A Life Without The Sun

When Will I Be Ready?

"...and so I'm sorry to have to tell you all, but Hinata sadly passed away last night." Takeda managed to push out of his throat, trying his best to suppress the tears welling up inside his eyes.

Immediately, Asahi and Suga burst out crying, screaming at the top of their lungs. Daichi wrapped Suga into a tight hug, himself sobbing quietly into his shoulder. Tsukishima let a few tears roll down his face with an emotionless expression, and then simply got up and walked slowly out of the gym (Yamaguchi following close behind his friend). Shimizu made her way towards Tanaka, who was sat on the floor with his head buried deep into his knees, and tenderly wrapped an arm around him.

All of their hearts had been well and truly shattered in that one moment. That gym, once home to Karasuno, National and International champs, was now nothing more than a place of mourning.

He was gone, gone for good. There was nothing any of them could do to bring him back.

-

That day, it rained and rained. The sun didn't come out from behind the thick blanket of cloud at any point, not even for a second.

Kageyama sat on his bed, numb, watching the drops of rain on his window make their way down to the windowsill underneath.
He hadn't gotten undressed from last night. Hinata's scent was still gripping onto the fibres of his sweatshirt, and he wanted it to stay with him for as long as possible.

Glancing over to his bedside table, he scowled slightly at the CD that was sitting there. Memories, dark dark memories, of the night before came flashing back into his mind.

It was all too vivid. That last torturous look into Hinata's glowing eyes as he gazed in amazement at the thing he loved most in the world, the stars, before they closed forever.
The hand that was resting on Kageyama's arm suddenly falling through the air as he felt all the oxygen in that small boy's body empty out of him. It made Kageyama's stomach twist into unfathomable knots and his head spin at such a velocity he truly believed every brain cell in his skull would die.

At that moment, he wished they would.

That CD was passed to him from the auburn-haired nurse. She had revealed to him that her name was Mizuki Shinju, and that Hinata had made her promise to pass on the CD to him when he had died.
She wasn't sure what it was herself, and he honestly didn't know if he wanted to find out.

"準備ができたらこれを再生します ♡" was written on the top of the CD in scratchy black marker pen. It was certainly Hinata's handwriting - the Kanji was written with his unique flourishes that Kageyama would always make fun of.

And that heart. That damned heart was one that Hinata would always draw in Kageyama's schoolbooks, and he remembered how he would always get so mad when he would go to do some work and see that a new one had been added to a corner.

But now, he would give anything to have a new one appear. And he wouldn't get mad. Not in the slightest.

He wasn't ready. He would never be ready. Closing his eyes and furrowing his brow, he cursed Hinata's selfishness.

How could he leave him? Why? And why didn't he tell him about the CD? He at least could have prepared for it, mentally. But it had been sprung at him almost straight after his death. It wasn't fair on him.

In the back of his mind, Kageyama knew that it was he who was being selfish. Hinata didn't want to die. Hinata didn't want to have to pass on the CD, whatever was on it. He didn't want to spend the last couple of months of his short life in pain every single day. But if Kageyama thought about that, it would become too much for him to bare.

For now, he simply sat on his bed and watched those little droplets of rain race down his window, and just hoped that the sun would appear to make the dreariness and grey go away.

-

Hinata's funeral was quiet and respectful. Only his closest friends and family attended: his mother sat right at the front, weeping quietly, with Natsu sat on her knee, confused as to why Hinata was sleeping in the open casket; Karasuno were sat a couple of rows behind, with only Tsukishima absent from the group, along with Kozume Kenma who had his hair brushed forward slightly to cover his red-rimmed eyes; and Kageyama, who was sat on the opposite side of the room, with Tsukishima on the same row but a couple of seats to the left of him.

After the priest had said a couple of words, Hinata's mother and sister moved over to some chairs that were adjacent to the coffin. Then one by one, each guest got up to pay their respects.

The air was smoky from the incense that billowed from the burners, and it made Kageyama's throat hurt. But he didn't mind - it was a temporary distraction from the agony in his heart.

As Asahi bowed towards Ms. Hinata, wiping a tear that was falling down his face away, Tsukishima slowly rose from his seat and picked up an incense stick. Sluggishly, he walked over to the small coffin and dropped it into the burner. He then got onto his hands and knees and bowed to Hinata's beaming portrait.

The sharp inhales and the motion of his back jerking up and down indicated that he was crying.

Honestly, he didn't know why it had affected him that much, it wasn't as if they were best friends. But for some reason it felt as if someone had a hand around his heart and was squeezing so tight it could burst at any moment. He knew that this was disrespectful, and that Hinata's mother had it worse and wouldn't want to look at this, but he really couldn't stop himself.

Quickly, the silent sobs turned into guttural wails as his head spun with millions of thoughts. Incense smoke was clasping the back of his throat, filling his lungs. He couldn't breathe. There was no oxygen in the room, and existential dread soon swept over him. He couldn't move, why couldn't he move?

His panic was interrupted by a rubbing motion on his back. Tsukishima swung his head around and was met with the teary eyes of Kageyama.

"It'll be okay."

In his head, he cringed at himself that he couldn't help more. After all, rubbing someone's back was all he could seem to think of at times like these.