Chapter Text
Kuroo
The bottle lands on Kuroo first, he smirks and scans the circle of people around him while the bottle is spun again. Spinning, spinning… slowing. Kuroo doesn’t look, it doesn’t matter who it lands on, not really.
“Hmm.” Oikawa makes an oddly ambiguous noise and Kuroo glances down to find the bottle has landed perfectly between two people. Beyond them, in the corner…
“Kenma!” Oikawa claps his hands together enthusiastically. “You’re up!”
Kenma blinks up at him, golden eyes peering through long hair that falls in his face. Kuroo knows that Kenma has no idea what is going on, having lodged himself in the corner with his phone since the moment they arrived. He’s only here because Kuroo dragged him. If Kuroo traumatises him too much, doubtless he won’t be so easily convinced next time.
“Kenma isn’t playing.” Kuroo says quickly.
Oikawa just laughs and gets to his feet, dragging Kenma out of his corner and shoving both of them into the hallway. Kenma is first to be tossed into the closet, like a cat thrown outside by the scruff.
“Nothing’s going to come of this.” Kuroo warns. “This is a waste of time.”
“No it’s not - we’re getting rid of you for 7 minutes.” Oikawa gives him a ‘friendly’ nudge, his height giving him an unfair advantage, and Kuroo is unbalanced enough that he stumbles forward, the closet door snapping closed behind him. The lock clicks into place.
Kenma instantly sinks to the ground, pulling his phone out of the pocket of his hoodie. The screen lights up, casting a soft blue glow over his face that leeches the color from his already pale skin and gold eyes.
Kuroo sighs, Kenma was nothing if not predictable. Kuroo makes himself comfortable on the floor next to him, inching closer to rest his chin on Kenma’s bony shoulder, padded by the thick fabric of his hoodie.
Kenma draws back a little and Kuroo gives him an odd look. “No good?”
“You smell like alcohol.” Kenma returns neutrally.
“Do you want me to move?”
Kenma’s eyes cut over to him, then back to his phone. “It’s fine.”
Kuroo settles in, draping himself over Kenma’s shoulders and watching Kenma deftly clear level after level of whatever game he’s playing these days. Every so often, gold eyes flick over to him, then away. Kurro comments occasionally on Kenma’s gameplay before getting distracted by Kenma’s hair, shoulder-length now and the blond cinnamon-toast color of bleached black. He plays idly with the soft strands hanging around Kenma’s face, twining them around his fingers.
Kenma doesn’t seem to notice, too fixated on his game. Or maybe he just doesn’t care.
Kuroo yawns. Time seems to be flowing like syrup, and he’s reaching the stage of drunkenness where he just wants to go take a nap. He sighs again, pressing his face into the side of Kenma’s neck and his soft silky hair. Kenma smells like Kuroo’s soap, a clean unidentifiable scent, comforting and familiar. It makes sense, he’d spent the night at Kuroo’s the day before.
Kenma doesn’t make any move to shake him off, but Kuroo pulls away again to play with his hair.
And surely it’s just the effect of the alcohol that has Kuroo murmuring, “You’re so pretty…” right into Kenma’s ear.
He doesn’t notice the way Kenma’s body stiffens next to him. He does, however, catch the gold eyes that slip sideways to glance at him. He finds himself lost in that inscrutable cat-like gaze, his train of thought deserting him.
“…so pretty.” He says again, unable to remember if he’d said that already. Maybe it’s all in his head. The line is a little bit blurry. He can’t remember what comes after that; he’d had a thought, that was for sure. It’s just beyond his grasp…
Golden eyes bore into him, gleaming even in the semi-darkness of the closet. Kenma’s expression is cryptic even at its most expressive, but Kuroo could swear he saw a glint of curiosity. Or… something else. The weak illumination from his phone softens Kenma’s delicate features, framed by his long hair that he rarely lets Kuroo tie back from his face.
Ah… that’s it.
“…Just like a girl.” Kuroo finishes softly.
