Good Mood

A Haikyuu! drabble

by mew-tsubaki

Note: The Haikyuu! characters belong to Furudate Haruichi-sensei, not to me. And now, a moment in the mind of Narita. ;] Read, review, and enjoy!

- ^-^3

Sweet mother of all—Narita Kazuhito wasn't one-hundred percent certain he could trust his ears right now.

Kinoshita kept glancing at him, though, throughout the rest of the evening. It was a quiet reminder that, no, that really had happened.

But…wow. Just wow. Narita tried to focus on playing some more Mario Kart 8 with his friend since it was the weekend and they'd decided last-minute for Narita to stay over at Kinoshita's. Frankly, those kinds of last-minute plans were what Narita enjoyed the most about his friendship with the blond. Almost all of the time, one could change his schedule to allow for the presence of the other, and this was just another example. It reminded Narita that he'd been in a fantastic mood as of late.

And why wouldn't he be? Their friend, Nishinoya, had finished out his suspension and was back to playing volleyball with them. Azumane had been convinced to come back to club, too, and he was getting along with Nishinoya again. The air had been cleared, and the club even had four new first-year players! Sure, they were a little strange—Tsukishima's attitude seemed to clash with his interest in the sport, Yamaguchi seemed only to be there for Tsukishima, and Kageyama and Hinata definitely conjured the term "frenemies" to Narita's mind. Still, things were great.

…except for Kinoshita's mood. He'd been unusually irritable since their libero and their ace had returned, which was partly why Narita had thought they should hang out that weekend, playing videogames to get their minds off things. Yet, one thing had led to another, and Kinoshita had just admitted to Narita that he liked him.

And, knowing Kinoshita and how he'd put emphasis on "like," Narita knew Kinoshita really meant it.

So Narita had responded in kind with a cheesy line about being the Luigi to Kinoshita's Daisy.

And that was how they'd arrived at this point, with both boys racing each other distractedly, Kinoshita glancing at Narita and Narita looking anywhere but at his companion.

Narita crashed his cart into Wario again, and his rank in the line-up dropped. Normally, Narita would expect Kinoshita to snicker or something…but that just wasn't happening tonight. So Narita waited for Lakitu to come and turn him around since he was stuck. Lakitu set Luigi right, but Luigi and Daisy finished in seventh and sixth, respectively.

Narita laughed it off. "Oh, boy… I think we're not going to do much better than this tonight." He paused the cup they were playing and exited without any protest from Kinoshita. When he quit to the home menu on his friend's Wii, he finally chanced a look at the blond.

Bad idea, since Kinoshita met his eyes, and Kinoshita's "I like you" echoed in Narita's brain, so Narita looked away again.

"Let's play something else."

"Sure."

They tried playing a Zelda game, which meant one of them played and the other kept his eyes on the screen to help and point things out. But tonight they were wielding Link horribly like new players, so they switched to Super Smash Bros. Frankly, the results were rather the same. They KO'd themselves more often than each other, or the opposing team, when they tried going that route.

They attempted to play a few of the other games Kinoshita had saved on his console, but it was the same difference. Narita frowned, realizing that games weren't going to distract them from earlier.

"Well…shall we call it a night?" he offered, putting the Wiimote down.

"We haven't eaten yet," Kinoshita mentioned, quirking an eyebrow. This was okay—this was regular Kinoshita. This Kinoshita, Narita could look at and meet his face.

"Well, no, but don't you smell that?" Narita got up and opened the bedroom door. "Everything's still hot. I think your mom brought things up when we were playing one of the other games just now."

Kinoshita grumbled under his breath. "Ugh, I wish she'd said something…"

"Kinoshita," Narita reminded him with a laugh, "really? You bit her head off the last time she interrupted your Smash Bros. campaign."

The shorter teen ran his hand through his hair agitatedly a couple of times. "Ah, yeah, okay. But can you blame me? I almost cleared the hundred-enemy challenge on hard."

Narita smiled and passed Kinoshita one tray. They took their time eating, but even that didn't last long, and neither of them prolonged the meal with small talk.

Kinoshita grabbed the dishes. "I'll take these downstairs and be right back." He stood awkwardly, rubbing the back of his right leg with his left foot. "Um, maybe we should just go to sleep early," he suggested, and he didn't give Narita a moment to comment before zipping out of his room.

The shaven-haired boy stared at where his friend had stood and sighed. He shook his head. Kinoshita… And he liked to tease Narita and Ennoshita for not handling confrontations well? But, if so, then Kinoshita should never have said anything. But, really, Narita was glad he'd spoken up.

