Work Text:
The rain starts before the argument, as if the weather saw it coming before they did.
Yamaguchi Tadashi sits on the edge of Terushima’s bed, watching a damp jersey sleeve slide down his arm. The air smells like rain-soaked asphalt and deodorant, a mix that clings to the back of his throat. The fan hums in the corner, drowning out the soft thud of his pulse.
Terushima’s just come back from practice — late again, grinning that same lazy grin that used to make Yamaguchi melt. Now it just slides off him like water on glass.
“Sorry, practice ran long,” Terushima says, tossing his gym bag onto the floor. He doesn’t look sorry. He looks electric — the kind of alive that only exists when you’re somewhere else, doing something you’re not supposed to.
“Mm,” Yamaguchi hums, his phone face-down on his knee.
A silence stretches.
Then: “What’s wrong?”
Yamaguchi could list them all — the missed calls, the half-lies, the perfume that wasn’t his — but he just says, “Nothing.”
Terushima laughs, a dry sound. “You always say that.”
“You always give me a reason to,” Yamaguchi murmurs.
It’s quiet enough that he thinks maybe Terushima didn’t hear. But then the other boy stops moving, shoulders stiffening.
They met freshman year, when Yamaguchi agreed to tutor him for psych gen ed. Terushima showed up to the café fifteen minutes late, smelling faintly of cologne and chaos, flirting with the barista before he’d even taken his seat. Yamaguchi just sighed, flipping to the page on operant conditioning, already certain this was going to be impossible.
He’d been impossible to take seriously. And that was exactly why Yamaguchi had fallen so fast.
Terushima made everything lighter — the way he’d text “you alive?” at 2 a.m. just to drag him out for fries; how he’d listen to Yamaguchi’s rants about journalism deadlines like they were lyrics.
Back then, Terushima had felt like oxygen.
Now, he felt like smoke.
“Stop looking at me like that,” Terushima mutters, dropping onto the bed beside him.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re diagnosing me.”
Yamaguchi almost laughs. “Sorry. Habit.”
Terushima tilts his head, half-grinning, but there’s tension in his jaw. “You’re still mad about last week.”
“Which part?”
“The bar. The girls. Whatever you heard from—”
“I didn’t hear it,” Yamaguchi interrupts softly. “I saw it.”
That does it. The grin cracks.
Terushima leans back, eyes darting to the ceiling as if there’s an escape hatch hidden in the plaster. “You really don’t trust me, huh?”
Yamaguchi folds his hands. His nails are clean, short — something to focus on while his heart aches in slow motion.
“I did,” he says. “Until you started treating me like one of your teammates. Disposable between games.”
They don’t fight often — Terushima’s too charming for that.
He talks circles around guilt until Yamaguchi forgets what he was mad about in the first place.
But not tonight.
Tonight, something in Yamaguchi has cracked — something small but final.
“You think you’re so misunderstood,” he says, voice calm. “Like the world keeps punishing you for being you.”
Terushima frowns. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means you like to be the victim. Yamaguchi says. “You wear it like a badge.”
“Wow,” Terushima scoffs. “Did you rehearse that?”
Yamaguchi stands up. His hands shake, but he hides them in his pockets. “No. I’ve just been thinking about it for months.”
The words come quietly, like rain down glass — not shouted, just inevitable.
“I’ve been making myself smaller so you’d feel big enough to stay.”
Terushima’s head snaps up. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Talk like you’re the only one who tried.”
Yamaguchi looks around the room — at the posters curling at the edges, the stack of undone laundry, the empty ramen cups.
He remembers the first night he slept here, tracing the tattoo on Terushima’s shoulder with his finger.
He remembers thinking, this is what it feels like to be chosen.
But now he knows better.
He wasn’t chosen. He was convenient.
The door knocks suddenly.
Kuroo pokes his head in — Terushima’s roommate. “Uh. Didn’t know you were here, Tadashi.”
“It’s fine,” Yamaguchi says, too gently.
Kuroo senses it — the voltage in the room — and nods awkwardly, retreating. “Right. Good luck, man.”
Terushima groans, flopping back onto the bed. “You just love making me the bad guy, huh?”
Yamaguchi shakes his head. “You did that yourself.”
“God, you’re dramatic.”
“I’m tired.”