Kenma’s eyes drop to his phone, now flashing a ‘game over’ screen. For a moment, he just stares at it without touching anything.
“Oh.” Kuroo hooks his chin over Kenma’s shoulder to see what he’s looking at. “You lost?”
Footsteps in the hall and Oikawa’s shrill obnoxious voice drawing closer. The lock snaps open, the closet door opening with a bang-–
Kuroo wakes with a start.
What the fuck kind of dream was that?
Kuroo doesn’t often remember his dreams, but when he does they’re an abstract blur of weird shit that happens without rhyme or reason. Not this, a memory he’d long forgotten, recreated with vivid attention to detail. He can still feel the soft strands of Kenma’s hair between his fingers.
Admittedly, he’s played with Kenma’s hair so often it’s not surprising he has a sense memory for it. Still. It’s weird. And Kuroo doesn’t have time to think about it because his alarm is going off and he needs to get up or he’ll be late for class. Heaven forbid he set his alarm a few minutes earlier and have a leisurely morning for once. Nope, instead it’s the usual rush to get out the door.
With one major detour. The same detour that inevitably happens at least once or twice a week and the reason that Kuroo intentionally sets his alarm fifteen mixtures earlier than he would probably need for himself. Namely: prying, coaxing, threatening and bribing his childhood best friend / roommate out of bed.
Kuroo has turned this science into an art, perfected after many years of dragging Kenma out of bed to go to practice and refined through the past three years of them living together. It’s not every morning that Kenma fails to set his alarm or just straight up turns it off while asleep, but it happens often enough that Kuroo has made space for it in his own morning routine.
Over the years, he has developed a myriad of strategies to get Kenma up, ranging from sadistically pulling away his blanket and leaving him to curl into an even tighter ball in one corner of his bed; to waving a cup of coffee under his nose and asking nicely. The first is more fun and typically less effort.
Unfortunately, his favourite method is seasonally dependent. The two of them, as broke college students, mutually agreed not to turn on the heat during the winter until they were actually on the brink of death. That made getting out of bed mildly agonising, the chill stripping away every bit of warmth built up during the night.
Kenma was the one who suffered most during cold fronts; Kuroo ran hot enough that it didn’t bother him unduly, but Kenma basically went around the apartment in the largest, bulkiest sweatshirts he owned. This extended to his sleeping habits, where in the winter he buried himself in an amorphous pile of blankets, engulfing his small form completely.
This precise arrangement enabled Kuroo’s favorite activity: plunging his freezing hands deep into Kenma’s warm bundle and seeking out the warm heat of his body to press his cold fingers to. This was by far the fastest way to get Kenma out of bed and alert, and had the side benefit of being immensely entertaining, especially when Kenma emerges from his cocoon and levels a murderous glare at him. It’s so hard to take him seriously, his gaze still unfocused and sleepy, his hair mussed, and so cute, that more often than not Kuroo ends up rolling on the floor laughing.
Sadly, September has so far been quite mild. He settles for poking Kenma’s cheek and telling him he’ll throw his Steam Deck out the window. Kenma’s gold eyes snap open immediately, surprisingly clear.
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Try me.” Kuroo responds evenly. “Now get up and eat your breakfast.”
Breakfast is, as usual, more an invention of his optimism than a state of reality. Instead, Kuroo installs Kenma on the kitchen counter while he makes him coffee. Kenma scrolls through his feed, slouched over his phone like he’s trying a vertical reenactment of his usual sleeping position. Kuroo taps him on the back as he reaches up to grab a mug from the cabinet above Kenma’s head.
“Don’t slouch.”
Kenma rolls his eyes but straightens enough that he loses his resemblance to a cooked shrimp. Kuroo hands him his coffee and reminds him they need to get going soon. This is something he does every morning, it has yet to have a measurable effect on accelerating Kenma’s routine.
