The rain has been coming down steadily for a while, but only in the past few minutes has the wind come harder, picking up the raindrops and dashing them rhythmically against the windows. When the evening sky illuminates with lightning, Rin looks up from his books. By the time he's sliding the glass door of the balcony, the thunder cracks through the air around him. He didn't think to count the seconds, but figures the center of the storm is only a few miles off.
Another bright, jagged streak shoots earthwards, lighting up the sky again. As Rin looks up into the dark, he wants to reach out to take the hand beside his on the railing, but of course he's alone on the balcony.
Another flash, another deep reverberating crack: and everything goes dark. Rin's fingers slide over the cold, slick surface of the railing as the curl around it hard; he leans out over the railing, feeling it cut across his hips. His neck arches with the upturn of his face and he squints through the rain, strains to see through the darkness, but there is no movement other than the continuous fall of rain, and nothing now illuminates.
It takes a moment for Rin to realize the rumbling hadn't been thunder but lightning striking, probably hitting a transformer. There's no one here to laugh at him so he does it himself, aloud, catching a few raindrops on his tongue.
"Everything's out for six blocks," he calls as he steps back through the sliding door and shuts it behind him. He shivers as warmth washes over him. His shirt is plastered down in front and along his arms, and he can feel the wet crease across his jeans where he'd hoisted himself up on the railing. The flashlight is in his room anyhow, so he can kill two birds with one stone. As he starts for the hall, he bangs his shin on an end table he'd forgotten or maybe had never noticed is there. He goes more slowly, feeling his way along, lightly dragging his hand along the wall when he comes to the hallway. A couple of picture frames swing askew as his fingers push against them; he'll have to straighten them when the lights come back on.
When he comes to tell-tale moulding around a second doorway, he pushes the door open and enters. He strips out of his shirt as he crosses to the closet, the top shelf of which he remembers putting the flashlight on when he moved in last month. And yes, it's right there at the edge. He smiles in satisfaction.
But when he brings it down, it's forbodingly light. He tries pressing the 'on' button anyhow, but of course nothing happens. He unscrews the head of the flashlight to find, as he suspected, the batteries missing. With a heavy sigh of exasperation, he screws the top back on and reaches blindly into the closet, dragging the first shirt that he touches off its hanger and slipping into it. He leaves the buttons undone as he starts back down the hallway, impotent flashlight in hand.
"Do you have any spare batteries?" he calls as he makes it back to the living room. "Haru must've taken the ones from the flashlight for something and forgotten to replace it."
"No batteries." Makoto's voice comes from the kitchen. "But I have something almost as good." There's a soft glow as he appears in the doorway, light from the candle filtering through cracks between fingers cupped to protect the flame as he walks.
"Ah, brilliant," Rin approves. "You really are always prepared."
"Unlike Haruka?" Makoto sets the fat candle down on the coffee table and produces several more from his pocket, lighting them wick to wick from the first one.
"I didn't say that."
"No," Makoto says, "but you were thinking it, weren't you?"
Rin doesn't say anything.
"You're always thinking about him, aren't you?" Makoto's voice is softer now, as soft as the gentle, flickering flames.
"Not all the time." The words sound hollow out of Rin's mouth, even though he knows they're true.
"You miss him."
This, Rin can confirm with a clear conscience: "Yeah."
"Did he break your heart?" Makoto's voice now is even softer than the candle flames.
"What?" Rin feels his brow knit, and lets it stay that way as he tries to look Makoto in the eye. Even if they weren't sitting in relative darkness, he'd have to work to catch Makoto's eyes because Makoto is looking down into the flickering flame. "Why would you think that?"
"Well," Makoto says, pushing his glasses up his nose as he looks up now, his voice steady, matter-of-fact, "you were lovers all those years."
Rin's brow smoothes as his jaw falls open. It takes him a couple of tries to get it moving again so he can respond. "You're not—" he starts, but even in his light he can see that Makoto is serious. "Friends," he finally manages to clarify. "Friends who lived together, yeah—but not. Not in the same bed or anything."
