Chapter Text
“No. Absolutely not.”
Yamaguchi’s jaw drops at the immediate response, completely thrown off. He thought this would be a no-brainer. “C’mon, Tsukki, please! This is so fucking embarrassing!”
Tsukishima scoffs, nudging Yamaguchi’s shoulder as he keeps washing the dishes from that night’s dinner. He holds out one of the now-clean plates for Yamaguchi to take. “Should’ve thought of that before you blabbed to Shouyou of all people. Did you seriously think that he would just let it go?”
“I didn’t tell him explicitly, it’s not my fault he assumed shit!” Yamaguchi dries the plate with unnecessary aggression before stomping to put it away.
“Just tell him you lied—”
“I have pride, Tsukki.” Yamaguchi crosses his arms and leans against the counter, trying to look stern. It’s actually extremely discouraging that Tsukishima is so reluctant to do this, but he refuses to let it show. “Can you just— can you think about it?”
“Think about going on the vacation I already dread every year, but this time also think about pretending to be your boyfriend in front of all our friends? Fat chance.”
“It’s not all our friends,” Yamaguchi mumbles. “Do you really hate the idea of fake-dating me that much?”
Tsukishima pauses on the last cup, turning off the sink with a sigh even though there’s still bubbles on it. Wiping his hands on his pants, Tsukishima turns around. “That’s not it.”
“Then what could it possibly be?” Yamaguchi kicks his heel against the foot of the countertop.
“They’ll see through it,” Tsukishima tells him simply. “We’d have to make up a confession. We’d have to do PDA. We’d have to pretend that we’re— y’know, in love.”
“I mean, I think we could pull it off?” Yamaguchi stares at Tsukishima’s expression for any hint of discomfort. There’s only reluctance, and the usual indifference that takes home on his best friend’s face. “Like if the biggest issue is lying—which you love to do—and kissing—which we did, like, three times in middle school—then what’s the problem?”
“Middle school,” Tsukishima snorts. “They’re going to expect us to fuck, not just kiss.”
“Then we pretend to fuck in our room!” Yamaguchi bursts out. He shrinks in on himself a little immediately after. “I’m sorry, Tsukki. I didn’t think Shouyou would assume you were the one I was dating.”
(It’s true. When Hinata hit him with that sad, puppy-eyed look when asking Yamaguchi if he was bringing a plus-one to the yearly cottage/lakehouse trip, it was almost like the lie was yanked out of his body.
“You’re not coming alone this year, are you?” There was so much pity in his voice.
The cottage isn’t even Hinata’s, it was Daichi’s. And yet, it made sense that Hinata was the one asking; only he was sunny enough to ask about it. The others were probably too scared to upset him. After Terushima had broken up with Yamaguchi mid-way through last year’s trip and stormed out of the cottage, it was like Yamaguchi’s love life was an off-limits topic for their whole friend group. After Yamaguchi got drunk and cried about it on the second last night, that is..
“It’s okay if you are,” Hinata said lightly, his eyes still wide and honest. Even over facetime, they had the same devastating effect. “Daichi just needs to know if we’ll need the tent for—"
“I’m bringing someone this year!” Yamaguchi burst out, and then snapped his mouth shut as Hinata’s fell open. “I—well, I guess I am?”
“Ohmygod, who?” Hinata leaned closer to the camera, almost bumping into his phone. “Do we know them?”
Yamaguchi fumbled for an answer. “Uh, I mean, it’s complicated—"
“So we do know them!” Hinata accused with a grin. “Who could it be? Wait.” He started to list off people they knew on one hand, and much to Yamaguchi’s horror, there weren't many. He could only watch as some sort of realization dawned on Hinata’s face, along with a giddy smile. “You and Stingyashima are dating?”
Yamaguchi blanched out of pure shock from the allegation, but Hinata seemed to take it as confirmation.
“Stop, I literally knew it!” Hinata clapped his hands in excitement. “I knew it!”
“You knew it,” Yamaguchi repeated, feeling like he might faint.
“Your secret’s safe with me!” Hinata held up an arm in oath. “And Tobio, he’s right here.”
“And me.” Kenma’s voice came from offscreen. “Been here the whole time.”
“And Suga,” Hinata admitted with a shrug. “Just texted him, I fear.”
“Sho!” Yamaguchi hissed. “What the hell?”
“Um, sorry! Gotta go! Talk later! Love you!” Hinata fumbled with his phone and then promptly hung up.)
“I mean, you let his whimsical ass assume shit, but it’s whatever.” Tsukishima turns back to the dishes to finish them. He’s quiet until he passes the final cup to Yamaguchi to dry. “You said this happened today?”
“Yeah. The trip literally starts tomorrow and Daichi needed to know if they would need a tent or something. And like, I know I should’ve just spoken up about it, but I already caused enough of a scene last year,” Yamaguchi admits. “I figured that telling everyone that I lied to Hinata’s face would be equally as bad, especially since he already told all our fucking friends the second he found out. Does that make sense?”
“Unfortunately.” Tsukishima retreats from the kitchen into the living room, and Yamaguchi trails behind him hopelessly. “Shit. He’s gonna call me next.”
“You can tell him the truth.” Yamaguchi assures him with a small smile. “Really, I’ll work something out, find someone else to pretend to date and tell Hinata he guessed wrong. Or I can just say they cancelled at the last minute.”
“Tadashi,” Tsukishima sighs. “You’re so dumb sometimes.”
And then his phone rings.
Yamaguchi timidly climbs onto the couch and watches Tsukishima pick up the call.
“What do you want?” He drawls, putting the phone on speaker. “I’m busy.”
“Busy with your boyfriend?” God, Yamaguchi can literally hear Hinata wiggling his eyebrows.
“Mind your own business, fuckwad.”
Hinata laughs brightly. Yamaguchi feels a little swoop in his gut. That’s not a denial. If anything, that’s how Tsukishima would respond if they were dating.
“Guess I don’t have to ask if you’re bringing someone this year, since… y’know…”
“Since what?” Tsukishima asks, sarcasm leaking into his voice. “For all you know, I could be flying to the Bermuda Triangle for the next week instead of going to Daichi’s.”
“But you won’t!” Hinata giggles again. “Because you’re with Yama!”
Tsukishima doesn’t answer for a second, and Yamaguchi thinks that this is it, that this is when Tsukishima is going to expose his lie and he’ll be humiliated. Fuck, how is he even going to show his face after this? Maybe he’ll be able to find someone. Emphasis on maybe.
But then Tsukishima answers, “I’m surprised your two brain cells could make that connection,” and Yamaguchi almost cries in relief.
“Will you tell us how you got together?” Hinata completely ignores that Tsukishima insulted him, carrying on as if he hadn’t said a thing. “If you don’t, I’m sure Yama will. He’s gonna get so red, and well, you know him.”
“Yeah, I do.” Tsukishima replies swiftly, “and I’m hanging up on you now.”
“No, wait—"
Tsukishima tosses his phone onto the couch cushion beside him. Then he reaches for the tv remote and glances over at Yamaguchi expectantly. Yamaguchi stares at him incredulously until he raises an eyebrow. “Stop looking at me like that. Are we continuing our show or not?”
“Thank you,” Yamaguchi gushes, launching himself across Tsukishima’s lap. The guy lets out a sound akin to a disgruntled squawk before catching him. “Thank you, thank you, thank you, you’re my best friend, I love you so much, you’re literally my saviour, I owe you everything—"
“Shut up, Tadashi,” Tsukishima grumbles, but Yamaguchi can tell he’s smiling. “Don’t make it a big deal. This is so fucking dumb. Don’t talk about this for the rest of the night, I can feel my brain cells deteriorating.”
“Okay,” Yamaguchi agrees easily. This is going to be so funny. They’re going to fool all their friends, and on top of that, it doesn't even have to get weird after! This is Tsukishima, after all. They’re not in love with each other, so they can just do this and afterwards tell everyone they decided they’d be better off as friends. That’s a common reason for a breakup, right?
This is a genius, foolproof plan, Yamaguchi thinks once he’s lying in bed that night.
So fucking dumb, Tsukishima called it.
Dumb and genius; Yamaguchi hopes that here, there’s not much of a difference.
They don’t talk about it until they’re literally minutes from the lakehouse. Yamaguchi has been keeping quiet, not wanting to be the one who awkwardly brings it up. Luckily, Tsukishima doesn’t give a fuck if it’s awkward.
“So, how long have we been together?” He drums his fingers on the steering wheel, speaking over the playlist Yamaguchi has on aux.
