ONLY ME || Haikyuu x Male

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

+ + KAGEYAMA POV + +

The gym felt empty without Ren there.

Kageyama frowned as the volleyball met his fingers, and he sent it over to Tanaka, who scored a point against the other Karasuno players they were scrimmaging against.

It should've been Ren who got that ball.

He high-fived Tanaka rather halfheartedly, a deep sigh leaving his mouth. He hadn't seen Ren around a lot ever since the interhigh preliminaries. The second year had shown up to three out of the seven practices they'd had so far, well, eight if you counted today. In all honesty, Kageyama was starting to miss having him there. Ren's presence was comforting, and above all, he was still worried about the guy after what happened at their last match against Seijou.

Kageyama, Hinata, Kinoshita, Daichi, Narita, and Tanaka ended up winning their first scrimmage against Nishinoya, Suga, Asahi, Ennoshita, Tsukishima, and Yamaguchi. Coach Ukai signaled for everyone to take a quick five minute water break before they went for another round, and Kageyama took the opportunity to approach Nishinoya.

"Ah, excuse me, Noya-san. Do you happen to know where Ren-san is? He hasn't been coming to practices lately and I was wondering if he was sick or something."

Nishinoya raised an eyebrow, confused and taking a swig out of his water bottle. "No, he's fine. He's just practicing with someone else."

Those words echoed around the gym, settling into everyone. It took them all a few seconds to process, but once they did, everyone except for Noya and the coach let out gasps of pure astonishment, Kageyama the loudest of all.

"What? Has he left the team? What other person? What? What's going on?" Kageyama grabbed Nishinoya by the shoulders, shaking the libero back and forth in pure despair.

"Hey, quit it! And calm down! Jeez, he hasn't abandoned us. He's training with one of his family friends. He said that he wanted to make sure that he could manage to fight alone before being able to fight with this team, so he's just been working on his individual abilities recently."

Kageyama released Nishinoya, a heavy feeling in his chest. It really hurt to know that Ren felt as though he had to do that. The second year was already amazing, it was just that he got stressed during the last match - according to Sugawara, that is. But it wasn't just that sadness that was making Kageyama feel all sick inside.

"But...who is he practicing with? Who is this family friend? Why are they a better training partner than any one of us?"

Nishinoya raised his index finger to his lips, thinking. "Er, well I'm not really familiar with the guy Ren's training with. I think his name is Shinobu? No, it's Shirabu. I know for a fact he's Shiratorizawa's setter, though, so that means he's pretty good."

"...WHAT?"

Kageyama had never felt so crushed, so upset, so absolutely betrayed until that moment right there. Shiratorizawa's setter? Over him? Of course that setter must be very skilled and must have experience, but why would Ren choose that guy over him?

His barrage of worrisome thoughts were disrupted by the gym doors flying open, and he perked up for a moment there, thinking that Ren realized that he was the better choice and decided to come back. But he instantly deflated when he saw that it was Takeda-sensei, who was looking rather out of breath.

"Tokyo! A Tokyo training camp!"

Everyone ran over to the teacher who'd face planted on the ground, his nose bleeding. "We've been invited to a training camp! With a bunch of powerhouse schools in Tokyo!"