ʜɪs ʟɪᴛᴛʟᴇ sᴇᴄʀᴇᴛs

Chapter 14

"Kenmaaaaa!", Hinata whined, grabbing his older brother's sleeve. "Why are you guys abandoning meeeeeee?"

Kenma didn't even spare him a glance, eyes focused on his game as he gently tugged his arm out of Hinata's grip. "We're not abandoning you. We're going home. You simply live in Miyagi now, and we live in Tokyo."

"At least tell Alisa I love her more than Lev! And give Makkachin a hug for me! And give one to Viktor too! And- And-" Kenma cut him off with a hand on his shoulder. When had he paused the game?

"Calm down Sho-chan. You're going to burst a blood vessel. It's only been - what, twenty minutes since our game? Relax, I'll call you at like... Eight. 'Kay?" Hinata nodded, a bit reluctantly. Kenma smiled. 

"Good. Bye, Sho-chan." Kenma enveloped him in a rare hug, tousling his hair before walking away towards his ride.

"Bye Kenma!", Hinata called, waving despite the fact that Kenma was facing away from him.

***

Hinata's noticed something lately. Nothing odd, nothing bad, just...something. Kageyama's eyes glimmer like oceans, sky blue highlights within them making an almost ethereal appearance. His hair looks perfect, fitting his personality and build perfectly.

Hinata doesn't know why his brain started pointing these things out but he wasn't complaining, the view was rather nice, if a bit distracting. He's just not sure what it means. Does he want Kageyama to be his best friend? Is he just trying to find things to tease him with? They do that a lot, joking and teasing.

Normally, it starts with one of Hinara's offhanded remark of 'Bakayama', then Kageyama gets defensive and Hinata starts having fun riling him up, watching the way the anger makes his face scrunch up.

He'd considered going to Tsukishima about what's happening to his brain but he figured the taller boy would just laugh at him. It was the same reason he hadn't asked anyone in his family. Of course, Yuuri would be nothing but kind, only problem is, he'd tell Viktor within the hour which meant Yuri would know, which meant Kenma would know, which meant Kuroo and Lev would know, which meant teasing. So back to square one.

Yamaguchi was his only other feasible option so he approached the boy after practice one day, when Tsukishima had gone home early due to a doctor's appointment.

"What's up Hinata?", Yamaguchi had asked, taking a sip from his water bottle.

Hinata's hands had tightened around his own as he explained the problem. He scowled as Yamaguchi laughed. "Don't laugh at me!"

"Sorry!", Yamaguchi yelped, laughing and grinning far too much for it to have even be considered remotely sincere. "It's just - you don't have a problem, sounds more like you-"

He was cut off as Tanaka walked over, swooping in to steal Hinata, who sent Yamaguchi a plaintive look, begging to be rescued. In response, the freckled teen merely shrugged, watching on in amusement.

***

Having decided to ignore the odd feeling, Hinata tried to enjoy visiting the rest of his family on the weekend. Keyword here: tried.

Lev kept babbling on about Yaku, which yeah, sure, his crush, great for him, but still! They were trying to have dinner!

Luckily Yuri had snapped after about five minutes of this, growling about someone named JJ and his fiancée. Yuuri and Viktor had laughed at that remark, garnering confused glances from most of the children at the table. Kenma was ignoring everyone, headphones in place and eyes firmly set on his plate.

Lev eventually petered off after about fifteen minutes, realising no one was listening to him anymore. He pouted for a bit before returning to his food.

Yuri, who had gotten permission to take a couple days off just to visit them that weekend, spent the second half of his mini vacation with Otabek, taking Potya with him on claims of urgent necessity and a sudden acute lack of feline fuzziness in his life.

Reluctantly, Hinata had gone back to Miyagi, missing a good chunk of the drama as Lev informed him. He was sad to miss it but at the same time, glad he was able to keep practicing with Karasuno.

Occasionally, Lev tried to make fun of his complete absence of skill when it came to certain parts of his favourite sport but then Hinata would point out that he was at least good enough to not get left behind on a training camp, which without fail, made his younger brother pout and sulk, ending most of their arguments immediately.

Hinata told Yuuri about Yamaguchi and Asahi, and the two joked about how Yuri and Tsukishima would either be best friends or hate each other with a burning passion, most likely the latter. When told about Sugawara, Yuuri agreed that he sounded responsible, the kind of person he could trust.

He would introduce the team to his family one day or at the very least, to Yuuri, since he seemed to be the only responsible adult on some days.

Hinata had stared flatly at Yuuri when his father had said that. Yuuri was far from responsible, he was scared of everything an irrational amount so he brushed aside every fear, even the rational ones, since he couldn't tell the two apart. Yuuri was as scared if stepping out the door as he was of being mugged with a knife in a dark alleyway. It was admirable at times but a hindrance more often than not.

Natsu wanted to meet his team too, her interest in volleyball slowly growing as Hinata got more and more invested in the sport. He told her he'd try to find a way to have her meet the team but so far she had only met Kageyama, who came over after school pretty often to work on serves and homework.

Speaking of which, Natsu had taken quite a liking to his setter, calling him her brother and everything. When Yuuri asked about it a couple weeks later, she simply said he would be her brother one day.

Yuuri had choked on his laughter, but Hinata was just confused.

All in all, the time between the Nekoma practice match and now has been...interesting, to say the least. One upside to it all, he supposed, is that his setter has been tossing to him a lot more lately. Kageyama had even smiled at Hinata! Smiled! Nicely! With no evil intent! Yeah, he couldn't believe it at first either.

Seems like wishes do come true after all!

***

Word Count: 1189