d been doing that every day of the week for the last few months and he was exhausted. 

It felt like he wasn’t getting better, it felt like nothing was moving forward, it felt like he was always just going to be a bench warmer, always just going to be mediocre. 

Was he really just not practicing enough? 

Yamaguchi glances over his shoulder, back the way they had come. 

Why didn’t Hinata have any flaws? That wasn’t fair. 

It wasn’t fair. 

He looks back down the road, then lifts his eyes up to the night sky above them. A smattering of stars glimmer between greyish clouds that hang heavy over the town. 

Why wasn’t his best enough? 

Between the clouds, high up and incomprehensibly far away, a small streak strikes through the dark.

Even though the shooting star disappears almost instantly, Yamaguchi reacts on childhood instinct alone, letting his eyes flutter shut for just a second. 

I wish I was like Hinata. 

But when his eyes open up, he’s still walking on the cold street, and Tsukki is still just minding his own business beside him. 

Not like Yamaguchi had expected anything else. 

A few more minutes and a couple blocks later, Yamaguchi slows to a stop outside his house, Tsukki’s just a few doors down. 

Without waiting for a cue, Tsukki lifts his hands up to pull his headphones off, glancing at Yamaguchi’s family home as if surprised to see it before looking back to him. 

“See you practice tomorrow, then?” Tsukki says. 

“Yeah,” Yamaguchi replies, before saying: “Or… well, we left off about halfway through The Two Towers, I’ve got time tonight if you feel like a little Tolkien.” 

Tsukki raises his eye, glancing back over his shoulder at where his own house was, seemingly in thought before saying:

“Sure,” Tsukki says, and reaches to pull out his phone, presumably to disconnect his music properly. Yamaguchi grins, before waving him along and turning to head up the path to his front door. 

He calls a hello to his mother, which Tsukki quickly echoes. There’s a tone of surprise, though not that much surprise, at the both of them returning rather than just her son. 

“Did you eat?” his mother calls. 

“No, I’m starved,” Yamaguchi replies. 

“Well, go clean up, I saved you some dinner. What about you, Kei?” 

“Oh, I’m okay,” Tsukki says. 

“He’ll take some too!” Yamaguchi called in response, earning himself an uncommitted glare from Tsukki, before he led him down the hall and off to his bedroom. 

It’s a familiar routine for them. What felt like a lifetime ago, Tsukki had forced a ten year old Yamaguchi to sit down and watch the entire original trilogy of Lord of the Rings, something that had rapidly become both tradition and comfort to the two of them. Sick with the flu? Nothing quite like staying in bed with The Fellowship of the Ring. Late night sleepover during a long summer vacation? Perfect opportunity to stay up until dawn with a marathon. Crowded in a team sleepaway training session, needing to decompress after surviving a thousand sprints? Well, Tsukki’s phone resolution was perfectly fine for the grandiose battles of Return of the King. Whenever they made it through the trilogy, they usually waited a few months, but inevitably a time would come when one or the other suggested rewatching and then they were off. 

Truthfully, Yamaguchi didn’t know why Tsukki loved the moves so much. 

But he knew why he did. 

“What was the timestamp, an hour fifty? Or something like that?” Tsukki asks, sitting cross-legged on Yamaguchi’s bed, school jacket through aside and uniform loosely undone for comfort. Yamaguchi crawls up beside him as they settle back. 

He puts one of the plates his mother had put together in Tsukki’s hands, leaning against his headboard, close enough to feel Tsukki’s shoulder press against his. 

“Eating in bed?” Tsukki says. 

“I know, we’re bad,” Yamaguchi laughs, at the same time he settles his laptop in a better position to both eat and view, even though neither of them really needed the view. The voices and the soft glow of the screen was enough to immediately make Yamaguchi’s chest feel less tight. 

---

Yamaguchi shuts the laptop, and the glow of the screen shuts off. Only silence is left heavy in the air, the dark blue of night having swept in through the windows and chilled everything. Tsukki is still laying on his bed, but he’s slid down, fallen asleep. 

Yamaguchi draws a knee up, staring around the walls of his familiar room that look unfamiliar in the dark. 

Alone now, with the quiet, he’s able to think again, and his thinking gets the better of him. 

He wants to open the laptop again, load up Return of the King and just keep going. Let the series play until the only thing he had to think about was Frodo and Samwise and the heroes at the end of a journey. Until strength was measured only by the ability to carry one’s friends, until effort paid off. 

He looks down at Tsukki. He’s still wearing his glasses - his mother will worry. 

Yamaguchi sighs, slowly rolling off the bed and reaching to grab his phone, swiping through to find the contact for Tsukki’s mum, glancing at the clock before sending her a quick message: 

Hi!! Sorry for not texting sooner. Kei’s at my place, do you want me to send him home?

He stands at the foot of his own bed and waits for a reply. Eventually she does reply, buzzing: 

He mentioned he might be staying over. As long as you get to school tomorrow, you know the drill!

Yamaguchi smiles slightly, sends his affirmation back, and then sets his phone down and heads back over to the side of the bed. It’s a little bit of an awkward angle, with the way Tsukki is laying, but he manages to carefully lean in and pluck his glasses off his nose, folding them and setting them on the bedside table. 

He’s overwhelmed by the desire to touch his face. His cheek, under his eyes, across his lips. 

It strikes him, not for the first time, how attractive his best friend was. Made even more so by sleep erasing his usual scowl, allowing his face to fall into soft passive sweetness. 

I’m just jealous, he tells himself, when a swell of heat rises in his chest. 

He does wish he could look like Tsukki. It’s not a lie, not really. 

He leaves the bedside and heads to the bathroom, shutting the door behind him before turning on the light, careful not to disturb anyone. He’s left alone. Well, alone save for the mirror version of himself that was staring him down. 

He doesn’t want to make eye contact with it. He has to, eventually, and face what he already knew he would see. 

It’s not that bad. 

Well… 

No, it’s not that bad. 

He’s no Hinata. But it’s not that bad. 

He glances at the closed door, nervous someone might be watching him even in the solitude of the late hour, before opening his drawer and carefully pulling out his cleansers and ointment and patches. It’s an ordeal of a process, washing and rinsing his face, applying creams, applying ointment, applying patches, carefully, over places he thinks he needs it the most. 

He brushes his teeth and puts his stuff away, he stares again in the mirror. 

It’s not fair. 

It’s just not fair, he doesn’t live a life so different from anyone else. Tsukki could fall asleep without washing his face and still have clear skin. Hinata spent half the hours in a day sweating his ass off, and Yamaguchi knew he wasn’t washing his face with any kind of gusto, how he wasn’t breaking out every second day seemed impossible. 

It was just him. 

Maybe it’s the same with practice. Maybe he was just worse than everyone else, and no matter how hard he tried, how hard he practiced, he’d never be as good as them. Just like he’d never clear his skin, he was never going to be a hero on the volleyball court. Because he was just worse, all the way around. 

Feeling lower than he had before the evening had started, he changes for bed, heads back to his bedroom, and stops just briefly in front of his window to draw the blinds, shutting out the starlight and streetlamps. 

I wish I was like Hinata. 

I just want one day, one day where everyone admires me. One day where people are impressed by me, one day where I’m the centre of attention. 

When everyone thinks I’m the coolest person in the room. 

Why aren’t I allowed to have that? 

He heads back to bed, crawling in carefully, still nervous about waking Tsukki. He rolls over on his side, face to face with his best friend. 

Do you think I’m attractive? 

He’s glad Tsukki hadn’t heard him. He doesn’t think he wants to know the answer. 

With nothing to do about the upset in his chest, Yamaguchi eventually just closes his eyes, and tries to sleep. 

---

He wakes up slowly, stretching out and barely conscious before suddenly hearing the hammering of his alarm in his ears. It shocks him the rest of the way away, and he fumbles around to grab his phone and shut it up. 

“Ah, sorry,” he says, rubbing his eyes. He glances at the time-

Four am? 

Why did he have an alarm set for four am? 

“I’m so sorry,” he repeats, more earnestly. “I… fuck, it’s early, we don’t have to get up yet,” he says. He must have set it by accident? Sometime when he was tired last night…? He doesn’t get a response from Tsukki, though. Wondering if he’d somehow slept through that emergency siren of a wake up, he glances over to-

Tsukki’s gone. 

Panic stabs through him, and he sits up fully awake, head scanning around. Stupidly, the first thing he checks is if Tsukki had somehow rolled off the bed without waking up. Of course he’s not there, so Yamaguchi stumbles up to his feet and looks around the room again. 

It was four am. Where had he gone? 

Oh, the bathroom? 

He glances over, out his bedroom door. It looked dark, but… 

He heads to the door and peeks out, seeing the bathroom door slightly ajar, dark inside. 

It’s four am! Where the hell did Tsukki go…? 

Yamaguchi’s brain is working overtime. Maybe there was an emergency, but… wouldn’t Yamaguchi have been woken? If Tsukki had had to leave in the middle of the night, he should have at least told him…

Oh, god, what if he fell and hit his head or something? 

Properly panicked now, he hurries out of the room and shoves open the door to the bathroom, flicking on the lights and expecting to find his best friend dead on the bathroom floor. 

Empty. 

His brief relief is immediately replaced by concern again. If not here, where? Running out of ideas, he steps forward and pushes back the shower curtain, just to be sure. Nothing. 

He turns around, and-

Oh. 

Oh?!

Staring at himself in the mirror, he’s looking at someone he doesn’t recognize. 

Has… has he always been that buff? 

His face is the same as it’s always been. He steps closer to the mirror to make sure of that fact, the same puffy red marks, scarring underneath, the patches from the night before only halfway ready to come off. But..

Holy hell he looked big. Broad, across the chest, defined shoulders. He steps back, curiously lifting up his own shirt to look at his stomach in the mirror. Has he ever had defined muscles before? God, he was lean, too - he turned to the side, looking himself over. 

What… oh. 

Oh, he was dreaming. 

He starts to laugh at his own stupidity, having not realized it before. 

That makes sense. That’s why Tsukki was gone, that’s why he was suddenly fit as all hell. That’s why it was four am. 

“Honey?” 

He glanced over to where his mum was standing in the doorway, arms crossed. 

“Hey,” he says. 

“You know I don’t mind you leaving early, but please try and keep it down? I could hear you stomping around in my dreams.” 

“Ah, sorry,” he replies, laughing. “I’ll be quiet.” 

She hummed and nodded, turning to shuffle away back to her bedroom. He watches her go, then looks back to the mirror.

This was definitely a dream. Where was he supposed to go? “Leave early” for what? 

The frustration of not being able to figure it out, his mother’s comment only convinces him more that this is a nonsense scenario from his dreams. 

Then he finds himself just… standing in the bathroom. Not waking up. 

He tries to pinch himself, and when that doesn’t work, wondering what the hell he was supposed to do. Normally if he realized he was dreaming he’d wake up, like, immediately. This was… taking a while. 

He pinches himself again. 

Huh. 

Okay, actually… that was weird. 

This was a shockingly vivid dream…

He leaves the bathroom, keeping quiet to avoid bothering his mother as he heads back to his room. He shuts the door, turns on the light, and looks around. Maybe this was one of those fun dreams where he’d get to fly around and be a superhero or something. He supposed if it was a dream, there was no rush to wake up, so…

He grabs his phone off his bedside table, swiping it open to take a-

This is not his phone. 

Stupid dream, getting things all wrong. He opens up his contacts, seeing that the last-

Weren’t you supposed to not be able to read in dreams? This is completely legible. It would be convincing if the last person he’d texted wasn’t Kageyama. 

He taps open the message, the last one sent from him.

Tomorrow, 5. See you then! 

Oh, that must be where-

Wait, I'm meeting with Kageyama? 

