An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Yui wakes up in a house that isn't his with a body that isn't his. Isn't this a ripoff of a movie?
Written for @daiyarpwk2020 day 3: Swap
Kaoru wakes up aching in places that definitely werenât sore when he went to bed. It feels like he spent hours swinging his bat, which doesnât make sense, because he spent all of his free time yesterday catching for Furuya. Then his mind wakes up enough to catch the fact that the alarm heâs hearing isnât the tone he sets on his phone. It sounds like an actual alarm clock.
He opens his eyes and sits up, and this is most certainly not his room. Thereâs no ceiling close to his face, no sleeping roommates complaining about having to get up and practice.
Like moving through liquid, Kaoru stands and walks â fast, he doesnât normally walk this fast and he isnât even trying â over to a mirror in the corner.
Masashiâs grey eyes blink back at him.
âMasashi, get up already if you want breakfast,â a female voice calls. Kaoru thinks he recognizes Masashiâs momâs voice.
Okay. So. He appears to have body-swapped with Masashi. Heâs not screaming, which Kaoru thinks is a very admirable first step. This is fine. He can handle this.
âMasashi, youâll be late for practice!â
Right. Practice. He can do this.
Kaoru thinks he does an admirable job of faking through breakfast. At least, no one calls him out, and thatâs probably the best he can hope for until this gets fixed. Masashiâs mom gives him some weird looks, but sheâs the only one home and she doesnât say anything.
It starts going downhill when Kaoru realizes he has no clue how to get to Seidou from here.
It canât be that far. Masashi walks every day, so it canât be more than a kilometer or so.
Right?
Kaoruâs probably convinced a few neighbors that Masashi is unbearably slow, but with a few helpful directions, he does manage to make it into practice on time. He shouldâve realized that this was not a reprieve, but a whole new level of hell.
âAh, Masashi-kun, I was hoping to get a few swings in with you before we start,â Kanemaru stops him. Was Masashi working on his swings with Kanemaru? Kaoru canât remember.
Then Kaoru spotsâŚwell, himself, which means â hopefully â Masashi.
âSorry, senpai, Iâve got to talk toâŚâ Kaoru trails off, beelining for what better be Masashi.
Something about the expression on his own face does remind Kaoru of Masashi, which at least means that theyâre spared some kind of mass body-switching event and Kaoru doesnât have to track down, like, Okumura or something.
âWe need to talk,â he says.
Masashi follows him away from the others, and when Kaoru tries to duck into the dugout, he smacks his head hard on the ceiling.
âOw, fuckingâŚhow do you walk around like this?â he demands.
âAt least I can reach things,â Masashi says, his usual neutral tone sounding so strange in Kaoruâs voice. âI couldnât get your clothes down from the hanger. Why do you hang it up so high if youâre so short?â
He sounds petulant and petty, and maybe itâs a product of the morning heâs had so far, but Kaoru finds it hysterically funny. The sound of uproarious laughter sounds insanely weird in Masashiâs voice, and it only makes Kaoru laugh harder.
When he finally calms down, the same blank expression Masashi usually wears is on his own face, but Kaoru thinks he looks a little annoyed as well.
âAre you done?â he asks.
âSure, fine, yes,â Kaoru says. âOkay. Now what?â
âNow, weâre about to be late to practice,â Masashi says. âI hope you can keep up with my position.â
âIt shouldnât beâŚâ Kaoru trails off as the thought suddenly strikes him. âOh my god.â
âWhat?â
âI am going to hit so many homeruns,â he says. âMasashi. Listen. We are never switching back.â
âYouâll have to give up your tiny strike zone,â Masashi says, looking alarmed.
âDonât care,â Kaoru says. Heâs been fighting against his height his entire life. He was rejected so many times for his height. Heâs going to love this. âBetween my batting skills and your strength, Iâm going to be unstoppable.â
âI have batting skills,â Masashi protests.
