Yachi was gaping at the fact that she just bumped into Ushijima Wakatoshi. The alarms were ringing loudly in her brain and she was still in shock despite the stinging pain from her injuries.

The other boy merely gave a light smile. "Oh? Did the legendary tales of Ushijima spread throughout Miyagi now?"

Ushijima turns to give an annoyed stare towards the boy.

"Relax, Wakatoshi. My name is Semi Eita, nice to meet you, Yachi-san." The ashen blonde haired boy who introduces himself as Semi nodded lightly at her.

"O-oh. N-nice to meet you both. Ushijima-san. Semi-san. I apologize once again for the trouble." Yachi replied.

Semi shook his head, "Nonsense. This was all an accident so you don't have to worry about anything."

Their red haired friend came back with a bag of first aid kit supplies. "I'm here!"

"Thank you very much – um – " Yachi thanked the spiky red haired boy.

He smiles in return, "My name is Tendou Satori. Just call me, Tendou."

Yachi nodded in return, "Tendou-san, then. Sorry for the trouble."

"No problem!" He replied brightly.

Semi then began to kneels before Yachi and took out some disinfectant wipes to clean off her wounds and began treating Yachi properly. "Excuse me, Yachi-san." He spoke before gently cleaning her wounds.

Yachi nodded as she watched with concentration to not feel the stinging pain as the boy cleaned off her wounds and dabbed some disinfectant on her wounds.

"Does it hurt?" Ushijima asked, suddenly kneeling next to Semi and looked up to her in concern again.

Yachi shook her head with a trembling smile. "It doesn't hurt that much."

Yachi kept biting her bottom lip as she watches Semi dabbing the disinfectant on her knees. Yachi was grateful when Semi ended, her knees were bandaged properly again and she was able to stand up.

"Thank you for helping me out and I'm sorry for the trouble again. Um, I'll change the money for the medicine." Yachi began to rummage to her pocket to reach out for her wallet when Tendou stopped her.

"It's okay, Yachi-san. You don't need to change the money. As long as you can get better soon, that is already enough." He said kindly.

Yachi blinked in surprise, "B-but I have to repay you." She voiced.

Tendou laughed, "Don't worry about it, Yachi-san. Relax! It's not that much."

Yachi furrowed her eyebrows, "Um…can I repay you in some way? Perhaps - "

"Phone number."

Yachi was caught off guard when Ushijima suddenly replied to her. She watches as he took out his phone from his pocket and showed it to her. "You can give me your phone number."

"E-eh? O-okay then…" Yachi was so stunned that she just stiffly took his phone and pressed her numbers timidly in his phone and saved it as her name before giving it back to him.

Ushijima spent no time to waste and called her phone number at that moment, making Yachi's phone ring as she took it out to see his unsaved phone number calling her phone.

"Now you can save my number too." He spoke.

"R-right." Yachi replied stiffly and saved Ushijima's phone number. Still perplexed by this whole thing, Yachi looked up to Ushijima in anxiousness. "I still don't understand how my phone number can repay the change – will you be contacting me about this in the future?"

"Yes. I will contact you, Yachi-san." Ushijima replied simply. Yachi blinked a few times when she sees the edges of his lips turned up a little.

'Was I mistaken or did he…tried to smile a little bit?' Yachi wondered in her mind.

Yachi still doesn't really understand how this is equivalent to the money that Tendou bought for the medicine to treat her but the expressions on Tendou's and Semi's faces while they looked at Ushijima was questionable. So Yachi decided not to press for more questions.

"Will you be okay after this, Yachi-san?" Semi broke the awkward ice and turned to Yachi with a polite smile.

"Yes. I'll be fine on my own now." Yachi spoke.

"That's a relief. Well, we must take our leave now. We apologize for what happened." Semi said courteously with a sheepish smile.

"I apologize for bumping to you, Yachi-san." Ushijima says as he took another bow of apology.

"A-ah, it's fine." Yachi couldn't help but bow for apology in return, "I'm grateful for your help. I'll repay your kindness as soon as possible."

"Well, then! Hope to see you again, Yachi-san! Bye-bye!" Tendou says before the rest of the boys took their time to bid their farewell to Yachi and turned around to start running again.

