Chapter Text
Iwaizumi hoped his neighbors weren't home because he knew from their extracurriculars that the walls felt more like sound amplifiers than barriers at times.
Grunting as his body met the wall harshly, any instances of pain were quickly overwhelmed by the mouth on his, the body against his. He sighed into the kiss and brought a free hand up, tangling his fingers through hair longer and much softer than his. His touch was gentle at first, until he felt teeth biting down harshly on his lip. Iwaizumi winced and retaliated by grasping a fistful of hair, yanking back and moving his mouth to the newly exposed neck, actions fueled by the moans filling his small apartment.
The vibrations he felt as he kissed along the throat only encouraged him and he tightened his grip on the tresses. He teased the skin with both his lips and his teeth, alternating between petal soft kisses and harsh bites, moving down to exposed collarbones, hearing heavy pants.
For the first ten seconds of every day, everything was all right.
It didn't matter if Iwaizumi had slept two hours or twelve; the fact was that the very first time he woke up from falling asleep, there were ten blissful seconds where everything was all right. In that tiny span of time, nothing mattered and nothing hurt, because his body was slowly waking up.
First, his consciousness; his mind woke invisibly, allowing him to hear the birds outside his window and feel sunlight warming his exposed skin. Slowly but surely, his body was lulled towards consciousness.
Then his eyes; despite how groggily it was, they would slowly see the morning sun illuminate specks of dust floating through his room. His vision would slowly bring everything into focus, and Iwaizumi would see the familiar sight of his bedroom, blank walls riddled with stains and marks and haphazardly scattered clothes strewn about.
And then the rest of his body would slowly wake; sensation slowly spreading down his body, through his limbs, and to his extremities. Two arms and two legs, ten fingers and ten toes; everything was accounted for, everything was present.
He'd take his first deep breath of the day and it was almost like his body had its own checklist. It made sure that he, Iwaizumi Hajime, was still there and fully accounted for.
And as soon as it was done:
Reality would crash into him like a meteorite impact.
Switching their positions, Iwaizumi slammed the slender frame against the opposite wall. The moans he heard were maddening, almost overwhelming his senses to the point where he barely felt nails dragging over his skin in an attempt to pull off his shirt. Chest heaving, Iwaizumi allowed separation of their bodies just long enough to grab a fistful of his shirt at the nape of his neck and pull it off in a seamless motion. Tossing it to the side, he looked away and only heard another rumpling noise to indicate more clothes had joined the pile. He couldn't say if he was pulled in for the next kiss or if he initiated it; he felt hot palms frame his face and a tongue slip into his mouth. It tasted so strongly of whiskey that Iwaizumi wondered if it could actually make him even drunker.
By the age of twenty-seven, Iwaizumi had come to a precarious agreement with alcohol: he would allow it to fuck him up, but just not that often.
He seldom drank to begin with, but if he did, he knew to not have five drinks in a row; instead, if he spread them out, he would not only be on his way to avoid blacking out, but that buzzing sensation would last longer instead of hitting him all at once.
And, he supposed, he did abide by his adage.
He didn't have five drinks in a row.
He'd had eight and had a feeling a good majority of them had been doubles.
His entire body ached, but the dulled pain was much preferable to the piercing headache that seemed to pulsate with his heartbeat. He'd spent a good majority of his life training his body to be in the best physical shape, but at this moment, even the idea of raising a hand seemed monumental. It took an immense amount of effort, but he slowly brought a hand up to his face and pressed the heel of his palm against his temple, swearing quietly under his breath.
Then in signature hangover fashion, the rising nausea stemming from emptiness in his stomach followed. Iwaizumi hated drinking; even when he'd been in college, he'd never drank for the taste or even for the slight buzz. If he drank, it was to the point of not being able to feel even his face because if he couldn't fall asleep, he could at least render himself numb. Iwaizumi could count on one hand the number of times he'd done that, and there was only one time he'd drank enough to have a hangover comparable to this one.
Iwaizumi was headstrong and normally wanted to confront his problems, but the spectrum of human emotion included feelings so intense that if Iwaizumi didn't numb himself and had to feel it all, he swore he wouldn't survive it.
