to greater things beyond the unknown||RK96000||

Chapter 9: Tokyo Daze

ao3 - RK96000

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When Shouyou blinks, he's a lot warmer than he was.

There's a soft couch underneath him, a huge cat plushie on his lap, and a heavy blanket draped over his shoulders. Shouyou stares at it all for a second before, unsurprisingly, he shivers and then realizes immediately after that he is still in his soaked volleyball uniform, dripping onto his friend's couch-

Stumbling up, only to see no one around, Shouyou heaves a silent sigh and then traces familiar steps through the house until he reaches the entrance.

He shouldn't bother his friends.

Shouyou pushes the door open, and dreading the train ride back, takes one step back into the unforgiving rain before he's dragged back inside by the back of his shirt.

Shouyou blinks, glances up to see an unamused Kuroo.

The door closes.

Kuroo gives a long, heavy sigh before he holds out his hand expectantly. "C'mon, Shou. We have a surprise in the kitchen!"

Kuroo is trying to bribe him, a little too obviously- but in his current state, all Shouyou can do is stare. There could be his mother in the kitchen, begging for his forgiveness, and he doesn't think he could feel a single thing.

Still, Kuroo is worried.

Shouyou takes his hand, letting Kuroo lead him to the kitchen instead of leaving- he doesn't think he really wants to leave anyways.

There, in the kitchen, is Kenma, sitting cross-legged on the counter only to drop straight down and head immediately towards Shouyou when he spots him.

"Shouyou," Kenma breathes, so soft and uncertain and worried that it only takes a split second for him to unravel apart at the seams, every repressed emotion bursting open as he sinks onto the kitchen floor and cries, each unwilling sob torn from his throat.

"It's stupid," he tells them, voice crackling with despair and hopes broken and years of resentment and wishing seeping out with every word. "I- I hate that I don't even- I don't even hate her. She hit me and-"

Kuroo and Kenma both go curiously stiff at his last words, sharing an obvious look between the two of them, before Kenma kneels before him and tugs him into a hug, slinking his arms around Shouyou before Kuroo, awkwardly kneeling down despite being a whopping 6'2, does the same.

"I was stupid-" Shouyou glares at the floor, the fiercest glare he possibly can, heaves a shuddering breath and forces his tears down. "It was obvious."

"You aren't stupid," Kenma tells him, as if it is a fact, with so much certainty to his voice that all he can do is laugh, leaning into Kuroo's shoulder even as he blinks through the tears.

Kuroo's arm tightens around him- when Shouyou glances up, it is to a face full of sorrow and pain, and then, when he glances at Kenma, his usually smoothed out features are marred by an angry frown and narrowed eyes.

"Why?" Shouyou asks, before he can think otherwise. "Why do you both care? All we've shared is a handful of sleepovers and dozens of conversations over text?" Then, a laugh bubbles out, cruel and dark and singed at the edges with hope finally burnt out. "My own mother doesn't even-"

"She's a bitch," Kuroo cuts in, but unlike the somewhat joking tone Shouyou had imagined Kuroo saying it when he had texted it in earlier, he sounds furious and deathly serious. "And isn't that what friendship is all about, dumbass?"