This story is a sequel to "It's all for the team's sake" but can be read alone.

It's all for Mom and Dad's sake

"Asahi-san!"

He barely had the chance to look over his shoulder before a blur of orange passed in front of his eyes and launched itself at his neck.

"H-h-hey, is something wrong, Nishinoya?" he asked, hardly even fazed by the sudden "attack". He'd known Nishinoya long enough.

"Asahi-san, I need your help!" Nishinoya chirped, his brown eyes big and oozing excitement. "It's about Suga-san and Daichi-san!"

Asahi cocked his head and quirked his eyebrows in worry. Nishinoya untangled his arms from around his neck, his small fists clenched. "Everyone and their mother knows they like each other, right? I think even Suga-san knows, but he doesn't want to make a move for some reason. But I think it's about time they stop fooling around and get together already!" he explained with determination. For some reason, Asahi was reminded of a little kid that wanted his parents to reconcile.

"But isn't that something they should figure out on their own? I don't think it's our place to meddle."

Nishinoya huffed. "But Suga-san helped us out! And Shouyou and Kageyama! And even Tsukishima! And it's obvious this is frustrating for Suga-san, like he's constantly expecting Daichi-san to confess and ask him out."

Asahi scratched his chin. It was true that Suga had been there to support them and to give him advice when he'd been insecure about his feelings for Nishinoya. It was also true that Suga seemed to be awfully touchy about the subject of whatever was going on with Daichi. Their feelings were obviously mutual, and Suga was definitely aware of that, but Daichi apparently wasn't.

He sighed. "Assuming we do get involved, do you have any plan in particular? Daichi's never been the type to be easily talked into things."

Nishinoya flashed him a mischievous grin. He had a bad feeling about this.

The first "plan" had to be the worst plan Asahi had ever heard of.

"I really think we should reconsider about this." He tried for the umpteenth time to talk Nishinoya out of it. "I'm sure there's a better way to make this work."

Nishinoya blinked at him, as if he couldn't understand the reason of his distress.

"But I even enlisted Tsukishima's help for this; do you know how hard it was to convince him? It's too late to back away now."

It was true that Suga had even helped Tsukishima man up and ask Yamaguchi out, and it was also true that he had agreed to cooperate with this particular plan, but Asahi was certain it was related to the fact that he'd get to make their captain trip, rather than any sense of gratitude whatsoever.

"But I really—" he started, looking around the gym to find Tsukishima casually standing a few steps away from Suga, who was discussing something with Tanaka. Before he could try and do something about it, Nishinoya looked up at him with that dangerous glint in his eyes.

"Ryuu's about to set the plan in motion, just you wait." He said confidently.

Not a second later, Tanaka's voice boomed over the gym. "DAICHI-SAN!"

Everyone turned to look at him with curiosity. Daichi started jogging in his direction. With impeccable timing, Tsukishima "accidentally" pushed a ball into Daichi's path when he was barely a couple steps away from Tanaka and Suga, and although he was able to dodge the obstacle, he lost his footing, tripped over himself and crashed straight into Sugawara, causing that both of them tumbled to the floor.

"Ow, oww, sorry Suga, you alright?" Daichi asked, pushing himself off the ground, only to find Suga's face barely a few inches away from his, and he visibly stiffened.

"Y-yeah, I don't think I got hurt. You?" he looked up too and found Daichi's dark eyes staring at him. His cheeks blossomed pink.

"Ye-I mean, no, I didn't get hurt either, haha."

They stared at each other quietly. The atmosphere in the gym was tense. It was as if everyone was holding their breaths, scared to ruin the moment.

Just as Asahi started thinking that maybe this terrible, terrible plan might actually work, Daichi pulled himself back to his feet and pulled Suga up in one swift motion before turning away, his ears burning red.

"E-e-everyone, be more careful with the balls, we don't want any accidents!"

Asahi was sure he didn't imagine the collective sigh that echoed through the gym.

"Oh man, I was so sure this would work!" Nishinoya whined, ruffling his own hair in frustration.

Asahi was afraid to ask, but he did anyway. "Why did you think it would?"

Nishinoya looked up at him with absolute determination in his eyes. "'Cos if it'd been me, I would've kissed you."

Asahi felt his cheeks burning and he had to hide his face behind his palms from the embarrassment. "Nishinoya!" He whined "Not in front of the entire team!"

"I wouldn't be able to resist though." Nishinoya beamed shamelessly. "But anyway, Daichi-san didn't man up like I expected, so we'll have to think of something else."

The sun was already setting, and the orange glow of the sky reflected on Nishinoya's irises, making them look warm and beautiful. Asahi sighed. There was something about Nishinoya's straightforwardness that made it impossible to resist his flow. Without giving it too much thought, he grabbed Nishinoya's hand in his and watched with glee as he looked up, his cheeks dusted pink, and a big smile, bright like the sun, grew on his lips.

