Chapter Text
Many of the stories Iwaizumi grew up hearing spoke of the twisted Wizard who ate the hearts of men and women alike. He is feared, and parents threaten their children with his name when they misbehave, but even so, people make their way to his castle in droves, hopeful for their wishes to be granted. And all of them, with no exception, meet the same fate.
It is a well-practised routine, you see. The wizard welcomes them into his castle with an easy smile. He shows them how to take their hearts out of their chests and laughs charmingly as, every time without fail, a look of surprise makes its way upon their faces. It’s shockingly easy to give up one’s heart in spite of its importance. Just a small, painless reach and a little belief, and the weight of their being lies in their hands. They never think twice before handing their heart over, and the wizard doesn’t give them a moment to hesitate and think better of their choice before he whisks their hearts out of reach. The transaction is over too quickly for regret to set in, and once it’s over you can’t feel much of anything at all.
Those doomed, empty, heartless victims wander the lands where they were left behind, a scattering of breadcrumbs left behind by a careless eater. Grey and washed out, they litter the country, as the wizard never visits the same place twice. They wander the countryside as living ghosts. No dreams, no fears, no spark, no life. Sometimes you can see them, waifish and wan, moving through the outskirts of villages and towns, driven only by the primitive need to regain their hearts, deaf to the pleas of their loved ones to return home. It is almost a rule of the world— to visit the wizard is to lose a heart, no matter what you were looking to trade in its stead.
Now, Iwaizumi does not think himself above the rules, and he isn’t much in the business of trading hearts for anything, but he is curious. And curiosity is sometimes a deeper flaw than hubris, as it is admittedly far more likely to get you into all sorts of trouble (and if his curiosity was sharp at the edges with desperation and a need for curse-breaking, well that is a fact Iwaizumi keeps to himself). It is this same curiosity that brings Iwaizumi to where he finds himself at present moment— standing with his hands on his hips at the borders of the Wastes, staring at the wizard’s odd moving building as it jittered and creaked across far-off fields. He had never seen the supposed castle from up this close, as it was usually a looming, distant, black shadow that had always been shrouded in some kind of fog. Interestingly enough, the Wastes had never really been a foggy sort of area until the wizard’s castle had shambled its way on over from god-knows-where a year and a half ago, though Iwaizumi supposes that it would not be all that hard for a wizard with a flair for the dramatic to conjure up some mist.
All in all, this was his first time seeing the building from up close, and Iwaizumi was just a little disappointed. He supposed the castle was impressive in the fact that it was able to move around, however haphazardly— but in just about every other facet, the castle, or more appropriately, house, was, dare he say it, unimpressive. It wasn’t much of a castle at all, really, and was instead a reckless pastiche of random pieces of rooms and balconies and roofs from different eras put together by a careless creator in what was quite frankly, an architectural menace. Iwaizumi was surprised the whole thing hadn’t shaken itself apart with how lopsided and jerky the house’s gait was. The castle is moving slowly enough that he is able to swing himself onto the small porch that houses that castle’s entrance with relative ease. The door is painted a happy yellow, and its paint is chipped and peeling at the corners. Runes carved in a glowing orange gleam from where they are arrayed across the doorframe, and their strict lines are interspersed every so often with crude drawings of what looked like stars.
There is also a small collection of plants by the entrance whose pots are also decorated with celestial bodies, and their stems sway merrily with each of the castle’s jerky movements. All in all, it paints an almost homey picture, and Iwaizumi was expecting something more… grand.
In any case, Iwaizumi supposes it is undeniable that this was in fact a wizard’s home, and he takes a moment to steel himself before knocking thrice upon the door. He pastes on a wary smile as he waits for it to open, his nerves already making themselves known as he braces himself for the charm the wizard is known for.
But Iwaizumi is not greeted with a charming smile. Or a proposition for heart eating. Or even who he expected at all, really. Instead, when the door swings open with a reluctant squeal, he is met with a sullen-faced boy whose hair was bleached blonde save for two odd stripes of black. The boy leans to one side of the door frame with a tome tucked under his arm and a dark scowl on his face. “You are… not who I’m looking for,” Iwaizumi says slowly, taken aback by the general lack of an intimidating heart-eater-wizard-person at the door. The boy doesn’t match the description he’d heard of the wizard in stories, and Iwaizumi seriously doubts the scowling teen’s ability to charm anyone into giving away their heart.
