“So if you’re bisexual, why aren’t you with a girl?”

And it had been going so well. A cascade of ink splotches all over Hajime’s notes when he clenches his fist, snapping his pen clean in half. The other members of his group project are staring, but not at him, their eyes are at the guy who’d asked without any shame and loud enough for the rest of the tiny study room inside the library to hear.

Hajime knows that the question is directed at him. He could just sock the guy in the jaw, never liked him anyways, he’s the kind of person who leeches onto a group for the assignment and all he contributes is his name on the final presentation they’re handing in. The room is silent. Nobody says a word.

The guy snorts and leans closer. “C’mon. You got the choice, after all. Aren’t you making it harder for yourself? Nothing against gays, they’re great and all, but you don’t have to go the hard way. And isn’t your boyfriend gay anyways – “

“It’s not a choice.”

“What?”

They all watch him when Hajime rises out of his chair. Midnight-blue ink falls from his hands and smears on the floor when he takes a step, another, slowly rounding the table past his group members until he’s in front of the guy.

On the other side of the study room, sitting with some psychology post-grads even though he’s only in his bachelor yet, Tooru looks at him with soft eyes of amber and fire.

“I said,” Hajime looks down at the guy, and speaks, “that this isn’t a choice. You should know better than to say that attraction and love are something we have control over. But if you really want to be that asshole, I’ll tell you. And then you’re going to get your stuff and leave, because the only thing that annoys me more than your disgusting attitude is your inability to remember a single law that we’ve discussed in the sixteen hours we’ve been working on this project and you’ve been sitting there like moss on a rock.”

Someone whistles behind Hajime’s back, sharp and impressed. He ignores it, but a grin slips over his mouth when a group member mumbles “Thank fuck, someone said it, the bloodsucker’s getting wrecked.”

Hajime clears his throat, and fuck it, he allows himself to grin in a way that Tooru likes to tease him about because he looks like something with fangs and claws that hasn’t hunted down a decent prey in a long, long time.

“You could give me the world and everything on it to choose from and I’d still only want him.”

The silence breaks with a shout across the room. “I love you too, but it’s still your turn to cook tonight!”

It was supposed to be a joke. Kenma hides behind the door of Kuroo’s room while he’s downstairs to get them some tea. Nobody else is home. This is a good prank, Kenma thinks, I’m going to scare him a bit and maybe he’s going to tickle me then. Maybe we’ll end up cuddling (that would be really, really nice).

It is supposed to be a joke. Kenma jumps out from behind the door and rips his hands into the air when Kuroo comes in. He wants to yell something, a funny quote from a movie, but his body freezes when-

It was supposed to be a joke. But then Kuroo’s on the floor, the tray is dropped, and Kenma watches how his best friend shrinks into a tiny ball and covers his head with both hands.

“Don’t hit me, please don’t hit me, I’m sorry, I’m s-sorry.”

“Kuroo.” Kenma’s voice breaks. He drops to the floor, reaches out, halts. “I didn’t know that you – I’m so sorry. Kuroo, l-look at me. I won’t hurt you.”

It takes a moment until Kuroo lifts his head. The tracks of tears on his cheeks feel like a knife through Kenma’s chest. “I’m so sorry,” he whispers, looking at Kuroo, not moving an inch.

It was supposed to be a joke. But five minutes later, Kuroo sits on the bed, the spilled tea is wiped away, and Kenma listens to the story of what Kuroo has been living through during middle school whenever Kenma wasn’t with him. And oh, Kenma didn’t know that he could hate other people so much, but he does when Kuroo tentatively talks about fists that make bruises bloom and how being gay has only started to feel right when high school came around and Kenma’s fingers laced up with Kuroo’s in front of the team for the first time without any pain raining down on him.

The sharp ring of his phone has Tooru jolt awake with a gasp. He sits upright in bed, heart chasing behind the fading remnants of a nightmare, and his pulse thunders underneath the flow of his blood. The display of his phone is alight in neon blue when Tooru grabs it and falls back into his sheets. There is only one message. It’s just a few words, but they’re enough to have Tooru’s mind go still and ice-cold.

They didn’t take it well. I’m coming over.

Minutes later, his phone rings again. Incoming call. Tooru waits five seconds, and the alarm dies out. It’s their signal, and god, hearing it in a situation like that hurts so fucking much. Tooru pushes his blankets back and uses the light of his display to sneak out of his room. The stairs don’t make a sound below his feet. There’s a shadow waiting behind the front door, silent, motionless.

Tooru opens. “I’m sorry,” he says, “come in. Tell me what happened.”

But Hajime’s eyes are tired and crimson-swollen, his lips parading a shameful hint of blood from teeth digging into them. “No. Don’t wanna talk about this shit anymore.” He brushes a hand through his hair, glancing up at Tooru. “Can I stay tonight?”

Tooru’s answer is to cradle Hajime’s cheeks between his warm hands, trembling and scared, and to kiss his lips as if this was their last night on earth.