Today they both have class at the same time - the first time slot at fucking 8 am which even for Kuroo is too damn early to be in a lecture hall. Unfortunately, even on days Kuroo doesn’t have to be up early, he sets his alarm just in case so that he can ensure Kenma actually goes to whatever computer science lab he really shouldn’t be missing. It’s just habit at this point, and in fairness Kuroo has always preferred getting an early start on his work so it’s not that bad.
Akaashi claims Kuroo spoils Kenma too much. He probably does.
Kuroo bullies Kenma into going to change clothes, then has to break into his room anyways to pull him out of bed again. All Kenma had accomplished was pulling off his shirt before the allure of more sleep had grown too strong, so Kuroo plays nursemaid and all but dresses Kenma himself. This is uncommon enough that Kuroo asks him about it.
“What is up with you this morning?”
“Tired.” Kenma stifles a yawn and puts his arms through the sleeves of the hoodie Kuroo is holding out for him.
“You’re always tired - how late were you up?”
There’s a suspiciously long pause, though some of this is excused by Kenma getting lost inside his sweatshirt as he tries to pull it over his head. Kuroo intervenes with a sigh, Kenma emerging looking like a grumpy cat. He sneezes unhappily. Kuroo fights to keep a fond smile off his face.
“Kenma?” Kuroo insists.
“I didn’t go to sleep late…”
Kuroo raises an eyebrow skeptically.
“More like… early.” Kenma concludes.
Kuroo sighs. “I don’t suppose you had a good reason like school work or something.”
Kenma wrinkles his nose. “Only you would do school work until 6 am.”
“Ok so you didn’t have a good reason.”
“There was new DLC.” Kenma shrugs.
“Of course there was.” Kuroo sighs again. “Just… go get your bag and let’s leave before I end up with another ‘unexcused absence’ on my record.”
He does have an excuse, every single one of them should have ‘Kenma’ written next to it.
“Mhm.”
“Kenma?” Kuroo snaps his fingers in front of Kenma’s face. “Listening?”
Kenma hums noncommittally and Kuroo throws up his hands, leaving the room to shove things into his school bag and praying Kenma will have moved by the time he’s done.
Surprisingly, Kenma is waiting for him at the door, watching impassively as Kuroo hops around on one foot trying to get his shoes on.
“We’re going to be late.” Kenma observes.
“Well whose fault is that.” Kuroo mutters, bundling Kenma out the door and trying to think happy thoughts that don’t involve pushing his roommate down the stairs.
Against all odds, they are not in fact late to campus. Kenma shoots him a look that clearly says ‘you could have let me sleep longer’, and Kuroo stifles the urge to strangle him.
They meet again for lunch, outside for once while the weather is still holding out. It’s one of those crisp fall days; the leaves just starting to turn vibrant shades of red and orange, the sweet smell of damp earth and leaf litter filling the air. When Kuroo shows up, Kenma is sitting at their usual bench, knees tucked up close to his body and his phone in front of his face. As he approaches, Kenma nestles deeper into the thick scarf Kuroo had wrapped around him as they were leaving.
He drops his phone into his lap when Kuroo takes a seat next to him, watching Kuroo search through his bag for the food he’d picked up for them.
Eventually, Kuroo fishes out a sandwich and hands it to him. “Class go ok?”
“It was alright. You?”
“Well I wasn’t late, so… good, I guess.”
Kenma doesn’t say anything, but Kuroo’s satisfied to see he’s eating for once. He’s never quite grasped how Kenma can survive on so little food, but he’s convinced it’s the reason for Kenma’s height (or lack thereof).
“Hey, I almost forgot to tell you - I had a dream about you.” Kuroo remarks casually.
Kenma freezes, then resumes picking apart his sandwich. “Ok.”
“Don’t you want to know what it was about?” Kuroo prompts.
“Oooh I do!” A new voice cuts in, instantly recognisable, as if the arms that seize Kenma in a hug from behind leave any doubt.
Kuroo jabs Oikawa in the arm. “Oi, scarecrow - Kenma hates it when you do that.”
