Professor Kuroo | Part Six (Kuroo Tetsurou x F!reader)
You weren’t expecting to get paired with the young and attractive Dr. Kuroo as your faculty mentor when you became a graduate student. And everything is fine until you both let it go a little too far one night in the dark quiet of the library. Now you’re both struggling the feelings brewing between the two of you.
genre: mutual pining, angst, slowburn (ya im killing myself too)
words: 2.3k
a/n: um. hi.
Professor Kuroo Masterlist
~
If Kuroo thought he was doomed before, he realizes just how royally screwed he is the moment he hears a familiar voice coo his name from behind him as he’s checking into the hotel.
“Kuroo-kun!!”
It totally slipped Kuroo’s mind that he’d be here. And with his eagle eyes and astute observation skills that only Akaashi can match, Oikawa is sure to notice something going on between Kuroo and you. And no amount of Kuroo’s begging to keep his nose out of it will thwart Oikawa’s meddling nature.
Beside Kuroo, you turn with a cocked eyebrow to see just who is calling Kuroo’s name like that.
You blink a few times in surprise upon seeing the man approaching the two of you. While Kuroo is handsome in a way a lot of people can appreciate, the man grinning and waving at Kuroo is pretty. In a way that makes even you a bit jealous. Chocolate brown hair with warm eyes to match, and a tall and lean build like Kuroo’s, you feel an unwarranted heat wash over you.
From the corner of his eye, Kuroo watches you stare a little slack jawed at Oikawa, and for a moment he wonders jokingly to himself if he has some competition now. But he knows awe is a lot of people’s initial reaction to seeing him. And Oikawa knows it too.
Luckily, Oikawa is too preoccupied seeing Kuroo again to notice you staring. He approaches, clasping Kuroo’s hand in his own, laughing, “You’re terrible at doing this magical thing called keeping in touch.”
Kuroo smiles sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. “Yeah, well, I’ve been a bit busy.”
Nudging his elbow into Kuroo’s side, Oikawa teases, “Right, of course, some of us aren’t as privileged to be presenting this year again.”
“Should I remind you they asked me?”
Oikawa frowns playfully. “Don’t rub it in.” Then, as if finally noticing you, he turns to acknowledge your presence. “Ah—I apologize for being rude! Who’s your friend Kuroo?”
Kuroo easily catches the suggestive twinkle in Oikawa’s eye and swiftly introduces you. “This is my graduate student.”
Oikawa blinks, but quickly gets over his shock, a smile curving the side of his mouth as he turns back to Kuroo. “They gave you a graduate student?” Then back to you as he bows a bit dramatically, “I’m sincerely sorry.”
Kuroo bursts out in protest, but you’re far too amused by this man and his behavior. “It’s really quite the struggle,” you nod solemnly, though he doesn’t even know the half of it. And as Oikawa hums empathetically to your words, Kuroo continues to flounder for words.
The both of you just watch him until he finally gathers himself enough to sigh while rubbing his temples, “You couldn’t even pretend to hesitate before joining him and his antics?”
You grin at him. “He made it too easy.”
Kuroo shakes his head. “He always does.” Then finally introduces his mystery friend. “This is Oikawa Tooru, we were roommates in college, and I haven’t been able to get rid of him since.”
Oikawa pouts at that. “Rude—and for the record it was me who couldn’t get rid of you.”
Kuroo merely shrugs. “Semantics.”
While they continue to bicker, you step away to check in to your room, unaware that Oikawa is now sneaking glances at you, his eyes twinkling with mischief. Oikawa is looking particularly interested in you and Kuroo knows that he’s suspicious.
“Spit it out before she gets back,” Kuroo deadpans.
Oikawa’s brows furrow, but then he murmurs, “Something happened between you two, didn’t it?”
“What makes you say that?” Kuroo says, far too quickly and defensively for the question to be taken as innocent.
Oikawa levels a look at him. “Because it’s painfully obvious.”
That makes Kuroo sigh and his shoulders to droop. He thought you two were doing a pretty good job at hiding your little tryst so far.
“Maybe not to people who don’t know you like I do.” Oikawa shrugs. “But when she talked you looked at her like I’ve never seen you look at anyone before.”
Rubbing a hand over his face Kuroo groans, “Fuck.”