The boy stares coldly at him. “Obviously.” He turns away from Iwaizumi for a moment to place the tome he had been carrying on a towering stack of other similarly mangy looking books by the door, where it produced a terrifyingly impressive cloud of dust in response. Iwaizumi itches to get his hands on them, or even read the titles upon their spines, but the boy catches the look in his prying eyes and moves to block them from view with his body.
Iwaizumi flounders for a moment, and clearly takes too long to gather his thoughts, as the boy crosses his arms and snaps at him. “What did you need? I don’t have the time to stand around by the door, even if you clearly do.”
“Well, what I guess most people want when they come knocking on this door— I’d like to see the wizard.” Iwaizumi says slowly.
The boy narrows his eyes, focusing his glare into something that would have been intimidating if he was a foot taller, “and what exactly do you want from him?”
Iwaizumi shuffles a little. “Well… I can’t exactly say?”
The boy’s frown manages to impossibly become even deeper. “Try.”
Iwaizumi sighs as he senses that the boy wouldn’t take no for an answer. He braces himself, and speaks. “I have a curs—” his next words are eaten by the yelp that leaves his throat as what feels like invisible hands sear their prints onto his throat. Their heat fades after a moment, but Iwaizumi knows from experience that their long-fingered traces will remain around his neck like a macabre necklace for a few days.
The boy’s demeanour changes entirely as his eyes light up with interest and none of the concern that one should probably display when someone is choked and branded in front of you. “Who on earth did you manage to anger that badly?”
Iwaizumi grimaces. “I don’t actually know?”
The boy only looks more intrigued, “what kind of curse is it?”
“Can’t say,” Iwaizumi says tiredly, “Look— can you just let me in?”
The boy steps aside. “I suppose Oikawa would find you interesting enough.”
Iwaizumi files the wizard’s name away to ponder over later, and steps inside the castle, where he is immediately assaulted by the mess of it all. Towers of books line every possible flat surface available, and Iwaizumi can smell incense burning from somewhere deeper in the castle. Loose papers litter the floor, their faces having what looked like failed wards or charms scrawled upon them. Even the ceiling does not seem exempt from the clutter— several wind chimes of both the metal and bamboo kinds clamour in dissonant tones from their places near the windows, and more papers float merrily in suspension in the air, some of them folded neatly into paper animals, whilst others are crumpled messily into balls. Iwaizumi bats a stray paper crane away from his face and scowls at it.
He moves further inside, and for a moment, Iwaizumi swears he can see a glimpse of a young man by the fire at his peripherals, his raven-black hair auburn at the edges where it catches the sun’s light. But when Iwaizumi turns to face the fireplace fully, nothing is there save for the small fire that burns a deep blue in the hearth.
He turns to ask the boy if had seen the other man, but the boy has already disappeared elsewhere deeper inside the castle without a single word to Iwaizumi. Iwaizumi sighs and makes to sit at the wooden dining table, and idly traces the scratches on its surface as he wonders where he’ll go from here.
***
Iwaizumi and Kageyama’s first proper meeting does not go well. That is to say, Kageyama was abrasive and spoke his mind with little thought to temper his words with kinder sentiments. In fact, their first encounter starts with Kageyama scowling at Iwaizumi and calling him “sinister” and a “liar” as well as making the (wildly incorrect) accusation that he was “up to no good in the castle”, which Kageyama follows with more blatant insults and the uncalled for remark that “Iwaizumi was inviting ruin to the castle.”
The boy (whose name Iwaizumi hasn’t yet obtained) is a solemn witness to the tirade, and afterwards, confides, “he’s just a bit protective of Oikawa and isn’t really used to visitors. I think he likes you.” Noticing Iwaizumi’s raised eyebrow, he adds, “Kageyama’s the real keeper of this place. If he didn’t want you here, you wouldn’t have been able to stay. He’s pretty powerful, and he woulda kicked you out.”
Iwaizumi hums warily in response. The boy, with his message delivered, spirits himself off to some other part of the house, and Iwaizumi returns to the living room to continue his stubborn wrangling with the mess.
Kageyama was watching him closely. His eyes, which blaze the same blue of the fire in the hearth, track Iwaizumi’s every move unnervingly as he organises the overstuffed bookshelves by the fireplace. His gaze grates at Iwaizumi’s nerves, and he cracks. “If you’re going to just stare at me all day, could you at least lend me a hand?”
