it’s grey and drizzling outside, a sunken humidity in the air, when things first blow up. it’s a stupid fight, yes, but bigger than any he & omi have had before; and of course they’ve argued before. they’ve never been the puzzle-pieces-slotting-together, you-complete-me-perfectly

type of couple. theirs is a love that has always been a little rough around the edges, fragile, requiring caution at times, caution and navigation and learning – lots and lots of learning

and atsumu wonders if maybe this is the time they’ve finally done it, made the irreparable fissure he thought they were doing so well not to have torn so far. it started with something silly that neither of them backed down from in time,

and now they’ve both hurled out something necessarily pointed. they known one another a little too well—have become experts on the other person—and so are experts at hurting each other too,

know where to strike so it wounds.

atsumu dug a little deeper.

omi’s sitting by the window waiting for the rain to stop and he won’t look at atsumu. it’s frightening not to be able to see his face, read his expression, know whether he’s thinking—

‘well, this is it then. we tried, but i guess we were bound not to work', because nothing about them is obvious or easy or straightforward.

the rain lets up a little. the world outside is grey & fogged. omi gets to his feet, brushes past him, reaches for his coat on the hanger.

atsumu feels his heart stagger: is he really just – walking out? leaving? as though he’s not worth a proper goodbye?

but then, his hand on the doorknob, omi says: “…there’s nothing to eat in the house. i’m going to pick up some pasta.”

he still won’t look at atsumu, but he adds, his expression inscrutable, “come if you want. or don’t.”

the door opens—he steps out—atsumu hesitates for a moment. he’s not good at chasing after people, has never seen it as anything other than some kind of total surrender

but a sudden, inexplicable terror strikes him now, and before he fully comprehends why, he’s seizing his own coat too, dashing out the door, following omi down the winding flights of stairs all the way down to the cobbled streets below, glittering with rain,

street lamps misted in the early evening.

they walk a foot apart. don’t touch anywhere; the edges of their shadows on the streets jagged, fitting together nowhere.

is it wrong to have wanted this? atsumu finds himself wondering. is it wrong to have wanted this - wanted /him/ - so badly?

is it wrong to still want it?

is it okay for atsumu to like him this much, despite it all?

are they running on fumes, chasing something they’ll never find, because this - whatever ‘this’ is - just wasn’t made for the two of them?

the thought overwhelms him. it’s ice in his veins

and he suddenly can’t move another inch forward—pauses in his footsteps, his heart racing. omi doesn’t notice at first and keeps walking on ahead. the street is empty today, and atsumu watches the sight of him walking ahead, alone, without atsumu by his side,

the space next to him where atsumu doesn’t fit but squeezes himself in anyway,

the hands he has in his pockets that atsumu should be holding,

the faintest drizzle dusting the tops of his curls with rains-ray that looks like distant stars.

and it is then that it hits him.

it’s then that atsumu knows, looking at him from a few steps behind, that watching him walk away is something every cell in his body screams at him is wrong.

far more wrong than any argument atsumu doesn’t want to give up,

far more wrong than the fact that he’s sometimes still a little too messy and omi’s still a little too guarded about it,

far more wrong than the differences in how they communicate – the mismatches they’ve had to work through,

because those things were - /are/ - difficult at times, sometimes tiring, sometimes feel indefinite, but they’re /them/ because they can and do figure it out. they sit side by side with too-hot coffee in mismatched mugs

and put together puzzle pieces that look like they should form opposite corners, and when the edges don’t fit they sand them down or rotate them or, fuck, glue them together anyway, because for every moment they struggle through blindly

there are a dozen moments of private smiles, shy fondness, cautious affection; the flutter of his heart, still, when omi’s fingers brush his; the way they wake up in the morning with cold sunlight streaming in past billowing curtains, their noses almost touching,

omi’s eyes opening sleepily to the first thing he’ll see every dawn: atsumu,

the breathless kisses, the unspoken understandings, the magnetic pull that brought them together into this entire thing in the first place.

atsumu watches omi pause ahead, notice his absence now, and in the dusky glow of street lamps and post-rain haze—

—turn, glance over his shoulder, look at atsumu at last,

and his face is wide open for a moment, honest and vulnerable, hurt still – but frightened,

like the empty space beside him feels just as wrong to him too—

and he’s stopped. god, he’s stopped, and he’s looking, a few feet ahead, and they’re there alone on the street as though tied by some thread that won’t let one of them pull away too far

and this isn’t chasing. this isn’t losing. this is, he thinks, just walking side by side; this is their knowledge that—for all the both of them hate losing a fight—the thought of losing one another is far, far more unbearable.

atsumu holds his breath. feels something suddenly settle quietly in the restless unease of his mind.

“…aren’t you coming?” omi calls then, softly, and atsumu feels the strange prick of tears in his eyes as his heart tugs him—stumbling—stupid, perhaps—right back to omi's side.

what he says is, “yeah";

what he’ll say is, “sorry";

and what he won’t say—not yet—but perhaps, someday,

is “where you go, always.”

—fin.

@MlYAHINAS is the one to blame, for sending me this: https://open.spotify.com/track/4FObSSNE4O4dgzD4iHFprW?si=RBar8HfeRnqXF5TtsRlqxw

good LORD there is a shocking number of typos in here. i apologise it is quite Hot And Stuffy today in sydney so brain refusing to work overtime hours xx