ONLY ME || Haikyuu x Male

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Ren wasn't used to losing.

Messing up, yes. He was quite used to messing up. But he wasn't familiar with the feeling of losing. If he was fully conscious and able to play, he should be able to win. And yet from the second that the training camp started, Karasuno had done nothing but lose.

And it was frustrating.

Ren stretched out his arms as he stood on the court, waiting to start their third set overall against Nekoma. They'd played the cats the day before, and they'd lost both sets. They'd gotten close, but never close enough to gain victory.

Surveying the other players on the court - Hinata, Daichi, Kageyama, Nishinoya, and Asahi - Ren could see the same frustration on their faces. Only, they seemed much more determined than he was. They seemed hopeful. He felt hopeless.

The game started off with Hinata and Tobio executing their quick, though not flawlessly. The silver-haired boy on the Nekoma team, Lev, just barely missed blocking it, and though Karasuno scored the point, it was close. Ren sighed. Their situation didn't seem to be improving at all, and the team was showing more of its cracks with every passing day.

Tobio handed him the ball for him to serve, and he approached the serving line tentatively. The past day had been full of mediocre serves, never missing, never scoring. It was infuriating, and with every fiber of his being, Ren was hoping that this serve would be the one.

He spun the ball in his hands and tossed it. The familiar run, the familiar leap, the familiar feeling of his palm meeting the ball. It should've been a perfect serve, designed to hit the floor without a single touch, and yet the Nekoma libero, Yaku, was there, and the ball soared upwards into Kenma's hands.

Fuck.

Ren scowled as he ran back onto court. Whatever restrictions he was trying to put on himself to control his psychosis, it was still limiting his raw ability to play. And that really sucked.

Daichi received the hit that Yamamoto, the Nekoma player with a blonde mohawk, sent at him. Ren pulled back to hit, but Tobio sent the set over to Hinata, whose eyes were squeezed shut as he swung his arm. And then the ball met the hands of Lev, and it shot to the ground, just out of reach of Nishinoya.

Ren's eyes widened, and silence settled over the court. Lev reached up a hand, beckoning Hinata as if saying, "Come at me."

He bore a frown on his face, eyes narrowed as he watched the exchange. Lev had blocked that too easily. Hinata's lack in fundamental skill was becoming too apparent recently, and if something wasn't done to polish him up soon, there was no chance for Karasuno's survival at all.

But who was Ren to judge the ginger? It wasn't as if his fundamentals were perfect either.

Nekoma moved to serve, and Ren got it up smoothly. Tobio set it to Asahi, and Lev managed to one-touch the hit. Yaku received, Kenma set, and Lev, once again, reached the ball, sending it flying to the space between Nishinoya and Ren. Nishinoya dove, but barely missed the ball, allowing for Nekoma to gain one more point.

Damnit. I should've gotten that.

He wiped the sweat off his brow as he jogged over to the sidelines as Coach Ukai called a time out. He snagged his water bottle and drank, frustration coursing through his blood. Why wasn't anything working? Why couldn't he just not be a hazard, and still play as well as he used to?

"Ren, are you okay? You're usually better than this. Playing-wise, anyway." Nishinoya walked over and placed a concerned hand on his shoulder, eyes soft as he posed the question.

Ren shook his head slowly, running his fingers through his hair wearily. "Just...I don't know. Trying to regulate how stressed I get, it's been affecting how I play, and I don't know how to balance it all."