The three girls blinked confusingly at their nervous blonde friend, the volleyball team manager Yachi Hitoka, who was definitely more agitated than usual. It was normal for the girl to feel scared over everything. Today was no exception, but this was just plain absurd.

"You didn't do anything to her, did you?" The tallest among them whispered to the girl who was the first to witness Yachi in her current state. The latter shook her head, and even though they would ask Yachi, she would only freak out and try changing the topic in a very obvious way.

Just then, a bag was placed on the seat in front of Yachi, causing her to flinch and yelp. The other girls looked at her in surprise when the blonde stood up all of the sudden with her chair toppling over as she yelled "Good morning!" loud enough for the students in the hallways to hear.

The girl in front of hair flinched as well, looking at her with wide eyes and an anxious facial expression. "G-Good morning, Yacchan… you seem to be greeting me far too excitedly since yesterday…" Said girl bowed, feeling shivers and paranoia creeping up to her spine. Every one of them waited for Yachi to say something else, anticipating.

Yachi was shaking down to her knees, rambling inside her mind. What now? She can't just go and tell people that the issue is getting out of hand! They would be terrified! Kageyama's normal face is scary enough, what more if he was mad? More importantly, did Sensei even tell Kageyama the name of the person who received his package? Does this mean their mail gets mixed up all the time? How come none of them even bother to give back their packages to each other? And Yachi even participated in opening the packages! They are all going to get arrested!

Just when the thoughts were getting worse, the bell rang and everyone scurried back to their seats. Yachi sat back down, frustrated at herself for knowing about all necessary information this whole time and not doing anything to help the people involved to fix their mess.

Then again, she wasn't even sure about it. There couldn't be just one Ishikawa in the entire prefecture, right?

Their homeroom teacher walked inside the classroom, setting down her folders. "Good morning, class." She greeted, as usual. The class greeted her, as well, before she started reading the papers she was holding. "Now, let's see… Adachi?" The rollcall started like it did every day. Yachi knew that she was one of the last people to be called, which always meant that she had all the time in the world to be nervous as she was.

She remembered the first time Kageyama brought the box to practice. She had her suspicions even at that time, but she never really had the evidence to tell anyone. Now she's wondering if she should have spoken up that she knew someone who had just recently moved near Kageyama's address. The couriers of the packages must have been confused, but who was she to barge into the issue? Why didn't they just confront each other about missing mail and packages? Or maybe she didn't even know that there would be any mail for her… she didn't seem like the type to check the mailbox.

"I can feel you glaring daggers at me from back there. You're scaring me, Yacchan."

Yachi was snapped out of her thoughts, not realizing that her eyes had been burning holes at the back of her friend's head. "Huh? Oh, I'm sorry. I was spacing out." She defended, her lips quivering as she tried to speak once more. As she spoke, their teacher happened to say the same thing as she did.

"Ishikawa?"

And as expected, the girl in front of Yachi; a girl with beautiful light brown hair with orange undertones tied into a ponytail, raised her hand. "Ishikawa Hirari, ma'am!"


"Are you still thinking about Kageyema's reaction from yesterday, Tsukki?"

Tsukishima grunted, feeling the urge to tell his companion to shut up while they eat lunch. "Why would you even expect me to think about that?" He raised an eyebrow, picking up a piece of beef strip from his lunch box before popping it into his mouth. Yamaguchi smiled. Just because Tsukishima doesn't care, it doesn't always mean that he never bothers to analyze things.

"Yeah, but it's suspicious, isn't it?" Yamaguchi insisted. "I mean, Kageyama received countless mails obviously addressed to someone else, while his gets lost to a different house, as well. And even though Takeda-sensei handed him over a package yesterday, he didn't even realize anything."

"So why didn't you say anything, then?" Tsukishima immediately countered, yet failing to push the topic aside. Yamaguchi was used to every side of the cold-hearted Karasuno blocker, so he remained unfazed. "I was actually surprised that you didn't say anything smart yourself, Tsukki."

Tsukishima's eyes fell on the vegetable in between his chopsticks. "I don't want to say anything without proof."


The day ended and Yachi failed to even say anything.

Yachi was in the same art class as Hirari, but all she ever did was glance back and forth from her drawing to her friend, causing Hirari to freak out even more. In the end, she never really got the chance to talk to the girl in private and ask about receiving Kageyama's mail the day before. Hinata is literally always around Kageyama, so she never got the chance to do anything during practice, as well. Also, interrupting practice over something trivial didn't sound right to her at all, given that Kageyama has priorities.

Or maybe she was just making up excuses so she didn't have to be the one to get In the middle of such an awkward situation. She could just be overthinking and it could be just a different person. What are the odds that Kageyama's neighbor could also be studying in Karasuno?

