Past, Present, Future
Disclaimer: Don't own.
They grew up together, in the same neighborhood, in the same group of kids who played soccer and hide and seek and kick the can and rock paper scissors and kickball and tag every afternoon and evening and weekend and vacation, a solid group of working-class families. Ootsubo was always the oldest, a few months ahead of the twins three doors down from him, and a few years older than the younger Kawasaki who tagged along with her older siblings despite their best efforts to dissuade her. Only a few of the kids ever showed any interest in basketball.
Nakamura didn't at first. Well, he did and he didn't. He liked watching the games on TV, always had trading cards in his back pockets and doodled hoops in the margins of his school notebooks. But he couldn't make a layup, couldn't dribble well, and was too short to do much rebounding (not that any of them were legitimately tall enough, but Nakamura was always on the short side). So he decided that basketball wasn't for him, even though he loved it, and went on with his life until Ootsubo was ten and Nakamura was nine and they desperately needed someone during a recess scrimmage. Three on two just wasn't fair, even if Ootsubo was a lot better than everyone else, so they called over Nakamura because they all knew him and liked him well enough and at least he knew the rules.
Somehow, over the course of several years, Nakamura had learned how to steal. Where it had come from, this sudden agility and sleight of hand, none of them could figure out (Nakamura himself claimed he'd always had it and actually seemed to believe himself). Of course, once he actually got the ball his passes were still shitty and he still couldn't shoot or rebound, but that didn't really matter.
Ootsubo had been more than a little impressed with this, and as a result he sought out Nakamura for neighborhood pick-up games and taught him how to pass (with somewhat limited success). Shooting was another matter entirely, something Ootsubo had neither the patience nor the skills to teach him. Still, though, he was making steady progress, even though his passes were still sometimes in the wrong direction or overthrown. He learned to muscle his way out of a double-team (even being small and lithe, he was pretty strong) and how to grab a rebound off of an opponent's fingertips.
"Hey, Shinya-kun, you should think about joining a team when you go to middle school," Ootsubo had said one spring night when he was twelve and Nakamura was eleven. "That's what I'm doing. If you go to my middle school, we'd play together."
"Yeah," Nakamura had replied.
Of course, he had gone to a different middle school, the other local one that his parents had attended. Ootsubo was a little bummed, but playing against Nakamura would be fun, too.
Oh, how wrong he was. In his second year of middle school, Ootsubo Taisuke came to the horrible realization that he had created his own worst enemy.
Nakamura had gone through a growth spurt and was now taller than average (still not quite as tall as Ootsubo, but a lot closer than Ootsubo was comfortable with). He had also gotten glasses, which apparently fixed his passing problem (although he still couldn't shoot). And if anything, he was even better at stealing than before, and he was assigned to guard Ootsubo, who was his school's ace.
He did a damn good job of it, stealing and blocking and hedging Ootsubo in until he was ready to scream in frustration. He'd grab a defensive rebound and try to dribble back out but the ball would vanish from under his hands and Nakamura would send a low pass to a teammate and before Ootsubo knew what was happening the teammate had lifted a layup into the net. It was frustrating as hell.
Their teams faced off almost all the time in practice matches, too, due to their close proximity and the friendship between their coaches. Every time, Nakamura would shadow Ootsubo perfectly. There were a few times when Ootsubo got lucky and broke through the defense but they were few and far between (though they did happen). Still, they remained friends, separating their competition from real life, amicably chatting and hanging out. Sometimes, they'd play one-on-one, and Ootsubo would always win because his shot was much more reliable. They weren't quite best friends, but they were close.
Ootsubo couldn't help but notice the sweat dripping from Nakamura's entire body, the way he raised his arms to block and his incredible shoulders (did he really say incredible?) looked even more defined, the way Nakamura…distracted him. He was revolted that he couldn't pay attention to the game, but entranced by the graceful way Nakamura moved. But he was confused about a lot of things; that was okay. He was fourteen and Nakamura was thirteen and confusion is a rite of passage at that age.
"You know, it's probably because of you that I've gotten so good at offensive rebounding."
"Hm?" Nakamura looks up at him.
