i first read close to the chest in high school, when i was about the same age as yahaba. id barely thought about kyouhaba as a ship before, or even the characters themselves much; im not sure why i decided to click on that link back in the day but im so, so glad that i did. i was so blown away by your fic that, to this day, i feel comfortable calling it my favorite fanfic out of any that ive read, in the haikyuu fandom and outside of it. i've probably read it a dozen times now, most recently in the past 24 hours. it's the fic that made me start noticing background characters more, start to extrapolate vivid lives for them the way you did for yahaba, and it's something i love doing to this day, even in my own (often unfinished and unpublished, but not always) fics. your storytelling was so convincing that i forget most of it isn't literal, canon material. this morning, after blasting through a reread, i realized that since the last time id read it you'd published a companion fic, and i nearly screamed in excitement. i just finished reading, and it's so, so incredible, as good or better than the original. if the first fic caught me at a time where i was a high schooler muddling through the social minefield of being queer, this one caught me at a time where im coming to terms with being less neurotypical than previously planned. im feeling so much for kyoutani right now; youve made me love him so, so much more when i already fell in love with him back in high school alongside yahaba. from the bottom of my heart, thank you. these two fics mean so much to me, and i just had to let you know. i'll be perusing your profile for more fics now, which i cant believe ive never done ❤️❤️❤️❤️
This is one of the most touching asks I've ever gotten, thank you so much!!! I'm so glad my work was meaningful to you! Honestly, writing those fics really helped me work through a lot of my stuff in the same order. I wrote CttC well after I had come out, but when I was in my first serious relationship and working to set up my life as a Totally Out lesbian. I wrote the Kyoutani piece years later, when I started coming more and more to terms with my own neurodivergency and stop trying to play it down in my own head. They're probably the most personal stories I've ever written and can imagine ever writing, so the fact that other people respond to them just makes me feel so many things.