He can feel Makoto studying him in the dark, and he makes himself stay open. "You didn't break up?" Makoto says at last.
Rin shakes his head. "He got an offer to go to America, and he took it. That was it. Nothing got broken except," he risks a wry grin, "our lease."
Makoto nods thoughtfully. "So you aren't in love with him? You never were?"
"No," Rin says, and wonders if everyone thought that. Sure, he and Haru were close—are close, despite the distance. They're like siblings, maybe something even closer; he's as close to Haru as he is to Kou. Closer, even. More than friends, then, more than brothers, and less—or not less, but other than lovers. He wonders if there is a word for what they are, and thinks that maybe the inadequacy of human language is why Makoto has had this misunderstanding.
He is just opening his mouth to explain all this to Makoto when Makoto says "good," and before Rin can close his mouth again, Makoto's lips are on his.
Rin opens his eyes again when Makoto moves back. His eyes have adjusted to the dark, and he can see, maybe not perfectly clearly, but he can see Makoto, he can see Makoto's eyes, a shimmer in them that might be a reflection of candlelight, that might be a reflection of Rin himself.
He can see Makoto's mouth too, and he kisses it again.
When the power comes back half an hour later, Makoto untangles himself from Rin only to switch off the lamps so they can continue kissing in the candlelight, bright and soft.
Sometimes, Rin’s life decides to take a different turn and makes him pay for being an ass in his high school years.
This time, it comes in the form of his mother’s call in the middle of the night, all the way from Iwatobi, somber and anxious and worried, “Rin, Gou’s been in an accident.”
For a second, his whole life turns into an inexplicable tableau of chaos. He’s gripping his phone too hard, knuckles white, breath coming faster and faster. “What? What accident? Is she okay?”
“There was a fire at school.” He hears a distinct murmur somewhere in the background, and realizes that his mom is still in the hospital. That makes something in his stomach bottoms out, for some reason. “Her whole class was in the chemistry lab, and they couldn’t open the door. She’s alright, just some smoke inhalation, the fire brigade came very quickly, but the doctor wants her to stay in the hospital for a few days just to be safe.”
“I’m coming home,” Rin says, his mind already running all the possibilities of how to get to Tottori. “Tonight. I can probably still catch the night bus, there should be one that leaves in about three hours, and I’ll get off at Nagoya and take the plane from there—“
“No, Rin, you can’t, you have a race the day after tomorrow. Gou’s perfectly alright, I’m calling to tell you not to worry about it—“
“Mom, if she’s in the hospital, she’s not alright!” He bursts out, voice shaking, panic and fear clawing their way up to his throat. It’s like his father all over again, he realizes—if he doesn’t get there on time, what would happen if Gou just slips away, without him even being there to say goodbye, or kiss her forehead for the last time. “I’m going home. I’ll skip on the race, is no big deal—“
“Matsuoka Rin,” and that’s her mother’s stern tone, the one that would always makes him stop dead in his track, stop and truly listen, no matter what. “I’m with her in the hospital. She’s just gone to sleep, and she’s okay, she was still yelling at Mikoshiba-san—“
Rin backpedals. “Why is Mikoshiba-san there—“
“Because he’s her boyfriend, and I’m not going to be that evil mother who keeps him from seeing her.” Rin wants to protest, but her mother’s voice has taken a soft, fond tone. Fuck. “Don’t worry your head off, boy, your sister is alright. I’m calling to tell you that she’s alright, rather than wait for some of your friends to call and freak you out before they could explain properly what is happening.” A pause, and then his mother’s voice drifts away, like she’s talking off the phone. “Yes, Nagisa-kun, I’m talking to Rin. Yes, of course you may stay, if it’s alright with your parents, too.”
So Nagisa is there. If Nagisa is there, Rei probably is, too. Except if Rei had also been in the fire, and—no. If that’s the case, he’d probably heard first from Nagisa, not his mother. Still, that doesn’t stop him from asking, “Are the rest—are they okay, too?”