Oikawa peeks a glance over Kuroo’s shoulder, seeing that you’ve been held up from returning to them by someone else from the University you work at. Oikawa takes the opportunity to press Kuroo further. “So, what happened?”
Kuroo rolls his eyes. “It really wasn’t anything serious.” And it wasn’t, nothing really happened between the two of you. But it’s the fact that neither of you can let it go that’s creating a problem. Seeing that Oikawa isn’t pleased by that explanation, Kuroo sighs. Lowering his voice even further, Kuroo admits, “I kissed her.”
Oikawa’s eyebrows shoot upwards. “And…she didn’t like it?”
“The opposite actually,” Kuroo scoffs, the familiar tightness beginning to grow around his heart.
“What’s the problem then?”
“You’re observant enough to figure out something is going on between us, but you can’t figure that out on your own?” Kuroo mocks lightly.
Oikawa sneers, somehow still looking attractive even with an ugly expression on his face. “Pardon me for attempting to skip the part where I dance around the answer for an hour. Stop being difficult, I deal with that enough at home from Iwaizumi.”
“Bet if you asked him, he’d say the same thing about you,” Kuroo mutters under his breath. Oikawa’s eyes narrow and Kuroo backpedals in an attempt to avoid Oikawa’s rare but painful wrath. “Okay—okay, she doesn’t want it to affect her job, or mine. And I can respect that.”
Now Oikawa’s expression transforms into one of pity; an expression Kuroo would very much like to wipe off that pretty face of his.
“Tragic,” he says, then straightens abruptly and smoothly transitions into a completely different topic. “Iwaizumi is doing great! Bullheaded as usual, but I picked him so who am I to complain?”
Kuroo blinks, caught off guard for a moment before realizing you’re approaching the two of them again. And without another moment of hesitation, he picks up the conversation easily. “What’s he doing nowadays?”
Oikawa beams, despite this conversation being nothing but a distraction to keep you from realizing they were talking about you, clearly more than happy to talk about his partner. “He’s still an athletic trainer, he just applied to be the official trainer for the Men’s Olympic volleyball team!”
“Wow, that’s really amazing!” While Kuroo and many others parted from volleyball after school, others hadn’t, and though Iwaizumi might not be playing, it’s still impressive he’s still involved with the sport in a unique way. It reminds Kuroo he should catch up with some other people from high school again.
It’s then that you join up with them again, looking a little annoyed, having been cornered by Dr. Suzuki about trading rooms with her. You gave in to her in the end, unable to say no to a superior, and it really wasn’t any trouble anyways, it was just a bit of a hassle to get your reservations switched around.
But when you approach Kuroo and Oikawa again, they’re talking about stuff from their past, and it makes you feel a little out of place. Enough that you start to move away to grab your luggage and decompress in your room, but Oikawa stops you.
He says your name, then explains, “Iwaizumi is my husband! I’ll probably talk about him a lot, so apologies in advance. I’m sure you’ll be sick of it by the end of week.”
Kuroo finds immense amusement at the way your face blanks when Oikawa says the word ‘husband’ clearly surprised by that fact—as most people are. You recover quickly though, smiling easily. “Do you know him too Kuroo?”
“Yeah, Oikawa and he have known each other since high school so I met him through Oikawa. He went to a different college though. Thank god, otherwise I probably would have spent a lot more weekends at home.” Kuroo scowls at his friend, remembering all the nights he did have to spend somewhere else because Iwaizumi was staying the night. “Just imagine a short, buff guy frowning over Oikawa’s shoulder all the time. That pretty much sums him up.”
Oikawa doesn’t argue with Kuroo’s depiction, nodding and smiling happily. Then he takes a brief look at his watch and excuses himself. “I’ll see you two at the opening meeting later!” He says, then gathers up his luggage and heads towards the elevators.
A few moments of silence pass before Kuroo asks, “What did Dr. Suzuki want?” You blink, unaware he even noticed. “You looked pretty put out by it.”
He tries not to chuckle at the way your lips morph into a scowl. “She desperately wanted to switch rooms. She ‘can’t stand being in an east facing room’,” you mock. “It wasn’t worth fighting her on it, so I switched, but it was still an unnecessary hassle.”