The second plan was even worse than the first one, if that was possible. Asahi wasn't sure of why Nishinoya had enlisted him to help if he was just going to come up with the most ridiculous plans ever –that didn't even require his participation-, but he didn't really have it in him contradict his boyfriend's ideas.

This time, it was Nishinoya, Hinata and Kageyama who were responsible to put the plan in motion. All Asahi had to do was watch from afar, in case Noya's first approach didn't work.

During lunch break, he followed Nishinoya to the cafeteria, where Daichi and Suga used to eat lunch together and occasionally devise new game strategies. They found them sitting next to each other and laughing, a nice, gentle aura surrounded them. Asahi wondered if it really wouldn't be a better idea to just leave them to figure it out on their own, since they already seemed to be so comfortable around each other, but before he could voice that thought, Nishinoya rushed to meet them and stand in between them, effectively blocking Sugawara from Daichi's vision.

"Daichi-san, what're you having for lunch?!" Nishinoya boomed with as much excitement as if he were telling Tanaka that he'd just been slapped by Shimizu. Asahi almost yelped. Was Nishinoya always so bad at acting casual? Daichi would see right through it in a second.

"Uh… Ya-yakisoba pan? Why'd you ask?"

Then again, this was as "casual" as Nishinoya got on a regular basis, so maybe even Daichi wouldn't find it strange to suddenly have their libero yelling at him about bread.

Whilst Nishinoya kept Daichi's attention, Kageyama, who was also doing a terrible job at acting casual (his movements were borderline robotic and he was shooting suspicious glances at every direction), approached Suga, his head low so Daichi wouldn't see him.

"Senpai-would-you-give-me-advice-about-some-tosses-please" he recited, as if he were reading his lines for a school play.

Suga blinked up at him and cocked his head. Noya might've succeeded in distracting Daichi, but why would Suga believe Kageyama wanted to practice tosses in the middle of lunch break?

"Sure, no problem, I just finished eating anyway." was the unexpected reply.

Kageyama nodded, muttered a "Thanks a lot" and turned on his heels. Suga got up from his seat and looked over at Daichi, but the moment he opened his mouth to say "I'm going with Kageyama for a bit", Nishinoya bellowed "DON'T YOU THINK YAKISOBA PAN IS AMAZING IT HAS NOODLES AND BREAD IT'S THE ULTIMATE SOURCE OF CARBS", effectively shutting down pretty much every other sound in the cafeteria, and Asahi feared he would die from second-hand embarrassment.

Surprisingly, Kageyama was actually able to drag Suga away without Daichi's noticing. Nishinoya didn't seem to notice though, because he continued lauding the greatness of yakisoba pan for at least seven more minutes without raising any suspicion. At least until whatever Noya said made Daichi want to consult with Suga, which made him realize that Suga was actually not here anymore.

"Huh? Where's Suga?"

Noya threw his arms up in the air in the fakest surprised reaction Asahi had ever seen. "OH! Suga-san disappeared!"

Daichi turned to look at him. "Asahi, did you see where Suga went?"

He shook his head nervously and tried not to make too much eye contact. For all that Noya was a terrible actor, Asahi knew himself to be one of the worst liars in their team, and he feared Daichi would notice it. Daichi did in fact stare at him as if he wasn't really sure about whether to believe him or not, but luckily Hinata appeared to do his part.

"Captain, have you seen Kageyama?" he asked, appearing agitated.

Daichi scratched his chin. Maybe he was growing suspicious after all. "I thought I saw him around earlier… Ah, maybe Suga went with him?"

All three of them froze for a second. Not that he was surprised, but now it was inevitable that the plan failed-

"I thought so too, but I just saw Suga-senpai in the back of the building speaking to a girl. It seemed like she was giving him a love letter so I didn't want to interrupt."

-Unless Hinata proved to be surprisingly good at improvisation.

Daichi's eyes widened for a moment. Maybe this would work after all.

"A love letter?" he repeated, his voice low.

"Well, I wouldn't know for sure," Hinata continued, avoiding Daichi's eyes, "but they had this kind of aura like fuwaaa or ukiiii, you know?"

Everyone fell silent for a moment. Asahi wasn't sure if this was just natural tension or if they were all trying to decipher what Hinata had actually meant. At least he was.

Half a minute later, Daichi sighed and stood from his chair "Nothing to do about it then." He sighed, sounding actually sullen… maybe even defeated. "Sorry Hinata, gotta get back to my classroom now. I haven't seen Kageyama either but lunchbreak's about to end, you're probably better off trying to find him in his classroom." He said, turning around. "See you guys later." He added before walking away in the direction of his classroom.

The three of them watched him go in dead silence.

"D-did I screw up?" Hinata asked once Daichi was out of sight.

