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Schizophrenia, Tooru reads, is a mental illness characterized by delusions, poor emotional responses, disorganized thinking, a lack of emotion, and/or hallucinations.
Tooru’s fingers trace the words, read them again and again until they are permanent fixtures in his mind.
The stars follow him home that night, twinkling and blinking their way behind him.
Hajime didn’t ask for this to be his life.
*
Tooru thinks that Tobio-chan might be trying to kill him.
“He’s against me, Iwa-chan,” he remarks idly at lunch, acting like he’s just talking about the weather. “He wants to kill me and take my place.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Hajime commands. “If Tobio-chan wanted to kill you, he would have already.” He eats another spring roll.
Tooru slams his palms down on his desk. “No, Iwa-chan! He’s waiting to learn everything that I know, then he’ll murder me!”
Tooru is yelling at the last two words, drawing stares and concerned glances from the teacher.
“Tooru, calm down,” Hajime coaxes. “Think about it. Why does Tobio-chan want to kill you?”
“He wants to eliminate the competition, Iwa-chan! You’re probably right after me!” Tooru hisses, hunching back over his lunch. “Don’t trust him, okay? Don’t be alone with him ever, or he might hurt you. Don't teach him anything, Iwa-chan.”
Hajime nods. “I promise, Tooru,” he replies, a little intimidated.
Tooru sighs with relief. “Thank you for believing me, Iwa-chan.”
Hajime swallows the last of his food around the lump in his throat. “C’mon,” he says abruptly. “Let’s practice a bit before next class.”
Tooru hums after him. It’s so nice for someone to believe him.
*
He almost hits Kageyama when he asks to be taught how to set. He is wicked, wicked, wicked, and he cannot be trusted. Hajime, though, only just stops him from thumping Kageyama’s head in.
*
They lose to Shiratorizawa. Tooru is absolutely listless for days, weeks afterwards, almost forgets to eat, sometimes forgets things that had happened just the day before. It isn’t important. Nothing is important, he realizes, fingers almost-but-not-quite twining around his tangled bedroom sheets.
He doesn’t love anyone anymore, knows that he shouldn’t need to love anything, knows that nothing is even worth loving anymore.
“Go to hell!” He shrieks at Hajime when he comes by Tooru’s house to ask after him. “Go to hell! You don’t get it, Iwa-chan, you don’t get it and I hate you!”
Tooru doesn’t talk to Iwa-chan for the next two weeks. His grades in math falter, although he hides his grades from Iwa-chan, who sits behind him. His history, too, begins to deteriorate, and he finds that simply doesn’t care.
Volleyball, too, doesn’t matter. He snoozes on the bench during practice, antagonizes his teammates, tries to throw punches a couple of times.
There is nothing worth loving, nothing to care about, and Tooru knows it.
*
Barely two days after his depressive phase ends, Tooru begins obsessively practicing. He spends hours upon hours practicing his spikes and his sets. His grades return to their slightly-above-average average, his hair, not greasy, but still unbrushed, and he obsesses over volleyball, too busy to care about how he looks or smells.
He bows to the entire team before practice one day.
“I would like to apologize for my behavior for the past two weeks!” He exclaims. “There is no justification for my behavior, and I am truly sorry!”
He keeps his gaze focused on the floor, refuses to look up and see the reaction, he knows it’s bad, knows that it’s gonna be really bad.
“We accept your apology,” the team choruses. Tooru finally looks up, forces his face into a peppy grin.
“Okay! Let’s practice!”
*
Tooru hasn’t smiled authentically in months, he thinks, Hajime knows. It’s like he can’t be happy anymore. He fakes it, pretending that he can be happy, pretending that he can laugh at jokes.
He doesn’t find much of anything funny anymore, but he also doesn’t find anything sad. It’s like he can’t feel anything.
It’s fine, until it’s not, and he thinks that he’s feeling everything that he missed out on for the past three months. It all comes crashing down on him at graduation, and he sobs when he gets the award for best setter. He turns back to Hajime, expects to reprimanded for his show of emotion, but Iwa-chan is crying too.
“We’ll beat them next time, Iwa-chan,” he says, sniffling. “We’ll definitely...beat them.”
Hajime doesn’t say anything, just nods.
“We’ll beat them,” Tooru says again, firmly.
