Karasuno's Managers: Little Ukai and The Vulnerable

31: What's Wrong with Takita

Each day that Takita Maeda woke up, he was thankful for 3 specific things in his life. Food was the obvious and most important of those. It gave him indescribable happiness. The second was his friends. Sure, the questionable "wake up or I'm throwing a bolder through your window" morning text from Shoji was definitely a threat, and 'Tome's "I see you" humour always made him look over his shoulder, but Takita never complained.

Lastly, he was thankful for his girlfriend Minori. She was an honest and dependable person, someone who listened endlessly and always graced him with a gentle smile. Though he had met her at the Aoba Johsai and Karasuno practice game six months ago and asked her out on a whim a week later, she was becoming one of the single most important people in his life.

In his own opinion, it was too early to use words like love and forever, but whenever he thought of Minori he had to bite his tongue.

Which is why when he woke one morning to an absence of a message from her, his stomach churned. For the first time since he had saved her number in his phone, Takita sent the good morning message. He slipped out of bed and went to wash his face for breakfast.

With one hand switching from his social media page back to the text messages, awaiting those three grey dots to show, he ate his tasteless morning meal.

On the way to school, he sent another message. It was a simple "how's the bus ride today?" but even as he neared Karasuno High, there was no response.

Throughout the rest of the school day, he was distracted. Waving off Shoji who nudged him to take notes and ignoring 'Tome who threw little bits of paper at his head, the churning in the pit of his stomach was making something heavy sink in his chest. His palms were sweating. He couldn't stop tapping his foot. He contemplated sending another message but did not decide to.

Practice was no better. His constant beginner errors couldn't be covered by the excuse of laziness, and it showed when Coach Ukai asked him to sit out halfway.

"What's up?"

Emiko dropped down next to him on the gym floors.

"I'm not in the mood."

An honest and blunt answer that she clearly was not anticipating. Emiko blinked and looked left and right. "Alright, I was saving this for later which means you can't tell Mirae. Whenever I'm feeling down, I go to snacks and I know just how much you love food in general so this should help you."

He accepted the golden package of biscuits. "This is going to be my last meal."

"Why?" she gaped. "Oh my god, are you dying? Did you fail an exam? Does my Uncle Keishin have something to do with this?"

"I don't know. All I know is that my life is in shambles, and this is the end for me."

"Tell me what's wrong." Emiko turned to face him. She pried the package from his hands, ripped it open, and held one to his mouth. Takita leaned forward and chomped.

"Don't baby him!" Shoji growled as he stomped over. He wiped the bead of sweat from his face, ignoring Mirae who chased after him with a bottle of water and stopped in front of them. "He didn't practice today. He stood around like a limp noodle and nearly got slammed in the face with a ball. He could have gotten seriously hurt standing around moping. Mirae tell me I'm wrong!"

"You're not wrong." She pushed the bottle into his chest. The look on her face softened and she leaned on her knees to look Takita in the eyes. "But something's clearly bothering you. What happened?"

"She, she..." he stuttered and wailed, falling into Emiko. "She broke up with me!"

The three of them were at a loss for words. Emiko was the first to recover.