The alarm clock rang, signaling it was time for him to leave. Kageyama grabbed his coat and put it on swiftly as he made his way to the door.
"I'm off." He said mechanically while tying his shoelaces, waving at his lover, who was preoccupied with cleaning up the table.
"Ah, wait, To—" Tobio, the word that Hinata couldn't bring himself to speak. "Wait, Kageyama!" he called, rushing to the door.
Kageyama turned around, his right hand already clasped around the doorknob. "Yeah?"
Hinata smiled as he reached Kageyama's side, his eyes glinting with mischief. "You're forgetting something." He declared playfully and he stood on his tip-toes to plant a loud smooch on Kageyama's cheek. "Have a nice day." He said finally, ignoring the blush on his cheeks, while appreciating the one on Kageyama's.
"Th-thanks. You too." Kageyama replied surly, and he waved one last time before walking out.
Hinata sighed, still smiling. "To-bi-o." he whispered, and felt his cheeks heat up. He slapped both of his cheeks with his hands loudly.
"I should get going too." He told himself, reaching for the groceries list they'd prepared over breakfast and shoving it inside his pocket.
"Rice." He intoned monotonously as he crossed the item off the list. Almost done. He just had to pick up some eggs, two cartons of milk and olive oil and he'd be done for the week.
Just as he was rounding up the corner to the dairy aisle, he felt a painful pang of pressure on his bladder. He may have had a little bit too much milk for breakfast, but he'd hoped he'd be able to hold it in until he was back home, but that was clearly not going to be the case. He turned in the opposite direction, deciding he'd make an emergency run to the store's toilet.
Luckily, there was only one guy waiting outside, leaning leisurely on his cart while browsing his phone. Hinata didn't stop to study his features, too focused on preventing an embarrassing accident. After a minute, he heard footsteps skipping out of the toilet and a loud voice breaking through his concentration.
"Sorry, Asahi, I think that last slice of bread was a little over its due date, I've got a horrible party going on in there!" the familiar voice didn't sound even remotely bothered or embarrassed. "We should hurry back before a real accident happens!"
Hinata looked up, he really couldn't mistake that voice for anyone else's.
"Noya-senpai!" he called excited when he recognized his senior's features. "Asahi-san too!" he added, realizing that the other guy in line was not in fact a stranger.
"Ah, Shoyou!" Nishinoya greeted him with a chirp. "What're you doing here?" he asked as Asahi waved at him with a small smile.
"This is where we always do our groceries; our place is two blocks away." He explained, knowing he didn't need to specify who he meant by 'we'. "I thought you two lived closer to Karasuno." He added, unable to hold back his curiosity.
"They don't sell Yuu's Gari Gari-kun in our usual store, we always come here to restock." Asahi explained, pointing embarrassedly at their shopping cart that contained nothing but a dozen boxes of Noya's favorite soda-flavored popsicles.
Hinata was about to reply when he felt a sharper sting to his bladder. "U-uhm, could you guys watch over my cart? I really need to…"
Nishinoya gave him a thumbs up. "Don't worry, Kageyama's pork curry will be safe with us!" he beamed energetically, and Hinata didn't wait for any more confirmation before he rushed into the bathroom.
"So…" Noya started with a mischievous grin as he took a sip from his lemon soda. "Shoyou's the housewife, doing all the shopping and stuff!"
They'd finished their grocery shopping together and had decided to go grab a snack and a drink to catch up.
Hinata blushed and shook his head. "N-n-no, that's not it! My classes for today were cancelled so it was a good chance to do the shopping. No one's the housewife!" he protested. "Are Noya-senpai's Gari Gari-kun gonna be alright in this heat? They're gonna be all melted by the time you're back home."
"'s okay, I'll just put them in the freezer and they'll go back to their original form once again."
Hinata hummed and nodded. "I hadn't thought about that." He glanced at his watch. It was still early and he didn't have anything to do at home, it was quite lucky he'd run into his friends. He grinned. "Do you both have today off too?" he asked.
"I do, but Asahi's gotta go open the bar in a few hours." Noya replied cheerily, to which Asahi just nodded.
"You and Kageyama should come visit one day. Suga and Daichi are almost always around." Asahi mused.
Nishinoya's face lit up as if a light-bulb had suddenly been turned on in his mind, his large brown eyes sparkling. "Oi, oi, Asahi, I've got an idea!" he chirped, tugging on his boyfriend's sleeve excitedly. "We should totally organize a team reunion at the bar! I can call Ryu and Chikara and the rest!" he explained flailing his arms energetically.
Asahi's face brightened as if to mirror Noya's. "Ah! That's actually a pretty great idea, Yuu. It's been a while since we all got together."
Nishinoya grinned, pleased for the praise.
Hinata's eyes went from one to the other, their little exchange going round and round in his head.
Asahi… Yuu… Asahi… Yuu…
"Is something wrong, Shoyou?"
Hinata blinked himself out of his stupor. Noya's eyebrows were quirked in mild concern.
"Ah, no, it's nothing. I was just thinking that you guys call each other by your first names and it's… nice."
Asahi choked on his drink and blushed, turning to look away. Nishinoya beamed.
"It's only natural when you're together for a long time, right? When someone you like calls you by your given name it makes you really happy. Don't you and Kageyama do it?"
Hinata blushed, playing with his thumb. "N-not really. I want to ask him to call me by my name b-but I don't really know how to. And I want to call him T-t-tobio too but…"
"But?"
Hinata squeezed his eyes shut, his cheeks burning with embarrassment. "U-u-uhm it's just… e-every time I think I'll try calling him that… I…" he hid his face behind his palms, too ashamed to look at his former teammates. "IrememberthattimeTsukishimasaiditsoundedlikeTobi-uoandIthinkthat'sverycute." He gushed out in a single breath.
