FIC: Rewind Forward (D1) 48/63
Title: Rewind Forward (48/63)
Author: Ociwen
Rating: NC17 (eventual)
Disclaimer: Konomi owns all.
Summary: Niou, meet Yagyuu.
Author's Notes: Spoilers for everything.
Morning tennis practices have never been Niou's idea of fun, least of all when the ground is soggy and he steps in a puddle at the end of his road on the way to morning tennis practice.
He sighs. His shoe squidges when he steps down on it. The air is so humid after the storm that it sticks to his skin. Haze settles over the rooftops and obscures the world. Niou trudges onward, his socks and feet getting nastier and nastier as the water seeps through his sneaker. He buys a two-pack of onigiri from the conbini, but when he bites into them, they're filled with fish paste.
He spits the onigiri out on the sidewalk. The wrapper is labeled fish-paste, not umeboshi, not what he intended to buy for breakfast.
"Puri," he mutters. His shoulders slump even lower.
Niou scuffs his sneakers on the sidewalk. He keeps waiting to hear the sound of his cellphone ringtone, or the vibration from a textmessage on his thigh. His fingers touch the edge of his phone in his pocket and only then does he remember he turned it off last night. Fish-paste curdles in his stomach. He feels ill.
"Puri."
It's the last week of school before the summer holidays. The Nationals are coming up soon, only this year, they'll be entering as the challengers, not the champions. Stupid Sanada, Niou thinks. Stupid Yanagi. Stupid chibi. Had to fuck it up for all us of us, didn't you guys?
He doesn’t want to deal with Sanada. He doesn't want to deal with Yanagi or Kirihara. And after what he saw last night, he doesn't want to deal with Yagyuu this morning either. Niou's finger hurts. He sucks on the tip, but the prick from the dart has long dissolved into his skin. It's all in his head. Niou scowls.
The campus is quiet. Niou steps through the brick gate and peers around. Cicadas hum in the cloying morning mist. The pavement is spotted with dew and damp spots cluster underneath the waxy shrubs. There are scattered hydrangea petals littering the walkways and a few shredded leaves from the maples, too. Humidity drips as the sun peaks out from streaking clouds. Niou pulls at his collar. His throat is tight.
For once, he's not the last one to arrive. Niou can see Sanada slamming balls into a cement wall at the far end of the courts, near the gymnasium. The balls echo as they smash into the ground. Sanada is silent, however. Niou narrows his eyes, then he walks into the clubhouse.
The fatty is changing. "Morning," he says. He pops a bubble. It stinks like fake apple.
Niou grunts. He opens his locker and dumps his backpack inside. He looks around. The mood is subdued-he doesn't even feel like calling Marui a fatass this morning. Niou's shoulders feel heavy. He grabs his racket and his waterbottle and his towel and heads out onto the courts.
Yanagi and Yagyuu run laps already, but Niou hesitates. He swallows a thick wad of mucus. Yagyuu falls off pace and waves Yanagi off. He nods to Niou. Niou turns away. He folds his sweat towel, then unfolds it and folds it back up the other way. He can't look at Yagyuu this morning without remembering the way Yagyuu smiled at those girls last night. Those girls who had their paws all over him. Niou grinds his teeth. He digs his fingernails into the griptape around his racket handle. There is a pressure inside his chest pushing on his ribs that hurts when he inhales.
For a moment, he almost understands the force Sanada uses to slam those balls into the cement wall. Niou's own body is so tense he practically shakes. His elbows lock and his knees feel like they're going to cramp up and he'll fall down dead and paralyzed like Yukimura…
He thinks about that too and he winces. Yukimura's surgery this weekend…the Nationals…his yelling at Sanada yesterday…Niou's never heard Yukimura that angry before. It gives him a chill now, remembering the ear-piercing shriek that seeped out from under Yukimura's doorway and shook the antiseptic corridor.
At least Yukimura was forthright with Sanada. Yagyuu plays these games with Niou: leading him on, dancing and bouncing around, wiggling his butt, and then…nothing but blue balls and sleepless night.
Niou fakes yawn. He needs to do something with his body other than stand here like a lame loser. He scratches the back of his neck. Sweat collects along his collar already.
"Niou-kun!"
Niou stiffens. His cock does too. Niou whips his head around and glares as Yagyuu walks up to him and says good morning. "Do you want to work on stretches?" Yagyuu asks. His request is banal and boring. His smile is standard. He pushes his glasses up his nose and his hand pushes back further, slicking damp, sweaty bangs back from his forehead. Niou's mouth may be dry, but today he refuses to play Yagyuu's game.
Niou sniffs, pivots on his heel and walks off.
Yagyuu runs up to him. He touches Niou's shoulder and Niou is nearly gone: it would be so easy to play this volley, back and forth with Yagyuu, teasing and toeing the tension between them as if it's nothing. It would be so easy to lean back and let Yagyuu ply him, play a tennis match against Jackal and Marui and just be the same as always.
Except thinking about it gives Niou a headache. His skull throbs. His dick is uncomfortable and hot between his legs. He curls his lip up and tenses his shoulder, giving Yagyuu a cold look when he turns. "I'm busy," he says.
Yagyuu blinks. Then his forehead scrunches up. He looks disheveled and confused and Niou wants him still, even though he's pissed as fuck. He always wants Yagyuu, especially when Yagyuu is damp with sweat and smells like citrus shampoo-he must have showered this morning before practice. Niou could close his eyes and play out those fantasies, of Yagyuu naked in the shower with his hand around his dick, masturbating and murmuring Niou's given name…
Niou closes his eyes and swallows.
"Everyone!"
Of course, Yanagi has to want something now and ruin the fantasy in the screen of Niou's imagination. Yagyuu's hand slips off his shoulder and a shiver runs down Niou's spine. His mind savours the feeling of the slight pressure and the warmth of Yagyuu's hands. His cock swells more. Niou squeezes his eyes shut for an instant, but the sweet, numb feeling between his legs is only heightened when Yagyuu asks, "I wonder what Yanagi-kun and Sanada-kun want…"
Those two stand at the baseline of the centre court. Kirihara slinks up to them with his head hung low and his tail between his legs. Marui bounces over and Jackal tosses his ball aside. Only then does Niou realize that there is no one to pick it up.
There is no one here, except the regulars. Niou shifts his eyes left, then right. No freshmen. No pre-regulars. No one else.
His mole twitches. He touches it. Yagyuu opens his mouth again, but he shakes his head, instead joining the rest of the regulars clustered around Sanada. Sanada looks as constipated as ever: the tendons in his neck are tense, his jaw is tight and his lips pursed thin. The sun draws out a shadow behind him when he sets his racket down and stands with his hands on his hips. A faint summer breeze lifts the hem of Sanada's jacket; it smells of smog and the mineral-y smell of damp earth after a storm.
Niou is in no hurry. He walks over and sets his racket down too. He hangs around behind the kid and stuffs his hands into his pockets. He can see Sanada shift his weight as he watches through the hair hanging over his eyes.
"Jackal," Sanada says.
Jackal takes a step forward. Sunlight glints off his forehead, showing the beads of sweat forming. "Ye-es?" he asks. His voice croaks. Niou narrows his eyes and watches a little more carefully.
Sanada takes a deep breath. He puffs his chest up. His face screws up. His cap brim shades his eyes, but the whites are illuminated and eerie, glowing around his tiny black pupils. He stares down his nose at Jackal. Jackal backs up a step.
"Hit me."
Cicadas hum in the thick silence that follows. Jackal winces. Sanada stands there, his eyes boring into Jackal to just do it.
Niou's eyes flick from Sanada's stony face to Jackal's uncertainty. Jackal opens his mouth. He shakes his head, and then he raises his hand to slap Sanada on the cheek. The tap barely makes a sound. Sanada doesn't flinch.
"That was pathetic," he says through his teeth. "What the hell was that?"
Jackal sweats profusely. Sweat dribbles down from the top of his head onto his shirt collar, wetting his neck. He makes a little noise in the back of his throat, but no one else says a word, no one except Sanada, who starts to rant on about rah rah rah leading the team without Yukimura rah rah rah law of Rikkai rah rah rah, Niou's heard it all a hundred times before. He grinds his teeth. Puri, he thinks. If you hadn't been distracted by Yukimura's surgery-
But wouldn't you have been distracted if it was Yagyuu? a little voice asks him. Niou stiffens. His hair bristles from the shiver that runs from his scalp, down his spine all the way to his toes, damp in his sweaty sneakers. Yagyuu is beside Jackal, standing there with visible, white-lipped shock on his face, despite his otherwise bland expression.
He wasn't blank last night, though. He was smiling at that bitch. Niou balls his fist. He wants to hit something, thinking about that. Anger rises, bitter and hot in his throat and it makes the temperature feel that much more scorching. He can hear himself breathing hard and heavy through his nose, and his nostrils flare.
Fuck her! he thinks. Fuck Yagyuu too!
And then Sanada looks at him. Those black, beady eyes focus on Niou and drill into his skull. His temple throbs. Niou glares back. Sanada calls his name and Niou will give him exactly what he wants.
He leans back on his right heel and slugs his fist forward, as hard and as fast as he can. Sanada's cheek cracks under his hand-cartilage crunches with a sickening sound that would make Niou's stomach turn, if it wasn't knotted up already. The solidity of Sanada's body breaks Niou's punch, and the feeling ricochets back through his body like a taser shock. Niou shakes. Sanada stumbles backward with a grunt.