What the-

Oh, volleyball, that had to be-

Holy fuck I’m living Hinata’s life. 

The realization hits him like a freight train, as he realizes that the explanation for all of this was that he was living Hinata’s life. Him and Kageyama always got to school early before practice to start before everyone else. Yamaguchi knew that, because Tsukki always complained about them being so full of energy by the time they walked in for their normal scheduled practice. 

Oh my god!

Wait, had his wish come true? Holy fuck, his wish had come true! 

Oh my god!

Oh my god!

Oh, oh my god!

Wait, did this mean- he flexed his hands, taking a deep breath and trying to pay attention to the way his body felt. Did this mean he’d be able to jump like Hinata could? He gives a light spring on his heels, before remembering his mother had already complained once. 

Only one thing to do - go meet with Kageyama and see if he’s Hinata all the way through! 

Unable to stop himself from grinning, and obsessed with the idea that he might have gotten his wish, he scrambles to change and get ready and race out the front door. He’s sure he shuts the door far too loudly for his mother’s comfort, but he’s off into the early morning without a second thought. 

Karasuno looks the same in the pre-dawn as it did post-sunset, dark and silent and different from the bustling school hours. Yamaguchi circles the fence outside to head back towards their gym, seeing the yellow glow of light even from a distance. He throws his volleyball shoes down on the step to change into it, tosses his school bag into the corner, and steps into the gym. 

“Hello!” he calls, at the same time a loud bang resonates from the corner of the gym, as Kageyama slams the volleyball down into the floor, catching it as it bounces back to him. 

“You’re late,” he calls. 

“Am I?” Yamaguchi laughs back. He’s pretty sure they had a full hour before practice was actually supposed to start. 

“You are,” he replies. “Are you getting lazy?” 

“Lazy?” Yamaguchi replies, still unable to stop grinning. This was so weird. 

Kageyama turns to face him, blue eyes cut narrow as he does, lips set in a stern line. It’s the same look he usually wears - the same look he usually directs at Hinata - but Yamaguchi hadn’t realized how… pining it was. He felt like Kageyama was looking under his skin, through his psyche. And for a second, Yamaguchi thinks he’s going to realize that this is a dream too, that this is something else entirely. That Yamaguchi is not his usual partner, that he’s gotten here by the wish of a shooting star. 

But Kageyama just huffs, and starts pacing across the gym. “Let’s go, then. Help me set up the net, I want to work on your jump.” 

“My… jump?” 

“I know you can get more height,” Kageyama replies. “If we can combine the quick with a little more height, it would be unstoppable. And we need a net to measure against.” 

“...oh?” 

Wait… that’s weird. 

So I’ve taken Hinata’s life… but I don’t have his skills? 

Yamaguchi looks back down at his hands, flexing his fingers slowly. He supposed that made sense, he was still in his body, so he didn’t have Hinata’s stature and probably didn’t have his spring. So what… 

Wait, so what did he have? What had Yamaguchi gotten that replaced Hinata in this fantasy? 

“Are you gonna help, dumbass?” Kageyama calls, and Yamaguchi yelps, torn from his thoughts as he rushes over to help Kageyama with the net. They don’t chat, they don’t even really look at each other. It’s not an uncomfortable silence, but even so Yamaguchi cannot help but feel like that silence presses weight on his chest. 

He finds himself staring at Kageyama, and… 

It was like his body remembered intimacy his mind hadn’t kept up with. Being around Kageyama felt electrifying, in a way Yamaguchi had never felt before, but… only in his chest, in his heart, his lungs. He couldn’t remember every other day of this new life he was living, but… 

Am I feeling how Hinata feels?

They set up the net, crank it tight and up to the proper height, and across the gym, Yamaguchi catches Kageyama looking at him. For just a second they lock eyes, and Yamaguchi feels like he’s spread out under a microscope, vulnerable and exposed. 

He’s not sure if it’s a “Kageyama has never looked at me like that” feeling, or a “I don’t think anyone has ever been looked at like that before” feeling, but it makes him feel naked. 

And then Kageyama is chest passing him a ball at such high velocity it slams into his chest and goes flying. 

No air in his lungs, Yamaguchi wheezes and doubles over. Before he can get a “what the hell was that?” out, Kageyama says: 

“What, your reflexes not awake yet?”

I guess Ultra-Me isn’t usually caught up in his own thoughts so much. 

I need to focus. Keep my eyes on the ball. 

A thrill runs through him, passion and excitement and energy. Time to play volleyball. 

“Sorry, Kageyama,” he calls, before turning and chasing after the ball.

Kageyama doesn’t reply, but Yamaguchi can tell he’s heading over to set up in his spot by the net. Ready to toss. So Yamaguchi goes to the serving line, spinning the ball in his hands. Each step feels more and more natural, as if his body is falling into a rhythm engrained into it. 

He lets his breath out. It’s like every nerve in his body is suddenly tuned into volleyball and only volleyball. He throws the ball up to Kageyama, who shifts just slightly to stay perfectly under it. 

Yamaguchi is already running. Muscle memory kicking in, eye on the ball as it spins in near slow motion. He feels his feet stick to the ground, power shifting into muscles that have never been this strong before, and-

It’s all over in an instant. He’s in the air, the view over the net impossibly clear, and the spike has made a shuddering bang! against the court before he even processes swinging his arm. 

It’s fast. 

Faster than anything he’d hit before - one of Kageyama’s beautifully perfect sets, this time having been honed and designed for his palm and his palm alone. 

He feels his feet hit the ground. 

He’s almost afraid to look at Kageyama, but when he does-

Not a grin, but something else entirely. 

“Looks like your reflexes woke up,” the setter says, though the tone sends coldness down Yamaguchi’s spine. 

“I can do better,” he responds, before he can help himself. It sounds like something Hinata would say. 

“I know,” Kageyama says, slowly turning to toss him another ball. “Again.”

---

They practice until they’re exhausted. It takes a lot to tire him out, in this not-quite-his body. It feels like a body that’s been practicing eight hours a day for many, many years. A body that doesn’t take breaks. 

Eventually, though, they rest not because they want to, but because practice will officially start in five, and it’s probably better for their lungs to take a little rest before another hour of pushing hard. Yamaguchi doesn’t mind it. 

Even though his body doesn’t ache the way it would have yesterday, mentally the toll is the same. And Kageyama is intense. Even glance, every comment, every word, feels like the guy is going to try and take a bite out of him. More, harder, faster, again, again, again. He’s just as demanding as he always is. 

It’s weird that Hinata isn’t there. It’s weird having his attention all to himself. 

It’s also weird that he hasn’t woken up yet. Yamaguchi fills his water bottle and immediately drinks about half of it, just to refill again. Kageyama is sitting on the ground working on a stretch, as they wait for the team to come in for their real practice. 

What are the chances of something feeling this alive and still being a dream? 

It had to be a dream, it’s not like magic is real. But it really, really didn’t feel like a dream anymore. 

Do I have to start going to church now?

Yamaguchi is saved from any musing on theological implications of miracles and wish granting by the door to the gym opening up. 

He lifts his head, unsurprised to see the first people shoving their way in are the third years. Daichi at the head, Suga chipper and loud behind him, and a half-asleep Asahi dragging his feet like his shoes were made of solid steel. 

“Good morning, heathens!” Daichi shouts. “You left the clubroom door open. Again.” 

“Shit, sorry,” Kageyama says, scrambling to his feet and almost immediately making a break for the door, to go fix the clubroom door Daichi almost certainly would have passive aggressively left ajar. 

He gets halfway out before skidding over gravel and glancing back to the gym. At Yamaguchi. 

What? 

It’s not like I left the clubroom door open, he was here when I got here. 

It was then that Yamaguchi remembered that in previous incidents, Kageyama and Hinata would waste no excuse to race each other around. Kageyama was probably thrown off by not having his sprinting buddy. 

Oh. 

Uh… 

God, do I really have to?

Daichi is staring at him for a second, and Yamaguchi swears that their captain sees through him. Sees that he is not, actually, their brilliant supernova of a middle blocker, but is actually just the benched pinch server. Sees that he’s stolen someone’s life through a shooting star. 

But after a second Daichi just goes: “Is this you formally blaming Kageyama? What’s wrong with you?”

Ah, right-

“Sorry, Daichi!” he shouts, before forcing his already tired legs back into a sprint, finding a reserve of energy somewhere. 

He leaps from the clubroom, watching Kageyama begin to pick up pace again, and-

Whack!

He crashes into someone when he tries to take the sharp corner, the other person stumbling back and cursing something condescending in response, before swatting at Yamaguchi and absolutely doing nothing to help stabilize him as he recovered from his dizziness. 

He’d recognize that voice anywhere, though. 

“Tsukki!” he says, perking up as he tilts his head back to watch his friend adjust his glasses. 

Tsukki looks back at him. 

“Sorry for assaulting you,” Yamaguchi adds, before looking around him. “I was trying to catch up with Kageyama. Oh, my god, I have something crazy to tell you - not right now, right now I need to go close a passive-aggressive door. But you are not going to believe what’s…”

He trails off, looking back over at Tsukki, and… 

“Wh… why are you looking at me like that?” Yamaguchi asks. Because Yamaguchi knows that look, he’s seen that look a thousand times. Always directed at other people. 

But Tsukki doesn’t use unnecessary words or needlessly explain himself. Tsukki was cool, he had a way of conveying all of that without wasting his breath. 

He glances down Yamaguchi, and then steps to the side to pass him, heading for the gym. 

“Tsukki!” 

The noise is almost like a cry of pain, uncontrollable as he spun around to watch him walk away. This gets Tsukki’s attention, who glances back over his shoulder, some kind of alarm in his expression. He doesn’t like being shouted at like that. 

“Do you need something?” he asks, shifting his bag on his shoulder. 

“Did I do something wrong? Are you mad at me? What happened?” Yamaguchi says. This body, this… life, everything up until this morning was gone from his memories, he’d been living a different life - Hinata’s life, but… But he wasn’t in Hinata’s body, Tsukishima belonged to him, not… 

“No,” Tsukki says, with another violating rake of his eyes before he turned away again. 

In what would would Yamaguchi have-

He takes a step backwards, trying to fight for memories. Memories that belonged to this life, this world. It’s difficult, though. He only has his real memories. So what did he do? 

How could he have ever done something to distance himself from Tsukishima? For any reason? 

Tsukki disappears into the gym. 

Well this just wouldn’t do at all. But… 

It’s not like Hinata had come in strolling beside him, so they hadn’t flipped, not directly, so… 

So it was fine. Yamaguchi could just… he could just be his friend again. Whether or not Tsukki would ever admit it, he liked Yamaguchi, at least enough to fall asleep in his bed three times a week. If Yamaguchi had managed to charm him into friendship once, he’d just do it again. Then, he’d have everything.

“So I guess it’s my responsibility to close all the doors,” Kageyama calls, shocking him back into focus, as he turned around. 

“It was you who entered the clubroom, my crap is sitting against the wall of the gym!” Yamaguchi scoffed, looking back at him. “Seems fair.”

“Whatever,” Kageyama says, before passing him to head back to the gym. 

Yamaguchi picks up his step, falling in at Kageyama’s shoulder. It felt weird, to step back into the gym, watch Tsukki set up for the morning stretches and not rush over to him. 

I want to tell you about this incredible crazy thing that has just happened to me literally all my dreams came true so-

But he doesn’t. He’s… intimately aware of the fact that everyone else is looking at him differently too, not just Tsukki. 

It’s not quite respect, it’s something else. 

They circle up for stretches, Daichi counts them out loud. Asahi glances at him out of the corner of his eye. Tsukki hardly bends at all. Kageyama mutters about stretching better than he can. Daichi finishes the count. They all switch legs, it repeats. 