In the end, Kageyama soon left with Hinata when practice ended, which was unusual since the two always stayed later than the others. One reason could be that the quizzes they had in class earlier must have exhausted them. Anything that involved thinking exhausted them more than volleyball ever did. That, or Hinata had spiked enough balls for today's practice, which was one extremely rare case.

The duo walked alongside the team, stopping for pork buns on their way home. Soon after, each of them separated towards different crossroads. Hinata took the mountain trail while Kageyama went on his usual road home. The night in Miyagi was peaceful as always. It was quiet and uneventful; it never failed to reassure Kageyama that his walk home would always be safe. Although uneventful, Kageyama liked it this way.

He would pass by his neighborhood soon after, remembering that there was one noisy thing every night. At first, he was surprised to even hear a random bark. Now, he's used to it to the point that the neighbor's dog would bark at him and he'd just keep walking instead of trying to challenge the puppy in a staring contest. He would pet it, but getting his fingers injured because he wanted to pet an animal through the neighbor's gate was out of the question.

When did their neighbor even get a pet? How many weeks has it been since he first saw the dog? He didn't bother to count.

As soon as Kageyama turned into a corner towards his street, a familiar bark distracted him from his walk. He glanced at the neighbor's gate, a familiar puppy wagging its tail upon seeing him. For some reason, the animal didn't bark at him out of anger anymore. It seemed more like it was happy seeing him now every time he passed by. With a brief glance, he decided to continue on to his way towards his house.

He walked into his front porch, taking one last glance at the neighbor's dog then the neighbor's house. Kageyama always believed that he probably had only been imagining it, but the house seemed different from what he remembered it to look like as a kid. Not that he ever paid attention – he wasn't really friends with the neighbor's kids. He didn't even know if the neighbor had kids. Come to think of it, do they still have the same neighbor from when he was younger?

"I'm home." Kageyama monotonously announced, not bothering to wait for an answer. He wasn't really sure if anyone else was home yet, but he always had spare keys with him in case no one was. Taking off his shoes, he started rummaging his things, looking for his keys when he heard the dog from next door start barking excitedly again. His neighbor must have arrived home, as well.

As he rummaged in his bag, he remembered the new pair of knee pads he had just received yesterday from Takeda. "Ah, crap. I forgot I had these." He mumbled to himself, taking the gear from his bag. "I'll use these tomorrow instead." And after a few more rummaging, he finally found the keys to his house. He inserted the key, when he heard a female's voice say "I'm home!" from next door. Turning the keys, he stepped in and breathed in his home's scent.

Luckily, tomorrow was a Saturday. More volleyball for him.

He tossed a few times up in the air while lying on the bed, when he heard someone announce that they were home. With that, he sighed, letting the ball drop to the floor before closing his eyes to finally rest. The night will go by quick, as usual, he knew. His dreams mostly consist of nothingness or monochromatic events – mostly his past as the lone kid who spent most of his time in an empty court than in the park or playground. On rare occasions, he would dream of colorful images. He never really remembers any of them upon waking up, so it stopped being a big deal to him whatever his dreams contained.

Morning came faster than Kageyama expected, mostly because the puppy next door started barking at around 4am. He didn't really mind – he was a morning person, after all. He always woke up before anyone else did at his home that he was used to having only sandwiches for his morning diet. It wasn't healthy enough, but he was just thankful for the rare occasions that his mother would wake up before him and cook a proper meal for her boy. He didn't really blame her for anything; he was fine either way.

Kageyama showered quickly and made two sandwiches with whatever ingredients he found in the kitchen. Unfortunately, they were out of mayonnaise, but he still had some fresh milk left in the carton for his daily dairy needs. With a glass of milk, he stepped outside into the break of dawn.

His eye twitched, his grip almost cracking the glass.

There, on the front porch, was another package.

Creases immediately appeared on his forehead and in between his eyebrows when he stepped angrily towards the small object wrapped up in plastic like it usually appeared. As he stepped closer, he heard the neighbor's dog barking from beside their lot.

He bent down to pick it up, reflexes causing him to turn his head when he saw the neighbor's gate open. A girl went out, picking up something from the mailbox with her back turned towards Kageyama. Seeing as he did not recognize her, (he didn't even bother waiting to see her face) Kageyama picked up the package with his other hand and went back inside. This time, he recalled their coach Ukai saying something and telling him that it was actually illegal to open packages and addressed to someone, so he didn't dare rip up the new arrival.

Fortunately, Takeda-sensei told him that if the package had no name on it and was delivered to his address, then it was understandable if he initially thought that the packages were for him. The only reason why he didn't was because he never had anything delivered to his house for the past two months except for the knee pads. It's not like anyone would even send him gifts, as well. No one in the volleyball club or the entire Miyagi prefecture knew his exact address.