âSure, you can hit homeruns, but only when you get the bat on the ball,â Kaoru dismisses. âI can get the bat on the ball. Together, weâve made the best batter known to man.â
âAnd what am I supposed to do?â Masashi complains. âI canât hit like you.â
âI dunno,â Kaoru shrugs. âYou donât have to swing at much, most pitchers canât get it in my strike zone anyway.â
âThen why do you swing at things?â
âBecause Iâm a damn good batter and I want other teams to fear my name.â
He claps Masashi on the shoulder, and Masashi almost collapses to one knee. Kaoru winces. Masashi really is a lot stronger than him, and Kaoru isnât used to the new body yet.
âCome on, letâs go.â
For about an hour, itâs the worst practice of Kaoruâs life. He doesnât know how to move Masashiâs long limbs, doesnât know how to get this body to obey him, and Masashi doesnât have any of the same muscle memory that his does. Fielding is a wash, and Masashi has gotten better at that in his second year, enough that people notice Kaoru fucking it up.
Batting takes him a second to get down, too, but by afternoon practice, heâs managed to settle into these new limbs enough that he can bat like himself. Not perfectly like himself, but heâs meeting or exceeding Masashiâs batting average, and it feels so good to watch the balls go flying.
Kaoruâs feeling very pleased with himself when they wind practice down, and he cheerfully stays with Kanemaru for extra practice, basking in the compliments to his improved form.
He hasnât been paying much attention to Masashi, which he feels a little bad about, but itâs been a bit of a weird day, so Kaoru feels like he can be forgiven.
âYui? Where are you going?â
Kaoru whips his head up instinctively at the sound of his own name, and sees Masashi heading for the front of the school.
âHome,â he says, and immediately seems to realize his mistake. He blushes, because Kaoruâs body blushes easily.
âAre you sure youâre not feeling sick?â Furuya â Furuya? â asks. âYouâve been off all day.â
âThat must be it,â Masashi says, and he coughs unconvincingly into his fist. Luckily, Furuyaâs a little dumb.
âGet some rest,â Furuya says. âI wonât ask you to catch for me today.â
âThat doesnât mean you get to steal the Wolf Boy from me, Furuya!â Sawamura shouts from the other side of the room.
âWeâve talked about you using my name,â Okumura complains. âI know we have. It happened an hour ago.â
âYou might want to just let it happen,â Haruichi advises. âHeâs not going to stop.â
Come to think of it, Kaoru and Furuya do have a routine. Itâs not all that unusual that Furuya can recognize that somethingâs up. Not that heâll guess whatâs really up.
Kaoru thanks Kanemaru for the extra practice and heads back to Masashiâs house, only stopping once at a convenience store to ask for directions.
This time, Masashiâs father is home, too, and Masashiâs brother is home from his university classes, and Kaoru doesnât do nearly as well faking as he did this morning. He tries, but despite his friendship with Masashi, it doesnât mean heâs actually any good at mimicking him, and besides, he rarely sees Masashi interact with his family. Itâs probably different to how he acts with his friends and teammates.
Kaoru gets sent to bed to sleep off whateverâs got him so sick, Masashiâs parents whispering with worry behind him, and figures itâs for the best. This was probably some strange fluke of a day, and whateverâs wrong with the universe will reset itself after a good nightâs sleep.
When he wakes up to the same alarm clock, he admits that was a pretty stupid thing to assume.
He rushes through breakfast and out the door, ignoring Masashiâs motherâs offers to stay home and rest if he still feels sick, and corners Masashi the second he sees him.
âOkay, this sucks,â he says. âHow do we fix this?â
âHow should I know?â Masashi asks.
âWell, I didnât do anything to cause this,â Kaoru says. Minus an idle wish on what he thought might be a falling star but actually turned out to be an airplane, so it doesnât count. âIsnât this usually caused by, like, a bad fortune cookie in the movies?â
âWhat movie is that?â Masashi asks. âAnd what makes you think I did anything?â
âWell, did you?â
Masashi looks away.
âWait, you did?â Kaoru asks. âWhat did you do?â
âIt was just a wish at the shrine by my house!â Masashi protests. âAnd I didnât wish for this!â
âThen what did you wish for?â Kaoru asks. Masashi mumbles something under his breath. âWhat?â
âI said, I wanted to get to know you better,â Masashi repeats, blushing with all of Kaoruâs body.
