Chapter Text
Soulmates.
You know, the whole idea that you meet a person you’re destined to be with for life, the person that puts color and brightness in your life and stars in your eyes, and makes your heart feel like it’s going to combust just from a kiss. Where their touch feels like fire and their voice feels like magic over the skin, and no amount of time could ever bring justice to the desire you feel for them.
Well, everyone has one, apparently. They even have matching marks–a little something neat and magical–to solidify it.
Iwaizumi has known his soulmate since before he could even walk.
He didn’t know it at first, that this bundle of curly hair and big brown eyes would somehow come to be the be all and end all of his existence. Or at least, sometimes it feels that way.
See, they met because their moms were best friends, deliveries a month apart from each other, houses right across the street, all of that motherly bonding. Iwaizumi almost never had a moment alone in his childhood, at least not one that he could recall.
The hangouts started from naptime in the same crib and lunches in highchairs, and progressed to playing volleyball in the backyard and bug catching in the summer.
Iwaizumi remembers all the late night movie parties, complete with their favorite stuffed animals, onesies, and some popcorn. He can still remember the glow in the dark stars on the ceiling the Area 51 posters on the walls, the one signed jersey framed just by the doorway from their favorite athlete.
Those were nice times, but they weren’t his favorite.
His fondest memories, were the ones spent on adventures.
Oikawa Tooru has always been an adventure.
The moment he figured out how his legs worked, he walked everywhere. When he learned to run, almost no one could catch him. In fact, it was one of the things Iwaizumi prided himself on, for a while. Chasing Oikawa’s tattered and torn t-shirts through the forests behind their houses, feeling air rush through his lungs and his heart hammer in his chest and ears, feet thudding against cold grass and hardened mud until they reached the top of the hill.
And then, they’d stargaze.
Oikawa always said he loved to look at the sky at night, marvelled by the idea that things that looked so close together were vast distances apart. And that just because he was stuck on this tiny planet, in one spot in the universe, if he tried hard enough, he could open his hands and grab every little sun twinkling over his head and move them, he could break from Earth’s atmosphere and dive into the deepest parts of black space and see something more.
Iwaizumi tried, he tried with all the might his little heart could muster, but he never felt himself leave the cool grass.
He might have blamed that on Oikawa, with as long as he spent watching him.
Oikawa glowed with something luminescent that no one could place, but everyone loved. He always felt far away, like he was supposed to be somewhere else, but he still felt warm and bright.
Iwaizumi fell in love with photography, wanting to capture every moment he could because of the painful reality that nothing lasted forever. He worked hard to get himself a nice camera–by way of mom’s chore lists and dad’s home boot camp–and his finger never left the shutter.
Oikawa was a natural born artist. He was constantly sketching, painting, scribbling on almost any surface when inspiration struck him. It was a pretty interesting day when Iwaizumi had to worm Oikawa out of trouble for painting the night sky over a school desk–even if it was an old broken one, but Oikawa just said that’s why he chose it.
Iwaizumi remembers all the the paintings and drawings, the filled sketchbooks in his room that smelled like old paper and ink.
He remembers the way Oikawa looked when he’d come through his window at night, windblown and beautiful, and say, “let’s go on an adventure, Iwa-chan.”
And Iwaizumi never had it in him to tell Oikawa no. Or maybe he really wanted to go on that adventure. Maybe he wanted that little spark in life that Oikawa gave him, that diving into the unknown with shaking hands and a racing heart.
Iwaizumi was fourteen when it happened. He woke up one morning and his mom gasped and spun him around, fingers poking and prodding at the skin on his back. When she brought a mirror to him, his eyes widened and his jaw dropped at what he saw.
Of course, He’d always heard the rumors about them, soulmarks. Everyone at school talked about them, how you got them around the puberty stage, when life became an awkward hell that all the bumbling lemmings stumbled through until they figured out their individuality.
He never stopped to think about them, but he also didn’t want to.
He didn’t want to think about the idea that he was meant for someone, because the one person he wanted to matter to the most was right in front of him, across the street, singing at the top of his lungs to shitastic music or letting a pianist or violinist fill his room while he slapped paint onto a canvas and made it into some kind of masterpiece.