Instinctively, Yamaguchi turns down the music. “We should probably go shorter rather than longer, no? Maybe a couple weeks? We can be more lenient when it comes to being awkward if it’s a newer development.”
“But hiding it for longer is a bigger ‘fuck you’ to all of them,” Tsukishima muses. “A month, at least.”
“Okay…” Yamaguchi watches the trees go by. Nature in the countryside is so much more alive than in the city. They’re vibrant, bathing in the summer sun. “I’ll check my google calendar to see when I was with you last month, but you can say around a month ago.”
“I would remember the damn date, y’know,” Tsukishima grumbles, opening the sunroof. When he shoots a glare at him across the car, Yamaguchi shrugs innocently.
“How about July fourteenth? We were studying for exams together. It was… thirty-five days ago.”
“Sure.” Tsukishima hums. “You confessed or did I?”
Yamaguchi has to think about it. Tsukishima seems like the type to nonchalantly mention his feelings and then move on with the conversation immediately after. Yamaguchi thinks that he himself would be the opposite. Logically, if he did have a crush on Tsukishima, he probably wouldn’t confess unless it was an accident. He tells Tsukishima just as much, who huffs out a quiet laugh.
“So I confess,” he concedes. “I showed up to our study session that day with your iced latte and you were in the middle of freaking out about your workload. That part is probably true, since you panic almost every day. So I tried to calm you down like I usually do…”
Yamaguchi watches him trail off. The sun reflects off the lens of Tsukishima’s glasses and he squints a little, eyebrows furrowed in irritation. There’s a bit of wind blowing through his hair. Yamaguchi was actually the one who cut Tsukishima’s hair a couple weeks ago, when Tsukishima decided he couldn’t be bothered to go to the barber. It’s still short, but the summer breeze rustles it nonetheless. It’s pretty. He’s pretty.
“And then you told me I’ll be fine, because once exams are done we’d go on a date,” Yamaguchi jumps in.
“And you couldn’t tell if I was joking or not,” Tsukishima appraises, his tone mildly amused. “And you wouldn’t shut up about it. So I kissed you.”
It sounds oddly romantic in a way that has Yamaguchi’s stomach swooping. “Yeah, you would do that.”
“I would?” Tsukishima scoffs. “I did.”
“Right,” Yamaguchi laughs easily. “You did.”
They’re about to turn onto the road before the cottage, so Tsukishima asks if there’s anything else that they should have figured out.
“Pet names?”
Tsukishima makes a face of disgust
“I’ll take that as a ‘we’ll play it by ear.’” Yamaguchi tugs his hair up into a bun, sick of the long strands tickling and sticking to his neck. “PDA?”
“Wing it,” Tsukishima shrugs as they pull into the driveway. “You do what you would do in a relationship, I’ll do the same. Shouldn’t be too hard. I’m used to you clinging to me.”
“Hey!” Yamaguchi swats his arm. “Mean.”
“Honest,” Tsukishima corrects, putting the car in park. Daichi’s waiting for them outside and starts to make his way over. He waves, then points between them with a shit-eating grin on his face. Tsukishima sighs. “Let’s go greet the children. We have much to explain to them, light of my life.”
“What the hell is wrong with you.” Yamaguchi, predictably, goes red. Even Tsukishima looks disgusted at his own words.
“A reasonable summation of things,” Tsukishima says before opening the car door.
Inside the cottage, they’re greeted by the coolness of newly-installed air conditioning, along with a chorus of hellos. Yamaguchi loves this part of the vacation every year—walking into the homey, wooden cottage for the first time and seeing the worn-out, loved furniture. On top of the furniture lie random articles of clothes, beach towels, even his friends. Case in point, Sugawara is currently lying across the dining table while Kageyama and Hinata take some type of measurements of his body.
“We’ve got you guys in the ground floor guest room beside the idiots,” Daichi gestures in its general direction. “We’re just waiting on Kuroo, now, he’s bringing the food. Then we’re doing hot dogs down on the dock for dinner.”
They go to their room in relative, comfortable silence. Yamaguchi doesn’t end up unpacking his stuff, actually, just sitting on the one bed in the room and watching Tsukishima stuff his clothes in drawers. Yamaguchi is more of the grab-from-suitcase and throw-back-in-suitcase kind of vacationer.
“No one asked about us,” he realizes, cheek pressed into the comforter.
“Kuroo’s nosey ass isn’t here yet,” Tuskishima reminds him. “And I’m pretty sure the two idiots were too busy doing… whatever, with Suga.”
Yamaguchi snorts. “I think they were measuring him?”
“I’d rather not know, actually.”
Yachi is in the common area when they return, hopelessly trying to teach Hinata and Kageyama some kind of card game on the floor. Kenma waits for them, watching upside down with his head dangling off one of the couches. The four of them form a wonky squared-circle. Suga is still on the table and Daichi is sitting at one of the chairs, reading a book propped against Suga’s body.
Yamaguchi sneaks up behind Hinata and barks in his ear.
“What the fuck!” Hinata squeaks and rolls into Kageyama’s lap. Kageyama deposits him onto the floor without much pity, right on top of the cards Yachi was in the middle of dealing. Hinata swats at Kageyama’s arm, both of them sporting silly, in-love grins.
“Hey you two!” Yachi doesn’t seem to mind pausing her actions, completely ignoring the ordeal. She grins at them brightly. “President. Wanna play?”
Tsukishima shrugs and sits beside her. “The idiots know how to play?”
“Yes!” Hinata lies loudly, puffing out his chest.
“No,” Kageyama glares at him.
Yamaguchi, not in the mood to argue over a deck of cards, joins Kenma on the couch. He curls up on the end where Tsukishima is sitting in front of, content to watch the chaos unfold.
“Warn me next time you scare Shouyou,” Kenma lifts his head where it rests against the couch’s arm to glance at Yamaguchi. “I’ll get it on camera. Years of joy will follow.”
Yamaguchi gives him a mock salute.
The game is a disaster. President is a relatively simple game, and yet with the combination of people there, it’s anything but. Hinata is determined to beat Tsukishima, who literally could not care less about the whole thing and is simply taking joy in taunting him. Yachi is trying to help Kageyama, who just seems to want to change ‘president’ to ‘captain’ and ‘bum’ to ‘benchwarmer.’ Kenma is predictably destroying them all, still upside down. Yamaguchi wonders how he hasn’t passed out with the blood consistently rushing to his head.
Daichi passes by at some point and deposits a blanket over Yamaguchi, who is feeling steadily sleepier as the rounds proceed. Something about his friends screaming and laughing around him seems to calm his soul, he supposes. He drifts in and out of a state of light slumber.
Even so, it’s hard to miss when Kuroo arrives. Namely because the door to the lakehouse slams open, and from there emerges a man screaming in an unmistakably Kuroo-esque way.
“WEINERS INCOMING! EVERYONE BACK THE FUCK UP!”
Yamaguchi jolts awake, his arm hitting the back of Tsukishima’s head in the process. Yamaguchi is too groggy to apologize when Tsukishima looks back at him with a blank stare, eyes fluttering shut once more. He hears a soft sigh and the rustling of Tsukishima turning back around.
“Thank you so much,” Suga’s voice gushes from the table that he’s apparently still lying on.
“Can’t you enter like a normal person?” Daichi asks, voice emanating from near the front. He’s likely there to take the groceries from Kuroo’s hands.
“Does a normal person live with as much whimsy as I do?” Kuroo challenges.
With the silence that follows, Yamaguchi assumes Daichi responds with a middle finger. “‘Kay guys, pack up. Let’s go down to the dock.”
“I’m swimming! Tobio, let’s swim!”
“It’s going to be fucking dark out.”
“And? You scared?”
Too sleepy to follow the rest of Hinata and Kageyama's conversation, Yamaguchi just lies there as the rest of them get up. He’s content here, listening to his friends bicker and move about. He can’t really tell if he lies there for ten more seconds or ten more minutes before he feels a tentative fingers rake through his hair. Even with his eyes closed, he recognizes them as Tsukishima’s. He hums, leaning into the touch.
“Hey.”
“Hm.”
“They’re all going downstairs.” Yamaguchi likes it when Tsukishima’s voice gets all soft like this. Usually, he never uses it unless they’re alone, but Yamaguchi can still hear their friends inside the cottage.
“‘M up, ‘m up,” Yamaguchi wrinkles his nose, tossing and turning in hopes of making himself more alert. He tries to sit up but is too tangled in the blanket to make any real progress. Giving up with a huff, Yamaguchi lets his face drop onto the couch cushions again.