Kageyama’s eyebrows furrow. “I’m a fire demon.”
“Okay?” Iwaizumi says impatiently. “Can fire demons not hold mops or something?”
The fire flares higher in the hearth in indignation. “I can!” Kageyama spits out, “but I can’t really move away from the fireplace, not really.”
“Oh.” Iwaizumi says, feeling kind of sorry. “Are you tied to the fire, then?”
“No.” Kageyama mutters, but adds nothing more in spite of Iwaizumi’s confusion.
***
Iwaizumi’s curse was a simple one, but was no less of a burden in spite of its few conditions. He had been under the curse for coming up to a month before he had finally worked up the nerve to ask for help, and in that month he had figured out three things:
Whoever had cursed him was an absolute asshole.
Certain words would bring about the branding hands, namely words such as ‘help’ or ‘curse’ or infuriatingly enough, ‘please’.
The curse was making him disappear. Or something. Iwaizumi is still unsure. But sometimes he reaches for things and goes through them. His shadow will at times lag behind him and will fail to align quite right with his feet.
All in all, Iwaizumi knew nothing that would really help with curse breaking at all, really. The boy who had let him into the castle had told him as much when he had sat down with him to have a crack at figuring out what to say to Oikawa, as well as to get a headstart on his curse-breaking situation. The meeting was held to little avail though, with the boy only growing snappier with every ‘I don’t know’ or ‘can’t say’ that Iwaizumi would utter— which was unfortunately his answer to most of the boy’s questions. He had answered what he could, though Iwaizumi can’t say that he sees the need for the boy to know his natal chart, or his childhood crush, or what colour his underwear was the first time he realised he was under a curse. Though at this point, he was clutching at straws. Iwaizumi watches the boy throw up his hands and storm off and only hopes that the wizard will be of more help.
***
What was meant to be a quick pop into the wizard’s castle to snoop around, meet the guy, ask for help, get denied, ask for help again et cetera et cetera (Iwaizumi now had a well-rehearsed speech prepared that was careful to avoid words that would trigger the branding hands) turned into a week and a half long stay as the damned wizard didn’t seem to live in his own house. Upon being questioned, Kyoutani (whose name he practically had to pry out of him) shrugs “Oikawa isn’t home all too often, and maybe if he was I would actually be getting something out of this stupid apprenticeship,” he scowls. Iwaizumi senses a long brewing pile of resentment just waiting to be unleashed in that conversation, so decides to not poke at it any further and resumes his cooking at Kageyama’s fire.
After another couple of days inside the castle, Iwaizumi is finally able to meet the wizard in the dead of the night, and is immediately off-put by him, for he is nothing like what he thought he would be like. In fact, the wizard had not said a single word to Iwaizumi and had instead slunk past to the staircase to Iwaizumi’s left, the stench of smoke and gunpowder trailing in his wake. The shadows near the fire lengthen their fingers as the wizard passes, their jagged edges reaching out eagerly to meet him, only to be ignored as the man continues his resolute walk to the stairs. Iwaizumi’s own shadow peels away from his feet to follow after the man, and Iwaizumi sends a scowl after the treacherous thing.
Iwaizumi can almost see the magic roil off of the wizard’s shoulders as he passes him, and shudders as its aura brushes past. Iwaizumi had been expecting charm, he had been expecting wit, and isn’t sure of what to make of what he saw in its stead.
***
When Iwaizumi meets Oikawa for the second time, it is under daylight, and the wizard almost seems a different creature entirely in the presence of the sun. Gone is the silent, brooding shadow that haunts the house at night, and in its place is a different brand of monster that is no less dangerous in spite of its charm. His smiles are sharp at the edges, and his eyes are much too bright and attentive for Iwaizumi’s tastes, with a flinty sort of gleam to them that was just a touch inhuman. The wizard spots the curse Iwaizumi has on him in the space between one breath and the next, leaning in close to peer at the too-bright-green of Iwaizumi’s eyes and before backing away with a sharp smile on his face. Iwaizumi scowls, “so can you fix it or not?”
Oikawa puts a hand to his chin playfully and makes a show of pondering Iwaizumi’s request which makes Iwaizumi want to smack him, “and what would you offer me, hmm?” Oikawa’s gaze sharpens as he moves closer to Iwaizumi and pokes a slender finger towards his chest, “would you give me your heart?” he murmurs. Iwaizumi sees something like the creature he saw in the night in Oikawa’s eyes, a hint of a hungry predator, and feels his heart start to race in its presence.
