Matsukawa Angst - Tumblr Posts

Chapter one: Plunging back into the darkness

Word count: 3.7k

Category: hard angst, smut

Chapter warnings: a bit of smut, drugs, mentions of medicine and hospitals

Summary: There are three hot guys who want to be with you, however, there are a few problems along the way. One of them is a plug, another one wants to keep you all to himself and the third one - a med student who deals drugs on the side. Your main problem, though? You have a terminal illness that has a very low life expectancy. Spiraling down a dangerous path seems like a fun way to spend your last years.

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It‘s depressing. The walls are white and blank of any pictures, posters, drawings – anything. It‘s constant and monotonous, boring. The smell is always the same too – something old, disinfectant and cleanliness. It’s always dim, too. You like visitor days — the smell and mood in the hospital changes, then. You love it the most during the holidays though. It’s as if even people who hadn’t had visitors in a while suddenly have a line of people desperate to see them. The mix of perfumes, smell of the food that isn’t the bland kind the hospital provides and their natural body odor makes you sick most of the time, but your days are still a bit brighter. 

It’s just a bit before Halloween when Mattsun visits you again. You’re sitting in your bed in sweatpants and an Aoba Johsai hoodie, which you got from none other but the dark haired man standing right before you.  

“Hey,” he greets you, casual as always. Issei’s dressed in black baggy jeans with an oversized dark green hoodie, hair as messy as always – a bit longer than it was during high school – and countless rings adorning his long fingers. You notice he’s still wearing the one you’ve had gifted him for one of his birthdays – a dainty forget-me-not on a silver band, contrasting with the massive skulls and snakes on the other rings. 

“Hey, Mattsun,” you respond, a small smile finding its way to your face. The pastel yellow hospital room always seems a bit brighter when he’s around, even when he doesn’t fit into the room properly. His frame looks surprisingly big in this tiny room, which only contains a bed, one uncomfortable chair, a table beside it, a tiny closet and a small tv. He seems out of place in the dull establishment. 

“I’ve brought you a few things,” he finally says, sitting down beside you and taking off his backpack. Your eyebrow raises up. It’s not unusual for him to bring you snacks or books, but your intuition tells you that today it’s something different. 

You’re right. Issei pulls out a string of fairy lights, but instead of the round bulbs  it’s tiny jack-o-lanterns that should light up once you plug the lights in. And then he pulls out a fluffy black blanket with a bunch of small skeletons drawn all over it. 

“Thought your room could use a little bit of décor during the spooky season,” he grins, same as always and you can’t help but pull him into a hug. He knew you had a bunch of medical tests during Halloween and he couldn’t even take you out after — long work hours and all. This was his way of saying sorry, of apologizing for making you spend one of your favorite holidays alone. 

“Ah, Mattsun, thank you, these are amazing,” you lift up the blanket, admiring the happy little skeletons. He helps you put up the fairy lights and then you sit back down again. Today, you don’t really have the energy to go outside and walk around in the park around the hospital. Mattsun doesn’t really mind though, or at least he seems not to, absentmindedly playing with your hair as if curling and uncurling your strands was the most entertaining activity in the world. 

“Oikawa is throwing a Halloween party so him, Makki and Iwa probably won’t show up. I’m working and I’ll only be out when the visiting hours are over. You sure you don’t wanna invite over Lev or some other friend?” 

You boop his nose and give him a loop-sided smile, “Lev’s in New York right now. I’m fine with spending Halloween alone and I don’t want my friends to skip parties just ‘cause I’m lonely. Besides, I’ll probably be irritable after all the tests, anyways,”

Issei stays silent for a moment and then his eyes light up, as if he’s connected two dots in his head.

“The pretty medical student’s group is having rotations at the hospital during Halloween, right?” it seems like he couldn’t be more delighted as you bury your head in his shoulder, not wanting to see his self-satisfied smirk. 

“Maybe you’re right,” you grumble, “or maybe you’re wrong.”

He lifts up your face with one huge hand to squish your cheeks. His hand is scorching hot. It always surprises you. It’s like Issei’s body temperature is abnormally high.

“That’s why you didn’t seem down at all  when I told you I had work during Halloween!” Issei says, still too enthusiastic to have found out your big secret, “Y/N, you know you’ll be a real bitch if you replace me with that trust-fund pretty rich bitch boy, right? And that I get jealous easily?” He shakes your face, side to side, “Right?”

You turn your face to the left, then to the right until he lets you go, and then you stick your tongue out. 

