Note: Occurs in their second year.
He looked up at the dark sky, as he jogged on the shore.
It looked very beautiful, the stars that sparkled, illuminating the night. He rarely saw such scenery in Tokyo, and he just now drowned himself in the view as he exercised.
This was where he vowed before, to a certain redhead, that he would devise a technique to overcome the Generation of Miracles in a ground battle, the same sea where both of them trained to be the Japan's best, and the same view where they both ran as waves crashed in their feet.
"Kuroko!" Speaking of the devil, the bluehead muttered. Kagami also ran beside him, and he chuckled at the thought that it was the reverse of the last year's event.
"Kagami-kun." He acknowledged, as the larger man kept with his pace. "What are you doing here?"
"Well, just wanna jog too." Kagami answered as he scratched his head, looking away from the smaller boy.
"I see." Kuroko said, as they continue to jog in silence.
It was an awkward music – the splash of the waves that was never really annoying, yet enough to consider their encounter not too quiet at all.
Unlike last year, this time their only goal was to defend their championship title, which became more difficult with Kiyoshi gone and misdirection not effective against Touou*. Despite those, they won the Inter-High, and today, they were again in the same beach where they launched a training camp last year.
"Thinking about something? You usually don't jog at this time." Remarked Kagami after some minutes of the silence.
"Kagami-kun, basketball is really fun, isn't it?" Kuroko locked eyes with the redhead, and the latter, as he noted, gave a look of you're-thinking-about-something-complicated-again before he smiled a little. He still could not get used to the fact that he could read his light like an open book, and also the fact that it was the same for him.
"Last year, at this place, all I could ever think was to beat my ex-teammates. Every single day, my mind was filled with thoughts about them acknowledging my basketball." The shadow started, looking up ahead. Kagami looked at him, trying to decipher what Kuroko really wanted to say. "During my middle school, everyone was better around me. Everyday, I spent my time practicing until late so that I could keep up with the practice menu for the first strings. I loved basketball, not because I thought it was fun, but because of the challenge."
"By the time I got into Seirin, I only thought about improving myself more so that I could beat them – I did not have the leisure to think I'm having fun." Kuroko continued, and then his lips turned up before looking at his light. And he stopped, and Kagami also halted. "But right now, I think I'm actually having fun in playing. The sound of shoes against the court, the feel of my hands in the ball, and the laughter of my teammates – us, Seirin – I never really thought I could enjoy basketball this much."
"Guess that much, huh… I was worried for nothing." The redhead said. "You seem more expressive these days. I mean, you still have that stiff speech and that damn poker face, but I can see that you're smiling more nowadays."
"I did?" Kuroko asked, and Kagami sighed that how unaware his shadows was about himself. "Izuki-senpai just told me a little while ago that he still find it hard to read me most of the times."
"That's just how it looked like to me! I mean, your eyes kinda sparkle when you're truly happy—" Realizing what he said, the redhead blushed and turned back to his shadows. "I…I mean, I guess, like that…"
Kuroko gazed at the night sky, the brilliant stars, and the moon that illuminated the tranquil shore where they stood.
But despite all those light that shone from above, he felt that nothing could beat his true light – this man in front of him. Maybe, just maybe, he thought, that he was the true source of this pondering about his happiness with basketball.
He thought that if Kagami would be gone, maybe go back to America, basketball would not be as fun. Seirin without his light was not a team he might like (he likes his senpai-tachi** and new first years, but still), and maybe beating the rival schools would be hard. And with those train of thoughts, he realized it was not really his skills, or the team, or the challenge, or the rival schools that made the sport fun – it was caused by the single person with the name Kagami Taiga.
"Kuroko?" the said person called out.
"I did not know you notice my expression too much, Kagami-kun," the boy teased with his deadpan expression and voice. The redhead groaned, but did not fight back, instead blushed a bit. "But, thank you. Thank you for sticking with me all this time." Kuroko bowed, almost 90 degrees.
"Waa-h! Hey, no need to be formal. Geez, stop this, you're being sentimental again." Kagami said. "I'm not gonna leave or whatever, okay? Anyway, let's finish this lap and sleep!"
They both jogged all way to the inn.
It was not as if Kagami did not acknowledge the gratitude from the boy – he knew how Kuroko overthought a lot, positive and negative things alike, and he actually just came up to see what he was thinking jogging up late at night. And it turned out that he just wanted to thank him, probably for beating the Generation of Miracles last year, or probably for this year as well. But he knew it was deeper than that.
Thank you for sticking with me all this time.
He recalled while he lie in the futon, and the smaller boy was just beside him. Of course, they're gonna stick together because they were light and shadow (and he was still embarrassed by that nickname), but lately, he did not care. He just enjoyed being around the other boy, not that he would admit it out loud. Kuroko is a hardworking man, yet his small, lithe body made him looked so vulnerable he felt the need to check him up once in a while. And he praised himself for being correct for that, because his shadow had a great sense of responsibility that he had to assure him once in a while about some things were not his fault, or that he needed to apology for. He was no mentally weak by any means, but once he got very moody, he knew he just needed someone to be beside him.
Suddenly, he felt little pale arms in his abdomen, and he shuddered a bit (trying not to shout, or else his teammates in the same room would get mad at him for waking them up late at night). And when he turned to the source of those arms, he saw that mop of light blue hair, and he heard the light breathing so close for his comfort.
"Kagami-kun…" the redhead heard Kuroko muttered in his sleep. "…thank you…"
And he just found his arms snaked around the smaller boy before he dozed off.
OMAKE
"Hey, Fukuda, Kawahara! Wake up!" Furihata shook both boys, as the latter weakly retaliated to their friend. "You need to see something!"
The two boys tried to sit up from their sits, rubbing their eyes lazily, as they asked the brunet to spill off the reason for waking them up.
"Look at Kagami and Kuroko!" he tried sound as excited as he whispered to both his friends, pointing to their light and shadow in the other end of the room.
The trio smiled, and Fukuda retrieved his camera and caught their picture.
Later, when the trio freshmen accidentally (purposely) let their senpai looked at the picture, Kagami had just to strongly argue that nothing happened last night and Kuroko disappeared as usual.
*due to Kiyoshi's injury. Misdirection oveflow, as told in the manga, renders Kuroko's usual misdirection useless in the later matches against Touou.
**senpai-tachi = upperclassmen