Iwaizumi slaps the hand away, and the atmosphere shifts to something lighter. “You’ll have to find something else you want instead.”
Oikawa pouts and moves away, and Iwaizumi reluctantly admits to himself that it is easier to breathe once Oikawa’s undivided attention was pointed away from him. “Too bad,” Oikawa sing-songs, “I bet you would’ve tasted wonderful.” Oikawa spins back around to face the stairs, and his coat impressively manages to stay firmly put on his shoulders in spite of the movement, “I wouldn’t have been able to help you out that much anyway.”
Iwaizumi can’t believe his ears. This man is insufferable. “You mean to tell me that you wanted my heart even when you would’ve been absolutely useless?”
Oikawa turns back to face him and cocks his head to the side. “Yes?”
Iwaizumi kind of wants to put his head through the table, but refrains. “Aren’t you supposed to be a wizard?”
Oikawa looks mildly affronted. “Well yes, but breaking curses isn’t exactly my expertise.” He shrugs, “maybe if you stick around a bit, I can do a bit of research and see if anyone from the Academy knows anything more.” He gives Iwaizumi a grin that’s sharp enough to cut at the corners. “We’ll work out what you can give me in return later. Now, what do you say?”
And Iwaizumi, inexplicably, decides to stay.
***
Time passes, and they establish something that’s almost like a routine, where Iwaizumi slots himself into life at the castle as if he’s always been a part of it. He learns that Kyoutani is only really at the castle three days of the week as he spends his other days helping out at the bakery his friend runs, bringing back soft loaves of bread or crumbly pastries back to the castle for Iwaizumi to sample. He learns that Kageyama prefers to show up in the night, and starts to line up his tidying up of the living room to the times that the fire demon would manifest in his place by the fire so he can exhaust his curious questions about fire demons or otherwise. (Kageyama pretends to be annoyed by the company, but Iwaizumi can see the corners of his mouth easing out of the frown Kageyama was wont to have on his face).
He learns that Oikawa spends most afternoons away from the castle, and only comes back in the late hours of the evening, smelling of smoke and metal. Whilst Oikawa is presumably present in the castle in the mornings, he never joins Iwaizumi or Kyoutani for breakfast. In fact, Iwaizumi isn’t sure that the wizard eats food at all— he has never seen the wizard eat so much as a single slice of bread in his almost month-long stay.
Today, he is cracking eggs into a bowl to scramble for breakfast, and making soft conversation with Kageyama when Oikawa whisks into the room with a stormy expression on his face. He moves over to the dining table where he looms over where Kyoutani is idly reading a magic textbook. The teen inches a couple spaces to the right uncomfortably. Oikawa slams a hand on the table— his palm making a dull thud on the scratched wood. “It has come to my attention,” he says solemnly, “that someone has poured all of my hair potions down the sink.” His coat’s sleeves flutter ominously in an invisible wind as silence ensues. Kyoutani directs wide eyes to Iwaizumi. “Now,” Oikawa adds imperiously, “I am not naming names, but if whoever did this was very sorry, then I won’t be spelling their hair to be orange for a week.”
Iwaizumi snorts. “What on earth would I be apologising for?”
Oikawa gasps theatrically and points a slender finger at him, “So it was you, you fiend!”
Iwaizumi crosses his arms and raises a brow, “what are you going to do about it?” Oikawa makes a sound of offence, but Iwaizumi speaks over it, “they’ve been there for weeks, and you know that the ingredients in those don’t keep, Oikawa.”
Kyoutani frowns, “he’s right, you know?”
“Et tu, Brute?” Oikawa says, a hand to his chest, “my very own apprentice, siding with Iwa-chan over me?”
Kyoutani scowls, “if you’d ever taught me anything, maybe I would’ve agreed with you.”
“Wah, so mean, Kyouken-chan!” Oikawa says with a laugh. He turns to Iwaizumi, “don’t think I’ll forget about your crimes, Iwa-chan.” He turns up his chin haughtily, “retribution is coming.”
In the end, Oikawa’s retribution comes a day later as promised, and Iwaizumi wakes up to find his hair a ridiculous shade of fiery orange, which in spite of his pleas, stays put for the promised timeframe of a week.