Tsukishima quietly laughs at him before he thumbs at the corner of Yamaguchi’s mouth. Fuck, he must be drooling. That’s so embarrassing. But Tsukshima doesn’t even comment on it, lowering his voice to something like a whisper. “Trying to get out of eating dinner with a bunch of dorks?”
Yamaguchi forces his eyes open, squinting. Luckily, it’s not too bright out with the sun setting, so it’s not too jarring. Tsukishima is kneeling in front of the couch covering the sun anyway, nicely backlit. The mess of cards is long gone from the ground.
“Nuh uh,” he shakes his head. “Just tired.”
Tsukishima’s eyebrow twitches. “Did you take your meds today?”
Yamaguchi frowns. He did, and he feels a twinge of annoyance at the fact that Tsukishima even asked; he literally saw Yamaguchi take the three little pills that morning before they left the apartment. But he knows that Tsukishima’s just trying to indirectly ask if this sluggishness is depression-related. He tries to act unbothered about it all, but Yamaguchi knows that he’s concerned.
“It’s not that,” he says as he stretches out on the couch. He feels pleased when the worry lines disappear from Tsukishima’s brow. “‘M cozy here.”
“Okay, bring the blanket with you.” Tsukishima reaches to flick Yamaguchi’s forehead. Before he succeeds, they’re interrupted by high-pitched, fake squeals.
Perfectly in sync, they turn slowly to glare at Hinata and Kuroo, who clutch each other like they’ve just witnessed a life-changing event.
“So cute!” Hinata croons. Kageyama walks by and hits him over the head as he passes. “What the fuck, Tobio!”
“You’re being dumb,” Kageyama informs him as he slips out the door. Hinata yells at him, chasing him in a way that makes it seems like the two of them will be running all the way down to the dock. Kenma starts to follow, albeit walking, while giving Kuroo an amused look.
"Kuroo!” Suga pops up from behind the kitchen counter. Kuroo screams, high pitched and loud, throwing himself towards Kenma, who’s half-way out the door. He catches Kuroo and sets him upright before continuing out of the cottage. Suga doesn’t bat an eye at the way Kuroo reacted, simply holding out a grocery bag of what is presumably their dinner. “Be a dear and bring this down to Daichi, ‘kay?”
“You’re a cunt,” Kuroo replies, and he takes the bag with him on his way out.
Yamaguchi laughs a little, bringing Tsukishima’s attention back to him.
“C’mon,” Tsukshima stands, reaching a hand out for Yamaguchi to take. With a groan, Yamaguchi lets Tsukishima haul him up and balance him as he wobbles a little. “Blanket?”
“Hm,” Yamaguchi reaches back to grab it. He sees Suga watching them out of the corner of his eye. Tsukishima sees him too, judging by how he takes the blanket and pulls it around Yamaguchi’s shoulders.
“Your hair’s a mess,” he mutters, reaching forward to tame the hopeless nest of hair. They’re standing close together, closer than they usually do around other people. Come to think of it, this fake-dating is definitely a bigger change for Tsukishima, right? He has to get all touchy, because if they were really dating he would have to tolerate Yamaguchi’s clinginess. And Yamaguchi’s already clingy. Him in love is clingy times eleven. He glances down at Tsukishima’s lips.
Out of nowhere, Suga lets out a dramatic hmmmmmmm before abruptly walking out of the cottage.
“Oh my god,” Yamaguchi hisses, immediately wide awake. He wacks Tsukishima’s arm repeatedly, ignoring when Tsukishima clutches his arm with a betrayed look on his face. “He knows, Suga totally knows! We’re so screwed!”
“Ow, ow!” Tsukishima swats him back before straightening up. “It’s fine, okay? We have no reason to lie to him specifically. We haven’t provoked him either, so I doubt he’d bring it up.”
“He’s sneaky,” Yamaguchi protests. “You never know with him.”
Tsukishima just shrugs. “We can’t really do anything about it. Don’t think about it.”
Yamaguchi nods. His stomach rumbles. “Dinner?” he asks hopefully.
Tsukishima snorts and turns to go downstairs.
It’s already rowdy when they get down there. Suga and Daichi are at the grill as if they’re the parents, Suga chattering about some bitch at work while Daichi nods along. The other five are in the water. Well, actually, Hinata, Kageyama, and Kuroo are in the water. Kenma is on a paddleboard, desperately trying to avoid the water that splashes everywhere when the three guys wrestle each other off the foam water mat. Yachi watches happily from the dock in a hoodie, her pants rolled up and crocs to the side so she can have her feet in the water.
“Wow, Kageyama! I didn’t think you could swim!” Tsukishima hollers with his hands cupped around his mouth.
“Shut up, Glasses!” Kageyama yells back. Hinata uses the distraction to shove him into the water. Kageyama reacts fast enough to bring Hinata down with him.
Kuroo throws his hands up and cheers, victorious, before he sees Hinata and Kageyama kissing in the water below him. “Get a fucking room or I’ll shove my tongue down Kenma’s throat right now!”
“I didn’t consent to that.” Kenma wrinkles his nose, but his cheeks are a little pink and give him away.
“I’m gonna go sit with Yachi,” Yamaguchi pats Tsukishima’s cheek before heading off. He wasn’t brave enough to kiss him that time. He’ll get there, surely. They have a whole week.
“Don’t leave me with them,” Tsukishima groans. Yamaguchi responds by throwing the blanket at him.
“Excuse you, we’re a delight to be around!” Yamaguchi looks back to see Daichi beckoning Tsukishima over with his spatula and one hand on his hip. The apron he has on says my wife loves my meat. The wife in question reaches out to grab Tsukishima, who jumps back. Suga cackles and refuses to give up, reaching for him again.
“Boyfriend, huh?”
Yamaguchi jumps in a way that mirrors Tsukishima. Yachi stands beside him, a pleased smile on her face. Yamaguchi clutches his imaginary pearls. “Jeez, how long have you been standing there?”
“Long enough to see you smile at Tsukishima-kun like you’re in love!”
Yamaguchi sighs. He thinks, very clearly, that he doesn’t want to lie to Yachi.
“Let’s go for a walk,” he tells her, and she dutifully puts her crocs into sports mode.
Yamaguchi can’t have anyone overhearing this conversation, so he ushers her past Tsukishima, past Daichi and Sugawara, and up the stairs leading back to the cottage.
“Dinner is soon!” Daichi reminds them.
“Thanks, Dad!” Yamaguchi calls over his shoulder. He can hear Daichi guffaw.
“I’m not your dad!”
“Are you leading me to my death?” Yachi asks as they climb.
“Yep!” Yamaguchi replies cheerfully.
Yachi keeps following him anyway.
The view from the cliff is nice, to say the least. Where the two of them sit now overlooks the dock from high up. It makes their friends look small, but they’re definitely not as tiny as ants. It’s right near the new hot tub Daichi got installed, which got some complaints about ‘ruining nature’ from the guys. (The ones that complained now use the hot tub the most.)
Yachi sits on the hammock and Yamaguchi is closer to the cliff, his legs dangling off the edge. He wonders if he could land in one of the nearby trees if he jumped off the edge. He doesn’t mention it to Yachi, who is clearly struggling to process what he just told her.
“Let me get this straight. Or, not straight. You’re pretending to date Tsukishima-kun,” Yachi says slowly, as if the words taste weird on her tongue.
“Yep,” Yamaguchi leans back, groaning when his head bumps against an exposed tree root. He looks at her upside down. The concerned frown on her face almost looks like a smile from where he is.
“And you’re going to pretend to break up?”
“Yep!” he repeats. “Maybe a couple weeks after this trip, we haven’t really talked about that yet.”
“I see,” Yachi smiles, but Yamaguchi can tell it's a little forced. “Does anyone else know?”
“Nah, just you. Unless Suga saw through us, you never know with him.”
Yachi nods, deep in thought.
With a heaving sigh, Yamaguchi sits himself up. He moves to join Yachi on the hammock, sending them swaying when he plops down. Yachi squeaks, holding onto the hammock like it’ll save her from going flying. “Yacchan. What are you thinking about?”
“Do you want my nice answer or my honest one?” Yachi peers over at him through her fingers.
“Honest?”
“This is the worst idea you’ve ever had,” she says without missing a beat. Incredulously, Yamaguchi spins to look at her with wide eyes. It makes the hammock jolt, but he ignores it.
“What.”
“Tadashi, it’s a bad idea. Oh my god, this is such a bad idea.” At the conviction in Yachi's words, Yamaguchi throws his hands up. Yachi sees the offence written all over his face and backtracks. “I’m sorry! It’s just, you’ve literally told me that you think he’s attractive—"
“He is!” Yamaguchi fails to see the issue here, still reeling from her unexpected disapproval. He kind of thought Yachi would be on board, or find it funny. But who is he kidding, this is Yachi, of course she’s going to worry. “First of all, I’m his best friend, I’m allowed to admire him! And second, I was drunk when I told you that! In confidence, I might add!”