Sanada spits a wad of blood onto the court. Niou should feel guilty for it. Yanagi gasps and Niou sucks in a breath. He stiffens, expecting a return blow…
But instead Sanada's lip-split down the middle and oozing blood-quirks. "That's better," he mutters. Then, louder, he shouts, "Next! Yagyuu!"
One by one they come forward and hit Sanada as hard as they can muster. Niou's hand aches, throbbing deep in the bones. His fingers are numb at the tips and his wrist burns all the way to his elbow. He scowls and snorts and walks off.
Practice is a waste of a morning.
He grabs his bags and goes into the school after changing into his uniform. There's always homework to be done-does he have a literature test soon? He might. He's been too busy with the Switch and Yagyuu lately that his grades could be slipping for all he knows. Niou hasn't touched his dayplanner in months-not that he ever used it. If he needed to know something, there was always Yanagi to tell him instead.
There's an hour before classes. The school corridors are mostly empty-except for a couple girls walking past Niou and whispering something. He leers at them and pulls a face when they turn their backs. They are flighty and giggly and smell like flowers. They have the soft curves and tits and everything that Yagyuu doesn't. Niou's insides wither, just a little. The umeboshi from earlier sits in his stomach and turns to vinegar, turning everything sour and unpleasant.
He needs to do something.
He needs his darts. Math problems. A tennis ball to slam into a cement wall.
Niou bums a smoke off one of the 3C boys loitering near the vending machines by the cafeteria. It's disgusting and perfect, all rolled into one. He rarely does it-he doesn't see the appeal smoking has for Yagyuu-but feeling that cigarette between his lips, coughing on the acrid smoke filling his lungs…
It reminds him of Yagyuu at the same time. Niou leans off the edge of the rooftop and peers down. Sanada is back at the cement wall with a ball again. Niou clicks his tongue. He taps his smoke on the ledge and ashes scatter. He exhales a blue-tinged stream, then inhales with a grunt. The inside of his lungs tickle. Niou bites back a cough; one of the 3C students hears him anyway.
"Can't smoke kid," he says.
Niou rolls his eyes. He looks back over his shoulder. The student has brittle orange hair and a cigarette dangling from his lips. There are chains hanging around his neck and belt. He looks about eighteen.
"Not a kid," Niou says. "You're just too old to be here."
The student raises an eyebrow and aviator sunglasses slip down his nose. He narrows his eyes at Niou. "Oh yeah?" he says. His knuckles crack.
The cigarette falls from Niou's lips. He curls them up in a sneer and shrugs. He's not in the mood to fight today. He lets the student back him up into an A/C vent. The metal burns the skin of his arm as hot air streams up around them. The student spits in Niou's face-Niou just cringes and slinks off. The student is twice his weight and for all her knows, twice his age too.
It doesn't matter.
Gross cigarette taste lingers on his tongue all through morning classes. They have a chemistry test: types of matter, solid, liquid, gas, easy as pie. Niou doodles pictures of atoms and finishes in half the time. He snorts a wad of mucus to make the taste go away, but it only makes his stomach heave when the slimy chunk slides down his esophagus.
As soon as the teacher turns his back, Niou fishes around his backpack for a handkerchief. He horks up a second wad and spits it inside the hanky. Each and every classmate turns to look at him, glaring and pursing their lips in silence. Niou scuffs his shoe on the linoleum. The squeak catches the attention of the teacher.
"Niou-kun," he says, "you can't be done. Get back to your test."
Niou looks at him.
The teacher stomps down through the rows of desks to grab Niou's test. His eyes read it over and the cocky curve of his mouth falls away.
Niou smirks, but he doesn't feel any sense of satisfaction from the teacher's sputtering.
***
He avoids Yanagi at lunchtime and heads to the baseball pitch. Part of him knows that Yagyuu will come. Part of him wants Yagyuu to come.
Most of him just doesn't know what to do at all.
He stirs the sesame seeds into his rice. His chopsticks clack on his plastic bento box. Sun beats down on Niou's back. He hates the sweltering feeling of the summer, but the thought of eating with the rest of his classmates-or even the tennis club in the literature room-is even less appealing.
He wants to be alone.
He wants company.
He wants to yell at Yagyuu.
He wants to ask Yagyuu what the hell is going on: lead him on, turn him off, just damn well pick something, you megane dork!
Niou is changeable and mutable himself, but it drives him batshit when Yagyuu does the same to him. Yagyuu is supposed to be predicable and polite and straight. Instead, he keeps touching Niou. He knows about Niou's erections and he's met Niou's family. Thinking about it now makes Niou's face hot, and his pants are sweaty under his knees. He shifts on the hard wooden bench. It creaks under his weight.
"Niou-kun."
Niou picks out a crab roll and pops it into his mouth. The wasabi tingles his tongue, but nothing more. Yagyuu takes a seat beside him and sighs. Niou scoots down further on the bench. Yagyuu turns his head slightly-typical megane, can't see out of the corner of his eyes.
"Are you waiting for someone?" he asks.
Niou ignores him.
Yagyuu hums. "It's a nice day," he says. "The others asked if we were going to all eat together outside."
"Be my guest," Niou mutters. He starts to stand up, but Yagyuu's hand stops him. A hot, clammy palm presses to the top of Niou's wrist. He hisses. Yagyuu doesn't let go; his long fingers wrap around Niou's arm and squeeze. Niou tries to jerk back, but Yagyuu just squeezes tighter. Insects sing all around them and the air is thick-with stifling humidity that makes it hard to breathe, with tension that makes it hard to think.
And with the desire that never really leaves. It makes it hard to move with his cock swollen, so close to Yagyuu's outturned knee that Niou practically collapses to the ground in a puddle of hormones.
Yagyuu lets go first. Trees rustle and a crow flies out of the leaves, its form a haunting shadow against the blinding sun. Niou breathes through his nose and his hair swishes as a hot wind melts his scalp. Yagyuu sits and eats his cafeteria lunch: cold soba, fried fish special and what looks like a packaged melon pan bought from a conbini.
He unwraps it and offers Niou a piece. Chocolate chip. Niou lifts his eyes just enough to catch Yagyuu's, but he catches the glare of sunlight off Yagyuu's glasses instead. Niou swallows. Chocolate chips stick to his fingers, sweet and sticky when he licks them off. Sighing, he stretches his legs out. Yagyuu does the same.
Niou is still angry enough to refuse to speak to Yagyuu, but sitting here feels good too. "There's an ABC Invitational playing in Tokyo in a couple weeks," Yagyuu says.
Niou grunts. He slurps on his juice box. His back is hot and sweat collects in his armpits. He smells-he knows-but Yagyuu doesn't turn his nose up or shift down the bench away from him.
When the bell rings for afternoon classes, Niou hasn't said a word more to Yagyuu. Yagyuu stands up and brushes his pants off. His head turns to Niou, but he doesn't press. Niou grinds his teeth and purses his lips-subconsciously, he wanted Yagyuu to ask. All Yagyuu does is wave his hand and say he'll see Niou at practice.
"Puri," Niou whispers. He balls his fist and as soon as Yagyuu has turned his back to leave, he punches the wooden bench.
His hand throbs all afternoon.
***
"Do you want to work on formations?" Yagyuu asks.
Niou curls his lip. He snorts. "Formations are for losers," he says. In the corner of his eye, he can already see Marui and Jackal roped together at the waist and running around the court to catch Yanagi's lobs. Jackal's long legs drag the fatass, who huffs and puffs and trips on the knot he and Jackal manage to tie themselves into.
Niou walks off to the gymnasium. His chest is tight and his stomach churns, but he refuses to give into Yagyuu. He sees Sanada inside and his shoulders fall. Dust motes dance on streams of hot sunlight through the tall windows. Niou's uniform is plastered to his sticky skin. Seeing Sanada strike and cut through a ball the machine punches out hits Niou in the gut.
So much for being alone.
He leans on the wall and watches until Sanada notices. Sanada pulls his cap off and wipes the sweat from his brow with the hem of his shirt. He's got bags under his eyes and pink-tinges too. Niou raises an eyebrow.
Odd, he thinks.
But then he remembers Yukimura. And Sunday. And the yelling.
He frowns as his heart sinks a little. He almost feels bad for Sanada, fighting with his boyfriend-or whatever the hell Sanada and Yukimura call each other.
"Working on something new?" he murmurs.
Sanada glares.
Niou shrugs. He settles back against the wall. Sanada says nothing and eventually, he turns around to glare at the machine instead of Niou. Niou blows a raspberry. His arm glues itself to the painted concrete. His leg falls asleep, the prickling sensation rising from his foot all the way up his leg to his one ball. He twitches, uncomfortable but unwilling to move at the same time.
Until the gym door opens with a blast of late-afternoon sun and baking heat. A tall, straight form stands there, silhouetted for a moment as he closes the door behind himself. "There you are," Yagyuu says. "Do you want to-"
Fuck off, Niou thinks.
Yes! another part thinks.
All he says is: "Go play with the chibi."
Yagyuu blinks and his glasses slide down his nose. He takes a long, hard look at Niou and for a moment, Niou wants to give in and go with Yagyuu. He wants to smirk and say "Fooled ya" and grin and sling his racket over his shoulder and be all cool with Yagyuu's request and watch Yagyuu wiggle his butt at the net as they work on some dumb Australian formation-
But.
"Fine," Yagyuu says. His face hardens and his lips thin out. He pushes his glasses up his nose with his middle finger. "I'm sorry I asked."
When he finally trudges home, Niou feels shittier than this morning. The showers were tense. Marui sang and Jackal danced and shimmied "Zumba". That was what he called it. Niou didn't care.