***
One day, Iwaizumi notices that Oikawa is quieter and his energy is not as exuberant as usual. None of his jibes at Kageyama have the same bite, and none of his smiles land quite right on his face. Before Iwaizumi can think to pull him aside to ask about what was wrong, Oikawa himself beats him to the punch— spiriting him off to his room after a lunch where he barely picked at his food (which was odd in itself, as after being confronted about eating, Oikawa usually humoured Iwaizumi enough to eat at least half of what was put before him at meals).
Oikawa is fiddling around with something at his desk and is fully occupied with his task, ignoring Iwaizumi in spite of being the one to drag him in here in the first place, so Iwaizumi takes the opportunity to take in the other’s room. He hasn’t had the opportunity to come up here before, with Oikawa preferring his privacy and keeping the room’s blue painted door firmly shut most days. The room follows the same book-littered chaos that the bottom floors of the castle display, and the air is somehow even more cluttered with scattered warding paper than the living room. There are more personal touches present here than in the rooms below, however. Iwaizumi can see little knick knacks scattered across his desk, and little charms which look very obviously handmade hang from the ceiling. The ceiling of the room is also painted to mirror the night sky, and displays several whirling constellations and other celestial bodies arranged around a central star which burns the same blue of Kageyama’s fire. They move in a lazy orbit and twinkle a duller echo of the stars in the true sky. Iwaizumi watches them for a while, enraptured.
His reverie is interrupted by a muttered curse from where Oikawa is now putting a veritable mountain of assorted things into a seemingly bottomless picnic basket. “Why’d you bring me here?” Iwaizumi asks.
Oikawa looks up and smiles, and it’s a gentle one with none of the plastic, cutting edges his usual ones have. He looks a bit more real today, Iwaizumi thinks to himself. Oikawa finishes packing his basket by throwing in two blankets and gets to his feet. “Ah, my dear Iwa-chan, my room isn’t our final destination today,” Oikawa pauses, then grins, “but it could be, if you wanted it to.”
Iwaizumi reddens at the innuendo, and slaps at Oikawa’s arm, ignoring the way his hand seems to pass through him at first contact. “You are insufferable.” Iwaizumi grumbles. “Where are we going then?”
Oikawa grabs at his hand, and when he phases through it, tugs at Iwaizumi’s sweater sleeve instead. “Come. You’ll see.”
They head back downstairs, and Oikawa turns the front door’s knob green before gesturing at Iwaizumi to pass through the doorway first. The world beyond the door is night, a stark contrast to the burning afternoon sun that still warmed his back from the doorway, and Iwaizumi blinks hurriedly as he waits for his eyes to adjust to the sudden darkness. Once they have, he can’t help but to let out a breath once he takes in what was before him.
What seemed like an endless sea of wildflowers stretched out towards the horizon, painting the verdant hillscape with pretty shades of purples, pinks, and blues. The sky is another world above them, glittering a brighter echo of the stars that were strewn across the ceiling of Oikawa’s room. Iwaizumi has never seen the stars so clearly— there is not a cloud present in the sky to obscure their light, and they gleam brightly, seemingly close enough to pluck out of the sky if Iwaizumi but reached out his hand. Iwaizumi tears his eyes away reluctantly to join Oikawa to where he has begun to dig through the picnic basket.
Oikawa is still in his strange, subdued mood, and is unusually quiet as he sets out a blanket on the grass. He lays down to face the stars, and there is a strange look on his face as he watches them burn in the sky. Oikawa points to where a small house is tucked away at the base of a nearby hill, its walls nearly covered entirely by ivy, “that was where I spent most of my childhood. I haven’t been back much since I left the Academy, but today’s special.” Oikawa reads the question in Iwaizumi’s gaze and snorts, “it’s an anniversary today.” His gaze saddens, “a star shower is supposed to happen too.” Catching Iwaizumi’s confusion, Oikawa laughs airily, and sits up to shake himself as if to rid himself of his sombre mood, “it’ll be beautiful to see, Iwa-chan, I’m glad I brought you today.” He claps his hands, “let’s eat, I packed some snacks.”
He moves over to the picnic basket and reaches elbow-deep into it to pull out a platter of fruits, cheeses, and crackers. Another reach yields a tray of small cakes. Yet another has Oikawa heaving out a plate stuffed full of sweet breads. Every time Iwaizumi thinks it’s over, Oikawa reaches into the basket again, it’s almost as if he’s conjuring more food out of thin air on the spot to take the piss. It’s far too much, and excessive in exactly the way Oikawa tends to be. Finally finished, Oikawa grins proudly at the sight of Iwaizumi’s raised brows. Iwaizumi only sighs and takes one of the cupcakes.
