Work Text:
“Asahi wake up or you’ll be late for school!!” Asahi’s mom yelled at him knocking on the door to his room. Asahi just grumbled in response. She sighed, looking at the door annoyed. “come on Asahi!! Get up!” Asahi’s mom banged her fist on the door one last time before giving up and walking back downstairs to finish making breakfast if Asahi wanted to get in trouble with his teachers, that was his own fault. All he needed to do was listen to her.
After a few minutes of debating on whether or not to get up from bed Asahi decided he’d rather not be yelled at by his teacher for being late. Again. He slowly rolled out of bed to look in the mirror. I look awful he thought studying the dark circles under his eyes, wondering if he’d be able to hide it with makeup. He rubbed his head and sighed running his hand through his thick brown hair. How late did I stay up last night? He decided not to worry about it (he probably got around 0 hours of sleep anyways) and checked his phone instead. Asahi looked around his messy room scanning for his phone. Where the heck did I put it? He walked around his room kicking dirty clothes out of the way until finally finding his phone under a pile of sweaters. Picking up his phone he immediately went into panic mode. 2 missed texts from Nishinoya. Shoot. these where sent an hour and a half ago. Asahi hated missing texts from Noya. It made him feel like he was ignoring Noya, which he would never do. He just has a terrible and really unhealthy sleep schedule! Asahi frantically tried opening up his phone, momentarily forgetting his password.
4:27 am
Noya⚡️: Mornin’ Asahi!!!
Asahi smiled reading the message. No one that Asahi ever knew other than Noya would ever consider 4:30 “the morning” he chuckled, he could never wake up that early even if he tried.
Noya⚡️: Could u tell Daichi I might be late to practice after school? Thanks!! :P
Asahi looked at the message for a while before responding. Is he okay? Noya wouldn’t be late to a practice if he had broken his leg. Could it be something really serious? Asahi immediately felt nervous while pressing send.
6:18 am Asahi: Sure, everything okay?
It took mere seconds for the 3 small dots to appear signalling him Noya was typing.
Noya⚡️: Oh yeah I’m doing great!! My mom just has this work conference thing and she wants me to come, srry if I worried u :P
Asahi sighed in relief. He was beyond happy that it wasn’t something serious. Asahi couldn’t imagine a life without Noya for even a month. That loud, energetic, sometimes annoying, ball of energy was among one of the few reasons Asahi got up in the morning.
Asahi: Glad to hear you’re good. I’ll make sure to tell Daichi. I’ll see you at practice then?
Noya✨: I have no clue how long my mom’s conference is but I hope so!
Asahi the threw his phone on his bed and got dressed then used concealer to hide the bags under his eyes. He then ran downstairs to quickly grab his breakfast before rushing out of his house and speed walking to school. Asahi didn’t really remember much after that, maybe he had fallen asleep in class or something? He was way to tired for his brain to function. How many hours of sleep did he get last night? Did he even sleep last night? What day was it again? “ASAHI” Daichi yelled in Asahi’s ear startling him and making him almost fall over in his chair. “Club time let’s go!!”
“G-got it” Asahi mumbled as he followed Daichi out of the classroom. “Oh that reminds me, Daichi,”
“Yeah?”
“Noya told me to tell you he might not be late to practice”
“Yeah you told me this morning”
“I did?” He really couldn’t remember anything. He was just to tired to function today. Maybe he’ll get more sleep tonight. Of course, that’s what he thought last night, and here we are.
Daichi just hummed in response and they both went quiet. Asahi wasn’t in the mood for talking anyways. “Asahi you need to get more sleep” Asahi cursed at himself for jinxing it. He just wanted to go home and fall asleep on the floor like any other normal person. Okay, maybe not so normal, but that’s not the point.
“What do you mean?”
Daichi stopped in his tracks and Asahi followed suite. Daichi the raised an eyebrow at Asahi making him regret stopping. Daichi was so scary. “What do you think?”
