so the manga just ended and i am DEVASTATED. the fact that the story is over haunts me to the core. nonetheless, thank you for the 8 years furudate-sensei
In the last couple of days, I've been noticing this girl. She isn't really a classmate—at least I don't think so. In fact, I have no idea who she is, what her name is, or what class she's in. All I know, is that she wears the Karasuno uniform.
Her name isn't included in role call, and she weaves between classes with no particular schedule.
I sat at my desk, holding my face in my palm as I watched her walk in between the desks. She leaned in towards Tsukki's face as if she were observing him further, but he didn't move an inch.
Does he not notice her?
Am I hallucinating?
The mysterious girl suddenly caught me staring and I froze. We held eye contact for what felt like forever, but it was really only a few seconds before she disappeared.
I blinked and shook my head, rubbing my eyes to confirm what I had just witnessed. I guess I didn't get enough sleep last night.
• • •
You floated above the heads' of the new first year class, staring down at a boy with dark hair and freckles.
Did he notice me?
Am I hallucinating?
You heaved a sigh, no way could he have seen you. That was humanly impossible.
Only spirits can see other spirits, humans can see other humans—the worlds simply don't overlap, and they never will. But you could've sworn he was looking directly at you.
Maybe he was just looking at blondie behind me. You reassured yourself. Yeah, that's probably it...
• • •
Those few seconds of eye contact with Freckles were clawing at your brain the entire day, so, obviously the only solution was to follow him home.
You casually walked with your hands behind your back, a healthy distance separating the two of you. He seemed to be walking by himself today instead of with that blonde giraffe.
Sure, you could float and spare the trouble of using your legs, but somehow being chained to gravity reminded you of how it felt to be human again. It was nice.
You noticed the boy's strides become unsteady and quite shaken if you were to say. Was something wrong?
• • •
I side eyed behind me to notice the girl still on my trail not too far away. My paces subconsciously became faster as I found myself speed walking.
I must be hallucinating. Maybe someone is playing a prank on me.
What was so disturbing was that her footsteps were completely silent. I just need to get home.
• • •
You scowled as you struggled to keep up with him. Why does it seem like he's almost running away? Did he leave the oven on or something?
Not that this was the time to think about it, but Freckles was kind of cute. The small sprout in his hair was nothing less of adorable, his face made him feel approachable and friendly, and there was this softness to his eyes that made you feel secure.
Maybe there were two reasons you were following him home.
Suddenly, the boy stopped walking. He slowly turned around to face you, and his face read a mixed expression of fear, irritation, and confusion.
"Excuse me, but do you need something?"
'I feel delusional.'
You blinked your eyes and did a 180° to see no other human in sight. You rotated again to face freckles and pointed to your chest.
"Me?"
"Yes you."
You took a moment to process what was going on before vanishing once again.
HE CAN SEE ME!
You flew above the clouds faster than the human eye could track and chewed on your nails as you stared down across the town.
I don't believe this.
He can see—AND HEAR ME?! Is he a yōkai disguised as a human or something?
It wasn't long before you decided to go back down and confront Freckles. He hadn't moved an inch since you last saw him.
You made yourself visible to the boy and stood in front of him.
"So you can see me," you said.
He drew his eyes downwards to your own and shakily nodded his head.
"Who... are you?" his voice trembled.
You gave him a soft smile before extending a hand, "(l/n) (y/n), it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance."
He hesitantly reached for your palm, but he passed straight through your body. "Wh-what the—"
"Oh, my bad," you mumbled and made it possible for him to make physical contact.
Woah that feels weird.
You pulled away and floated in the air, your hands intertwined behind your head. "So, basically I'm a ghost, I prefer the term 'spirit' though—makes me sound cooler," you said, watching as his expression only twisted with more bewilderment. "B-but I'm friendly and everything. I won't hurt you."
Freckles slowly nodded his head as he processed this new information. "S-so... I can see ghosts?" he gulped. "Spirits," you corrected him under your breath, "but yes, you can see ghosts."
"Wait—actually, can you see that man sitting over there?" you asked, pointing towards an older spirit who sat atop a plastic bin. He noticed your gesture and gave a friendly wave.