The honesty lands heavy, unexpected. Terushima blinks up at him, confused, like the words don’t compute.
“Tired?”
“Of making excuses for you,” Yamaguchi says. “Of waiting for you to grow up.”
He’s not crying. Not yet. The sadness is too dry, too practiced.
Later, he’ll walk home under the flickering streetlights, shoes splashing through puddles, and think about how strange it is — the way love can feel like both a wound and its own bandage.
But right now, he just stands there in Terushima’s room, breathing the same stale air, realizing the person he loves doesn’t know how to love him back.
Terushima sits up slowly, running a hand through his hair. “You’re blowing this up. I didn’t cheat.”
Yamaguchi doesn’t respond.
“Did I flirt? Maybe. But that’s just me. You knew that when you met me.”
“I did,” Yamaguchi whispers. “I thought it was something you’d outgrow.”
Terushima laughs, sharp. “You don’t outgrow being yourself.”
“No,” Yamaguchi says. “You just get left behind for it.”
The silence that follows is brutal — the kind that stretches a second into a lifetime.
Terushima looks at him like he’s seeing a stranger.
Yamaguchi looks back like he’s saying goodbye.
He picks up his jacket from the chair. It’s damp, still cold from the walk over. He slings it over his arm, trying to ignore the sting in his throat.
“You’re leaving?” Terushima asks, as if it’s a surprise.
Yamaguchi hums. “You’d rather I stayed?”
Terushima shrugs, voice soft now. “I don’t know.”
“That’s the problem.”
Outside, the hallway buzzes with weekend noise — laughter, someone’s speaker playing an old Aimer song.
Kuroo’s in the kitchen, pretending not to notice. He gives Yamaguchi a small nod — sympathy disguised as casualness.
Yamaguchi forces a smile and steps out.
Halfway down the hall, his phone vibrates.
📱 [Kei 🦖]: Hey, saw your texts earlier. You okay?
He stares at it for a beat. Then replies:
[Tadashi 💚]: Not really. But I will be.
By the time he reaches the university gates, the rain’s stopped. The air smells like wet leaves and diesel. His reflection stares back from a puddle — soft features, tired eyes, a boy who’s finally stopped apologizing for being too much.
He thinks of all the times Terushima had told him to “chill out,” to “not take things so seriously.”
And now, he wishes he’d said it back: You should’ve taken me seriously while I was still here.
A few days later, at the café near campus, Hinata and Kageyama wave him over.
“Where’s Terushima?” Hinata asks between sips of iced coffee.
Yamaguchi shrugs. “Probably at practice.”
Kageyama blinks. “You guys fought?”
Hinata elbows him. “Don’t be nosy.”
Yamaguchi smiles faintly. “It’s okay. Yeah, we did.”
“You okay?” Hinata asks softly.
Yamaguchi looks out the window. The rain’s back — gentler now, like it’s finally tired too.
“I think so,” he says. “I think I just forgot what I deserved for a while.”
Terushima doesn’t text. Not that night. Not the next.
But a week later, Yamaguchi spots him across the quad, laughing with friends. Same grin, same energy — like nothing ever happened.
It should hurt. It does, in a way that’s clean and distant, like pressing on an old bruise.
Terushima catches his eye for half a second. Something flickers there — guilt, nostalgia, something too small to name — but Yamaguchi looks away first.
He doesn’t owe that moment anything.
That night, he opens his journal for the first time in weeks.
> You won’t be missed.
But you’ll stay with me, somehow.
Not because you mattered.
But because you reminded me that I do.
He closes the notebook and stares at the ceiling until the streetlights fade into dawn.
For the first time, his chest doesn’t ache. It just feels — empty, and open.
Like something healing.
A week later, he runs into Tsukishima outside the library.
Tsukki’s got a book tucked under one arm, headphones around his neck, the same unimpressed slouch that used to make Yamaguchi laugh.
For a second, neither of them says anything. Just a small nod — two people trying to fit back into a rhythm they’d paused for too long.
Tsukishima’s the one who breaks it.
“You look different,” he says, like he’s commenting on the weather.
Yamaguchi huffs a laugh. “That bad?”
Tsukki glances up from adjusting his glasses. “Didn’t say bad.”
“Then what?”