“Well, what happens when you fall in love with him for real?”
Yamaguchi stops breathing for a second. Oh, yeah. That would be an issue.
“I’m not going to,” he croaks. His voice cracks, and it makes him thankful that he’s speaking to Yachi of all people, because she would never judge him for that. She just judges his ideas, apparently.
“Tadashi.”
“I’m not,” he tells her firmly. The air is laced with something a little uncomfortable now, and Yamaguchi knows that it’s because of him.
‘I don’t want either of you to get hurt.” Yachi puts a hand on Yamaguchi’s shoulder, her touch tentative and light. Her voice is small, and if Yamaguchi looks at her, he knows he’d see wobbly lips and glassy eyes.
“We won’t, don’t worry. This wouldn’t get between us, ‘kay?” He smiles, staring down at the dock. He sees Tsukishima sitting with Kuroo now, who’s out of the water and wrapped in a towel. Tsukishima has Yamaguchi’s blanket folded nicely in his lap. Kuroo says something that makes Tsukishima snort. Yamaguchi feels fond. Fond of Tsukishima, but also fond of all of his friends. Especially Yachi at the moment. He looks at her to find she’s also observing the dock. He nudges her knee. “What was your nice answer going to be?”
Yachi, for the second time in the conversation, doesn’t miss a beat before answering, “I didn’t have one and hoped you would want me to be honest! Because if I’m being so real, I’m freaking out a little over this.” She smiles at him, transparently nervous.
Yamaguchi shakes his head frantically, reaching for her shoulders. “No, please don’t freak out, you know that’s going to make me freak out too!”
“No—no. You know what? It’s fine. You’re both consenting adults. It’s fine!”
“You don’t sound very sure!”
“DINNER!” They both jump at Hinata’s voice. Yamaguchi shoves his middle finger in the direction of the orange in his lower peripheral vision. He just knows that all of them were doing the game of saying a word and gradually getting louder with each person, because they’ve done it many times. They just don’t do it as much anymore because as soon as it gets to Hinata he always screams.
“Just be careful, okay?” Yachi pats his knees a couple times.
“When am I not?” Yamaguchi grins, and he ignores the feeling of impending doom. Yachi smiles back at him before trying to get off the hammock. Key word, trying. She almost eats shit and Yamaguchi has to get up first and help her off.
Dinner is alright. The food is yummy, of course, because Daichi made it. This collection of people always takes Yamaguchi a bit to get used to because they’re so loud. They haven’t all been together in a while, with all of them in different stages of life—some in university, some doing master’s degrees, and such. Now, whenever they’re all present, it’s always after a few get togethers where at least one of them is missing. So it’s an adjustment to say the least, once they’re all there. For Yamaguchi’s ear drums, mostly.
“Are we going into town this week?” Hinata’s in the middle of asking.
“Sure,” Suga says while stealing a bunch of fries from Daichi’s plate. The guy is so smitten that he just lets Suga do it, giving him a half-hearted glare that anyone with eyes can see through. “Something you wanna do?”
“Kageyama forgot our toothbrushes,” Hinata munches happily on his hotdog.
“I did not!” Kageyama’s mouth falls open in betrayal. Tsukishima tries to throw one of his fries into the opening and fails. Yamaguchi snorts, because Kageyama doesn’t even notice. “You did!”
“Tomato, Tomato.” Despite the typical saying, Hinata says tomato the same both times. Yachi tilts her head in confusion. “We don’t have toothbrushes.”
“We have spares in the bathroom cabinet,” Suga throws a fry towards the lake. It sails over Kuroo’s head and ricochets off his hair, falling onto the dock beside him. He looks at the fry for a second before glancing up at Suga with his singular visible eyebrow raised.
“Tomato, tomato,” Kenma murmurs. “Does he seriously think he's supposed to say the same thing twice like that?”
Kuroo starts to cackle. “Does anyone know how Shouyou has survived as long as he has?”
“No,” Kageyama replies sadly.
“Luck,” Yamaguchi states seriously.
“Skill!” Hinata calls out.
“Pure dumb luck,” Tsukishima restates over all of them.
“Mom! Dad! The new couple is ganging up on me!” Hinata pouts, but there’s a smile creeping onto his face. He knows exactly what he’s doing. Yamaguchi flips him off again.
Deviously, Kuroo rubs his hands together like a fly. “Well, well, well.”
“No.” Tsukishima says bluntly, crossing his arms. “Absolutely not.”
There’s approximately three seconds of silence before every single person starts asking multiple questions at once. All their voices jumble together, likely carrying across the lake. It’s specifically hilarious because even Daichi and Kenma are asking questions, and Yachi is clearly trying to act like she doesn’t know what she does. Even so, none of it adds up to the pure hilarity of Tsukishima’s bewildered face. Yamaguchi can’t stop laughing.
It’s incredible that they can hear Tsukishima tell them to stop, and then they all fall silent.
“Aura,” Hinata whispers to Kenma, but they all hear it.
“General aura!” Kuroo salutes. Suga follows, then Hinata. They're all able to hold it for a second before their hands swatted down; Kuroo by Kenma, Suga by Daichi, Hinata also by Kenma.
“Did one of you ask if we’ve consummated our marriage?” Tsukishima asks this with such regret that it’s visible on his face. He has to take a deep breath when Kuroo raises his hand. “You’re so incredibly ridiculous, you know that, right?”
“I absolutely do.” Kuroo puffs out his chest. “I take pride in it.”
“He takes more pride in his stupidity than how big his dick is,” Daichi adds. Eight heads slowly turn to look at him. Under the scrutiny of sixteen eyes, Daichi just shrugs. “What, bros can’t know the size of each other’s dicks?”
“Wait— is he bigger than you? Is he bigger than me? Babe, tell me when to stop,” Suga commands, and then he’s clapping his hands together to slowly guide them apart. “Now?” He keeps going. “Now?” Daichi isn’t even looking at him. “NOW?”
It’s comical how desperate Suga is for Daichi to tell him when he could just ask Kuroo, who’s literally ten feet away from him. Daichi is too focused on eating his hotdog to notice.
Yachi, the poor girl, has been forced to hear dick talk against her will, looks genuinely distraught. “Yachi, run while you still can,” Yamaguchi whisper-shouts. She shakes her head, mouthing that it’s already too late.
“Okay, I’ve been holding back from asking and I can’t anymore!” Hinata bursts out. Suga stops moving, his hands now spread to his whole wingspan. “When did this happen? Who asked out who? Who, WHO?”
“Guys, I think we need to perform an exorcism, because why is Bokuto possessing Hinata? Fucking owl man,” Kuroo points at him with wide eyes. Hinata puts his hands up like he’s being held at gunpoint. “Witch!”
“Tsukki asked me out,” Yamaguchi interrupts, just to spare them all. Kuroo, Daichi, and Hinata groan. “What?”
“Bets, probably,” Yachi pipes up.
“You bet on this?” Tsukishima scowls. They all nod without shame. Yamaguchi thinks it’s hilarious, actually, and he almost fails to keep himself from cackling in Tsukishima’s face.
The only reason he’s able to withhold is the jolt in his chest. His friends bet on this. They bet on his friendship, and bet that it was something more. And while they are pretending that it is, Yamaguchi is perturbed by the idea that his friends truly thought there was something romantic between them. Especially when there is not.
“Just out of genuine, innocent curiosity,” Daichi raises his hand, yanking Yamaguchi out of his head. “How did you ask out my son?”
Yamaguchi mouths the word son before shaking his head in disbelief. “He came to our study session in the library, and, um. I was stressed—y’know, exam season—and he asked me out as some sort of motivational tactic? I didn’t really get that he meant it romantically until he called me dense and kissed me.”
There’s about three seconds of silence before all the guys apart from Kageyama stand. Yamaguchi watches in complete confusion as they all reach into their pockets, walk over to Kageyama, and deposit money into his waiting hand.
“I was the closest guess,” he says sheepishly in Yamaguchi’s direction. Then, he smirks at Tsukishima menacingly. “You’re one predictable motherfucker.”
“Oh, fuck you,” Tsukishima snaps.
“What, can’t handle the heat?” Kageyama shoots back. He says the phrase robotically, as if he’s reciting something he learned from Hinata. He probably is, based on how Hinata radiates joy despite losing the bet.