Nishinoya shook his head "N-no, Shouyou, your performance was awesome." He pulled at his hair in frustration "Aaaaahhh, he was supposed to get jealous and go get Suga before someone else took him!" he whined.

In hindsight, Asahi should've seen it coming. Suga had always been popular with girls –he was very handsome and extremely nice-, he'd been getting confessions and love letters by the dozen since first year. If something like jealousy were enough, Daichi would've asked Suga out years ago. Still, he hadn't expected Daichi to actually get so… sad. It was as if he was already resigned to lose Suga sooner or later. Maybe this intervention was more necessary than he'd initially thought.

"Damn, and it was such a good plan too!" Hinata lamented.

"Yeah, I thought that if it worked with Kageyama who's really bad at communicating, it would definitely work on Daichi-san."

Apparently, Nishinoya had disclosed the truth about Suga's bizarre intervention to force Kageyama to realize that he and Hinata had somehow started dating without him noticing.

"But we're not giving up, right? For Suga-senpai's sake?!"

Nishinoya put his hands on his hips. "Absolutely! We'll just have to think of something else, but there's no way we're giving up until Daichi-san stops being an idiot. For Suga-san."

Asahi smiled. Their plans may be terrible through and through, but everyone was trying to look out for their friends, and he really couldn't blame them for wanting to repay Suga for everything he did for them.

Plans number three through five were so terrible Asahi cringed when remembering them after they failed. All they seemed to have accomplished was make Daichi suspicious –he'd already asked him about four times if something was going on, and he was a terrible liar, it was a miracle they hadn't been discovered. The sixth plan was the first that required Asahi's participation, mainly because Daichi was already suspicious of Nishinoya and Tanaka. This plan felt slightly less terrible than the other ones, but given their track record for lack of success, he was not really sure about how good their chances were.

He approached Daichi, glancing at the coupons in his hand nervously. Why did he have to do this? The excuse was that he was the only third year apart from Suga and thus could approach Daichi more casually (because no one had dared ask Kiyoko to stoop as low as to participate in these awful plans). But he was sure Daichi would see through the lie no matter how much he rehearsed his lines in his mind.

"C'mon, Asahi-san, we believe in you!" Nishinoya whispered from his hiding spot near the exit door of the gym. Asahi couldn't really say no to Nishinoya when he had that twinkle in his eyes, so he sighed and steeled himself, clutching the coupons a bit too hard as he walked towards Daichi.

"H-h-hey, Daichi!"

Well, there goes the casual greeting.

Luckily, Daichi seemed to be preoccupied picking up some balls from the floor to put them back in their cages, so he wasn't really looking at him. "Something the matter?"

Asahi swallowed hard and extended his hand with the coupons at Daichi. "I-I-I found these lying around, and I… t-t-t-thought they may be Suga's, could you give them to him?"

Daichi finally looked up at him and then at the two coupons. They were for a discount at "Hell Fire All You Can Eat Buffet", a local restaurant that for some reason specialized in super spicy food. They had been Ennoshita's contribution to their cause, he was apparently rather skilled with getting discounts. Daichi grabbed them and inspected them for a second before turning to look for Suga, who was busy doing extra practice with Kageyama (who was doing an impeccable job at distracting Suga for each and every one of their godawful match-making plans).

"Why don't you give them to him yourself when he's free? We're about to close the gym, they'll wrap up soon."

Asahi froze for a split second. It wasn't that they hadn't prepared for such an eventuality, but he was hoping against all hopes that it wouldn't come to this because there was no way Daichi would believe what he was about to say.

"W-w-well I… I-I… actually I'm-busy… have… s-s-something came up, yes, gotta run n-n-now, sorry!" he squeaked and dashed away before Daichi had the opportunity to stop him.

In the second that it took Daichi to glance at the coupons again, Asahi was gone. He quirked an eyebrow in confusion and then frowned. Asahi better have a decent excuse for disappearing before helping to clean up the gym. He was about to call out to everyone to wrap up their individual trainings, but when he scanned the gym with his eyes, he noticed almost everyone had left already. Only Kiyoko was left, speaking with Takeda-sensei about some statistics and then there was Suga and… No, Kageyama wasn't there anymore either, and Suga was walking towards him, wiping the sweat off his forehead with a towel and being beautiful while performing the most mundane tasks, as per usual.

That was kind of Suga's thing, actually. Looking breathtakingly gorgeous at all times, under any circumstance. When he jabbed someone in the ribs or coordinated the second and first years to chant "Nice serve!" from the bench, he was beautiful. When he scolded Asahi for his negativity or taught Kageyama to be more amiable, he was beautiful. When he was concentrated in class, staring at the board and taking notes in his swift and smooth handwriting he was beautiful. Even when he frowned or when he cried, he was always beautiful. And when he smiled and the stars themselves seemed to sparkle in his warm eyes, or when he cheered after they scored a point and vibrated with excitement, and when he laughed, he was so, so, so beautiful.