“Nagisa-kun and Rei-kun?” His mother’s tone take a rather amused tone. “Yes, they had gym out in the field. Good thing the fire brigade came quick, I heard Nagisa-kun was about to run into the building to get your sister out.”
Rin sweeps one hand across his face. God, he has such idiotic friends. “What an idiot.”
“Your friends are great.” His mother tells him. “Now don’t worry about us, and go back to sleep.”
Even after his mother’s stern order to not worry and go back to sleep, Rin finds himself standing in front of Haruka’s apartment fifteen minutes later, staring at the wooden door, debating whether to knock or call.
He can’t just sleep—not when his heart is still hammering at the news of the accident. He could’ve gone to Makoto’s, except the brunette is in a class trip to Fukuoka, and Rin is really not in the mood to stay in his apartment alone. So he raises a hand, and knocks.
No answer. He frowns, fishes out his phone and dials Haruka’s number. Which is kind of a vain effort, considering he knows that Haruka leaves his phone in places he never remembers. So he knocks again—twice, thrice, until he hears sounds from the other side of the door, and waits.
The door opens, revealing Haruka still dressed in his casual attire when he works late, looking both tired and surprised to see Rin, but doesn’t say anything.
Rin shrugs. “Mind if I crash here tonight?”
Haruka says, “I thought you went home.”
“I did.” He shifts from one foot to the other, anxious. “My mom called. Said there’s an accident in Iwatobi.”
He watches Haruka’s eyes go wide. “What?”
“There was a fire.” He pauses, and Haruka moves aside, gesturing him to come in. Rin steps in, lets the door close behind him, and follows Haruka to the living room. He throws himself onto the couch, watches Haruka goes into the kitchen to get some water. “They’re fine—Nagisa and Rei. They had gym outside.”
The tension on Haruka’s shoulders visibly peters off. Rin waits for a beat, and adds, “Gou inhaled too much smoke, or something. They’re keeping her in the hospital.”
Haruka turns, a flash of worried look in his eyes. “Is she alright?”
“Mom said she was yelling at Mikoshiba-san, so I assume she’s fine enough.” Rin shrugs. But the tips of his fingers are still shaking. Haruka returns the bottle of water into the fridge and crosses the kitchen to turn on the coffeemaker. When he gets back to the living room, his hands are holding two mugs of black coffee that Rin accepts with a grateful sigh.
“Thanks for coming,” Haruka tells him, quiet like he always is. The corner of Rin’s lips tug upwards, because that should be his line, but his friends seem to always know what to say to him. He resents that a little, somehow—Matsuoka Rin shouldn’t be so predictable, shouldn’t look too vulnerable.
There’s no hiding stuff from his best friends, it seems.
The coffee is strong, enough for Rin to cringe a little, the last of sleep tugging on his eyes vanishing in an instant. Haruka’s disappeared into his studio, coming out with his box of stationeries and a stack of papers, settling down on the floor and starting his work again on the coffee table. Rin watches him draw lines and lines, turning what looks like scribbles into sketches inside each of the panels.
“When’s your deadline?” Rin asks, because he doesn’t want to think about Iwatobi, and Haruka’s presence is still not enough to chase away the fear.
“This weekend,” Haruka replies almost absently, eyes never leaving his drawings. “Sensei wants this done tomorrow evening.”
“That’s a lot.” Rin says, and that’s when his phone buzzes in his pocket. The two of them pause, Rin a bit more tensed than Haruka’s, because what if it’s from his mother, what if Gou is not alright, what if—
Haruka looks at him. “Rin. Answer that.”
Rin does, without looking at the screen.
“Rin?” and there’s that sharp relief, because it’s Makoto, and Rin thinks he might have made an embarrassing sound. “Hey. Are you home?”
“No,” Rin glances at Haru, who rises to his feet and pads over to Rin, settling down next to him, shoulders pressed, like he’s trying to listen in on his and Makoto’s conversation. “I’m at Haru’s.”