“The thing I can’t handle,” Tsukishima grits his teeth, “is the general stupidity radiating from all of you.”
“General stupidity!” Kuroo shoots up in his seat. Like last time, Suga follows, then Hinata. Slowly, Kageyama too.
Yamaguchi bursts out laughing, and Tsukishima elbows him in betrayal. “Hey, you walked right into that one!”
Tsukishima starts throwing fries at those saluting. When he runs out, he just flips them all off. “Fuck all of you.”
“Okay!” Daichi laughs nervously. Probably trying to de-escalate the situation before it devolves into some sort of food fight. Hinata is already picking up as many fries as he can in one hand. “Maybe we shouldn’t pry, we know that Tsukishima’s kind of a private guy.”
“Private guy,” Kuroo mutters. He’s definitely thinking about the military ranking.
“This is worse than when Hinata found out and told everybody,” Tsukishima grumbles.
They all start laughing. Naturally, Yamaguchi’s eyes gravitate to Tsukishima beside him. He’s obviously grinning but trying to hide it by holding his head in his hands. It’s in that moment, on the dock with all his friends, that Yamaguchi thinks that even if this fake-dating ends up being a disaster, at least it had them all laughing.
There’s not many things he wouldn’t do to make Tsukishima smile, he realizes. In the back of his mind, he registers that that’s a particularly dangerous thought.
Somehow, Yamaguchi wakes up early that morning without an alarm. He expected to wake up later, because of how exhausting it was last night. No one went to bed before two in the morning because it was the first night and they all were goofing off. They were supposed to do smores, but by the time they remembered they were all too comfortable on the dock to move to the fire pit.
When Yamaguchi was finally able to retire for the night, he was too worn out to worry about the fact that he and Tsukishima were sharing a bed. Turns out, he didn’t even need to; it wasn’t awkward in the slightest. They’ve fallen asleep on the living room couch tangled in blankets and they’ve shared a bed countless times before. Yamaguchi was already sleepy as hell getting into the bed. Tsukishima slipped in beside him and immediately complained about him stealing the blanket. Yamaguchi kicked his shin and went to sleep.
Now he lies in the exact same spot hours later, straining his ears to hear what Tsukishima and Kuroo are talking about in the kitchen. Blinkling the sleep from his eyes, he sits up.
“Say, Tsukki,” Kuroo’s voice carries into the bedroom, the door halfway open being more than enough to allow the words to reach Yamaguchi. They must be sitting at the kitchen counter, based on the clanging of cutlery. “Trouble in paradise?”
“Literally, what do you want?” Tsukishima sounds almost completely amused, but there’s a certain tensity in his voice that Yamaguchi is unfamiliar with.
It’s worrying enough to make Yamaguchi slip out of bed. Right away, he’s trying to tame his hair and he settles for tying it up loosely. He also grabs the nearest sweater and pulls it over his tank top. It smells like Tsukishima, comforting him as the hood falls over his forehead. He hears Kuroo reply as he adjusts it.
“I want,” Kuroo enunciates, “to make sure that there’s nothing wrong with you and Tadashi. Because I am a concerned citizen. And you were close together the entire night but we haven't seen you guys kiss!"
He’s actually right. Yamaguchi had a couple clear opportunities to kiss Tsukishima last night, but he clammed up each time. He knows he’s not the only one to blame, though. Tsukishima also could've done something, but he didn’t. The aloofness is on brand for him, but it most certainly is not the same for Yamaguchi. He’s clingy, Tsukishima’s not. The only believable reason that he wouldn’t kiss his fake boyfriend is if the fake boyfriend in question didn’t want him to.
Apparently, Tsukishima already thought of this. “Look at who you’re talking to and reflect on what you just said.”
“I just mean, isn’t Tadashi touchy? And you are too, in a relationship—"
“You have literally never seen me in a serious relationship.”
“This is a serious relationship?
“Yes.” That makes Yamaguchi pauses at the door.
“Okay, but am I wrong about you being touchy, though?”
“Yes,” Tsukishima stresses. Yamaguchi can hear him lying, which is a little surprising. It’s true, Tsukishima has been in maybe two relationships total, both not lasting long enough for Tsukishima to be comfortable bringing them back to the apartment. Based on the limited amount of times Yamaguchi has seen Tsukishima with people he’s had feelings for, he was actually quite physically affectionate.
It’s very similar to how touchy he is and always has been with Yamaguchi, anyway. Always small, fleeting touches and brushes of skin against skin. Never flashy. Always considerate.
Yamaguchi stumbles out of the bedroom, acting a little sleepier than he actually is. The other two don’t seem to be done with their conversation, but Kuroo snaps his mouth shut when he sees Yamaguchi emerge.
Tsukishima is too busy glaring at Kuroo to notice. “Y’know, not everyone needs to kiss their significant other in front of other people to be confident about the status of their relationship. Unlike some PDA fanatics I know.”
“What’s going on?” Yamaguchi mumbles, rubbing his eyes as he makes his way over.
His voice and the volume of his steps catches Tsukishima’s attention, who immediately softens at the sight of him. Yamaguchi doesn’t know how he catches it. Tsukishima breathes a laugh out of his nose. “Nice hoodie. Nothing’s going on.”
“Morning,” Kuroo greets Yamaguchi as if he wasn’t the subject of conversation less than a minute ago.
“Morning.” Yamaguchi slots himself into the space at Tsukishima’s side with a hum. “You left me alone in bed so early.”
He’s laying the act on thick, but Tsukishima doesn’t seem to mind. If anything, he seems deeply amused. Laying on an air of self-reproach, he slings an arm around Yamaguchi’s side and sighs exaggeratedly. “Sorry, dear.”
“Mean.” Yamaguchi looks up at him, pouting.
“Oh, how ever will I make it up to you?” Tsukishima tilts his head a little, tauntingly, as if he’s trying to goad Yamaguchi into doing something. Daring him to. His gaze flits down from Yamaguchi’s eyes, down to his lips, and back up again.
“You’re a dick,” Yamaguchi says, and he gives in, surging forward to kiss him.
It’s more of an innocent peck than a kiss, just a warm press of their lips. It’s nice. Honestly, it’s similar to the kisses they had in middle school, before they knew how to use tongue and that kissing didn’t have to be a quick point of contact. Every one of their kisses back then were either a spin the bottle accident, a dare, or pure curiosity. This one is basically the same in concept, except Yamaguchi can feel the experience radiating from his best friend. The certainty in the drag of his lips.
He knows Tsukishima slept around quite a bit in the last few years, but the proof of it, the physical feeling, is sort of disconcerting. Yamaguchi can’t put his finger on why.
“Kuro, stop watching them kiss like a fucking weirdo.”
They turn to see Kenma standing at the edge of the kitchen, fresh out of the bedroom and barely visible in what is obviously one of Kuroo’s hoodies. Speak of the devil, Kuroo doesn’t even seem to be phased by the repremandment, his eyes lighting up.
“Weirdo, you say?” The shit-eating grin on Kuroo’s face has Kenma muttering an oh no and turning around, presumably to get away. Kuroo doesn’t let that happen, running after his boyfriend while he raises his voice to an unsettling croon. “But I’m a creeeeep, I’m a weirdoooo~”
It’s so painfully clear that this happens often, based on Kenma’s SOS glance aimed over at the two of them in the kitchen. And worse, they’re in a cottage. Full of idiots that all need to be stopped.
“What the hell am I doing heeeeere~” As expected, Suga is awake to contribute.
Kuroo all but tackles Kenma where he walks, pulling him close as he continues waddling them back to their room. Kenma goes limp in his arms as a sign of protest, but Kuroo takes it on stride by throwing Kenma over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, all while he’s still singing, “I don’t belong hereee— Oooh, oooooh, SHEEEE’S RUNNING OUT THE—"
“SHUT THE FUCK UP!” Oh, and Daichi’s awake too. Yamaguchi would be surprised if anyone was still asleep after that. He can’t stop himself from laughing and he feels Tsukishima laughing silently against him too, jostling his head where it rests on his chest.
When Kuroo and Kenma disappear into their room, the sudden silence in the cottage is a little disorienting. It makes Yamaguchi realize that he did in fact kiss his best friend without any prior negotiation.
“Was that okay?” He asks quietly.
“It was fine,” Tsukishima pushes Yamaguchi’s hood further over his eyes. “Thanks.”
Tsukishima isn’t the outwardly thankful type for the most part, so that shocks him a little. Trying his best to ignore the fluttery feeling blooming in his chest, Yamaguchi grins up at him.
He’s starting to see why Yachi told him this is a bad idea.