"N-no, there's no one there," the boy stuttered. You nodded your head and rose your finger to your chin. "Interesting..."
"Correction, you can't see ghosts, you can only see me!" you beamed, holding a proud thumb to your chest.
"Is that a good thing?" he asked, still a bit shaken by the whole affair.
"Eh, depends on what you make of it," you shrugged. "Say, what's your name anyways?"
"Y-yamaguchi..." he said, "Yamaguchi Tadashi."
"Hm, Tadashi... I like it!" you watched as Yamaguchi's face flushed a light pink.
You don't get compliments that often, do ya?
You slowly descended towards the ground, landing gracefully on one toe. "You can calm down, Tadashi-kun. There's no need to be so tense. I'm just a soul like you," you said, "but without a body..." you mumbled the last part to yourself in a slightly bitter manner.
Yamaguchi nodded his head and eased up a bit. It was barely anything, but it was a start.
There were so many questions swirling through his mind at the moment, but he chose to save them for another time.
• • •
You wandered around the familiar neighborhood with your hands in your uniform pockets, waiting for a certain someone to wake up. Beginning to lose patience, you went to the house yourself.
The kitchen was a tad bit messier than others, but the living room was straight and tidy. You hopped up the stairs and peeked your head into each room you passed, fading through the wooden doors like water.
You finally found yourself in Yamaguchi's room. He slept on his side with a pillow in his grasp, a tiny stream of drool wetting his lips.
"Oi Fre—Tadashi, wake up." you shook the boy's shoulder. He showed no sign of response.
Must be a deep sleeper.
Maybe I should try a different approach.
"Tadashitadashitadashitadashitadashitadashitadashitada-" you repeated his name incessantly before giving up.
Maybe he's a soft morning call kinda guy.
You floated onto the bed like a piece of paper, landing on your side as you faced him. Gently running your fingers through his hair, you whispered into his ear, "Good morning, Tadashi-kun~"
He remained asleep as he nuzzled your hand, his lips curling into a soft smile. Be still, my heart.
Yamaguchi's eyes fluttered open before his face combusted into a bright pink. "WH-WHAT?! (y/n)! You can't just do that!" he jumped to the other side of his room, holding a blanket to shield his bare chest.
You sat crisscrossed atop his bed and shrugged, causing him to shout more.
"It's an invasion of privacy!" he tried his best to explain, but it was as if he was reprimanding a brick wall.
"Don't worry~ It's not like anyone will know." you waved your hand as if dismissing the matter.
"Well I'll know—er I-I do know! ...Wait wha—GAH NEVER MIND!" Yamaguchi rambled to himself before storming out of the room in a fit of embarrassment and irritation.
"Well, I screwed up."
To make up for your reckless actions, you decided to make his bed for him. Moving objects of the living world was significantly more difficult. Everything weighed ten times heavier.
You clenched your jaw as you pulled the comforter to the corners of the mattress. The most painful part was moving the pillows back to the head of the bed.
You wiped your sweat-less forehead and sighed with satisfaction. Well that's enough work for a year.
I should probably go apologize. You dragged yourself to the top of the stairs where you purposefully fell down to the bottom. "Ow..."
Actually, that didn't hurt at all.
Yamaguchi stood in front of the kitchen stove, frying a couple of eggs with pursed lips and an irritated scowl.
"I realize that I barely see you smile when we're together," you said, leaning against the doorframe to the kitchen, "which is odd because you're almost always smiling everywhere else."
Yamaguchi let out a stern huff, his face still flushed pink from earlier.
You sighed, "I'm sorry, Tadashi... I didn't think thoroughly about my actions."
Yamaguchi froze in place before letting out a lighthearted snicker, "Why do you sound like your apologizing to a teacher?"
His adorable laugh caught you off guard, causing your shoulder to pass through the house's wall. You quickly recovered and dusted off your unaffected clothing.
"I-I dunno, I guess I've just apologized to teachers more than anyone else in my life that it's become a habit," you said.
"Huh? Why's that?" he asked as he slid the eggs onto a plate.
"I got in trouble a lot." you pursed your lips.
Yamaguchi placed the pan in the sink and ate his breakfast at a small kitchen table. Suddenly, an idea popped into your head.