“Sorry, sorry!” 

Coming in like a raging bull, the door is thrown open, and Hinata Shoyo himself stumbles in. Yamaguchi turns around to look at him, shocked by how… unchanged he seemed. 

Wait, who was Hinata in all this? 

Was he me? Or, at least, me in the way that I am him? 

Hinata’s face is flushed, his skin red, sweaty, he looks exhausted. He seems smaller than he ever did, body skinny like a twig, hair a mess. He swallows and tries to catch his breath. 

“Sorry I’m late,” he replies, and it really sounds like he’s about to choke on his own gasping breath. 

What’s happened to you? 

“No worries,” Daichi calls. “I know you have a long ways to come-”

The mountain. 

He has to bike over the mountain. 

Hinata nods, laughing, though it’s a strangled noise. “At least it’s helping my endurance,” he called, before tossing his bag over by Yamaguchi's and hurrying over. 

Well, at least Hinata is still Hinata… mostly. 

There’s a moment of guilt, of realizing that he’d functionally stolen Hinata’s life from him. 

Well in my defense I didn’t think to add a bunch of fine print to a wishing star. 

But was it really so bad to enjoy this? Dream or not, Yamaguchi was the star. He could tell, since everyone was looking at him like he was going to be lunch. 

---

They run drills, they do a few three-on-three warm ups, they set up for passing practice, then serves. It’s a pretty standard practice, well rounded for warm up. Kageyama sticks to his side like Yamaguchi has asked him to be there. Partners for passing, for drills, for everything. Yamaguchi finds that he doesn’t have any issue keeping up with him, but it’s exhausting mentally. 

He considers just… asking Kageyama to back off for a second. Can’t they just train normally? 

But Kageyama is giving him a bit of a victorious smirk, when he manages to pull ahead and finish a sprint before him, so Yamaguchi decides he has to at least try and beat him. Again, and again, and again. 

Eventually, Daichi is whistling, calling them to a stop from their practice and shouting something meaningful but repetitive about “good work” and “good effort” and whatever the hell else he was saying. The blood is rushing through Yamaguchi’s ears, and making it hard to focus. 

He drowns himself with his water bottle, hardly able to get enough, and looks over his shoulder to where everyone was slowly beginning to put away the equipment for classes that were about to begin. 

Yamaguchi realizes he’s going to have to come back and do another afternoon practice. He’d already done two hours today! 

Oh, god, was Kageyama going to make him do more?

Probably. 

He catches his breath, and is thankful, at least, that this body is used to it. He recovers pretty fast, and doesn’t feel as aching as he normally would. He tries to wipe sweat from his forehead, and catches one of the sore zits on his face, making him hiss. 

He really should have added fine print to his wish. 

He helps put away the rest of the equipment, and Daichi says something about Ukai coming around after classes, so everyone should be on decent behaviour. 

Yamaguchi sets a mop away, and-

He turns his head, noting out of the corner of his eye how Hinata was standing, in the dark, facing the wall. He flexes his hands, looking at them as if he’d never seen them before. 

“Are you okay?” Yamaguchi asks. Hinata jumps, turning around to look at him. 

“I… yeah,” Hinata says. “You were great, out there, today. By the way.” 

“Thanks,” Yamaguchi replies, giving him a smile. “You did great too.”

Hinata laughs. “I was trying. I’m gonna get off that bench one day, you better watch out.” 

Oh of course. 

I took his position - he took mine.

“I won’t give it up that easily,” Yamaguchi teases back, which only makes Hinata grin, before he turns to hurry out of the closet and grab his stuff to change for class. Yamaguchi can’t help but think about how lucky he was, to still have his perfect skin. Guess the secret wasn’t in volleyball. 

He changes, washes his face, cleans up and grabs his bag. Tsukki is long gone, having ducked the moment Daichi had allowed him to, but unfortunately for him, Yamaguchi shares the same classes, and isn’t afraid to pass notes. 

Which he does, as the teacher’s back is turned, writing: Are you still in that fancy academics program?

Just to make sure the world hadn’t turned completely on its head. 

Unfortunately for him, Tsukki just sort of looks at it, frowns, and then tucks the paper into his pocket. 

Yamaguchi hummed, wrote up another note, and passed it over as soon as he could. 

Rude. Reply to me!

Tsukki looks at it again, scowls at Yamaguchi, then tucks the paper away. 

Yamaguchi pouts back at him, but Tsukki doesn’t seem to notice. The teacher turns around again, and they both have to get back to work. 

He suffers through poetry or algebra or whatever the teacher is saying, before finally getting dismissed for lunch and immediately turning to drag his seat over to Tsukki’s desk. 

“Okay, did I get cursed by a witch?” Tsukki says, the moment he sits down. “Why are you bothering me?”

“What? No! We’re friends, aren’t we?” Yamaguchi laughs. He tries again to dredge up any memory he can from this “new life” he’s been living, but he can only bring up his regular ones. 

“I mean…” Tsukki says, scrunching his nose up. “We’re teammates.”

“Friends,” Yamaguchi insists, before saying: “I mean… why wouldn’t we be?”

Tsukki stares at him for a moment, before sighing and saying: “Look, I don’t know why you’re suddenly on my case about this, but it’s not like I have anything against you. If you’re… worried about losing your socialite points or whatever, it’s fine. You’re fine.” 

“I don’t know what that means,” Yamaguchi says. 

“I mean you don’t need to be my friend just to prove that you are,” Tsukki replies. “It’s fine, I don’t hate you-”

“I’m not doing that!” Yamaguchi says. “Really, I’m not. I… think you’re cool, I wanna hang out.” 

“No thanks,” Tsukki replies. 

“...no thanks?” Yamaguchi laughs. “Why not?”

“Not interested?”

“Not interested?” Yamaguchi squawks back. “Really?”

“Really, I don’t much feel like chasing a volleyball around more than I already have to,” Tsukki replies, sounding a little offended now. 

“Chase a volleyball - who said anything about volleyball?” Yamaguchi replies. 

“You, every second of every day,” Tsukki replies. “So yeah, not interested.”

“We don’t have to play volleyball,” Yamaguchi says, scooting in a bit closer, feeling his knees knock against the table. “We can just… hang out, study, or… you know, watch Lord of the Rings.” 

Tsukki’s hands pause, from where he was trying to get his lunch out to eat, and glances over to him. 

“How do you know I like Lord of the Rings?” Tsukki says, and he sounds genuinely disturbed. 

What do you mean how do I know? It’s like the first thing I learned about you, I’ve known forever.

“I… it’s…” Yamaguchi falls silent. 

Why was Tsukki acting this way? He could be cold, and aloof, but Yamaguchi really hadn’t thought it would be so difficult to at least warm up to him. If Tsukki was here, at Karasuno, on the volleyball team, that meant that in this version of reality, he and Tsukki had been playing on the same team as long as they always had. They’d probably met the same way - had all that been shaken by this tiny change to Yamaguchi’s life? 

Why was he acting like Yamaguchi had never even spoken to him before. 

“What, you've been reading my diary?” Tsukki says, sharp and snide as usual. “Where’d you figure that out?” 

“You… told me,” Yamaguchi says. 

This seems to make him second guess himself - probably figuring that it wasn’t unreasonable he’d have let it slip at some point, regardless of how private he was. 

“...Right,” Tsukki says, before saying: “Is there a reason you’ve chosen now to suddenly accost me with your friendship?”

I didn’t exist until right now? 

“No, no, just…”

“Hey! Yamaguchi!” 

Yamaguchi flinches, turning around in his seat to see Kageyama standing in the doorway. 

“W-what?”

“Come on, come practice with me?” 

“Right now?” Yamaguchi stammers. 

“There isn’t another lunch period! Come on!” 

“Go on,” Tsukki says. “Your boyfriend’s waiting.”

“He is not my-” Yamaguchi whipped around, but Tsukki wasn't even looking at him. He’s unlatching his box and focused on picking at what little of it he would probably actually eat. Yamaguchi stares at him for a moment, intimately aware of Kageyama waiting for an answer, but-

Tsukki really doesn’t like me. 

Is it because I… Because…

What am I supposed to do here if Tsukki doesn’t like me?

“Yamaguchi!” Kageyama shouts. 

He glances over his shoulder. “Not today!” he says. “I need to work on something with Tsukki,” he adds, which makes Tsukki lift his head and scowl. 

“You really won’t leave me alone.” 

Kageyama scoffs, shouts: “Fine, not like I need your clumsy ass anyway-” and is gone. 

Yamaguchi looks back at Tsukki. Tsukki looks back at him. 

“Look, Tsukki, this is going to sound crazy, but… we’re… we’re best friends-”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Tsukki interrupts immediately. “We haven’t been friends since middle school - you’ve been to my house once. Is this because I skipped practice last Tuesday? You’re trying to guilt me into showing up more consistently? I already explained-”

“No, no, none of that,” Yamaguchi says, waving his hands. “None of that. I just… I… uhm…”

“You know I can’t keep up with you,” Tsukki replies, before moving to pull his headphones up. “Go catch up with Kageyama. I know you want to.” 

Yamaguchi stares at him for a moment, before, with a painful emptiness in his chest, pushes himself back and puts his chair away, and turns to head out of the class. 

He doesn’t go to find Kageyama, though. He needs a breather, he can’t play this much goddamn volleyball in a day, no matter how familiar it was to his body. He heads the opposite way he expects to see Kageyama, up through the school towards the bathrooms, stopping in to splash water on his face. 

Tsukki didn’t like him. 

I can’t keep up with you. 

Was that the trade off? Yamaguchi got to live the life of his dreams, but Tsukki couldn’t keep up? 

No, no, no way - Yamaguchi was still Yamaguchi - it wasn’t him that Tsukki didn’t like, it was… whatever version of him had existed before this point. The other one, the Hinata-one. Now that he was here, all he had to do was… yes, yes, he could still make it work. 

He’s just leaving the bathroom, and heading down the east stairwell to get some sunshine and clear his head, when a familiar voice catches his attention. Actually, a few familiar voices. 

“Uhm… I know strength and conditioning doesn’t… like officially start until third year, but… do you think maybe I could tag along, a few times a week?” 

Yamaguchi freezes, even though he knows he’s done nothing wrong, and carefully turns to see who was coming down the hall. Hinata, trailing after Daichi like a lost little puppy. Daichi appeared to be mostly focused on a handful of papers he was somewhat haphazardly stapling up across the walls, some student-leader thing people usually just tuned out when he talked about. 

“Look, I love that you’re suddenly giving it your all, but… you don’t need to be pushing yourself like that,” Daichi says, hitting the staple into the wall before turning to look down at him. “If you want the extra practice, Kageyama and Yamaguchi stay after school every day of the week, just tag along with them for an hour.” 

“I… I know,” Hinata says. “But I need a stronger foundation. My stamina is bad, my spike is weak, I want to be stronger, physically, not just get better technically.”

Daichi stares at him for a moment, before nodding slightly. “Well, you can’t join the third year classes, that’s ridiculous, and I’m not waiting around to babysit you after school, but… I can put together a couple of… routines, that might help you out, if that’s really what you want-”

“Yes! Thank you!” 

Yamaguchi feels a stab of fear go through his chest. 

“That would be amazing. And I promise you, captain, I’m going to blow you out of the water. By the end of this year, I’ll be hitting every set Kageyama puts up!” 

And for a second, there’s a blast of direct sunlight. And Yamaguchi knows, instinctually, perhaps with the brain that operated this body before he took over, the one that had previously had that level of ambition, that if he slows down, if he stops working - if he puts his attention into winning Tsukki over - Hinata Shoyo was going to eat him alive.

