Chapter Text
Reality is overrated.
People tell Kenma to go outside and “live his life” because it’s short or whatever. Kenma knows better. In reality, when you trip on pavement, you’ll end up with your knee scraped open; when someone doesn’t like what you say, they get angry; when you make a mistake, there are permanent consequences.
In real life, you are born into a body and people will take that as a basis to judge you upon. You’re too small, too weak, too pale. You’re a boy, so you better behave like one. You should like sports. You’re playing that game? That’s for girls and old people! Try playing one of those games where you shoot people. Or the ones where you just race each other in fancy cars before crashing into a wall. Kenma doesn’t like those games. At least not because of the violence or the cars. He likes games where you have to think to make it through the level. Riddles you can only solve if you pay attention to everything and test things out. Plans and Strategies.
At the start of middle school, Kenma stops playing girly/old people games. When Kuroo asks him why, he says they became too boring for him. The Legend of Zelda is better anyways. Kuroo shrugs and starts talking about his current favourite volleyball player.
Usually, Kenma doesn’t like having people around himself when he’s gaming. Kind of ironic, considering he’s always gaming when there are people around him. Maybe he just doesn’t like being around people in general. They are always judging. They are always looking and asking. Kenma prefers not to be seen.
Kuroo somehow manages to be different. Somehow, when Kuroo looks, it doesn’t feel like he is judging. When Kuroo asks, it never feels like he’s demanding. In some mysterious way Kuroo makes being seen feel nice.
Which is why Kenma tells him things. During late nights or while walking home from school, when there is a comfortable silence, Kenma will let a thought escape into caring, secure, gentle hands and the weight on his chest will become a little lighter. He’s told him that he hates the feeling of eyes on him and the sound of unintelligible murmurs. He’s told him that sometimes he wishes he were a character in a video game, where there is a clear goal and every problem can be solved with a bit of logical thinking.
“Why is your character a girl?” Kuroo asks one evening as they are walking home after practice. The schoolyear is coming to a close. In less than a month, Kuroo will be going to a different school again.
The question sounds a little too much like judgement. But it’s Kuroo who’s asking. The one person who has never judged him. It’s probably just genuine curiosity. And the answer is heavy on Kenma’s lungs. He wants to let it go.
“It feels nice. Not having to be a boy all the time.”
Kuroo seems to consider that for a moment, while Kenma tries to focus on his game. The heroine he created has beautiful long, blonde hair and wears a gorgeous dark purple dress that swooshes gently as she moves. She’s an archer.
“I mean, I think it would be fun to try it for a day,” Kuroo says eventually. It goes downhill from there.
“To have boobs and long hair and stuff. You know, we learned about gender in biology recently. It’s super interesting! Girls have different chromosomes than we do, and our chromosomes determine which body parts we grow. Isn’t it crazy what a huge difference such a small thing can make? Chromosomes are so tiny, like 100 times smaller than the pixels on your Nintendo, and they are the only reason you and I are boys. Imagine if…”
Kenma stops listening at this point. He’s gotten to one of the more difficult parts of the game. He tries to forget about the way his throat hurts when he swallows and the persistent pressure on his chest.
Kuroo goes to Highschool and leaves Kenma on his own.
Not really. He still comes over every day to talk to him as he plays his games and makes him go outside because “You need your daily dose of vitamin D, Kenma!”
Kenma still feels lonely though.
He kind of pushes the conversation to the back of his mind, but he is reminded of it every time he creates a new character for a game. It bothers him that he can’t enjoy that part of gaming like he used to. It’s one of his favourite things. Being able to choose what you want to look like over and over again. Now the fun of it is overshadowed by stuff like “chromosomes” and “you’ll never know what it’s like being a girl in real life”.
Then there’s a girl. A streamer from England, which makes it hard to understand her at first, but Kenma’s English skills really profit from it in the long run. She initially caught his interest with her gaming set-up. It was all in red and black, held relatively neutral. Or masculine or whatever. It sort of reminds him of Kuroo’s new volleyball uniform. But she has pink cat ears attached to her headset. And there is this large rainbow flag in the background. Kenma continues watching her streams because she’s ridiculously good at developing strategies. Possibly even better than him. She’s definitely his favourite.