It never occurred to Iwaizumi that his soulmate would have been the one he was looking at the entire time.
To find that Oikawa had the same soulmark he did, a collection of constellations sprawled across shoulder blades and down their dominant arm, it did something inside of him, deep in the pit of his stomach.
“Soulmates, huh?” Oikawa mumbled while they sat on the same hill they always had, looking up to the stars again. “It feels weird, to know that some force out there picks who you get to be with.”
Iwaizumi’s heart almost sank.
“All things considered, I’m glad it’s you, Iwa-chan.”
Instead, his heart shot through his chest and made an attempt to join those silly little stars above his head.
Iwaizumi can’t remember when he fell in love.
It might have been the first time they went stargazing, or the first time they caught fireflies. It might have been the time Iwaizumi broke his foot falling off the roof, and Oikawa only started to laugh once he knew Iwaizumi was alright.
It could have been all those times Oikawa called his name, his nickname, with that silly little face and peace sign. Or the moments where Oikawa’s voice went soft and hushed, deeper, spewing out all of his dreams and desires about getting far, far away.
Oikawa Tooru was a mystery, a beautiful mystery, and Iwaizumi called himself the luckiest guy in the world to be fated for him.
Problem was, he could never keep him.
Oikawa avoided the conversation about colleges like the plague, and the day after graduation, he vanished, just like he always did when returning Iwaizumi safe and sound to his room after an adventure. Only, this time he didn’t leave a trace.
Well, maybe a little one.
Iwaizumi came home to a box on his bed wrapped in a bow, a little note on the side.
Go have your adventure, you might find something!
-Oikawa
Iwaizumi peeled the box apart to find a camera, his jaw dropping because it was the latest and greatest one out there, neatly tucked into a camera bag. Just underneath that was a painting, signed by Oikawa in the corner. The painting was beautiful, cherry blossoms set across the top and moving across the canvas, a small piece in the corner that told Iwaizumi this was painted right outside their school.
He was angry at first. How could Oikawa just up and leave him like that? With so many things unexplained, so many things unresolved, and Oikawa just disappearing with a couple of gifts in his wake.
But Iwaizumi took them. He saved the canvas, and the camera became his precious item, using it almost everywhere he went.
And off to college he went, pushing Oikawa into the back of his mind.
It started off great, with people taking an interest in both him and his photography. He filled out, bulking up and losing the acne, he and his dorm mate got along well, he got invited to parties, outings, the works.
But he couldn’t get rid of Oikawa.
He tried, once he learned that a lot of people didn’t know their soulmates yet, or that they didn’t want to be tied down to one, and Iwaizumi thought, “I could do that. I could change fate.”
So he tried. But there wasn’t a spark. Nothing. No one made him feel the way Oikawa did. And as much as he didn’t want to let that bitter truth sit on his tongue, he couldn’t help it.
So when Oikawa showed up to a party one night, a year later, looking windblown and gorgeous, Iwaizumi also tried to refrain from punching his lights out.
“Where the hell have you been?!” Iwaizumi hissed, clearly upset, visibly upset.
And Oikawa smiled, pushing a beer into his one hand and grabbing the other, pulling him away from the crowd and up to the balcony, where they sat in the cool air and caught up on life. Oikawa had been everywhere, having saved up money to just get out and go exploring. He wanted to see things, do things, like paint the skyline in the city or base jump with a wing-suit. And he did.
Here he was again, attending an art school just thirty minutes from Iwaizumi, deciding he wanted to get a complete education because “why not?”
Iwaizumi couldn’t find it in him to bring up soulmates, the idea of them having matching constellations marked across their bodies, skin stars with faint lines connecting them.
“Did you like the camera I bought you?” Oikawa asked, pulling his fingers through his hair and smiling over the rim of his beer can, cheeks tinged scarlet from cool wind and ethereal existence.
It surged through Iwaizumi, the fear that Oikawa might be here today and gone the next. “It’s the only one I use,” he replied.
Oikawa leaned close, so their knees were touching, running his thumb along Iwaizumi’s knuckle bed. He was tipsy, maybe worse than that, breath smelling like cheap beer but skin smelling like lavender and soft rain.