*
Between his third year of middle school and his first year of high school, Tooru starts taking Clozaril.
Common side effects of Clozaril include, but are not limited to: blurred vision, confusion, fainting, irregular heartbeat, shakiness in extremities, moderate weight gain, and unusual tiredness or weakness. For more side effects, contact your doctor. If you experience severe side effects, contact your doctor. Do not mix Clozaril with recreational drugs. Do not drive immediately after starting Clozaril. Etc., etc., etc.
Tooru keeps practicing with Iwa-chan over the summer, serving and receiving and setting.
The ball is sailing to his open palms, and he's got this, he's been practicing this, he's a setter, he's good at this. He moves his hands minutely, keeps everything aligned.
His arm starts shaking first, his fingers tingling and shivering, his elbow glitching back and forth, and he misses the ball. It sails towards his face, and he only just gets his other arm in front of his face in time to block it. He stares at his malfunctioning hand, remembers the side effects he'd been listing off to Hajime just minutes before.
Shakiness in extremities, and remembers his doctor's warning that Clozaril might affect his performance in volleyball.
"Oi, Trashykawa!” Hajime hollers. “Are you gonna get the ball or what?”
Tooru grits his teeth, grins at Iwa-chan. He dashes over to retrieve the ball from where it’s rolled into the bushes, trots back over to the makeshift court in Hajime’s backyard.
“Iwa-chan?”
“What?”
“What were we doing?”
Hajime stares at Tooru, only vaguely remembering the symptoms that he had been half-listening to.
Confusion, and he remembers promising Tooru’s mother to look after him.
“Tooru, do you wanna head inside for a bit?”
Tooru looks from the volleyball to Iwa-chan and back again. “No, Iwa-chan. Let’s finish our game.”
When he serves, he almost breaks the ball, and Hajime is scared of the frightening grin Oikawa’s sporting.
*
Oikawa gains twenty pounds and five centimeters between his third year of middle school and his first year of high school. He isn’t obscenely obese, but the “unusual tiredness or weakness” is really hitting him, and he isn’t great at practice.
So he goes off of his meds for a couple weeks. He knows that this is a bad idea, is completely 100% positive that he shouldn’t be doing this.
But he loves volleyball more than he loves himself, and he knows what he has to do.
*
Tooru’s spikes hit the court like earthquakes. They move too fast for the opposing team to even see, sometimes, other times move too fast for anyone to touch without fear of burning their skin off.
“Iwa-chan,” he says after their third practice match of the year. “They’re following me.”
“Who?” Iwa-chan asks, trying to stuff his clothes into his gym bag.
“The shadow people,” Tooru says, clutching the strap of his gym bag. “Followfollowfollowfollow.”
“Tooru,” Hajime sighs. “There aren’t any shadow people.”
“Shadowshadowshadow,” Tooru argues. “Hmmmmmmm shadow.”
“Shut up,” Hajime grunts. “C’mon, we’re goin’ back to school.”
There is a sudden tightness at Hajime’s elbow, and he looks over to see Tooru clutching his tracksuit like it’s the only thing holding him to earth. Tooru is muttering to himself and presumably to Hajime and possibly to the shadow people.
“Let’s get on the bus, asshole,” Hajime sighs, and Tooru follows him at a distance of mere inches.
“Iwa-chan,” he whispers, when they get on the bus, “don’t let the shadow people take me.”
“Right,” Hajime says. “I won’t.”
“Don’t,” Tooru repeats. “Nononononononononodonotdonotdonotnononononopestopno.”
“I know,” Hajime says, putting his hand on Tooru’s shoulder. “They won’t take you.”
Tooru hums, and Hajime can’t tell if it’s because he’s happy or if it’s because he’s anxious.
"Thank you," Tooru whispers halfway through the ride, and Hajime relaxes.
*
Tooru takes his meds sometimes, skips them other times. He’s confused, still, confused and he can’t explain why and sometimes that’s because of the drugs and sometimes because it’s just how his brain works. His first year at high school doesn’t hurt as much as he thought that it would, and even losing most of their competitions, that doesn’t sting like he thought it would sting.
It doesn’t hurt as much as it could have when the third years leave.