“Less pathetic,” Tsukishima says, deadpan. Then, after a beat, quieter: “Better.”
Yamaguchi smiles, slow and a little unsure. “You’re still mean.”
“You’re still dramatic.”
“That’s not always worse.”
Tsukki gives a small shrug, the corner of his mouth twitching. “For you, it means you’re back to normal.”
He starts to walk off, but stops, tossing the next line over his shoulder like it’s nothing:
“I heard about him through Kuroo. Good riddance.”
Yamaguchi watches him go, that familiar fond ache blooming in his chest.
“Thanks, Tsukki,” he says softly.
“Don’t thank me,” Tsukishima calls back without turning. “You’re the one who finally figured it out.”
In the quiet walk home that night, Yamaguchi listens to the city breathe — cars, laughter, wind through damp trees.
He imagines Terushima somewhere out there too, maybe still awake, maybe replaying their last conversation. Maybe not.
It doesn’t matter.
Because this — this calm, this clean ache — is his now.
Not born of someone else’s chaos, but from his own decision to stop waiting for love to sound like apology.
He exhales.
The world doesn’t end.
The rain doesn’t start again.
Just a quiet night, and the slow, steady rhythm of his own heart — learning how to beat alone.
Terushima's POV
The first time he sees Yamaguchi again, it’s been twenty-three days.
Not that he’s counting.
Not exactly.
He just happens to know.
It’s Thursday, the kind of afternoon that hums — cicadas shrieking in the heat, air thick with summer’s last tantrum. Terushima’s cutting across campus toward the rec center when he spots him through the café window.
Yamaguchi’s laughing. Head tilted back, hand half-covering his mouth like he’s still shy about being seen. Across from him sits Akaashi, calm and smirking, the kind of person who looks like he knows everyone’s secrets but never spills them.
Terushima doesn’t mean to stop walking. But his body does it for him.
The world goes muffled for a moment — like someone’s pressed pause on everything but that laugh.
It hits him then, sharp and stupid:
That sound used to belong to him.
He’s been pretending it doesn’t matter.
Practice, parties, a string of meaningless nights that blur at the edges. He laughs louder now, drinks more, spins the bottle even when no one asks him to.
His friends think he’s fine. Of course they do. Terushima Yūji is always fine.
He’s the joke, the spark, the one who turns silence into something that sounds like fun.
But lately, the silence feels heavier.
It waits for him when he gets home, sits beside him while he scrolls through old photos, stares back when he catches himself hovering over Yamaguchi’s name at 3 a.m.
He’s typed out three messages. Deleted all of them.
You still mad?
You left your hoodie here.
Do you still—
Delete. Delete. Delete.
Because if he sends one, he’s admitting it — that he misses someone who saw right through him and left anyway.
That night, Kuroo corners him in the kitchen.
“Yamaguchi looked good today,” Kuroo says, opening the fridge.
Terushima frowns. “Why would you tell me that?”
Kuroo shrugs. “Because you looked at him like you forgot how to breathe.”
“Shut up.”
Kuroo grins. “Can’t. It’s a gift.”
Terushima rolls his eyes and grabs a beer. “You think he’s seeing someone?”
“Does it matter?”
He doesn’t answer.
The truth is, Yamaguchi had been right. About everything.
He’d made himself smaller.
Bit by bit, until the quiet felt normal.
And Terushima—he’d let him. Maybe even liked it that way.
It made him feel larger, louder. Certain, in a way he never really was.
Yamaguchi always knew who he was.
Steady. Measured. All heart and logic.
The kind of person who built his world carefully, piece by piece.
Terushima wasn’t like that. He was static—bright, restless, always buzzing.
He didn’t mean to hurt him. Not really.
He just didn’t know what to do when things stopped being easy.
When love stopped being fun.
Because for him, love was a game.
It always had been.
And Yamaguchi—
Yamaguchi had ruined that.
He’d made it real.
Made it honest.
He’d made it a mirror.
And Terushima?
He’d never been good at looking at himself.
A week later, he ends up at the same café again. By accident, he tells himself. Except it’s not.
He orders the same drink Yamaguchi used to get — matcha latte, no syrup, extra foam — and hates himself for remembering.
The barista calls his name. He takes the cup. It’s too sweet.