“That was a whole lot of epithets to describe a person you don’t know,” you poke fun of him, as if you hadn’t found about a thousand ways to describe how handsome he was during long evenings spent with Issei, “Besides, I was grieved, you hear? Grieved and languished when I found out you were working during Halloween, but… The pretty trust-fund kid relieved my pain by like… 15 percent,”

“And you still haven’t talked to him…” Mattsun drawls, “You just watch him and then tell me how he’s so pretty and oh, how his bed-head looks so nice, but you haven’t said more than a “hello” to him,”

“I’ll talk to him, eventually. For now I just gotta look pretty and smart. Who knows, maybe he’ll talk to me first,” you retort and cross your arms.

“Or you could just talk to him,” Mattsun leans back until he’s basically laying down in your tiny bed, “I’m sure he steals glances at you too, not exactly a lot of attractive med students and you’re a bit above average.” He chuckles. 

“Hey!” you poke his side, hard and Issei grabs you by the waist and pulls you on top of him, making you giggle. 

“Okay, way above average. Some people might even say you’re attractive,” he raises his arms defensively and then puts them on the small of your back, rubbing gentle circles.

“Some people?” he nods, “But not you?”

“Maybe I do too,” he wonders, “But if I tell you, you’ll get all blushy, giggly and shit,” he kisses your nose, gently and you let out a sigh, “And I have work soon,” Issei gives you another kiss, this time on one of your cheeks. 

“So?” you ask, eyes all big and doe-like. It makes Issei give you a lopsided smile. 

“So, if you get all blushy and giggly,” he rolls over and now you’re trapped under him, looking up with lust-blown eyes,, “I’ll get hard and that’s not exactly a problem I can get rid of in five mins.”

You bite your bottom lip and lift your pelvis to grind against his growing erection. Issei lets out a grunt. 

Your relationship is weird. Occasionally you have sex, go on unofficial dates when you feel strong enough to, and all his friends know you’re off-limits. But you’re not official. And the wonderings as to why that is, find their way into your mind way too often. Friends with benefits? Yeah, sure, if friends with benefits are that emotionally attached to each other. 

Not today, not now though - you don’t let yourself wander off. You’re only focused on Mattsun’s lips kissing and nipping away at your neck. 

“Maybe I want you to get hard,” you whisper in his ear and give it a nip.

“You’re a minx, you know that?” he takes some skin in between his teeth and bites. Hard. 

“Ow, you asshole,” you swat at his chest, only causing him to chuckle, “That’ll leave a mark.”

Issei licks the bite mark he just left, as if that will make it better. 

“Yeah it better. Don’t need no pretty rich boys stealing away my girl,” and then he finally kisses you on the lips. He tastes the same as always – marlboro gold cigarettes and citrus flavored gum. Comfortingly familiar. 

“Your girl?” you question, in between kisses. Your whole body feels warm just at the name. You know you shouldn’t overthink it, but you can’t help it. It feels so good to be called his girl.

“Yeah, what about it?” he smirks and rewards you with another kiss on the lips, making you part yours and give him full access. Citrus floods your tastebuds and you moan into his mouth. 

One of his hands travels from your back and slowly reaches into your sweatpants, finding your panties - unsurprisingly - wet. 

His fingers circle around your clit and you break the kiss, your head leaning back and lips soundlessly parting from the sudden pleasure. 

Before you can give an answer to Issei’s previous question or let those few minutes before he has to leave turn into much more fun activities - there’s a knock on the door. 

Immediately, you’re off of him and on your feet. Mattsun sits up and then the door opens. 

A young nurse walks in, carrying a glass of water and a bunch of colorful pills. 

“Oh, sorry Y/N, didn’t know you’d have visitors. Matsukawa,” she acknowledges the man on your bed, having seen Issei enough times to recognize him, “Time for meds,” she puts them on the bedside table alongside with the water glass and you let out a sigh of relief. Pain was kicking your ass for the past hour.

She stares at you for a bit, her eyes focus on your neck and slightly widen. Your hand instinctively lifts up to cover the hickey Issei left.

She leaves without acknowledging it further. 

Matsukawa lets out a chuckle that slowly turns into a loud, uncontrollable laugh. 

“Now what are you laughing at?” you cock your head to the side, taking the pills and washing them down with big gulps of water. 

“Imagine if she hadn’t knocked.” 

“Then,” you’re on top of Issei again, “She would’ve seen way more than a hickey you left on me,” you giggle.

Issei grunts. 

“Babe, as much as I would like to stay there with you and explore,” his hand trails down, “More fun activities,” he softly kisses your nose and then boops it, “I gotta go to work- have an evening shift today,” 

“Yeah yeah, go make coffee for rich snobs,” you respond, finally standing up and letting Issei do the same.

He smoothed out his clothing, a confident grin finding its way to Mattsun’s face.

“What?”

“Admiring my work” 

You kick at him, but he catches your ankle just at the right time, squeezing it until you yelp and then he let’s go.

