The thing about being on a team was that you were obligated to care.
One had to care about the team's objective, one's performance, and rather unfortunately one's teammates.
One of the worst parts of that was the unequal distribution of emotional responsibility. They were all essentially one cohesive unit, a great machine with complex and unique parts which had different and specialized needs.
If the analogy were to continue, these parts formed systems of sorts. Different parts relying on each other more heavily than other more distant parts. Entire units operating in coinciding dances around each other, separate from other units but equally responsible and affected if any individual cog stopped turning.
Therefore a malfunction inside the jurisdiction of one system could wreak havoc on the machine as a whole before the other systems even knew there was a fault.
In short, most social circles and organizations separated into smaller groups of friends or acquaintances that were closer to each other than they were to the group as a whole. The Karasuno Boy's Volleyball team was no exception.
The third years had their own dynamic. It let them all be something close to friends without bending or overstepping the bounds of their respective positions. Suga's authority never overpowered Daichi's, even if his word was often the final one on any given decision. Neither Kyoko nor Asahi were expected to defer to either of them as fully as the underclassman. On rare occasion jokes passed between them that were incomprehensible to others, and even Asahi could be seen teasing the others once in a blue moon.
Most of the second years had their own cluster of familiarity, Tanaka and Noya being something of an occasional guest at the proverbial table. The second years, not counting these anomalies, were a closed group, sometimes distant from the heart of the team. Ennoshita was undeniably their leader and the most likely of them to venture into the terrain of the other groups. Perhaps their distance- casual teammates with vague feelings of solidarity in smiles and tears, radically different to the almost kinship shared between the rest of the team- was a direct result of the infamous Exodus of Coach Ukai Sr.
They had quit when the going got tough.
Although neither their teammates or the Coach held it against them, it seemed they were unwilling to forget the blemish on their own records. So they kept themselves distant, a vague sense of unworthiness following them, as they cheered their hearts out and practiced till they formed callouses.
Tsukishima could admit to respecting commitment like that.
Though he personally doubts he'd ever find himself dedicated to a group enough to put himself through, what must be, a terribly strenuous redemption quest. The stress on their bodies alone was off-putting, not accounting for the mental hoops they must have jumped through.
Speaking of mental hoops.
The first years, he begrudgingly admits, had been one of these groups. In a strange, round about way, Hinata and Kageyama happened to be around Tsukishima when he was feeling particularly chatty enough to let his guard slip. Yamaguchi's presence constantly nearby, accepting and content with the new additions, may have given his subconscious leave to relax too much for his own good. They had settled into an easy camaraderie of sorts; Tsukishima picked at their faults, the two idiots would get pissed or confused, Yamaguchi would try to not laugh. Rinse. Repeat. Turn heat to high when bored.
It was causal, and in some strange way that may be vaguely sadistic, it was reassuring. Tsukishima could prod at them without much thought and though they got angry, he could always see that it was never more than shallow annoyance or outrage. They were, through virtue of thick skin or thick skulls, of the rare few people who could tolerate, dare he say, even like to be around him.
He liked to be around them.
And wasn't that a terrible thought. They were easy people to be around.
Their hotheadedness gave him a headache more often than he'd like, and their respective forms of stupidity made him feel as though he lost brain cells the more time he spent around them, but he could admit to feeling something more than indifference toward the pair at this point.
He wasn't fool enough to deny the way they all gravitated toward each other when in stressful situations. Though contrary to what others may assume, he doubted any of them did it out of comfort. Perhaps the pairs of them respectively provided some form of comfort to each other, but deep down he knew the reason the four of them ever ended up meshing as well as they did was out of necessity.
They were the youngest. The new kids. The low men on the totem pole, out of place and finding their way through the motions. They payed due respect to their upperclassman out of necessity, and let themselves go around each other out of the same. It wasn't so much friendship as it was mutual respect and belonging. They gravitated toward each other in the same way lone predators find and form packs with other loners. There is no friendship, no real understanding, only the unspoken trust and loyalty born for survival's sake.
And that was it really. On some level he could understand Yamaguchi and Yamaguchi understood him. He'd never entertained the possibility of understanding anything about Hinata or Kageyama, not really. He could understand the base reactions- he's determined to excel because he was told he couldn't, he's conscious of criticism because of his middle school trauma, he gets up-in-arms about the team because they are his pride- but the more complex reactions were a mystery to him. One he'd never been interested in.
Until now.
Now his ignorance, his assumption that simple men have simple minds and simple motives, was putting his delicate balance of a social circle in jeopardy.
Despite never going out of his way to form it, he had been put through an awful lot of trouble because of it, and he'd be damned if that was all for nothing because of one misspoken jab.