Asahi looked down at the floor, sighing. “I know, but there’s just so much school work and even when I’m not staying up late working on it, upcoming tests and projects stress me out so much I can’t sleep. So I’ll just read a novel or something”
Daichi rested a hand on Asahi’s shoulder “It’s not heathy, tell me, how many hours of sleep have you gotten this week?”
Asahi gulped. He didn’t even know if he had slept at all this week. “M-maybe four?”
Daichi snapped his head sideways to look at Asahi. “FOUR!? that’s less than a hour a night! That’s really not healthy!!” As if you know anything.
“Yeah, but I’ll be fine, it’s really not that big of a deal.” Asahi resumed walking towards the club room slightly faster this time.
“If you say so” Daichi sighed and jogged to catch up with Asahi, placing himself beside the tall man. “But if it affects your performance at practice, I’m kicking you out and you’re gonna go home and sleep.”
“Kay” is all Asahi could respond with. He didn’t even know if he’d be able to practice considering how tired he was. But, Daichi was scary, so Asahi didn’t really have a choice but to agree. Once they arrived at the gym, he could immediately see Hinata and Kageyama arguing on who could fit more peas in their mouth. “Why? Why do they do this?”
Asahi rubbed his temples and just tried to tune them out. He scanned the rest of the gym. Daichi and Sugawara almost immediately started talking to each other when Daichi walked into the room, Tanaka was running is circles yelling something about trees and Tsukishima and Yamaguchi were holding hands.
Wait.
Tsukishima and Yamaguchi where sitting on the floor just casually holding hands and talking to each other. And Tsukishima was smiling. Asahi couldn’t remember the last time he had seen him that happy.
“I can see you starring you know.” Tsukishima leaned forward to look at Asahi and raised an eyebrow, his smile turning into a frown.
“Oh I am so so sorry!” Asahi quickly apologized and looked away deciding to instead practice his serves until practice started. He grabbed a volleyball off the floor and bounced it a couple of times to check if it was deflated and, since it wasn’t he walked up to the line and started his serve routine. Nothing too fancy, he just bounced the ball on the ground twice and spun it in his hands, it was fairly simple. He threw the ball up in the air and cursed under his breath at the low toss. He started running, then he tried jumping like he normally would but he could barley pry himself off the ground. Well, a low toss doesn’t change anything if you can barley get into the air. He quickly hit the ball, his hand placement completely off, almost missing the ball completely. Hopefully Daichi wasn’t watching that utter failure of a serve. He really did want to practice today, and he’d be bored out of his mind if he went home now.
“Alright guys gather round!!” Ukai’s voice echoed across the gymnasium as Hinata and Kageyama sped across the floor seeing which one could reach the coach the fastest. Once everyone had gathered around Ukai started explaining the layout for today’s practice, although, Asahi wasn’t listening, he was already thinking about how much he missed Noyas energetic presence. “...And make sure keep your eye on the ball during this drill. Got it?”
“Yes sir!!” Everyone yelled in response, and it was then when Asahi realized he probably should’ve been paying attention.
The practice went by in a blur, Asahi only really remembering Daichi yelling at him over and over again. Noya still hasn’t arrived, but then again, they were only about an hour and a half into a four hour practice. He wondered when Noya was coming back. Hopefully soon. Asahi would give anything to see the libero’s goofy grin right now. Oh gosh, separated for a little more than an hour and I’m already going insane. What’s wrong with me? Asahi was deep in thought when his shoulder screamed in pain. “Hey Daichi what was that for??” The ace snapped his head at Daichi who had just punched him in the arm, and gosh he was looking way madder than usual.
“I told you if your lack of sleep affects your ability to preform at practice I’d be sending you home!” Daichi was practically starring into his soul by now.
“Well y-yes but..” Asahi tried to frantically think of an excuse but his brain just went to the most automatic response ever. “Could this maybe be a warning? I’ll pay more attention I swear!”
Daichi looked extremely irritated now. “I gave you a warning!! Heck, I gave you 5!! Go home and get some rest!!”
