Title: Coercivity
Pairing: OiKage
Fandom: Haikyuu!!
Rating: safe
Sundays are made up of chores that he carries through almost to annoying perfection. He strips his bed of its sheets and blankets and pillow cases, he goes through his drawers and his hamper for everything. He tosses it all in the washer. And while the clothes tumble and hiss, he cleans the kitchen, he goes through the fridge and marks what he'll need and what he can go another week without.
Sundays are not usually very rainy but today it is. He glances out the window and he watches it splatter against the glass. It taps in a broken rhythm that most people ignore but that he, somehow, finds inviting. Sundays aren't usually for walks but here he is, pulling on his rain boots and a warm jacket.
He wants a pork bun from the restaurant just south east of where he is now.
He wants to see the city like this. Muted and soggy but bright.
Tokyo is not as pretty as everyone said it'd be. It's mostly people and neon lights. He's never really been impressed with it. Not until now, in fact. Now it's romantic with the drizzle that beats down on the cement. It makes girls lean into their boyfriends, makes mothers huddle their children under umbrellas that are much too small. He's never been much of a people watcher but it's hard not to notice the difference in the air as he walks. Huddled up under an umbrella that is much too big for him. He pulls the collar of his jacket up, braces himself against the push of the wind as he rounds a corner. It frisks up his shirt, makes his teeth chatter.
To keep himself from turning and stomping right back home, he thinks of the warm covers he'll get to slip into as soon as he gets home with his pork bun. He thinks of clean socks he'll slide his feet into and the soft mumbling of a TV he won't really be watching in the background. He thinks of--
Ah, but he's not really thinking of anything now. Not at this moment. Not when his feet skitter to a halt and he stops so suddenly that the rain on his umbrella slips forward and off and pelts the ground all at once.
Kageyama Tobio has never been a scientific man but he was told once that a strong enough magnetic field could screw with a compass. He never asked how or why this was possible, he'd just accepted it as fact. But he supposes that if life were a compass then his needle, right about now, would be going a little berserk. Because standing in front of him is very much magnetic-- though he's not exactly sure if this is a good thing or not.
Oikawa Tooru has not gotten taller in the years that have passed. Rather he's just-- filled out. In some sense. Tobio can't put his finger on it. Maybe it's the fact that he's sopping went and that he's half balanced on a bike that won't seem to budge. Maybe it's just that it's been too long since he's actually seen him. People always look different after you haven't seen them in so long, he guesses. Like being away from home and coming back to notice that it has a very particular smell.
That's beside the point, though, he tells himself.
Oikawa is not home. He is not North on his compass. He is not the X on the treasure map.
He's something destined to knock Tobio off kilter. Destined to make things drastically harder.
Ah, but that's not true either.
Tobio glances hard left and shies from the phantom sensation of fingers in his hair, laughter gusting against his neck.
What a thing to think about, he tells himself, at a time like this.
He stiffens very dramatically where he's standing and tries very hard to think of a way to navigate around Oikawa. Around the situation that will, no doubt, occur as soon as he moves within his line of sight. He feels something in his belly twitch, feels his throat tighten up at the sight of him. Just him. It’s not even that he’s doing anything because he’s not. Oikawa is just half balanced on his bike with his phone in hand. He's hunched up to shield the screen from the rain and Tobio is about to wonder why when his eyes drop down to where Oikawa's foot is resting. The chain has snapped. What an unfortunate situation to be in, especially with no umbrella.
A clap of thunder sounds in the distance and Oikawa jerks out of surprise. Not fear. Tobio knows it because he doesn't actually look up just sort of twitches in place. There's an ache in his chest for the fact that he even remembers his mannerisms. A hollow sort of ache that tugs at scar tissue and makes it awfully hard to breathe right about now.
Another clap of thunder and Oikawa hisses something under his breath as he stands up off his bike. He glances left, then right, looking for a place to stand out of the rain, no doubt. He's distracted, that's the point, and Tobio seizes the opportunity to walk very fast around him.
