Being a couple with Hinata doesn't exactly go the way Kageyama thought it might. Not that he actually spent much time in the week that he'd been aware of his feelings imagining them as a couple - he'd been far too busy feeling sorry for himself and missing the apparently obvious signs that Hinata has been pining for him (or so Hinata says).

But the day after Hinata asks him out, it's time for their spring vacation and Hinata's parents take him and his sister on a family trip to Kyushu. It's one they apparently take every year just before the kids start school again and it gives them a chance to make the most of the warmer weather down there to enjoy the beach as much as they can this time of year.

What that means for Kageyama, however, is that a mere 24 hours after getting a… boyfriend… he is essentially bed-bound with a sprained ankle, a foul mood, and boyfriendless.

He's not even sure if it counts as dating when they can't even set eyes on each other for two straight weeks after getting together. Kageyama makes the executive decision that it doesn't, because he'll be damned if his first memories of his and Hinata's relationship will be of him laying in his bed with his foot in the air and setting a ball to himself for hours on end.

It's during one of those sessions that, while thinking of the way Hinata will smile at him and hug him when he returns, he sets the ball at a funny angle, making it rebound off his window seal, his dresser, and finally his bad foot.

Kageyama is pretty sure he goes through every curse word known to mankind and even invents some of his own, before giving up on his volleyball and calls Hinata to blame him for everything that has gone wrong in his life.

Thankfully, with a combination of sheer dumb luck, good genes and a clean track record of sports injuries up until this point, Kageyama is able to put all his weight on his sprained ankle by the time school starts again two weeks later.

He gets up earlier than usual, eager to get the hell out of his house and into the club room before the new first years arrive. His physio has told him he needs to wait at least another month before he can get back on the court properly, which is the opposite of ideal with prelim prep already around the corner. But he'll be damned if he doesn't at least go to support, train or do anything he can to keep his mind sharp while he recovers fully. If this had happened just a few months prior, they could have easily relied on Sugawara to lead them into battle, but that's no longer an option. Right… because he's a second year now.

Hinata emails him to let him know that he'll be running a tiny bit late - apparently, he was so excited to get back on the court (and to see his boyfriend again - Hinata seems to like that word in an aggressive sort of way) that he stayed up too late and slept through not one, but two alarms.

Kageyama rolls his eyes but punches the air symbolically that he'll be the first one there on their first day back. 1-0 to him.

As he approaches the clubroom, he first hears, then sees Tanaka and Nishinoya laughing and joking inside. Noya is doing handstands, while Tanaka blows on him to see if he can topple him over with his breath alone. Nice to see some things never change and Kageyama is eternally grateful for that.

"Kageyama!" Tanaka declares, making Noya jump up from his handstand with perfect form, only a little red in the face.

"How's your ankle?" he asks.

"It's healing up. No game time for a little while still, though. Physio says it should be about a month, but maybe-"

"No!" They both say in unison and Kageyama is taken aback. "You're staying off the court for as long as you need to recover!" Tanaka warns him.

"That's right!" Noya agrees. "Just because Daichi's not around anymore, don't think you'll be getting it easy from us. We'll be watching to make sure you're resting. Third years' orders!"

Kageyama can't help but smile at that. He wonders if he'll be so full of confidence and excitement when he's in their position. Leading the club and setting an example. Right now, it just fills him with dread that this year's and next year's first years will take one look at him and his scowling face and his frequent bad temper and hate him.

"Well, we're off to set up, see you soon!"

They leave as Kageyama awkwardly waves them goodbye and starts to putter around the club room, taking things out of his bag and reacquainting himself with the space.

"Hey!" he hears soon after and is greeted with a nest of orange hair and bright eyes.

"Hey," Kageyama breathes, loving the sound of Hinata's voice in real life and not through a phone connection. "Thought you were going to be late?"

"I skipped breakfast so I could see you," he says excitedly.

Truthfully, Kageyama feels a little awkward now that they're in the same space together. The last time they were both here, they were friends and teammates. Now they're boyfriends and he has to remind himself to untwist his stomach at the thought of it.