Yamaguchi thinks that his friend group has an affinity for being stupid. It’s the only reasonable explanation for the way he’s devoid of a brain-to-mouth filter when he’s barely tipsy. The drinking activities usually happen later in the week, once they’re all a tiny bit sick of being responsible adults. But they’re already drinking on the second night this year, right in the living room. Probably because Kageyama and Hinata wanted an excuse to make out.
Tsukishima is stuck between Kenma and Yamaguchi on the couch, nursing a lukewarm beer. He’s been holding onto it for the whole time they’ve been drinking. He probably doesn’t want to get too intoxicated. Yamaguchi doesn’t mind, because he’s still drinking, and Tsukishima is more accepting of touch and clinginess when they’re both drunk. Specifically when Yamaguchi is more drunk than he is. Not that Yamaguchi is particularly drunk tonight.
“You should ask Daichi for a condom,” Yamaguchi suggests out of the blue, leaning into Tsukishima’s shoulder. Wow, maybe he’s a little more tipsy than he thought.
“For a cond– keep it down, Tadashi,” Tsukishima hisses when Kenma slowly swivels his head to look over at them.
“No, keep it up.” Kenma raises an eyebrow at them. The rest of his face stays still. It’s sort of creepy. “I’m intrigued.”
“I’m going to kill myself,” Tsukishima shoots back while crossing his arms. Yamaguchi giggles and lets his head fall on Tsukishima’s shoulder. It obscures him from Kenma’s view, which is exactly what he wants.
“Might as well commit to the bit,” Yamaguchi whispers into Tsukishima’s ear, breath hot against his nape. “C’mon. Please?”
He thinks his lips brush Tsukishima’s neck, who shivers despite the fact that he’s wearing a hoodie. “Jesus Christ,” Tsukishima mumbles to himself, abruptly pushing himself to his feet. He looks back at Yamaguchi, who hits him with a smug, blissful smile with his eyes closed. “You’re a brat.”
“You like it,” Yamaguchi calls out, because Tsukishima’s already slinking away.
“That was impressive,” Kenma comments. Yamaguchi is about to thank him when he suddenly sits up very straight. “Oh,” he exclaims, completely devoid of thought, and promptly ducks his head.
Yamaguchi looks at Kenma in confusion, but then Hinata is flying over the back of the couch. He goes crashing into the cooler and almost knocks it over before springing up and yelling, “I told you I could do it! Now you have to suck my dick!”
“Oh, yeah?” Kageyama comes stumbling into view, steading himself on the side of the couch. “You’re so stupid, I was already going to do it anyway! Ha! Eat that!”
They start arguing right there, over who’s going to suck whose dick when everyone’s in bed. Quite frankly, Yamaguchi can’t follow along like he usually does, too busy trying to figure out how the hell Kenma didn’t just get absolutely decked. Kenma reacted in a way that makes it seem like Hinata flying over the couch is a daily occurrence. Maybe it is. Maybe that’s what it’s like to have Hinata as a roommate. Kenma would know.
Completely unphased, Kenma sits back up. “I half-thought he was just going to tell you to shut up, actually.”
“Who?” Yamaguchi replies dumbly.
“Your boyfriend.”
Oh, Yamaguchi forgot about that.
Now that he’s thinking about it again, maybe he shouldn’t have sent Tsukishima over while Daichi’s talking to Kuroo. The guy clearly hears what Tsukishima subtly asks Daichi, a shit-eating grin growing on his face. By the time Daichi leaves them there, he’s beaming.
“Yeah, he kind of acts like a dick sometimes,” Yamaguchi agrees. Tsukishima flushes red when Kuroo teases him with a poke to his side.
“Not to you,” Kenma recites, as if he’s thinking about every interaction he’s seen Tsukishima and Yamaguchi have. If Yamaguchi wasn’t looking, he’d think Kenma was reading from a notepad of observations.
“I guess not,” Yamaguchi blinks. He’s never really thought about it like that. He doesn’t feel like he’s an exception to Tsukishima’s sarcasm, but the fact that Kenma—vigilant, perceptive, analytic Kenma—noticed must mean something.
The two of them watch Daichi return and try to discreetly hand Tsukishima what must be some condoms, because Kuroo starts cackling like a madman. Kenma’s eyes seem to squint fondly, not even phased when Tsukishima appears to threaten to shove the condoms down Kuroo’s throat.
“You two are good together,” Kenma remarks, casually but with complete certainty.
“Thanks.” Yamaguchi chokes out. “I’m— um, I’m gonna go have sex with him now.”
“Wow,” Kenma takes a sip of his drink as Yamaguchi stands up. “Thank you so much for letting me know.”
Tsukishima and Kuroo are still arguing when Yamaguchi reaches them. Daichi has completely given up on getting them to stop, now in the kitchen talking with Suga and Yachi. They’re probably gossiping.
“—a pervert!” Yamaguchi hears Tsukishima exclaim once he gets close.
“I’m a man of curiosity!” Kuroo argues. When he catches a glimpse of Yamaguchi, his eyes light up, a complete switch from this morning. “Yamaguchi will tell me!”
“I will?” Yamaguchi pauses midstep. Maybe he should make a run for it.
“You won’t,” Tsukishima states firmly, his cheeks flushed. It’s unclear whether it’s from embarrassment or from the alcohol.
“I’m not even asking anything bad!” Kuroo complains. “I just wanna know who sticks it in who!”
“Jesus Christ,” Yamaguchi slips out without realizing. “You are a pervert.”
“I’m not!” Kuroo wails. “Kenma! Come defend me!”
Kenma pretends not to hear.
“Pervert,” Tsukishima reasserts.
“Anyway,” Yamaguchi diverts the topic before the arguing resumes. “I came over here to get Tsukki.” Tsukishima raises an eyebrow. “I’m tired. We should— y’know, bed!”
Tsukishima snorts. “Bed?” Him acting oblivious on purpose makes something in Yamaguchi’s blood boil. Not in an angry way, somehow. It’s something else.
Rolling his eyes, he reaches forward and twists his fingers into the drawstrings of Tsukishima’s hoodie. Pulling him forward, Yamaguchi waits until they’re basically nose to nose before he grins. He’s never this bold. He has never been this forward in his entire life, but the fact that this is all fake is getting to his head and making him act ten times more commanding. “You wanna fuck me or not, Tsukki?”
Kuroo lets out a squeak before he turns and flees. “Kenma, help, they’re gonna fuck in the living room!”
Tsukishima doesn’t even retaliate for once, frozen as his eyes flick over Yamaguchi’s face and pause on his lips. Yamaguchi almost crashes their lips together, just because he can. But he shows restraint, because who knows what would happen if he gave in? Instead, he spins around and drags Tsukishima to their room. He calls out a general goodnight to their friends, from which he gets an interesting array of yells back.
Kuroo wolf-whistles and then gags when Kenma shoves his fingers in his mouth to get him to be quiet.
Hinata and Kageyama don’t reply, too busy making out.
“Use protection!” Sugawara hollers from the kitchen. Daichi snorts. Yachi covers her ears and kindly wishes them a normal goodnight.
“They think we’re gonna fuck,” Yamaguchi tells him as soon as the door closes.
“I don’t fucking care,” Tsukishima is still flushed, his glasses a bit askew. He shrugs without much conviction and tosses the condoms onto the dresser. He’s much less tipsy than Yamaguchi is, and they’re both barely drunk, so it’s startling when Tsukishima says, “I could just push the headboard against the wall a couple times. They’re all dumb enough to believe it.”
“Want me to fake moan while you do that?” Yamaguchi launches himself on top of the bed with a giggle. He lies on his back and watches Tsukishima pull off his hoodie, leaving him in his t-shirt.
Tsukishima scoffs out a laugh. “No way you’re good at that.”
“I’m not,” Yamaguchi agrees, and his tongue is loosened from the alcohol so he proves his point by letting out an obnoxiously high-pitched moan.
Tsukishima’s palm is on Yamaguchi’s mouth immediately, muffling the noise. He stares at him, halfway on the bed, his mouth falling open for a second before snapping it shut. “That was horrible.”
“I know!” Yamaguchi says cheerfully. His delighted demeanour dissolves in less than a second at the mention of knowing things. “They’re gonna know, aren’t they?” he mutters.
“We don’t have to prove anything to them,” Tsukishima shoots back. “We were pretty obvious out there, too.If they ask, just blame it on me not wanting them to hear.”
It makes him upset that Tsukishima is so willing to take the blame for this type of thing. Yamaguchi is the one that got them into this mess, so why should Tsukishima be the one taking all the shit?