Outside, the sun’s sliding behind the buildings, painting everything in gold and shadow. He sits on the low stone wall, listening to the soft hum of traffic, the sound of someone’s laughter echoing down the street.
For a second, he imagines Yamaguchi walking by. Imagines what he’d say.
Maybe nothing.
Maybe I’m sorry.
Maybe just hi.
He wonders which version would hurt more.
Later that night, he opens his notes app and types:
> You were right. I think I am misunderstood. Mostly by me.
He stares at it for a while, then adds another line:
> I hope you sleep well. I hope you stopped shrinking.
He doesn’t send it. He doesn’t have to.
The next morning, he finds the hoodie Yamaguchi left — gray, soft, still faintly smelling of rain and something minty.
He folds it neatly.
Puts it in a box with old ticket stubs and photos and a letter he never gave him.
Tapes it shut. Writes nothing on the top.
Just leaves it by his door.
In the weeks that follow, Terushima starts showing up to class again. He cuts his hair. Joins an intramural team. Stops pretending he’s unbreakable.
And sometimes, when he catches himself laughing too loud, he remembers Yamaguchi’s face that last night — the stillness of it, the kind of calm that only comes from finally choosing yourself.
He thinks: maybe that’s what love is supposed to look like.
Months later, during an away game, he scrolls through his playlist on the bus. A random track comes up — slow piano, soft female vocals. The kind of song that hurts quietly.
He doesn’t skip it.
He just leans his head against the window, watching the city lights smear across the glass.
In the reflection, his own eyes look tired. But honest.
And somewhere under the ache, there’s something else.
Something that feels suspiciously like growth.
When he finally falls asleep, he dreams of rain — not the kind that drowns, but the kind that cleans.
Yamaguchi’s there, standing under it, face turned to the sky, unafraid.
Terushima reaches out —
but this time, he doesn’t call his name.
He just lets him go.
Five years is a long time to go without saying someone’s name out loud.
And yet, when Yamaguchi Tadashi sees him across the ballroom, it falls from his tongue before he can stop it.
“...Teru.”
He’s not close enough for Terushima to hear — thank god — but the syllables leave his lips like muscle memory, shaped by something older than pride.
The gala’s all marble floors and white light, crystal laughter clinking against champagne glasses. The kind of place where everyone’s trying to look like they belong.
Yamaguchi doesn’t. He’s in his pressed suit, badge clipped to his pocket — Press. He’s not here to dazzle. He’s here to observe. To write about the charitable faces of famous athletes who learned, somewhere along the way, how to smile for headlines.
And one of them is Terushima Yūji.
He looks... older. Not in the sad way — in the real way.
The bleach is gone, hair now its natural dark brown, shorter at the sides. His tattoos are still there, but they peek from beneath crisp cuffs instead of the messy sleeves Yamaguchi remembers.
His grin’s the same, though — still too big for his face, still capable of lighting entire rooms.
And when Terushima laughs at something one of the reporters says, Yamaguchi feels his chest stutter like an old machine catching a familiar rhythm. The glint of his tongue piercing flashes briefly in the light — a ghost of his younger self, stubbornly refusing to fade.
He doesn’t plan to approach him.
Of course he doesn’t. He has professionalism, a deadline, a whole life beyond this ballroom.
He can write about other people. About the way triumph looks in the flash of a camera, about redemption arcs and comeback seasons.
He doesn’t need to write about them.
But fate’s got its own sense of humor.
Half an hour later, while he’s sneaking out toward the catering table for another glass of water, someone bumps into him — firm, solid, shoulder-first.
“Ah, sorry, man—”
Yamaguchi turns, already shaking his head, and freezes.
For a heartbeat, the world stops being an event. It’s just noise — dim and faraway — and two people staring at each other across the years.
“...Tadashi?”
Yamaguchi hates how easily his name sounds in Terushima’s voice. Like it never left his mouth.
“Hey,” Yamaguchi says softly. “It’s been a while.”
Terushima blinks, then huffs a laugh that’s part disbelief, part awe. “Five years, give or take.”
“You remember.”
“I remember a lot of things,” Terushima says.
And that’s when Yamaguchi knows he’s in trouble — because he does too.
They move to the edge of the hall, by the tall windows that overlook the city. Rain’s starting to fall again — light, unthreatening.