“Oh, that’s good. Is Haru there?”
“Here,” Haruka says. Rin lowers his phone, switches to speaker. Makoto’s voice crackles when he next speaks: “That’s good, you guys are together. I called Rin first because Rei told me about Gou. Are you two okay?”
“Rin’s shaking,” Haruka reports. Rin makes an undignified sound. “I am not!”
Makoto’s chuckle drifts out, breaking in the middle, and Rin silently curses the reception. “I’m glad,” he says, and how ridiculous is it that Rin can actually hear him smile. “Rei called just now. He told me things in detail.”
Haruka is silent. Rin makes a nonchalant sound. “It doesn’t matter. They’re all fine.”
“The fire was caused by an explosion from the toilets in second floor,” Makoto begins. Of course he’d seen through Rin’s nonchalant façade even through the phone, what the fuck. “They’re still not sure what caused the explosion, but the fire goes straight up to the third floor, right into the chemistry lab.”
“Way to get more fuel,” Rin murmurs, irrationally resenting whoever it is that designs Iwatobi High building and placing the chemistry lab right above the toilets. Or maybe he’s angry at the teachers who scheduled Gou’s class to have chemistry class today, whatever.
Haruka knocks his head gently against Rin, and tells Makoto, “Continue.”
So Makoto does. They spend about fifteen minutes listening to Makoto recounting all the things he’s gotten out of Rei. It isn’t too bad, Rin thinks when Makoto finishes, Gou and her friends weren’t trapped too long inside the lab, and while smoke inhalation could be bad, the students had anticipated it by covering their mouths and noses with wet clothes. None of them was unconscious when the fire brigade got to them, and even Gou walked to the ambulance with Nagisa and Rei.
It makes him feel better about the whole thing.
Haruka’s leaning snug against his side when Makoto ends his story with a quiet, “So, yeah, there’s nothing to worry about.”
Rin exhales. “Thanks, Makoto.”
“Do you guys want me home sooner?” Makoto offers, his kind tone apparent even with the cracky reception. “I’m sure I can say something to my lecturers. No one would mind. We can go home to Iwatobi together, after Rin’s race.” There’s a smile in his voice now. “If I go home tomorrow, I can watch your race, Rin.”
It’s a tempting suggestion, if it isn’t for the fact that Rin knows Makoto had been looking forward to his class trip. But the offer makes the corners of his lips tug up anyway, because it’s sweet and thoughtful, and just so Makoto. “No, it’s okay. I won’t be going home.”
“I have deadlines, too.” Haruka adds, suppressing a yawn. He looks tired; Rin wonders how many hours Haruka’s spent bent on his drawing desk, finishing his work.
“Okay,” Makoto tells them easily, pauses, and there’s the slightest tone of hesitance when he begins again, “You know what, I’m not too sleepy myself—“
“Don’t hang up,” Haruka tells Makoto, rising to his feet again and stretches, before padding back to where his work is waiting. “I’m working.”
“I’m on the couch, but I’m not sleepy either,” Rin grumbles. “Fucking coffee.”
Haruka slants him a warning look, but the corner of his mouth is tugging upwards a little. Rin chucks the couch pillow at him.
Makoto chuckles, voice crackling from the phone. “Okay,” he says, light and easy, and suddenly Rin notices that he’s no longer shaking. He’s wide awake, sure, but the fear consistently nagging on the back of his mind has ceased to exist. He burrows down onto the couch further, cradling his mug of coffee, watching Haruka return to his sketches, and asks, “How is Fukuoka, Makoto?”
“Bring me mackerel,” Haruka calls absentmindedly.
Makoto laughs. “Mackerel isn’t even Fukuoka’s specialty, Haru,” and then he begins to tell the course of his class trip since leaving Tokyo to Fukuoka. Rin listens, and he’s sure Haruka does too, even if he doesn’t look like it.
Rin thinks he understands a little now, when people say that distance shouldn’t matter.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
happy white day from iwatobi-chan and ellen
Re: happy white day from iwatobi-chan and ellen
They all look so cute hhhh
Happy White Day to you too!
