Chapter Text
You knock on the door to the apartment that Kuroo shares with Akaashi and Bokuto. Fidgeting with your fingers, you wait for someone to open the door. Barely five seconds pass before you hear heavy footsteps coming towards the door, and you're not surprised when it's Bokuto who opens it.
"[f/n]-chan!" he shouts in surprise.
"Hey, Bo-kun," you answer, giving him a small wave.
Bokuto gestures for you to come inside.
"Oy, oy! Kuroo! Your lady's here!"
You take off your shoes and stand in the living room, anxiously toying with the frayed sleeves of the sweater you stole from your boyfriend as you wait for him. You look over to see Akaashi sitting on the couch watching you. He looks pointedly at your fidgeting hands and raises an eyebrow at you. You just shake your head slightly and turn your gaze to the floor. Normally you talk to Akaashi when something's wrong; he's one of your closest friends, but this is something that Kuroo has to hear first.
The sound of a door opening makes the nervous butterflies in your stomach flutter, and you look up to see Kuroo step out of his bedroom and start walking down the hallway. When he sees you he frowns a little and you're immediately hit with a guilty feeling; lately you've been answering all of his texts with short responses, or just not answering at all. This is the first time you've seen him in a little over a week, and you can tell that he knows you've been avoiding him. It's not that you didn't want to see him—you really, really did—it's just that you needed time to freak out on your own before bringing it up with him.
You've been scared.
Really scared.
After pausing at the end of the hallway for a second, he walks through the living room and approaches you slowly.
"Hey," he says, voice soft, running a hand gently down your arm.
"Hi," you reply, giving him a nervous half-smile. You look down and take his hand—so much bigger than yours, and calloused from volleyball. "Can we go to your room?"
"Yeah, sure."
He leads you through the living room and down the hallway to his room. As you shuffle behind Kuroo, you do your best to ignore the weight of Akaashi's eyes on the back of your head.
You both step into his room, and you go to sit on the edge of his bed, staring down at the floor. After Kuroo closes the door he joins you, leaving some space between you, making your stomach drop a little.
It's quiet for a couple of minutes until Kuroo finally speaks:
"So, um, did I do something to upset you, or—"
You shake your head franticly. "N-no, no that's not..." you trail off, still not quite ready to say it out loud.
"Then why have you been ignoring me?" He shifts over, placing a hand on the bed behind you so he can lean in to try and look at your face.
You take a deep breath and look up at him. "I need to tell you something," Your voice gets quiet, "But I'm afraid."
He brings his hand up to rub your back gently. "Don't be afraid, kitten, you can tell me anything."
You know that, but it doesn't make this any easier.
Looking down at your hands, you take another deep breath before saying, "I'm, um, I'm late."
His hand freezes on your back, and after a few beats of silence you start to fidget.
Kuroo clears his throat. "Um, when you say late, you mean..."
"I mean late late."
You feel a lump start to form in your throat as he lets out a breath. "Okay," he says, obviously trying to keep his voice calm. His thumb starts to rub soothing circles into your back. "How late are you?"
"A little over two weeks," you say quietly.
"Shit."
"Yeah."
Kuroo tilts your head up and looks down at you with a troubled expression. He places a hand on your face, stroking your cheek with his thumb, and his voice is gentle when he says, "Why didn't you tell me sooner?"
"I kept waiting and hoping... I didn't want to stress you out if it turned out to be nothing." You feel the lump in your throat get tighter, tears stinging at the back of your eyes.
"That's silly," he says, resting his forehead on yours, "So, I take it you haven't taken a pregnancy test yet?"
"No, I-I couldn't—" you try to swallow down the lump in your throat, fighting back the tears, but it's no use and your next words come out tight and strained, "I couldn't do it alone."
And just like that, the tears start to fall down your cheeks. You take in a shaky breath, and Kuroo pulls back, looking at you with wide eyes.
"Hey, hey, hey," he says, pulling you into his chest and placing a hand on the back of your head. "Shh, I'm sorry, baby, don't cry."