It still takes an entire night of weaving their bodies into a skin-tight hug, one that holds together souls and minds, for Hajime to say another word about it. The morning sun rises when he rests his soft lips against Tooru’s forehead and whispers: “I don’t care if they hate me. I’m so sick of hiding that I love you. They gotta live with it, because – because I can’t and won’t stop loving you.”

“We’ll find a way.” Tooru’s voice is quiet and calm, but his fingers shake where they rest on Hajime’s heart. “And if it means you staying here until we graduate, we’ll do that.”

They both know that it won’t be that easy. Hajime buries his face into Tooru’s warm shoulder and doesn’t say anything. But the smile that Tooru’s mother gives them when they come downstairs the next morning, hand in hand – well. Maybe it’s a start. Maybe it’s something like hope.

“My father called,” Hajime says when Tooru comes into their dorm room.

It’s all he needs to say. Tooru drops his bag, slams the door shut and strides over, falling down on the bed where Hajime’s sprawled out. “Tell me.” He kisses the corner of Hajime’s mouth, curls himself into the curve of Hajime’s chest where it hurts the most. He smells like lavender and sweat. Hajime turns his head to bury his nose into the warmth of Tooru’s neck.

“We didn’t talk long.” He speaks slowly, carefully. Every word weighs on his tongue, iron-heavy and thick. “Of course he asked how mom is. If she’s got a boyfriend. Told him to fucking call her himself, but I know he won’t.”

“And then?” Tooru’s chin is pressing into his scalp, hands warm and still on his shoulder blades. Hajime feels small. It had taken months for Tooru to convince him that opening up didn’t mean that someone was going to ram their claws up his soul and twist until he bled. Tooru is patient when he wants something. He never lets Hajime doubt that he wants him, always has, maybe always will.

Hajime closes his eyes, breathes into the dark. “He asked if I still had a boyfriend.”

The warm hands on his back twitch. “Haji,” Tooru says, gentle.

“I said yes. He hung up.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Hajime whispers into Tooru’s skin, and his fingers go tight and angry in Tooru’s shirt. “Just – don’t be sorry for… for – “

“For loving you?” Tooru says, and then: “Never. Not for that.”

“Good.” His blood still aches and coils, but Tooru then kisses the edge of his mouth again, and Hajime lets him. Tooru gives him the silence he needs. He’s simply there, all evening, until it’s dark outside and Hajime kisses him back.

“Yo, ace. I heard that your star setter is a fuckin’ fag. ’s that true? You let a gay dude play by your side?”

The game hasn’t even started and Hajime is already pissed off. The other team’s setter grins at him when they line up before the net, throwing Oikawa a disgusted look.

Hajime takes a deep breath and shakes his head at Kunimi who looks like he’s ready to climb over the net and commit murder. “Wait. Hey, Oikawa. C’mere for a sec before you serve.”

“What is it, Iwa-chan?” Oikawa jogs over, volleyball under his arm, giving the referee a short gesture to wait for a moment. As soon as he’s reached the net, Hajime grabs him by the collar and pulls Oikawa right against his chest.

“I sure hope he’s gay,” Hajime tells the other setter whose face is going bloodless and pale. “Because if he wasn’t, he wouldn’t be my boyfriend and I couldn’t do this.”

The entire gym breaks into chaos when Hajime presses his lips against Oikawa’s, and the other setter looks ready to faint when Hajime’s tongue slips over Oikawa’s soft mouth for a split second.

It doesn’t matter that the referee has to give a loud warning whistle and threatens to throw Hajime off the court if he does it again. The other team looks uncomfortable, and their expressions quickly change to terrified when Hajime lets go of Oikawa, grins, and says loud enough for everyone to hear:

“Let’s destroy them.”

And Oikawa stands at the back line, smiles, fingers gently rotating the ball before he throws it up in the air. “With fucking pleasure.”

December 3rd

Jean has perfected the art of forgetting. Things, people, old bruises on his heart that’s always been too loyal and good until the day he brought someone home, and their laced up fingers had his father take his half-empty bottle of booze and throw it against his head along with the word “fag”. It’s been lonely and cold since then. Scholarship, study of medicine. Honorable doctor. What a talented young man, his colleagues say. His bed’s only for him, has been ever since the laceration on his forehead healed.

It’s 3 am and a gurney is shoved into his emergency room; several bruises and slashes on a young scared face, tears in dark fearful eyes and a sky full of freckles scattered over warm cheeks. Broken arm. Jean stitches what he has to, holds a calloused hand when the man who’s almost still a boy cries all night. He hears his story, and he knows that he’ll be lost and spiralling down an abyss that he’s barely just crawled out. “Fag”, the boy sobs, he’s been called. It echoes in Jean’s head, booms and roars and fucking sings.

His shift ends, and it doesn’t. He spends nights by his side. His name’s Marco. He’s beautiful and so heartbreakingly good that Jean curses the world, and it’s weeks after Marco’s out of hospital and on his couch “for just some time” when Jean comes home at 5 am, greeted by bright eyes with hope rising in them, and he wraps his arms around Marco, lips finding his, finally, and a little whisper between gasped breaths – “stay”.