Yawning, he placed the package into the legendary box before leaving. At the same time, a certain female had just recently finished sorting the mail. They both walked their separate ways, backs turned toward each other and passing each other's houses as they started their day towards different routes and different plans for the day.

The volleyball club always had a talent for fast forwarding the day until they start practicing. Everyone was busy preparing for a scheduled practice match in the afternoon. Yachi, who was running to the gym, crossed paths with Hirari, who was also running towards somewhere. Yachi had completely forgotten to ask about her friend's address as she continued to cram for the preparations to the practice match.

Hours passed, and Karasuno won 2-0 against their opponents. Luckily, both teams were able to learn from each other. Tsukishima, much to his dismay, had accidentally developed a new fan from the opposite team who kept bugging him about read-blocking and how cool he was. Yamaguchi would only chuckle at the scene, obviously so proud of how far Tsukishima has improved in such a short amount of time. Meanwhile, Hinata would get jealous and offer the first-year fan some lessons of his own.

It was already 8 o'clock when Kageyama passed by the barking dog and walked into his front yard. This time, he didn't enter immediately. Taking a glance at the neighbor's gate once again, he could hear a female's voice scold the puppy for being too loud in the middle of the night. He then entered his home, announcing his arrival, as always.

In the other house, a mother was convincing her daughter to take the other route home next time. "I heard your friend's coming back to Miyagi. Her house is alongside the other route, right? You should take that one so you could have someone walk with you next time."

Kageyama had lived in Miyagi long enough for him to memorize all the possible routes home. As a well-built male, he was pretty confident in taking the quickest route, even though there were lesser streetlights and danger could be lurking in every corner. He was never really paranoid – for some reason he didn't know, he was never a target of possible serial killers or hostage-takers. Maybe it's just his face? Did he really look that angry all the time? Not that he would complain if it was to scare danger away.

Plus, taking the other route meant going through a busy and noisy marketplace and he wasn't too fond of that idea. He liked the quiet route.

He drifted off once again into his dull dreams, the sports ball lying idle on his between his two palms this time.

Before he could even process that the next day was a Sunday, he woke up in the morning of the weekend. There was no barking dog this morning; it concerned him a little. He yawned and stretched; he even did a few arm exercises with his dumbbell before he took a nice shower. The morning seemed a bit chilly for him; he decided to wear a jacket, just in case. With that, he left the house, seeing as there were no packages for him to take inside.

He looked towards the direction opposite his usual route and found a retreating figure of a girl and a puppy on a leash, walking to the other route. He then turned around to pass by the said girl's house to walk to his usual route with hands in his pockets.

Kageyama reached a crossroad where he found Hinata running. A trigger in his instinct caused him to run faster than lightning, catching up to Hinata in no time. They ended with a draw, panting and heaving in large amounts of air, unable to complete one whole sentence without stopping to breathe.

"You… that… was a false start…" Kageyama blurted out, yet Hinata did not reply due to lack of sufficient oxygen circulating in his brain. Unluckily for Kageyama, Hinata was always the first to recover from a tired state. "So did you find the sender?" Hinata reminded.

Kageyama looked up from his tired state, still panting. "I'm looking for the addressee, dumbass. It's easier than looking for the sender when I don't even know where it's from." He straightened his posture and placed his hands behind him, trying to stretch his torso backward.

"Well, then, why don't you go ask your neighbors?" Hinata suggested, irking Kageyama. "I don't know my neighbors." The taller boy argued back while they started walking towards the direction of their destination. Today, they will be going back to Tokyo for a few practice games before the school week starts once again.

"Then make friends with them! Who knows, maybe you have the same address, after all." Hinata asserted and Kageyama swore that it was the dumbest statement Hinata had ever made since they first met.

The Karasuno team gathered inside the bus, where some of them even managed to catch a few winks before the game. They reunited with their friendly rivals, Nekoma High, both teams thrilled to be facing each other in a match like always. Kageyama always promises himself that he would finally be able to approach Kozume Kenma, the opponent's setter, nicely but only succeeds in scaring him off every single time.

There was a short break after two sets of Karasuno and Nekoma. Yachi and Shimizu handed the team some water bottles to replenish their spent fluids. Everyone went to admire the players on the other side of the net. Tsukishima was approached by Kuroo, captain of Nekoma and his blocking mentor, even though his annoyed gaze warned the Nekoma blocker not to. Kuroo didn't mind the cold stare from the first-year Karasuno middle blocker, though.

"You know, there was this girl who temporarily became a manager for us." The conversation started with Kuroo opening a topic that absolutely had nothing to do with volleyball. "She had to transfer schools, though, since she was only here in Tokyo for an application for a scholarship program. It was surprising since she was just a first-year, yet she was a pretty smart little lady. Got along really well with Kenma, too."

