⸻ [NAME] HADN'T BEEN TO PRACTICE in three days. three entire days that the young woman hadn't appeared and instead taru was either being dropped off by his mother or walking with takeru and oikawa.

it made oikawa nervous, wondering why she wasn't showing up. was she sick? there's a chance she could've gotten sick from food poisoning or because of the air conditioning being too cold.

or maybe she was avoiding him.

his eyes grew wide at that possibility.
maybe she was avoiding him, maybe semi had told [name] what he said and it caused her to grow uncomfortable around him.

oikawa sat on the bench inside the gym, head digging into his palms as his thoughts began to overwhelm him. what was he going to do if she was avoiding him? he could use it as a way to get rid of his unnecessary feelings- but he couldn't just let their friendship end so easily.

he lifted his head from his hands just in time to see taru walking into the gymnasium, his mother following in behind him.
oikawa huffed to himself, standing from his seat and walking towards the gym doors with a plastered grin.

"hey, thanks for bringing him!" he forced himself to say enthusiastically, clapping his hands together and kneeling down to taru to look eye to eye.

"no problem."

oikawa looked up, watching as taru's mother kissed her son on the forehead and walked away. taru turned and looked back at oikawa, a blank expression on his face as the two awkwardly stared at each other.

oikawa cleared his throat, standing up quickly and rubbing his shoulder, "so where's your sister?"

taru shrugged, responding with 'home' before walking around his coach to meet with his friend that stood on the court to play a match before practice- but the young man quickly ran over to catch up with the child.

"i-er," oikawa coughed, his fist at his lips, "wh-why?"

the small volleyball player looked up, confused as to why oikawa was suddenly bombarding him with questions. he blinked a couple of times, his [eye color] eyes staring into oikawa's brown ones.

"i don't know," taru responded monotonously, clearly uninterested in the conversation at hand- that was about his sister, "she's been crying nonstop, it's kind of annoying."

oikawa was wide-eyed, jaw nearly dropping.

taru turned back to the net, positioning himself to set the ball for takeru but was once again interrupted by his coach's continuous questions and concerns.

"what happened? is she okay?"

[name]'s younger brother shrugged once again, jumping up to set the ball to taru before landing on his feet and turning to oikawa.

taru was clearly growing annoyed, a twitch of his eyebrow and an agitated frown replacing his usual uninterested demeanor. he stared at his coach, hands moving into the pockets of his practice shorts.

"i dunno, i tried calling semi from the house phone but he didn't answer," he informed, turning back to his teammates, "are we done?"

oikawa was even more confused by the young boy's responses to his questions. she didn't seem like the girl to cry over avoiding a friend, especially not oikawa.

was she rejected from a college? maybe that was why. she was rejected from college and didn't want to leave home and it broke her heart that all she could do was cry over it.

he groaned, walking back to the bench.

should he visit her after practice to check on her? no, that's semi's job. oikawa wasn't her boyfriend, it would make things worse if he went to check up on her.

oikawa's hands moved behind his hand, finger intertwining as he decided to ask his sister about the situation, smiling proudly at his decision until a volleyball flew to the top of his head.