Work Text:
“N…Ni…Naisu…Naisu t-to me…meeeet y-you…”
“Wrong! Do it again!”
“N-Naisu—“
“You’re not supposed to stress the syllables, Makoto! Control your enunciation!”
“E-Eh—“ Makoto blinked at Rin with wide, bewildered eyes before staring back at the English practice book Rin had shoved under his nose and moving his lips around the sound, “N…Nnnnn…Nai—“ Rin slapped his hand on the table again.
“Wrong!”
“Riiiinnnnn!” Makoto burst out, looking distressed and affronted. “Come on, I thought you were the one who was supposed to be practicing!”
Rin crossed his arms and stuck his nose in the air. “I got the pronunciation right! You’re completely butchering the words, Makoto,” He added with a broad grin, his lone sharp tooth flashing mischievously at the brunet.
“I’m not--!” Makoto protested feebly. He glanced helplessly over at Haru, who simply made a point of staring down at the sketch he had been working on as if to differentiate away from the commotion.
“Noisy,” Haru muttered and Rin laughed.
“C’mon, Makoto, it’s get the pronunciation right before the relay or it’s bad luck! Don’t curse our team, Tachibana!” Rin drummed his hands on the table, a gigantic grin on his face as he watched the taller boy squirm.
“C-Curse—“ Haru looked up from his sketch as Makoto stuttered.
“Oi. Now you’ve brought it up and made it an actual thing,” Haru said sharply, adjusting his seat a little – folding his legs rather than kneeling on the cushion, his pencil hovering over the sketch marks.
“Oh I did didn’t I,” Rin didn’t even try to look sheepish, instead immediately turning back to Makoto and slapping his hands decisively on the table. “Exactly why you need to get it right now, Makoto! C’mon, you can do it!”
Makoto flushed red. He normally wasn’t that easily embarrassed, even if he were put on the spot in class, but Rin’s insistence on him getting the English pronunciation right was flustering him.
He glanced over at Haru, but the black-haired boy had reverted his attention back at his sketching. Haru gave off the impression that he was deliberately ignoring the two, but there was a slight twitch in his lips as if he was amused but only refused to show it.
Two hands suddenly slapped on Makoto’s cheeks and Makoto found himself looking at Rin – who had leaned right up close, his eyes bright with laughter, and turned Makoto’s head to face him. “C’mon! It’s nice to meet you!”
Makoto had to hand it to Rin: It wasn’t like Makoto had heard a lot of proper English being spoken before, but Rin had played the CD given in the practice book earlier on, so Makoto had a pretty good idea how the sentence should sound, and Rin had a good grasp on it.
“I—It’s—N…Naaaiisssss…tomeetyouuu!!” Makoto blustered his way through the sentence. It wasn’t like it was significantly better than his earlier attempts but Rin looked satisfied.
“See? That’s it, Makoto,” Rin released Makoto and sat back down. “It’s just English! No big deal! You managed to not jeopardize our luck,” He added with another flash of a grin, playfully winking at Makoto.
Haru snorted discreetly and Makoto turned to him immediately, ready to protest just as the door opened.
“Mom!”
Makoto’s mother stood at the door, one hand tentatively on the doorknob, the other wiping over her apron. Her soft green eyes (just like Makoto, both Haru and Rin noted, though Haru was used to the similarity by now) creasing into an amused smile as she surveyed the boys. “I thought I heard some yelling. Are you having fun, dears?”
“It’s okay Auntie,” Haru spoke up before Makoto or Rin. “Rin is teaching Makoto English.” Makoto’s mother laughed a little.
“Is that so? Well I’m going back to the kitchen,” She stepped back, smiling indulgently at all three of them. Haru and Rin were over at Makoto’s place for a sleepover, and Rin’s loud outgoing way of speaking had resounded through the house like an energetic contrast (which was in by no ways unpleasant) to Haru’s curtness and Makoto’s mildness. “I’m making hamburgers for dinner.”
After a chorus of thank you and sorry for the inconvenience the door shut and Haru snorted again.
“That sound is starting to piss me off, Nanase,” Rin squinted at Haru. “Let’s hear you say it.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“Annoying.”
“Hey!”
“Guys don’t—“ Makoto scrambled up just as Rin hurled himself off his side of the table and tackled Haru. The blue-eyed boy fell back with a soundless yelp, his sketchbook and pencil scattered to the side. Of course, Haru refused to go down without a fight, pushing Rin’s laughing face as they both rolled and tussled on the floor of Makoto’s bedroom like a pair of kittens.