“I can just, like, jerk off really loud,” Yamaguchi proposes without thinking. Then he realizes what he said and backtracks frantically. “I mean, you can like, go to the bathroom while I do, or—wait, that’s so fucking weird, I’m sorry, forget I said anything—"
“Jesus, Tadashi,” Tsukishima breathes out, sitting down on the bed beside him. Yamaguchi tenses, trying not to look in Tsukishima’s direction out of embarrassment. But then Tsukishima nudges his knee with an elbow. “I don’t think it’d be that believable if I left the room, genius.”
“Yeah,” Yamaguchi winces. “Didn’t really think of that.”
With a sigh, he shifts on the bed so that his back is against the headboard. Tsukishima sidles up next to him, their thighs pressed against each other. Yamaguchi knows his face is red and the room is suddenly too hot, but he no longer thinks it’s because of the miniscule amount of alcohol he consumed. Tsukishima takes a deep breath when Yamaguchi nervously lets his head fall back, hitting the wood with a dull thunk.
“This is dumb,” Tsukishima informs him quietly. Yamaguchi is about to agree when Tuskishima continues, “Let me jerk you off.”
Yamaguchi’s head turns to him so fast he thinks a muscle in his neck will hurt tomorrow. His eyes are wide and frantic trying to figure out why the hell Tsukishima said what he said. Trying to figure out if it’s a joke.
“I’m not joking,” Tsukshima rolls his eyes, making Yamaguchi realize he spoke out loud. “Just… committing to the bit.”
Of course he would throw Yamaguchi’s words right back in his face. He seems so determined about it too, and arousal stirs in Yamaguchi’s core. It startles him a little, the way his stomach swoops. Tsukishima waits patiently for his answer, holding eye contact with sickening confidence.
“Okay,” Yamaguchi breathes before he actually thinks about it.
“Okay?” Tsukishima replies with a raised eyebrow.
He knows that this is a really, really bad idea. Likely his worst idea yet. But for a reason he doesn’t decipher, Yamaguchi can’t stop himself. “Yeah.”
Tsukishima huffs out a little laugh before he reaches for the waistband of Yamaguchi’s shorts. He pauses there and glances at him for one last bit of confirmation. Yamaguchi is hopelessly endeared by it. He answers by dragging Tsukishima’s hand to his clothed dick. Tsukishima stares at where his hand rests for a second before palming Yamaguchi properly.
And sure, Yamaguchi is barely half-hard right now, but the pressure is amazing and he has a feeling that Tsukishima will get him worked up pretty damn fast.
“You have lube?” He asks, voice more breathless than he expected it to be. They make eye contact in a way that tells him Tsukishima wasn’t expecting it either.
“Yeah, probably.” Tsukishima doesn’t seem very inclined to go retrieve it, mumbling his words without pulling his hand away. He reaches for Yamaguchi’s waistband again, and this time he’s able to pull Yamaguchi’s shorts down to his thighs. Considering that Yamaguchi thought Tsukishima was just going to hook them under his balls, this is much more exposing than he expected. He opens his mouth to speak but realizes what Tsukishima is doing.
“Stop staring!” Yamaguchi squirms under the intense scrutiny of Tsukishima’s gaze. He can feel himself hardening under the attention, though.
“You have freckles on your dick,” Tsukishima replies, sounding a little in awe.
“Shut up, shut up, oh my god.” Yamaguchi covers his face with his hands and starts to curl in on himself in mortification.
Before he can actually cover himself, Tsukishima’s hands push on both sides of his hip bones, pinning him where he is. His fingers are right near Yamaguchi’s dick. They look at each other for a second, two pairs of wide eyes, before Tsukishima cracks a smile.
“They’re cute.”
“What?” Yamaguchi squeaks, too aware of the warm press of Tsukisihma’s hands against his skin. He grips the comforter and kicks his shorts the rest of the way off because he’s not sure what else to do, waiting anxiously for a response.
“The freckles,” Tsukishima states, almost sounding bored as he takes Yamaguchi in his hand. “They’re cute.”
Yamaguchi is startled by the first upstroke, hips involuntarily following the movement. Tsukishima doesn’t even react, tugging at him dry. With the amount that his dick is leaking, it won’t be that way for long. Tsukishima starts off slow, grip a little too loose. It gets tighter with every stroke, each movement filled with the same level of confidence and purpose every one of Tuskishima’s actions always have. The initial shock of what’s happening has worn off by now, so Yamaguchi lets himself go a little bit.
He looks down, watching his dick almost completely disappear with every pass, obscured by his best friend’s hand. Fuck. What an inconvenient time to realize that Tsukishima has very attractive hands. All Yamaguchi can think about is Tsukishima’s large, pretty hands and pale, delicate fingers, and how they’re currently wrapped around his cock—
“Oh, fuck,” he groans, throwing his head back. It bumps against the headboard and he gasps out, turning into a moan when Tsukishima rubs one of the larger veins on him. “Shit—"
His head lolls to the side just in time to see the cogs in Tsukishima’s head turning. “Fucking lube,” he mutters, and then he leans forward to spit on Yamaguchi’s dick.
Holy shit. Yamaguchi thinks he’s going to die tonight.
Tsukishima doesn’t pay any mind to Yamaguchi’s responding whimper, twisting his hand to mix the precome and saliva across the entire length of him. He looks so focused that his eyebrows are slightly pushed together. He’s so hot, Yamaguchi can’t think straight. All he can do is follow Tsukishima’s eyes to look at the way he’s getting jerked off. Honestly, Yamaguchi would be ashamed by how useless he’s been rendered, but he’s too busy trying not to come too fast. He prays that Tsukishima won’t notice.
The sight of those perfect hands on him, the soft sound of skin sliding against skin, it’s all overwhelming. Yamaguchi has a fleeting realization that he could probably cum even if Tsukishima avoided his dick entirely and literally just ran his hands up and down his body. With perfect timing, Tsukishima's grip tightens around him. “Oh my god.”
“You’re responsive.” Amusement colours Tsukishima’s voice in a way that makes Yamaguchi’s skin burn. “And sensitive.”
He squeezes his eyes shut and shakes his head. “I’m not, ‘m not, c’mon—"
“You are,” Tsukishima disagrees easily, something deeper bleeding into his voice.
He doesn’t give Yamaguchi time to process, dragging his thumb along Yamaguchi’s frenulum with a deliberation that must’ve been planned. Because he’s super sensitive there, and somehow Tsukishima knows. It startles Yamaguchi so badly that he cries out, cock leaking pathetically. It feels so good, it feels too good, and if Tsukishima keeps abusing that spot he’s going to cum—
“Ah— Tsukki!” His hand flies down to grab Tsukishima’s wrist. His hand stills where it is, leaving Yamaguchi’s mouth open and panting as he tries to calm himself down. He takes a few shuddering breaths before he meets Tsukishima’s eye.
And, oh, Tsukishima is looking at him like he wants to devour him.
“See?” His pupils are dilated, and he sounds almost as out of breath as Yamaguchi feels. He looks smug and so, so pleased with himself. He swipes at the precum dripping from Yamaguchi tip and the smile on his face widens when Yamaguchi’s hips jerk. “Sensitive.”
When Tsukishima resumes stroking him, it’s fast. The ring of his fingers works furiously, the sticky motion of his hand sounding unexpectedly lewd. The contrast of it all is dizzying, the gentle touch turning rough in only a few moments.
The resulting keen that escapes Yamaguchi’s mouth is so embarrassing that his hand flies away from Tsukishima’s wrist to cover his mouth. It effectively muffles the moans and the curses that spill out. “Mmf— fuck, fuck, fuck—”
Clicking his tongue in disapproval, Tsukishima uses his free hand to tug Yamaguchi’s away from his mouth. “You can’t be doing that, Tadashi… Defeats the whole purpose.”
Yamaguchi’s gut swoops and he whines. “‘S embarrassing.”
“Is it?” Tsukishima tilts his head to the side, attentively observing the way Yamaguchi blushes and nods. “Well, you’ll have to get over it. Maybe you need to focus on something else, hm?”
Before Yamaguchi can question it, Tsukishima’s hand stops moving. It stops moving, and the lack of stimulation is torturous. “No, don’t stop—"
“Don’t stop?” Tsukishima repeats. He eyes the way Yamaguchi throbs in his hand, smirking growing on his face. “Hm. I think you should do it yourself.”
“Tsukki,” Yamaguchi gasps hoarsely. He should hate it, the humiliation that thrums in his veins, but he just feels like he’s on fire. He feels like he is the fire, feels like Tsukishima is the air around him, feeding the flames with more and more with each passing second. He can’t escape it. The pressure, the burn, the pleasure , it's all Tsukishima, every single part of it. “Tsukki, please.”