In one reality or the other.

---

Yamaguchi stays after practice with Kageyama. They train in the gym until Daichi loses his mind and drags them by the collar out of it, and then they train in the field. 

They pass, back and forth. A constant game of “I’m not going to be the first to drop it, you hear me?” as the sun slowly sets. 

Would Yamaguchi be a terrible person to say he was bored? He didn’t dislike Kageyama in any way, but… goddamn, the guy didn’t have an off-switch. Everything was intense eye-contact and growled demands and weirdly intimate rolls of the eye. They practiced for an hour or some in the gym, then they were heading for our two outside. The sun disappears, Yamaguchi sniffs. 

He’s not as tired as he would have been, in his other life. But he’s bored, he’s tired of this, and somewhere in the back of his mind, he really wants to go home and lay in bed with Tsukki and watch Return of the King, and complete their nth rewatch so that they could start it over again. 

But Tsukki wasn’t interested, and Kageyama wasn’t tired. 

But-

He does actually see Tsukki, go wandering past on the far end of the field, headphones up. Yamaguchi pauses, distracted for a moment when he remembered that Tsukki wasn’t going to stop and ask him to walk home. 

The volleyball slams into his shoulder and goes rocketing off. 

“Geez, what was that?” Kageyama called. “You’re not even trying!”

“Sorry, just… sorry,” Yamaguchi says, scrambling forward and grabbing the volleyball from the grass. 

“Okay, we got a practice game coming up, and I will not tolerate you being this scatter-brained in front of our enemies,” Kageyama says. “So spit it out, what is it?” 

“Nothing’s wrong,” Yamaguchi repeats. 

“Bullshit,” Kageyama scoffs, wandering over to him. “I know you better than that, you’ve never taken your eyes off the ball for anything less than an emergency. What’s up?”

Yamaguchi forces his attention back on him. But the moment he does, Kageyama’s eyes flick past his shoulder, over to the fence where Tsukki was disappearing. 

“Tsukishima?” Kageyama prompts. 

“What about him?”

“That’s what’s distracting you-” and then Kageyama’s nose scrunches up in distaste. “It was the same at lunch, what’s going on? Did he say something to you?”

“No, no!” Yamaguchi replies, waving a hand. “No, just… I’m just… trying to be friendly. We were… friends, before. That’s all.”

“Oh, yeah,” Kageyama says, as if he hadn’t known this. “You two came from the same middle school, right?”

“Uh… yeah.”

“Huh. Well, don’t waste your time trying to get bullies like him to be your friend,” Kageyama adds, waving a hand. 

“He’s not a bully,” Yamaguchi mumbles back, but when he glances over his shoulder, Tsukki is long gone. 

“Could have fooled me,” Kageyama replies, and then a touch against Yamaguchi’s arm makes him jump, and he has to turn to face Kageyama again. “Seriously, don’t mind him. If it’s this distracting, it’s not worth it. We got nationals to win, right?” 

“Right,” Yamaguchi says, though the temperature at night has cooled somewhat. There’s warmth in Kageyama’s eyes - he doesn’t think he’s ever seen that before. He takes a step back to free him from the touch. “Actually… I think I need to go home, my mom will worry-” he says. 

“We’ve barely started,” Kageyama protests. “Dude!” 

“I know, uhm… I’ll… see you tomorrow, okay?”

Kageyama throws his hands in the air, clearly frustrated with Yamaguchi’s behaviour, but he can’t spend another second of time here. He grabs his bag from the grass and takes off towards the fence, somewhat hoping that he’d be able to catch up to Tsukki. 

He doesn’t, though, and instead manages to jog half the way home before giving up. He turns to head down his street, pausing just briefly to glance up at the stars in the sky. 

He doesn’t see any shooting stars this time, but he’s not sure what he’d have wished for if he had. Does he want to go back? 

To what, go back to what? Isn’t this everything I’ve ever wanted? To be the best of everyone? 

But Tsukki…

He stops at his house, presses the key to the lock, and glances over a two doors down to where Tsukki’s house was lit with warm lights. Had he really, in this life, only ever been there once? It seemed impossible, Yamaguchi knew the halls there like the back of his hand, he’d grown up in that house, as much as he had this one. 

Did Tsukki really not like him in this reality? What, was he too good at volleyball for him? Too passionate, too ambitious? Was Tsukki really that adverse to effort that he’d abandoned the friendship in the timeline where Yamaguchi was better than him? 

He unlocks his door, and slips inside. Almost immediately he hears a voice go: 

“Oh! Sweetheart, you’re home early.”

“Hey,” he says, giving his mum a smile before heading through towards his room. 

“Did you want some dinner, I just put it away-”

“Uh… yeah, I’ll come get some in a bit.”

She gives him a smile and he heads to his room. His room. 

It’s not exactly familiar to him. It’s almost identical, with… specific changes. More volleyball shit, that’s for sure. His stash of manga and books have disappeared, his desk is messier but with more junk, less school work. There are no photos of him anywhere, though with a pang he realizes that most of the photos he’d had before had been of him and Tsukishima. 

The only one that is there is his middle school volleyball team picture, set up on the bookshelf where it usually was. He reaches up to grab it, looking for hints into what this life had been for him. 

He’s standing in the center - number one across his chest. He’d been the captain?

Woah. 

And they’d been pretty good, it looks like - he finds a bronze medal from a year ago hanging on the wall. He’d never had a medal before. 

He heads over to his bed, sitting on on the edge of it and looking around the room, thumbs running over the glass of the picture. 

He could really be something here. He was still himself, but he’d been given the miracle of a childhood with a lot more focus in it. Volleyball and volleyball alone. Creating a body honed in on spikes and jumps and sprints. 

He flops back to stare at the ceiling. Maybe he could go professional, in this world.

Would it be worth it, without Tsukki? 

It’s a painful thought. The idea that he didn’t have that friendship anymore. Would he wish himself back into his old life just to get his friendship back. 

Friendship. 

Maybe… maybe it was better this way. Yamaguchi didn’t like to think of it all that much, but he was fairly certain he’d fallen in love with Tsukki the moment he’d laid eyes on him. Even as a kid, even before he’d had the words needed to describe it as such, everything about him had been… 

Yamaguchi closes his eyes. He wanted so badly. To be with him, to spend every day with him, to share every story, it had overwhelmed him as a kid and only became bearable now as he shoved it down. He didn’t think Tsukki could ever feel the same. He’d stopped hoping for that, hoping for that made him feel like an idiot. He’d resigned himself to being the best friend. 

So… maybe… 

Maybe this was better? 

Maybe getting cut off cold turkey would be better for him. Let him move on, force him to care about something else. Maybe being Kageyama’s best friend, maybe being the next ace of Karasuno, maybe he’d even be happier. 

It wasn’t feeling much like a dream anymore. For a second he considers going outside and hoping for the clouds to clear so that he could find a star and wish himself back. Wake up next to Tsukki and tell him all about whatever the hell this had been. 

But he doesn’t. Eventually he realizes he’s hungry, so he drags himself up and heads downstairs to get dinner. 

---

The next day passes in the same way. He’s awoken by an alarm that he forgot to turn off, and is shocked to find himself still in his weird alternate life. What if he got to live forever like this? 

He washes his face, gets dressed, and heads out in the dark morning to meet Kageyama before practice. And it’s the same as it was before. 

He’s getting more used to this body, more used to playing more intensely. Kageyama doesn’t offer any insults, this time around, maybe because Yamaguchi is focused better, but he’s not very complimentary either. A lot of sharp orders, and even sharper sets. Yamaguchi hits them all, until-

“Hey! Kageyama! Yamaguchi!” 

He looks up, before he could toss the ball, surprised to see Hinata appearing in the doorway, tugging his volleyball shoes on. 

“What?” Kageyama says. 

“Can I practice with you?”

Kageyama snorts. “Sure, whatever.”

Yamaguchi blinks, turning back to look at Hinata, who’s hurrying over. 

“Sorry for crashing your practice,” Hinata says, giving him a bright smile. “But I feel like I’ve been sitting out too long.”

“This is the first time in a month you haven’t been late,” Kageyama scoffed. “What changed?”

“Hey! I’ve got a mountain to bike over!” Hinata complains. “Do you know how early I had to get up to be here?”

“Whatever. I’m not wasting my tosses on you, though. Why don’t you… try and pick up Yamaguchi’s spikes or something.” 

“What, you’re not even going to toss to me?” Hinata scoffs. 

“Why would I?” Kageyama replies, leaning over him. “You can’t even jump high enough to clear the net.”

“And if I could?”

“If I could what?” 

“If I could hit your toss, what then? Would you let me spike then?” 

“Sure, whatever,” Kageyama replies, and he turns around to toss the volleyball over to Yamaguchi, clearly intending to get on with practice, but Hinata has other plans. 

“Then I’ll do it,” Hinata replies. 

“What?”

“Just you watch, Kageyama Tobio. By the end of the year, I’ll be hitting your tosses just as good as Yamaguchi can!” 

Kageyama turns around, and for a second, Yamaguchi thinks he can feel lightning through the air, hunger in Hinata’s eyes insatiable as always. For a second, he’s back in his original life, watching them go at each other over who’s better than who.

But this time, whatever brief spark had been created quickly disappears, and Kageyama’s sharp eyes turn over to Yamaguchi, as if to say isn’t that cute?

And then he whistles and tells everyone to get back to practicing, he was tired of talking. 

Yamaguchi swallows, nervously, backing up to do just that. It’s the same spiking practice they were doing before, but this time he’s got a defender on the other side. 

Hinata’s not as good as he is, where Yamaguchi had come from. He didn’t have a lifetime of practicing every second of the day to fall back on. His receives are clumsy, if he can get under it, but his reaction time is pretty much the same as it’s always been. 

Yamaguchi hits the spikes as hard as he can, each slam into the ground making Hinata leap for it. Kageyama scoffs as it clips his arm and goes bouncing off into the wall. 

But Hinata doesn’t complain. Even when he starts to look exhausted, even when his body begins to give in on him, he doesn’t complain. He goes to pick it up. 

Yamaguchi gets bored. 

He wants to ask to do something else. Something other than spiking practice, something other than volleyball. All they do is volleyball. But when he turns around, Hinata is wiping sweat off his red face, breathing heavily, eyes fixated on the volleyball Yamaguchi held. 

Kageyama, however, looks at Yamaguchi. Maybe he doesn’t notice Hinata’s rabid hunger for more. A spark that clearly got transplanted into Yamaguchi’s former lifestyle, something that now ached to see the view from the top again. 

Something Yamaguchi wasn’t sure he could contend with. 

But by god he wasn’t going to let this freak of nature take away his spot that easily. 

He throws the ball to Kageyama again, and takes off running before he sees where it’s going to be. 

Bring it to me. Give me one of those fast sets, I know I can hit it. I know I can-

Yamaguchi is already in the air - Kageyama fires like a sniper with the ball, a sharp bang echoing through as he spikes it down. 

I could be the hero of this-

Bang!

Hinata gets under it. The ball slams heavy into his arms, and goes bouncing up high. So high it’s almost impractical - it’s entirely uncontrolled, but it’s certainly a receive. Easy to follow up on. 

Hinata smiles. It’s not a very pleasant look, it makes him look like a monster, as he watches the ball bang into the gym floor on its descent.

Kageyama glances back at Yamaguchi. “Be faster next time,” he says. “He shouldn’t have been able to pick that up.” 

“Will do,” Yamaguchi says, because it’s all his voice can find the words for. 

Sparring him from having to jump again, the door opens behind them and causes everyone to turn and look. Much like last time, Daichi comes in with a quickly following Suga, and a half dead Asahi with one shoe untied. 

