Chapter Text
It’s been months now, but Rin still won’t go. Haru grows used to it, grows fond of it (partly). There is someone in his apartement when he comes back from an especially crude day of training, someone he can share some thoughts with, when he’s lost in it again.
He becomes so used to it that it slips his tongue – it’s a Tuesday evening when Haru und Makoto go out to grab their weekly bowl of tonkatsu ramen at a small noodle shop just around Makoto’s.
Haru is less lost in thoughts than before – especially not as lost as when it just happened. Makoto says something that makes him laugh, snort into his soup so that some of it splashes out of the bowl, on his hands and face. “Yeah, Rin said the same exact thing yesterday,” he says and the horror of his own words is a fist in his stomach. He can’t turn to face Makoto, not when he said something borderline crazy in his presence. If Makoto thinks that Haru’s gone crazy now, he doesn’t show it. He just doesn’t say anything.
That’s his chance – Haru thinks. “So, what happened again with the other trainer you told me about?” he asks nonchalantly and stirs his soup. The ramen noodles were already a bit soggy, but still tasty enough. He feels the exact moment where Makoto hesitates, he suddenly hears the voices around them louder, like they are pressing to his head, then silence, a silence so frightening and so sudden that he finally looks up to see Makoto’s face. But he only smiles his gently smile, that seldomly pushes to hard. Haru is sure, that he wants to speak about Rin, too. Afterall, he was his friend, too.
But Haru doesn’t have the courage to bring it up first, so he lets the opportunity slip, let’s himself be drowned in dark clouds and stormy waves, until it seems there is no point in breathing anymore.
Makoto talks – just talks. Answers Haru’s question, then talks on, so Haru doesn’t have to talk. But it can’t always be like this, Haru thinks, as Makoto’s speech lulls him into a numb stage. “Makoto,” he interrupts him, “thanks for being my friend.” He feels embarrassed and feels his ears go red, then his neck. He’s sure there are tiny tears pooling in his eyes, but he holds his emotion back, so much that he doesn’t feel how much his teeth are biting into his lower lip.
“Thanks for being mine!” Makoto exclaims and Haru is taken aback that he can be so positive, so open, so happy without being ashamed for any of his emotions, but it makes him happy, too, and he laughs, smiles and orders a beer for them to share. He might have noticed it now, that in the past few months he was unresponsive, dull, which was fine, really, but he was content to see that he could feel other emotions that grieve and regret, too.
When he comes back to his flat, he doesn’t even notice in the first few moments that Rin isn’t there. Has he gone out? Do ghosts do this? It’s only a few seconds until he gets into a panicked state.
“Rin?” he asks into the darkness of his flat and contemplates what his life has become, now that he’s desperately hoping for a ghost that has haunted him to reappear. He doesn’t answer and Haru breaks down. Tears spill from his eyes and he sinks down to the floor. His hands are cupping his forehead, where the cold sweat breaks out. He can’t be gone. He had to be somewhere!
Haru bolts out onto the streets, running up and down the alleys. He doesn’t care who thinks he’s a lunatic, he looks in every corner, shouts Rin’s name. But he’s nowhere to be found.
Defeated he goes back to his flat – he can’t believe he had to part with him again. There war so many things he wanted to say to him – wanted to ask him, wanted to share with him. And now his second chance had gone by. He’s crying when he goes to bed. When he lies on his back, he’s breathing hard, and every second he continues concentrating on his breathing and thinking about he has gone mad, the breathing gets more extreme.
Sleep comes and shows mercy, and when he wakes up the next day and sits on his table, there he is, standing in a corner of the room, looking at him with a certain pain in the eyes.
Haru feels relieve wash over him, wants to ask him, where he has been – but nothing comes over his lips and he just stares, until he doesn’t, and looks down on his breakfast.
“Are you okay?” Rin’s ghost asks and sits next to him, reaching for his hand, but retreating fast. Haru doesn’t answer and that’s already an answer on his own. Rin looks guilty, but doesn’t say anything. When Haru has to leave for university, he stands in the door, undecided what to do next. He turns back a little, eyes narrowed to the ground. “Don’t leave without a word…again.”
He tries to get his mind off things, tries to follow the lecture and the professors’ words. He’s glad he has some training where he can connect with the water and feel it soothing his soul. Rin is in the water – or what’s left of him, another Rin, other than Ghost-Rin. It’s his swimming spirit that is with him whenever he swims, no matter the distance or daytime. It’s not maddening, it’s calming, but Haru can’t help thinking back to the Rin in his flat, who could leave anytime.
He meets up with some newfound friends he made along the way, who aren’t Makoto, Nagisa or Rei, or even Gou, but his own personal friends. He sometimes can’t believe he was able to make friends on his own, without someone translating his stubborn and silent character. But he has them and he’s glad, because they can help him take his mind of things. It’s a sign that he’s moving forward, even if it’s slow and he thinks to himself, that it’s only the dead who can’t change. There’s even a guy that’s interesting, although Haru could never admit it, never out loud and even less to himself.
Rin comes to the group, silently sits next to him. Haru throws him a look that says, what, you’re here too? He throws him some glances the whole evening, but when his friends address him and laugh with him, he’s distracted enough to not plaster his gaze on Rin the whole time.
A few days have passed by and Haru realized that Rin wasn’t going anywhere fast.
He feels relieve, but also that he’s unsure. Will Rin be with him when he graduates? When he marries? Worse, when he gets intimate?