When Tsukishima responds, his tone is light, almost mocking. Like he knows Yamaguchi needs him carnally and finds it amusing. “Please what? I told you, do it yourself.”
The first tentative thrust into Tsukishima’s fist only happens because Yamaguchi needs something, some sort of stimulation or he’ll lose his mind. He expects to be reprimanded for it, expects Tsukishima to stop him. But he doesn’t. Tsukishima just watches hungrily, devouring the movement of Yamaguchi’s hips with his eyes.
“Keep going,” Tsukishima tells him, low and steady, almost lazily. “I know you’re desperate to.”
Yamaguchi’s pulse quickens, the shame in him overrun by need. He shifts again, gently at first, but then with more purpose. He can’t help but let out a broken sound at the delicious friction of Tsukishima’s tight fist. Each breath he takes ends in a moan.
“C’mon, Tadashi,” Tsukishima’s expression remains unreadable, his eyes glinting with quiet approval. There’s something in his voice, something in the way it cracks slightly, that makes Yamaguchi go crazy.
“Ah, shit.” His muscles burn, but he keeps lifting his hips because he can’t stop now, propped up on his elbows so he can get higher. And fuck, the way Tsukishima is looking at him is insane, like he’s enjoying the sight of Yamaguchi struggling to balance between embarrassment and desire. He probably is. It messes with Yamaguchi’s head, has him whining high and desperate the way he always does when sex is good. “Mmf— ohmygod—”
On instinct, Yamaguchi grabs at the comforter, desperate to ground himself as his mind starts to go fuzzy. He feels himself slipping further, and Tsukishima seems to notice. He must decide to take pity on him, moving his hand down to meet Yamaguchi’s thrusts. The slap of their skin meeting joins the obscene slick noises already filling the room.
The coil in Yamaguchi’s gut is about to snap. “Close,” he gasps uselessly.
Tsukishima rucks Yamaguchi’s shirt up his chest. He must be trying to prevent cum from getting on it, a sweet gesture, but all Yamaguchi can zero in on is the way Tsukishima’s palm is pressing against his chest to keep the fabric in place. His stupidly gorgeous hands, one on his chest and the other on his cock. Yamaguchi’s stomach clenches, and then he’s cumming.
His hips stutter, and when they lose rhythm, Tsukishima takes over by working him through it. It feels like he’s cumming for hours, but then it’s over too soon and he’s a mess.
Letting his head fall against the pillows, he exhales deeply. “Holy shit.”
Tsukishima laughs softly beside him, and then his fingers (the clean ones, thank fuck) are running through Yamaguchi’s hair. His fingers scrape lightly against Yamaguchi’s scalp, gentle and real. “Okay?”
“More than okay,” Yamaguchi shifts so that he can look over at Tsukishima. He’s flushed, the red tinge in his skin creeping down past his neck. It’s cute. Yamaguchi dares to look down and—yeah, Tsukishima’s hard. When Yamaguchi meets his eye, something blooms under his skin, warm and unsettling. He panics a little, unsure what it is. His mouth moves too fast for his brain. “Want me to suck your dick?”
He doesn’t know why he says it, but he definitely likes Tsukishima’s reaction. A little blink of shock, a furrow in his eyebrow.
“No, it’s okay,” he says softly. “I think I’ll just take a shower.”
It’s a rejection, but Yamaguchi can’t take it that way. Because there’s an implication in Tsukishima’s words, that he’ll just end up jerking off in the shower. It makes Yamaguchi’s spent dick twitch, and of course Tsukishima notices.
“Shut up,” Yamaguchi swats at him weakly. He pauses, for a moment, thoughtful. “You think they heard?”
“I don’t care,” he shrugs, as if he didn’t prevent Yamaguchi from muffling his moans a few minutes earlier. Sliding to the end of the bed, Tsukishima smiles a little. “Be back soon.”
The room is unnervingly quiet when the door closes behind him.
Yamaguchi sighs before he sits up. Some cum managed to get on his shirt even with Tsukishima’s efforts, so he pulls it over his head and uses it to wipe at the release on his stomach. He doesn’t bother with the mess on his dick, too sensitive to do anything but wait until he washes up in the shower. If he has the energy to when Tsukishima gets back, that is.
The thought of Tsukishima makes his stomach twist.
He really doesn’t want to find out why, but the room is silent and he’s alone, so of course his mind wanders.
Yamaguchi likes what happened. It was intimate. He liked the way Tsukishima looked at him, liked the feeling of Tsukishima’s touch. In the back of his mind, something tells him that it’s because he just likes Tsukishima.
But that can't be, right? It felt good because Tsukishima knows what he likes. That type of stuff is best friend’s intuition, surely. Not feelings on either end. Because they aren’t going to fall in love. That’s not an option. The whole reason he asked Tsukishima to do all this fake dating bullshit was because Yamaguchi knew he wouldn’t catch feelings for him. Or the other way around.
But the more Yamaguchi thinks about it, the more he realizes that he was wrong.
So he might have feelings for his best friend. What a sick and twisted post-nut clarity he’s having.
He hears the bathroom door open down the hall and jumps. He’s too scared to face Tsukishima right now. He can’t, not when he just realized that he has feelings for him. Yamaguchi curls onto his side, back to the door, and decides he’s going to pretend to be asleep. God, how long has he known Tsukishima, and this is just now something that has to come up?
There’s chatter coming from down the hall. Distinctly, he hears Tsukishima tell someone to fuck off before the bedroom door opens. His voice is raised, definitely to make sure that the people in the hall hear even once the door clicks shut.
“Tadashi, I told you to be quiet. Stupid Hinata and Kageyama ended up hearing you, they’re claiming that they’re traumatized—" He cuts himself off with a sharp inhale. He gets all quiet and soft, then. “Tadashi?”
Yamaguchi’s heart turns to jelly at the gentle lilt in his voice. Even so, he focuses on keeping his breathing even and his eyes shut. He hears Tsukishima walk up to the side of the bed, steps even and slow. There’s weight added to the bed, and Tsukishima brushes Yamaguchi’s hair out of his eyes.
“Idiot,” he huffs fondly.
Yamaguchi kind of wants to cry. Instead, he lets Tsukishima roll him over, and wipe at his skin with a warm washcloth. He can’t help but squirm at the wetness, hoping it seems like it roused him from his slumber.
It works, judging by how Tsukishima speaks lowly to him. “Sorry, sorry. It’s just me.”
“Mm?” Yamaguchi hums, closing his eyes further instead of opening them. He rolls around a little to sell it, heart squeezing when Tsukishima laughs quietly.
“I’m cleaning you up, you big baby. Stay still.”
God, he’s probably looking at Yamaguchi’s flaccid penis. That’s so fucking awkward, but Yamaguchi knows he has to thug it out to prevent blowing his cover. He does, somehow. Tsukishima finishes cleaning him up and starts to walk around the room. Bags rustle, clothing slides against skin, the bedside drawer opens and something falls into it with a dull thud. Finally, Tsukishima joins Yamaguchi on the bed. By that point, Yamaguchi really is sleepy and actually almost falls asleep as Tsukishima gets him into a pair of loose shorts.
“Tadashi, get under the covers,” he murmurs, waiting patiently for him to do so. In the end, he has to pull the covers over both of them. The only problem here is that Tsukishima is a gentleman. So he ends up far on his side of the bed, his back to Yamaguchi even after he reaches to turn off the bedside lamp.
The thing is, Yamaguchi is a weak, weak man who just realized he has feelings for his best friend. He rolls over and latches onto Tsukishima’s back, freezing when Tsukishima stiffens. If he wanted to, Tsukishima could shove him off. It would be perfectly reasonable for him to do so; they don’t cuddle often, anyway. It would make more sense if he did push him away—
Tsukishima’s hand curls around Yamaguchi’s where it falls over his middle and rests against his abdomen. Yamaguchi thinks his heart is pounding. He hopes Tsukishima doesn’t notice.
Yamaguchi lies there awake long after Tsukishima’s breathing has evened out. His nose is almost touching the nape of Tsukishima’s neck. Their legs are slowly getting tangled underneath the covers. Their fingers are more intertwined than they were a few minutes ago.
Yachi was so right. This isn’t genius or foolproof. It’s dumb. It’s so dumb, and a horrible idea, and Yamaguchi doesn’t know what he was thinking. He doesn’t know what he’s going to do with himself for the rest of the week. Fake-dating his best friend and probably falling in love with him?
He’s so fucked.