Iwaizumi took in the long lashes set above eyes brown and glistening with something, something that kept Oikawa somewhere in the skies and distant.
So, with both intoxication and love, he kissed him. Right there on the balcony of some frat house with nothing on the mind but pure adrenaline and Oikawa, he kissed him hard, knocking over empty beer cans as his hands reached for something, anything to grip onto.
And Oikawa kissed him back, by some miracle, pulling tight at Iwaizumi’s shirt and climbing his way into his lap.
Blood rushed to Iwaizumi’s lips and left them red and swollen as he pulled up for air, resting his forehead against Oikawa’s and drinking in the sight of him with eyes closed, smiling, skin flushed and breathing labored.
“Beautiful,” jumped out of Iwaizumi’s throat, involuntarily.
Oikawa let his arms hang over Iwaizumi’s shoulders and laughed. “Iwa-chan, has anyone ever told you how gay you can be?”
“Yeah, actually,” Iwaizumi wrinkled his nose, and shook with laughter. And the night continued like that, conversations with laughter, kisses in between, feeling like time had stopped even with the sunrise.
Iwaizumi got used to Oikawa’s presence again. They met up between, after classes.
Iwaizumi’s roommate gave him a weird look when he demanded heavily he have the room with the bigger window, but Iwaizumi didn’t care. He knew if he left the latch unlocked, Oikawa would at some point make his way up the tree outside.
And he did, all the time, coming through at odd hours, sometimes smelling like a fresh shower, sometimes smelling like alcohol and cigarettes--although thankfully Oikawa never smoked.
“Iwa-chan, are you happy?”
Iwaizumi watched Oikawa pull himself into one of Iwaizumi’s t-shirts and nothing else as he made his way over to him, climbing into his bed and curling up close, the cold sting of the sheets making him shiver.
“Why do you ask?”
“I can’t ask if my destined to be boyfriend is happy?”
Iwaizumi almost combusted on the spot at the word boyfriend.
“Oikawa, we–”
“We’re not dating. And some force in this world keeps telling us that we’re supposed to be together. And I hate the idea that someone, something is telling me what to do,” Oikawa went to reach for Iwaizumi, but as the words left his mouth, Iwaizumi snatched his hand and pushed it back at him, his jaw tight and eyes dark.
“If that’s so repulsive to you, then why are you here?”
“Because no matter how much I resist this stupid mark of fate, no one makes me feel like you do,” Oikawa sighed and bowed forward, pressing lips together, hands wrestled into Iwaizumi’s shirt.
It wasn’t “I love you” but Iwaizumi took it, he took all of it, as he pulled Oikawa free from clothing and tilted him back against his pillow, drawing out moans and gasps from his mouth and hearing his name strained and hushed on lips.
And the next morning, Iwaizumi got to bathe in the afterglow of his first time, Oikawa looking beautifully disheveled and tucked beside him.
A month later, Oikawa was gone again. He left a new painting for Iwaizumi;, this time it was something a little more abstract, with brilliant colors and soft strokes.
Iwaizumi rolled through the rest of college in a dull blur, everything feeling lackluster.
He got a job as a bartender, working his photography on the side, and moved in with a new roommate, hoping for that spark to kick in, something to put color back into his world and fire in his heart. It all felt stale, and it showed, even in his photographs.
He missed Oikawa. He missed the way he smelled, the way he spoke, the way he laughed. He missed kissing his nose or along the ridge of his shoulder, or down the inner side of his thighs and watching him quiver.
And the more he thought about it, the worse he got. Oikawa didn’t want a soulmate. Oikawa didn’t want him. No one knew what Oikawa wanted, because he was some lost enigma trying to reach for the nonexistent. The unobtainable. He was a dreamer with too many dreams.
Iwaizumi gave up after two years of waiting, and tried it again, to forget and move on.
He dated other people, he got promotions, he got his own apartment. And slowly, color came back. It wasn’t a spark, but a low flame, something comfortable, like a rhythm he could learn to move to.
Oikawa would always be some warm, wistful memory in the back of his mind.
Oikawa Tooru was untouchable, invincible.
Iwaizumi Hajime was his soulmate.
They would always be just close enough, but never quite together.