“Aw~” Oikawa whines, but releases Kenma, plopping down on the bench across the table from them. “But he’s so adorable! I can’t help wanting to cuddle him whenever I see him. I have no idea how you get anything done at home.”
“Not everyone has your lack of self-control and non-existent sense of boundaries, Oikawa.” Oikawa’s extremely grudging roommate, Akaashi, takes a seat on the opposite end of the bench from him.
“What’re we talking about?” Bokuto, Akaashi’s perpetual shadow and Kuroo’s best friend, wedges himself between the two of them and throws his arm around Akaashi.
Kuroo goes to make up something, a sudden premonition striking him that sharing the contents of his dream isn’t the best idea in this company, when Oikawa’s excellent hearing ruins everything.
“Kuroo had a dream about Kenma,” Oikawa announces.
Kuroo internally facepalms.
“It was just like… a normal dream.” Kuroo adds defensively.
“Normal for you or normal like normal?” Oikawa is clearly enjoying this.
“Normal as in normal— don’t give me that look.” Kuroo snaps, seeing the glint of amusement in Oikawa’s eye.
“What was your dream about?” Bokuto asks curiously, removing his arm from around Akaashi’s waist when he slaps his hand away. Kuroo’s favorite part of Bokuto dating Akaashi is Akaashi’s strict ban on public displays of affection, it tempers Bokuto’s enthusiastic tendencies rather nicely.
“Just— You know… a dream.” Kuroo finishes lamely.
“Ahah! So it WAS one of those dreams!” Oikawa cries triumphantly, startling a poor pigeon roosting in one of the trees nearby. “Come on Kuroo, you were all ready to tell Kenma, why can’t you tell us?”
Kuroo notes out of the corner of his eye that Kenma’s face pinches slightly with disgust. Feeling maligned, unfairly, for once, Kuroo pulls out his ace.
“Oikawa I swear to god I will call Iwaizumi right now and he will beat your ass, shut the fuck up.”
From there conversation devolves into petty bickering and Kenma puts his headphones on to drown them out. Kuroo knows that he often finds their friends a bit much. Personally, he kind of enjoys the chaos. Somehow the subject changes naturally to less dangerous topics - like Bokuto’s imminent failing grade on next week’s advanced mechanics quiz - and lunch ends without further scrutiny of Kuroo’s dreams.
It isn’t until he and Kenma are walking home from the library that evening that Kuroo broaches the subject again, hoping to clear his name. He isn’t sure why he cares, one dream is unlikely to change Kenma’s opinion of him by much considering how much of Kuroo’s stupidity he was privileged to witness while they were growing up. Still, Kuroo can’t get the look on Kenma’s face out of his head.
“So… about that dream.”
“Mmh.” Kenma’s expression twists slightly, a diluted version of the disgust from earlier. Yeah ok, Kuroo definitely needs to clear this up because he doesn’t want to see that look aimed at him preferably ever again.
“It was a memory, actually.”
Kenma’s expression softens, impassive once more. He glances at Kuroo, then averts his eyes back to the sidewalk, his way of showing that he was listening.
Heartened, Kuroo pushes forwards, “It was really vivid too, like I was actually there. It was from that night where Oikawa locked us in the closet. Remember that?”
There’s a small stutter, like for a second Kenma forgets what he’s doing half way through taking a step. Then it’s gone, and Kuroo thinks he must have imagined it.
Certainly there’s no sign of emotion or unease when Kenma replies. “Yeah, I remember.
“Anyways. That’s it. I just thought it was kind of weird - I’ve never dreamed about something that happened to me before. Have you?”
“Sometimes.” Gold eyes flick over to him, then back to the pavement.
“Oh really? That must be cool - do you ever dream about me?”
“We just walked past our turn.” Kenma observes calmly.
“We—? Oh fuck.”
Their evening goes about as normally as it always does. They watch a movie, Kuroo spends the rest of the evening on homework while Kenma curls up on the couch around his beloved Steam Deck. It’s companionable, until eventually Kuroo finds himself nodding off over his papers and drags himself into his room to sleep sometime after midnight. All in a good day’s work, really.