He shuddered to feel soft lips and hot breath skim along his jawline and then down his throat, peppering kisses and bites. "Don't leave a hickey," he groaned hoarsely, wincing at a sharp bite. His words were met with a laugh and Iwaizumi could feel his belt being undone.
Lips came up to his again, a lazy, drawn out kiss that stole his breath away from him. "What…" he heard mockingly.
The feeling of kisses being trailed down his body rendered him speechless, and Iwaizumi was left in a daze, letting his head fall back, parted lips barely remembering to inhale. Half-lidded, dazed eyes stared at his ceiling as he felt both his pants and boxers being pulled down just enough, swallowing and biting his lip when he felt warmth tracing along him.
"Don't tell me you're with someone, after all…"
And before he could respond, the sensation of being enveloped in warmth and alcohol coursing through his veins took over him, and he was barely able to keep himself standing.
It was like ice shot through his veins.
He sat up immediately, breath catching in his throat as fear immobilized his lungs. "Fuck…"
A hand shot out and palmed along his nightstand, panic growing in his chest when he felt only plain wood and the base of his lamp. Iwaizumi tossed his covers aside and swung his legs over the side of his bed; his heels landed loudly on the floor. He stood quickly and his hangover immediately had his room spinning; Iwaizumi managed to not fall, though he was swaying, eyes squinting and hand holding his head as he navigated over to his pants halfway between his bed and the door.
Fuck… fuck, don't tell me…
As his heart pounded in his chest, Iwaizumi's breathing grew shallow. His shaking hands made it an even more daunting task to navigate his phone, as his headache didn't appreciate the light and eyes couldn't care less for the small font. Nevertheless, he managed to navigate to the home screen, where he saw a myriad of missed text messages.
Licking his painfully dry lips, he winced as another wave of pain shot through his head and he tapped into his chat history, squinting eyes scanning his messages.
From: Matsukawa
i'm so sorry. let me know if i can do anything.
From: Hanamaki
are you okay? call me back
From: Hanamaki
we have a futon set up. let me know if you wanna crash
From: Hinata
iwaizumi-san, i'm sorry to hear!! we're here if you need anything
From: Ushijima
Sorry to hear about your engagement.
Iwaizumi froze. For just a moment, everything stopped. The chirping birds were replaced by a ringing in his ears. The anxiety fueling his heart was replaced by cold in his stomach. The panting filling and emptying his lungs was replaced by a single, slow exhale. The cold sweat over his body was replaced by the kind of warmth that only dread could bring.
The searing pain in his head was gone, replaced with absolute nothingness.
His fingers, which had been trembling so badly, went limp and his phone fell to the ground, landing with a loud thump and leaving a dent. His heart, which had been racing so quickly that he was afraid it would leap out of his chest, was now pounding so harshly, that it sent reverbs through his chest. Iwaizumi slowly brought a hand to his chest, feeling the tips of his fingers skim against his skin. Once that contact was made, he touched the base of his palm against his sternum, slowly pressing harder and harder, until he thought his chest might just give in, just to feel something tangible.
When his knees nearly buckled, Iwaizumi managed to breathe, 'stop'. It was in such a strained whisper, voiced from a throat so sore, that he wasn't sure if it would be heard. The sensations stopped after a moment, but the pleasure still lingered, lighting up his nerves. Even something as small as feeling a breeze as the other stood up had Iwaizumi shuddering.
"Don't tell me," he heard and was met with dark eyes. "You're seriously attached? Ahh… you're a piece of shit…"
Scoffing, Iwaizumi lifted a hand and tangled his fingers through the locks of hair and crashed their lips together again. He felt absolutely no resistance to the kiss and angled his head to deepen it, pressing their mouths together so harshly it was almost painful. He navigated their bodies into his bedroom, kicking off his pants along the way.
His bed creaked with the sudden weight of a new body and Iwaizumi was quick to undo the single remaining belt and zipper remaining between them, allowing them to be kicked off as his hands touched over exposed skin, fingers curling and leaving pink welts in their wake. "That's none of your business," he grunted.
A laugh that irritated Iwaizumi more than he could describe.
Moving his hand down the newly fully exposed body, Iwaizumi was pressing kisses along the sharp jaw when he heard words again and was growing increasingly annoyed at the amount of talking in a generally non-talkative activity. "You're a pretty shitty person to cheat on—"
Iwaizumi smirked briefly when his fingers touched a sensitive spot.