“Good morning,” Daichi calls. Yamaguchi had made sure to follow after Kageyama and sweep up anything that Daichi might notice in the club room before practice, so there’s no following scolding of them. 

“Good morning!” Suga chirps as well, and then Asahi does… a noise that might be a good morning, and bends down to tie his shoe. 

“Practice officially starts in ten, so catch your breaths,” Daichi adds, after a second. “Ukai’s gonna be swinging by at the end to go over a few things for the practice game, so I don’t want you all huffing and puffing like you’ve never run a mile before.” 

“Why would-” Yamaguchi starts to stay, but then realizes that this probably means he’s about to be asked to run a mile. Fuck. 

Taking the order to heart, Yamaguchi disappears to refill his water bottle and try to drown himself in it. The rest of the team slowly files in for the day, and he can hear the pleasant laughter and chit chat in the morning. 

They go through their usual morning stretches, even though Yamaguchi is more than warmed up, and sure enough, Daichi is soon whistling for them all to change their shoes and head down to the field for a mile run. 

“Think you’re gonna break your record?” 

Yamaguchi jumps, looking over to where Noya had snuck up beside him, still stretching his legs with each step. 

“My… my record?” 

“Mhm. You almost hit seven minutes last time,” Noya replies. “You’re creeping up on me and Daichi’s times. Swore up and down that you’d get sub-seven next time.” 

“Oh, haha,” Yamaguchi says. He’s pretty sure he’s never run less than ten minutes on a mile before. “Well, it’s not really about… well I guess it is about personal improvement… I’m not trying to, like, take your records or anything…”

This makes Noya blink, before he scowls and says: “Of course you won’t. I’m gonna hit under six this time even if it kills me.” 

“... well don’t do that,” Yamaguchi says, at the same time he feels a smack on the back, and turns around to see Kageyama. 

“What, scared you won’t be able to beat me again?” he says. “I’ve gotten faster.” 

“Ah, ha ha…” Yamaguchi says - not laughs. He’s not sure what to say. Well, he supposed he’d have to just run as hard as he could and try and not make a fool of himself. 

Either way, conversation drops as they all head down to the field. Kiyoko pulls up a stopwatch and a clipboard, settling in at their marked finish line as everyone moves to get ready. 

Kageyama jostles him, fighting shoulder to shoulder to get in-

The whistle blows, and everyone is off like their lives depend on it. Well, except for Tsukishima, who is off like a man who understands how to pace himself. 

Normally they’d run together. Yamaguchi always tried to sprint the last quarter, so he consistently kept better times than Tsukki, but he’d never had the energy or commitment needed to run the apparently almost seven minute mile he was doing in this life.

Who the fuck cared that much about their mile times? 

His feet are pounding over the track, having been able to keep himself in the lead out of adrenaline and adrenaline alone - Kageyama pushing in beside him like he was trying to prove a point. 

His body stays put together, long after he’d have expected to lose his wind. 

Kageyama is clearly focused on beating him and him alone, but while they’re caught up in their personal fight, Noya has taken off from the inside of the track, creating a quite significant lead. 

Kageyama hisses just slightly, before pushing to take off as well, though Yamaguchi is fairly certain nobody will be catching him now. 

Lap one - lap two - Noya is maintaining his steady lead. Yamaguchi is starting to feel it now. Who the hell runs a full mile? They should be pacing themselves! This is ridiculous! And painful, and he didn’t fucking like it! 

He feels himself starting to slow. He sees Kageyama glance over his shoulder, confused but not willing to slow down. 

What had kept the him that used to be in control of his life going? Was it really just running? Or competition? Did Hinata feel such a genuine drive to be the best that there was no other option for him? Yamaguchi was bored, he didn’t want to sprint another half mile-

He tries to take advantage of this body, reminding himself - he’s supposed to be the next ace, he’s the star of the team, everyone - quite literally - was measuring themselves against their ability to beat him! What an honour, he couldn’t just give up-

He picks up his pace again, despite the fact that his lungs have started to hurt, but almost the moment he sets his sights on Kageyama’s back, movement flickers beside him and he glances over to see Daichi passing by with a frankly upsettingly calm demeanour. Was he not suffocating running like this? 

How did Hinata do it? 

Hinata never ran out of energy - was it possible that he actually was running out of energy, he just didn’t stop anyway? Or… 

It’s not a one-for-one switch. I must be just crazy enough in this version of reality to sprint through the burning sensation…

So he tries, he pushes himself harder through the last lap, knowing that if he’d run an almost seven minute mile before, the body could do it again. Even if he felt sick trying. Was his technique bad? Why was this so difficult if he’d apparently done it before? 

I’m not having much fun.

And then suddenly he hears the click of a stopwatch and his feet have hit the finish line. 

“Seven forty-three,” Kiyoko says. 

That’s… higher than I think I’d had before. They said I almost got below seven… shit…

“Hah!” 

Yamaguchi, trying to suck in another breath, lifts his head to look at Kageyama. 

“You must have been asleep on your feet,” he goes on. “Letting yourself slip like that. What is that, a thirty second regression?”

“Whatever,” Yamaguchi says, because he’s struggling to breathe and really does not have the brain power needed to care about competing. Whatever the hell Kageyama wanted from him, it could wait. 

“Whatever?” Kageyama echoes back, and when Yamaguchi can’t be baited into fighting, just huffs and turns away. 

“Eight-thirty,” Kiyoko says softly, and Yamaguchi swallows back the exhaustion and lifts his head to watch Suga crossing the finish line. He grins, heading over to join the others, taking a double high-five from Daichi before shoving Noya over into the grass, seemingly just for fun. 

The second years all finish coming in - and-

“Nine-nineteen,” Kiyoko says, before making a soft squeaking noise and following Hinata as he crosses the line, looking surprised. Despite her usually softness, she’s suddenly emboldened to go: “Hinata! That was incredible!” 

Hinata stiffened, turning around in shock, face fully red for more than just exertion. “I-it was?” 

“What happened?” Tanaka called, probably just because Kiyoko spoke words out loud. 

“Hinata has a full minute and a half of improvement on his time!” 

“Woah, holy shit, dude!” Tanaka laughs, heading over to him and smacking his shoulder. “Where’d the speed come from?”

“I… I don’t know,” Hinata replies, and he looks like he’s struggling to breath even more than Yamaguchi was. His hands are even shaking, from the effort. “I just… I wanted to keep up. I…I hate being in the back,” he says, and Yamaguchi can hear the vitriol in his voice. 

So I was right. 

Hinata does run out of energy. He just doesn’t consider stopping. 

How’d he improve on my time by a full minute and a half and only two damn days since we switched?

“Nice going,” Daichi calls. “That’s the kind of hustle we like to see.”

“Yeah, seriously Hinata,” Suga adds, tossing him his water bottle from the grass. “That’s sick.” 

“Maybe next year you’ll be the run I’m racing against up at the front,” Noya calls, grinning. He, however, does not look very exhausted. “However, I did just hit five-minutes fifty-six, so…” 

“Really?” Hinata says, eyes lighting up. “You’re so fast! That’s so cool-”

And everyone is laughing. 

Yamaguchi can’t do much but take a seat on the side of the track and wait for his next instructions, so he does. And…

Everyone is still crowding around Hinata. 

They’re laughing, talking, impressed by his sudden improvement - no, his sudden ambition. It’s like he’d woken up out of a slumber. 

And suddenly… Suddenly Yamaguchi is back to his normal life. He flops backwards to lay in the grass, and he realizes it doesn’t matter that he ran a less than eight minute mile. Everyone’s still crowding around Hinata. Hinata is still the entrancing one, still the topic of conversation. 

What am I doing wrong? Am I not supposed to be him right now?

“Okay, that’s everyone,” he hears Kiyoko says, and Yamaguchi slowly lifts his head, watching Tsukki - tired enough from the run, red in the face, skirting around the edge of the cluster of kids and grabbing his water bottle. He says nothing, just takes a sip. Perpetually cool, perpetually unbothered, like nothing mattered. 

Had… had Tsukki said anything this practice, so far? 

For a second Yamaguchi feels a stab of concern, before remembering-

No, stop it. Stop it! You’re not a lovesick puppy anymore. You need to focus on not losing out to Hinata. You have the upper hand, you have all the years of experience, what’s going wrong? 

So he pushes himself up, wobbles on his feet, and waits for the next event. 

“Okay, everyone, back up to the gym,” Daichi calls, clapping his hands together. “We’re going to run some serving drills until Ukai gets here and then we’ll let him take the lead, okay? Make sure you refill your water bottles and drink enough once you get back!” 

“Got it!” 

The team turns, and Yamaguchi falls into rank as everyone files back up to the school. He’s recovering faster than he thought he would, but-

Hinata takes off into a jog, despite the fact that he looks so tired he might fall over. 

“Bet I’ll be the first one back!” he calls, before running off. The team laughs, and Noya takes the bait to run after him. 

Kageyama doesn’t. It’s weird to see him not, but-

“What?” Yamaguchi says. Kageyama stares for a second, before looking away. 

“Just wondering when you’ll stop being a lameass,” Kageyama mutters. 

“What?” 

“Whatever.”

Kageyama takes off into a jog, catching up to Noya and Hinata. 

---

More volleyball. They play more volleyball. Yamaguchi is sort of sick of playing volleyball. He knows, he knows! Sacrilege to these friends of his, but… He thinks he did a total of ten hours yesterday, and he was facing down another day like that today, and… it was tiring. He could handle the normal three hours a day, and he could even handle doing an extra hour before and after, but every waking moment?

His float serves aren’t any better than they were before. That’s funny. 

Yamaguchi serves again, and again, in a long line with the others. The weekend was coming up soon, he wondered if Kageyama was expecting him to spend the whole weekend practicing with him as well? What did Hinata do on a normal weekend? 

He can’t help but let his mind wander. Him and Tsukki liked to go into town and wander the mall there. They’d usually get lunch and people watch and bus back to hang out and finish homework or study. Then, they’d probably end up crashing at whoever’s house they’d gone to, pulling up movies or tv shows… sometimes Tsukki would want to read, and Yamaguchi would just fall asleep listening to the pages turn. 

He thinks again about Return of the King. It felt weird, knowing that he’s switched lives now, that they wouldn’t ever finish that rewatch. It almost felt like he’d abandoned it. The entirety of Middle Earth, held in stasis, waiting for them to come back so that they could fight for the freedom of their people and defeat the evil lord Sauron. 

He glances over to his left, to where Tsukki was, somewhat lazily serving his next ball, his usual consistent, completely average but successful serve crossing the net. 

Return of the King was Tsukki’s favourite of the movies. Yamaguchi had always been partial to the first one, but Tsukki swore the finale was what made the whole series special. 

It… would suck, actually, to never watch it again, with him. 

Did this Tsukki still love the movies, did he rewatch them whenever he felt sad, whenever he needed comfort, whenever he was bored? Or had he found something else to do, was the ritually wholly theirs to share? 

Stop it! Seriously, Tadashi, you need to quit it. 

He was doing that puppy thing again. It didn’t matter! What was wrong with him, that he wasn’t able to enjoy being the centre of this team’s admiration just because Tsukki wasn’t looking at him anymore? It shouldn’t matter! Tsukki wasn’t going to love him anyway, and he clearly didn’t care enough to keep up with him in this world, so… So Yamaguchi should just get over it. He didn’t need Lord of the Rings or Tsukki’s stupid face or any of it. 

He was going to be the ace of this team, dammit! 

A sharp whistle snaps him out of his spiral, and Coach Ukai has arrived. 

They circle up and take a seat, and it’s all very remedial updates - Yamaguchi’s questions about the weekend are answered as he’s advised that Saturday would be their practice match with Date Tech, and they all at to be at school at eight to head over there and play. 