He’s busy with summer training camp, anyway, too busy to take his meds some days. He runs and sprints and spikes and sets and still, sometimes, sees shadow people and can’t understand his own thoughts, sometimes thinks or knows that one of his teammates are trying to kill him. His meds sometimes get neglected in a plastic bag when he collapses into bed at night, magically forgotten in his tiny bag of toiletries. He doesn’t have a lot of energy, even when he hasn’t taken his meds since after school ended, so his hair’s a little greasy and his eyes are a little crusty.
“Oi,” Takahiro, one of the few first years on the trip says, on the second to last day. “Tooru. Have you been taking your meds?”
Tooru is sitting with his breakfast, shoulders hunched over. He glances over at Takahiro, looks vaguely panicked before he forces his eyes to settle and his mouth to point up at the ends.
“Who told you I was on meds, Makki?” Tooru asks easily, like he isn’t horribly upset that Takahiro even knows that he’s on meds, like he isn’t even more upset that Takahiro knows he’s been missing them.
“Iwaizumi,” Takahiro shrugs. “He told everyone on the team that you’re on meds.”
“Did he,” Tooru murmurs, and he gets up without finishing his breakfast.
*
Oikawa Tooru doesn’t speak to Iwa-chan for the last two days of training camp, doesn’t even speak to him when they get back home and are excused from club activities until just before school starts again. He doesn’t speak to him when they reassemble in the Aoba Johsai gymnasium for the first volleyball practice of their second term, doesn’t speak to him until Hajime confronts him.
But he takes his meds, and he’s ready.
“Oi,” Hajime says, after the first volleyball practice of their second year. “You haven’t been speaking to me.”
“No,” Tooru acknowledges. “I haven’t.”
“And may I ask, why is that?”
“Because,” Tooru says, packing up his gym bag. “I never said you could tell the team about my meds.”
“Wh-that was first term! How are you still angry about that? You never said it was a secret!”
“I shouldn’t have had to,” Tooru says. He notes that he and Iwa-chan are the only two players left in the locker room.
“What does that mean?” Hajime demands.
“Iwa-chan, I told you that in confidence. Do you know what that means? I told you that, assuming that you would know better than to tell everyone else.”
“Tooru, you needed help! You skip your meds and you act like you’re fine and even when you’re on your meds you’re still-” Hajime doesn’t finish his sentence, just stares at Tooru and lets his arm fall to his side.
“Crazy, Iwa-chan,” Tooru says, stepping around him. “I’m crazy, even when I’m on my meds. I am not your responsibility. It’s my choice, when I’m on or off my meds, and you don’t get to decide what’s best for me.”
“Tooru-” Hajime says. “I just wanted to make sure you stayed safe.”
“That’s sweet, Iwa-chan,” Tooru says. “But it’s only other peoples’ business if I say it is. As in, I tell them.”
Hajime sighs, and Tooru leaves.
*
Tooru gives Iwa-chan a volleyball for Christmas.
Iwa-chan gives him a charm bracelet with a volleyball, an alien face, and a star on it.
*
They nearly won the Spring High in second year, very nearly. They’re beaten by Shiratorizawa, badly, but Tooru swears that they’ll beat them next time. The third years shove his head down, yelling about how they won’t be able to beat anybody without the talents of the third years.
Tooru laughs even while he cries, since he’s realized that that means the third years are leaving this year, since all of them are planning on going to college. Tooru cries, too, since this means he’s going to be a third year this year.
The captain walks up to him at the next practice after the Spring High to tell him the news.
“Oikawa,” he says, “I think you should be the captain of the team next year. Are you interested?”
Oikawa nods, pulls his towel back and forth across his neck. “Aren’t you worried?” he asks. “I mean, Iwa-chan told you, right?”
“Oh, yeah,” the captain says. “That shouldn’t be a problem, so long as you’re responsible with your medications and your mental health won’t affect the team’s well-being.”
“Alright,” Tooru finally says. “I’m in.”
“Great,” the captain says. “Do some good work next year.”
“Yes, sir,” Tooru says, halfway sarcastic. “I’ll try to do as good a job as you have.”
“Thanks, Oikawa,” he says.
*
At the beginning of third year, Oikawa realizes that he was made to be captain.
He isn’t always on his meds, but he crushes Tobio-chan, and that is his favorite part.
*
The stars follow him home again, but this time, he is leading them.
He lives.