Losing is Winning

Chapter 19

Really excited to be sharing this chapter!! Let me know what you think<3

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After giving him a few seconds to slip out of his shoes, Hinata led him through the hallway into his room. Neither did he say anything, nor did his face give any thoughts away. But that Hinata let him inside was a good sign, wasn't it?

The grip around his wrist vanished once the door slid close behind them. Tobio stopped in the middle of the room, watching Hinata walk over to his desk to lean against it. As soon as he turned around, his blank, expectant gaze bore into Tobio. "What were you gonna say?" His arms sneaked around his own waist, making him look smaller than he already was; as if he wasn't sure what was going to happen and how he should prepare himself.

Tobio's heart squeezed as he scrambled to recollect his thoughts. Standing in front of Hinata after not seeing or talking to him for the entire week, his mind was thrown back to all things that had happened. "I-" His lips were prickling, as if Hinata's own were still touching them, even after an entire week. "You-" Hinata's voice echoed in his mind. I like you. He swallowed the lump of anxiety that was building in his throat. "We have to talk again. We cannot not talk at all anymore." He looked into Hinata's face. "I don't want that," he added when he noticed Hinata furrowing his brows.

The muscles around Hinata's face relaxed again, and Tobio felt a small wave of relief wash through him. Don't take any wrong steps, don't say anything wrong. Don't hurt him even more.

"I know that the way I reacted hurt you," he started, eyes flitting through the room. That was a good start, right? Show Hinata that you are aware of your mistakes and his feelings. Now he only had to make his real emotions comprehensible to him. Just... how was he supposed to put all this chaos inside of him into words? Consciously, he took a deep breath, focusing on what exactly he was feeling.

"You've been the first person that I thought understood me. And volleyball. And what it's about." Tobio forced another breath into his lungs. How did he usually talk and breathe at the same time? Right now, coordinating both simultaneously felt like an impossible task. "No one ever... wanted to play with me. And I know that it's not the same as for you, because I had a team that I was practicing with, but..." His tongue only reluctantly formed the words that he had stored so close to his heart, the words that had never been supposed to be spoken aloud. "But since my grandpa died, there has been no one that would have voluntarily played with me."

Despite the words only crossing his lips slowly, sharing them with Hinata felt right. Something in him knew that, despite their discrepancies and arguments, Hinata would never use those words against him. Still, he kept his eyes firmly fixed on the edge of Hinata's desk, afraid that he might stop talking if he looked into his face.

"So I- I got scared when you said you liked me. Because"—Tobio's teeth dug into the inside of his cheek—"you are the first person that... really wanted to play with me. And I love playing with you. My fingers get all tingly whenever you ask me to toss for you, and every time you tell me my set was good, everything in me feels like... like it's gonna explode or something." He breathed in, forcefully keeping his eyes from moving up to Hinata's face. He had to fight to stop a defensive scowl from contorting his lips.

Never had he wanted to talk about those feelings. Hell, he even suppressed them whenever they had become too prominent in his own mind, afraid of what they could mean, what they could entail. Now, none of this mattered anymore. He consciously tore down all his barriers to, for once, be entirely honest.

Steeling himself to keep on speaking, no matter what he would be faced with, he looked up and into Hinata's eyes. They were wide, mouth slightly agape. "Your words of encouragement, your happy exclamations after spikes, all your smiles and laughs. All the trust you put into me and all the times you've helped me without even realizing it. I cherish all of that." He wet his lips. "So I-I... got scared when you said that you like me." The words nearly got stuck in his throat. "Because- because I don't want to lose all of that with you. But that's exactly what happens in relationships. You have them and then they break, and that's it. And..." He wasn't sure what had been the exact logic his mind had followed. It had been such an automatic reaction that it had been more his subconsciousness acting than anything else. "I think- I think I thought it would have been better to keep what we already had. Because it's good, isn't it?"