Chapter Text
PUEN POV
Puen's not sure why he's alive, if he's being entirely honest.
Not that he wants to die, he's just not sure what the point of living is.
At home, at school-- Wherever he goes, he's just sort of there, standing on the sidelines all alone watching people live their lives around him. But he doesn't participate.
Doesn't really care to.
He just doesn't see the point.
He'll never belong, anyway. And people who make promises only ever let you down.
Not that it really matters.
Because, after all, nothing does.
SINGHA POV
Volleyball is everything.
Life is hard and other people can't always be counted on, but volleyball doesn't change.
For everything that he's lost and all the thing's he's never had, the court, the net and the game make up for it.
Keeping him out of trouble, teaching him how to make friends and giving him hope for the future: everything came from volleyball.
Volleyball showed Singha how to create a life for himself with faith, practice and his own two hands.
He can hold his head high and laugh because of it.
He has a place that feels like home because of it.
Volleyball is everything.
PUEN POV
Puen is sitting outside after school ends for no particular reason. He doesn't want to go home, but he doesn't want to go anywhere else either, so he just stays at school.
He fiddles with his phone in the dark doing nothing important and figures he'll leave when he gets hungry or tired.
He's done this a million times before and imagines he'll spend forever doing it:
Meandering. Wasting time.
Waiting to die.
Out of nowhere, a volleyball smashes his phone to the ground and someone yells an apology.
"Khot tohd!"
Puen looks up only mildly annoyed, grabbing the ball and smashing it back to the group of boys on the court.
"Hey! You're good!" The kid at the front exclaims and Puen is a little taken aback.
"Do you wanna play with us?" The kid asks and something in Puen's chest trembles.
It's the first time someone's complimented him, noticed him, and it's just for hitting a ball. (He'd expected them to be angry. He'd thought it would turn into a fight.)
He hesitates.
The boys on the court are all staring at him, waiting for his answer and he's sure he won't be good at this, but--
But he wants to try it.
He wants the kid with the pretty eyes to keep smiling at him and he wants to stop being alone.
He nods.
His love affair with volleyball begins.
SINGHA POV
Singha likes Puen.
He'd always seen the other boy around school, had noticed him mostly just for being quiet, but he'd never had any real motive to speak with him before.
Until he screwed up and Leng managed to get a ball past him.
Watching the ball fly away from the court and knock Puen's phone out of his hand was like seeing a car wreck in slow motion. His heart jumped into his throat and he thought for sure there'd be trouble.
The look on the other boy's face certainly indicated as much.
But then Puen spiked the ball back to them and Singha's inner sports nerd took over.
"Do you wanna play with us?"
The words were out of his mouth before his brain could process them, but he couldn't help it. The kid was good.
And seeing the look on his face, the fear and the wanting, the hesitation--
Singha didn't regret a thing.