Great. Great, great, he was going to spend twenty hours in two days and then his whole Saturday playing volleyball. Fucking… fantastic. 

Do I hate volleyball?

No, no, he’s just tired. Besides… 

He rubs at his face, feeling exhaustion beginning to eat at him. What was he, a quitter? Oh, he couldn’t keep up even after having it handed to him on a silver platter? He need Tsukki to hold his hand and tell him he was doing a good job? 

He was pathetic. It was stupid, and he was pathetic.

Hinata is not better than me.

The coach wants to see the serves they’d been working on. 

Yamaguchi gets up and gets back in line. 

---

Kageyama corners him at lunch, and tricks him into passing drills. He suffers through science classes and literature and lessons from a teacher he didn’t much care for, trying not to look behind him to where Tsukki was sitting. 

Then he’s dragged into afterschool practice. Then he’s dragged into after practice practice. 

Then Daichi kicks them out of the gym, and Kageyama-

“I’m going home,” Yamaguchi says. 

Hinata is not better than me.

“What?” Kageyama says, bouncing the volleyball. “It’s only, like, six.” 

“I know,” Yamaguchi says. “But I’m going home. I just… we have that practice game tomorrow, we need to rest for that.” 

“God, you’ve been so weird lately,” Kageyama replies, and it almost sounds like there’s anger in his voice. “What, getting sick of me or something?”

Yeah, entirely.

“No, I just… it’s so much volleyball, I just want half an evening of rest, is that too much to ask?” 

“Ugh.” 

Yamaguchi rolls his eyes, and grabs his stuff. “Look, we’ll go back to practicing infinitely another day. Today, though, I’m going home-”

“Fine! Whatever! Stay… slow and clumsy forever then, I don’t need you,” Kageyama scoffs, turning away from him. Even so, Yamaguchi can hear the hurt in his voice. I’m not saying you’re trash and I hate you, dumbass! I just don’t want to play an eighth hour of volleyball today!

Yamaguchi simply does not have the mental energy needed to moderate that right now. He leaves, instead. 

---

Despite having the eight am meeting time Saturday morning, technically Yamaguchi sleeps in way later than he had the last two days, so it feels like a late arrival. He has a slow morning, cleans up, and stares at himself in the mirror. 

Same stupid face full of acne. Same stupid ears, stupid eyes. A stronger body, a more aggressive lifestyle, but he’s still him. 

Except he’s not, it’s not really him. It’s the Hinatavized version of him that eat, sleeps and shits volleyballs. 

He grabs his jersey and heads for the door. 

---

He notices it immediately, the moment he meets the team out front. 

Tsukishima isn’t there. 

He spends a little bit of time turning in place, looking around. Maybe he was in the bathroom, or getting water? Maybe he was late? He holds his tongue, ignoring the way Kageyama is glaring at him like he’s personally offended him. It isn’t until they’re getting onto the bus, and the bus doors are closing, that he really starts to worry. 

He kneels on the seat, to lean over to where Daichi and Suga were sitting together in front of them. He makes them both jump, shoving his nose between them, and says: 

“Hey, we’re not leaving without Tsukki, right?” 

“Oh,” Daichi says, shifting to face Yamaguchi a little better. “Tsukki’s not coming-”

“What?” Yamaguchi said, perhaps too loudly, and now everyone was looking at him. “He can’t skip it! Why not?” 

“Tsukki is part of the first year representative team for the academic decathlon,” Daichi replies. “They’re actually holding their tournament today, so he’s on a bus to Shiratorizawa right now to… do sudoku, or whatever happens in an academic decathlon.” 

“We’re all very proud of him and his sudoku,” Suga adds, rather sarcastically. “If he gets a gold medal I’m gonna be pissed.”

Is… what? 

Is that a thing Tsukki does? 

I feel like I’d have heard about this at some point if Tsukki was… doing academic decathlon prep or whatever. Is this a new thing? Is this… wait… 

No, wait, is he doing even more academics when he’s not my friend? Oh my god - wait, no, what if he has nerd friends in his classes and that’s why he doesn’t want to talk to me? Are there other people out there that might tolerate Tsukki?

He can’t have other friends that’s bullshit-

“You okay?” Daichi asks, and Yamaguchi realizes his panic is showing on his face, so he hurries to sit back.

“Yeah, I just… didn’t know. Who’s gonna take his starting position for the practice game?” Yamaguchi asks, swallowing back his unease. Look, Tsukki could dislike him all he wanted in this reality, but having other friends was borderline unforgivable. 

Oh my god what if there was a girl nerd-

“Coach Ukai was actually talking about putting in Hinata,” Daichi says, crossing his arms. “He’s… been so passionate lately, and we can always swap him out if he doesn’t gel. But… you know, he’s not likely to play on court during official games, so we may as well see what he’s got now.”

“...Hinata,” Yamaguchi says. 

Two damn days in my life and he’s already got himself off the bench? 

Is the guy made of volleyball magic? What the hell? 

“Not Narita?”

“If Hinata flubs it, we’ll put Narita in,” Daichi agrees. “We’re lucky we’ve got such a passionate team this year, there are a lot of options. Nobody’s quite got Tsukki’s height, though, so…”

“Haha, yeah, he’s… big,” Yamaguchi says, before crossing his arms and staring at the back of the seat in front of him. 

Tsukki wasn’t even going to be there? Yamaguchi had never even heard of such a thing! 

Fuck! I’m doing it again-

You know what? Good! Good thing, because clearly he’s just a distraction, and I don’t need that. 

I’m gonna go play - as a real starter! - and show off how good I am, and be the hero, and then I’ll feel better and everyone will think I’m amazing and I won’t need Tsukki because I… have…  everyone else.

Fuming and muttering to himself, they take the short trip to Date Tech. It feels almost like the world is how it was before - Noya and Tanaka are being loud and annoying, Ukai is trying to call for everyone to be normal for once, at one point Yamaguchi watches Suga just slam his fingers into Asahi’s spine without forewarning. 

They head into Date Tech. Normal, except for Tsukki not being there. 

Normal, except for the way everyone on Date Tech turns to watch him enter. 

Immediately, he’s the movie star on the red carpet. People seem to move out of the way, the entire Date Tech team shifting to face them, tracking him through the room. The Karasuno middle blocker that was shaking things up. The only reason they’d gotten this practice match at all. 

Okay, musings aside, and boredom with the constant training aside, this was what he had actually wished for. He hadn’t wished for the training and the weird intensity with Kageyama and Tsukki acting like a moron, he’d just wanted this. 

One game where he was the star.

Okay. Now I’m excited again. 

He sets his stuff down, and wanders over to join the pre-game huddle, sliding in beside Kageyama and feeling a hand rest on his back. 

Across from him, Hinata vibrates with energy like some kind of nuclear reactor about to have a meltdown. Yamaguchi watches Suga put a hand on his head to try and still him manually. It does not work. 

“Alright,” Daichi says, glancing between them. “Date Tech always gives us trouble, but that iron wall doesn’t mean anything. We’ve got power, we’ve got speed, and none of us are the same people we were even just a week ago-”

Does he know? That’s weirdly targeted. 

“I know we’re down our own wall this time, but that’s not going to change anything. We’ll just pick up their spikes if we can’t block them, yeah? We’re gonna go out there and give it our all, show them what the new Karasuno is like. Okay? Everyone hands in-”

Yamaguchi stretches his hand in, feeling everyone do the same. He takes a breath.

“Karasuno, F-!”

-the volleyball slams into his arms with a ferocity that almost hurts him, watching it go spinning up into the air. 

“Cover!” Yamaguchi shouts, but he’s already getting up. Sweat drips from his nose, but he knows he can’t slow down. Kageyama is already covering, even as he shouts, and that ball is heading right to him, he knows it. So he has to be running. He can’t be receiving the ball anymore, he has to be running-

He’s running, lining up his jump. God, quick attacks were so scary. The read-blocking iron wall waits for Kageyama’s move, Aone and Futakuchi both up at the front, tensed. But what if he times it wrong? 

He jumps, the sudden step Aone takes the first warning that Kageyama has fired his shot. 

Bang! 

It goes flying off Aone’s hand, back into the air. Damn, Yamaguchi didn’t even know he could hit that hard. 

He hits the ground again. 

Back up, back up-

You need to be able to run again - or block, again - or… wait where’s the ball?

Their setter sends it to the left.

Noya picks it up, easily, and it’s moving again. 

That’ll be sent to me again. I need to go. 

Yamaguchi is running again. He hates doing these quick attacks, but the iron wall would suffocate anything less. 

It comes zipping in a little close, but this time he’s far enough over that the wall can’t close him completely.

Bang!

He watches their libero hit the ground, wincing as he smacks his chin. The ball goes off. 

The Karasuno team behind him cheers, having taken another point. He turns around, grinning. Hands are clapped, someone punches his shoulder. It’s their serve. 

“You’re doubting me,” Kageyama calls. 

“What?” Yamaguchi says, between breaths. 

“You’re hesitating, before your jump, you want to look and make sure it’s coming to you. Don’t.”

“I know,” Yamaguchi replies. “I trust you.” 

Yamaguchi moves over a place, stretching his arms out. He’s feeling good. He’s feeling like all that practice actually does something. 

Ukai blows a whistle, the ball is served up, just a standard serve. Date Tech picks it up easily, and the ball is come this way again-

Wham-!

Noya picks it up again, the ball spiralling through the air, a sharper course for Kageyama to pick up. 

I have to go again. Even faster. Don’t hesitate! 

He doesn’t. He leaps for the spike but it doesn’t come. 

Bastard!

He hears Asahi slam it down into Date Tech’s court with a bang, and stumbles as he lands from his jump. All that talk about trust and he didn’t even set it to him! 

Kageyama grins at him. He knows what he did. Yamaguchi scowls. 

The game goes on. 

They take the first set, but it’s very close. Like, only by one point close. It makes Yamaguchi nervous. He’s the star here, for once, and they’re barely winning. What if they lose the second set? What if he’s not good enough, even in the alternate reality in which he’s good enough? 

There’s a few shouts of encouragement, a brief water break. Yamaguchi tries not to rub at his skin too much, feeling sweaty and sore and uncomfortable. 

The whistle blows again. Yamaguchi is not going to let this team down. Never. 

The first few points are traded back and forth. Kageyama is spreading his sets out more, less focused on Yamaguchi. Is he worried he’s still hesitating, or does he have a plan up his sleeve? 

It’s hard to say. 

He slows down the pace of his run up, to accommodate it. It was easier, when he knew that Kageyama was going to set to him, but now he’s in his head. 

The ball does come, though. 

He slams it down as hard as he could. 

Kageyama yells at him for hesitating again. 

“Just jump,” he spits. “You’ve never trusted me, you want to control it too much.”

“I’m not trying to control it!” Yamaguchi says. “It’s just… you… I never know where you are, I never know where to aim, I just… It’s too fast for me, I need to see the ball to hit it!” 

“Don’t worry about that,” Kageyama mutters. “We’re down a point, now. You need to move faster, that’s the only way we get around the iron wall, you know that.” 

“Okay,” Yamaguchi says. “I’ll…”

“Just jump.”

“I’ll jump.”

Kageyama nods, smacks his arm, and then turns away to line up again. Yamaguchi catches Hinata staring at him, something hungry like jealousy or frustration in his eyes again. He doesn’t let it linger. 

The next rally is kill-blocked, the next goes up, Yamaguchi remembers his orders. 

Do as Hinata does. 

Trust him. 

Just trust him. He’s brilliant, right?

Yamaguchi takes off, the moment the ball is in the air on their court, and jumps for his spike well before he even knows if Kageyama managed to get under the ball to set-

Wham!