"Y-your girlfriend…"
"Tch… I'm not attached to anyone," he snapped, pulling back just enough to reach into his nightstand drawer for a bottle of lubricant. "Not anymore," he continued. "Not that that was going to stop you."
Hearing a laugh, Iwaizumi looked down to see a heart stopping smirk.
"Well, I didn't say I was a good person."
Last night, alcohol and darkness muddled features, but in daylight and sobriety, nothing was stopping Iwaizumi from clearly identifying the face of someone who had haunted him for years. He didn't even have to turn around to know he was still in his bed; Iwaizumi's eyes were still closed, but that smirk was burned into his memory.
"…Fuck."
Iwaizumi exhaled slowly, pinching the bridge of his nose. He heard movement behind him; it was slight, but the superpower of a hangover was ultra-sensitive hearing, at the cost of pain. He swallowed thickly and dropped his head, feeling the dip between his shoulders exaggerate.
He closed his eyes, breathing ragged in an attempt to keep his cool.
"Get out."
Rubbing his face, Iwaizumi heard footsteps and clothes rumpling. He couldn't help but swear quietly again when he felt the other person walk past him, felt a cool rush of wind. "You were right, by the way," he drawled, opening his eyes tiredly finally to watch the six foot one, haphazardly dressed dark brown haired man at his door, pulling on his shoes. "You're a terrible fucking person."
The other laughed shortly, opening the door without ever once looking behind him.
"Yeah, well, takes one to know one, Iwa-chan."
The door slammed shut behind him.
It all came rushing back, details from last night crashing into Iwaizumi at a two hundred kilometers an hour.
Having expected a late night practice with the team, Iwaizumi was pleasantly surprised when it ended at a reasonable hour. He had texted Himari to ask her what her plans were and when she didn't answer, decided to pick up her favorite dinner from a shop along the way to her apartment. Iwaizumi would admit that he hadn't been as present in their relationship as he should have been. They had gotten engaged maybe a month ago and as unfair as it was, it had partially been to reassure her that he was serious about the relationship. It was just a phase, he told himself, he'd recently started what he had considered his dream career, and he wanted to solidify his footing in the role, and it came at the cost of his personal relationship.
She had brought up multiple times how he'd seemed distant and spent more time at his job than with her. Iwaizumi was tired of the fight because it always started, elapsed, and ended the same way.
"I can't just not go; what if one of the idiots injures himself? Have you met the members of the national team? They are all idiots."
"Well, it's a great thing we have something called a hospital, don't we?"
When he'd showed up at her apartment, he wasn't too perturbed to find that she had a friend over. She didn't seem like she'd appreciate being kissed, and so he left it at a simple greeting and offered her the bag of take-out, told her to have a good night. Her friend had called a cheerful 'thank you,' but when Himari didn't say anything and just glared at him, Iwaizumi sighed, momentarily letting his head fall back to roll his neck and stretch out a few tense muscles.
"You know I don't do passive aggressive, Himari," he said tiredly. "Either get over it or spit it out."
She bristled.
"That's it? 'Get over it'?" she snapped, and Iwaizumi regarded her warily, but couldn't help but narrow his eyes. "You think this makes up for all the anniversaries you've missed? Dates you've stood me up on? You, showing up once as a surprise? Did you think I'd just always be waiting around for you?"
"Why are you getting more upset about this than I am?" he asked tiredly. "I'm not upset that you're too busy to hang out tonight; just eat the food with Yachi. We'll hang out some other—"
"We're engaged, Hajime, stop talking about us like we've just started dating!"
By this point, Yachi had come over and tried to ameliorate the tension, slowly taking the takeout from Iwaizumi and setting it on the counter. "You know, I can leave! This is the first time Iwaizumi-san's had a night off, so you two should—"
"No," Himari said sharply, never once interrupting her glare towards Iwaizumi. Yachi visibly shrunk back and Iwaizumi couldn't help but feel bad for her. He just gave another sigh and ran a hand through his hair; there was maybe one too many beats of silence, because she spoke first and Iwaizumi would forever wonder what would've happened if he'd spoken first.