"I see." Tsukishima replied, pressing a towel to his neck, uninterested. "Man, you should be more interested in girls. You'll never get a girlfriend at this rate, you know." Kuroo teased, although he already expected what Tsukishima's answer would be. The blonde moved the towel to his forehead, removing his glasses with his other hand.

"I'm not trying to." Tsukishima said. Kuroo sighed in defeat. "Thought so. But anyway, I'm just telling you this because I recall that she had a friend back in Miyagi. Thought you might know each other."

Tsukishima didn't have any female friends, so he just looked at Kuroo funnily without saying another word. "Then again, maybe you don't. I think she was originally studying in Shiratorizawa, after all."

The coaches called upon their teams for a meeting, leaving the conversation open-ended. The match started and ended quick and the teams ended the day with new learnings to incorporate in their future official matches. It was an eventful weekend.

Kageyama and Hinata were forced to go home early due to Daichi refusing to let them in the gym for reasons that they could spend the rest of their Sunday resting. Like the usual set-up, Hinata would bike along the mountain path and Kageyama would walk through the quiet route home. He was usually the only one walking – only a few motorcycles and small vehicles passed through that road – but this time, there was something different.

Across the road, there was a familiar girl walking alongside him. He didn't think it weird; the night was still young compared to the other times that he went home. She was walking a bit ahead of Kageyama, so he had no idea if she ever noticed him there. Still, Kageyama failed to remember her face. Maybe he should start paying attention to his neighbors now?

He remembered what Hinata told him.

He would never just approach a girl while she is walking home alone in the middle of the night – this one was holding a baseball bat right in front of her warily. Self-defense? Kageyama just didn't want to be labeled a creep or arrested for assault. He most especially had no intention of getting on the receiving end of a baseball bat. Nevertheless, he had never seen the girl walk along this route before. His thoughts ended when they both reached home and she would greet her pet dog while Kageyama walked past her house.

The next day was a Monday. It was a pretty much normal day for Kageyama, except that he managed to have someone walking with him tonight, as well. It was 7:30pm in the streets where the lights were dim. She had a golf club instead of a baseball bat. Again, not one of them ever acknowledged the other until they reached their respective homes. Kageyama secretly wondered which was more painful to get hit by: a baseball bat or a golf club. He didn't want to know.

Soon after, it had become a norm for Kageyama as the days of the week went by – much like the puppy that had been barking at him since Day 1 when it was brought into his neighbor's house. She was always walking ahead of him, so he doesn't really know her face and he never asked for her name. She stopped bringing random self-defense weapons with her and started acting like a normal girl on her way home. Not that she wasn't normal; it was just a bit disturbing for Kageyama to see a small girl ready to beat the crap out of anyone who approaches her.

On the fourth night, she finally seemed to notice his presence when she briefly turned her head sideways to slightly take a peek at him, but she didn't seem to react to him as if he was a threat. Maybe she knew he was walking the same route all this time? None of them really minded it.

The usual happened. She would get into the gate while Kageyama would walk into his front porch. He hadn't been receiving any new mail the past days, so he assumed that the sender must have been 'back in Miyagi' or whatever one of the notes said. He had forgotten it over training.

"I'm home." He announced, not expecting anyone to be home. However, a warm feminine voice called from the kitchen after he spoke. "Welcome home, Tobio." The distant voice greeted him. It seemed his mother was home early tonight. Removing his shoes, he passed by the kitchen on the way to his bedroom.

"Oh, Tobio… about the box of packages you had been receiving…" Kageyama stopped in his tracks, stunned by his mother's words. She went into his room while he wasn't around? He wasn't really hiding anything from his family, so that was okay with him, but it still didn't make him any more comfortable. "A delivery boy came to our house earlier, apologizing for getting our addresses mixed up with someone else's. It appears there have been quite a few troubles with their outdated maps the past months. Apparently, the house next door was mistakenly registered with our address after a family moved in months ago."

Kageyama's eyes widened. He went a few steps back and bolted into the kitchen in the blink of an eye. His mother turned around to look at him in bewilderment at her son's sudden movements. They both stared at each other, waiting for one of them to say something. "T-Then, I can… I can take the box outside tomorrow?" Kageyama stuttered. It's been a while since he had said anything to his own mother.

The woman set the coffee she was drinking back on the table, before speaking. Kageyama noticed that there were piles of paperwork on the dining table. It must be work. "Yes, please do. It was kind of you to even place them all in a box, too. Just seal it, and it's good to go."

Kageyama bowed politely before heading out the kitchen and into his bedroom. He had things to fix, after all.