Maybe he’s crushing on her a little bit. It’s not like he could tell for sure, after all he’s never had a crush before. Looking at her comment section, he wouldn’t be the only one.
Not like any of them had a chance with her though.
“I’m sorry, I’ll have to cut it a little short today.” Her voice is a little tinny in Kenma’s headphones. He looks up from where he has been pretending to do his maths homework. “My girlfriend is coming to visit me for the weekend and it’s going to be my first time meeting them in person.” She squints at the screen in front of her, probably to makes sense of the flood of comments. There is an excited smile on her pretty face throughout all of it. “Yeah, I’ll ask them if they want to join one of my streams.” And then, after squinting and rambling for another minute: “For everyone who hasn’t caught on yet, they generally use they/them pronouns, so please make sure to stick to that unless they say they prefer something different. They’re genderfluid.”
Kenma’s brain gets stuck on that word. Genderfluid. Something about it just resonates with him. It feels oddly right.
In the middle of it all he forgets to be jealous. Maybe it isn’t a crush after all.
The next day the streamer introduces her boyfriend to her viewers. He talks about himself for a bit and patiently answers any questions and he is probably the coolest person in existence. The whole thing makes Kenma feel weird. Some of the things he says make so much sense to him. Like he gazed through the screen, straight at what was hidden behind Kenma’s eyes and laid the inner workings of his soul open for everyone to see. But it’s a good kind of weird. Even if it’s a little scary.
Genderfluid.
That word rests in the back of Kenma’s mind for many weeks. He just likes it. It sounds nice. Somehow it compels him. Intrigues him.
Then it sort of drifts away amidst the ordinariness of life.
Kenma starts truly questioning his gender at the beginning of High School. To put it more broadly: he starts questioning everything. His gender. His friendship with Kuroo. Whether he should stop playing volleyball.
He feels like he’s about to be sick whenever someone calls him a boy. He tries to escape into his games, but he can’t do that at practice, and he just wants to leave as soon as possible, but the third years are total jackasses who think they can order him around like a slave or something.
It takes him too long to let Kuroo in on it. He should have trusted Kuroo to back him up with something like this. He knows he can trust Kuroo. He knows Kuroo would never do anything to hurt him.
He doesn’t tell Kuroo that he thinks he might not be a boy.
One day at practice Taketora mentions that his hair makes him look like Sadako. At first Kenma is offended to be compared to something from a horror movie. Then he realizes Sadako is a girl - which makes him feel weightless for a while. Eventually it settles in that looking like a horror movie character OR a girl would both cause more people to notice him. He dyes his hair blonde the same night. At least nobody would compare him to Sadako ever again. He’s not sure if it helps against the looking like a girl thing. He’s not sure he minds that part of it after all.
Later that week, at an hour that could be considered morning already, he creates an anonymous streaming account. His heart is beating at a ridiculous pace when he adds a set of pronouns. She/Her.
For a month she’s convinced that she’s a girl. She spends too much time in the mornings brushing her growing and transfixingly shiny hair, she says even less in class to avoid being addressed like a boy and she’s suddenly aware that everyone she considers even loosely as a friend is male. She notices that when coach calls them to attention it’s always “boys”. Of course. She’s playing on a boys volleyball team after all. And why would anyone ever even consider that Kenma might be a girl instead. They don’t teach about transgender people at school. Everyone would think she’s making it up.
Then “girl” doesn’t feel right anymore either. She feels detached from the concept of gender entirely. She wonders if she actually was just making things up. If, in reality, he isn’t trans at all and he just made himself believe that to feel special. Or because he had successfully managed to deconstruct the concept of gender in his brain.
The week after that, she kind of feels like a girl again. She changes the pronouns on her streaming account to they/them. Those are the only ones that never make her feel wrong.
Genderfluid.
Up until that point, it felt pretentious to claim that word. Like Kenma would be taking something they had no right to.
It slowly rises from the depths of their unconscious. Further and further, taking up more and more space in their mind. There isn’t really a moment at which Kenma decides “I am genderfluid”. They just are.