“Didn’t expect to see you here,” Terushima says, hands in his pockets.
“Working,” Yamaguchi replies. “I’m covering the event.”
Terushima grins. “Still the overachiever, huh?”
“Still deflecting with charm, huh?”
He laughs — real, surprised. “God, you still talk like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you’ve already psychoanalyzed me before I say a word.”
Yamaguchi smiles faintly. “Maybe I have.”
For a moment, they just stand there. The silence isn’t heavy this time. It’s aged, like wine that’s stopped trying to be sweet.
Terushima shifts his weight. “You look good, Tadashi.”
“Thanks. You too.”
“You heard about me?”
“Who hasn’t?” Yamaguchi teases gently. “Youth coach, motivational speaker, the guy who turned his reputation around. I wrote a feature about you two years ago.”
Terushima laughs. “I didn’t know that.”
“You didn’t read it.”
“I didn’t have to,” he says, eyes soft now. “If it was yours, I’m sure it was kind.”
Yamaguchi looks away, pretending to watch the city lights. “I wasn’t kind. Just honest.”
“That’s worse,” Terushima murmurs, smiling a little. “You were always good at that.”
A waiter passes, offering champagne. They each take a glass, more to fill their hands than their mouths.
Terushima leans against the window, profile glowing gold under the chandelier. “I’ve thought about calling you,” he says quietly.
Yamaguchi hums. “You never did.”
“Didn’t know if I had the right.”
“You didn’t,” Yamaguchi says. Then, softer: “But you could’ve tried.”
Terushima’s laugh is brittle. “Would you have picked up?”
“I don’t know,” he admits. “Depends on which version of me you called.”
“The one from college?”
“That one probably would’ve cried.”
“And now?”
“Now I’d listen,” Yamaguchi says. “But I wouldn’t wait.”
There it is — the truth between them, quiet and clear.
They sip their drinks in silence. Somewhere, a camera flashes; someone toasts; life continues.
Terushima says, “I’m glad you’re doing well.”
“I am,” Yamaguchi says. “It took a while.”
Terushima nods. “Yeah. Me too.”
He looks at him then — really looks — and Yamaguchi feels something ache deep in his ribs.
Not longing, not regret. Just recognition.
They were kids then — too young to understand what love required.
Now, they’re grown enough to know that love alone isn’t enough, but kindness is.
“Hey,” Terushima says suddenly, setting down his glass. “You still drink that weird matcha thing?”
Yamaguchi blinks, then laughs — startled, bright. “You remember that?”
“Of course I do. You used to make me taste it every time like it’d suddenly stop being bitter.”
“I was trying to convert you.”
“You failed.”
“I usually do,” Yamaguchi says, still smiling.
“No,” Terushima says, voice gentler now. “You just tried too hard.”
The rain picks up, soft percussion against the windows.
Yamaguchi glances toward the exit. “I should go. My editor’s waiting for a draft.”
“Yeah,” Terushima says. “I should, uh—” He gestures vaguely toward the stage where the emcee’s calling for guests. “Smile for cameras or something.”
They stand there for one last moment, the distance between them thick with everything unspoken.
“Yūji.”
He looks up, startled by the use of his name — his real one.
Yamaguchi’s eyes are steady, unreadable but kind. “You’ve grown up.”
Terushima chuckles softly. “Took long enough, huh?”
“Yeah.” Yamaguchi adjusts his bag strap. “I’m glad.”
He turns to go — and then, halfway through the motion, Terushima blurts, “Wait.”
Yamaguchi pauses.
“Coffee,” Terushima says, voice low but sure. “Not now, not tonight. But sometime. No cameras, no interviews. Just... catching up.”
Yamaguchi looks at him for a long time. The kind of look that feels like standing in the doorway of a house you used to live in — familiar, but not home anymore.
Then he smiles. Small. Real.
“Maybe.”
Terushima exhales, nodding. “I’ll take maybe.”
When Yamaguchi leaves, Terushima watches him go — that same careful stride, that same quiet confidence.
Outside, the rain’s slowed. Streetlights halo the puddles gold.
Terushima takes another sip of champagne and thinks, not for the first time, that luck has nothing to do with love.
Sometimes it’s just about timing.
And sometimes, if you’re lucky —
timing gives you one more chance.
END (for now).