#every so often i'll open the file for this fic and lose my fucking mind

[kimbapisnotsushi]

Grief was a heavy thing. 

It was supposed to be, at least. Tobio had heard it time and time again — how it weighed you down in your bones, sank under your skin, could shatter your heart like glass beneath the overwhelming pressure of it all.

But standing in front of his grandfather’s altar, Tobio didn’t feel heavy. Instead there was a hollowness, wide and aching, thrumming in his veins. His mind was blank; everything around him was white noise. It was all fuzzy and dim, and he probably would have kept standing there forever if Miwa hadn’t tugged on his arm.

“Come on,” she murmured. “It’s getting late. You need to sleep.”

Tobio blinked, tilted his head down at her. Some distant voice inside him noted that he was getting too old and too tall to let Miwa baby him like when they had been kids, but right now he was content to tuck himself against her shoulder as she swept him past people who talked in hushed voices and glanced over at them every so often. Tobio didn’t register any of it, but Miwa’s grip tightened around him. 

“Did you see? The parents actually left early. Those poor children . . .”

“I heard the boy was practically raised by Kazuyo, I don’t understand how he can look so cold about this.”

“The girl ran from home as soon as she could, and this is the only time she returns? Completely disgraceful!”

“Such a shameful funeral, honestly, Kazuyo deserves much better than something so improper.”

Down the hall, turn right, out the double doors, past the crumbling stone steps and into a fresh breeze and the night sky. It really was a beautiful temple — the center courtyard was lit by stone lanterns glowing honey-yellow, and the trees and flowers were in bloom. It was one of the smaller ones, which Kazuyo would have liked. Even with all his talent, Tobio’s grandfather had never been one for pomp and circumstance.

“Who cares about tradition?” he had said once, eyes crinkling with a smile. “Just dump me in a ditch and bury me there. Good fertilizer. We can grow bell peppers over my body.”

Tobio’s heart clenched at the memory. He didn’t think bell peppers would ever taste the same again. 

Nothing would ever be the same again.

“Nee-san,” he said softly, the first he had spoken the entire day. It sounded alien to him. Like he couldn’t quite comprehend that the words were coming from his own mouth. “What do we do now?”

Anyone else would probably have thought that Tobio was asking a literal question, but Miwa always understood him. She was the only person other than Kazuyo who did. 

She squeezed him tight. “We grieve. We heal. We learn what feelings to let go of and what to keep. And we don’t ever, ever forget how much Kazuyo-kun loved us — and how much we loved him.”

Loved, not love. Tobio didn’t know if he could do that. Kazuyo had taught him to love in the here and now, to cherish all the things you held dear and hold them in your heart as you moved forward. He had never taught Tobio how to love in the past tense. He had never taught Tobio how to love somebody who was no longer there.

— excerpt from so long, a character study of kageyama tobio and what his grandfather meant to him

#every so often i'll open the file for this fic and lose my fucking mind #because sometimes i'm like 'god what do i even do here' #'how the fuck could i possibly do justice to the entire emotional rollercoaster that is kageyama's life' #and i don't think i can really #but i can sure goddamn try!! #kageyama tobio #kageyama kazuyo #haikyuu #haikyuu!! #sou says stuff #sou writes stuff