And then—
The bottle rocks as it spins, a rhythmic grate of glass on hardwood flooring. Around, and around, until it lands on Kuroo.
“Alright!” Oikawa exclaims happily. “Now to see…” He spins the bottle again—
Wait… this is…
“Kenma!” Oikawa’s enthusiastic shout startles Kuroo back to the events at hand. “You’re up!”
Kenma looks up at him, his momentary inattention making him look more innocent than usual when he blinks up at Oikawa looming over him with apprehension.
“Kenma isn’t playing.” Kuroo finds himself saying.
Oikawa laughs and drags them out into the hallway, chucking Kenma into the closet.
“Nothing’s going to come of this.” Kuroo warns. “This is a waste of time.”
“No it’s not - we’re getting rid of you for 7 minutes.” Oikawa shoves him in too, closing the door behind him and locking it for good measure.
Kuroo glares at the door for a moment, then sinks down to the floor where Kenma has already made himself comfortable.
The rest of the dream plays out beat for beat, just like it had the night before. Throughout it all, Kuroo is merely a passenger in his own body as he re-enacts this memory for a second time.
When he wakes up, he stares at his ceiling for a moment before deactivating his alarm.
Again?
Kenma is shockingly already up when he enters the kitchen, Kuroo’s threat from yesterday having apparently left an impression. Kuroo considers mentioning that he’d had the same dream again, but then decides that would be weird. Kenma notices him staring and glances away, uncomfortable with prolonged eye-contact. Yeah, Kuroo doesn’t need to make this any stranger than it already is.
Two times he can excuse, but after a week of the same vivid dream, Kuroo is starting to think he might be losing it. Next Sunday he ends up at Bokuto’s new apartment after receiving a pitiful SOS to help him put his IKEA furniture together. Kuroo agrees, because it’s Bokuto, and shows up at his door trying to look like he’s excited to be there. This is slightly easier than it would normally be because Kuroo honestly had been looking for an excuse not to be at home.
He’s become hyper aware of how he looks at Kenma, like if he glances at him too long, Kenma will look up and mystically divine that Kuroo has been dreaming about the time he called him pretty when he was drunk. It is by far not the worst thing he has done while drunk, but at the same time it’s still weird. IKEA furniture is somehow the lesser of two evils.
Bokuto doesn’t seem particularly enthusiastic to get started either, deciding to make lunch for the both of them first and tackle the boding pile of flat-packed furniture parts on a full stomach. Kuroo is certainly not going to turn him down, especially not when it gives him an opportunity to talk to him about this whole dream thing.
Honestly, as much as he loves the guy, Bokuto wouldn’t be his first choice for sussing out the hidden mystery at the heart of this affair, but Oikawa is not an option. Not if Kuroo wants to continue living a relatively peaceful life.
Well, no time like the present. Kuroo watches Bokuto moving around the kitchen, considering how to broach the subject before realising he’ll just have to be blunt.
“So… I’ve been having a weird dream.”
“Weird weird or weird weird.”
“You sound like Oikawa,” Kuroo complains.
“I’m just asking!” Bokuto holds up his hands in surrender. “This is you we’re talking about.”
“Oh that’s nice,” Kuroo replies sarcastically.
“Ok, ok - what kind of weird dreams?”
“Not ‘dreams’ - the same dream, for a week. It’s so vivid it’s almost like I’m there, and it begins and ends in the same place every time.”
“Ok…?”
“It’s about Kenma.”
Bokuto opens his mouth, eyebrows furrowed, and Kuroo cuts him off before he can get the wrong idea.
“It’s just a memory. Nothing special about it.”
“Alright, so what’s the problem then? Doesn’t sound like a bad dream.”
Kuroo rakes a hand through his hair. “I want it to stop. I feel like I’m losing my damn mind. The same dream, every night. It’s exhausting.”