"We're over anyway. Just go, Hajime. Don't bother coming back. We're done."
He'd met Himari in his last year of college, and they'd been friends for about three years before starting to date. Iwaizumi hadn't had any relationships in college and spent most of it recovering from a failed one in high school, so when he met Himari, he made it explicitly clear early on that he wasn't looking to date. She'd just laughed, tucked a strand of her warm brown hair behind her ear.
"I mean, the coffee was going to be a bribe for you to share your notes with me, but you must really think highly of yourself to assume it's a date."
While he still considered Hanamaki and Matsukawa his closest friends, over time, Himari slowly ingrained herself into the group, bringing them back up to four people once again. Iwaizumi didn't deny that over the years he started to care for her more than a friend and when he asked her out, she'd beamed, teased that she'd known all along this would happen.
It was the first time in a long time that he smiled genuinely.
Maybe it was the pressure of a relationship. She certainly didn't seem to mind when he had to bail at the last minute because of work or school when they were friends, but she'd started telling him how it upset her when they dated. At the beginning, Iwaizumi tried to be understanding, but the patience he normally had for someone he cared about quickly faded because these fights were too familiar. He understood that as a boyfriend, he should be prioritizing her. But, he would say, it wasn't as if he was choosing someone else over her. This was his job; this was his career, why did she still take such an issue with it?
Most of their fights were about that, but over time, more fights came up. When he proposed, it had been maybe the first week in a year where they had no fights, but then they started up again. The fights always ended the same way; she'd yell, he'd defend himself, and then a few days later he would apologize and she would forgive him. But somewhere along the way, it seemed that she'd stopped forgiving him, and Iwaizumi hadn't realized it.
Did he miss the signs? His high school relationship was similar; he'd been accused of not being properly invested in the relationship.
Maybe, Iwaizumi thought, he just wasn't meant to be in a relationship.
After Oikawa left, Iwaizumi immediately went to take a shower, scrubbing extra hard as if he could wash off the parts of him that Oikawa had touched with soap and scalding water. He was in the shower for almost an hour, standing under the water; every time he closed his eyes, he felt Oikawa's body against his, his mouth on him and it was maddening and he nearly slipped when his fist shot out, colliding solidly with the wall.
When he finally stepped out and pulled on some clean clothes, he checked his phone to see several missed calls from Hanamaki, taking a moment to try and exhale residual annoyances before calling back. When Hanamaki declined and called back immediately with video, Iwaizumi scowled, but obliged and held his phone up, glaring tiredly. "I'm fine," he snapped. "You don't need to keep calling me; I've been through a breakup, I know how they work."
Hanamaki stared at him with an unreadable expression and when Matsukawa came into the frame, he mirrored it.
Iwaizumi snapped at them to just spit out whatever they had to say.
Hanamaki hesitated.
"…Is that a hickey?"
Iwaizumi immediately hung up; turning on his heel, he returned to the bathroom and flipped the lights on, craning his head to be able to examine his neck, immediately seeing a dark spot. Of course, he thought bitterly, immediately scowling, of course Oikawa would leave a hickey after explicitly being told not to. He suddenly found himself wondering if it had been before or after Iwaizumi confirmed he wasn't with anyone, felt ice prickling his cheeks until red exploded in his vision.
"Fucking bastard…!"
Before he realized it, his mirror shattered from the impact of his fist. The sound cleared Iwaizumi's mind immediately and pain radiated from his knuckles up his arm. He gingerly pulled his fist back, watching a few small shards fall onto his bathroom counter. Slowly extending his fingers, Iwaizumi winced a bit at the pain, but focusing on it helped him to relax.
As the blood pounding in his ears slowly faded, Iwaizumi realized his phone was ringing and knew it had to be Hanamaki. He closed his eyes and took a moment to collect himself with a deep breath, licking his lips and swallowing thickly. After making sure there were no glass shards in his knuckles, he headed into the kitchen to grab a rag, wrapping it around his hand before going back into his living room to answer his phone, this time only Hanamaki in the frame.
Hanamaki scoffed. "Any longer, and we would've gone to your apartment."
"You seriously need a job, Hanamaki."