It comes like lightning into his hand, and he slams it down before Aone can get in front of him. 

There’s no cheer or celebration, though. Just a few calls of nice kill and Tanaka high-fives him. Yamaguchi turns around to look at Kageyama, who’s nodding. 

Okay, that. Again. 

Bang! 

And again. 

Bang! 

“Nice one!” 

“What a shot!” 

And… again. 

Bang!

Kageyama tosses to Asahi and Tanaka and Daichi as needed, but…

Yamaguchi sucks in a breath, and he glances at the score cards. 20-22. They’re winning. But they had a few more rallies to get through. No chase of them breaking or huddling or anything at this point, even though he’s hoping for a water break. Thankfully, after one more rally he’s rotated back, and Swaps out for Noya. 

He heads over to the bench, where Narita and Kinoshita and Suga and Ennoshita are all sitting as they usually are, sans him of course. They’re cheering and calling, and… 

None of them got to play at all, today. They didn’t even sub them in to test it out. Yamaguchi suddenly feels bad about being happy to step off the course, and turns around to watch Hinata, shaking with energy, stand in his place. 

“You’re playing amazingly,” Suga says, and Yamaguchi jumps, looking down at him. 

“Am I?”

“I mean, you always do,” Suga replies, before saying: “You just seem… out of it, a bit? You’re usually louder.”

“...Am I?”

This makes Suga laugh. “Yeah. Are you feeling okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Yamaguchi says. “I’m having fun.”

“Good.”

Am I?

He looks-

“Woah!”

He hadn’t been paying attention. It’s Tanaka that makes the noise, from the court, at the speed at which Hinata has suddenly zipped past. Without Yamaguchi on the court, the blockers tended to have an easier time focusing on their blockers. Less distraction - they knew Hinata wasn’t a threat. 

But he’s sure as hell jumping now. 

For a second, Yamaguchi can see Kageyama freeze in time, looking across the court at where Hinata has leapt, higher than this reality usually lets him, rising just enough to look like he was going to spike. 

Magnetic. 

Kageyama snipes the volleyball over to Asahi behind him instead, and it goes slamming down into the court. The iron wall had, for once, let themselves be distracted. 

Hinata hits the ground, panting, wild in the eyes. 

“What the hell was that?” Daichi called. “I didn’t know you could move like that.” 

“I saw an opening,” Hinata says, struggling to catch his breath. “Figured I’d jump, just in case Kageyama wanted to use it.” 

Kageyama doesn’t say anything. He’s just… staring at Hinata. 

Everyone is staring at Hinata. 

Fuck. 

He needed to get back on the court. 

But it’s still their ball. Their serve. 

Yamaguchi is locked out until Noya rotates off again. 

Shit. Is Kageyama going to toss to him? He would, right? 

Well… it’s not like he’s never ever toss to me, so…

But…

---

Yamaguchi stands on the sidelines and watches his team win without him. 

Just like he always does. 

Even if he’s the star, this time around. Even if Hinata doesn’t score a single point. Kageyama never does toss to him. 

It’s bitter, in his chest. He feels…

Angry. 

And on instinct, he tries to turn his attention onto Tsukki, to find him out on court knowing he wouldn’t be cheering with the team. To head over to him, a private little celebration just for the two of them. Something that felt real even if he’d been on the bench. 

But I wasn’t on the bench, this time. 

I was the centre of attention, I scored half those points!

I guess I should…

Yamaguchi should run out there, to join the team huddle, where they’re cheering and smacking each other on the back. Hinata would, after all. But Yamaguchi doesn’t. 

He never has before. 

He always runs to Tsukki. 

“I’m going to the bathroom,” he says, turning around and not feeling certain the words escaped his lips at all. Suga frowns, watching him go, but doesn’t try to stop him. 

He’s unfamiliar with the Date Tech halls, but it’s not that hard to figure out where the bathroom was. He heads around a corner, down the hall, and pushes his way inside. The mirror mocks him. 

Isn’t this you? Isn’t this the you you always dreamed of being?

He splashes water on his face, tries to stop himself from freaking out. 

I want to go home. I want to go home, and watch Return of the King with Tsukki and eat popcorn and talk about spiders and video games and which stores at the mall were having the best winter sales.

This isn’t very much fun. 

He turns the water off - he hears the bathroom door close. 

He lifts his head, assuming he’d see Suga or Daichi or Kiyoko, someone sent to fetch him. Instead, he’s surprised to see Kageyama standing with his back to the door.

“I’m almost done,” Yamaguchi says. 

“What changed?” Kageyama replies. 

“What?”

“What changed?”

“What changed what?”

Kageyama rolls his eyes. “You, asshole. The last few days, you’ve been… different. It feels different. You’re… I’m not gonna compliment you, but usually you’re… different. Now you’re… avoiding me at lunch, leaving practice early, you’re not… fighting with me anymore, and you left the moment we won. Like you didn’t care.”

What’s the point of winning if Tsukki isn’t even here?

I’m only playing this stupid game because of him. 

“I’m just tired,” Yamaguchi says, as Kageyama sighs, heading over to him. Kageyama also seems to get distracted by the mirror, and for a moment, in their reflection, Yamaguchi can see what Kageyama is talking about. 

The two of them, the freak duo in this reality. But he wasn’t special or weird, like Hinata was. He was just… something else. Was it so wrong to not want to devote his life to this game?

Why did Hinata get to be so special? 

“Tired of me?”

“...No,” Yamaguchi says. “You haven’t done anything wrong. It’s not about you.” 

“We need you, if we’re going to nationals,” Kageyama says. “If something's bothering you, you need to figure it out. Tell me, if it’s something I can fix, I’ll do it.” 

“That’s sweet.”

“I mean it.”

“...okay.”

“For real,” Kageyama says, putting a hand on Yamaguchi’s arm to turn him around. The reflection in the mirror is gone, and now he’s looking at Kageyama directly, and he’s standing so close, and… “I’ll do anything to stop you from slipping away any more than you have. Just say the word.” 

Oh wait oh my god-

He figures out what this tension is far too late to do anything about it. He should have said something to fill the soft silence.

Kageyama takes his hand and kisses him. 

I think I really should have added fine print to that wish.

Oh. My god. 

It’s not entirely unpleasant, but it’s fucking weird. 

He pushes him away, once his brain processes: Oh, my god, Kageyama is in love with Hinata. 

Yamaguchi keeps his hands on Kageyama’s shoulders. 

Not exactly the person I wanted to be my first kiss but okay.

“Oh,” Yamaguchi says, because it’s the only thing that encapsulates all those thoughts. 

“Oh,” Kageyama echoes back. “I… I’m… sorry.”

Kageyama shakes his head. 

“No, it’s fine,” Yamaguchi says, quickly, pulling back to cross his arms. “I… just…”

“I really thought-”

“And you’re probably right, I just… uhm…”

“Probably… right?”

“I imagine up until two days ago I was probably giving off a different signal.”

“Different…?”

“Look, Kageyama, I… just… It’s been… a weird week, so… Uhm.. let’s just… the team is… probably waiting-”

Kageyama squeezes his eyes shut, and for a second Yamaguchi is genuinely worried he’s going to hurt himself with how tightly he’s squeezing, before he suddenly nods and turns around and flees the room. 

Wow! 

Bad. 

That was awful. 

Yamaguchi takes another look at his mocking reflection, takes a deep breath, and heads out of the bathroom. 

---

Date Tech wants a rematch. The rest of the team is chomping at the bit to keep practicing, so the coaches allow it. It’s the only time in Yamaguchi’s life he’s seen Kageyama look regretful at having to play volleyball. And it’s the only time in Yamaguchi’s life he’s genuinely happy to not be on court, whenever he swaps out for Noya. 

Kageyama is not playing his best, to say the least. 

You ever… break your setter's heart and then send him out to play ball? No? Just a Yamaguchi Tadashi thing? 

“I spoke too soon, earlier,” Suga says, from beside him on the bench. “Now you look unwell.” 

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Yamaguchi says. 

“You sure?”

“Absolutely.” 

Kageyama sets a ball so fast Asahi isn’t even in the air when it comes over his way. 

There’s no angry faster! this time, though. Kageyama looks apologetic, and then just runs his hands over his face. 

Ukai blows a whistle. “Kageyama, get over here, you’re taking a breather.”

Kageyama - normal Kageyama - would fight it, but he just nods instead. Ukai snaps his fingers. 

“Sugawara, that’s you. Get in there.”

Sugawara leaps up with glee. “Oh, hot dog!” 

“Hot dog?” Tanaka calls from the court. “What are you, ninety?”

“I’ll fucking kill you,” Suga replies, instantly, which earns: “Language!” from coach Ukai. 

“Sorry, sorry,” Suga sings, heading over to tap out Kageyama and settle into his position. 

Kageyama heads over to the bench, lays eyes on Yamaguchi, grows genuinely panicked, and then just turns around to sit on the very furthest end of the bench. 

Narita, now cursed to sit between them, looks rather… unhappy, glancing between the two as if realizing something had happened. 

So Kageyama is in love with him and now depressed, Suga was playing as setter with a shitty version of Hinata who couldn’t jump high enough to pass the net, and Yamaguchi’s best friend was doing competitive chemistry across town, and he couldn’t even tell him about any of this because he didn’t like him that much anymore.

Wow, actually, this timeline sucked hard.

And now he really feels bad for Kageyama. Not because of the big obvious reason he’d feel bad for him, but because he… took away Hinata. 

Not that Hinata seems to mind. Honestly, Yamaguchi is fairly certain if he lived this reality forever, by their third year things would have naturally righted themselves. Hinata was like a gravitational constant - he was always going to draw attention to himself. And much like Yamaguchi hadn’t changed personalities, he clearly hadn’t either. 

I don’t want to say that I want to go back. 

I don’t want to say it’s because I miss Tsukki. 

But I do. I really, really do. 

And it’s not really worth being the star without him. 

Does that make me pathetic?

He glances over to where Kageyama was sitting with his head in his hands, palms pressed to his eyes.  He thinks about how their prodigal setter had just choked on court because of a kiss gone awry. 

Maybe we’re all just doing this for the people we care about. 

“Come on, Suga, set the next one to me!” Hinata calls. 

Well. Most of us. God only knows what’s going on in his skull.

---

The night air is cold. They’d been dropped off hours ago, and for once, for once, Kageyama doesn’t accost him trying to get him to practice more. Kageyama actually just flees, which makes sense. 

Yamaguchi doesn’t go home, though. He wanders down the street halfway, and then finds a little stone retaining wall to sit on, kicking his feet and listening to music as he watches the sky. 

This isn’t a dream. Probably. But he’s not sure how to force himself to wake up. He’s a little nervous about having to spend another day here. Or another week. Or a lifetime. 

But he’s already made up his mind. If he can’t find a shooting star to wish himself home, he’d step back from volleyball. Break Kageyama’s heart, let him find Hinata properly on his own. And put his attention into Tsukki. 

I am a little bit pathetic. 

But honestly, I’d rather be pathetic with him than whatever the fuck this reality is.

He keeps his eyes on the stars, and listens to Concerning Hobbits through his headphones, letting himself, just for a second, get lost in the pleasant music, the joyous hope of it all. 

No shooting stars, but-

With a tin whistle melodic in his ears, movement catches his attention, and he looks down the road to see-

“Tsukki!” Yamaguchi calls, tugging his headphones out before lifting a hand to wave. “Hey!” 

Tsukki seems surprised, hesitatingly lifting his hands to pull his own headphones off.

“Hey. How’d the game go?” 

“Good. Won the first game, lost the second.” 

“Really?” Tsukki replies, sounding genuinely surprised. “I didn’t think you guys could lose.”