“These photos are incredible, as usual,” Iwaizumi’s boss grumbles a bit as he looks over Iwaizumi’s photoshoot of the Tokyo skyline. “You really do have an eye for this stuff, Iwaizumi.”
Iwaizumi rubs the back of his neck, bashful, shrugging his shoulders, that small smile of gratitude spreading across his face. “Nah, this one was easy. The helicopter ride was nice though, thank you for expensing that.”
“Company policy,” Mizoguchi chuckles, “as long as you don’t die on us.” He stacks the photos together and slides them back into the manila envelope. “I’ll get these upstairs so we can submit them for the ad. This was a big project for you, so you have some downtime before the next one. Oh! Here’s your bonus, as promised,” Mizoguchi slides a check to him, and adjusts his tie before he seals the envelope.
“Have a good night, boss,” Iwaizumi says, pivoting on his heel and stepping out of the doorway. He slings his bag over his shoulder, putting the check away and heading for the elevator. He’s got work at the bar tonight, and he knows Saeko would have his head on a platter if he showed up late.
His bicycle ride over is a breeze, nice because the autumn air is here, chilly but not quite lacking the remnants of summer. The sunset is soft, the warm glow falling behind buildings and the increasing number of neon signs that make themselves apparent. Like the sun is running from him the closer he gets. How familiar.
Iwaizumi shakes it off and straps his bike to the rack, heading inside to clock in and begin his shift.
“So? So! Did you get the bonus or what?”
“Hinata, I just got here,” Iwaizumi sighs, laughter on his lips as he punches his ID into the machine against the wall.
“C’mon, the photos were amazing, Iwaizumi-san!”
Iwaizumi whips out his bonus check with a grin, hearing Hinata hoot and holler with excitement, leaping high into the air like he always does. “Kageyama-kun! He did it! You owe me money!”
“I didn’t make a bet with you, dumbass,” Iwaizumi hears the disembodied voice from around the corner, and a few seconds later, Kageyama is in the doorway with a tray tucked under his arm and an apron around his waist.
“Congratulations, Iwaizumi-san. Are you off for a while?”
“Yeah,” Iwaizumi nods, putting his things into his locker and peeling out of his work clothes, putting himself into his bartending attire. “Aren’t you two supposed to be on vacation?”
Iwaizumi watches Hinata fidget nervously, eyes darting back and forth between Iwaizumi and Kageyama like he has some big secret that he’s not supposed to reveal. Well, it isn’t exactly that. It’s more like, bringing up anything on the topic of soul mates around Iwaizumi feels wrong, and rude.
It’s true, Hinata and Kageyama were supposed to take a week off to do God knows what somewhere. Iwaizumi met them as a pair, soulmates that squabbled almost on the regular, but when it came down to it, they were a match made in heaven.
Iwaizumi saw their marks, each with an individual wing on their shoulder, beautifully spread across their backs with feathers, dark and shiny and strong. Hinata always said that he dreamt of flying, and Kageyama promised to do his best to make that a possibility.
Gross in some ways, touching in others.
“We uhm… we decided to wait until spring. Maybe. Since we...got scouted,” Hinata touches his cheeks, now red as a berry, trying hard not to smile with all of his face. Kageyama tugs at the tips of his bangs like the equivalent of a baseball cap.
Oh, these two were sport stars, college volleyball players looking to join the national team as a duo. Iwaizumi only played recreationally, but after watching these two, he wondered what it would have been like if he’d taken it seriously the whole way through.
They were college students by day, waiters by night–Saeko having given them the opportunity to work a few hours and stash cash while they worked on their dream.
That was the kinda bar Saeko ran. Picking up all the dreamers and giving them a home, a safety net of sorts while they earned their stripes in the real world.
Iwaizumi had been here the longest, aside from Hanamaki, who was working on his doctorate. But Iwaizumi was different, because everyone here still had a place to go, some kind of dream to catch. He was just comfortable.
He’d graduated college and landed the job he wanted, a photographer of all sorts, doing giant projects like landscapes to even fashion shows. He worked at the bar to keep himself busy, he didn’t need to be here, but Saeko welcomed him like family, and he took it. His dream was achieved, so now he did what the rest of the adults do. Work himself into his grave.