"Being between jobs is a legitimate thing," Hanamaki retorted and Iwaizumi rolled his eyes, shaking his head. Setting the phone on speakerphone, he placed it down on the table and went to retrieve a first aid kit, returning just in time to answer Hanamaki's voiced concern.
"I'm fine," he grumbled, opening the case and taking out an antiseptic wipe. "You're not my parents—"
"We're just worried," Hanamaki interjected and Iwaizumi almost physically winced from the guilt. "I mean, not enough that Matsukawa's gonna skip work and, you know, there's no huge rush of urgency at his job—"
"Yeah, the dead tend to stay dead."
"But your last break-up—"
"Was nine years ago," Iwaizumi cut in sharply. Hanamaki didn't say anything at first and Iwaizumi immediately felt a bit guilty for the outburst, focusing on cleaning his knuckles. He waited until he was finished bandaging his hand up to mumble an apology. "I know why you guys are worried, but it's not like that this time."
"Hook-ups aren't your thing either. Who were you with?"
Iwaizumi's chest seized and he struggled to keep his breathing even. Flexing his hand and using the pain to ground himself, he licked his lips. "…Uh, it was just someone from the bar."
That was true.
The previous night's memories avalanched in his mind; he saw flashes of the bar, the shots, meeting Oikawa, and bringing him back to his apartment. The harder he tried to repress them, the more they came back, the same way the harder he scrubbed his skin, the more tangible Oikawa's touches from last night.
"Whiskey, neat."
He paused and rubbed his face.
"…Make it a double."
He kept checking his phone and each time that he saw there were no new notifications, his scowl deepened. Should he text her? Should he wait? His heart was thrumming, feeling like it was in his throat, making it hard to breathe.
After Himari slammed the door shut in his face, Iwaizumi had been frozen in place, feet rooted as he stared blankly at the wood that muffled Yachi's words but didn't drown out the sound of her frantic voice. Himari hadn't slapped him, but humiliation had a hell of a punch and Iwaizumi barely remembered how he had navigated his way to the bar.
Was it possible to black out without drinking anything?
It was only after finishing his first shot that Iwaizumi realized he hadn't eaten; what he'd intended as his dinner was now at Himari and Yachi's, possibly left there, entirely forgotten. Iwaizumi winced; he could feel the burning sensation of the alcohol traveling down his throat, settling into his stomach and mixing with the uncomfortable pit. He nodded and held up a finger when he caught the bartender's eye, and his second glass was soon empty and next to the first.
There was no way that just happened, he thought, groaning as he buried his face in his hands. They'd been dating for over two years; there's no way that she dumped him—that she ended their engagement—after a conversation that didn't even last five minutes.
Another shot.
She was reasonable. That's why he liked her; she'd been so reasonable, unlike his first boyfriend. She was mature and understood that he had his own life outside of what they had together. She teased him and was always, unwaveringly there for him, no matter what.
Another shot.
Or, Iwaizumi thought numbly, maybe she had a point. Maybe it wasn't that she was expecting too much of him, it was that he wasn't putting in as much effort as he should have. Missing a date for a work emergency, that was reasonable; she'd never gotten mad when he explained someone had gotten hurt and so he couldn't make their dinner. She'd gotten mad when he said he decided to go in despite not being scheduled, out of precaution. She'd gotten mad when practices ran long and he told her with a simple text, returning to his apartment to see a homemade meal put away into Tupperware, handwritten notes with reheating instructions.
Maybe she had a point.
Maybe he was a bad boyfriend.
Maybe it was over.
Iwaizumi took a deep breath, but the oxygen just felt like it made the alcohol more potent. He thought he'd asked for a water next, but when the bartender set a fifth shot in front of him, he didn't complain and soon set down yet another empty glass. The room was spinning, even when he had his eyes closed, forehead resting against his clasped hands.
When he heard the stool two down from him move, he opened his eyes, but didn't move from his position. He didn't even have to look over; what he saw from the corner of his eye was more than enough and he swore under his breath and fixed his gaze on the empty shot glasses in front of him because suddenly, alcohol wasn't the only cause for his dizziness and pounding heart.
Iwaizumi was an athletic trainer, so he had a solid foundation in the sciences. On top of that, he had always been a realist, and so he didn't believe in very much that he couldn't rationalize or prove. He kept himself grounded and refused to be swept away by the whirlwind of romantic notions, finding them pointless and exaggerated, despite having spent two thirds of his life by the side of someone just like that.