"Where'd everyone go?" Suga asked, breaking his train of thought. "I was practicing with Kageyama when he said something came up and then just disappeared." He cocked his head, his face was slightly flushed from the exercise, and that perfect spot next to his left eye looked even more lovely when the skin around it took that soft pink color. His fingers twitched. Lately, he'd caught himself wanting to touch that beauty spot next to Suga's eyes a lot more often than he should. Once or twice he'd actually given in to those urges and felt his skin tingling for days afterwards.

"Dunno'" he shrugged. "Asahi was just here a minute ago, but he left just like that." On second thought, everyone seemed to be acting strange lately, although he couldn't quite pinpoint why he felt that way.

"Guess we'll just have to whoop them for it tomorrow, right?" Suga winked, a devilish grin growing on his lips, and even then he was so beautiful, Daichi's breath hitched for a second. "Let's hurry it up, I'm starving."

That reminded him of something.

"Oh, Suga." He called, showing him the coupons. "Are these yours? They were lying around and apparently no one else claimed them. Sounds like your kind of thing." Daichi would never understand Suga's love for extra spicy food, but he'd never get tired of watching the way he flushed red, grinning and wheezing in delight when he got burnt eating it.

Suga took the coupons and inspected them from both sides, his eyes widening with glee. "Not mine, but if no one wants them I'll certainly have them." He grinned. "I love that place, thanks Daichi." He looked elated. Daichi secretly thanked whoever had lost these coupons for giving him this moment to just appreciate Suga's ecstatic expression. "Ah, but they expire tomorrow! There's two of them, wanna' go after practice?"

Daichi froze. He knew Suga hadn't meant it in the way it had sounded but he still couldn't help how his heartrate picked up and his cheeks started burning. He swallowed hard. Dinner. With Suga. Just the two of them after practice. It almost…

It almost sounded like a date.

He clenched his fists. You can't ruin it now. Suga definitely hadn't intended it to be a date –this was just part of his usual easy-going nature-, but could he trust himself not to blow it? He'd been holding back for almost three years already, only a few more months to go. And he'd managed to carry himself naturally, without being weird or awkward or obvious about his feelings, even when the object of his affections was standing right next to him almost all the time. He couldn't ruin it all at the last minute.

But holding back seemed harder and harder every day. Recently, every time Suga smiled that beautiful smile of his, all Daichi could do was imagine how it would taste if he kissed it. Or that time he tripped with a ball and fell on top of Suga, and when he'd noticed, he'd been staring at his lips for what felt like an eternity. And just a few days ago, after Suga spiked Nishinoya's toss, he had roared in excitement, his eyes sparkling with pride, and how close he had been to just say "I love you" while staring at that dazzling smile. If it were just the two of them alone, could he really trust himself to watch Suga delightfully burn himself with spicy food without confessing his feelings? He knew that both his friendship with Suga and their team's dynamics would be jeopardized if those feelings were ever released. He couldn't do that to Suga, or to everyone else after how much they had trained, especially now that they were so close to HaruKou. No, he couldn't risk it. Just a few more months. Hang in there a little bit longer.

"I'm… sorry I… I got s-stuff to do, sorry. You should invite Shimizu…" Suga seemed to like her anyway. His stomach coiled unpleasantly "Or Kageyama. He's been working hard."

"Oh." Suga looked away, his smile wavering slightly. "That's okay, it's a last minute thing anyway." He sounded… disappointed. Hurt, even. "We should clean up and close down, it's getting late."

Daichi bit his lip. "Yeah, we should."

"You've got to be fucki-!" Ennoshita covered Tanaka's mouth with one hand so they wouldn't be discovered. But the truth was, pretty much everyone shared Tanaka's sentiment. There was no mistaking the collective groan of both annoyance and frustration. Nishinoya was slamming his head against the nearest wall, and even Tsukishima rolled his eyes and huffed.

"Ridiculous." He uttered, and he left without another word, followed closely by Yamaguchi.

Asahi had to admit this was truly unbelievable. He even felt slightly tempted to stomp in there and shake some sense into Daichi's thick skull. Contrary to all of his expectations, the plan had actually worked perfectly, except for the part in which Daichi was inconceivably stupid and ruined everything.

"It was right theeere…" Yachi whined.

"On a silver platter. Literally. There. Oh god." Tanaka continued, once he was free from Ennoshita's grasp.

"You saw it too, right Kageyama?" Hinata asked, pulling at his orange hair.

"Yes, Sugawara-senpai definitely asked the Captain out."

"If even Kageyama noticed, what does that say of Daichi-san…"

"O-oi!"