You grip his t-shirt in your hands and cry into his chest. The feeling of Kuroo's arms around you, being surrounded by his familiar scent, is comforting, but you've been holding this in for so long and it takes a while for the tears to slow.
After a few minutes of rocking you in his arms, murmuring soothing words, Kuroo pulls away enough to see your face. He wipes away the tears under your eyes and kisses your forehead. "You don't have to do this alone," he says firmly, "I'm here. Whatever happens, I'm here."
You never once thought that Kuroo would abandon you over this, but the words are still reassuring and help you to get it together a little bit.
"Did you bring a test with you?" he asks.
You shake your head, no. You'd gone into the store to buy one, but chickened out. It had just been too overwhelming.
"Okay, that's okay," he kisses the top of your head and pulls you close again. "How about I run to the corner store down the street right now? You can stay here, okay?"
"Okay," you whisper.
"Alright." Kuroo lets you go then and stands up off the bed. You watch him stumble around his room grabbing his wallet, keys, and a sweater. Once he's done that he moves to stand in front of you, so you tilt your head up to look at him. When you do he cups your face with his hand and leans down to kiss you, firm and reassuring, making the knot that's been sitting in your chest loosen just a little bit. After a few moments, he pulls back a little and murmurs, "I love you," against your lips.
You place your hand over his, bump your noses together, and whisper, "I love you too."
He gives you one more chaste kiss and then straightens up to walk over to his door, opens it up, and then turns to say, "Be back soon."
You give him a nod and then he's gone, closing the door behind him.
In the silence you've been left in, you curl up on Kuroo's bed, pressing your face into the pillow's to breathe in his scent, and as you lay there you hope, for the first time in your life, that you'll start bleeding through your jeans at any given moment.
Kuroo walks down the hallway trying his best to mask the absolute panic that he is feeling in his gut. He walks right by Bokuto and Akaashi, who are sitting cuddled up on the couch, without sparing them a glance, and starts forcing his feet into his shoes. He's hoping they won't pay him any attention, but just as he's about to open the door, Bokuto speaks up:
"Hey! Where you off to? Everything okay?" He's looking at Kuroo over the back of the couch with a concerned expression.
"What? Yeah, everything's fine," he says, hoping it was convincing. "I'm just heading to the corner store to get stuff—snacks."
"Oh, cool! Mind grabbing us a bag of chips? You know the usual."
"Uh, yeah man, sure." He pulls open the door and starts to leave.
"Thanks dude!" Bokuto yells after him.
He doesn't respond and continues to rush out of the building. His brain is running a mile a minute, and his stomach feels all twisted in knots. He can't even imagine how you feel, considering it's your body that is potentially...
Fuck, he is freaking out.
As he runs down the street, too keyed up to just walk, he tries to think back to every time in the last month that you guys didn't use a condom, or weren't as careful as you should have been. It's hard to pinpoint anything because it's not like either of you were thinking very straight in the moment.
He reaches the corner store and barely takes a moment to breathe before he yanks open the door. When he steps inside, he takes a quick glimpse around to see if there's anyone he knows here; there's only one other person besides the cashier, and that person is just the old man who is literally always here buying peanuts, so he figures he's good. It's not that it really would have mattered that much, he would still buy it regardless; it's just that he would rather avoid any gossip getting spread around campus, for both of your sakes.
After a couple minutes of searching he finally spots a shelf with some tampons and other feminine looking products, and decides that might be the right place. His eyes scan down the shelf until he finds what he's looking for right on the bottom. Kneeling down, he starts to read the packaging. Some of them look kind of shady, and he doesn't want to risk getting a false result, so he grabs the most expensive one and stands back up. With another glimpse around, he sees that the store is empty, so he goes and quickly grabs what he told Bokuto he was coming for.
He gives the cashier a polite hello and dumps the stuff on the counter, purposefully setting the pregnancy test under a bag of chips. The cashier, who knows him, Bokuto and Akaashi as regulars, scans all of the items, including a package of your favourite candies, and when he gets to the pregnancy test he raises and eyebrow at Kuroo and shakes his head. Kuroo fixes his gaze on the bag of snacks, bouncing on his toes anxiously, until the cashier clears his throat and gives him a total. Kuroo pays him and runs out of the store as soon as he gets his change.