--Airi
no subject
Another bright, jagged streak shoots earthwards, lighting up the sky again. As Rin looks up into the dark, he wants to reach out to take the hand beside his on the railing, but of course he's alone on the balcony.
Another flash, another deep reverberating crack: and everything goes dark. Rin's fingers slide over the cold, slick surface of the railing as the curl around it hard; he leans out over the railing, feeling it cut across his hips. His neck arches with the upturn of his face and he squints through the rain, strains to see through the darkness, but there is no movement other than the continuous fall of rain, and nothing now illuminates.
It takes a moment for Rin to realize the rumbling hadn't been thunder but lightning striking, probably hitting a transformer. There's no one here to laugh at him so he does it himself, aloud, catching a few raindrops on his tongue.
"Everything's out for six blocks," he calls as he steps back through the sliding door and shuts it behind him. He shivers as warmth washes over him. His shirt is plastered down in front and along his arms, and he can feel the wet crease across his jeans where he'd hoisted himself up on the railing. The flashlight is in his room anyhow, so he can kill two birds with one stone. As he starts for the hall, he bangs his shin on an end table he'd forgotten or maybe had never noticed is there. He goes more slowly, feeling his way along, lightly dragging his hand along the wall when he comes to the hallway. A couple of picture frames swing askew as his fingers push against them; he'll have to straighten them when the lights come back on.
When he comes to tell-tale moulding around a second doorway, he pushes the door open and enters. He strips out of his shirt as he crosses to the closet, the top shelf of which he remembers putting the flashlight on when he moved in last month. And yes, it's right there at the edge. He smiles in satisfaction.
But when he brings it down, it's forbodingly light. He tries pressing the 'on' button anyhow, but of course nothing happens. He unscrews the head of the flashlight to find, as he suspected, the batteries missing. With a heavy sigh of exasperation, he screws the top back on and reaches blindly into the closet, dragging the first shirt that he touches off its hanger and slipping into it. He leaves the buttons undone as he starts back down the hallway, impotent flashlight in hand.
"Do you have any spare batteries?" he calls as he makes it back to the living room. "Haru must've taken the ones from the flashlight for something and forgotten to replace it."
"No batteries." Makoto's voice comes from the kitchen. "But I have something almost as good." There's a soft glow as he appears in the doorway, light from the candle filtering through cracks between fingers cupped to protect the flame as he walks.
"Ah, brilliant," Rin approves. "You really are always prepared."
"Unlike Haruka?" Makoto sets the fat candle down on the coffee table and produces several more from his pocket, lighting them wick to wick from the first one.
"I didn't say that."
"No," Makoto says, "but you were thinking it, weren't you?"
Rin doesn't say anything.
"You're always thinking about him, aren't you?" Makoto's voice is softer now, as soft as the gentle, flickering flames.
"Not all the time." The words sound hollow out of Rin's mouth, even though he knows they're true.
"You miss him."
This, Rin can confirm with a clear conscience: "Yeah."
"Did he break your heart?" Makoto's voice now is even softer than the candle flames.
"What?" Rin feels his brow knit, and lets it stay that way as he tries to look Makoto in the eye. Even if they weren't sitting in relative darkness, he'd have to work to catch Makoto's eyes because Makoto is looking down into the flickering flame. "Why would you think that?"
"Well," Makoto says, pushing his glasses up his nose as he looks up now, his voice steady, matter-of-fact, "you were lovers all those years."
Rin's brow smoothes as his jaw falls open. It takes him a couple of tries to get it moving again so he can respond. "You're not—" he starts, but even in his light he can see that Makoto is serious. "Friends," he finally manages to clarify. "Friends who lived together, yeah—but not. Not in the same bed or anything."
He can feel Makoto studying him in the dark, and he makes himself stay open. "You didn't break up?" Makoto says at last.
Rin shakes his head. "He got an offer to go to America, and he took it. That was it. Nothing got broken except," he risks a wry grin, "our lease."