“Well, we didn’t have our best blocker,” Yamaguchi says, giving him a grin. “Speaking of, how was your thing? The science deck, or whatever?”

“Decathalon.”

“Yeah, that. How’d you do?”

“Alright,” Tsukki says. 

“Did you win? Is it… is it the kind of thing you can win?”

Tsukki doesn’t seem to trust the line of questioning, shifting his school bag over his shoulder. “Why do you care?”

“Because…” Yamaguchi just stares at him for a moment, unsure what to say. 

Because I’ve been in love with you since I was twelve except I wished myself out of that timeline so technically it didn’t happen?

“Because it’s really cool. You’re really smart and I like that about you.” 

Tsukki narrows his eyes. More distrust. 

“What! I can’t compliment you?”

“I suppose you can,” Tsukki says. Yamaguchi pats the stone retaining wall beside him. Tsukki does not, actually, sit with him. He pats it again. 

“I’m not sitting with you.”

“Fine.” 

Tsukki starts to walk again, but before he can put his headphones back on, Yamaguchi calls: 

“You didn’t tell me how you did!” 

Tsukki turns back to look at him, hesitating for a second before sighing and reaching into his bag, lifting out a small, hanging faux-bronze medal on a blue ribbon. “Karasuno got third, overall. And I got highest overall in Humanities and Literature, but they don’t give you a reward for that.” 

Yamaguchi feels himself start to grin. “That’s incredible.”

“...uh-huh,” Tsukki replies. “Are you… feeling okay? You’re acting really weird.”

I don’t think I like whichever version of me this reality had.

“How so?” Yamaguchi asks.

“Just… caring? I guess?” Tsukki replies. “I dunno, you don’t normally slow down enough to give a shit what anyone else is doing.”

Ah.

“Is that why we stopped being friends?” 

“Stopped being friends?” Tsukki laughed. “I don’t really consider us to have ever been friends.”

“Really? Not even after you saved me from those bullies?” Yamaguchi says. 

Tsukki shrugs. “I dunno. I tried to be your friend. But… you wanted to play volleyball. You always wanted to play volleyball. And when I couldn’t keep up you found people who could, I don’t think it’s that complicated.”

“Do you think we could be friends now?” 

Tsukki almost shakes his head, before half turning away. “I don’t think we’ve got all that much in common now. I’m probably gonna drop the team anyway.”

Yamaguchi opens his mouth, but ultimately doesn’t find anything to say. 

He’s having his heart broken by a guy who doesn’t even know him anymore. 

“Have a good night!” he calls instead. 

What a terrible reality this was. 

He holds his headphones in his hands, and turns his attention back towards the sky. There are clouds drifting in, covering the light from him. But he knows the stars are still there. Even if they’re covered, even in this fucked up reality. 

They’re still there. 

So he closes his eyes, for a moment, on impulse. 

I wish I could go home.

And then he thinks about adding some fine print. 

I want to go back to the way my life was before. I wish this had all been just a dream.

When he opens his eyes again, he’s still sitting in the dark. Tsukki is disappearing down the road - the music on his phone has stopped playing. 

He sighs, gathers himself together, and walks home. 

---

He eats dinner. He does homework for a class he hopes he never sees again, he heads into the bathroom and stares at a version of his body that he sort of hates. 

Stronger, healthier, more active.

At the cost of his soul, apparently. 

He wasn’t built like Hinata, to live every day of his life soaked in volleyball sweat like a maniac. 

What if he doesn’t get home? What if he can’t, what if this is permanent?

Was Tsukki really going to quit the team? How was he going to handle Kageyama being in love with him? What if he never got any of his friendships back how he needed them? 

He washes his face. He rubs the same stupid acne ointment on, muttering under his breath about it as he sticks on his patches and keeps everything dry. 

Maybe he’d quit the team, too. It wouldn’t feel right. 

It wouldn’t feel right. Not without Kageyama and Hinata bickering and fighting and being incredible. 

Not without Tsukki to run to.

He feels quite miserable about it all, filling himself with dread as he shuts out the lines and crawls into bed. For a moment, he’s scared of waking up in this reality again. Please, please, please let me go back home.

I’m not having any fun.

So he plugs his headphones in, and curls up under the blankets with his laptop, and briefly considers loading up Return of the King, since that’s technically where he left off in the story, but he can’t. 

That’s where he and Tsukki left off, and he doesn’t think he can watch it again without him. 

Ever. 

I’m never watching that movie again.

Not unless I manage to win him over and we can watch it together. 

So he puts on Fellowship of the Ring instead, hides in the dark and watches the start of the epic adventure, filled with hobbits and wizards and hope. 

It’s a long movie, but he doesn’t mind. For three and a half hours he feels like he’s himself again. 

And then he falls asleep. 

---

Laughter. 

Yamaguchi groans, slightly, shifting to squeeze his eyes shut, and then slowly make sense of why someone is laughing at him. 

Laughter? 

He opens his eyes, and-

“Tsukki!”

Tsukishima, who had been very languidly stretched out beside him and enjoying laughing at him drooling in his sleep, shrieks suddenly as Yamaguchi goes directly from REM cycle to tackling him over, off the bed, and onto the ground behind him. 

Tsukki groans, muttering curses under his breath as he smacks his head on the floor. 

“Whoops,” Yamaguchi says, but he can’t get out his usually sorry, Tsukki! because he really doesn’t feel sorry at all, and instead takes advantage of the fact that he’s now pinning down and straddling his friend on the floor to hug him again, tighter, since he can’t escape. 

“What the hell is this,” Tsukki says, half asleep. “What’s happening?” 

“You wouldn’t believe me even if I told you,” Yamaguchi mumbles, before relaxing, just slightly, but not taking his face out of where he’d pressed it against Tsukki’s neck. “I just had a… bad dream.” 

“Bad dream?” 

“Yeah.”

“What kind?”

“The… kind where… just… bad. It was bad.” 

He feels Tsukki’s hands on his back for a second, before a gentle pat indicates he would like to be let go of. 

Yamaguchi does not comply. 

“A nightmare?” Tsukki prompts after a second. “You’re acting like a toddler.”

“Yeah, a nightmare,” Yamaguchi mumbles, giving him another tight squeeze, before pulling back. “Pop quiz.”

“Oh, okay,” Tsukki says, so immediately ready for trivia that Yamaguchi feels back he’s not going to ask him real trivia questions. 

“How long have we been friends?”

Tsukki frowns. “Six years?” 

“Close enough. Are you participating in the school’s academic decathlon this year?” 

“...what?” Tsukki says. “Where’d you hear about that?” 

Yamaguchi’s eyes shoot up. “Huh?”

“The academic decathlon, where’d you hear about that? I didn’t tell anyone about that.” 

“So you are?”

“I’m not! But- the school admin asked me, it was offered. They just offer it to the highest achieving kids and go down the line until a team’s put together,” Tsukki says. “But I didn’t-”

“Why didn’t you tell me!” Yamaguchi says, smacking at him. “And more importantly, why aren’t you going? You could get a bronze medal! And be the best in class for humanities and literature!”

“Ow!” Tsukki hisses, flinching slightly “That’s so incredibly specific - stop hitting me!” 

Yamaguchi sits back, taking a deep breath. “Sorry. Sorry. I just… you’re… you. And if you have the chance to do great things then I want you to succeed, so… why’d you say no to something like that?” 

Tsukki huffs, sitting up. “Well that’s none of your business.”

“Answer the question!” 

“Fine! Geez,” Tsukki says, pointing a finger at him. “You’ve woken up in a weird mood, you know that? And get off me!”

Yamaguchi does not move. 

“I passed on the decathlon because it required quite a few days of after school prep that would have overlapped with volleyball practice,” Tsukki says. “And… I dunno, maybe I care more about volleyball than some stupid school test.”

Oh…

Wait…

“Question three,” Yamaguchi says. “You’re not secretly considering quitting the team?” 

Tsukki shakes his head. “I might hate volleyball and also everyone on the team, but… you know, it’s what we do. Plus you’re always so… goddamn energetic, if I quit I’d feel like a loser.”

“I’m energetic?” Yamaguchi laughs. 

“You practice like six hours a day, it’s disgusting,” Tsukki says. “I’m so glad I’m tall, I could not handle that level of overcompensation. It feels like standing next to a superconductor.”

That other Tsukki…

He wants to say something. Something cheesy, something romantic, something sweet, something like ‘yeah, you make my life better too,’ but he can’t. He won’t. It would be weird. 

So he kisses him instead. 

He feels Tsukki freeze for a moment, assuming his hesitation is shock, and then-

He thinks the feeling of Tsukki’s hand on the back of his head is enough to send him to heaven. Yamaguchi has never actually  kissed anyone, barring fake-Kageyama, and almost immediately begins to panic, pulling back with a muffled squeak and stammering: 

“Ah, sorry- sorry Tsukki I just-”

And then before he can continue his embarrassed stammering, Tsukki is kissing him again, sitting up more and holding onto him tighter. 

Better than being a star, that’s for sure. 

---

Yamaguchi shows up for practice early. 

Hinata and Kageyama are already there. The sound of the volleyball hitting the gym floor is painfully familiar, and Yamaguchi is shocked by himself, for the fact he’s here this early. He’d have sworn he’d not practice his ass off anymore now that he’d learned his lesson, but… 

Well… 

“Room for one more?” Yamaguchi calls. 

Hinata perks up, turning around to look at him. 

“Oh, hey! Yeah, always! Come on, hit some spikes with me. Kageyama’s got tosses enough for everyone!” 

Kageyama scrunches his nose up, but Yamaguchi laughs and pulls his shoes on. 

“You’re not usually here this early,” Kageyama calls. 

Yamaguchi tries not to think about kissing him in the Date Tech bathroom. 

“You never invited me,” he says. “But… I think waking up early a lot more than I like staying out late. I’m heading home with Tsukki right away after school, so… trading one practice for another.”

“Oh, special plans?” Hinata says, somewhat coyly in a tone Yamaguchi isn’t even sure he’s aware he’s using. 

“Sort of. The movie we want to watch is almost four and a half hours long so we need a big chunk of time.”

“It’s what?” Kageyama replies, with the distress of a man learning movies could be that long for the first time. “Why? Why would it be that?”

“Well we’re not gonna watch the unextended version,” Yamaguchi replies. “That would be insane.” 

“Yeah, that would be insane,” Kageyama says, before shaking his head. “Whatever.”

Yamaguchi is very happy he is no longer being constantly watched and assessed by this man. So he heads off, stretching his arms out and lining up to get out of the way so that Hinata could do his next spike. 

Hinata finishes taking a drink from his water bottle, and before he can turn away, Yamaguchi says: 

“Oh! Hinata, hey, I’ve been meaning to ask-”

“Mhm?”

“What the hell do you do to keep your skin so clear? Do you use any specific soap, or cleanser, or…?” 

“Soap?” Hinata says, the tone of a boy who’s never intentionally washed his face. “I dunno, skin is just skin. Why?” 

“I hate you,” Yamaguchi says, before he can stop himself. 

Hinata’s face falls, genuinely hurt for a moment before Yamaguchi says: “I’m kidding. Now go hit that ball. Kageyama is waiting for you.” 

Hinata nods, firmly, before turning to get back to practice, and Yamaguchi allows himself to take pleasure in watching his brilliant quick spike for the first time in a few days. 

It occurs to him, at the back of his mind, that if his dream had been right, about the academic decathlon, that it might have been slightly more than a dream, because he hadn’t even known that was a thing before he’d gone to sleep. 

He’s not gonna worry about that. He’s got a float serve to practice. 

“Jump higher, dumbass!” Kageyama shouts. 

“I’m sorry!” Hinata wails. 

And all is right in the world.