When steps back into the apartment he toes off his shoes and tries not to immediately run down the hallway to get to you. Instead he casually walks through the living space—throwing Bokuto's chips at him on the way, getting flipped off in return—and then speed walks down the hallway to slip into his bedroom.
You hear the door being opened and turn your head to see Kuroo coming through the door. He gives you a small smile and comes to sit on the edge of the bed, a plastic bag in his hand. You sit up and shuffle over to sit next to him, leaning against his shoulder. He reaches into the bag to pull out a small rectangular box and hands it to you. Taking it, you read the packaging:
Results in five minutes!
99.9% Accuracy!
Use the brand women across the country trust! Don't take chances!
If you weren't so fucking terrified the last part of that would be funny.
Suddenly you feel a calloused thumb brushing your bottom lip, pulling it out from between your teeth. You hadn't even realised you were chewing on it.
"What if I am pregnant?" you say, turning to look at Kuroo.
He shrugs and says, "Then we'll figure it out, but we can't do that until we know for sure." He nods at the box in your hand.
You open up the box and read over the instructions before taking the testing stick out and looking it over. You take a big breath and then let it out slowly. "Okay, I'll, um, go pee on this stick then."
You get up, tucking the test into the front pocket of Kuroo's sweater, and then head towards the door. Before you open it you hear Kuroo call out your name softly, so you turn to him.
"Don't screw it up," he says with a cheeky smirk.
You let out a laugh despite yourself, shaking your head as you say, "I'll try not to miss," and head out into the hallway.
Luckily the bathroom is right across from Kuroo's room, so it's easy to slip in relatively unnoticed. You pause and look at yourself in the mirror, noticing how tired and stressed you look, before sitting on the toilet and doing what you had hoped you wouldn't have to do for a long time. You follow the simple instructions exactly and then set a timer for five minutes on your phone.
Quickly you wash your hands then exit the bathroom to sneak back into Kuroo's room, opening the door gently. Kuroo doesn't seem to notice you at first; he's on the edge of the bed with his head in his hands, fingers tangled into his hair. At the sound of the door closing, Kuroo's head shoots up and he looks up at you with wide eyes, hair messier than usual, before he frowns and promptly looks away. You're willing to bet that he's upset that you saw him so very obviously distressed.
You walk over to Kuroo's desk and place the test down carefully and then sit down next to him. Smoothing out his hair as best you can, you say, "It's okay that you're freaking out, Tetsu."
He looks over at you, his face open, eyes honest, and says very softly, "I'm terrified, [f/n]"
"Me too," you say as you lay your head on his shoulder. He wraps an arm around you, presses a kiss into your hair, and then lays his head on yours.
You're both quiet after that—waiting.
As time ticks by, it starts to feel like someone has placed a vice grip on your rib cage. You try to focus on something other than the stupid little pee stick that's sitting on Kuroo's desk, but you just can't keep your eyes off of it. There's a static energy surrounding both you and Kuroo, and it's making all of the nerves in your body thrum. Kuroo starts to shake his leg, and you know he's feel the exact same way. You close your eyes and start repeating one word in your head, over and over: please, please, please, please, please, please, ple—
The alarm on your phone goes off from inside your pocket.
Kuroo's leg stills.
The vice grip on your rib cage tightens.
It feels like hours have past, yet like this moment has come all too soon.
You silence the alarm on your phone.
You both stare over at the desk, the room too quiet.
Neither of you move.
"Tetsu," your voice comes out tight and quiet.
He gives your waist a squeeze and then starts to stand. "I'll, uh—I can look at it, if you don't want to."
You whisper an okay and watch him step over to the desk.
As you watch him pick it up, your heart beats too fast in your chest and you think you might throw up from the anticipation.
Kuroo takes a breath and looks down at the test—
—and when he doesn't immediately sigh with relief, you know exactly what it says. You don't need him to say it out loud, his silence is enough, but he does anyway:
"It—it's positive."
Your whole body goes cold.