Makoto nods thoughtfully. "So you aren't in love with him? You never were?"
"No," Rin says, and wonders if everyone thought that. Sure, he and Haru were close—are close, despite the distance. They're like siblings, maybe something even closer; he's as close to Haru as he is to Kou. Closer, even. More than friends, then, more than brothers, and less—or not less, but other than lovers. He wonders if there is a word for what they are, and thinks that maybe the inadequacy of human language is why Makoto has had this misunderstanding.
He is just opening his mouth to explain all this to Makoto when Makoto says "good," and before Rin can close his mouth again, Makoto's lips are on his.
Rin opens his eyes again when Makoto moves back. His eyes have adjusted to the dark, and he can see, maybe not perfectly clearly, but he can see Makoto, he can see Makoto's eyes, a shimmer in them that might be a reflection of candlelight, that might be a reflection of Rin himself.
He can see Makoto's mouth too, and he kisses it again.
When the power comes back half an hour later, Makoto untangles himself from Rin only to switch off the lamps so they can continue kissing in the candlelight, bright and soft.
no subject
WHY DID YOU SEND IT ON ANONYMOUS I WANT TO KNOW WHO THE GENIUS WHO WROTE THIS IS..
THANK YOU!!! SO MUCH!!
--Airi
no subject
How to Spend A Night [Makoto-Rin-Haru (1/2)
This time, it comes in the form of his mother’s call in the middle of the night, all the way from Iwatobi, somber and anxious and worried, “Rin, Gou’s been in an accident.”
For a second, his whole life turns into an inexplicable tableau of chaos. He’s gripping his phone too hard, knuckles white, breath coming faster and faster. “What? What accident? Is she okay?”
“There was a fire at school.” He hears a distinct murmur somewhere in the background, and realizes that his mom is still in the hospital. That makes something in his stomach bottoms out, for some reason. “Her whole class was in the chemistry lab, and they couldn’t open the door. She’s alright, just some smoke inhalation, the fire brigade came very quickly, but the doctor wants her to stay in the hospital for a few days just to be safe.”
“I’m coming home,” Rin says, his mind already running all the possibilities of how to get to Tottori. “Tonight. I can probably still catch the night bus, there should be one that leaves in about three hours, and I’ll get off at Nagoya and take the plane from there—“
“No, Rin, you can’t, you have a race the day after tomorrow. Gou’s perfectly alright, I’m calling to tell you not to worry about it—“
“Mom, if she’s in the hospital, she’s not alright!” He bursts out, voice shaking, panic and fear clawing their way up to his throat. It’s like his father all over again, he realizes—if he doesn’t get there on time, what would happen if Gou just slips away, without him even being there to say goodbye, or kiss her forehead for the last time. “I’m going home. I’ll skip on the race, is no big deal—“
“Matsuoka Rin,” and that’s her mother’s stern tone, the one that would always makes him stop dead in his track, stop and truly listen, no matter what. “I’m with her in the hospital. She’s just gone to sleep, and she’s okay, she was still yelling at Mikoshiba-san—“
Rin backpedals. “Why is Mikoshiba-san there—“
“Because he’s her boyfriend, and I’m not going to be that evil mother who keeps him from seeing her.” Rin wants to protest, but her mother’s voice has taken a soft, fond tone. Fuck. “Don’t worry your head off, boy, your sister is alright. I’m calling to tell you that she’s alright, rather than wait for some of your friends to call and freak you out before they could explain properly what is happening.” A pause, and then his mother’s voice drifts away, like she’s talking off the phone. “Yes, Nagisa-kun, I’m talking to Rin. Yes, of course you may stay, if it’s alright with your parents, too.”
So Nagisa is there. If Nagisa is there, Rei probably is, too. Except if Rei had also been in the fire, and—no. If that’s the case, he’d probably heard first from Nagisa, not his mother. Still, that doesn’t stop him from asking, “Are the rest—are they okay, too?”
