Fly (Keishin Ukai) - COMPLETED

16 - Little Crow

From Ukai:

I'll pick you up at 4.

Yuki read the message multiple times as she tried to contain the nerves that were increasing with each passing hour. There was no doubt she was excited, but part of her did worry how the game would go. She prayed she would not panic when it came down to it. She was the one who wanted to be at the match; she could not let Keishin down. Not again.

Knock Knock

Yuki jumped at the sudden noise. She had been home alone for the last few hours and kept herself distracted by drawing. She tried her best not to overthink as she grabbed her bag and went downstairs. She opened the door to see Keishin, hands in his pockets with a friendly smile on his face.

"Ready?" he asked. Yuki nodded before following him to his car. The drive was quiet, except the odd tapping noise that came from her foot. "You okay?" She again nodded, but he frowned. "Look it's okay if you want to back out, no one will be m-"

"No! I'm going t-to do this!" she told him sternly. He chuckled lightly at her sudden outburst.

"Okay, good. I hope you have knee pads, by the way, the last thing you need is to be getting a burn trying to keep the ball up," it was a joke, he thought it was funny, considering her brother was a Libero and all. But his chuckle died down when he saw Yuki's face drop. "Yuki, please tell me you have knee pads..."

Yuki hand clasped the bottom half of her face as she stared out at the road. How did she forget knee pads? She did not want to admit she had, knowing Keishin would be irritated. He did not say anything, but she could feel him staring, boring out a hole in the side of her head. She started to nibble on a nail as she glanced at him.

"You forgot them, didn't you?" He asked though he was sure he knew the answer already. Yuki nodded slowly. "Yuki..." he placed his head on the steering wheel as they waited at a red traffic light. "You're going to be the death of me. You know that?" he turned his head to look at her.

"Sorry..." She looked away from him as guilt ate her up.

"It's fine; we'll just quickly stop off at mine, it's quicker than going back to yours, I'm sure I have a spare somewhere..." Yuki did not reply as she stared out of the window, watching the buildings go by as the traffic light became green. "Hey," his hand landed on her shoulder as he gave her a small shake. "It's okay, don't worry about it, it happens to the best of us." Keishin smiled towards her, Yuki nodded, returning the smile, though it did not stop making her feel bad. Messing up was one thing she hated more than anything. Making people go out of their way for a mistake she did was not something that sat well with her.

It only took around ten minutes for them to arrive at his place, and Yuki found herself pleasantly surprised. She thought he would live in a small apartment along a quiet street, but in fact, his house was away from anyone else - surrounded by dirt and grass.

"We're here," he said as he turned off the engine and jumped out.

"I did not t-think you would live somewhere like t-this..." she mumbled in awe of how beautiful it was.

"I grew up here with my parents, but as they grew older, my mum did not like being so far away from the store. So they moved, and I inherited this." He said as he opened the front door. She said nothing else as she entered the house - ensuring to take her shoes off first. It was clean and beautiful, it was obvious it was a family home before, pictures of family and paintings of nature scattered the walls. Everywhere was clean and neat, and Yuki was embarrassed to admit she was shocked. "Honestly, it's a bit too big just for myself, the house has been in the family for generations, so I don't have it in me to leave." She did not reply as she followed him upstairs. "Alright, knee pads, knee pads...where would I have a spare..." he mumbled to himself, his hands on his hips. "Try to look in those draws while I look in these. I'm sure they are somewhere." Yuki nodded and started to search through the ones he said, part of her feeling strange going through his belongings. She just hoped she did not suddenly pull out a pair of his boxers.