akaashi saunters up to you after practice one day, and smiles when he sees your face buried in a book. you don’t notice his presence beside you, reaching a hand up to tuck the hair that’s fallen out of your ponytail behind your ears, huffing slightly when some stray hairs still remain.
an amused smile surfaces onto akaashi’s face when he sees that, because you’ve always been impatient at everything, and he finds it endearing that even with that, you’ve always managed to sit down and finish books in one sitting.
“hey,” he says, and you jump slightly, before tilting your head up to blink at him, and akaashi draws in a quick breath before leaning forward to help tuck the elusive strands of stray hair behind your ear for you, and when he sees the grateful smile that spreads across your face after he does that, he can’t help but smile back at you.
“oh, you’re done changing! are you ready to go?” you say, closing the book to place it onto the bench, and akaashi startles, reaching forward to hold a finger in between the pages that you were at before the book shuts, and you raise a brow at him.
“you didn’t put a bookmark yet,” he reminds you, and you shake your head, smiling at him.
“i’ve finished the book during our free period earlier, i was just re-reading it for fun,” you say, and akaashi exhales out a sigh and you grin at him.
“do you want to lend this book? it’s really good,” you tell him, turning back to stuff your items back into your school bag, and akaashi laughs when you turn to raise a brow at him.
“sure,” he says, reaching for the book, but you hold it back to your chest and he blinks.
“are you sure you want to borrow it? you always read whatever i tell you to read, and you always tell me that it’s good, but are you sure you’re not reading it just because i’m telling you to?”
you’ve caught him. akaashi doesn’t usually read your genre of books, but he has to admit to himself that after a while, that particular genre really caught up to him. he tries to ignore the fact that the reason he started to fall for the genre was because he always saw your bright eyes and heard your excited lilt to your tone whenever you talked about the latest book that you were reading to him. he tries to ignore the fact that the reason he fell for the genre was because he fell for you.
“no, i really do like to read it,” akaashi answers, and laughs when you narrow your eyebrows at him, “i’m serious, (Y/N), i think it’s really interesting.”
you smile a relieved smile at him before passing the book to him, and akaashi smiles down at you and pats your shoulder lightly, “ come on, i’m walking you home.”
later that night, after akaashi has texted you a goodnight, he sits on a chair, flipping through the pages of the book.
when a small slip of paper falls out from one of the pages, akaashi tilts his head slightly, before reaching down to pick it up.
it’s small enough to be a random scrap of paper, but when he looks a little closer, he realises that it’s a slip of paper torn from a notebook. and when he squint’s his eyes under the dim light of his study lamp to read it, a big smile surfaces onto his face.
because you’ve written his name and yours with a small heart, and akaashi thinks he really needs to tell you about his feelings tomorrow.