They were definitely right. Suga had literally asked Daichi on a date and he'd refused. Truly unbelievable. Asahi had so far figured that the reason Suga didn't confront Daichi about their painfully obvious mutual feelings was because he wanted Daichi to take the first step. But clearly he was as frustrated with this unresolved situation as everyone else in the team, if he'd gone as far as to surreptitiously take that step. Daichi couldn't possibly be so blind, could he? If this hadn't worked, what would?

He sighed.

"Let's call it a day, everyone. We should leave before they find us here."

"Nishinoya, have you thought about something else?"

Noya looked up from his lunch. "Oooh! Are you finally getting interested in this?" he asked, his mouth half full of rice.

"I guess… I got really frustrated about how things turned out last night."

"I KNOW, RIGHT?" He bit down on an octopus-shaped sausage viciously. "I can't believe… If Asahi-san implicitly asked me on a date like that I would've been so happy! How could anyone refuse?"

Asahi felt the blood rising to his face and he scratched the back of his head sheepishly. "Why'd you always have to compare this with us?" he asked, although he didn't expect to get a comprehensible answer.

"Maybe that's why this isn't working? Because you're thinking of yourselves when coming up with these plans?"

They both shot their heads up at the sound of that soft and familiar voice.

"Kiyoko-san!" Noya yelped, jumping to his feet with an excited grin plastered over his face.

Asahi blushed. Being caught by Kiyoko participating in this extremely embarrassing operation was just awfully mortifying, and pretty much everyone had agreed to that. That was the reason that even Tanaka and Nishinoya hadn't asked for her help, even though everyone also agreed that she might be the most capable of giving useful advice. How had she discovered them?

"Hitoka-chan told me everything." She said, as if she'd read Asahi's mind. "But I really think that with Sawamura, a more straightforward approach would be more fruitful, otherwise, I don't think he'll understand. Azumane-san, you should talk to him." She continued, casually tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, a small smile drawn on her lips.

Asahi's blood ran cold. "W-what, me? I-I don't think I'm really fit for that job, I-I-I'm terrible at confrontations, everyone knows that, right? I'm sure that N-n-nishinoya will come up with another idea, right? Nishinoya?" he looked over at his boyfriend, pleading for salvation, but what he found was a pair of ecstatic brown eyes, sparkling as if he'd just had an epiphany.

"As expected from Kiyoko-san! It really can't be any other way!" Asahi dreaded the next words long before they were spoken. "Asahi-san, we're counting on you!"

"Asahi-san, you can do it!" Nishinoya whispered, nudging him into the clubroom.

Asahi took a deep breath and clenched his fists to steel himself. This was for Suga, he had to do it.

"Daichi, can I have a word with you?" he enunciated slowly.

Daichi crossed his arms over his chest. "Sure, what's up?"

Ennoshita looked up at him and signed the others to clear away from the room and shut the door once they'd all left. There was no specific "plan" this time, but Kageyama was distracting Suga back in the gym just for good measure.

"I…" he started, then shook his head. Shimizu was right. Although he'd previously believed they should leave Daichi alone to figure everything out, what had happened last night had made him realize Daichi would never in fact figure anything out unless someone slammed his face against a "ask Suga out already" brickwall.

"Just when are you planning to ask Suga out and put an end to this nonsense?"

Daichi visibly froze. His pupils shrunk and his face lost all color in an instant. His entire body seemed to stiffen.

"Whe—Where is this coming from all of a sudden?" he asked, his voice faltering.

Asahi wanted to roll his eyes. "There's nothing 'sudden' about this, Daichi, and you know that. You've been avoiding the issue with Suga since we first joined the team."

Daichi looked away, his brows furrowed. "Then you should know why I can't do it. It would make everything too messy and awkward for everyone. And I don't want Suga to feel uncomfortable."

Asahi sighed. It's not like he didn't know Daichi was completely oblivious to Suga's feelings, but getting an upfront confirmation just made it even worse. He was beginning to understand why Suga was so frustrated about this. Maybe the reason Suga hadn't taken the first step so far was because he wanted Daichi to notice –and he'd made every possible attempt to make his feelings as painfully obvious as possible. If he didn't know better, he'd think Daichi was actually pretending not to notice just so as to not break Suga's heart.

"Aren't you looking down on all of us, thinking that something like this would mess everything up?" he asked, feeling slightly confident about where this conversation was going. "Our team is stronger than that. And do you really think Suga wouldn't be able to face you directly and give you an answer so everyone can move forward?"

Daichi's canine sunk into his lower lip.

"All of these are just excuses, aren't they? The truth is you're just too afraid to put an end to this; it's you who doesn't have the courage to be honest with Suga because you'd rather cling to a 'what if' than risk getting hurt." A part of him wanted to tell Daichi that Suga actually loved him too, but it was definitely not his place to say something like that. "You've called me a coward before, but you don't even trust Suga and your friendship to be able to handle your true feelings." He knew he was going way off their script, but he felt he needed to say these words now to help Daichi realize the absurdity of the whole situation.