But Hinata doesn't give him the time to be nervous before he's on him; hugging him and thoroughly invading his space and Kageyama forgets his stupid nerves and just breathes him in. He barely got to do this before; everything had happened so quickly the day he'd gotten his injury and they'd only shared a second brief hug outside the school before Kageyama had left.

Now, he revels in the fact that Hinata can tuck his entire head under Kageyama's chin and how soft his hair is. God, he's pretty sure that he could fit all of Hinata inside his zip-up hoodie if he tried. He tightens his arms, making Hinata even smaller and feels his delighted wiggle as he snuggles closer. He has a sneaky suspicion that Hinata will be very fond of hugging as they go forward and he's definitely going to pretend to hate every second of it and enjoy it with everything he has.

"How was your trip?" Kageyama murmurs and Hinata makes a contented sound.

"Good," he says "I ate so much ice cream I thought I was gonna be sick."

"Moron," Kageyama tells him. "Only you would see that as a good thing."

Hinata smiles up at him. "How is your foot?"

"Strong enough to kick your ass on the court soon enough."

"In your dreams, Hobble-yama. Good luck catching up to me. You wanna be careful I won't beat you to be team captain next year!"

Kageyama smirks down at him, grateful to the pit of his stomach that nothing has changed between them. That dating didn't magically shift the fundamentals of gravity or uproot the laws of time. As long as it's just them, this way and for as long as Hinata wants him, he has no reason to be scared.

"Come on, short stuff, let's get ready before our new third years kick us out of the club for tardiness."

At the mention of volleyball, Hinata bounces off him in pure excited energy resembling that of a newborn puppy allowed outside for the first time. They change in almost silence like they always do, but as Kageyama stretches and pulls his white t-shirt down over his torso, he opens his eyes to see Hinata staring at him wide eyed. Seeing Kageyama's eyes on him, he pretends to look the other way in a farce that is, quite frankly, embarrassing to look at and it's not helped at all when he knocks over his own bottle of water.

Kageyama feels the heat on every part of his face when he realises he was the one Hinata was staring at. That is… certainly new.

They've gotten changed in front of each other so many times now that Kageyama wonders if maybe there is something strange growing on his body that caused Hinata to linger on him like that. Then again, they've also never gotten changed in front of each other whilst in a relationship where Hinata was technically within his rights to visually appreciate Kageyama as much as he wanted. Yes, that is…. definitely new.

"Sorry, I … uh…."

"It's okay," Kageyama says before Hinata has a chance to think of whatever disturbing excuse he can come up with on the fly. He's pretty sure that the one brain cell Hinata would use to do that is currently recovering from seeing Kageyama without his shirt on and he's not cruel enough to subject Hinata to that ordeal.

"You uh… I don't…" he is terrible at this. God, what would Suga say if he were here? He's the most mature person Kageyama can think of right now. "You shouldn't feel embarrassed I think… we're going out, you um… you shouldn't have to look away… right?"

In the meantime, Hinata has covered his eyes as though he's watching a horror movie and Kageyama rolls his eyes. "My shirt is on, Hinata."

"Right!" he exclaims "Right, sorry! I'll um… get used to this I suppose…" he smiles and scratches the back of his head. One of Kageyama's favourite gestures of his.

"Yeah me too," he admits.

They carry on getting ready and Hinata sits on one of the benches taping up his fingers, just a precaution after being off for two weeks. It's been a while since he's done it and out of the corner of his eye, Kageyama can see that he keeps messing up, twisting the tape with his free hand and failing to use the scissors at the same time. He's seen enough.

"Come here, let me show you how to do that properly. That stuff is expensive you know."

Kageyama sits next to him on the bench and gets Hinata to rest his hand, palm facing upwards, on the top of one of his thighs. He keeps quiet as he works, just worrying his bottom lip between his teeth as he tapes Hinata's joints with precision. It's gotten weirdly quiet in the room and he can actually hear the tiny, shallow puffs of hair Hinata lets out next to him. He thinks he hears them speed up slightly as he moves on to each new finger and takes extra care not to hurt him or make the tape too tight by mistake.

"Other hand," he mutters. Hinata does as he's told and as Kageyama reaches for him, he notices Hinata's other palm is slightly sweatier. It doesn't help the tape to stick very well.

"Kageyama?" Hinata asks.

