Nineteen: Chapter 1

"Frozen vegetables just never taste the same," Kagami Taiga mumbled to himself as he took the lumpy bag out from the freezer. But, he had no choice but to capitulate; there was simply not enough time to wash and chop vegetables, much less go shopping for them.

He was a very busy university student in America, after all.

As he brought out the scissors, he stuck an entire banana in his mouth, the peel falling to the floor.

"Yo, Tiger," a call came from his door. Sighing, Kagami swallowed the banana, dumped the vegetables into a frying pan and set it on high before answering whomever it was that was bothering him.

"I got your mail."

"Thanks, man," Kagami nodded, taking the envelope. Noticing that his friend was not leaving yet, he raised an eyebrow. "You need something?"

"Nah, Tiger, chill. Just… your room has a lot of stuff you brought from Japan, huh? Man, look at all those trophies! What were you, a judo champ?"

Kagami cast an eye over his room, feeling a wave of nostalgia sweep over him. "No… basketball."

"Ah, right, forgot you were on the team here."

Kagami could hear the pan sizzling. "If you don't need anything…"

"Yeah, yeah, my bad. I'll be going now. Later."

"Yeah."

Closing the door, Kagami shuffled through his mail. Junk, overdue library fines, car fine, speeding ticket, parking ticket payment overdue fine… yeah, the usual. He sighed and almost tossed the mail onto his table, but then saw an envelope he'd missed—from Japan.

"From… Kise?"

Unusual. To say the least. Hardly anyone from Japan kept in contact with him. They used to exchange emails every so often when Kagami first left for America, but eventually, that faded away, too.

And why a letter? What did Kise think he was, an old man who didn't know how to use email? Granted, Kagami had thrown a couple of laptops out the window from sheer frustration because basketball streams kept buffering, but still.

He tore the envelope open, vegetables completely forgotten. The letter was short. His double eyebrows knitted together as he tried to read the complicated Japanese hiragana-katakana-kanji mess he hadn't used in a while.

Kagamicchi,

You're so mean for leaving us all behind! TAT Even though everyone has gone off to his own universities… I somehow got stuck with Midorimacchi! :c

"You've told me that a million times, idiot!"

Come back to Japan as soon as you can! We gotta go visit Kurokocchi soon! It's about that time, you know? Everyone's already said that they can come, even Akashicchi and Murasakibaracchi—

"Why is that dick's name so long?" Kagami growled after it took him five minutes to figure out that Kise had written Murasakibaracchi and not alkdjfwiohg.

Even Akashicchi and Murasakibaracchi said that they could come all the way from the other side of Japan! Isn't that exciting? It'll be like a class reunion.

"We weren't even ever in the same class!"

Anyway, I'm rambling too much, teehee~ You have my email, right? I lost yours, and I thought it'd be cool to write a letter in the technology era, so I bullied your address out of Izuki! Just hit me up, and I'll arrange the times for everybody.

Ahh, Midorimacchi wants to say something, how rare!

Kagami, I regret to see that you are doing well. I have calculated the time it will take for this letter to reach you, and was able to get some special information for you, so be grateful, you dimwit. On that day, May 9, your sign is supposed to have the worst luck. I suggest an umbrella.

And that's it from Midorimacchi!

"What…"

Later, Tigercchi! Hehe 6: (that's a smiley face with its tongue sticking out, by the way. Midorimacchi just tried to grind my head into dust, so it came out funny!)

Bye~

"What a pain in the neck," Kagami growled. "Giving me a headache so early in the morning with his irritating Japanese—"

Suddenly, the sprinklers doused him with water and simultaneously, the fire alarm screeched as if its sole purpose in life was to scream Kagami's eardrums to bits. Black smoke was pouring from the kitchen.

"Mother of god—"

And looks like it was raining outside as everyone began running out of the building.

I suggest an umbrella.

"Umbrella, my ass!" Kagami snarled, whisking the pan off the stove. Cue forgotten banana peel on the floor and—

Yeah, Kagami really wished he had an umbrella as the hot, burnt contents of the pan splattered onto his face. He settled for a long, drawn-out scream of anguish and pain.

Tell Midorima to take his horoscope and his luck and whatever else he has and to screw it into a tree! And, I'll come! I have one more exam here, so after this week, I'll fly to Japan.

Kise grinned and beckoned his roommate to come look at what Kagami had just sent him. "Isn't that great, Midorimacchi?"

With a distinct hmph, Midorima returned to bandaging his fingers.

"Ahh~ As I thought, I really can't get along with Midorimacchi."

Kise tucked his arms behind his head and twirled around in his chair.

"Won't it be great?"

"What," Midorima grunted.