Sanada stomped off early. Niou scratched his mole and wondered, but not for too long. Sanada's pissy mood was expected. Even Yanagi didn't raise an eyebrow.
But he did raise an eyebrow when Yagyuu entered the showers at nearly the same time as Niou and purposely used one on the opposite side of the tiled room. Niou drowned himself under a cold spray. His body was covered in goosepimples then, and now-thinking about Yagyuu's narrowed eyes and thin frown-he shivers again.
***
On Tuesday, Niou wakes up in a mess of twisted pajama pants and pounding heart and sticky come between his legs. He flops back on the pillows and groans. Flickering memories of his latest dream float across his vision-tall cryptomeria trees and dripping cypresses, bobbing in a large wooden bath weightless and relaxed, the tension in his belly when Yagyuu looked at him with smouldering black eyes, picking through his brain and undressing him with one look.
Niou moans. He cups his dick through his pajamas and rubs a bit. The skin is sensitive and throbbing and inside his head he's angry, but…
"Yagyuu…" he whispers. Don't go with that girl!
He drags his ass to morning practice, yawning all the way. Niou takes the bus. It's too hot to walk-even the cicadas have shut up this morning-and the A/C on the bus is cool and soothing over his feverish skin.
The only problem (aside from Yagyuu) is that Sanada doesn't show up.
They all look at each other. The freshmen and the preregulars start to whisper. Yanagi frowns and hands Kirihara his clipboard.
"Should I get the loudspeaker?" Jackal asks Marui.
Yanagi says no. He cups his hands around his mouth and calls out "Twenty laps and forty swings!" But he's lucky if anyone in the club does half. No one seems to care about Yanagi-he might be a monster, but on his own, well…
Bit of a pussy, Niou thinks. He watches Yanagi sit on a bench and scribble down notes in a book. Yanagi's slitted eyes glance up to the practice, but he's not invested the way Sanada is. He doesn't threaten punishment. He says "Aa" and "I see" when a freshmen comes up and tells him that they need more balls. He's s shit senpai and he talks more with Kirihara, who's draped over his shoulder and flicking pollen bits across Yanagi's lap, and Yagyuu than he does anyone else.
In the clubhouse, Jackal asks, "Shouldn't we be worried about Sanada?"
Yanagi blinks. Niou stops buttoning his shirt for a moment to listen. Marui shoves Kirihara off his arm and Yagyuu looks up from tying his shoelace.
"Genichirou probably has a good reason," Yanagi says.
Niou doesn't buy it. He watches Yanagi's eyes twitch, ever so faintly, then shift to the left towards the window.
"That's what we thought when it started to happen to Yukimura," Marui whispers.
A lump grows in Niou's throat. He tries to swallow, but the spit catches and sticks. Niou forces himself to cough and the feeling doesn't get any better.
When Yagyuu says "Adieu" and waves to the team from the clubhouse doorway, Niou can taste bile in the back of his mouth. His pulse pumps once, long and hard through his body as his cock swells in his underpants.
Sanada's not in the literature classroom at lunch, but he is in gym class-he and Niou play on different volleyball teams so Niou can't ask about where the ass has been disappearing lately. Not that Niou really cares, but curiosity pricks him between the ribs and he can't help but notice the sluggish laps Sanada runs around the gymnasium and the way he seems to trip over his sneakers more than usual.
Yagyuu, of course, happens to play on Niou's team. Niou plays near the baseline. Yagyuu is close to the net and he wiggles, just like always, completely oblivious to the fact Niou can see the shake of his hips and the slight strain of his bum in his shorts. Niou swallows hard. The volleyball bounces next to his right arm.
"Why didn't you get that?" a classmate shouts.
Niou shrugs. Inside, he burns with embarrassment when Yagyuu's eyes sweep down his bent body and his lip curls up-just enough for Niou. Niou's intestines shrivel up under Yagyuu's disapproving frown, but his cock rears its head again. Niou slumps lower, trying to hide his erection and the flush of shame over his cheeks.
He leaves the gym as soon as he can after Phys Ed finishes.
Sanada isn't at afternoon practice.
The sun beats down on their backs and heads. Insects sing and Yanagi rubs his temple. He nods when Kirihara asks if he can go catch bugs instead of playing.
"Put them in a jar," Yanagi says. Kirihara skips off, cackling to himself. Marui flops down on the bench next to Yanagi.
"Too hot this afternoon," he says. "I'm beat already."
Even Jackal skives off laps. Yagyuu runs his, but he's a proper little gentleman who is incapable of breaking practice rules. Niou lurks under a shady tree and sweats. He watches Yagyuu from the shadows. Light bounces off Yagyuu's uniform as his sneakers slap the perimeter of the courts. His glasses slide down his nose constantly. He sweats and messes his hair up when he pushes it back from his eyes. Niou's mouth is dry. Yagyuu doesn't spare him one glance and that hurts.
Niou leaves tennis practice early, without showering. No one seems to notice him slip off with his bags, but he does stop when he walks by the hydrangea bushes. Kirihara crouches low and his grin catches the light. His eyes are huge and they glow with a creepy whiteness as Kirihara cups his hands and strikes at a spot under the branches.
"Heh heh heh," he mutters. "Got you, you little fucker."
"Having fun?" Niou asks.
Kirihara looks at him. He dumps the insect into a jar filled with a dozen others, maybe, all chirping their dying breathes before Kirihara screws the lid back down. "Why aren't you practicing with Yagyuu-senpai?" he asks. The kid stands up and scratches his hair. His stinks like sour sweat. Niou wonders if the kid's heard of deodorant-or puberty-yet.
Niou tenses. "None of your business," he says. He snorts through his nose and fakes a smirk. The muscles around his mouth ache faintly. "Why aren't you practicing?" he asks.
Kirihara makes a noise. He sticks out his bottom lip and chews it. "There's something between you guys," he says, completely avoiding Niou's question. Niou swallows hard and backs up a step when the kid walks closer to him, accusing with a sharp little grin and sharper eyes.
"I know you guys have somethin' going on, senpai. I'm not stupid." Niou opens his mouth but Kirihara rubs his chin and speaks before Niou has a chance. "Guess you guys should just kiss and make up, ne?" Kirihara laughs under his breath.
Niou is frozen to the spot. His tennisbag slips on his shoulder and his blood runs cold through his limbs. Kirihara's words cut to the bone and echo over and over in his ears: kiss and make up kiss and make up kiss and make up…
"That's what my sister always says," Kirihara adds. "But she's just a stupid bitch. Guys don't kiss guys, that's gross."
Niou bursts into laughter so loud that Kirihara drops the jar of insects. It smashes on the ground and the little shards of glass gleam in the filtered light as the cicadas jump off and run to their freedom.
***
But at home he can't stop thinking about what Kirihara said.
Niou sits on the floor and pokes darts into the board. The only screwdriver in the house that he knows about is from a model set of his brother's, but it would be too small. He stuffs another dart into Sanada's forehead-the printout is so full of holes that Sanada's scowling face is unrecognizable now.
Supper is cold tofu and rice. Niou sighs. Resting his chin on his hand he pushes his chopsticks around the rice bowl and stands them up straight.
"Don't do that!" his sister snaps. He glances up at her and sticks out his tongue. She pulls his chopsticks out and sets them down on the rest beside his right arm. Stupid sister, he thinks.
"How was tennis practice?" his mother asks.
Niou grunts.
"Did you play doubles with Yagyuu-kun today?" she asks. Niou sucks in a breath. The fingers he'd been drumming on the table stop for a fraction of a second, and his heart skips a beat.
"I can play singles too," Niou mutters. His cheeks feel warm. He doesn’t want to think about Yagyuu, and yet it's all he ever does think about. In his mind he picks apart everything Yagyuu says and does, and he tries to make a logical sense of out. But the problem is, Yagyuu is so full of contradictions that all Niou can make out is a pulsing headache and the swollen erection in his shorts.
After dinner Niou sits on the back porch with the plate of melons his mother cut up. He chews on a rind and licks the sweet juice from his bottom lip. The other night, he and Yagyuu were outside here. Niou squints and he can see the dark splotches where melted popsicle dripped down off their fingers. He looks up and his mother and sister putter around the garden with trowels and a hose, spraying the bushes and blooming plants with water. The light is mauve in the west and the insects are louder than ever, humming their songs into the waning evening light. In the east, there is a single shining star above the blurry city lights.
Niou wonders if it's a star. He can't tell, but the light doesn't move. Slowly, he closes his eyes and sets the melon rind down. Please, he thinks. He bows his head a shade, but not enough for anyone else to notice. Still, his face is warm.
There's no way that Kirihara knows. Niou hasn’t done or said anything to Yagyuu-it's always Yagyuu calling the shots outside of tennis now. He's the real gamemaker. Yagyuu said he needs time. Yagyuu said to wait. Yagyuu said Yagyuu said Yagyuu said!
Niou groans. He rubs his forehead with his fingertips, making small circles in his sweaty skin by his hairline. It itches. He scratches it until the crawling sensation stops and is replaced with a vibrating sensitivity that makes his hair stand up all over his body.
Unless Yanagi said something, Kirihara can't know. The fact that Yanagi knows is irritating enough. Niou clenches his teeth at the thought of Yanagi chuckling over this piece of data. It's embarrassing for him to be this way; Yanagi knowing just makes Niou's stomach churn with sickly sweet melon taste.
"Masaharu!" his mother calls. Niou lifts his head. She points to a pile of weeds near a drooping rose bush spilling petals onto the rocky pathway through the garden. "Could you put these in the compost for us, please?"