“Asshole,”

“Yeah yeah, you love me,” before you can debunk his statement, Issei is at the door, “Who knows, maybe one of those rich snobs,” he mocks you by making his voice higher, “Will be your pretty med student,” 

“Doubt it!” 

“I’ll tell you if a pretty snob with a bed-head comes in,” Issei retorts and he’s out the door before the slipper you’ve thrown can reach him. 

You sigh and fall back to your bed, curling into a ball. The pain is back and it seems that the meds didn’t really help. Well, at least you’ve managed to keep it together until Issei left. Good. 

***

Halloween comes quickly and the hospital empties. A lot of people go back home for the holiday and you’re thankful.

After all the medical tests you went through in the morning, you’re still grumpy and the silence is enjoyable, rather than eerie.

You’ve had an hour until med students came in for practice, but that passes quickly. 

You fix up your clothes, jumping into a pair of jeans that make your ass look great and a comfy sweater. Not overdressed, just pretty enough for the handsome med student.

Whose name you’ll ask. Well, if you gather enough courage, anyways. You can’t keep letting Mattsun tease you.

You’re out the door of your hospital room, notebook and pen in hands, head lifted up. A deep breath, reminding yourself that you deserve to be in the med student practice as much as others do. 

What they don’t know won’t hurt them. And as far as they’re concerned, you’re one of them and don’t spend half your time in the hospital as a patient.

Today you’re divided into smaller groups. You’re supposed to observe surgeries and take notes. You wonder what kind of surgery you’ll have to watch today. Skin graft ones are the worst and you pray that today, it’s not one of those. 

Your hopes are killed and buried 6 feet under, when you walk into the designated operating room. Of course it’s a fucking skin graft surgery. The man laying on the operating table has a nasty burn on his cheek. The skin is raised with a  leathery texture and is dark brown in colour. Third degree burns. 

Although, maybe fortune isn’t fully mocking you - the pretty med student is here, alongside a few others. His bed-head is wilder than ever before and bags under his eyes could put a raccoon to shame. 

You remember that you’re standing at the door and instantly move, not wanting to make it more awkward than it already was. Did he notice you staring? Hopefully not. 

You stand closer to him than other students. He glances down at you, golden brown eyes quizzically. You want to punch yourself. Thoughts running through your head wildly. Don’t look like a creep, Y/N fucking speak, damn it.

“You look like death. Do skin graft surgeries make you a bit sick too?” you manage to say, voice higher than intended.

The corners of his lips twitch up, “No, just a long night.” 

You raise one of your eyebrows up and he chuckles. 

“Not like that. Was helping a friend out. You, on the other hand, look like you just saw death.” 

Hah. A clever joke. You just called him death a second before. You open your mouth to answer, but then the surgeon walks into the room and you’re left without the satisfaction of a snarky comeback. 

“Okay, you guys already know what kind of surgery we’re doing today and if you don’t - get the fuck out of this room,” surgeon’s words earn a few laughs and his eyes crinkle in a smile, which is not visible beneath the mask, “Does anyone know what kind of grafts we’ll be using?” 

You know the answer. Time to leave a good impression on the trust-fund kid.

“You’ll be using full-thickness grafts,” you manage to respond and the surgeon nods.

“And why is that?”

“The burn is on the face of the patient, it’s not too big and, uh, full-thickness grafts tend to have a better cosmetic outcome than split-thickness grafts.” 

“That’s right,” the surgeon nods and the dark-haired guy leans down, to whisper directly into your ear,

“Smart and cute? Maybe practice won’t be so boring, after all.” 

Your cheeks burn and you have to bite the inside of your cheek to avoid the bright smile creeping its way onto your face.

“I have way more, um, good qualities than just being smart and cute.” you respond, not letting him get the upper hand in the situation. You still have to find out if he’s flirting or just teasing, though.

“I’d like to find out, those… Personality traits of yours,” he replies.

Yes, flirting, definitely flirting. Maybe, just maybe, Mattsun’s advice to talk to him wasn’t all that bad.

“I’m L/N Y/N,” you introduce yourself, putting your hand out for a handshake and for the sole purpose of finally putting a name to his face. 

“Kuroo Tetsuro,” he smiles and takes your hand into one of his huge ones. It’s surprisingly warm; comfortingly so.

One step further to getting to know the mysterious Kuroo Tetsuro. You’ll have to tell Issei about this

***

A week or so after Halloween, Lev takes you out. He has a week of vacation, so he uses it to get back to Tokyo and you two choose the best day to spend together, which is hard; taking into account that you’re a hospital patient and he’s busy with his modelling job. Yet somehow, you manage. 

“How’s your health?” he asks, tone reminding you of your mom. He has your hand in his and you’re thankful. Your energy is quite low today so the support tall man provides is helpful. Lev’s green eyes study you, as if that would help him find all the answers he sought. 