“Congratulations,” Iwaizumi smiles, ruffling Hinata’s hair and giving Kageyama a solid pat on his shoulder. “I hope it works out for you two.”
“Uhm...Iwaizumi-san,” they both stammer, out of sync but with the same intention.
They exchange a look with each other, before looking back at him. Hinata speaks first, loud and just a little bit nervous, by way of shaking hands and sweaty palms. “W-Will you come to our graduation in the spring? We want you there! Our free tickets go to family first but… you’re like our second family!”
Kageyama nods beside Hinata to everything he’s saying, and with the way they keep looking at him like puppies that want their heads patted, he can’t say no. “Family...Asking kind of early aren’t you?” Iwaizumi asks nervously, fastening his apron around his waist.
“With your work, if we asked you any later you might have taken another project,” Kageyama answers.
“True,” Iwaizumi nods, shutting his locker and spinning the dial. “Alright then, consider me going. And, thanks for having me,” he grins, and they both grin back at him, before they hear the familiar yell of Saeko from the edge of the locker room.
Iwaizumi moves out onto the floor, pausing to wash his hands before he grabs his keycard and greets the couple of guests ahead of him. Hanamaki has already begun serving, and Saeko is making rounds to greet everyone–the way she always does.
“So, am I going to see your photos on a couple hundred thousand magazines soon?”
“Er, yeah,” Iwaizumi nods, “how’s the studying coming along, Makki?”
“If I didn’t love my subject so much I’d want to shoot myself. I’m still debating it, actually,” Hanamaki quips as he flips silverware between his fingers, the little show he puts on to make guests marvel.
“And then where would Mattsun be?” Iwaizumi smirks, pausing to greet a guest and take their order across the counter.
“He always says that if I die before he does, he’s going to tattoo dicks over the flower petals,” he shrugs, clicking his teeth as he shakes the canister.
Iwaizumi snorts, punching in the order onto the screen to send it to the kitchen in the back.
Hanamaki Takahiro. Iwaizumi has known him for a few years now, a witty guy with a pretty calm demeanor. He’s always been in competition with Iwaizumi, despite their amazing friendship, so he tries pretty much anything to one-up him any chance he gets. Hanamaki’s soulmate, Matsukawa Issei is similar. They’re truly two peas in a pod, decorated with pretty floral tattoos down their forearms.
“Will he be here tonight?”
“Nah, he’s pulling a late shift for training at the health center. He really wants to get his next credential so he can start working on more patients.” Makki shakes his head. Matsukawa was working to become a sports doctor, and he was a damn good one too, from how much Makki talked about him, and how many stories he had about superstars coming in with all kinds of injuries.
Matsukawa always received perks after healing one of those young punks in that facility. Tickets to all kinds of sporting events. Hanamaki called it a soulmate perk, Iwaizumi called it ‘lucky as hell’.
They don’t talk about their story too much, but apparently they both met at really low points in their lives, and somehow meeting each other made them both want to pick their asses up and do something better. They probably shit talk each other more than anything, but Iwaizumi has seen it, those little moments they have that are tender with unspoken affection riddled all over.
He pauses in his thoughts to take another order, flipping a fork between his fingers the way Hanamaki did and lightly smirking when he sees Hanamaki slyly flip him the bird from the side.
“Hajime!” Iwaizumi spins and looks down to find Saeko with a hand on her hip and the other underneath a tray. She reaches for his hand and gives it a firm squeeze, grinning from ear to ear. “Congratulations on your bonus!”
Iwaizumi gives her a side smile as he swirls a towel into an empty glass. “So when am I taking you to dinner?”
“A true gentleman,” Hanamaki says from behind, “take me too.”
“Please,” Iwaizumi chuckles, “I owe her. You on the other hand, eat too much.”
Saeko snickers at their small squabble. “Be nice, Hajime. Y’know, it’d be nice if we all went out soon. I found a really good place just across the way!”
“Sounds good to me,” Hanamaki smiles, sliding a martini forward and walking over to close out another tab.
Iwaizumi pivots on his heel to follow Saeko back into the kitchen as she goes to set down her tray and load it full of dishes. “Ah, Saeko nee-san! I’ve got it!” Hinata chirps, scurrying forward to take the tray from her and dash back out to the guests.