When the blond returned, Narita was already comfy on the rug on the floor beside his friend's bed. Kinoshita hit the lights without preamble and climbed into his bed from the bottom, as Narita was blocking entrance from the side. He tossed, turned, and flipped around, Narita could hear, but eventually he settled down.

Ten minutes later, they were both still wide awake.

Kinoshita cursed under his breath. "I can't sleep," he mumbled into the darkness.

"Same," Narita concluded. He rolled onto his back and clasped his hands together atop the blanket he was borrowing. He stared up at the ceiling, of which he was aware of its presence only by the faint light pollution of the streetlights slipping between the blinds on Kinoshita's window. "I don't think I'll be sleeping anytime soon, either," he said quietly.

"Mm" was Kinoshita's response, and Narita could picture his friend nodding his head, face half hidden by the covers.

The taller boy sighed again. "Then, since we're both wide awake, why don't we talk?"

Silence. But at least it wasn't a rejection.

Narita thought. Kinoshita hadn't told him only that he liked him. He'd said something else, too… "Clarify something for me: What did you mean, about hating us not having as much alone time together at club these days?"

There was a strangled noise followed by a low whine. "Agh…fine…," Kinoshita huffed. "I… With Nishinoya and Asahi-san back, things are just…" He briefly paused. "It doesn't feel as though we have any alone time anymore. You know, like in the clubroom or setting things up or putting things away."

Narita blinked. He wanted to chuckle, but he didn't, afraid he'd give the wrong impression. "Kinoshita…we see each other all the time outside of club. We're not in the same class, but we eat lunch together every day. I live close by. And I'm over here half the time—that's even why we didn't have to stop at my house before coming here. I leave clothes here." He exhaled and scratched his jaw. "What more do you want?" he said quietly, more to himself than to the other male.

Again, silence.

Still, Narita thought Kinoshita was sweet. He liked that Kinoshita wanted to monopolize him. But he still had one question: "How long?"

"How long, what?"

Oh, come on, no beating around the bush. Narita rolled his eyes. "How long have you…?"

"Three years. Since right before the end of our second year in middle school…" The bed creaked, and Kinoshita's voice sounded closer when he next spoke. He'd turned to face Narita and obviously had moved towards the edge of the mattress. He was probably leaning over the edge, too. "…you?"

Narita closed his eyes, a wide smile blooming on his face. "Five years." He wondered how long that needed to sink in…

"Five?!" Kinoshita spluttered.

Not long, apparently.

"But we've known each other for—" Realization had most assuredly struck, because Kinoshita's coherency took a nosedive, and the sounds he made after became garbled nonsense.

"Five. I know." Narita thought back to when he and Kinoshita had officially met. Yes, they lived near each other and had gone to the same elementary and middle schools, but it hadn't been until right before entering middle school that they'd befriended each other. Even so, five years later, Narita knew he spoke the truth. "I just don't think I realized it until now," he thought aloud.

The room grew quiet once more. But, whereas before it had been uncomfortable, there was something welcome about the calm this time. Kinoshita had a digital, not an analog, clock, so there wasn't even any ticking to fill the void, but Narita imagined it. The soft ticking, like a metronome, the only reminder that the night was moving on.

Narita reached up on the side of the bed, and it didn't take him long to find Kinoshita's hand—Kinoshita was reaching for his, too. The contact was nice and pleasant and warm, just like the drowsiness that began to pull on Narita. His words came at the end of his breath. "…goodnight, Hisashi." Surprisingly, the sudden familiarity didn't feel weird at all. He chocked it up to how close they'd been to begin with.

"'Night, Kazu," Kinoshita mumbled.

The other boy's eyes flew open. "Wait, 'Kazu'?"

But a soft snore escaped Kinoshita then, leaving Narita on the floor, nearly having a heart attack at his best friend's adorableness.

- ^-^3

XDDD Kinoshita's so cute, I don't blame Narita—poor Narita will be done in by him one of these days… ;D Honestly, this was just fluff I wanted to write after "Bad Mood" (Kino's POV/the prequel), though, yeah, I wanted to pick Narita's brain, too. I love the ship, but I genuinely love their characters, too—the second years have a special place in my heart, especially the second-year trio. :'333 So review if you love them, too!

Thanks for reading, and check out my other [HQ!] fics if you enjoyed this!

-mew-tsubaki :}