ItâsâŚa strange kind of mirror to Kaoruâs wish, in a way. Kaoruâs wish â on an airplane, so it still doesnât count â was for Masashiâs attention. He doesnât seem to notice anything other than baseball, which is cool, but Kaoru has this new sexuality thing heâs kind of dealing with, and Masashi is kind of his best friend, and they have this bond forged from being the only first years on the first string, and Kaoru would maybe like it if Masashi looked back at him every now and then.
But wishing on a plane because he has a crush definitely shouldnât have made them switch bodies, so heâs fine with blaming this on Masashiâs thing.
âYou couldâve just asked, you know,â he says. âWhat do you want to know?â
Itâs like pulling teeth all day at school, getting Masashi to ask questions, but eventually he seems to get the point of the exercise, and Kaoru, not wanting to prolong whatever this is by refusing to answer, lets Masashi in on a lot of personal stuff, like how insecure he feels sometimes, like how sometimes he just wants to scream because everyone only seems to see his height and not how hard he works, and even some other personal stuff, like the fact that he might like boys as well as girls and heâs not entirely sure what heâs supposed to do with that.
By the end of the day, Kaoru is emotionally exhausted, and that better have been enough to break this, because he doesnât think he can do it again.
âIâll see you tomorrow,â Kaoru says. âAnd hopefully youâll be you again.â
âSee you,â Masashi tells him.
Kaoru skips dinner and passes out as soon as he gets to Masashiâs house, and is blissfully excited to wake up in his own body again.
And he doesnât.
Kaoru almost screams in frustration. They donât have school today, but he books it over to Seidou anyway. Masashi is waiting for him at the gate.
âPlan b,â Kaoru says. âWhat shrine did you say you went to again?â
On the way over, Masashi tells him about the crazy old shrine maiden who takes care of it, and her younger coworker who tries to keep her in line, and how the old woman had offered him a fortune and a wink when heâd gone to make his wish.
âThereâs the younger one,â Masashi says when they get there. âSanae-san, I-â
âDid she get you too?â Sanae asks, exhausted, before Masashi can even finish.
âWhat?â
âMy senpai, she was giving out these charms that had an unusual effect,â Sanae says. âDid she give you one?â
âYes?â Masashi says.
âAlright, Iâll get you two switched right back,â she says, looking extremely underpaid. She pulls two charms from her waistband. âHold these, and everything should go back to normal.â
As soon as Kaoru touches his, he gets this weird split vision for a second before his eyes go fuzzy and stabilize. Heâs looking at Sanae from a different angle.
It worked.
âSo it wasnât about a wish I made?â Masashi asks.
âNo, of course not,â Sanae says. âDonât go spreading this around, okay? She didnât mean any harm, sheâs just mischievous in her old age.â
âSure,â Kaoru says.
They make it a few blocks away from the shrine when Masashi turns to Kaoru.
âDid you mean everything you said yesterday?â he asks.
âOf course,â Kaoru replied. âI didnât want to fuck it up by lying.â
âEven the part when you said you like boys too?â
âIf this is the part where you stop being friends with me because you think itâs weird you can wait until tomorrow.â
âNo, I donâtâŚany particular boy?â
Kaoru crosses his arms over his chest. He can feel the blush taking over his face.
âMaybe.â
âWho?â
Kaoru is about to yell at him when he looks up and sees how earnest Masashi looks.
âWhy did you want to get to know me better?â he asks. Masashi looks away. âHey. You should take me out on a date. Since this is your fault.â
Masashiâs eyes widen.
âReally?â
âYeah, but not today.â Everything is still a little weird, and Kaoru needs to settle back into his body. âYou should go talk to your parents, though. I think theyâre worried about you.â
âDo you want some breakfast?â Masashi asks. âIâll introduce you to them properly.â
âBreakfast,â Kaoru says, âsounds fucking fantastic.â