“These kids never let me work,” she frowns, shaking her head at the bundle of energy that has made his way out to the floor by now.
“You’re the boss, remember?” Iwaizumi mentions with a smirk. He reaches up to a shelf to grab another bottle of liquor to replace in the front, popping the top off and switching it for the thin nozzle.
Saeko fills another table order onto her tray, shrugging her shoulders. “I know, but I like keeping busy! Besides, the paperwork bores me to tears. I really have to thank Hitoka-chan for jumping on board with me,” she claps her hands together in a lighthearted prayer, eyes going towards the ceiling.
“Yacchan really does save us from a lot. I should bring her with us,” Iwaizumi snaps his fingers, gesturing the little finger gun towards Saeko like he’s landed on a brilliant idea. Saeko looks back at him with just as much intensity, before they high five each other.
“She’s in the back office, so stop by on your break okay?” Saeko smiles, and just as she’s about to lift the tray to head out, Kageyama swipes it from her hands, long legs carrying him out the doorway with a small “I’ve got it, nee-san,” thrown over his shoulder.
“Damn it!” Saeko snaps, clapping her hands together in frustration.
Iwaizumi folds the last of his laundry and tucks it into his bottom drawer, pulling himself into some drawstring sweatpants and motioning towards his kitchen. It’s late, probably around two in the morning–since he stayed over just a bit to help Hanamaki and talk to Yachi–but he’s pretty used to being up at this hour.
He doesn’t always like being up at this hour though, because it let’s him think about too many things. Like the box stuffed in his back closet that he can’t bring himself to throw away, or the camera that he was given as a graduation present that he can’t stop using.
Hanamaki made fun of him for it once, spending a little extra money on finding parts for the camera, versus just upgrading the entire thing. But Iwaizumi couldn’t bring himself to do it. The one time he thought about selling the camera his hands started to shake over the shutter. Plus, he’s taken many beautiful photos on it. He thinks of it like his good luck charm, with a little touch of Oikawa. So when people ask him why his photos always come out so beautifully, he can blame it on the one person who gave him the camera.
He pours himself a glass of water, thinking he’ll take it down and then head to bed. He doesn’t have much to do tomorrow outside of clean his apartment, cash his check and wait for his early shift at Saeko’s, so he can afford to sleep in late. It’s been a while since he’s been able to do that, he thinks to himself as he clicks off his kitchen light.
Iwaizumi goes to head for his bedroom, but as he pads across the length of his apartment, he hears knuckles rap against his door, quite harshly too, like the person on the other side might be in some kind of rush.
At this hour, it puts him on high alert. He wonders if it might be Hanamaki, or maybe Saeko. It could even be Mizoguchi. He highly doubts it would be Yahaba, but he won’t erase every possibility just yet. He double checks to make sure his baseball bat is still tucked into the umbrella bin by the door--he didn’t want to buy it, but his mom made him, and it just might come in handy–and goes to undo the latch. He peeks into the keyhole, but the person outside is covered by a hood, which only makes Iwaizumi all the more suspicious.
He could just not answer the door, but he also doesn’t want to leave it with the idea that someone is outside. He sets his glass down on the counter and reaches for the bat, tucking it behind him.
With a heavy breath, he turns the doorknob and pulls the door open.
Iwaizumi had at some point told most of the people that he’s close to about his life’s story. Saeko knows, Hinata and Kageyama know, even Makki and Mattsun know about it. He didn’t make it some long, drawn out story. But when the question of, “have you met your soulmate yet?” came about, Iwaizumi was running out of lies, and he really did love these people, like a second family. So he told them. About the walking enigma that he was so fated to be with. That he was so madly in love with. That he wanted to hate from his very core, and never quite could.
He told them because he never thought he would see him again. He told them because he thought he had moved on from that point in his life.
He told them because he never thought that he would somehow appear at his doorstep after five years, looking windblown and beautiful, ethereal, familiar scent of lavender and rain filling his head with too many flashes of the past, things he thought he had finally let go of–or at least locked away deep enough in his heart.
“Hi, Iwa-chan.”