So here he was, sitting on his bed in the middle of the damn night, thinking about the implications of sibling responsibility and the impact of guilt on one's mental stability.
Wow, where had he gone wrong in life?
A knock on his door drew him out of his thoughts. Before he'd even moved to answer, it swung gently open to reveal Yamaguchi. The other boy stood awkwardly just inside the door frame, a hand raised shakily in greeting, the other curled around his waist. He'd changed out of his school clothes and made his way here after texting Tsukishima to expect him. For some reason he still insisted on looking nervous. Tsukishima didn't even bother to get off of the bed before throwing the other boy a withering glare.
"Aren't you supposed to wait to be let in?" He grouched as Yamaguchi smiled shyly in response.
"Sorry, Tsukki." He murmured, making his way toward the bed, and Tsukishima knew he wasn't sorry at all.
He sat down heavily next to the blonde, scooting up next to the wall and burrowing into blankets comfortably. Tsukishima watched him with the thought that he resembled a nesting hamster. Goddammit, this was his bed not a couch.
Yamaguchi poked his leg with socked feet, a decidedly annoying gesture, but Tsukishima only managed to huff grumpily in response. Yamaguchi kept poking him until he resigned and leaned against the wall himself. The shorter boy watched him carefully for a moment before cocking his head slightly in concern.
"What's wrong, Tsukki?" He prodded gently, a slight frown marring his freckled face.
Tsukishima slid his gaze toward him silently, thinking through his response. Yamaguchi was twisting his hands in his lap like he did when he knew the answer but needed Tsukishima to put it out in the open.
Yamaguchi was rather fond of Hinata. Kageyama too, but Hinata especially. They got along well and Yamaguchi seemed to enjoy the other boy's company and presence. Naturally being friends with Tsukishima had always been an inhibitor to the other boy's social life, already made difficult by his natural shyness. It was times like this when Tsukishima genuinely wondered if it was worth it.
"Thinking about Shrimpy." He answered curtly. Yamaguchi continued to stare at him, the faint freckles around his eyes standing out against the relative smoothness of his face. His lips twisted slightly, not as much a change of expression as a twitch, but Tsukishima could read him just fine. He was waiting for elaboration, more than the obvious statement thrown at him.
With a sigh Tsukishima continued, already annoyed with the conversation, "Don't you think it's strange?" Yamaguchi rose an eyebrow in encouragement to continue. "How defensive he got about his sister like that?"
Yamaguchi watched him silently for another moment before turning to look at the far wall and humming in thought. He pursed his lips lightly and squinted, his face turning into a strange picture of concentration that Tsukishima struggled not to laugh at. Eventually he hummed in agreement, nodding almost to himself. "He's normally a lot more resilient, true," the brunet agreed softly, gaze sliding to the bed they sat on as he picked at it in thought, "it must have struck a chord, I guess?"
Tsukishima hummed in agreement, sliding down the wall until he was practically laying down next to his friend.
Yamaguchi watched him carefully before realization seemed to dawn and his gaze sharpened in suspicion. "You think there's something more there, don't you?"
Tsukishima smirked up at the other boy, vaguely proud at the connection he'd drawn. He huffed out a sigh by way of response, waving a hand in the air flippantly.
"All I'm thinking is that for such a personable guy to flip like that, there's more than one bad comment at play." Yamaguchi eyed him suspiciously, wrinkles forming between his brows as he fought to see the meaning behind Tsukishima's conjecture.
Eventually Yamaguchi's concentration slipped into pouting and he fell onto his side, flopping over Tsukishima's stomach dramatically.
"Tsukki," he sighed, half a whine, "I'm normally good at this 'read-between-the-lines' stuff but can you just spell it out for me this time?" He rolled over subtly, getting comfortable on the taller boy's bony torso. "Please?"
Tsukishima sighed, feigning annoyance, but ran his hand through Yamaguchi's hair in a comforting gesture. "Just this time," he relented with a roll of his eyes, "because you look tired and we all know how difficult thinking can be when you're tired." His tone was teasing and perhaps a little mean but Yamaguchi just snorted in reply before whacking his leg harshly.
"I'm thinking," he began, steering the conversation back to the point, "there's some past trauma going on here."
He held his breath subtly, watching as Yamaguchi tensed against him, alarm straightening the soft lines of relaxation he'd only just managed to ease into. Yamaguchi didn't turn to face him, but Tsukishima could hear the nervous frown he must have worn in the silence before he replied.
"Trauma?" He asked quietly, worry dripping through his coaxing curiosity. Tsukishima realized how leading that statement must have been, but couldn't really rule out whatever 'trauma' Yamaguchi had conjured up in his anxious mind. He didn't have any real evidence on what kind of trauma he meant.
