Empty

●Chapter Twenty-Nine●

"Dude, you are majorly stressing yourself out over your breaking point. You also were absolutely exhausted from the extra practice last night. And that's just volleyball I'm talking about. Add in the stress from you trying to hide your mental issues, worried about worrying others, over thinking. Take care of yourself."

"Seriously, I don't want to get a call from Daichi saying you killed yourself. I've grown to like you these past two weeks." Bokuto said. 

"I'm working on it, I promise. Last night was just a bad night. Some of the things Kuroo had said stuck in my head and got to me, he was right and I knew he meant I needed to change my way of thinking but I just kinda let it continue last night." I looked down. 

"You got this dude, don't psych yourself out. It's gonna be a long road to recovering but...You got this. And we'll all be beside you, even if we're still recovering ourselves." Kenma gave me a small smile and tossed me a vape. 

"Thank you guys." I said. 

"Suga. Why didn't you wake me up?" Oh boy, here we go. 

"I told you not to say anything." Kuroo stood there and scratched the back of his head. Daichi came over to me and clung onto me in a hug. 

"You know you can talk to me." He said. 

"I know, love. I know. I just...You were tired and I didn't wanna wake you."

"I don't care how late it is, how tired I am, what we have going on the next day, I always want you to wake me when you feel like this. Even once we're back home, I want you to call me when you need me."

"I'm sorry." 

"Don't be sorry, just promise you'll get me next time?" 

"I promise." I said. 

"Good." He kissed me. I obviously kissed back. 

"Still gross." Kuroo said, even though he had a smile on his face. 

"And you're still jealous." I laughed. 

"Am not!" 

"Are to! Daichi laughed as well. We all hung around passing the vapes and a bowl while we talked. Daichi and I sat and cuddled, and grossed everyone else with more kisses. It was a good time. 

"For starters, chill with the PDA, also, get your asses up and go eat something." Coach came outside. I looked at the time on my phone and saw we were running late For lunch. 

"Sorry!" I laughed as I led the group to race each other to the cafeteria. 

*~*

During the second round, Our game against Nekoma was up first. We started with our double setter lineup, the same lineup that won us the last game. 

I knew it was going to be harder, not only because of Nekoma's amazing skill, but because they haven't played a game yet. They have all of their energy, whereas we don't. I didn't think it was going to be this hard though…

Kuroo sent down spike after spike at us, changing up the power behind it, where he wanted it to land, the spin on it somehow. Not to mention they did their own synchronized attacks, Kenma randomly dumped the ball too. We ended up losing the first two sets against them. This third set was going to be difficult. One wrong move, we'll lose any motivation we have, we'll give them the upper hand, and we'll lose. 

"Alright, let's do this." I whispered to myself as I got into position. They sent the ball over with a crazy powerful serve. Daichi picked it up, sending it to Kageyama. He set it to me, starting one of those special quick attacks. Kuroo blocked it, sending it right back down to the ground. 

"Gotta try harder than that." Kuroo said with a wink. God I'm sick of the cockyness, even if I know the reasoning behind it. 

We switched up attacks like we had with Fukurodani, making it more difficult to predict. Unfortunately it just wasn't enough and we lost to Nekoma in straight sets. 

"Better luck tomorrow." Kuroo laughed. Can I punch him?

We got off the court, all sweaty and tired, and grabbed water. I chugged mime down, even though you're really not supposed to do that because it can make you sick. 

Not good enough. 

They're all better than you are

Fukurodani let you win. 

God damnit. Fuck off. 

"I'm going outside." I said. I was near Coach and Daichi so they'd both hear. They could also probably hear the annoyance in my voice alongside the depression. 

As I figured, they both followed me out. 

"What?" I asked. 

"Woah, don't get snippy. You guys did good out there today, Kid." Coach said. 

"Not good enough." 

"You beat Fukurodani. That's plenty good enough."

"It's not enough for us to beat Shiratorizawa at nationals."

"You're on the right track though. You've improved immensely over this camp, and we have another camp planned with Nekoma and Fukurodani in a month." 

"Whatever. Just go away. Let me calm down for a little." I said. They nodded and went inside. I sat against the cold cement bricks that made up the building. Felt good leaning against them after sweating and being hot as hell. We got this. We. Got. This. 

I know we can do it. We'll get better. We'll make it to nationals.

Word Count;1967