"Hm?" he replies nonchalantly, keeping his eyes on the task at hand.

"May I kiss you?"

Oh.

At first, he thinks it's a stupid question to ask, but then it takes him a second to realise that they haven't done that yet… technically two weeks of dating and they physically hadn't even had a chance to kiss… was he really destined to screw things up that badly?

Kageyama doesn't stand a chance before his thoughts race at a hundred miles per hour. What if he's bad at it? What if they never kiss again? Does it really count as dating if you're not kissing? What about his hands? His eyes? Closed? Open? He's still holding the damn tape in one hand and he's not moved for a few seconds by now and-

He accidentally skims Hinata's wrist with his free hand and feels his racing, fluttering pulse. It wakes him from his panic and makes him look up. He doesn't think Hinata's telling pulse is beating out of fear. Judging by the soft and vulnerable and preciously smitten look on his face, Hinata wants to kiss him. Has probably wanted to kiss him for a while now. Whereas stupid Kageyama hasn't even thought about kissing once since all of this started. He doesn't know how he managed to be so dim when obviously kissing was the way most people even entered into a relationship. He and Hinata had just hugged.

Kageyama swallows far too audibly for his own liking and looks down at Hinata's waiting mouth, then back to his sweet expectant eyes. Of course Hinata would ask him something like this when another person might have just leaned in and gone for it. Hinata handled him with a level of care he wasn't sure he'd ever get used to, physically, mentally, and emotionally. Had iced his ankle for him even when he was screaming in pain himself, had apologised for merely looking at his shirtless boyfriend minutes prior. Was support and smiles and kind words when he knew Kageyama needed them and bitey nitpicking the rest of the time. What about him could possibly make Kageyama nervous?

He looks back down at his mouth, a mouth which has driven him to the brink of insanity over the past year and will continue to do so for as long as possible and says, "Yes."

He musters up the courage from somewhere to lean in with Hinata rather than let him do all the work (or get all the glory) and finally, their lips meet.

It's a kiss as chaste as humanly possible and it's absolutely perfect. Hinata brings his free hand to cup the side of Kageyama's face, his other hand squeezing Kageyama's where they're still joined on Kageyama's leg.

Kageyama has almost no idea what he's doing, but he assumes neither does Hinata and so he stops overthinking his every breath, movement, and feeling and attempts to melt into the sensation instead.

Hinata moves his mouth against his and he attempts to mirror him by moving in unison. They angle their heads slightly and then they fit together perfectly. There's no frantic pace, no making out, nothing except the single touch of their lips warming each other and their hands squeezing together beneath them. It's warm, it's comforting and it makes him feel so much closer to Hinata already, even if his lips are chapped and he's unsure of how wet it should feel. It piques Kageyama's interest thoroughly for how much more there might be to kissing and how much he and Hinata could practice before they become awesome at it.

Eventually, there's no choice but for them to pull apart unless they want to dive right in for a second try, but they have to be at practice soon. And Kageyama feels so lightheaded that for once he's grateful of his injury so he doesn't have to deal with making any sets today. Hinata is going to ruin his volleyball career, he can feel it.

When he opens his eyes, Hinata looks dazed and it makes Kageyama so happy he could scream. His eyes go a little cross-eyed trying to look at Kageyama so close and it makes Kageyama preen from how sweet it looks.

Perhaps it's that, or the way Hinata is still holding his hand, or the way Kageyama's mouth still feels warmer, that possesses him to blurt out, "That was my first kiss."

And Hinata beams. He beams like the sun itself.

He's so preciously enthusiastic about every little thing Kageyama does that it sometimes makes him feel as though he's breakable. Like he could shatter into a million pieces under Hinata's smile if he let himself.

"I'm glad," he murmurs.

Kageyama presses his forehead against Hinata's, exhales shakily and smiles. Before frowning aggressively quickly.

"Wait what do you mean you're glad?" he demands. "Wasn't that your first kiss too?"

"Um… no?" Hinata says nervously. Kageyama halts like a skipped vinyl.

"You.. how.."

"Well, you see when Sachiko and I were seeing each other, we went to see a movie together. While the movie was playing, she leaned in to give me a kiss on the cheek but I turned my head to say something to her and she sort of got my mouth instead. It was sorta nice I guess but it lasted for like two seconds and it was the only time it happened. We were both kinda surprised and embarrassed by it."