Niou grumbles, "Yeah yeah" and, lethargic and shuffling, he wanders across the wet pavement stones to the pile of weeds. He bumps into his sister's arm along the way and the hose bounces in her hand, spraying water up in a shower of droplets overhead. They patter down across their bodies and Niou laughs when she shrieks at him.
The hose water is a cool mist over his body. It feels good-a tiny break from the thick, humid heat that lingers at dusk. He picks up the weed pile, all grasses and tiny prickly things that Yukimura would know the name of.
He should be back soon. When his rehab ends. Knowing Yukimura, Niou can't help but think that he'll push his body harder and faster to get back to tennis before the Nationals. If he saw their most recent practices, though…
He'd burst his stitches…
Then they'd be really fucked for the Nationals. If Sanada lost to a twelve year old brat, well…
Niou doesn't want to think about that either. He lets his mind drift as he pads to the compost bucket. The stones are bumpy and cool on the soles of his feet, but sharp little gravel, so tiny Niou can't see it in the dying light, they poke his skin and make him jump. He dumps the weeds in the compost and prances back to the porch, dancing through the garden and bumping his sister in the opposite arm, just because.
It doesn't sate the gnawing inside his belly. Neither does a long, warm bath. Niou dunks his head under the water and stares into the murky blue mineral salts he added. They sting his eyes and the warmth and softness of the water makes his limbs sink deeper, but inside his mind races. He needs to talk to Yagyuu, but he won't approach Yagyuu first. Girls are forward and ask guys about their feelings. Surely not even fags do that.
"Puri," he says. His word bubbles up to the surface and bursts into the echoing bathroom.
He can hear a knock from the other side of the doorway. Niou looks up, he sits up and his mother tells him that there's a phonecall for him. Niou exhales. Who the hell is calling me now?
"It's the mother of one of your teammates," she says. "Please hurry up!"
Puzzled, Niou shakes off his hair and stands up. His legs wobble as he climbs out and grabs a towel to sling around his waist. His feet leave puddles when he pads out into the hallway in a cloud of steam from the bathroom.
His mother's glasses go foggy for a moment as he hands the phone to him blindly.
"Hello…?" he says.
"Hello," a strange voice on the other end says. It's definitely a woman, but if Niou didn't know any better, the high pitch and whispered breathing would make him assume it was a chick his age. "This is Genichirou's mother. You're the first name on his phone list and-"
She hiccups. Niou furrows his brow and leans against the doorway. His mother hovers nearby, biting her lip as she listens. Niou scowls at her and mouths "Go away!" but she only backs up a step a two.
"-and he hasn't been home for three nights but he's been to school, Niou-kun. Have you seen him? Is he okay? Do you know what's going on?" Sanada's mom inhales sharply and Niou is certain her gasp is a sob. He cringes. "Is he o-kay?" she asks again.
"Uh…" Niou rubs the back of his neck. His throat bobs. Sanada's mom is crying on the other end of the line and it's getting increasingly uncomfortable standing here as his towel starts to slip, too. He frowns. "Yeah, he seems okay. Uh…" Niou racks his brain to think of something to tell this woman. "Uh, he's probably just practicing real hard before the Nationals is all."
"He hasn't been home since SUNDAY!" She starts to cry harder. Niou jerks back from the phone and cringes. He's shit at this. He has no idea what to say and no idea how to comfort this woman.
In a blurred attempt to get rid of her, he shoves the phone back to his mother and says, "I don't know!"
His mother blinks. Her glasses slip.
Niou rushes to his bedroom and closes the door. As he slides down the back of the door, his wet skin and the towel catch and his mother walks downstairs, assuring Sanada's mom everything is okay and they'd make sure to help find Sanada.
It's almost expected when his mother knocks a few minutes later. At least this time, Niou's in his boxers to go to bed. "I don't know what she's talking about," he says. He raises his hands when his mother opens her mouth. "Sanada's been at school and I don't know what shit-"
"Language, Masaharu," she says with a frown.
"I don't know anything, okay?" he says. He blows through his lips and flops back onto his bed. "I have a headache," he grumbles. "I'm going to bed." To prove his point, he rolls onto his side and fakes a snore. His mother sighs. Her shadow lingers in the doorway for a moment, until she closes it behind herself with a shallow click.
The fuck is wrong with you, Sanada? he thinks. Niou shakes his head against his pillow. It's damp and cool under his neck. Air conditioning wafts over his skin, making him shiver, making his nipples stiffen and his cock too.
Out of guilt, he sends Sanada a quick textmessage. where the hell have u been??? Then he shuts his cell off and plugs it into the charger for tomorrow. Niou lays on top of the sheets, listening to the night-time noises of his family getting ready for bed. When the footsteps in the hallway stop and the floor doesn't creak anymore, he sighs and slips a hand under his waistband.
When he closes his eyes, he can pretend Yagyuu is beside him, blowing that cool air into his ear. Niou smiles and rubs his cheek on a dry part of the pillow. "Hiroshi…" he whispers.
When he closes his eyes, he can pretends that his hand is Yagyuu's, tight and clenched around his hot cock, thumbing the slit at the end and smearing pre-cum, touching the sensitive spots under the head and stroking the skin that runs down the shaft. Niou parts his legs wider and pulls his boxers down lower as his hands roam. His belly tightens with pleasure. His breathing picks up and he imagines the smell of Yagyuu's shampoo, the sound of Yagyuu's silky voice, the feeling of Yagyuu's hair tickling his belly instead of the A/C…
He comes with a muffled grunt, but it's never good enough on his own. Niou stares at the ceiling as his heart pounds against his ribs. His body slackens and his dick throbs, soft on his skin, but it's not the same.
He swallows a lump in his throat.
I don't understand you, Yagyuu.
***
Sanada is at morning practice.
Niou sidles up to him. Despite Sanada's purple bags under his eyes and the scruffy hair under his cap, Niou presses forward and says, "Your mom called my house last night."
Slowly, Sanada turns around to him. A single blood-shot eye twitches at him from under the cap. Sanada breathes so loudly that he sounds more like an animal than a human.
Niou sidles back away.
In the showers, Marui whispers, "Yukimura forgave him finally."
Niou soaps up his armpit. Suds slither down his arm. Across the showers, he can see Yagyuu doing the same. The sight of Yagyuu's black armpit hair sudsed up and his naked chest, with his brown nipples and broad, straight shoulders makes Niou's mouth woolen. He swallows and looks to Marui. His erection flags for a moment. Enough for now, thankfully.
"What?" he says.
Marui sucks in a breath and makes a chipmunk face before he exhales. His eyes look around the showers, but Sanada's not here, he's still out playing with Yanagi. "He sat outside of Yukimura's hospital room every night until Yukimura forgave him. Sanada's mom called MY house two nights ago."
It's so embarrassing for Sanada that Niou can't even force himself to laugh. He slaps his hand against the wet tiles and mutters, "Damn…"
The ass might be a stupid idiot, but his determination…
It makes Niou jealous and impressed all at once. Especially when Yagyuu purposely says "Good bye" to all of the team when he leaves for classes but his gaze only avoids Niou. Niou stares at the floor and his sneakers start to blur.
***
He talks back to the art teacher. There's no particular reason why-there usually isn't. They work on still-lifes. Last week, it was nature drawing outside. It's all useless rubbish anyway. Niou crumples up his sheets of paper and flicks them across the classroom. Yanagi stiffens when a tiny chunk of paper hits the back of his neck. Niou snickers when Yanagi's lame bowlcut moves as his scalp shivers. Yanagi turns around in his seat and looks at Niou.
The teacher only needs to see it once to ask Niou what he's doing.
Niou thinks for a moment. The teacher is an old man with a bad comb-over that lifts in the rattling air from the A/C vent on the far wall. Niou smirks. "Not much of an apple person," he says, nodding to the basket of fruit in the middle of the classroom.
"Do you want to fail the assignment?" the teacher asks. His nose reddens. Niou can see a vein throb in his temple. It's tempting to flick a paper ball and see if he can hit that, too.
Niou shrugs. "Do I care?"
***
At lunchtime, he's late. Stupid detention, he thinks. He runs out to the school grounds. No one was in the literature classroom except Marui, Jackal and the wonderchibi. Niou took one peek inside, saw the three of them crowded around Kirihara's gameboy, and rushed back through the school. All of the windows are cranked open in the hallways and there are deep grey clouds in the distance. But for now, the sky is blue and thick with clouds and smoggy summer heat that clings to everything in a film of damp.
He stops beside a window on the third floor and looks out across the grounds toward the baseball pitch. There is no one there except a few kids who look like first years playing catchball. His eyes rake the campus, darting from tree to hedge to tree again.
And there, underneath the large tree close to the basketball courts, Niou can see two figures. His heart catches in his throat along with a breath as he recognizes one, then the other.
Yagyuu is there.
With a girl from the arcade.
Under the confession tree.
Niou's heart stops pounding. Yagyuu leans close to the girl; her back is turned to Niou, but he can see enough of that tell-tale angle and duck of Yagyuu's head when he tilts his face down and-
Niou falls to the floor. His knees collapse under himself and he can't watch Yagyuu kiss her. He struggles to breath-his lungs have collapsed, too, and his ribs crush down on his heart, slithered to the floor along with any hopes he might once have had.
He sits there, staring blankly at the linoleum floor, until he hears the bell. Dimly, he knows he has class, but all he can think, see, feel is the utter heartbreak in his chest from Yagyuu kissing that girl.