“You should eat something too,” Iwaizumi points out, once it’s clear that Oikawa isn’t making a move towards the food. Oikawa fails to hide the face he pulls, but he takes a plate and a piece of milk bread and nibbles at it reluctantly. Later, Iwaizumi sees Oikawa hide its remains in a napkin when he thinks Iwaizumi isn’t looking.
They (Iwaizumi) finish eating and walk towards the lake together, the knee-length grass parts like the sea around them, and the wind only lends to the illusion of the ocean as it whips the grasses into smooth wave-like motions with its gusts. They reach the lake’s pebbled shore, and Oikawa nudges Iwaizumi’s arm, pointing upwards.
Above them, the sky starts to fall. At first, it is but a lone star that falls from its place in the skies, and its lonely light is a smooth arc across the night as it plummets to the earth. But as if pulled from orbit by the first star, others start to follow, and soon enough, what seems like dozens of stars are cascading to the ground.
Oikawa’s gaze is fixed upwards, but Iwaizumi looks to the lake and watches as the sky’s perfect mirror is disrupted by the ripples as fallen stars fracture its surface. It takes no more than a couple of minutes for the stars to end their journey before the night is still once more. Oikawa seems quieter than ever, his eyes unmoving from a single empty spot in the sky even once it’s all over. “Hey,” Iwaizumi says softly, “what are you thinking of?”
Oikawa turns to meet his gaze. “A choice I made a while ago.” He turns his gaze back up to the heavens, back to that same gap in the constellations. “You know, I met Kageyama on a night like this one. Right at this lake actually.”
Iwaizumi frowns at the nonsequitur, but humours Oikawa’s topic change. “A star shower?”
Oikawa nods, eyes still distant. “It was bigger than this one, it was like all the stars were falling at once and the sky seemed so empty after.” He lets out a long breath before holding out his hand. “Come on, let’s head home.”
Oikawa’s hand is warm in his as they walk back.
***
He and Oikawa have taken to spending time on the gallarija that is haphazardly attached to the right-side of the castle where its green-painted walls clash dreadfully with the orange of the walls of the room beside it. It’s one of Iwaizumi’s favourite pieces of the castle even in the face of the number of stairs it takes to get there. The windows of the gallarija are propped open at an angle, allowing the breeze to gently sway the petals of the wilting asters in their pots. The wind is a welcome respite from the summer heat which was relentless in spite of the arc of the sun nearing its end at the horizon.
Oikawa is standing next to him by the windows, and the sleeves of the coat he has perched on his shoulders brush against Iwaizumi’s arms with his every movement, but Iwaizumi finds that he doesn’t mind the contact.
“Cute, isn’t he?” Oikawa says when he tracks Iwaizumi’s gaze to the lake where Kyoutani is making wolves of the water and indulging his creations with a game of fetch. They’ve been at it for a while, and Iwaizumi can see Kyoutani’s fatigue in how the silhouette of the wolves he’s made waver at the edges. Even so, Kyoutani is wearing a rare smile as he stands in the water, pants rolled to his knees as three wolves weave eagerly through his legs.
Iwaizumi isn’t sure if cute is the right descriptor for Kyoutani at all, but indulges Oikawa with a sound of agreement.
“He’s come a long way,” Oikawa adds a moment later. “When he first turned up at my door he could hardly arrange a drop of water into a circle, much less an animal.” Iwaizumi can hardly imagine it, even he, who knew nothing of magic, could sense the power in Kyoutani’s aura.
“What made you take him in?” Iwaizumi asks, curious, “he’s your first apprentice, right?”
Oikawa snorts. “He’ll be my only apprentice.” He waves a hand dismissively, “I hardly have the patience or the aptitude for teaching, and yet look how far he’s come. It’s almost scary.” Oikawa leans more of his weight against the railing, and it creaks threateningly in response. “As for why I let him in? I suppose I saw the same hunger I had when I was younger in him.” Oikawa pivots on a heel to face Iwaizumi, and gives him a grin that doesn’t touch his eyes, “Kyouken is more sensible than I was at his age though!” Oikawa’s shoulders slant as his disposition sombres, “he won’t be making the same mistakes I did.”