Asahi looked down at his feet while walking out of the gym. He suddenly didn’t feel like doing anything other than sitting in a corner eating ice cream. He didn’t care if he wasn’t allowed to, his mom had left for a work trip around noon and wouldn’t be back for another two days. Slipping his shoes on, Asahi thought about Nishinoya. Nothing really in particular, just his smile, the way he was never afraid to try something new, he really was the exact opposite of Asahi. “Hiya Asahi!!” Speaking of which.
“Oh hi there Noya.” Asahi smiled slightly slinging his bag over his shoulder.
“Hey where are you going? I just got here!” Noya put his hands on his hips in an annoyed fashion.
“Oh sorry, Daichi kicked me out cause my lack of sleep was affecting my performance” He looked down at his bag awkwardly, not wanting to make eye contact with the small libero. Although that’s only part of the reason I wasn’t paying attention. Asahi thought sadly. Noya started taking off his outdoor shoes and slipping on his volleyball sneakers.
“Well, even though I really wanted to play Volleyball with you, I’m on Daichi’s side this time, sleep is really important!! Besides, you look worse than usual”
“I guess so.” Asahi put his hands in his pockets. “Well, I better get home then. Bye!” Asahi waved at Noya and walked away.
Well, he didn’t actually walk per se.
“Asahi, normally when people say that they walk away.” Noya walked up beside him.
“What do you mean?” Asahi looked around and realized he didn’t actually move an inch. “Oh.” Asahi said quietly. “Sorry, I’ll go now” he looked back at Noya who was taking off his gym shoes. “What are you doing?” Asahi tilted his head in confusion.
“I’ll walk you home!!” Nishinoya said, smiling brightly at the tall ace. “Oh no! you don’t have to do that!” Asahi didn’t want Noya to miss anymore of practice than he already has by forcing Noya to accompany him home, plus, Asahi could walk himself home no problem, he does it almost everyday!
“Well we can’t have our ace walking straight into the middle of the road cause he’s too tired to actually think things through!” Noya took a quick peek inside the gym where the others were practicing. “Besides, I don’t think Daichi has seen me yet”
Asahi rubbed the back of his neck. He felt really bad making Noya walk him home, but, knowing Nishinoya, no wasn’t an option. “Okay, I guess you can if you want to”
“ALL RIGHT!!” Noya screamed out of nowhere making Asahi jump. He then took Asahi’s wrist and led him down the sidewalk to Asahi’s house, only a couple minutes away by walking.
Asahi look down at his arm. Noya had a tight grasp on the ace’s wrist, and even though he wouldn’t deny that he liked it, Asahi spoke up anyways. “Uh hey Noya? Could you maybe let go of my wrist please?” Asahi hoped for a split second that Nishinoya would no, but instead the libero quickly took his hand off Asahi’s arm.
“Oh yeah sorry about that!!” Noya smiled in an awkward way that made Asahi’s face turn a slight shade of pink. Not wanting Noya to see the blush on his face, Asahi turned his head away and started thinking about something else. He decided he would think back to the dilemma he had last night; one of the reasons he had stayed up so late. Asahi had spent over an hour contemplating whether or not he had a crush on Noya, but he was too sleep deprived to come up with a solid answer. If he was being honest, Asahi didn’t know what qualified as a crush, cause he had never really had a serious one before, so, Noya would be his first. But that’s if he decides he has a crush on his best friend who he’d known forever. Was it weird to like your best friend in that way? Was it even allowed? Asahi’s mind was filled up with questions until he thought back to Yamaguchi and Tsukishima at volleyball earlier. The one thing he did remember about practice was that Yams and Tsukki confirmed that they were dating, so maybe it wasn’t that weird to have a crush on a really close friend.
“So,” Noya started putting his hands in his pockets, “anything interesting happen at practice?” He asked looking up at Asahi.
“Well, I wasn’t really paying attention, since I’ve slept like, twice this week but, Yamaguchi and Tsukishima started dating-”
“Wait really?!?” Noya stopped in his tracks and made direct eye contact with Asahi. He was cute. Okay maybe this is a crush. Asahi thought smiling slightly.
“Oh yeah, they were holding hands today before practice too.” Asahi imagined him and Noya holding hands, now with a huge smile all over his face.