So Yagyuu's straight after all.
Niou should have known better.
Author: Ociwen
Rating: NC17 (eventual)
Disclaimer: Konomi owns all.
Summary: Niou, meet Yagyuu.
Author's Notes: Spoilers for everything.
Morning tennis practices have never been Niou's idea of fun, least of all when the ground is soggy and he steps in a puddle at the end of his road on the way to morning tennis practice.
He sighs. His shoe squidges when he steps down on it. The air is so humid after the storm that it sticks to his skin. Haze settles over the rooftops and obscures the world. Niou trudges onward, his socks and feet getting nastier and nastier as the water seeps through his sneaker. He buys a two-pack of onigiri from the conbini, but when he bites into them, they're filled with fish paste.
He spits the onigiri out on the sidewalk. The wrapper is labeled fish-paste, not umeboshi, not what he intended to buy for breakfast.
"Puri," he mutters. His shoulders slump even lower.
Niou scuffs his sneakers on the sidewalk. He keeps waiting to hear the sound of his cellphone ringtone, or the vibration from a textmessage on his thigh. His fingers touch the edge of his phone in his pocket and only then does he remember he turned it off last night. Fish-paste curdles in his stomach. He feels ill.
"Puri."
It's the last week of school before the summer holidays. The Nationals are coming up soon, only this year, they'll be entering as the challengers, not the champions. Stupid Sanada, Niou thinks. Stupid Yanagi. Stupid chibi. Had to fuck it up for all us of us, didn't you guys?
He doesn’t want to deal with Sanada. He doesn't want to deal with Yanagi or Kirihara. And after what he saw last night, he doesn't want to deal with Yagyuu this morning either. Niou's finger hurts. He sucks on the tip, but the prick from the dart has long dissolved into his skin. It's all in his head. Niou scowls.
The campus is quiet. Niou steps through the brick gate and peers around. Cicadas hum in the cloying morning mist. The pavement is spotted with dew and damp spots cluster underneath the waxy shrubs. There are scattered hydrangea petals littering the walkways and a few shredded leaves from the maples, too. Humidity drips as the sun peaks out from streaking clouds. Niou pulls at his collar. His throat is tight.
For once, he's not the last one to arrive. Niou can see Sanada slamming balls into a cement wall at the far end of the courts, near the gymnasium. The balls echo as they smash into the ground. Sanada is silent, however. Niou narrows his eyes, then he walks into the clubhouse.
The fatty is changing. "Morning," he says. He pops a bubble. It stinks like fake apple.
Niou grunts. He opens his locker and dumps his backpack inside. He looks around. The mood is subdued-he doesn't even feel like calling Marui a fatass this morning. Niou's shoulders feel heavy. He grabs his racket and his waterbottle and his towel and heads out onto the courts.
Yanagi and Yagyuu run laps already, but Niou hesitates. He swallows a thick wad of mucus. Yagyuu falls off pace and waves Yanagi off. He nods to Niou. Niou turns away. He folds his sweat towel, then unfolds it and folds it back up the other way. He can't look at Yagyuu this morning without remembering the way Yagyuu smiled at those girls last night. Those girls who had their paws all over him. Niou grinds his teeth. He digs his fingernails into the griptape around his racket handle. There is a pressure inside his chest pushing on his ribs that hurts when he inhales.
For a moment, he almost understands the force Sanada uses to slam those balls into the cement wall. Niou's own body is so tense he practically shakes. His elbows lock and his knees feel like they're going to cramp up and he'll fall down dead and paralyzed like Yukimura…
He thinks about that too and he winces. Yukimura's surgery this weekend…the Nationals…his yelling at Sanada yesterday…Niou's never heard Yukimura that angry before. It gives him a chill now, remembering the ear-piercing shriek that seeped out from under Yukimura's doorway and shook the antiseptic corridor.
At least Yukimura was forthright with Sanada. Yagyuu plays these games with Niou: leading him on, dancing and bouncing around, wiggling his butt, and then…nothing but blue balls and sleepless night.
Niou fakes yawn. He needs to do something with his body other than stand here like a lame loser. He scratches the back of his neck. Sweat collects along his collar already.
"Niou-kun!"
Niou stiffens. His cock does too. Niou whips his head around and glares as Yagyuu walks up to him and says good morning. "Do you want to work on stretches?" Yagyuu asks. His request is banal and boring. His smile is standard. He pushes his glasses up his nose and his hand pushes back further, slicking damp, sweaty bangs back from his forehead. Niou's mouth may be dry, but today he refuses to play Yagyuu's game.
Niou sniffs, pivots on his heel and walks off.
Yagyuu runs up to him. He touches Niou's shoulder and Niou is nearly gone: it would be so easy to play this volley, back and forth with Yagyuu, teasing and toeing the tension between them as if it's nothing. It would be so easy to lean back and let Yagyuu ply him, play a tennis match against Jackal and Marui and just be the same as always.
Except thinking about it gives Niou a headache. His skull throbs. His dick is uncomfortable and hot between his legs. He curls his lip up and tenses his shoulder, giving Yagyuu a cold look when he turns. "I'm busy," he says.
Yagyuu blinks. Then his forehead scrunches up. He looks disheveled and confused and Niou wants him still, even though he's pissed as fuck. He always wants Yagyuu, especially when Yagyuu is damp with sweat and smells like citrus shampoo-he must have showered this morning before practice. Niou could close his eyes and play out those fantasies, of Yagyuu naked in the shower with his hand around his dick, masturbating and murmuring Niou's given name…
Niou closes his eyes and swallows.
"Everyone!"
Of course, Yanagi has to want something now and ruin the fantasy in the screen of Niou's imagination. Yagyuu's hand slips off his shoulder and a shiver runs down Niou's spine. His mind savours the feeling of the slight pressure and the warmth of Yagyuu's hands. His cock swells more. Niou squeezes his eyes shut for an instant, but the sweet, numb feeling between his legs is only heightened when Yagyuu asks, "I wonder what Yanagi-kun and Sanada-kun want…"
Those two stand at the baseline of the centre court. Kirihara slinks up to them with his head hung low and his tail between his legs. Marui bounces over and Jackal tosses his ball aside. Only then does Niou realize that there is no one to pick it up.
There is no one here, except the regulars. Niou shifts his eyes left, then right. No freshmen. No pre-regulars. No one else.
His mole twitches. He touches it. Yagyuu opens his mouth again, but he shakes his head, instead joining the rest of the regulars clustered around Sanada. Sanada looks as constipated as ever: the tendons in his neck are tense, his jaw is tight and his lips pursed thin. The sun draws out a shadow behind him when he sets his racket down and stands with his hands on his hips. A faint summer breeze lifts the hem of Sanada's jacket; it smells of smog and the mineral-y smell of damp earth after a storm.
Niou is in no hurry. He walks over and sets his racket down too. He hangs around behind the kid and stuffs his hands into his pockets. He can see Sanada shift his weight as he watches through the hair hanging over his eyes.
"Jackal," Sanada says.
Jackal takes a step forward. Sunlight glints off his forehead, showing the beads of sweat forming. "Ye-es?" he asks. His voice croaks. Niou narrows his eyes and watches a little more carefully.
Sanada takes a deep breath. He puffs his chest up. His face screws up. His cap brim shades his eyes, but the whites are illuminated and eerie, glowing around his tiny black pupils. He stares down his nose at Jackal. Jackal backs up a step.
"Hit me."
Cicadas hum in the thick silence that follows. Jackal winces. Sanada stands there, his eyes boring into Jackal to just do it.
Niou's eyes flick from Sanada's stony face to Jackal's uncertainty. Jackal opens his mouth. He shakes his head, and then he raises his hand to slap Sanada on the cheek. The tap barely makes a sound. Sanada doesn't flinch.
"That was pathetic," he says through his teeth. "What the hell was that?"
Jackal sweats profusely. Sweat dribbles down from the top of his head onto his shirt collar, wetting his neck. He makes a little noise in the back of his throat, but no one else says a word, no one except Sanada, who starts to rant on about rah rah rah leading the team without Yukimura rah rah rah law of Rikkai rah rah rah, Niou's heard it all a hundred times before. He grinds his teeth. Puri, he thinks. If you hadn't been distracted by Yukimura's surgery-
But wouldn't you have been distracted if it was Yagyuu? a little voice asks him. Niou stiffens. His hair bristles from the shiver that runs from his scalp, down his spine all the way to his toes, damp in his sweaty sneakers. Yagyuu is beside Jackal, standing there with visible, white-lipped shock on his face, despite his otherwise bland expression.
He wasn't blank last night, though. He was smiling at that bitch. Niou balls his fist. He wants to hit something, thinking about that. Anger rises, bitter and hot in his throat and it makes the temperature feel that much more scorching. He can hear himself breathing hard and heavy through his nose, and his nostrils flare.
Fuck her! he thinks. Fuck Yagyuu too!
And then Sanada looks at him. Those black, beady eyes focus on Niou and drill into his skull. His temple throbs. Niou glares back. Sanada calls his name and Niou will give him exactly what he wants.
He leans back on his right heel and slugs his fist forward, as hard and as fast as he can. Sanada's cheek cracks under his hand-cartilage crunches with a sickening sound that would make Niou's stomach turn, if it wasn't knotted up already. The solidity of Sanada's body breaks Niou's punch, and the feeling ricochets back through his body like a taser shock. Niou shakes. Sanada stumbles backward with a grunt.