“Nagisa-kun and Rei-kun?” His mother’s tone take a rather amused tone. “Yes, they had gym out in the field. Good thing the fire brigade came quick, I heard Nagisa-kun was about to run into the building to get your sister out.”
Rin sweeps one hand across his face. God, he has such idiotic friends. “What an idiot.”
“Your friends are great.” His mother tells him. “Now don’t worry about us, and go back to sleep.”
-----------
How to Spend A Night [Makoto-Rin-Haru (2/2)]
He can’t just sleep—not when his heart is still hammering at the news of the accident. He could’ve gone to Makoto’s, except the brunette is in a class trip to Fukuoka, and Rin is really not in the mood to stay in his apartment alone. So he raises a hand, and knocks.
No answer. He frowns, fishes out his phone and dials Haruka’s number. Which is kind of a vain effort, considering he knows that Haruka leaves his phone in places he never remembers. So he knocks again—twice, thrice, until he hears sounds from the other side of the door, and waits.
The door opens, revealing Haruka still dressed in his casual attire when he works late, looking both tired and surprised to see Rin, but doesn’t say anything.
Rin shrugs. “Mind if I crash here tonight?”
Haruka says, “I thought you went home.”
“I did.” He shifts from one foot to the other, anxious. “My mom called. Said there’s an accident in Iwatobi.”
He watches Haruka’s eyes go wide. “What?”
“There was a fire.” He pauses, and Haruka moves aside, gesturing him to come in. Rin steps in, lets the door close behind him, and follows Haruka to the living room. He throws himself onto the couch, watches Haruka goes into the kitchen to get some water. “They’re fine—Nagisa and Rei. They had gym outside.”
The tension on Haruka’s shoulders visibly peters off. Rin waits for a beat, and adds, “Gou inhaled too much smoke, or something. They’re keeping her in the hospital.”
Haruka turns, a flash of worried look in his eyes. “Is she alright?”
“Mom said she was yelling at Mikoshiba-san, so I assume she’s fine enough.” Rin shrugs. But the tips of his fingers are still shaking. Haruka returns the bottle of water into the fridge and crosses the kitchen to turn on the coffeemaker. When he gets back to the living room, his hands are holding two mugs of black coffee that Rin accepts with a grateful sigh.
“Thanks for coming,” Haruka tells him, quiet like he always is. The corner of Rin’s lips tug upwards, because that should be his line, but his friends seem to always know what to say to him. He resents that a little, somehow—Matsuoka Rin shouldn’t be so predictable, shouldn’t look too vulnerable.
There’s no hiding stuff from his best friends, it seems.
The coffee is strong, enough for Rin to cringe a little, the last of sleep tugging on his eyes vanishing in an instant. Haruka’s disappeared into his studio, coming out with his box of stationeries and a stack of papers, settling down on the floor and starting his work again on the coffee table. Rin watches him draw lines and lines, turning what looks like scribbles into sketches inside each of the panels.
“When’s your deadline?” Rin asks, because he doesn’t want to think about Iwatobi, and Haruka’s presence is still not enough to chase away the fear.
“This weekend,” Haruka replies almost absently, eyes never leaving his drawings. “Sensei wants this done tomorrow evening.”
“That’s a lot.” Rin says, and that’s when his phone buzzes in his pocket. The two of them pause, Rin a bit more tensed than Haruka’s, because what if it’s from his mother, what if Gou is not alright, what if—
Haruka looks at him. “Rin. Answer that.”
Rin does, without looking at the screen.
“Rin?” and there’s that sharp relief, because it’s Makoto, and Rin thinks he might have made an embarrassing sound. “Hey. Are you home?”
“No,” Rin glances at Haru, who rises to his feet and pads over to Rin, settling down next to him, shoulders pressed, like he’s trying to listen in on his and Makoto’s conversation. “I’m at Haru’s.”
“Oh, that’s good. Is Haru there?”
“Here,” Haruka says. Rin lowers his phone, switches to speaker. Makoto’s voice crackles when he next speaks: “That’s good, you guys are together. I called Rin first because Rei told me about Gou. Are you two okay?”