However, even if he couldn't explain why or rationalize it, Iwaizumi did believe in a sixth sense because every time one specific person was around him, Iwaizumi could tell, even before he heard or saw him. And even almost an entire decade, that still held true.
Iwaizumi had long ago lost track of time and was no longer checking his phone. The five empty shots in front of him had become eight by the time the bartender informed him that it was last call and he shook his head numbly when asked if he wanted one more. "Just close it out," he mumbled, pulling out his card. He glanced over to his left and took a moment, eying the empty shot glasses in front of Oikawa, unable to help but steal a look at him. His bangs obscured his eyes, but he was swaying slightly, seeming to catch himself every now and then. "…His tab too," he said, handing the bartender his credit card.
One more disappointing check of his phone later, the bartender returned his card and as he slipped it back into his wallet, he could see him say something to Oikawa. Iwaizumi stood gingerly; among his eight shot glasses, there were only two glasses of actual water, and one of them hadn't been even finished. He shook his head when the bartender asked if he wanted him to call a cab for the two of them. He didn't correct him that they weren't together.
Oikawa didn't either.
Iwaizumi had to pass by Oikawa to leave; that was his excuse. Pocketing his phone, Iwaizumi shoved his hands in his pockets and slowly started walking, first few steps experimental; he lingered by Oikawa and wondered if he should say anything.
It took a moment, but Oikawa wordlessly stood up and the first time he looked at him was when they were back at his apartment and he was kissing him.
"Look, I'm hungover—can we talk later?"
He hung up his phone and let his head fall back, inhaling deeply and closing his eyes.
Hanamaki was right; he didn't normally do one-night stands. His concern stemmed from the last, and only, time that Iwaizumi had had one, and while he appreciated the concern, he absolutely did not want to talk about it.
Iwaizumi dragged himself to the counter to find an aspirin to take and checked his email as he waited for it to kick in, prayed that he wouldn't be called in for an emergency in the next few hours. He was doing his best to push last night out of his memory, and yet whenever he opened his phone to find Himari's number to call, he kept going to where Oikawa's contact information would have been, if he hadn't deleted his number a few months into college.
Why was he even in Tokyo? They hadn't kept in touch, but Matsukawa mentioned that Oikawa dropped out of university and nobody knew where he went. Iwaizumi had snapped that he didn't give a shit what Oikawa did anymore, but when he'd heard through the grapevine that he'd just taken a year off and re-enrolled in a different university, he made sure he was alone in the chemistry building hallway before sinking down against the wall and burying his face in his arms, the sigh he'd given in relief taking both air and his ability to stand.
After graduating from university, Iwaizumi had gotten licensed as an athletic trainer; this had been his intention even before starting university, knowing that his height would make it impossible for him to play at the professional level. He had intended on playing for a few years though, but wound up quitting soon after the first game in his first year and devoted himself fully to his studies.
And it paid off; he'd started about half a year ago as the athletic trainer of the national volleyball team, where he'd been met with some familiar faces. While it would never be the same as the close-knit volleyball family at Seijoh, it brought Iwaizumi a similar feeling of comfort, to be surrounded by people just as passionate or even more so about volleyball. Even though neither Hanamaki or Matsukawa pursued volleyball after high school, Iwaizumi would invite them when the team decided to play casually, and that was as close as he would ever be able to get to his high school memories.
For a while, Iwaizumi was happy. He had two of his closest friends, he had his dream job, and he had a fiancée. He'd truly thought they were everything he'd needed, and he had figured his life out already by age twenty-seven.
Iwaizumi didn't talk about Oikawa, and most people were fairly cognizant of that and didn't need him to explicitly state it. If they did keep trying, Iwaizumi would shortly, but politely, tell them that he no longer kept in touch with Oikawa, which usually elicited surprise of some sort and then dropping the topic. But one day, Hinata had caught Iwaizumi in a bad mood; looking back on it, he probably brought him up because he somehow wound up being Oikawa's friend, and so thought that he and Iwaizumi might be fighting. Hinata's intentions had to be pure, but Iwaizumi snapped at him that he didn't keep in touch with Oikawa and didn't care about him.