"Seeing everybody again! I already got confirmations from the rest of Kurokocchi's team that they could all come. All that's left is to set a date and then we'll all be together again!" Kise, ignoring Midorima's lack of reply, laughed and threw up his arms. "It's been so long, too! We're all already nineteen. It's been a year since everyone's been together. And a year since…"

Midorima's eyes flickered up from his task before darting back down to stare at the white bandages. The time from one year ago was a touchy subject nobody liked to talk about. If anything, everyone wanted to forget it. But, it couldn't be so. Of course. Because what had happened had happened, and the only thing to do was to deal with it. One couldn't change the past, so one had to build up on the past and use it to move forward. One could only use to past to prepare thoroughly for the future.

Though what had that incident taught Midorima to prepare for? He wasn't sure. Maybe it was to never make friends again, to prevent ever feeling the pain of losing one again. Maybe it was to keep an eye on everyone he held dear to make sure they would never disappear.

Well, in any case, it taught him that Oha-Asa, as always, was to be heeded. The advice given by Oha-Asa that day… if only he had paid more attention and been more wary…

Be careful! Watch out for your precious things, or you might end up losing them!

"…Midorimacchi? Y-Your hand…"

Midorima blinked. There was a strange white lump where his hand should have been. He blinked again and realized that he had been so caught up in his thoughts that he'd used the whole roll of bandages to bind up his fingers and was now left with some strange-looking tumor-like object that would surely take hours to get rid of.

"You can use fire to burn it all off!" Kise suggested happily as Midorima began unwrapping his hand. His suggestion was met by a cold gaze, which clearly conveyed the idea that Midorima was not going to have any more of Kise's ridiculousness so help him, God.

"…when do you think we will meet up?"

"I'm planning on the day it happened," Kise said, uncharacteristically quiet. "It seems more proper that way, you know?"

"So, then… May 19," Midorima murmured. It was a statement, not a question to which Kise nodded.

"Ahh, if only Kurokocchi… well, not like saying 'if only' will change anything," Kise said. He let his head fall back so he could smile wryly at the ceiling. "It can't change anything…"

It was a correct statement. Saying 'if only' would not change anything. It would not change the memories of that day, May 19. It would not change the truth of red on bright blue. It would not change the dreams each of Kuroko's friends had of that fateful day when Kuroko's life simply…

"Isn't that Kurokocchi up there?"

"Seems so. I never knew he could ride a bike."

"I know, right? He seems more the type to fall off as soon as he got on."

"That's mean, Dai-chan!"

"Wait—something seems weird."

Simply…

"What's he doing?! That idiot! The light's red!"

"Maybe the brakes are—the brakes aren't working?"

"He's going too fast—Dai-chan, you won't make it!"

"Shut up! At least I can try!"

…It simply wasn't something they liked to talk about.

"Hurry and call the ambulance, Satsuki! Aomine and Akashi won't make it, so hurry and call!"

"Ahh, how annoying that I can't seem to get that out of my head," Kise said lightly. He could tell from Midorima's grave silence that he was having a similar experience. It wasn't something they could talk about, something they could comfort each other about. It wasn't anything that could be fixed. They could only accept it, because it had been…

"No! Come on, Kurokocchi, wake up—come on!"

"Strange…"

"What? Akashi, you can still talk about weird things even in this sort of situation? How are you so calm?!"

"Calm down, Mine-chin…"

"No, this whole thing is strange when you think about it."

"Save it for later! The ambulances are here, get out of the way!"

…it had been only an accident…

"Stop pacing like that, Kise. It's making everyone else nervous."

"I need to do something! I can't just sit down and wait while Kurokocchi is—while Kurokocchi is…"

"What was he doing anyways, that idiot?!"

"Calm down, Mine-chin…"

"Shut it! That's the second time you've told me that today! This isn't a situation in which you just tell someone to calm down after their friend's been run over! That damn driver—I'll—"

"Shh, Dai-chan… it was an accident… it's no one's fault."

"Was it really an accident?"

"What's that, Aka-chin?"

"No… it's just that it's strange…"

…an accident that no one liked to talk about.

"Ahh, whoever said bad things fade with time was a big fat liar!" Kise grumbled. "Hey, Midorimacchi! Let's go out to eat! Dinner's on me."

"But the test tomorrow—"

"Ah, screw it, it's just one test."

"But I must prepare—"

"Just bring ten of your lucky items tomorrow and be sure to pack your specially made rolling pencil!" Kise laughed and grabbed Midorima around the neck. Midorima protested weakly, but ultimately allowed Kise to drag him out the door.

It was an accident that no one liked to talk about because they didn't want to believe the possibility that it actually hadn't been an accident.

They didn't want to consider the possibility that it had been a suicide…

…because if Kuroko had actually committed suicide…

…it would have been because of his friends.

Yes, it would have been his friends to drive him to the point of being suicidal and trying to take his own life. And because this was an idea so horrific and so terrible, his friends simply called it…

An accident.

/edit: Jul 16 because of some super embarrassing typos T.T

This was an idea that suddenly popped up into my head one day. I wrote half of it weeks ago, and then figured out where I wanted that half to go, and wrote the rest of this chapter, as you see it.

Thank you for reading!