Daichi didn't say anything, he just clenched his fists. All this time he'd been telling himself that he'd kept his feelings a secret for Suga's and Karasuno's sake, but perhaps that hadn't been entirely the case. Perhaps he'd been lying to himself for so long he'd actually started to believe that he was selflessly sacrificing himself for everyone's well-being, when in fact all he had done was protect his own heart. But how could he not? The thought of Suga looking away from him and saying 'sorry, I don't see you that way' terrified him.

"But—I-I can't…"

"Yes you can!" Nishinoya suddenly burst through the door, and Asahi yelped. "You just have to say it! It's not that hard."

"J-just because you could say it so easily…"

"I couldn't!" he interrupted, his brows furrowed with determination. "Confessing my feelings wasn't easy at all! It's natural to be afraid of rejection!" he slammed his hand on the wall. "And I even got rejected the first time! It was very painful and made me regret I said anything!"

Asahi felt his gut twist painfully. They'd never properly talked about it, so he hadn't stopped to think about how he'd hurt Nishinoya in the past. Back then Nishinoya had said he didn't need any apologies, but now that he was bringing it up, Asahi couldn't help feeling guilty about how he'd handled that situation.

"If it's going to hurt, why should I do it?"

"Because it's better than not knowing!" Nishinoya yelled, and Asahi really hoped Takeda-sensei wasn't nearby so he wouldn't want to check on what the noise was about. "If you don't at least try, you'll spend the rest of your life wondering what would've happened. You'll regret all the opportunities you wasted and all the 'what if's and 'could've been's that never came true. It's like volleyball! Of course getting blocked out is scary, but if you don't even spike the ball, you'll never win the match! There's nothing worse than giving up without trying!"

Daichi flinched. Nishinoya's eyes were blazing with determination. And then, just casually, Asahi's hand was lying softly on Nishinoya's shoulder and squeezing lightly. There was nothing special about it at first glance, but at the same time, the touch looked especially intimate. Daichi looked down at his hands, remembering how they buzzed after a high-five with Suga, or the goose bumps that rose on his skin when he'd brushed Suga's beauty spot with his thumb.

What if…?

He'd asked himself many such questions over the last three years. What if his feelings were not one-sided? What if… what if Suga too…?

"Daichi" Asahi said, his voice low and the look on his eyes soft and sympathetic. "Don't you think Suga at least deserves the truth?"

He clenched his fists. The memory of Suga's dejected expression from last night crossed his mind.

"He does."

Koushi sighed as he locked the gym door behind him. Everyone else had already gone home. Lately, Kageyama was asking for a lot of extra practice, even though it was quite obvious that there was little he could teach in terms of being a setter. It didn't make a lot of sense, and he was pretty sure there was more to it than just a sudden interest in learning about everyone's preferred tosses but Suga liked the feeling of being relied on, so he didn't give it that much thought. He put on his sneakers and started towards the club room to change back into his uniform.

He glanced at the time on his cellphone: a quarter past seven. He remembered the coupons he'd stuffed on his gym bag last night and bit his lip. Daichi was an idiot. He almost didn't want Daichi to ask him out anymore. He'd assumed that giving him the coupons was Daichi's best attempt at asking him on a date, and thus hadn't even thought about it when he'd invited Daichi for dinner. Now he deeply regretted it. Even if he knew his feelings weren't one-sided, getting rejected still hurt. Maybe it was just not meant to happen with Daichi.

That thought hurt more than he wanted to admit. Even if he tried to play it cool, the truth was he was getting tired of waiting. And last night had proven that, even if he'd ever tried to take the first step, Daichi would only take a step back.

Why did I have to fall in love with an idiot? I deserve so much better.

He hurried to the club room. It wasn't too late, he could still make it to the restaurant and enjoy a nice dinner. He deserved to treat himself. It was a shame that one of the coupons would go to waste, but there was nothing to do about that. He'd enjoy a little bit of "me time" and stop thinking about Daichi's incorrigible stupidity. Maybe he should've heeded Daichi's idiotic advice and invited Shimizu. He would've had fun with Shimizu and Daichi would be jealous because he was now apparently convinced that he liked her, because Daichi was an idiot, so it would be two birds in one shot.

He sighed. He really needed to stop thinking about this; it was doing him no good to get so mad.

He zipped up his jacket and grabbed his bag, digging his hand into the outer pocket to fetch the coupons while he closed the door with his other hand.

Before he could turn for the stairs, someone called out to him.

"O-oi, Suga!"

Speak of the devil.

Daichi was standing next to the door, staring at him and fidgeting slightly. Suga cocked his head. Daichi should've left at least twenty minutes ago, and he hadn't been there literally three minutes ago when he'd come to get changed. It was almost as if he'd been hiding and waiting for him to come out so he could ambush him, but that thought was very absurd.