The team never brought up Oikawa again after that.
Bumping into Oikawa on the same night his fiancée dumped him had to be some kind of karmic retribution, because those chances should have been astronomically slim. Of all the people in Tokyo to bump into. Of all the cities for Oikawa to be in. Of all the bars for Iwaizumi to be in.
Of all the bars for Iwaizumi and Oikawa to be in.
The fact that Oikawa didn't even say anything was infuriating; he was the one to sit by Iwaizumi (leaving a seat between them, as if that was going to shroud his identity)—why didn't he leave? He made the choice to come over and take a seat, and then he stayed there the entire night, without saying a single word. When did he come in? Why didn't he just leave? Why didn't he say anything? Why was he drinking?
Iwaizumi's feelings towards Oikawa weren't one-sided; he was very certain that how he felt was mutual.
When the hangover had become minimal, Iwaizumi had forced himself to stand up and open his refrigerator to take out ingredients he had bought earlier in the week. He'd gone almost four years where Oikawa was just a bit of white noise in the background; Iwaizumi would admit that he could never entirely erase Oikawa from his mind, not when he'd been such a big part of his life and shaped him into who he was today and even affected his career choice, but he'd done so well in compartmentalizing Oikawa into something manageable. He'd be white noise, but he could almost ignore him.
His heartbreak had lasted for years; it had taken a long time for that precise shade of blue to turn into red. He had tried his hardest to move on before he was ready, but it never worked. For years, Iwaizumi's heart been so absolutely shattered and hardened that it seemed as though the galaxy of pain Oikawa left was the only sadness he could feel. He'd heard over and over that it would take time, and he'd always hated; that was a stupid, cop-out answer, he'd thought.
Then one day he woke up and even though it still hurt like hell, it hurt just a little bit less.
"…Fuck him."
Iwaizumi was no longer at risk of sending his fist flying into the nearest solid surface, but he was still scowling when he went back to slicing carrots, intending on making curry for the week. Once he was finished with them, he moved onto the other vegetables, dicing them and tossing them into the pot filled with store bought broth.
While it was cooking, he decided to answer his texts. He'd be back at work tomorrow anyway, and the last thing he wanted was for them to try and talk to him in person about it. He'd already texted Yachi to ask about his things; he and Himari hadn't moved in together to a single apartment, but treated each other's apartments as their homes. They were both locked in leases for a while and Iwaizumi's proposal hadn't been planned out very far in advance; Iwaizumi spent more time at Himari's place than his own, and while the items he had there weren't important, he thought it would be the polite thing to do to offer to pick them up and save her the hassle of throwing them out.
He had set his phone down to check on the pot, but when he heard his phone chime, Iwaizumi wiped his hands on a nearby rag. He winced when he'd moved his left hand too much; he'd almost forgotten about the cuts and scrapes. Waiting until the pain dulled, he made a mental note to remember to avoid using it and picked up his phone to check who had texted him.
From: Yachi
yes, i can ask her in a few days! but, iwaizumi-san… you're really just giving up that easily?
Iwaizumi frowned. He'd spent all night waiting for Himari to text him, but he'd also spent the time re-evaluating his part in the break-up. He didn't know how to make her happy; maybe they just had different expectations of a relationship, and he wasn't sure if it would be possible to reconcile that.
To: Yachi
after cooling down and thinking about it, i realized she's right. i wasn't putting in as much effort to the relationship as she was.
Her reply came quickly; was Himari with her?
From: Yachi
but that's something that can be changed, right?
Iwaizumi was still as he stared at Yachi's text. She was right, of course; Himari hadn't dumped him because of something that wasn't fixable. If it was just that she didn't feel like he was invested in the relationship, then he could change that. He could be sterner with the hours he put in, he could make more of an effort to prioritize her, he could do more spontaneous, romantic gestures. Relationships were compromise, Iwaizumi knew.
But if it was so easy to fix, then why hadn't he thought of it until now, when she'd brought it up over and over again?
Iwaizumi chewed on the inside of his lips for a few moments, ultimately heaving another sigh and texting back, feeling his heart ache.
To: Yachi
just let me know when i can go over and pick up my stuff.