The kitchen opens directly onto the small living room, empty but for the deconstructed furniture and a singular couch, facing the TV on the opposite wall. This means that, to take a random example, if someone happened to be lying on said couch, they would be entirely invisible from the kitchen until such time they chose to declare themselves or sit up.
Akaashi does both simultaneously, interjecting. “Have you tried lucid dreaming?”
Kuroo almost falls off his bar stool. “Akaashi?!”
“Hello, Kuroo.”
Kuroo looks between Akaashi and Bokuto, trying to wrap his head around why Bokuto hadn’t mentioned his boyfriend was going to be spectating their suffering. Or why didn’t he just ask him to help with his fuckass IKEA furniture. Bokuto doesn’t notice Kuroo’s confusion, too busy beaming at Akaashi like he’d hung the fucking stars in the sky.
“Why are you here?” Kuroo demands eventually when it’s clear no one will start explaining.
“Oikawa’s working from home.” Akaashi responds simply.
“Oh. Fair point. Sorry, what were you saying?”
“Lucid dreaming, it’s a technique where you retain your awareness and control within a dream and can—”
Kuroo waves a hand dismissively. “Yeah no I know what lucid dreaming is but why do you think that would help?”
“Well maybe if you were able to change the dream you could influence it - find a way to end it or something. Although I’m afraid I don’t know much about oneirology…” Akaashi lowers his eyes, looking abashed.
“Onei— what?” Kuroo blinks at him confused.
“The psychological study of dreams.”
“You’re so smart Kaashi,” Bokuto enthuses, smiling at him fondly. Which. Gross.
Akaashi glances at him impassively and turns his attention back to Kuroo. “Anyways, when you’re in the dream, are you aware that you’re dreaming?”
Kuroo thinks about it, after the first time, he had been aware that he’d had the dream before. “Yeah… actually I think I am.”
“Well, that’s already a good start then. Why don’t you try changing things tonight?”
Kuroo nods. “Ok… yeah I’ll try that, thanks, Akaashi.”
Bokuto beams at Kuroo like ‘isn’t he great?’. Kuroo, though appreciative of Akaashi as a human being, is unable to match his boyfriend’s enthusiasm for him. Which is how it should be, honestly.
Kuroo has a feeling this is going to be a very long afternoon.
He’s half-right. He and Bokuto get through only about half of the furniture before Bokuto decides that he doesn’t need to do all of it today and surely he can live with his tabletop propped up on boxes rather than affixed to the table legs. After all, he has chairs for it now, and that’s all that really matters. In truth, the chairs turned out to be the least of their problems; before abandoning the table, they ended up devoting several hours to constructing a behemoth of a shelving unit Kuroo can only assume is graded to support several medium-sized elephants.
Akaashi, as Kuroo had suspected, left them to it, reclining on the couch with a book that from the title looks to be some philosophical treatise. Kuroo sometimes wonders what the fuck Akaashi even sees in his best friend.
When it comes to Bokuto, it isn’t really a mystery; Kuroo had been privy to multiple long rants about all of Akaashi’s virtues before and after they started dating. A year into their relationship, Bokuto’s feelings only seem to have intensified… and maybe Kuroo does think they’re kind of adorable, when he doesn’t find them annoying.
For instance, when Bokuto asks Akaashi multiple times if putting on music would bother him, as if Akaashi doesn’t have a perfectly good apartment to go back to (even if it also contains Oikawa). But whatever, Kuroo can forgive Bokuto’s excessive indulgence when he sees the way he lights up in Akaashi’s presence.
After he and Bokuto finish building the shelf, Kuroo steps back to stretch his back and hopefully pop his vertebrae back into place. Trying to find a good reason not to immediately tackle lifting the heavy ass bookshelf up against the wall, Kuroo wanders over to sit next to Akaashi on the couch.
“Hey, what are you reading?” Kuroo asks curiously.
Akaashi lowers his book slowly, marking his place with a faded velvet bookmark. “It’s a collection of readings from my class on the history of philosophy in religious writings.”
“Oh. That sounds… interesting.”