"What?" He replied, a little bit more callously than intended. Thinking so much about yesterday's fiasco had made it hard to pretend he wasn't still angry.

"Have… d-d-did you invite anyone to the buffet th-thing?"

He felt awfully tempted to lie and say he had indeed invited Shimizu just to watch Daichi's face contort in idiotic jealousy, but it was a pathetic lie considering Shimizu had gone home early today. Did Daichi really stay behind just to make sure he hadn't invited someone else? Even after rejecting the invitation himself, and with such an obviously fake excuse?

If you didn't want me to go with someone else, you should've accepted when I invited you, was what he wanted to say. "No." was what he answered instead. He just wasn't in the mood to deal with Daichi's stupid jealousy. "I'll go on my own, it'd be a shame to let the coupons go to waste." And by god do I deserve a break from this nonsense, was left unsaid.

He turned around and headed towards the stairs, completely done with Daichi for today. Maybe even the rest of the week.

"A-a-ah, w-wait! Suga!"

He stopped in his tracks and looked back to see Daichi almost tripping with his own feet as he rushed down the stairs. He knitted his eyebrows, not sure if he was in the mood to stick around and figure out what in heavens Daichi wanted.

"What." He repeated, curtly.

Daichi managed to catch up with him without tripping any further and looked up into his eyes, his face flushed bright red.

"I just… the-the stuff I had to do was… Fuck, nevermind, I… I'd like to go. With you. Together. To the buffet thing. J…just the t-two of us…"

Suga felt his heart leap inside his chest, and his face grew warm all of a sudden.

"I-I mean if-if you don't want to that'd be o-okay too." Daichi wasn't looking at him anymore, his eyes on the ground and his fingers gliding up and down over the strap of his bag nervously. It was kind of cute.

"Are you inviting yourself to dinner with me?" he asked, because he needed to be sure, he needed Daichi to say things straight to avoid any more embarrassing confusions.

Daichi's face contorted in horror and he raised his hands in surrender. "No! Wha—no, no! I… I mean it doesn't have to… I just… Damn this!" he rubbed his face with his palms. His distress would've been mildly amusing if Suga wasn't so focused on hearing whatever the actual answer would be. "I want to go on a date with you. It doesn't have to be tonight, heck, it doesn't have to happen at all ever if you don't want to but… I-I'd like to go out on a date with you. On many dates in fact. I-I actually like you… a lot. And not… not like… like friends but… just you… all of you." His voice went quieter and quieter with every sentence, wavering with insecurity.

Koushi couldn't help it anymore. His lips curled up in a smile, the corners of his eyes softening with fondness. His cheeks were burning now, and his heart was beating so fast it didn't feel healthy, but none of that mattered.

"I'm sorry, I know this is kinda we—"

Suga took a step forward, grabbed Daichi by the front of his jacket and pulled him down to shut him up with a kiss before he could say something stupid to ruin it. It was quick, short and a little bit clumsy. Through half-lidded eyes, Koushi saw Daichi's face burst aflame and his brown eyes go wide as saucers. Koushi pulled him a little bit closer and pressed their lips together harder before pulling back, his fingers still tight on the fabric of Daichi's black jacket.

"Ah… ah… e-e-eehh?"

Suga quirked an eyebrow, not sure if he should be amused by Daichi's absolute lack of eloquence.

"I've waited three goddamned years for you to ask me out, at this rate I'm going to grow white hairs before you grow a pair and kiss me out of your own initiative." He declared, although he wasn't half as angry as he was trying to act anymore.

"O-okay."

He finally let go of Daichi's jacket, his heart swelling with happiness. He looked up at Daichi's flushed and dumbfounded face, and he grinned.

Then he jabbed Daichi's side with one hand.

"Suga, what the hell?!" Daichi winced, painfully.

"You made me wait for too long!" He laughed, trying to force an upset expression on his face, to no avail.

Daichi's eyes found his, his cheeks still bright red, and his look of bewilderment and confusion softened. The ghost of a smile tugged at the corners of his lips.

"I'm sorry, Suga. I've made you wait a lot." One of his big hands cupped Suga's cheek, his thumb gliding over the beauty spot next to his left eye. Koushi's face felt warm. He'd always liked it when Daichi touched him like this, even though it was always an absentminded gesture. At least until now.

Koushi smiled and nodded. Daichi tilted his head and kissed his lips, soft and gentle. His breath got caught in his chest and his palms glided over Daichi's chest and around his neck to deepen the kiss, if only for an instant.

When they finally pulled apart, Daichi was smiling. The hand that was caressing his cheek moved to tangle in his unruly hair.

"See? You haven't grown any white hairs yet."

"IIIT WOOOOOOORKED!" Tanaka roared, taking his shirt off and waving it over his head like a flag.