Makoto jumped when they knocked against the side of his bed, but that didn’t seem to stop them. “Riinnn! Haaruu!” Makoto quickly lurched forward to wrap his arms around Rin’s abdomen, pulling him off Haru. To which he was fairly successful – Makoto was strong for his age, carrying an entire bucket of cement by himself when it should normally take two students – until Rin let out a cry of “I will not be stopped!” before pulling Makoto down with him onto Haru, who let out a sound of indignation. A foot jabbed against Makoto’s side and the brunet let out an involuntary giggle.
Rin stopped struggling. “Oh my god,” He breathed. Even Haru had stilled.
“W-What—“ Makoto looked up from where his face had been buried against Rin’s back when they tussled.
“Makoto you’re ticklish!” Rin laughed and dived. Makoto stifled a shriek when Rin and Haru tackled him, grabbing him by his waist and under his arm.
The three boys tussled and struggled and roughhoused all over the place. Makoto’s room was used to this sort of treatment – there were plenty of days in which the hyperactive twins was chased around, shrieking, by a Makoto pretending to be a dragon - but the three boys were definitely much bigger than the twins. Their feet repeatedly banged against the edge of the table, the bed and the closet, but it did not deter their laughing and yelling and wrestling in the least.
Eventually they stopped with Haru shoving the two boys off, jumping onto Makoto’s bed and scuttling to the far end. Both Makoto and Rin flopped onto the carpeted floor and breathed heavily.
Rin rolled over onto his stomach and glanced over at Makoto. The other boy had his eyes closed and was slowly catching his breath, his sweater rumpled and covered in the strands of dust from the carpet.
Makoto opened his eyes and glanced sideways at Rin, still breathing slowly. “Mmmm…Rin, what’s wrong?” He shifted a little but remained where he was.
“Uh,” Rin blinked. “Nothing.” Makoto looked flushed from all that roughhousing, his chest rising slowly at each breath. His green eyes also looked a little hazy, as if Makoto was trying to focus his attention on Rin while at the same time slowly recovering from the laughing fits Rin and Haru had induced on him.
Rin wondered about the bubbly feeling welling inside his chest. It was similar to the one he had when he saw Makoto fidget and bite his lip whilst trying to decipher the English letters into sounds; fairly identical to the one he felt when Makoto wrapped his arms around him to pull him off Haru; just like the one he got when he heard Makoto giggle.
Makoto was giving Rin a puzzled look, but on hearing Haru shuffle on his bed he pushed himself up. “Haru, what are you doing?”
Rin raised his head to look: Haru was lying flat on his stomach with his arms folded under his chin, looking at Rin judgmentally. Rin puffed his cheeks at Haru, feeling like he had been caught doing something very wrong by Haru’s sharp ocean-blue eyes (very different from Makoto’s mellow valley-green ones). Rin could’ve sworn the “I only swim Free” boy was pouting. Maybe scowling.
“I thought you were going to practice your English,” Haru finally said, though it was vague as to whom the reply was directed towards.
“Huh—oh yeah.” Rin got up and surveyed the table, which had been kicked a few inches from its original place during their wrestling.
“My dad should be home with Ren and Ran soon,” Makoto noted, still a little flushed, standing up and helping Haru up to his feet as well. Makoto’s father had taken the young twins out to the park to allow the older boys some peace by themselves. “The twins might want to play when they come back.”
Rin pulled the table back to its original place or somewhere around there. Haru carefully picked up his sketchbook and pencil. “Then let’s not waste time,” Rin picked up the English practice book with decision, a grin playing on his expression. “I’m not done with you yet, Makoto!” Makoto looked distressed in response to that.
“But why me?” Makoto sighed, settling down by the table. Haru watched them both intently.
“Because, Makoto, just because!” Rin answered vaguely and was rewarded with a sound on the borderlines of a laugh and a helpless squeak.
Haru grunted. “Just don’t be noisy.”
“You’re no help, Haru,” Makoto teased, to which Haru only just blew a wisp of hair off his face in response, tousled by the earlier tussle. “Well, shall we continue, Rin?”
Makoto looked at Rin with an amused smile, sending off another flutter of bubbles in Rin’s chest. His green eyes creased softly, just as his mother’s had done, and Rin blinked dumbly for a few seconds, acutely aware of Haru pointedly staring at him.
“Yeah--!” Rin blurted out before flipping through the pages of the practice book as a distraction. He coughed distractedly to regain his composure without presenting a new page to Makoto. “Say this! Do you want to be friends with me?”
As Makoto’s brow furrowed with confusion, his gaze darting at the translation of the presented question and at the written phonics, his mouth hesitantly trying to form the right sounds, Rin wondered if there was a way in English to tell your friend that he was good-looking and gave Rin butterflies.