Yachi watches them as they run to the distance. She caught Semi looking back once before waving at her as she awkwardly waved back in return.

'Okay, let's deliver the goods to Mrs. Fujiwara and go back home to rest.' Yachi then turned around to walk to the other side of the street.

She missed the moment when Ushijima turns his head around to watch her as she begins to walk in the opposite direction.

Throughout their running, none of the three boys talked about the previous event as they jog on their own paces. The air seemed a little odd for the conversation to start about the girl Ushijima just asked her number for.

It was very out of his character that he acted that way.

Tendou then glanced a few times towards Ushijima's face whose eyes seemed to be wandering to somewhere else.

"Huh? What's with that look, Wakatoshi-kun?" Tendou asked briefly as they were running.

A few seconds passed before Ushijima spoke out. "She has the same name as the editor from the Little Giant posters."

Yachi was so very much in shock when she came to school on Monday. As soon as she stepped into the school grounds after passing the school's entrance, a familiar tall figure suddenly appeared right before her.

"Yachi-san!"

"Gwah!" Yachi choked in shock as she jumps on the spot with fright.

She held her chest as she tries to calm her thundering heartbeat and looked up to see who just called her out of the blue like that. Recognizing his jet black hair and grumpy face, Yachi blinks at the person in front of her.

"K-Kageyama-kun?"

Kageyama suddenly felt uneasy and kept playing with the strap of his bag, "G-good morning, Yachi-san."

Yachi was finally able to calm down and greeted him back, "Good morning, Kageyama-kun. What's wrong?"

Even though the air was a little awkward since the last time they saw each other was during the fight – Yachi thinks that Kageyama might ask her anything relating to volleyball club.

Kageyama took his moment to answer, "I…I wanted to apologize for what happened last time. Sugawara-senpai told me you got hurt." Kageyama then shifted his eyes to Yachi's knees which were still bandaged.

Yachi also followed his line of gaze before she looked up and waved her hand in dismissal. "It's okay, Kageyama-kun! More importantly…are you doing okay?"

"I'm fine. I just…I'm very sorry that you got hurt because of me. I didn't mean to hurt you." Kageyama bit his lips and closed his eyes for a few seconds as he breathes through his nose then suddenly his upper body lowered down to bow 90 degrees towards her.

"I'M VERY SORRY!" He apologized loudly.

By now Yachi was extremely flustered by his apology. Even though it was genuine, she was embarrassed that there were people watching them as they walked passed by them from the school's entrance.

"It's fine, Kageyama-kun! Please raise your head. I've already accepted your apology so – "

Kageyama them stood straight up again and replied, "My older sister said that it's best to apologize honestly from the heart every time I did something wrong."

"Your older sister?" Yachi replied numbly.

He nodded, "She said that 'to be a man, I should be able to apologize to girls honestly so I don't hurt their feelings.'"

Yachi couldn't help but chuckle lightly at such innocent expression on Kageyama's face as he recites his sister's advice. This was the first time she had ever seen him with an obedient expression to someone else other than the senpai from the club.

"That's…that's a good advice to live by. But thank you, Kageyama-kun. I accept your apology." Yachi replies genuinely.

Kageyama's face suddenly beamed brighter than before. Biting his lips as he tries to keep the smile blooming from his face. Although he tries to hide his quirked lips with the back of his hand, Yachi was quick enough to notice his expression.

'Ah…Kageyama-kun sure looks nice with a smile like that.' Yachi couldn't help but smile as well as she felt healed by his handsome expression.

Yachi then asks, "Let's head to class now. We shouldn't be late for morning assembly."

"Y-yeah."

Kageyama made sure to walk Yachi to her class while they talk about miscellaneous things about school work and club practice. Unknown to Yachi, Kageyama couldn't help but still feel guilty at the bandaged knees on Yachi.

He has to make up to her with something better later.

'Maybe nee-chan can help me with this too.' Kageyama thought as he watched Yachi talking to him with a bright expression on her face.

He couldn't help but think how lovely she looks.