There was a moment of silence while the other two deciphered Hinata's blabbering, followed by what sounded like muffled laughter.
"Tobi-uo? Like… a flying fish?"
Hinata wished the earth would swallow him.
"I'm home" Kageyama called as he slipped off his shoes and stepped into the apartment.
Hinata felt a chill going up his spine. "W-welcome home Kageyama-kuuun."
Kageyama cocked an eyebrow, confused by Hinata's nervousness, but didn't comment about it. "Did you go to the grocery store?"
"Y-yeah, of course, I said I'd go in the morning didn't I? I even ran into Noya-senpai and Asahi-san there!"
"Is that so?" Hinata felt Kageyama walking towards him, his body heat suddenly right behind his back. "Aren't you forgetting something?" he said, his voice really close to Hinata's ear, which made his heart skip a beat.
Hinata turned around to meet Kageyama's deep blue eyes, his own eyes blinking in doubt. "I didn't forget anything from the list, I checked three times." He assured, feeling really comfortable with the physical proximity.
Kageyama himself looked embarrassed as he pointed to his own reddening cheek and looked away. "My 'welcome home' k-k-k-kiss."
Hinata's heart skipped a beat and he grinned. "Y'know it's kind of cute that you get so worked up about something like that after all these years." He chuckled and stood on his tiptoes to press a smooch to his boyfriend's cheek, just like he'd done in the morning. "Welcome home."
"S-s-shut up, dumbass Hinata."
Hinata snickered as he pranced towards the kitchen to decide what they'd cook for dinner.
"Oh, by the way, Kag—"
Tobio.
Flying Fish.
"C'mon, Shoyou, man up! Just try to toss it into something casual, don't make a big deal out of it. Stop thinking and just say it! If you don't think you won't remember the flying fish!"
"I bought your pork curry, Tobio."
Hinata froze. Kageyama froze. Loud heartbeats echoed in the room. Hinata envisioned a flying fish that struggled to say "Na… Naff… Nice" with Kageyama's voice. The vision was equal parts ridiculous and adorable. He wanted to be swallowed by the earth again.
"Th-thanks."
Another minute of heavy silence.
"Y-y-you don't mind? If I call you that?" Hinata looked up to Kageyama's face tentatively. He was blushing furiously all the way from his neck to the tips of his ears. Kageyama was very cute in Hinata's eyes.
"N-n-no, I… it's n-n-nice."
Hinata wanted to cheer in victory, but he held back. "And…" he began "how about… we've been together for a while right? I-it's normal to call each other by our n-names now." He chewed on his lower lip and played with his thumbs anxiously, his eyes fixated on Kageyama's face. This shouldn't be a big deal and yet here he was, extremely nervous about upsetting his boyfriend while trying not to think of flying fish.
"I like Hinata." Kageyama declared, apparently catching on to what Hinata was trying to say before he could actually say it. "I mean… I like you o-o-obviously but…" his cheeks grew even redder and he looked away, his brows furrowing in frustration. "I also like… calling you 'Hinata'."
Hinata cocked his head, half curious about that confession, half overjoyed by the admission, half embarrassed by the whole situation and half endeared by Kageyama's cute blushing face. It didn't really occur to him that things only had two halves.
"That's because…" Kageyama continued, once again not even letting Hinata phrase his thoughts. "you write 'Hinata' like the sun and I like that." He mumbled, his voice so low and rushed it was almost unintelligible. "Itreallysuitsyou." He'd clearly reached the limit of embarrassing admissions he could blabber in one go, but Hinata didn't mind because his heart was floating in a cloud. His face lit up and his eyes were sparkling with wonder and a beautiful red color bloomed on his cheeks. He beamed and jumped, throwing his arms around Kageyama's neck, completely overridden with happiness.
"Hinata's fine" he chirped, nuzzling Kageyama's chest. He felt Kageyama's arms wrapping around his waist and his heart swelled. "Hinata's totally fine."
BONUS:
"Ah! But you know? The 'you' in Shoyou is actually the same as in 'sun'"
Kageyama blinked, repeatedly. They'd lived together for three years and not once had he stopped to really think about the spelling of his boyfriend's name, even if he knew how to write it. He felt impossibly stupid.
He got up from the floor, where they'd been lying next to each other and staring at the ceiling while sharing a nice, contented silence. He didn't dare look at Hinata in the eye
"I'm tired, I'm going to sleep."
Hinata opened his mouth to tell Kageyama that it was way too early to go to sleep, but he couldn't get a word out before Kageyama spoke again.
"Good night, Shoyou."
The end
(Psst: It was five in the afternoon, Kageyama is a loser)
Since it's HinaKage day and also my tiny Rolling Thunder son's birthday (tomorrow) I wanted to make a little HinaKage thingy with a little AsaNoya and I'd been thinking about the names things for a while. I spend an inhuman amount of time thinking about lovers calling each other by their first names, because that's such a big deal in Japan (I mean there's people like Noya who call almost everyone by their first name, but it's more an exception to the rule?)
I went back and checked on the Tobi-uo joke and actually Tsukki and Yama think of it rather than say it out loud, but this is Tsukki do we really think he's not gonna use that joke to make fun of Kageyama, of course he is.
Hinata's last name uses the "hi" for "sun"(日), but his first name Shoyou uses the "you" (陽)that is used in "taiyou"(太陽). When I realized this I absolutely wanted to use it to make Kageyama a hopeless romantic and a total loser all in one. I'm also passionate about word plays with kanji so here's this thing
Anyway, I hope you've liked this, please leave comments to let me know what you think! And enjoy HinaKage day and Noya's birthday!