Kuroo nods knowingly. Of the faculty, Dr. Suzuki is a plenty nice woman, but strange requests like that aren’t uncommon from her.
“So, where’d you end up?”
You peer at the keycard in your hand. “Room 328.”
Kuroo’s brows furrow. He thinks he’s on the third floor too. You watch him fish for something in his bag and extract his own room key. Upon seeing his room assignment, he exhales softly. Then he turns the card around and mutters, “I’m in 330.”
You glance to and from the card in his hand and his face, your eyes wide with disbelief. This week was already tempting fate, and this isn’t particularly helpful. “You’re kidding.”
“We did say we’re living in a movie.”
“Yes,” you groan. “But I’d appreciate it if the universe would stop proving us right.”
“Come on,” he nudges you comfortingly. “It’s not that bad. This way we can walk to all the events together!”
You smile weakly, trying to ignore the way your brain immediately thinks—yeah, and I get to think about how you’re just on the other side of the wall. Within reach. It would be easy for nobody to know.
Sighing, you reluctantly accept the situation. And you have the feeling you’re going to be doing that a lot this week.
“Having fun yet?” Kuroo asks as the two of you move towards the elevators.
You can’t help your scowl deepening. “Loads.”
Once you’ve made it up to your rooms, the two of you plan a time to meet up for the opening presentation of the conference before parting ways.
You take the much needed alone time to screw your head on straight after the whirlwind of a morning you’ve head. Attempting to keep your mind from wandering to Kuroo just in the other room, you go through the schedule noting what presentations you’re interested in and events throughout the week you want to go to. Trying to distract yourself even further, you open up your laptop and go over your own presentation for the thousandth time.
By the time you’ve done all that, hardly an hour has passed and there’s still another to go before the time you and Kuroo set to meet up.
Laying back on your bed, you run a hand over your face, sighing at this utterly ridiculous situation you’ve found yourself in. The smart thing to do would be to avoid Kuroo at all costs this week, but it’ll be almost impossible to do so. Your schedules are too intertwined, and people might notice the odd change in your behavior.
But at some point, someone is going to notice things aren’t quite so professional between the two of you anymore.
All you can do is just hold on until then.
You force yourself up, knowing if you just lay there for the next hour, your mind is bound to wander, and you’ll work yourself into an anxious mess that you’re really trying to avoid. So, you busy yourself with unpacking, then inspecting every inch of your hotel room when you come across the knowledge your room has a balcony.
You step out onto it, only realizing your mistake once a voice says from beside you, “Not a bad view, right?”
You jolt, attention swinging to the balcony beside yours, finding Kuroo standing there, his dark hair blowing gently in the breeze and golden eyes on you. He’s let loose a bit, his tie slackened, and the first few buttons of his white shirt undone, revealing the column of his neck and a peek of his chest.
You swallow thickly, tongue feeling fat and useless in your mouth.
Tearing your gaze away from him, you manage, “I didn’t realize we had balconies.”
“Wonder if Dr. Suzuki knows what she gave up.”
You snort. “I think she’s very much enjoying her room not facing the east.”
He chuckles, turning around to lean his back up against the railing, his eyes still trained on you.
God—you’ve been apart for all of two hours, and you feel like you’re going to crumble under the weight of his gaze.
“Do you want to just go down to the conference hall early? I feel like I’m just sitting around,” he offers.
You take him up on it immediately, keen on the safety of a crowd and having an excuse to part from Kuroo if need be.
Kuroo tries not to dwell on how quickly you scurry back into your room, seemingly rushing to get out of his presence. And when your balcony door slides shut, he tips his head back and lets out an exhausted sigh.
He isn’t sure what exactly this week has in store for him, but if the sinking feeling in his stomach is anything to go by, it can’t be anything good.
~
a/n: uh yup this happened lmao, i suddenly decided it was time to finish this bitch. i can’t say i’ll keep my promise but....a christmas present is just around the corner 😈 pls tell me what you thought!! scream at me!! tell me to get to the good stuff!!
taglist: @apollochjld @vicassa @crescentsteel @anejuuuuoy @bumbledunce @carbs-need-more-love @tskeiki @sourapplex @the-real-wholesome-bitch @siriiel @tremendouslydistinguishedpirate @yatoatyourservice @miamiya @postsfromthe6 @acescoolhat @ysatrap
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