"Yacchan, you should eat more! Look at you, you got so thin after joining the volleyball club – we can't have you like this. Here, take my rolled eggs."

"Mikoto-chan, thank you but you should eat your lunch as well." Yachi replies as the other girl puts a roll of eggs on to Yachi's lunchbox.

"And have you starve? No way. Eat more, Yacchan." Mikoto says as she puts another meatball into Yachi's bento.

Yachi smiles sheepishly as her seatmate gave her bits of her food to Yachi. Ever since she saw Yachi with her knees bandaged in the morning, the black haired girl had been fussing over Yachi.

"Cut it out, Mikoto. Yacchan is going to blow up from all the food you gave her." On the other side of Yachi's desk, a brown haired girl with her hair neatly braided in two tails, commented as she watches the spectacle in front of her.

"But she is so skinny now. She needs all the energy for her club. Being a manager is time consuming and draining so Yachi should get all the energy she can." Mikoto replied easily.

"Seriously…"

"It's okay, Hiyori-san. I'm very grateful that you're both looking out for me." Yachi piped up.

Hiyori shrugged her shoulders as she took a bite of her rice from her lunch box. "That goes without saying."

Currently, the three girls were eating together in lunch time. Yachi had gotten along with Mikoto and Hiyori ever since they worked together during a group project so she was now more comfortable in hanging out with her classmates without being awkward or uneasy.

It was also during this time when Yachi was being fussed over by Mikoto who has been quite concerned towards Yachi who joined the volleyball club as the manager.

"Would you like more eggs, Yacchan?" Mikoto asked.

Yachi shook her head and held on to her chopsticks. "Thank you, Mikoto-chan, but my current lunch is enough. Please enjoy your food."

"You can give those to me." Hiyori asked as she slid her lunch box to Mikoto's.

The black haired girl's eyes narrowed with a glare. "Not you – you eat like dinosaur!"

Hiyori frowned, "You can give your food to Yacchan but not to me?"

"Of course! Yacchan needs to fill her baby cheeks again so she needs to eat more." Mikoto replied as if that was the most obvious thing in the world.

"What are you, her mother?" Hiyori furrowed her eyebrows and kept pushing her lunch box. "Just one rolled egg."

"No! You have two lunchboxes already, why are you such a greedy child?!"

"Well I'm a big girl so I need more food. Come on, Micchan – let's not be stingy."

"Who are you calling Micchan now?!"

Yachi smiles as she watches her friends argue back and forth about food. Sometimes she feels like she was spending time with people who are similar to her volleyball club teammates. Even though Mikoto and Hiyori were friends, they couldn't help but bicker and fight every time they spend time together

But at the same time they don't really stop spending time with each other.

'They are very similar to Hinata and Kageyama-kun in a way.' Yachi's mind flew somewhere else as she finished her food.

As her friends kept bickering in front of her, Yachi felt the phone in her pocket vibrated. Wondering who would contact her at this time of the day, Yachi quickly took a peek to her phone to see who just texted her.

Her eyes widened when she sees the name of the sender.

Kuroo Tetsurou just sent you a text message

Author's Notes:

Hello everyone!

Midterms is done yay! The tests were so hard :( Even though I studied, it was still not enough. Hopefully I can get my scores back soon because I'm very anxious for my results haha. But in the meantime, I want to go back writing again haha.

This time is another bridging chapter. I kept rewriting the future chapters about how Yachi and the other volleyball team members can resolve the Hinata-Kageyama conflict. I just realized how difficult it is to writing scenes about conflicts - relationship between humans are very sensitive so I'm trying to explore how the dynamic works between the characters in Haikyuu and how Yachi fits in to it. (and this is why my plot notes for this fic is such a mess lmao).

Did you all know that Ushijima keeps a really CLOSE eye on ads? The scene from the anime when Ushijima reading the ads from Jump made me laugh so hard, he's such a weird boy haha but that what makes him funny.

And also another surprised at the end. I was actually hesitating on who should contact Yachi first through phone - aaaah I'm so excited for this part but I'll have to reserve it for the next chapter hehe.

Thank you all for reading this chapter! I'll see you all in the next chapter :))) Please stay healthy and be careful :3