It was moments like this that Iwaizumi felt at peace. It was a rather slow, summer day. Even though the dryer broke, the weather was nice enough to have the clothes hung outside. Lying on top of the grass in his backyard, Iwaizumi worked on some newspaper questionnaire problems as his childhood friend re-watched an old alien movie on his phone.
True, Oikawa was infuriating. Heck, if Iwaizumi had a quarter for every time Oikawa did something annoying, he would have just enough to buy a new drying machine for his mother before she came home. Alas, quarters didn’t fall from the sky. Lying on his back, Iwaizumi squinted at his next question.
Define a best friend. It wasn’t even a question but a statement. The dark haired boy scratched his head. Shrugging, he tossed his newspaper aside, got up, and gathered his clothes into the house. He glared daggers at Oikawa when he saw the boy propped up against a wall, lost in his own little world.
Creeping up beside him, Iwaizumi nudged Oikawa with his foot. “OI! Aren’t you gonna help me?!”
“Ow! Don’t kick me. Let me pause my movie,” Oikawa pouted, batting away the offending foot. Iwaizumi dropped some towels on Oikawa’s face before sliding the backdoor open. Pulling the towels off of him, Oikawa ran a hand through his hair. “Where do you want me to put these?” he sighed.
Iwaizumi pointed somewhere without looking. “Just put them on the couch. I’m going to order us a pizza.”
Oikawa wagged his finger disapprovingly. A light laugh escaped from his mouth. “You have to watch your figure, Iwa-chan~ I know I can, but sometimes you do slack off during practice and—”
“Shut up, will ya?” Iwaizumi hissed as he held his phone up to his ear. A few rings later, someone answered his call.
“Hi, I’ll like a combo pizza with—”
“—light cheese and no onions,” Iwaizumi and Oikawa said at the same time. Iwaizumi pressed his index finger against his lips, but Oikawa was too busy doing selfies to even notice.
“The address is [insert random address here]. Okay, thanks.” As soon as the call ended, Iwaizumi slammed the phone on the counter. “What the heck was that?”
Oikawa sighed and shook his head. “Iwa-chan, if you get mad over the littlest things, you’re going to get gray hair faster~” His voice dropped a few notes as he tagged his selfies. “Besides, we’ve known each other for so long that I know what you’re going to say.”
“Very fun.” Iwaizumi grabbed the towels from the couch and started folding them while Oikawa went back to watching his movie. After some time, Iwaizumi realized he left his newspaper outside. The questions were faced down on the grass, and the papers were so warm to Iwaizumi’s touch. Straightening the questions out, Iwaizumi came back into the house and stared at the question he left off on.
Define a best friend.
Pencil between his teeth, he mumbled, “A best friend is someone who—”
“—is very similar to the person they’re friends with, but they both have enough differences to show they are their own person,” Iwaizumi and Oikawa said at the same time. Iwaizumi stared at his friend, eye brow raised. Oikawa merely shrugged.
“Don’t give me that bull about us being childhood friends,” Iwaizumi said before Oikawa could speak. “There is no way you knew what I was going to say.”
Oikawa did what he always did. His hands were at his hips and the familiar pout was back. “I did, Iwa-chan. I really did! Like, for a while now, I’ve noticed that I can figure out what you’re going to say next.”
“You’re just saying the words after I do.”
“No, I don’t!”
“When” “When”
“I” “I”
“speak” “speak”
“fast” “fast”
“it’s” “it’s”
“obvious.” “obvious.”
Oikawa gasped when he saw Iwaizumi stick out his tongue. “Iwa-chan, I swear to you. I have a gift. I know what you’re going to say before you even say it.”
Iwaizumi rolled his eyes. “The little experiment we did proves it wrong.” Flipping through the newspaper, Iwaizumi clicked his tongue. “Or if you want, we can test your gift on advertisements. Don’t want to read those to myself.”
“Stop being a doubter! Why can’t you just accept that I have a superpower? I mean, I know you’re jealous that you don’t have the gift.”
“Really?” Iwaizumi slapped his newspaper down and scooted over to Oikawa.596Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEMPgq6w0dH
“Look, I have the power too. Start talking.”
“No, you don’t. You’re not doing it right! You’re just copying what I’m saying.” Oikawa and Iwaizumi said at the same time.
“Stop it!” Oikawa yelled, slamming his phone on Iwaizumi’s knee cap. The boy hissed and tugged Oikawa’s locks. As Oikawa recovered, Iwaizumi grabbed his newspaper and pencil.
“See. It’s nothing. Besides, if you do have this power, that means I can start a word and you can end it.”