"Check this out," you said as you tugged onto the corner of one of his eggs.
The egg duplicated itself into a translucent copy as you held it in your hand.
"Ghost food!" you dangled it above your mouth and swallowed it whole.
"Y-you can do that?" he asked in a muffled voice before swallowing down his own food.
"Uh huh," you nodded your head proudly, "that's how we eat the offerings left at our graves."
"Oh... that actually makes a lot of sense."
• • •
"Hey, let's play two truths and a lie!" you offered out of the blue as the two of you entered the school campus. It was still early so there weren't many students.
"Uh, sure." Yamaguchi waited for you to start, but you only gave him an expecting smile. He took the notion that this game was mostly just for you to learn about him.
"Okay, uh—I'm a pinch server in volleyball, kids used to bully me about my freckles, and I had my first kiss in seventh grade."
You rose a finger to your chin in thought, nodding your head as you floated in the air beside him. "Kids used to bully you for your freckles." you rose a finger in conclusion, confident in your answer.
"Nope," said Yamaguchi.
"Ehhh? But your freckles are so cute! What kind of bitch babies would make fun of 'em?" you frowned, "Tch, they're probably just jealous."
A deep red spread over the bridge of his nose as he hid his face with one hand. "I-I don't think they were," he mumbled.
"Well it doesn't matter anymore, those brats don't have taste anyways," you shrugged, floating in front of the boy as you shot him a wink.
Yamaguchi deadpanned and continued walking down the empty hall. "For a ghost, you're quite playful," he remarked.
"Oh, right! My turn." you hopped onto the ground and skipped alongside your new friend. "I've been a spirit for the last 18 years, I never had a boyfriend in my past life, and my death was caused by a murder."
Yamaguchi suddenly tensed up at your last sentence. What was he supposed to do with a subject like that dropped onto him?
"Y-you never had a boyfriend in your past life?" he stammered.
You stuck out your tongue and gave a thumbs down, imitating a game show sound effect, "Ehh, wrong." But I'm flattered.
"I actually have no idea how I died," you said as you stared up at the ceiling.
"Oh... I see," Yamaguchi mumbled.
Just as you opened your mouth to start a new conversation, a foreign voice interrupted you.
"Oi, Yamaguchi. Why are you so early?"
You gasped to yourself, "It's the blonde giraffe!"
Yamaguchi stifled a laugh at your comment.
"What's so funny?" the lanky boy caught up to his shorter friend. "Ah sorry, Tsukki, it's nothing," Yamaguchi dismissed the topic.
You took this as your cue to leave and waved to Freckles as he gave you a subtle nod before you vanished.
Following not too far behind the two, you examined Freckles' friend. He practically radiated sarcasm and his demeanor was very unmotivated—quite a contrast from the upbeat Yamaguchi.
"He's kinda cute," you said to yourself.
Yamaguchi whipped his head around, his eyebrows subtly tented.
Oh shoot, he heard me.
Later in the day, Yamaguchi found himself at the school library. He approached the front desk and asked the librarian in a shaky whisper, "Do you know where I can find past yearbooks?"
The round, older lady smiled at the first year and escorted him to a bookcase in the back of the library. He quietly thanked her as she walked back to her desk.
This particular area of the library was one Yamaguchi hadn't visited before, nor even knew existed. Grey dust coated the shelves and books as he scanned each tattered spine.
"18 years, she said," he mumbled to himself as he found the yearbook from eighteen years ago. It was a large, faded paperback in which the students were ordered by year and alphabetical order.
He repeated your name to himself as he flipped through the crisp pages that hadn't been touched in years. It was clear the book had only been viewed once or twice before being forgotten about.
His finger stopped as it came across a colored picture of you.
Yamaguchi stared at the photo.
Your eyes weren't particularly focused on the camera, and your lips were just barely curved in a faint smile.
You hummed to yourself as you floated through the library, passing through each shelf as you made your way to the movie section when someone caught your attention.
Is that Freckles?
He was holding a yearbook from the year of 1994, the book open at the page of your high school photo.
"Aw, shit."
i've considered writing the tsukishima | isn't she cute (pt. 3) cuz y'all have been BEGGING for it, but first i have some other things to cover. stay tuned for part 2