Sanada spits a wad of blood onto the court. Niou should feel guilty for it. Yanagi gasps and Niou sucks in a breath. He stiffens, expecting a return blow…
But instead Sanada's lip-split down the middle and oozing blood-quirks. "That's better," he mutters. Then, louder, he shouts, "Next! Yagyuu!"
One by one they come forward and hit Sanada as hard as they can muster. Niou's hand aches, throbbing deep in the bones. His fingers are numb at the tips and his wrist burns all the way to his elbow. He scowls and snorts and walks off.
Practice is a waste of a morning.
He grabs his bags and goes into the school after changing into his uniform. There's always homework to be done-does he have a literature test soon? He might. He's been too busy with the Switch and Yagyuu lately that his grades could be slipping for all he knows. Niou hasn't touched his dayplanner in months-not that he ever used it. If he needed to know something, there was always Yanagi to tell him instead.
There's an hour before classes. The school corridors are mostly empty-except for a couple girls walking past Niou and whispering something. He leers at them and pulls a face when they turn their backs. They are flighty and giggly and smell like flowers. They have the soft curves and tits and everything that Yagyuu doesn't. Niou's insides wither, just a little. The umeboshi from earlier sits in his stomach and turns to vinegar, turning everything sour and unpleasant.
He needs to do something.
He needs his darts. Math problems. A tennis ball to slam into a cement wall.
Niou bums a smoke off one of the 3C boys loitering near the vending machines by the cafeteria. It's disgusting and perfect, all rolled into one. He rarely does it-he doesn't see the appeal smoking has for Yagyuu-but feeling that cigarette between his lips, coughing on the acrid smoke filling his lungs…
It reminds him of Yagyuu at the same time. Niou leans off the edge of the rooftop and peers down. Sanada is back at the cement wall with a ball again. Niou clicks his tongue. He taps his smoke on the ledge and ashes scatter. He exhales a blue-tinged stream, then inhales with a grunt. The inside of his lungs tickle. Niou bites back a cough; one of the 3C students hears him anyway.
"Can't smoke kid," he says.
Niou rolls his eyes. He looks back over his shoulder. The student has brittle orange hair and a cigarette dangling from his lips. There are chains hanging around his neck and belt. He looks about eighteen.
"Not a kid," Niou says. "You're just too old to be here."
The student raises an eyebrow and aviator sunglasses slip down his nose. He narrows his eyes at Niou. "Oh yeah?" he says. His knuckles crack.
The cigarette falls from Niou's lips. He curls them up in a sneer and shrugs. He's not in the mood to fight today. He lets the student back him up into an A/C vent. The metal burns the skin of his arm as hot air streams up around them. The student spits in Niou's face-Niou just cringes and slinks off. The student is twice his weight and for all her knows, twice his age too.
It doesn't matter.
Gross cigarette taste lingers on his tongue all through morning classes. They have a chemistry test: types of matter, solid, liquid, gas, easy as pie. Niou doodles pictures of atoms and finishes in half the time. He snorts a wad of mucus to make the taste go away, but it only makes his stomach heave when the slimy chunk slides down his esophagus.
As soon as the teacher turns his back, Niou fishes around his backpack for a handkerchief. He horks up a second wad and spits it inside the hanky. Each and every classmate turns to look at him, glaring and pursing their lips in silence. Niou scuffs his shoe on the linoleum. The squeak catches the attention of the teacher.
"Niou-kun," he says, "you can't be done. Get back to your test."
Niou looks at him.
The teacher stomps down through the rows of desks to grab Niou's test. His eyes read it over and the cocky curve of his mouth falls away.
Niou smirks, but he doesn't feel any sense of satisfaction from the teacher's sputtering.
***
He avoids Yanagi at lunchtime and heads to the baseball pitch. Part of him knows that Yagyuu will come. Part of him wants Yagyuu to come.
Most of him just doesn't know what to do at all.
He stirs the sesame seeds into his rice. His chopsticks clack on his plastic bento box. Sun beats down on Niou's back. He hates the sweltering feeling of the summer, but the thought of eating with the rest of his classmates-or even the tennis club in the literature room-is even less appealing.
He wants to be alone.
He wants company.
He wants to yell at Yagyuu.
He wants to ask Yagyuu what the hell is going on: lead him on, turn him off, just damn well pick something, you megane dork!
Niou is changeable and mutable himself, but it drives him batshit when Yagyuu does the same to him. Yagyuu is supposed to be predicable and polite and straight. Instead, he keeps touching Niou. He knows about Niou's erections and he's met Niou's family. Thinking about it now makes Niou's face hot, and his pants are sweaty under his knees. He shifts on the hard wooden bench. It creaks under his weight.
"Niou-kun."
Niou picks out a crab roll and pops it into his mouth. The wasabi tingles his tongue, but nothing more. Yagyuu takes a seat beside him and sighs. Niou scoots down further on the bench. Yagyuu turns his head slightly-typical megane, can't see out of the corner of his eyes.
"Are you waiting for someone?" he asks.
Niou ignores him.
Yagyuu hums. "It's a nice day," he says. "The others asked if we were going to all eat together outside."
"Be my guest," Niou mutters. He starts to stand up, but Yagyuu's hand stops him. A hot, clammy palm presses to the top of Niou's wrist. He hisses. Yagyuu doesn't let go; his long fingers wrap around Niou's arm and squeeze. Niou tries to jerk back, but Yagyuu just squeezes tighter. Insects sing all around them and the air is thick-with stifling humidity that makes it hard to breathe, with tension that makes it hard to think.
And with the desire that never really leaves. It makes it hard to move with his cock swollen, so close to Yagyuu's outturned knee that Niou practically collapses to the ground in a puddle of hormones.
Yagyuu lets go first. Trees rustle and a crow flies out of the leaves, its form a haunting shadow against the blinding sun. Niou breathes through his nose and his hair swishes as a hot wind melts his scalp. Yagyuu sits and eats his cafeteria lunch: cold soba, fried fish special and what looks like a packaged melon pan bought from a conbini.
He unwraps it and offers Niou a piece. Chocolate chip. Niou lifts his eyes just enough to catch Yagyuu's, but he catches the glare of sunlight off Yagyuu's glasses instead. Niou swallows. Chocolate chips stick to his fingers, sweet and sticky when he licks them off. Sighing, he stretches his legs out. Yagyuu does the same.
Niou is still angry enough to refuse to speak to Yagyuu, but sitting here feels good too. "There's an ABC Invitational playing in Tokyo in a couple weeks," Yagyuu says.
Niou grunts. He slurps on his juice box. His back is hot and sweat collects in his armpits. He smells-he knows-but Yagyuu doesn't turn his nose up or shift down the bench away from him.
When the bell rings for afternoon classes, Niou hasn't said a word more to Yagyuu. Yagyuu stands up and brushes his pants off. His head turns to Niou, but he doesn't press. Niou grinds his teeth and purses his lips-subconsciously, he wanted Yagyuu to ask. All Yagyuu does is wave his hand and say he'll see Niou at practice.
"Puri," Niou whispers. He balls his fist and as soon as Yagyuu has turned his back to leave, he punches the wooden bench.
His hand throbs all afternoon.
***
"Do you want to work on formations?" Yagyuu asks.
Niou curls his lip. He snorts. "Formations are for losers," he says. In the corner of his eye, he can already see Marui and Jackal roped together at the waist and running around the court to catch Yanagi's lobs. Jackal's long legs drag the fatass, who huffs and puffs and trips on the knot he and Jackal manage to tie themselves into.
Niou walks off to the gymnasium. His chest is tight and his stomach churns, but he refuses to give into Yagyuu. He sees Sanada inside and his shoulders fall. Dust motes dance on streams of hot sunlight through the tall windows. Niou's uniform is plastered to his sticky skin. Seeing Sanada strike and cut through a ball the machine punches out hits Niou in the gut.
So much for being alone.
He leans on the wall and watches until Sanada notices. Sanada pulls his cap off and wipes the sweat from his brow with the hem of his shirt. He's got bags under his eyes and pink-tinges too. Niou raises an eyebrow.
Odd, he thinks.
But then he remembers Yukimura. And Sunday. And the yelling.
He frowns as his heart sinks a little. He almost feels bad for Sanada, fighting with his boyfriend-or whatever the hell Sanada and Yukimura call each other.
"Working on something new?" he murmurs.
Sanada glares.
Niou shrugs. He settles back against the wall. Sanada says nothing and eventually, he turns around to glare at the machine instead of Niou. Niou blows a raspberry. His arm glues itself to the painted concrete. His leg falls asleep, the prickling sensation rising from his foot all the way up his leg to his one ball. He twitches, uncomfortable but unwilling to move at the same time.
Until the gym door opens with a blast of late-afternoon sun and baking heat. A tall, straight form stands there, silhouetted for a moment as he closes the door behind himself. "There you are," Yagyuu says. "Do you want to-"
Fuck off, Niou thinks.
Yes! another part thinks.
All he says is: "Go play with the chibi."
Yagyuu blinks and his glasses slide down his nose. He takes a long, hard look at Niou and for a moment, Niou wants to give in and go with Yagyuu. He wants to smirk and say "Fooled ya" and grin and sling his racket over his shoulder and be all cool with Yagyuu's request and watch Yagyuu wiggle his butt at the net as they work on some dumb Australian formation-
But.
"Fine," Yagyuu says. His face hardens and his lips thin out. He pushes his glasses up his nose with his middle finger. "I'm sorry I asked."
When he finally trudges home, Niou feels shittier than this morning. The showers were tense. Marui sang and Jackal danced and shimmied "Zumba". That was what he called it. Niou didn't care.