“What are you thinking about?” he asks conveniently at the same moment Haru thinks about how he’s supposed to have sex when Rin’s ghost would silently stand by and watch him. He’s not too shy around Rin’s ghost, so he just says exactly that.
Rin laughs a loud, hearty laugh, so loud that Haru again, wonders how nobody except him can hear it. “I may give you some privacy at that time. Anyone you have in mind?”
But Haru doesn’t answer – can’t say that there always has been one person in his mind, and one person only to occupy his thoughts. He opens a bottle of sake (that someone had brought a looong time ago to congratulate that he moved into his first own appartement) and out of habit he even poured Rin a drink. They spend the evening talking about this and that, and Haru gathers the courage to ask: “What is it like to be dead?”
Rin says nothing for a whole while and Haru figures it’s something ghosts can’t say, like some moral code they have to follow – but then Rin opens his mouth. “Unsatisfying” he says the one word delicately, watching Haru closely. “Because you can’t swim anymore?”, Haru asks then, stupidly, as he later thinks. But Rin’s smile is gentle, and he is relaxing again, propping his head on his hand. “I’m always swimming with you, Haru. It’s one of the good things of being dead.”
Haru’s face gets hot and he drinks some more of the sake.
“It’s unsatisfying because I want to be with you, when you’re with your friends, because there are so many things we haven’t talked about. I often think how I always kept my distance, moving away, twice, even!... and everything. I see Gou and my mom and how they grieve, and it’s sad, but I don’t have any regrets, because they know how much I loved them.”
If Rin was real, and not just a ghost, he would have teared up already. “Are those your real feelings?”
“Yes and no. I mostly feel content – because I’m dead – what else is there to feel? But I’m with you and I remember all those feelings I had when I was alive. I remember them, I’m not sure I really feel them.”
Haru thinks, that this is mad, that he has become mad, especially since he accepted the ghost so easily, rarely questioning it, talking to him and now even drinking with him.
“I’ve watched you now for some time,” Rin starts, and it’s written in his face how he obviously doesn’t want to talk the following, “but I think even without me, you can be happy. And that’s good.”
Haru stops in his tracks, the glass half risen to his mouth. He doesn’t say anything for a while.
“I thought I’d never be happy again,” his voice barely a whisper, “you meant everything to me.”
Ghost Rin doesn’t look as shock as Haru had imagined the real Rin to look when he’d confess that. Ghost-Rin just has this very gentle, very knowing look, that makes him hot and cold. Haru drops his eyes, then looks back up. Ghost-Rin looks more than real all of the sudden, like he could touch him right there.
“I’ll be with you, Haru. I will never go away, even if you don’t see me. I will always be happy when you’re happy.”
Haru leans forward, feels with his fingers for his shoulder. His hand doesn’t go through like normally, he actually touches him. Rin reaches out to him, too, caresses his face, cupping his cheek. “I’ll always know how much I meant to you. Even if you’ve never said it out loud, it was always on your face.”
They hug, fingers gripping clothes, hugging so tight Haru feels like he could suffocate from oxygen loss, because Rin is gripping him so tight.
The moment ends too quickly, and Rin is again, back to his old, ghostly self, untouchable.
They lie in bed together, talking about dreams and how they met as kids, and Haru falls asleep although he doesn’t want to. The next time he wakes up, it’s Rin frantically shaking him awake.
“Haru. Haruu. Haru, we have to go.”
The train station is empty, but it doesn’t come as a surprise. The sun has not even risen yet. They take a night train that directly goes to the harbor near Kawasaki. It’s half an hour, maybe, and Haru doesn’t get why he would wake him so violently. Rin doesn’t want to tell him, but that’s just like him, Haru thinks.
They get to the harbor when the sun is about to rise.
“Haru. I’m sorry,” they ran to the beach, because Rin urged him to do so.
“I didn’t know,” he says, “that there was a time limit…or a limit at all. I’ve got to tell you-“
But Haru cuts him off. “What? That you admire me? That you’ll always be here for me? Rin, you won’t! I won’t notice you, when you’re with me!”
He looks at Rin’s broad back and his red hair that gently glides in the wind. Rin turns to him. “I will be gone soon. I realize that I have to end this. You’re not supposed to live with the dead, Haru.”
Haru can’t move – so this is a goodbye, after all.
The sun appears at the horizon, blinding him, but he still gets his eyes opened enough to look at Rin.
“I love you, Haru. I always have. I’m sorry, that I never had the courage to tell you.”
His presence gets weaker, Haru feels and sees it. The sun shines through Rin, through his smile and glassy eyes, until there is no Rin, only the beach and Haru and his broken heart.
“Me…too,” he sinks to the ground, feeling the sand on his hands. “I love you, too.”
‘Always’ after all, had an expiration date.
Afterwards, it’s a blur. Haru remembers calling Makoto and saying nothing, then sending his location. He picks the mess up, that Haru is, and listens to all of it. To Ghost-Rin, to his and Rin’s dumb love that was always postponed, to another match they had to win, until one of them finally could say it. Haru mentions the other guy he thinks is kind of interesting and Makoto says nothing and listens the whole time. Haru doesn’t know why someone gave them a chance to talk again, him and Rin.
Rin was happy for him, wanted his happiness, and wanted him to move one.
Rin had been 24, and only the dead stayed 24 forever.