Part 13: Ace

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The next day during practice, we were on a water break, and I noticed Asahi standing outside watching the practice. I didn't pay too much attention to it, I was too busy with my own thoughts. While my face never showed too much emotion, I certainly felt a lot of emotions. I was worried, terrified even, that Tsukishima would look at me with the same look that Tobio did. A look of pure disgust

I felt my stomach twist into a knot. I felt like I was going to be sick. I couldn't bear to think of Tsukishima thinking I was disgusting, I couldn't even bring myself to look into his eyes without feeling like I would fall into pieces. He seemed concerned, and he kept on trying to come over and talk to me, but I wouldn't let him. I avoided him at all costs. I couldn't face him, not when I felt this weak and pathetic. 

Eventually I noticed Daichi going out to speak with Asahi, though I honestly couldn't care less about that. I just wanted to get out of this gym as soon as possible. I could stand Tobio feeling such a negative way towards me, after all I was used to it, but Tsukishima never looked at me with anything except for positive feelings, or at least that's what I hoped. 

We began to practice once more when suddenly, Takeda and some other guy appeared. It looked like the guy who worked at that one shop that the team stops by sometimes. 

"Alright everyone! I finally got you a coach! This is Keishin Ukai, he'll be coaching all of you until after the practice match with Nekoma." Takeda seemed extremely excited about this. 

W-wait, practice match with Nekoma? Did I miss something about that??

"I arranged a practice match with the Karasuno Neighborhood Association team, so all of you better make sure that you're all warmed up." Ukai said. 

Great, I just learned that we're having a practice match with Nekoma, and now we're having a practice match with a bunch of adults?

I began to mentally prepare myself for what was to come. We practiced for a little while before eventually, the other team arrived. Nishinoya seemed reluctant to play, but others eventually got him to join in since he's the only libero here. I noticed Asahi walking outside, but didn't want to try and draw any attention to him.

Hinata, however, had other plans. "Hey! Asahi!" Hinata called out, startling Asahi. "Why don't you come and join us? We could use another player." 

Coach Ukai went out and spoke with Asahi, and practically forced him to come and play volleyball with us. 

"Ah, we need a setter for this team, you guys have more than one, right? Why don't you have one of them play on our team?" Some guy from the neighborhood association team said. 

"Y/N, why don't you go over and play on their team? It'll give you a good chance to work with some other players." 

"Eh? A-alright..." I spoke rather softly, I was too caught up in my own thoughts to be able to use any energy to speak any louder. 

We began the match, and I was instantly able to send the ball to one of the people on my team, though I couldn't tell exactly who it was. They spiked it and scored us the first point easily. Then, on the next play, Tobio and Hinata performed their quick attack, which I wasn't expecting at all. Everyone else on my team seemed shocked by it too. I knew that they could do a quick, but I didn't think that they would do it this early in the match. 

The match went on for a while, back and forth and back and forth. I was only partially focused on the game itself, the rest of my focus was on other things. Other terrible, terrible things. My thoughts would always drift to Tsukishima, and how he could react if I were to confess my feelings. There were more bad thoughts about this than there were good. 

Eventually, the match ended. I felt like there was something important that happened during the match that I may had missed, but it honestly didn't matter to me.  The association team had won, and some of the people I set to complimented my setting. If they weren't so good at spiking then those sets probably would have messed them up...

Coach Ukai called all of us over as the neighborhood association team left. He said something about how we all needed to work on our receiving skills. The rest of our team talked among themselves for a little while before eventually, we cleaned up and we all went home. 

I was walking home with Tobio, when he suddenly stopped walking. I noticed and stopped walking as well, I turned to face him. "Why were you acting so depressed during practice today? Were you trying to get attention or something?" 

"Huh? I didn't think I was acting any different than I normally did at practice..." I responded, was I really drawing attention to myself during practice?

"Y/N... what's wrong? Genuinely, I want to know." Tobio seemed sincere with his words, it felt... weird.

"Why do you want to know? So you can make fun of me more? So you can expose my emotions to anyone? Don't act like you actually care, it's painfully obvious that you don't." At this point, I wasn't that sad anymore, I was starting to get angry.

"I- Y/N, I'm sorry. I know I've been a really shitty person to you and all, but I want to change that. I want to actually be a good brother to you, for once." 

"Oh? And what suddenly caused this change of heart? Did Hinata call you out for yelling at me everyday after practice? Are you upset because Hinata can't return your feelings if you keep on being such a terrible person?" I felt hot tears begin to run down my face. How could he just suddenly act like this? How can he even think that I would be willing to so easily forgive him after everything that he has done to me? 

"Look, Y/N, I know that you won't be able to forgive me right away, but could you at least give me a chance to earn your trust back?" Tobio looked at me, he had a glint of pity in his eyes. 

I hated it when people pitied me. I hated it when people looked at me like that. I hated that Tobio thinks that I could believe that he would change when he hasn't even shown me any proof of that being possible. 

"S-stop..." Tobio looked confused as I spoke. "Stop looking at me like that..." 

"What? Stop looking at you? Would you rather me just go back to pretending that you don't exist?" Tobio was getting angry, the little bit of patience that he had was wearing extremely thin. "Or would you rather me keep on acknowledging that I'm better than you. I tried to be nice to you for once, but apparently you're so selfish that you can't seem to take what you can get." 

Tobio stormed off, walking straight past me, not even paying any mind to me. He was extremely angry, and this time I was the only cause for this. I made Tobio angry, and once I got home I would definitely pay the price. 

"S-selfish? A-am I really th-that selfish?" I felt myself breaking down. I was on the sidewalk, and I sat down, leaning against a wall. "A-am I really a b-bad person?" I was sobbing at this point, I couldn't move. 

I'm such a terrible, terrible person. How could anyone be this selfish? Does anyone really like me? No. The answer to that is no. Nobody likes me. Nobody wants me here. It might be better for everyone if I were just to... disappear. 



Word Count: 1333

𝕀𝕟 𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕂𝕚𝕟𝕘'𝕤 𝕊𝕙𝕒𝕕𝕠𝕨  Tsukishima x Male ReaderWhere stories live. Discover now