Sanada stomped off early. Niou scratched his mole and wondered, but not for too long. Sanada's pissy mood was expected. Even Yanagi didn't raise an eyebrow.
But he did raise an eyebrow when Yagyuu entered the showers at nearly the same time as Niou and purposely used one on the opposite side of the tiled room. Niou drowned himself under a cold spray. His body was covered in goosepimples then, and now-thinking about Yagyuu's narrowed eyes and thin frown-he shivers again.
***
On Tuesday, Niou wakes up in a mess of twisted pajama pants and pounding heart and sticky come between his legs. He flops back on the pillows and groans. Flickering memories of his latest dream float across his vision-tall cryptomeria trees and dripping cypresses, bobbing in a large wooden bath weightless and relaxed, the tension in his belly when Yagyuu looked at him with smouldering black eyes, picking through his brain and undressing him with one look.
Niou moans. He cups his dick through his pajamas and rubs a bit. The skin is sensitive and throbbing and inside his head he's angry, but…
"Yagyuu…" he whispers. Don't go with that girl!
He drags his ass to morning practice, yawning all the way. Niou takes the bus. It's too hot to walk-even the cicadas have shut up this morning-and the A/C on the bus is cool and soothing over his feverish skin.
The only problem (aside from Yagyuu) is that Sanada doesn't show up.
They all look at each other. The freshmen and the preregulars start to whisper. Yanagi frowns and hands Kirihara his clipboard.
"Should I get the loudspeaker?" Jackal asks Marui.
Yanagi says no. He cups his hands around his mouth and calls out "Twenty laps and forty swings!" But he's lucky if anyone in the club does half. No one seems to care about Yanagi-he might be a monster, but on his own, well…
Bit of a pussy, Niou thinks. He watches Yanagi sit on a bench and scribble down notes in a book. Yanagi's slitted eyes glance up to the practice, but he's not invested the way Sanada is. He doesn't threaten punishment. He says "Aa" and "I see" when a freshmen comes up and tells him that they need more balls. He's s shit senpai and he talks more with Kirihara, who's draped over his shoulder and flicking pollen bits across Yanagi's lap, and Yagyuu than he does anyone else.
In the clubhouse, Jackal asks, "Shouldn't we be worried about Sanada?"
Yanagi blinks. Niou stops buttoning his shirt for a moment to listen. Marui shoves Kirihara off his arm and Yagyuu looks up from tying his shoelace.
"Genichirou probably has a good reason," Yanagi says.
Niou doesn't buy it. He watches Yanagi's eyes twitch, ever so faintly, then shift to the left towards the window.
"That's what we thought when it started to happen to Yukimura," Marui whispers.
A lump grows in Niou's throat. He tries to swallow, but the spit catches and sticks. Niou forces himself to cough and the feeling doesn't get any better.
When Yagyuu says "Adieu" and waves to the team from the clubhouse doorway, Niou can taste bile in the back of his mouth. His pulse pumps once, long and hard through his body as his cock swells in his underpants.
Sanada's not in the literature classroom at lunch, but he is in gym class-he and Niou play on different volleyball teams so Niou can't ask about where the ass has been disappearing lately. Not that Niou really cares, but curiosity pricks him between the ribs and he can't help but notice the sluggish laps Sanada runs around the gymnasium and the way he seems to trip over his sneakers more than usual.
Yagyuu, of course, happens to play on Niou's team. Niou plays near the baseline. Yagyuu is close to the net and he wiggles, just like always, completely oblivious to the fact Niou can see the shake of his hips and the slight strain of his bum in his shorts. Niou swallows hard. The volleyball bounces next to his right arm.
"Why didn't you get that?" a classmate shouts.
Niou shrugs. Inside, he burns with embarrassment when Yagyuu's eyes sweep down his bent body and his lip curls up-just enough for Niou. Niou's intestines shrivel up under Yagyuu's disapproving frown, but his cock rears its head again. Niou slumps lower, trying to hide his erection and the flush of shame over his cheeks.
He leaves the gym as soon as he can after Phys Ed finishes.
Sanada isn't at afternoon practice.
The sun beats down on their backs and heads. Insects sing and Yanagi rubs his temple. He nods when Kirihara asks if he can go catch bugs instead of playing.
"Put them in a jar," Yanagi says. Kirihara skips off, cackling to himself. Marui flops down on the bench next to Yanagi.
"Too hot this afternoon," he says. "I'm beat already."
Even Jackal skives off laps. Yagyuu runs his, but he's a proper little gentleman who is incapable of breaking practice rules. Niou lurks under a shady tree and sweats. He watches Yagyuu from the shadows. Light bounces off Yagyuu's uniform as his sneakers slap the perimeter of the courts. His glasses slide down his nose constantly. He sweats and messes his hair up when he pushes it back from his eyes. Niou's mouth is dry. Yagyuu doesn't spare him one glance and that hurts.
Niou leaves tennis practice early, without showering. No one seems to notice him slip off with his bags, but he does stop when he walks by the hydrangea bushes. Kirihara crouches low and his grin catches the light. His eyes are huge and they glow with a creepy whiteness as Kirihara cups his hands and strikes at a spot under the branches.
"Heh heh heh," he mutters. "Got you, you little fucker."
"Having fun?" Niou asks.
Kirihara looks at him. He dumps the insect into a jar filled with a dozen others, maybe, all chirping their dying breathes before Kirihara screws the lid back down. "Why aren't you practicing with Yagyuu-senpai?" he asks. The kid stands up and scratches his hair. His stinks like sour sweat. Niou wonders if the kid's heard of deodorant-or puberty-yet.
Niou tenses. "None of your business," he says. He snorts through his nose and fakes a smirk. The muscles around his mouth ache faintly. "Why aren't you practicing?" he asks.
Kirihara makes a noise. He sticks out his bottom lip and chews it. "There's something between you guys," he says, completely avoiding Niou's question. Niou swallows hard and backs up a step when the kid walks closer to him, accusing with a sharp little grin and sharper eyes.
"I know you guys have somethin' going on, senpai. I'm not stupid." Niou opens his mouth but Kirihara rubs his chin and speaks before Niou has a chance. "Guess you guys should just kiss and make up, ne?" Kirihara laughs under his breath.
Niou is frozen to the spot. His tennisbag slips on his shoulder and his blood runs cold through his limbs. Kirihara's words cut to the bone and echo over and over in his ears: kiss and make up kiss and make up kiss and make up…
"That's what my sister always says," Kirihara adds. "But she's just a stupid bitch. Guys don't kiss guys, that's gross."
Niou bursts into laughter so loud that Kirihara drops the jar of insects. It smashes on the ground and the little shards of glass gleam in the filtered light as the cicadas jump off and run to their freedom.
***
But at home he can't stop thinking about what Kirihara said.
Niou sits on the floor and pokes darts into the board. The only screwdriver in the house that he knows about is from a model set of his brother's, but it would be too small. He stuffs another dart into Sanada's forehead-the printout is so full of holes that Sanada's scowling face is unrecognizable now.
Supper is cold tofu and rice. Niou sighs. Resting his chin on his hand he pushes his chopsticks around the rice bowl and stands them up straight.
"Don't do that!" his sister snaps. He glances up at her and sticks out his tongue. She pulls his chopsticks out and sets them down on the rest beside his right arm. Stupid sister, he thinks.
"How was tennis practice?" his mother asks.
Niou grunts.
"Did you play doubles with Yagyuu-kun today?" she asks. Niou sucks in a breath. The fingers he'd been drumming on the table stop for a fraction of a second, and his heart skips a beat.
"I can play singles too," Niou mutters. His cheeks feel warm. He doesn’t want to think about Yagyuu, and yet it's all he ever does think about. In his mind he picks apart everything Yagyuu says and does, and he tries to make a logical sense of out. But the problem is, Yagyuu is so full of contradictions that all Niou can make out is a pulsing headache and the swollen erection in his shorts.
After dinner Niou sits on the back porch with the plate of melons his mother cut up. He chews on a rind and licks the sweet juice from his bottom lip. The other night, he and Yagyuu were outside here. Niou squints and he can see the dark splotches where melted popsicle dripped down off their fingers. He looks up and his mother and sister putter around the garden with trowels and a hose, spraying the bushes and blooming plants with water. The light is mauve in the west and the insects are louder than ever, humming their songs into the waning evening light. In the east, there is a single shining star above the blurry city lights.
Niou wonders if it's a star. He can't tell, but the light doesn't move. Slowly, he closes his eyes and sets the melon rind down. Please, he thinks. He bows his head a shade, but not enough for anyone else to notice. Still, his face is warm.
There's no way that Kirihara knows. Niou hasn’t done or said anything to Yagyuu-it's always Yagyuu calling the shots outside of tennis now. He's the real gamemaker. Yagyuu said he needs time. Yagyuu said to wait. Yagyuu said Yagyuu said Yagyuu said!
Niou groans. He rubs his forehead with his fingertips, making small circles in his sweaty skin by his hairline. It itches. He scratches it until the crawling sensation stops and is replaced with a vibrating sensitivity that makes his hair stand up all over his body.
Unless Yanagi said something, Kirihara can't know. The fact that Yanagi knows is irritating enough. Niou clenches his teeth at the thought of Yanagi chuckling over this piece of data. It's embarrassing for him to be this way; Yanagi knowing just makes Niou's stomach churn with sickly sweet melon taste.
"Masaharu!" his mother calls. Niou lifts his head. She points to a pile of weeds near a drooping rose bush spilling petals onto the rocky pathway through the garden. "Could you put these in the compost for us, please?"