“That’s so awesome!!! Good for them!!!” Noya had a goofy smile plastered on his face while he whispered something under his breath that Asahi couldn’t quite hear, something about wishing he was with someone maybe? Asahi really had no clue.
They walked for a bit longer before finally reaching Asahi’s house, much to their disliking, but there was nothing they could do about it so they said their goodbyes and Asahi walked inside his house, plopping himself on the couch. Asahi decided to do homework since he had nothing better to do since his mom was on a work trip in Canada.
After finishing his homework, Asahi decided laying on the floor to preserve his energy was the best thing he could do now, not feeling like walking upstairs to his bed. After what felt like hours of laying on the floor doing nothing, there was a knock at the door, and seconds later the door slowly creaked open revealing a tired Nishinoya. Why does he look so tired? Asahi tilted his head to the side and noticed a clock that read 10:30pm. Well that would do it.
“Asahi!! Why are you laying on the floor??” Noya immediately grew concerned noticing the taller male laying in the middle of the floor. Asahi wasn’t really in the mood for questions so instead he countered with one of his own.
“Whatcha doin’ here Noya?” The words came out quiet and muffled, but Asahi hoped Noya heard what he said because he didn’t feel like even existing right now, much less talking. Wait how’d he get in? Did I leave the door unlocked? Noya walked inside and shut the door quietly behind him before taking his shoes off and finally kneeling beside Asahi holding a water bottle in front of his face. “You forgot your water bottle at practice, so came to return it to you!!!” Noya had a huge grin plastered all over his face like usual. It was cute. They sat there in silence for a moment before Noya spoke up again. “Alright get up Ace, where’s your room?” Asahi just laid on the floor motionless. “Okay I guess I’ll just have to search the entire house! Come on!”
He basically dragged Asahi across the entire house before finally finding Asahi’s room. “Yeah this is it.” Asahi mumbled opening the door and walking in, then flopping underneath the covers of his bed. The small libero smiled softly while turning to leave, but Asahi started talking. “I’m sorry if you think I’m being ungrateful making you take care of me like this, I really am grateful, and I should probably get more sleep.”
“Oh it’s really nothing!! You’re always taking care of me! It’s nice to be able to return the favour!” Before Asahi could comprehend what was happening he started talking, unable to stop himself.
“Noya I like you.” gosh dang me and my sleep deprived brain.
Noya shot him a slightly confused look. “I like you too. You’re an awesome teammate.”
“No not like that!” Asahi was too tired to stop himself so he decided to get it over with. He grabbed Noya’s hand while he continued to talk. “I like you a lot!! Like, like like, you!” Asahi breathed in a shaky breath and continued. “You always have my back no matter what. You’ve always been there for me, on and off the court. On top of that you have the most amazing smile, and the funniest laugh. I love you Noya.” Asahi lay there silent, waiting for Noya to rip his hand away and start yelling insults, calling him gross, and storming out, but Noya did none of that. He just sat there, in pure shock. And before he knew it Noya had practically jumped on him, bringing him into a crushing hug.
They were both grinning ear to ear way too happy to even speak. They stayed like that for a long time until Nishinoya finally spoke up. “Me too Asahi, your super nice, and gentle, and an all around awesome guy.” Noya smirked a bit “plus you’re super hot” Asahi’s face immediately became completely red as Noya started laughing, rolling over from on top of Asahi to his side. “I love you Asahi.” Noya said silently, kissing his forehead before leaning up against Asahi’s muscular body and slowly starting to doze off.
He really didn’t want to disturb Noya, he looked like he had a rough day, but Asahi figured Noya would get cold sleeping on top of the covers so he quickly nudge Noya and got him to wiggle underneath the covers. Noya, half asleep already, turned over to face Asahi nuzzling his head into the side of his neck and smiled. Asahi could help but smile too. He truly loved the Noya with all his heart, and now he was there, right in front of him. “I love you too” Asahi hugged Noya tightly, and, for the first time for years, Asahi slept amazingly that night. Falling asleep almost immediately, holding the small libero in his arms, and now, he would never let go.