“It is… actually.” Akaashi glances at him as if to check Kuroo really is interested before continuing. “It puts things into perspective to see that humans have always been asking themselves the same kinds of questions.”
“Hey Kuroo, do you know where this bolt was supposed to go?” Bokuto calls from the other side of the room, bending over their theoretically ‘complete’ shelving unit.
Kuroo shrugs. “No idea - it was probably an extra.” He turns back to Akaashi, “Sorry, you were saying? Humans have always been humans…? That sounds really deep.”
Akaashi shakes his head. “It’s kind of the opposite. Reading ancient texts like these, sometimes you get the impression they could have been written only a few decades ago. Once you realise that cultural and technological context are the only major differences between us and the people who came before us, it’s as if a veil is lifted and history becomes something that can be reached. It’s very relatable.”
Kuroo stares at him for a moment. “Damn, love really must be blind.”
Akaashi blinks at him. “I’m afraid I don’t see what you mean.”
“You’re telling me that you think thoughts like that, but that is the man you’re dating? I mean no offense, I love him, but seriously what do you see in him?”
Akaashi pauses and looks over at Bokuto. “I think he would surprise you.”
“Hmm,” Kuroo makes a vague noise of agreement and Akaashi returns to his book.
Bokuto starts clearing space preparing to lift the shelf into place and Kuroo makes a half-hearted attempt to be a good person. “Yo, do you want help with that?”
Please say no.
“Nah, I got it,” Bokuto bends and hefts the bookshelf up, muscles flexing under tan skin as he heaves it up against the wall.
Kuroo watches appreciatively, grateful to not be taking part, and then makes the terrible mistake of glancing over at Akaashi who is… also watching Bokuto.
As if he has an extra sense for being perceived, Akaashi catches his eye. His placid expression shifts slightly to something that clearly says ‘whatever you’re thinking, I don’t want to hear it’. Kuroo isn’t any happier to have part of his question answered.
That night, Kuroo goes to bed with a mission. He’s going to change things, tonight will be the night, and hopefully after this he’ll be rid of the dream for good. It’s not that he hates the dream itself, it’s just… he doesn’t like this awkwardness that has manifested in his relationship with Kenma. He doesn’t like the hyper-awareness that makes even normal, familiar things into something he can’t help but overthink.
Before he even realises, the exhaustion from the long day of work catches up with him, and—
The bottle spins on the hardwood floor, catching the overhead light that sparkles within the glass as it moves. Kuroo stares down the barrel of the bottle neck, pointing undeniably towards him.
This time, this time he would change things.
“Alright!” Oikawa exclaims happily. “Now to see…” The bottle is spun again—
“Kenma! You’re up!”
Kenma is like a deer in the headlights looking up at Oikawa when he hears his name.
“Kenma isn’t playing,” Kuroo says firmly.
Just like before, Oikawa laughs, leaning down to grab Kenma’s arm and drag him up. Ok, ok, Kuroo needs to say something now, something that will convince Oikawa that shoving them in a closet together to make out is a bad idea. Fuck, he really should have thought this through before he fell asleep.
Kuroo moves to intercept Oikawa as he tugs Kenma towards the hallway. “Kenma’s claustrophobic.”
Kenma gives him a strange look for the lie, but Kuroo keeps his eyes on Oikawa and prays he won’t contradict him.
Oikawa frowns. “Really?”
“Yeah - the closet’s too small. Just pick someone else.” Kuroo breathes an internal sigh of relief. He was really doing it - he was consciously able to alter how the dream played out and—
“Since when am I claustrophobic?” Kenma mutters.
Oikawa’s frown immediately turns into a wicked grin. “Aw Kuroo, don’t tell me you were just getting nervous about kissing Kenma were you? You won’t get away that easily!”
Kuroo does attempt to resist Oikawa’s iron grip on his arm - since when had the man been so strong? But once again he finds himself thrown unceremoniously into the hall closet. With Kenma, obviously. Kuroo whips around just in time for the door to shut in his face and the lock to snap into place.
Fuck.