Pouting, Oikawa looked down at his phone. “Fine.”
“Sa…”
“Syriacus!”
“Suburb,” Iwaizumi finished.
“No fair! You changed it right after you heard my answer.”
“I don’t even know what a ‘Syriacus’ is. If it’s an alien species—”
“It’s not.”
“Buh…”
“Bunions?”
“Buffalo. Did you just say bunions? Why is everything you say an embarrassing medical condition?”
“No! That’s not what I meant. You were thinking those things, and those were the words you were about to say. You’re changing your answers.”
“Are you calling me a liar? I’ll give you one more chance, and this word is not a weird medical term that you picked up from alien movies. Her…”
“Hernia.”
“Herself.” Iwaizumi smirked. “Zero out of three. Are you convinced now?”
“Iwa-chan, maybe I do have this ability but your doubt is zapping away my powers. Maybe I need to be by the drying machine.”
Iwaizumi froze and looked up. “Hang on for a second. I need to—”
“—call someone real quick,” both boys said at the same time. Oikawa shrugged as he watched Iwaizumi grab his phone and go out into the backyard. Shutting the sliding door, Iwaizumi rushed to the edge of his backyard and dialed in a number.
“This is Iwaizumi Hajime from the Miyagi Prefecture. The subject has developed the ability…again. I request for an immediate recycle.” Ending the call, Iwaizumi strolled casually back into his house and sat on the couch. Oikawa was watching his alien movie on the carpet floor with towels as cushions for his elbows.
“Hey, who were you calling?”
“Nobody,” both boys said. Oh no. “You see, there’s a problem, and I…” both boys trailed their sentence at the same time. No. Not again. Iwaizumi jumped when Oikawa turned around to look at him with blank eyes. “I was calling…I was talking to a…” Both boys frowned at the same time. Both boys smiled, waved, made baby noises, and uttered the word “Plumber” at the same time.
Oikawa snapped out of his blank trance when the front door was kicked open by men wearing all black. As soon as he locked eyes with them, they grabbed his arms and dragged him with them.
“Hey! Get off of me! Hajime!” Oikawa watched as his friend stared at him from the couch. Oikawa elbowed, squirmed, screamed, and punched his captors. Turning his head, he saw a white van. “Let go of me! You’re not taking me away! Hajime! Help me!” His captors threw him into the van’s back and locked the doors.
Through the tiny window on the back door, Oikawa saw one of his captors push someone in a wheelchair into Iwaizumi’s home. Oikawa pounded his fists raw as he screamed at the top of his lungs. “HAJIME!”
Back in the living room, Iwaizumi could hardly breathe. Why? This wasn’t the first time. I just sat here and did nothing. He’d heard many Oikawa Toorus react the same way before. How was this encounter any different? I can still hear him. Iwaizumi’s lungs went back to work as soon as he heard the sound of wheels coming.
A man in a lab coat pushed an occupied wheelchair into the living room. Its occupant had a brown paper bag over their head, and they moved slowly as they got up from the wheelchair and sat at the far end of the couch. Iwaizumi mouthed his thanks to the doctor, and he nodded back as he left the subject and Iwaizumi alone.
Silence. Iwaizumi slid off the couch and picked up Oikawa’s phone. Or, should he say the broken one’s phone. With it in his hands, Iwaizumi got on one knee and pulled the paper bag off his guest. A familiar set of chocolate locks covered his guest’s eyes as they looked at Iwaizumi with a blank stare.
“Hi, Tooru. My name is Hajime,” Iwaizumi managed to croak as he held onto the person’s hands. They blinked at him. Iwaizumi sniffed as he pulled the person into a hug. Resting his chin on their shoulder, he whispered, “I’m your best friend.”
And that’s when it happened. Tears, tears fell. Birthdays, competitions, and everyday life played before Iwaizumi as if it was his own black and white movie. A smiling Tooru laughing over a joke. A crying Tooru as he held hands with Hajime at their last year of secondary school. A random picnic both friends took on a holiday. And an image…an image of a Tooru lying in a white bed, exhausted yet happy as he watched his last alien movie with his best friend.
“You’re my best friend,” Hajime mumbled, tears streaming down his cheeks. The Tooru look-alike slowly wrapped his arms around Hajime and rested his chin on Hajime’s shoulder. The hug was awkward at best, but the corny, genuine smile on his face was a shining beacon of hope. For a moment, it did truly feel like that the real Oikawa Tooru was hugging Iwaizumi back. For a second, everything felt normal.
For a second, a robotic clone did feel like he was human again.
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