“Can we not talk about hospital stuff when we’re out? I wanna enjoy my time with you.” 

Lev lets out an awkward chuckle, his free hand finding its way to his platinum hair.

“Sure, sure,” he says and pats your head, “I’m glad to see you. Really missed you.” 

“Aw, Lev, I missed you too,” you say, voice sweet and a smile playing on your lips, “I saw your most recent photos on Instagram. Almost one million likes? People must love you!”

He shrugs, “They just love my face. The few interviews I’ve done aren’t nearly as popular as my photos.” 

You can’t help but laugh, “Don’t complain. Not a lot of us can make money off of our faces alone!” 

“Yeah yeah, whatever.” Lev answers, absentmindedly and then suddenly lights up, “Hey! How’s it going with that handsome med student? Don’t tell me you still haven’t talked to him.” 

“I have actually!” Lev’s facial expression turned to surprise, “Oh, don’t be so shocked. I even asked him for his name!” 

“And?”

“And what?” you cock your head to the side, a bit confused.

“What’s his name, dumbass?” he gently flicks your forehead and you frown,

“Oh! Oh, it’s Kuroo Tetsuro.”

Lev suddenly stops and fully turns to you.

“Kuroo? Black hair, kinda tall, always with a bed-head?”

“I- Yeah. Also, not kinda tall-“

“Shorter than me,” Lev interrupts and before you can respond that everyone is shorter than him, he continues, “He was the captain of my high school volleyball team, a really good guy actually, surprising, since you usually like assholes.” 

Lev doesn’t like Mattsun; Mattsun doesn’t like Lev. Silly conflicts from high school and such. Before you can argue that Issei is, in fact, not an asshole, Lev turns to you, face painted with worry.

“Listen, I can’t talk from experience since I haven’t seen him since he, uh, graduated, but I’ve heard he’s doing some real  shady business now.” 

“But he’s a med student,” you frown.

“Yeah, being a med student doesn’t really make you immune to doing shady things,”

“Maybe- maybe they’re just rumours,” you reckon and Lev shakes his head. It’s unusual for him to be so serious.

You’re going past a run-down skate park when he looks around and quickens his step, almost dragging you with him.

“Ah, Lev, I can’t go that fast. Why are you-“

The tall man’s eyes are focused on a person, who’s leaving the skate park and coming straight towards you.

“Sorry, I’m sorry,” he says, not slowing down, “See that man over there? Suna Rintarou. I really, really don’t want to deal with him right now.” 

“Okay,” you say, in between breaths, “Okay.”

Lev is calculated and cold, but you’re beginning to panic. What could be so bad about meeting Lev’s acquaintance?

Well, you’re about to find out because the tall man, Suna, you remember, catches up to you. 

Lev stops in his tracks, stepping in front of you; his height almost covering you.

“What do you want, Suna?”

The man clad in worn-down blue jeans and a bomber jacket full of patches, smirks. There’s a cigarette, hanging from his lips. No, not a cigarette. A blunt. If you had more time to collect your thoughts, you’d even say he’s stupidly handsome.

“What? I can’t say hello to my old friend? Didn’t you miss me, Lev?'' His voice, saccharine as can be, cuts through the tension like a sharp knife. 

“No, not even a bit,” Lev answers, voice cold and devoid of any emotion.

“I need a favour.” Suna says, not waltzing around with words.

“No.”

“Not even gonna listen to what favour I want to ask for?”

“No,” Lev answers once again, firmly. His hand finds yours once again and squeezes, hard, “Frankly, we should keep going.” 

“Ah, don’t be like that. Hey! Maybe your friend will help. What do you say, sweetheart?”

The pet name sounded so condescending, but it’s in your nature to help people. Too kind, as Lev often said.

“No-“ Lev begins and at the same time you answer:

“Y-yeah?” You can’t help but stutter. God, where is your voice when you need it the most? You stand beside Lev now, not hiding anymore.

Suna takes in your appearance, humming in thought.

He grabs your glove-clad hand and before you can answer, yanks you towards him. You almost trip and Lev is about to rip Suna’s head off when the black-haired man unbuttons two buttons of your coat and puts something inside your inner pocket. One of his hands brush against your skin and it’s ice cold. You shiver and take a step back from him. Lev is seething. 

“They’re doing a raid. And I’ve already been caught a couple of times. Can’t do jail time. And who’s gonna think such a sweet looking girl has drugs? Nah, man.”

Drugs. You have drugs in your inner pocket.

Lev pulls you close to him and is about to take the baggie out of your pocket and tell Suna to shove it up his ass, when the distinct figure of a police officer begins walking closer to you. 

You blanch, legs feeling like jelly.

“Right on time,” Suna drawls as he smiles down at you.

The police officer gets closer with each passing breath. 

You’re screwed.