"It might not be anything too bad," he reassured the freckled boy, despite the fact he knew it really could be that bad, "it's entirely possible it was just one bad accident that happened to stick with him somehow."
It was also entirely possible there was a huge black hole of a traumatic incident that caused the normally friendly and open Hinata to become hostile and closed when it came to his family. Thinking back to the not-quite-fight, Tsukishima was willing to bet that whatever put Hinata on the defensive so strongly was awful. He'd never seen anyone- anything have a look like that.
Except maybe he had.
When he was younger, he'd had a phase where he'd sought out the most brutal, most intense nature documentaries he could find. The bloodier the better. It was one of those strange phases he'd quickly grown out of and never looked back on. But the look in Hinata's eyes brought it all rushing back.
He remembers seeing those same eyes in a documentary. This one detailed the feeding habits of carnivorous birds of prey. It was one of the worst of the films he'd managed to acquire, and even his unwavering curiosity had given way to queasiness at the sight of the way the birds hunted, and killed their prey. They way they tore it limb from limb. Slowly, haltingly, fighting with each other, almost as if it were a game.
In that moment Hinata had the same eyes as those birds.
The same gold, the same sharpness, the clarity. The unflinching gaze, searching for every move, watching, waiting. Mocking. Hungry. Cold.
The Hinata he knew seemed almost a different person to the one who'd looked at him then. As if he were a mouse to be watched, toyed with, torn apart as it struggled desperately.
Whatever had happened to cause that shift was big. It was big and dark and it was angry. It prowled around the edges of the boy's mind waiting for someone to slip. It made him angry, it made him defensive, unwilling to share things that he normally would.
It hadn't slipped Tsukishima's notice that Hinata rarely talked about his family beyond brief mentions of his sister. For such a chatty person, it had always struck Tsukishima as a little out of character. He talked incessantly about anything and everything, except it seemed, himself and his family.
Tsukishima could probably reluctantly list the names of all the rag-tag members of the idiot's middle school volleyball team, but if asked anything about Hinata's personal life he would draw a blank.
Red flags raised on numerous occasions now, Tsukishima was less than willing to let sleeping dogs lie. Had it not affected him personally he'd be reluctant to touch the issue with a ten-foot pole, but now? Now, he was annoyed.
"You don't think it's some small accident though, do you, Tsukki?" Yamaguchi was frowning up at him now, that rare challenging glint in his eye.
Tsukishima liked this glint in particular, the one that said Don't lie to me, I'm no fool.
It showed that, contrary to popular belief, Yamaguchi had his pride and he wouldn't let someone walk all over it. Not even Tsukishima.
Most people assumed Yamaguchi was his lackey, someone he kept around to laugh at his jokes and back up his wit. What they were too stupid to realize was that Tsukishima didn't need nor want a lackey. What he needed was someone to expand on his jokes with an unexpected comeback. Someone to text him what he should have said in a argument that happened three hours ago, someone to call him out on his bullshit, and someone to tell him that just because his natural reaction to others was snark didn't mean he wasn't still a good person.
Sometimes it was conversations like these, where Yamaguchi read and pushed him out of his carefully calculated behaviors that reminded Tsukishima that perhaps weighing the odds and taking the safest route wasn't the right answer.
It would be so easy to tell Yamaguchi that he was worried over nothing, that Hinata would be fine, and maybe he'd be able to believe it eventually too.
But with Yamaguchi looking at him like that, like he knew he was right on the edge of lying to them both, like he was willing to let him if that's what he wanted, Tsukishima found that he didn't want to.
Getting away with things just seemed to lose its appeal, when you knew you'd been caught. Even more so when you both know it's only by their good grace you're getting away with it.
"No, I don't." He kept eye contact with Yamaguchi, studying the way resignation filtered into pride and happiness before settling into contemplation.
When most people looked at Yamaguchi they saw freckles, nervous hands, and a shy smile. Tsukishima knew him long enough to see more. He saw the careful consideration, the sharp wit behind the nerves, and he wondered sometimes how he could get the boy to show it openly.
"Well," the brunet interupted his thoughts quietly, fingers picking at the comforter under them, "if it's not small it must be big."
Tsukishima was tempted to point out the idiocy of that statement but Yamaguchi spoke up before he could.
"If it's big than I'm sure he needs help carrying it," he was staring at him now with a smirk in his eyes though the nervous smile stayed where it was, "and we all know you're lousy help."
Tsukishima snorted derisively in response before roughly pushing the other boy off of him.
"Talking to the Captain it is, then."
"The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team."
"We're a team. It's part of our job to help each other out, and to forgive each other quickly. Otherwise, we'd never get anything done."