Try Your Luck

Chapter 1

Kuroo was screwed.

The man sighed, letting the book's thick binding flutter shut as he lay his head on the desk in defeat. This was it. His entire academic career was in shambles.

Kuroo figured he really should've studied harder. Maybe, done a bit more work or met with the teacher a smidgen more than a grand total of two times. He felt confident that his charm could've won that old hag over even if everything else had failed. Not that it mattered now that all his classes were over, and yet, he couldn't help worrying anyways.

Because he honestly never would have imagined—heck, nobody could have imagined that Kuroo Tetsurou, valedictorian, ladies' man, university spokesperson, and all around accomplished third year student would be failing a class.

Given, he really should not have taken a class outside of his chemistry major, but he honestly believed he could handle whatever 'Advanced Theoretical Physics' had to dish out. It seemed easy enough—just a tad more difficult math than he was used to, and the professor was a little wonky, but he had confidence he would be able to pass with flying colors.

Obviously, he was wrong.

Kuroo traced a line with his finger under the book's title, "Common Unlucky Symbols" that was etched across the cover. He had studied all he could and crammed the rest, and now that all hope was lost and he didn't have anyone to blame but himself, he felt desperate enough to search for other godforsaken reasons the universe hated him. No matter the excuse, he was going to have a big fat 'FAIL' on his transcript and he would have to deal with the consequences of explaining the whole ordeal to his parents, and worse yet—risk losing his scholarship.

He groaned again as his head connected with the desk and the man with poorly bleached hair behind him gave him a glance.

"Is that really the best way to feel better?"

Kuroo grumbled in response, refusing to lift his head from the desk, but clutching the book in front of him with clenched fists. "No, but I've reached a new low asking for academic advice from Bokuto of all people. He told me that maybe I was cursed or ran into more black cats than I was supposed to or broke a mirror in a past life and it's led me to—" he gestured wildly in the directions of the book's contents. "This."

"Hm," the man turned his attention to the shelves, resuming his task. "Maybe you should've asked Akaashi to help instead."

"He'd never let me live it down, you know that, Kenma," Kuroo moaned.

"And, you don't think Bokuto won't tell Akaashi anyways?"

Kuroo paused, bolting upright, his hair even more of a mess than usual. "Fuck."

"You really didn't think this through, did you, Kuroo?"

"Cut me some slack, I'm trying here!"

"Then can you try to help me with these books? If you didn't know, we're supposed to be working, not researching wild superstitions."

Kuroo sighed, running a hand through his hair once before getting up to organize books with his co-worker. He had only started volunteering at the public library since last semester and although the work was tedious at times, Kuroo tended to enjoy the labor more than he abhorred it. He had honestly applied for the position to fill up his resume at first, but overall, it wasn't too bad. It gave him some down time between classes and he got to talk to all types of people whenever he manned the reference desk. It beat his last job as a waiter by a landslide, and he was paid for that job.

Still... it didn't stop him from feeling antsy about ending his shift as soon as he could so he could tackle the twisting in his gut. Kuroo's eyes seemed locked on the clock on the wall, ticking away ten minutes from 4pm. Sensing his unease, Kenma sighed next to him.