And it becomes their heaviest burden. Something they want to spill every time Kuroo is alone with them. They know that Kuroo would be fine with it. Maybe he won’t know what it means in the beginning, but he would learn. After all, Kenma knows that Kuroo used to have this thing with Yaku. Not quite the same, obviously, but probably enough to make him listen. And Kuroo cares. He cares so much. He’s there whenever Kenma has a bad day, even if they don’t tell him the reason. He believes in them with all the confidence that Kenma lacks. They feel bad for not telling him. Not being able to tell him.
The Golden Week of their second year turns out to be a blessing from the gods, very much opposed to Kenma’s expectations. They were resigned to a long week of training matches and a minimum of privacy. And it is actually as dreadful as expected, up until -
“Hey, what are you doing there?”
Kenma looks up from his game to see sunshine incarnate. Maybe it’s because of their analytical skills or maybe it’s because his worldview is entirely changed after looking into the complexities of his own gender identity, but he immediately gets a feeling that Hinata Shouyou is trans. Transmasuline, presumably, since he is wearing a Karasuno shirt and talking about volleyball a lot. Nekoma will play against them at the end of the week. There’s a different fabric underneath his white T-shirt, causing the folds to drag differently in his chest area. Shoyou is bubbly and bright and loud. Everything that Kenma is not. And yet, Kenma is looking forward to playing against him.
On their way back to the rest of the team, Kuroo asks Kenma why he’s smiling. Kenma doesn’t grant him an answer. But they don’t stop smiling either.
Every second they spend around Shoyou gives them pure comfort. His never-ending joy and energy should be exhausting Kenma, but somehow it has the exact opposite effect. It’s like their energy was at 00.9% all their life and now they’re finally able to recharge. Sadly, they only get one day together. Kenma doesn’t get a chance to talk to him about… that. They get his phone number though and make sure to stay in contact.
When Kuroo tells him that he convinced the coach to invite Karasuno to their training camps, Kenma plays his games leaning into his side for the rest of the evening.
“Looking forward to seeing shrimpy again, huh?”
Kenma doesn’t reply. He doesn’t need to.
They sit in silence, sharing each other’s warmth, savouring the moment.
Kenma wants to tell him so badly.
The next week Kuroo starts making him study for his exams. He passes them, but he’s still cross about his console being taken away as leverage.
When Shoyou finally shows up at the camp, Kenma’s mood takes a 180-degree turn. After they’re done with matches for the day, the two of them are basically glued to each other. Shoyou talks, Kenma listens; Shoyou asks, Kenma answers; and sometimes Kenma talks. He curses his teammates for always lingering around. He really wants to finally broach that one topic with him and he doubts that Shouyou will bring it up on his own and either way, he wouldn’t dare talk about it in front of others.
The time passes way too quickly. Too soon he has to say his goodbyes again. He feels Kuroo’s comforting hand resting on his shoulder as they wave after the bus.
That night, Kenma decides to send Shoyou a text. It’s simple. Nothing complicated; straight to the point. He doesn’t give himself the time to overthink.
11:02 PM
To: Shoyou
I’m genderfluid
He sends it off, puts his phone away and proceeds to stay up the whole night, trying to beat the final level of the game he’s currently playing. Shoyou doesn’t reply until the next morning.
07:21 AM
From: Shoyou
I had to look up what that means but THAT IS SO AWESOME! Did you know I’m also trans? That means we’re trans buddies now! I can’t wait to hang out with you again Kenma!!! Oh do you use a different name or anything? WAAAH THIS IS SO EXCITING!
To: Shoyou
Not really. I’m not out to anyone else. But I prefer neutral terms.
From: Shoyou
UNDERSTOOD, YOUR MAJESTY!
Kenma’s cheeks hurt from smiling.
“Oya oya? My little kitten is smiling this early in the morning? Did Shrimpy ask you out on a date or something?”
Something is off about Kuroo’s smirk. Kenma rolls their eyes and ignores him. They don’t like Shoyou like that.
Probably.
They’re fairly certain that Shoyou likes Kageyama like that though. So. There’s that.
The two of them walk to school together, Kuroo guiding Kenma around obstacles with a gentle hand on the back of their neck while they are focused on their PSP.
Kenma wants to tell him.