"IT FINALLY WORKED!" Nishinoya roared too, using Tanaka's shoulders as support to jump.

Everyone else was high-fiving and fist-bumping and yelling victoriously too. Asahi thought they might want to quiet down a bit, but he figured even Daichi and Suga wouldn't notice they were watching when they were so immersed in each other. He smiled, as happy as everyone else to see that this had worked out in the end.

"Thanks for the advice, you were right about talking to Daichi directly." He said, turning to Shimizu, who was quietly watching Suga and Daichi walking away.

She brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. "I think Azumane-san said exactly the things Sawamura needed to hear." She explained softly.

"What about me, Kiyoko-san?! I said some amazing things too, right?!" Nishinoya chimed in excitedly. Since Asahi was kneeling on the ground, Nishinoya could circle his neck with his arms from behind, resting his body weight against Asahi's back

"Noya-san, you were really cool as always!" Tanaka said. "All those things you said about regret and getting hurt… they really touched my heart!" he added with tearful eyes.

Asahi felt a pang of guilt constricting his chest, but before he could dwell on it, he felt Nishinoya hum and rest his chin on his shoulder.

"I think Asahi-san was the coolest." He stated, then pressed a quick smooch on his cheek. From the corner of his eye, Asahi could see the bright grin shining on his face.

"Geez, get a room."

Nishinoya laughed.

"Daichi?" Suga asked as they rounded the corner to get to their destination. "What made you decide to tell me the truth… after all this time?"

Daichi blushed and scratched his cheek. "I just… got a little push in the right direction, I guess." He didn't want to admit that it had been Asahi of all people who had set him straight.

"So basically Nishinoya yelled at you until you caved." Suga declared with certainty. "Probably Asahi too."

"Wh—what gives you that idea?"

Suga cocked his head to the side, his silver hair bouncing to the side in a truly adorable way.

"I'd say I'm surprised you didn't notice, but you didn't even notice me flirting for three years, so maybe I should've expected it."

Daichi felt the colors rise to his face again, both for the underhanded assault on his perception skills and for the thought of Suga flirting with him.

"What should I have noticed?

Suga sighed. "I don't really know the specifics, but everyone seems to be conspiring to get you to ask me out or something. Kageyama's been less than subtle about trying to keep me distracted while everyone else was speaking to you for the past few weeks." He explained. "I'm pretty sure that time you tripped on the ball and fell on top of me was planned too."

Daichi didn't know if he was furious or if he wanted to die from embarrassment. Now that he looked back on it, it all made sense. Asahi giving him the coupons, Nishinoya yelling about yakisoba pan, even Tanaka calling him to walk right into the path of that stray volleyball... So that meant that not only the entire team had ganged up on him, but they all knew everything about his feelings and his stubborn blunders. He suddenly felt very motivated to have everyone doing one or two dozen laps of flying falls.

"Were you part of it?" he asked, although he wasn't sure how he'd feel about either answer.

"Nope. Like I said, I just knew Kageyama was trying really hard to occupy my attention."

"If you knew it why'd you play along?"

Suga grinned cutely. "Because I wanted you to ask me out, obviously." He replied with faux innocence, and all Daichi could do was sigh. He couldn't really blame Suga for that. Rather than punishing everyone, he'd actually have to thank them for helping him get on the right track. If not for them, he might've actually succeeded in graduating without ever voicing his feelings. He was already regretting all the time he'd wasted, those three years and all the things they could've done together if he'd paid a little more attention.

Daichi glanced at their hands, dangling very close to one another, their knuckles brushing occasionally. He'd had to start learning about having initiative to compensate for those three years they'd lost. He took a deep breath and in one swift move, grabbed Suga's hand in his. Suga looked up at him, his beautiful hazel eyes wide and sparkling with glee. Suga smiled –smiling came to him so easily and yet all of his smiles felt unique and precious- and entwined their fingers together, then tugged at his hand to keep walking.

"Come on, we're almost there and I'm starving! Food won't wait for you three years!"

"You're never gonna let me live that down, are you?"

"I'll have to think about it. Ask me again in three years."

Daichi had to laugh. "I'll be holding you up to that!"

Suga grinned. "It's a promise then!"

The end

This was supposed to be a little something for Daichi's birthday but it turned out super long and mostly from Asahi's POV –which was very hard to write- and everyone keeps calling Daichi an idiot lmao, I fail so badly. Since it's Asahi's birthday on New Year's I also wanted a bunch of cute AsaNoya

After It's all for the team's sake I wracked my brain for a good way to finally make Suga's wish come true. I also wanted everyone in Karasuno to help and show their appreciation for Mom, but without scheme master Suga to pull the strings it was all very messy. I hope everyone liked it, for some reason I continue to struggle to keep these nerd boys in character so I'll be really looking forward to hear your opinions about it.

Happy New Year everyone!