Niou grumbles, "Yeah yeah" and, lethargic and shuffling, he wanders across the wet pavement stones to the pile of weeds. He bumps into his sister's arm along the way and the hose bounces in her hand, spraying water up in a shower of droplets overhead. They patter down across their bodies and Niou laughs when she shrieks at him.
The hose water is a cool mist over his body. It feels good-a tiny break from the thick, humid heat that lingers at dusk. He picks up the weed pile, all grasses and tiny prickly things that Yukimura would know the name of.
He should be back soon. When his rehab ends. Knowing Yukimura, Niou can't help but think that he'll push his body harder and faster to get back to tennis before the Nationals. If he saw their most recent practices, though…
He'd burst his stitches…
Then they'd be really fucked for the Nationals. If Sanada lost to a twelve year old brat, well…
Niou doesn't want to think about that either. He lets his mind drift as he pads to the compost bucket. The stones are bumpy and cool on the soles of his feet, but sharp little gravel, so tiny Niou can't see it in the dying light, they poke his skin and make him jump. He dumps the weeds in the compost and prances back to the porch, dancing through the garden and bumping his sister in the opposite arm, just because.
It doesn't sate the gnawing inside his belly. Neither does a long, warm bath. Niou dunks his head under the water and stares into the murky blue mineral salts he added. They sting his eyes and the warmth and softness of the water makes his limbs sink deeper, but inside his mind races. He needs to talk to Yagyuu, but he won't approach Yagyuu first. Girls are forward and ask guys about their feelings. Surely not even fags do that.
"Puri," he says. His word bubbles up to the surface and bursts into the echoing bathroom.
He can hear a knock from the other side of the doorway. Niou looks up, he sits up and his mother tells him that there's a phonecall for him. Niou exhales. Who the hell is calling me now?
"It's the mother of one of your teammates," she says. "Please hurry up!"
Puzzled, Niou shakes off his hair and stands up. His legs wobble as he climbs out and grabs a towel to sling around his waist. His feet leave puddles when he pads out into the hallway in a cloud of steam from the bathroom.
His mother's glasses go foggy for a moment as he hands the phone to him blindly.
"Hello…?" he says.
"Hello," a strange voice on the other end says. It's definitely a woman, but if Niou didn't know any better, the high pitch and whispered breathing would make him assume it was a chick his age. "This is Genichirou's mother. You're the first name on his phone list and-"
She hiccups. Niou furrows his brow and leans against the doorway. His mother hovers nearby, biting her lip as she listens. Niou scowls at her and mouths "Go away!" but she only backs up a step a two.
"-and he hasn't been home for three nights but he's been to school, Niou-kun. Have you seen him? Is he okay? Do you know what's going on?" Sanada's mom inhales sharply and Niou is certain her gasp is a sob. He cringes. "Is he o-kay?" she asks again.
"Uh…" Niou rubs the back of his neck. His throat bobs. Sanada's mom is crying on the other end of the line and it's getting increasingly uncomfortable standing here as his towel starts to slip, too. He frowns. "Yeah, he seems okay. Uh…" Niou racks his brain to think of something to tell this woman. "Uh, he's probably just practicing real hard before the Nationals is all."
"He hasn't been home since SUNDAY!" She starts to cry harder. Niou jerks back from the phone and cringes. He's shit at this. He has no idea what to say and no idea how to comfort this woman.
In a blurred attempt to get rid of her, he shoves the phone back to his mother and says, "I don't know!"
His mother blinks. Her glasses slip.
Niou rushes to his bedroom and closes the door. As he slides down the back of the door, his wet skin and the towel catch and his mother walks downstairs, assuring Sanada's mom everything is okay and they'd make sure to help find Sanada.
It's almost expected when his mother knocks a few minutes later. At least this time, Niou's in his boxers to go to bed. "I don't know what she's talking about," he says. He raises his hands when his mother opens her mouth. "Sanada's been at school and I don't know what shit-"
"Language, Masaharu," she says with a frown.
"I don't know anything, okay?" he says. He blows through his lips and flops back onto his bed. "I have a headache," he grumbles. "I'm going to bed." To prove his point, he rolls onto his side and fakes a snore. His mother sighs. Her shadow lingers in the doorway for a moment, until she closes it behind herself with a shallow click.
The fuck is wrong with you, Sanada? he thinks. Niou shakes his head against his pillow. It's damp and cool under his neck. Air conditioning wafts over his skin, making him shiver, making his nipples stiffen and his cock too.
Out of guilt, he sends Sanada a quick textmessage. where the hell have u been??? Then he shuts his cell off and plugs it into the charger for tomorrow. Niou lays on top of the sheets, listening to the night-time noises of his family getting ready for bed. When the footsteps in the hallway stop and the floor doesn't creak anymore, he sighs and slips a hand under his waistband.
When he closes his eyes, he can pretend Yagyuu is beside him, blowing that cool air into his ear. Niou smiles and rubs his cheek on a dry part of the pillow. "Hiroshi…" he whispers.
When he closes his eyes, he can pretends that his hand is Yagyuu's, tight and clenched around his hot cock, thumbing the slit at the end and smearing pre-cum, touching the sensitive spots under the head and stroking the skin that runs down the shaft. Niou parts his legs wider and pulls his boxers down lower as his hands roam. His belly tightens with pleasure. His breathing picks up and he imagines the smell of Yagyuu's shampoo, the sound of Yagyuu's silky voice, the feeling of Yagyuu's hair tickling his belly instead of the A/C…
He comes with a muffled grunt, but it's never good enough on his own. Niou stares at the ceiling as his heart pounds against his ribs. His body slackens and his dick throbs, soft on his skin, but it's not the same.
He swallows a lump in his throat.
I don't understand you, Yagyuu.
***
Sanada is at morning practice.
Niou sidles up to him. Despite Sanada's purple bags under his eyes and the scruffy hair under his cap, Niou presses forward and says, "Your mom called my house last night."
Slowly, Sanada turns around to him. A single blood-shot eye twitches at him from under the cap. Sanada breathes so loudly that he sounds more like an animal than a human.
Niou sidles back away.
In the showers, Marui whispers, "Yukimura forgave him finally."
Niou soaps up his armpit. Suds slither down his arm. Across the showers, he can see Yagyuu doing the same. The sight of Yagyuu's black armpit hair sudsed up and his naked chest, with his brown nipples and broad, straight shoulders makes Niou's mouth woolen. He swallows and looks to Marui. His erection flags for a moment. Enough for now, thankfully.
"What?" he says.
Marui sucks in a breath and makes a chipmunk face before he exhales. His eyes look around the showers, but Sanada's not here, he's still out playing with Yanagi. "He sat outside of Yukimura's hospital room every night until Yukimura forgave him. Sanada's mom called MY house two nights ago."
It's so embarrassing for Sanada that Niou can't even force himself to laugh. He slaps his hand against the wet tiles and mutters, "Damn…"
The ass might be a stupid idiot, but his determination…
It makes Niou jealous and impressed all at once. Especially when Yagyuu purposely says "Good bye" to all of the team when he leaves for classes but his gaze only avoids Niou. Niou stares at the floor and his sneakers start to blur.
***
He talks back to the art teacher. There's no particular reason why-there usually isn't. They work on still-lifes. Last week, it was nature drawing outside. It's all useless rubbish anyway. Niou crumples up his sheets of paper and flicks them across the classroom. Yanagi stiffens when a tiny chunk of paper hits the back of his neck. Niou snickers when Yanagi's lame bowlcut moves as his scalp shivers. Yanagi turns around in his seat and looks at Niou.
The teacher only needs to see it once to ask Niou what he's doing.
Niou thinks for a moment. The teacher is an old man with a bad comb-over that lifts in the rattling air from the A/C vent on the far wall. Niou smirks. "Not much of an apple person," he says, nodding to the basket of fruit in the middle of the classroom.
"Do you want to fail the assignment?" the teacher asks. His nose reddens. Niou can see a vein throb in his temple. It's tempting to flick a paper ball and see if he can hit that, too.
Niou shrugs. "Do I care?"
***
At lunchtime, he's late. Stupid detention, he thinks. He runs out to the school grounds. No one was in the literature classroom except Marui, Jackal and the wonderchibi. Niou took one peek inside, saw the three of them crowded around Kirihara's gameboy, and rushed back through the school. All of the windows are cranked open in the hallways and there are deep grey clouds in the distance. But for now, the sky is blue and thick with clouds and smoggy summer heat that clings to everything in a film of damp.
He stops beside a window on the third floor and looks out across the grounds toward the baseball pitch. There is no one there except a few kids who look like first years playing catchball. His eyes rake the campus, darting from tree to hedge to tree again.
And there, underneath the large tree close to the basketball courts, Niou can see two figures. His heart catches in his throat along with a breath as he recognizes one, then the other.
Yagyuu is there.
With a girl from the arcade.
Under the confession tree.
Niou's heart stops pounding. Yagyuu leans close to the girl; her back is turned to Niou, but he can see enough of that tell-tale angle and duck of Yagyuu's head when he tilts his face down and-
Niou falls to the floor. His knees collapse under himself and he can't watch Yagyuu kiss her. He struggles to breath-his lungs have collapsed, too, and his ribs crush down on his heart, slithered to the floor along with any hopes he might once have had.
He sits there, staring blankly at the linoleum floor, until he hears the bell. Dimly, he knows he has class, but all he can think, see, feel is the utter heartbreak in his chest from Yagyuu kissing that girl.
So Yagyuu's straight after all.
Niou should have known better.