The thing about Oikawa and the thing about Tobio is that they're very stubborn. Anyone who knows them can name that as a personality trait very quickly. It makes them dense sometimes, Iwaizumi has said. Tobio doesn't take into account that Oikawa knows those rain boots anywhere because of the scuffs on the toes. He doesn't take into account that he knows the umbrella too. He doesn't take into account that Oikawa might know him just as well as Tobio knows Oikawa. It's not a factor into the equation. But when Oikawa blurts his name out in surprise, the needle pointing north jitters for a moment before it spins near out of control.
Like a moon stuck in the gravitational pull of a planet, Tobio feels himself turning before he realizes what he's doing. Feels himself tipping his umbrella up so that Oikawa can see him. Their eyes meet and Tobio feels something hollow in his chest fill up and then collapse in on itself like a crumbling building, turning his body into rubble where everything just falls apart. Leaving him hollow. Leaving him empty.
There is no getting out of it now.
Oikawa looks startled. He looks like Tobio is the last person he thought he'd see-- or even want to. There's a moment where he opens his mouth to say something but Tobio is already turning very abruptly. Already moving away from him to slip into the convenience store. Oikawa blinks, watching Tobio shake his umbrella out, and wonders what that was even about. Not the pause, not the surprise, but walking away. Was that really necessary?
Oikawa slips sideways to huddle under an awning of some shop that's been closed for the past thirty minutes. His phone is wet but not damaged and he's not exactly sure how that's possible considering he fell straight into a puddle not fifteen minutes ago. He supposes he's just blessed with good luck. Not exceptional good luck considering who he just ran into but good luck nonetheless. But Tobio, no matter how much Oikawa will deny, is an infectious person. Once he crawls under your skin he's there to stay and right now is no different. He's rattling around in Oikawa's mind even as he tries to call Iwaizumi to ask what he'll need to fix a broken bike chain. He's lurking around in the cords of his heart and Oikawa refuses to acknowledge the pull of them even when Iwaizumi's voicemail sounds in his ear.
In vain because even with Oikawa outside, huddled into a sopping wet shirt, Tobio is scowling at a rack of umbrellas. None of them are blue. There's green and there's black and there's purpose but there's no blue. He stands there, brow pinched and shoulders hunched, and snatches up the green one. It's the closest he'll get to blue and it's just a temporary one anyway. Why is he even bothering? He's asking himself this over and over and over.
Why go so far for someone you haven't seen in so long? Why put yourself through this? Why, why, why, why?
They're questions he can't answer and, honestly, isn't even looking to. He's just moving to the whims of instinct at this point. It's begrudging, of course. It's begrudging. He won't make it in time to the restaurant before it closes. He won't get his pork bun. He sighs, giving in to the unfortunate situation, and orders some of the convenience store brand. It's warm and it isn't good at all but he eats it anyway on his way out. The dough sticks to his fingers and he wrinkles his nose for it as he steps out.
Oikawa is still where he left him and Tobio is stuck at yet another stand still.
They say that stars scream when they're consumed by a black hole. He doesn't remember where he heard that one. Just that he found it interesting in a passing sort of way. An interesting tidbit that he doesn't understand thinking about now of all times. But he supposes that Oikawa is the black hole here. Furiously yanking and pulling Tobio apart. Snagging onto his skin, the cords of his heart in the form of memories Tobio thought he'd forgotten.
The crinkle of sheets in the morning. Oikawa's teeth on his skin. His laugh in his mouth. His hair. His fingers, his knees, his nose.
He can understand why needles go crazy in the grip of a magnetic field. He can understand why a star screams as it's gobbled up. Swallowed. Consumed.
Because as he steps forward it's what it feels like. It feels like a map turned upside down. It feels like a white hot poker sinking into his gut and scrambling things about.
What way is up, what way is down?
His boots scuff the cement and there is pain in his heart when he steps under the awning beside Oikawa. Unnoticed for the moment until he's not. Until Oikawa is turning to look at him as he holds the umbrella out.
Where is left, where is right?
This is how he supposes it will always be.
Oikawa will always be something of a gravitational pull and Tobio will always find himself locked in it's clutches.
But as Oikawa's fingers brush Tobio's own to take the umbrella with a mumbled 'that wasn't necessary, but thank you', Tobio realizes that that's just something he must resign himself to.