"I mean, you made it so I pretty much couldn't get anywhere with the ball or pass it to anyone, so my only option was to get under the basket and jump for the rebound, because that's the one advantage I had over you."
"Don't remind me," Nakamura says, looking down at his can of tea (he's smiling, though).
"Man, I wanted to play against you in high school more than once. It would have been fun."
"Hm," Nakamura says again. He's clutching the can tighter, denting it even though it's one of those really thick cans. His knuckles are turning white. Then, "You probably won't face me at all. Kise's determined to play this whole match, and his leg seems to be doing okay. Plus, you know, I think our third-years really deserve to be sent off fighting, whichever way this game ends. I mean…" he trails off and sighs.
Ootsubo frowns. "So you wouldn't fight?"
Nakamura twitches, as if he's about to look up again. "I'd fight. I'd fight my hardest. But please don't say that I'm a better player than Kise-kun, because that's not even a comparison that should ever be made."
Well, yeah, but that's not really the point. "You're a better shooting guard than Moriyama."
"He's a third-year. He scores; I don't. He's better."
Ootsubo snorts. "I'd have a much easier time of it if he was guarding me than if you were. Anyway, you know…Shinya-kun…"
Nakamura smiles, sort of. It's twisted and kind of decayed, rotted somehow. When did he get so jaded? "I know."
He knows that playing against him would be more significant to Ootsubo than playing against Kise, that Ootsubo doesn't really care about Kise personally—sure, he's a challenging opponent who's flat-out brilliantly talented and keeps pulling out new tricks, but Ootsubo has known almost nothing of him until this year. Nakamura is his main—not really rival, but sometime-antagonist and sometime-teammate, the guy he's watched grow alongside himself, the guy he thinks of when he thinks of basketball.
Nakamura's still gripping the can of tea tightly, so Ootsubo reaches over and removes one of the hands—it's easier than he expected, slipping it into his own. But Nakamura's still squeezing, clenching his shoulders and his quivering jaw. He wants this, too, wants this even more badly than Ootsubo—because Ootsubo would be playing anyway. Even if this was a match against some team made up of players Nakamura didn't know, he'd still want to play. He'd want it badly, to play in such a meaningful game, would curse himself for being greedy for wanting to play two games in a row, would somehow put on a smile and cheer wholeheartedly from the bench anyway because it's no use being self-centered now when he needs to help the team in any way he can.
"You should have come to Shutoku."
Nakamura shakes his head. "And back up for sure for three years? No thanks. At least here, I'll have a fighting chance to start next year. At least I might get a full game in."
The words die on Ootsubo's lips before he can utter them—that Midorima probably wouldn't have come if Nakamura was there, that Nakamura might have been able to start as a freshman, that he would have argued with Coach Nakatani to get Nakamura more playing time—but it's uncertainties mixed with blatant lies, things that will make Nakamura screw up his face and walk away. And that's not how it should end (if talking before the game like this is the end, which it had better not be). So instead he presses his mouth to Nakamura's quickly.
It's the natural progression of events, really, that they'd end up here like this.
Nakamura doesn't let go of his hand.
One day, they will rent an apartment together, and the living room will have a shelf in front of the window, and on that shelf Nakamura will place the endless glass bottles of green tea he drinks. He will go through at least a bottle and a half a day, not even bothering to pour the liquid into a glass because why bother dirtying another one? They will want to save on their electric bill and not run the dishwasher too often.
Ootsubo will become irritated and claim that he's too frugal and tell him to recycle them but it just won't get done and the bottles will accumulate like little pieces of history, stamped with expiration dates that go in sequences until the shelf fills up completely. At that point, they will recycle them all, carrying them down the stairs together, as many green bottles as they can carry filling their arms.
When they are done, Ootsubo will distract Nakamura from his tea by taking him in his now-empty arms and whispering in his ear words about basketball matches that were never played, matches between the two where Nakamura guarded Ootsubo and stole the ball, and Ootsubo's orange high school jersey stuck to him with sweat because he just couldn't keep up with Nakamura's nimble hands and quiet strength. Nakamura will press his lips to Ootsubo's neck and grin broadly so Ootsubo can feel it against his flesh and for a moment they pretend those games were real.