“Rin’s shaking,” Haruka reports. Rin makes an undignified sound. “I am not!”
Makoto’s chuckle drifts out, breaking in the middle, and Rin silently curses the reception. “I’m glad,” he says, and how ridiculous is it that Rin can actually hear him smile. “Rei called just now. He told me things in detail.”
Haruka is silent. Rin makes a nonchalant sound. “It doesn’t matter. They’re all fine.”
“The fire was caused by an explosion from the toilets in second floor,” Makoto begins. Of course he’d seen through Rin’s nonchalant façade even through the phone, what the fuck. “They’re still not sure what caused the explosion, but the fire goes straight up to the third floor, right into the chemistry lab.”
“Way to get more fuel,” Rin murmurs, irrationally resenting whoever it is that designs Iwatobi High building and placing the chemistry lab right above the toilets. Or maybe he’s angry at the teachers who scheduled Gou’s class to have chemistry class today, whatever.
Haruka knocks his head gently against Rin, and tells Makoto, “Continue.”
So Makoto does. They spend about fifteen minutes listening to Makoto recounting all the things he’s gotten out of Rei. It isn’t too bad, Rin thinks when Makoto finishes, Gou and her friends weren’t trapped too long inside the lab, and while smoke inhalation could be bad, the students had anticipated it by covering their mouths and noses with wet clothes. None of them was unconscious when the fire brigade got to them, and even Gou walked to the ambulance with Nagisa and Rei.
It makes him feel better about the whole thing.
Haruka’s leaning snug against his side when Makoto ends his story with a quiet, “So, yeah, there’s nothing to worry about.”
Rin exhales. “Thanks, Makoto.”
“Do you guys want me home sooner?” Makoto offers, his kind tone apparent even with the cracky reception. “I’m sure I can say something to my lecturers. No one would mind. We can go home to Iwatobi together, after Rin’s race.” There’s a smile in his voice now. “If I go home tomorrow, I can watch your race, Rin.”
It’s a tempting suggestion, if it isn’t for the fact that Rin knows Makoto had been looking forward to his class trip. But the offer makes the corners of his lips tug up anyway, because it’s sweet and thoughtful, and just so Makoto. “No, it’s okay. I won’t be going home.”
“I have deadlines, too.” Haruka adds, suppressing a yawn. He looks tired; Rin wonders how many hours Haruka’s spent bent on his drawing desk, finishing his work.
“Okay,” Makoto tells them easily, pauses, and there’s the slightest tone of hesitance when he begins again, “You know what, I’m not too sleepy myself—“
“Don’t hang up,” Haruka tells Makoto, rising to his feet again and stretches, before padding back to where his work is waiting. “I’m working.”
“I’m on the couch, but I’m not sleepy either,” Rin grumbles. “Fucking coffee.”
Haruka slants him a warning look, but the corner of his mouth is tugging upwards a little. Rin chucks the couch pillow at him.
Makoto chuckles, voice crackling from the phone. “Okay,” he says, light and easy, and suddenly Rin notices that he’s no longer shaking. He’s wide awake, sure, but the fear consistently nagging on the back of his mind has ceased to exist. He burrows down onto the couch further, cradling his mug of coffee, watching Haruka return to his sketches, and asks, “How is Fukuoka, Makoto?”
“Bring me mackerel,” Haruka calls absentmindedly.
Makoto laughs. “Mackerel isn’t even Fukuoka’s specialty, Haru,” and then he begins to tell the course of his class trip since leaving Tokyo to Fukuoka. Rin listens, and he’s sure Haruka does too, even if he doesn’t look like it.
Rin thinks he understands a little now, when people say that distance shouldn’t matter.
Because it really shouldn’t.
-~0~-
Re: How to Spend A Night [Makoto-Rin-Haru (2/2)]
AND THANK YOU SO MUCH!! I REALLY LOVE IT!!
You wrote them in such a cute manner ghh
--Airi