Kageyama will throttle him. He swears he will shake him until the universe pities them and puts one rational thought into his boyfriend's head.

"You nitwit, that doesn't count."

"It does too!" Hinata demands. "It was lips on lips, how else do you count a kiss?"

"Well, first of all, it has to be on purpose. I swear to god if you were any smaller we could use you as a practice ball, there's nothing inside you but air."

"Very funny, Kageyama, you're just jealous because I was your first kiss!" He does what can only be described as a fake, maniacal, villainous laugh and Kageyama clenches his fists.

"Don't worry, Kageyama, coming from the more experienced one of the two of us, I think you did pretty good!" He finishes off the comment with a condescending pat to Kageyama's arm, which just about tips the scales of Kageyama's patience.

He pulls Hinata's hair, which causes him to cease speaking to Kageyama for three whole minutes (and only because he needs Kageyama's help to grab something off a high shelf), after which they bicker and fight all the way to the gymnasium.

Later, after they've met and Kageyama has (predictably) scared the living daylights out of three of the five new first years, he and Hinata volunteer to clean up. Which leaves them with enough privacy that, while putting things away in the same storage cupboard they'd cried and fought and hugged in two weeks prior, Kageyama pulls Hinata to him by the collar of his shirt, loving that Hinata naturally has to come up onto his toes to meet him at his level, and kisses him for the second time.

It may be just as brief as their first and it may be Hinata's "third" kiss in his life, but as Kageyama points out, it's the first time for both of them that they've kissed their boyfriend for the second time. It's also the first kiss he's had complete say in initiating and this pleases him enough that he doesn't even scold Hinata too much when Hinata jokingly refers to him as Boyfriend-yama.

"I'm not calling you boyfriend," he says as they lock up the supply room. "Your name is Hinata or Dumbass, both of those seem just fine to me."

As they walk off, Hinata wraps himself around Kageyama's arm and looks up at him with an expectantly optimistic look on his face. "What about Shouyou?" he asks impishly.

Kageyama blushes furiously and looks away. "We'll see," he mumbles. "Don't count on it."

Hinata's smile doesn't falter one bit at Kageyama's reluctance as he squeezes his arm a little harder. "Of course I'm gonna count on you."

Kageyama inhales sharply and audibly at that, because he fully believes Hinata. It's the only way their relationship has worked for as long as it has. Hinata has trusted him almost since day one. And Kageyama knows it's going to be a painful uphill battle for him to repay that trust with his own shortcomings. That there won't be a single day that they won't get under each other's skin. When he stops to think about it, he's scared. Scared of everything they're going to face in this strange and unwritten chapter that neither of them have a clue how to read. But if Hinata can be brave and if Hinata can ask him to be his boyfriend and if Hinata can ask to kiss him and if Hinata can grab his arm and plaster himself against him without a care in the world, then it's his damn job to try and meet him halfway.

"It takes a hell of a lot of courage to say this is a person that I like, even if it's to yourself. But once you do it just feels… it feels like you can walk taller and straighter. Like breathing doesn't take so much effort anymore."

He slides his arm out of Hinata's grip and puts it around Hinata's shoulders instead, scooping him in, close and small. He's not sure he's ready for the others to see them like this, not yet. But for Hinata, in their private moments, he wants to try and give him a side of him no one else sees. "I'm glad to hear it," he says, and just breathes.

Hinata wraps an arm around his waist and when Kageyama looks down at him, his first thought, apart from how well Hinata fits against him, is Shouyou Hinata is my boyfriend.

One day, during their most real and quiet and intimate moments, maybe Kageyama will admit it to Hinata that this, Kageyama decided for himself, this is the real start of their relationship. He knows Hinata will fight him over it. One day. Or maybe he won't. But this is what he wants to remember it by. Hinata's arm around his and Kageyama holding him against his side and the two of them walking towards the exit of the same gym they'd met and fought in a year and a day ago.

For that tiny moment, whether it be during a game, the race to the clubroom or the end of a fight, the feeling that accompanies that thought beats any point he's ever scored.