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“Hello!” A tiny voice chirps. “Who are you?”
Rin snaps his head around, eyes growing wide in absolute disbelief, and thinks holy shit, he can see me.
――――――
Shortly thereafter, Haruka arrives in a gust of wind, materializing beside Rin, soaking wet from wherever job Hell sent him off to do, and Makoto gasps and says, “You’ll catch a cold if you don’t dry up!”
Haruka jerks, stares at Makoto, turns his head to Rin, a rare display of pure emotion and confusion and surprise dancing across his face.
Rin thinks it’d be a long time before his mind completely forgets the look of pure joy that flashes in Haruka’s eyes.
――――――
“My name’s Makoto! Tachibana Makoto!” He sticks both of his hands out, and continues, “Nice to meet you, Haru-chan and Rinrin!”
Haru-chan and Rinrin share a look, Rin wiping at his eyes as he chokes out a laugh and they both kneel down, reaching out to grasp one tiny hand each ― reaching out to Makoto ― chubby fingers clasping calloused palms, and Haruka, Haruka who has the beginnings of a smile tugging at the corner of his lips, Haruka who may be holding on a little too tight, staring a little too long, says, “It’s very, very nice to meet you too, Makoto.”
――――――
They spend the entire day together, after Haruka dries himself up with a snap of his fingers, Makoto going, "That's so cool! Can you teach me how to do that, Haru-chan?", after they tell Makoto that he shouldn't let anyone know about his friends on top of the stone steps, after they answer Makoto's never ending questions with words like magic! or it's a secret or we'll tell you, one day.
They spend the entire day together, til the sun sets and Makoto has to go home and help his mother cook dinner, til Rin and Haruka thinks they'll burst from giddiness and disbelief over the fact that he's here and he can see us and he's so tiny.
Makoto starts to stand up, legs wobbly as he brushes the dirt off his shorts with his soft palms, and Haruka lurches and grabs his waist, clinging while Makoto laughs in surprise and tries to pry his hands off.
"Haru-chan, I have to go!"
"Nooo," Haruka groans as he buries his face in Makoto's back. He tickles his waist, reducing Makoto to giggles til he falls over and lands on Haruka's lap.
"H-Haru-chaaan!" Makoto whines in between giggles, "Rinrin! S-save meee!"
"Don't worry, Mako! I'll defeat the monster!" Rin replies, and he crawls over and flops on top of them, laughter rolling and carrying across the air.
――――――
Rin thinks that they finally got lucky, this time, when Makoto manages to see them so early on, thinks that he and Haruka won't have to go through years and years of being silent watchers, a guardian angel and a lurking demon.
Rin soon learns that it was stupid of him to keep his hopes up, that the universe doesn't give a shit about anyone or anything under it, that he and Haruka and Makoto are perpetually damned to be the stars of one, big cosmic joke.
――――――
Makoto goes to the empty lot on top of the steps the next day, and the next, and the next, and for days after that, too ― sometimes waiting for hours, waiting for Rinrin and Haru-chan to come and play with him again.
But after a few months of no one showing up, when his parents start asking him what he does for hours and hours on top of the steps, when his twin siblings, Ran and Ren, are born, Makoto decides to stop going altogether.
So he doesn’t visit it anymore, but he glances over the empty lot, everyday on his way to school, til his family decides to pack up and move away from their quiet neighborhood.
――――――
After they find Makoto, Heaven undergoes a lockdown due to a coup-de-e'tat, and Haruka, Rin learns later on, ends up getting locked in Tartarus for three years, due to a prank pulled by some lower demons.
When Rin manages to go back to the empty lot on top of the steps, ready and eager to finally, finally get to see, touch, feel Makoto again, he learns that five years has already passed, and he finds Haruka, alone, sitting on the patch of grass he remembers so well.
Haruka lifts his head, stares at Rin head on, and says, "he's not here anymore."
A pause.
"Then what the fuck are you waiting for," Rin replies, "let's go look for him."
"You know how pointless that is,” Haruka sighs, plucking a blade of grass by his feet, “once we lose the initial connection, it's practically impossible to feel him again."
"Didn't stop us from trying before," Rin counters.
"He usually found us, on those times."
"Well, now it's our turn."
Haruka sighs but stands up, and Rin smirks, unwanted hope unknowingly blossoming in his chest.
――――――
The next time they see each other, Makoto is twenty years old, a teaching assistant at a local preschool.
He’s sitting on a bench at the children’s playground after a hard day's work, sipping a cup of coffee and reading a book when he feels a strong gust of wind, hears a flutter of wings behind him coupled with a tired “we finally fucking found you,” before he turns around, eyes meeting a dangerous flash of teeth, clear blue eyes, and a panging sense of nostalgia.
“You’re real,” Makoto states, gaping, probably looking like a fish.
“Whaddya mean, we’re real? Of course we are,” Rin says, ambling towards the bench and plopping beside Makoto, Haruka perching on the armrest beside Rin.
“But I thought, when you guys didn’t appear again, I thought ― ”
Haruka shakes his head.
“Sorry, we didn’t get to say goodbye properly, it’s been a tough time for both of us, and it’s only partially calming down right now," he says, and Makoto doesn't get it, not really, but he senses the desperation in Haruka's eyes, the hope in Rin's, so he says,
“I won't pretend I understand, but, OK," he takes a deep breath, vaguely wonders what these two are, before he smiles and says, "It’s nice to see you again, Rinrin, Haru-chan!”
Rin groans. “Please don’t call me that. Ever," he says, at the same time as Haruka deadpans, “Drop the -chan.”
Makoto’s laughter rings through the air, as clear and gentle and warm as they remember it.
――――――
They get to know Makoto, bit by bit, this lifetime around. Haruka and Rin find out how he doesn’t like getting up so early in the mornings, how he feeds all the cats in the alley beside his apartment complex since the landlord won’t allow any inside, how he loves green curry and chocolates, how his job is mostly tiring and oddly pressuring, seeing as he’s shaping young minds, but he loves it, loves the feeling of helping children learn about the world and themselves, his quirks and habits, what he’s been up to in the years they weren’t together.
In return, Haruka and Rin tell Makoto bits about themselves, how they’re not human (or at least, haven’t been one for a long, long, long time), how they don’t really need to eat, but Rin sometimes eats spicy food just for the heck of it, and Haruka eats mackerel by the dozens whenever he feels like it, how they don’t really need to sleep but enjoy taking quiet naps together, how an angel and demon manage to be together even if they technically shouldn’t and couldn't.
Makoto takes it all in stride, since he figured the non-human aspect as much, and had always known he could see things others can't, telling them about the time he was talking to a lady by a tree when he was a child, and his parents looked at him and asked, "who are you talking to, honey?"
They also talked about why Rin and Haruka disappeared, much, much later when their little dates turned into something like a daily routine, Rin and Haruka randomly popping up in Makoto's place, sometimes alone, mostly together. They talked about the times when Makoto thought it was his fault, that he did something wrong which caused Haruka and Rin to not want to see him again, and that would always cause Rin to tear up a little, and for something in Haruka's heart to clench and they tell him to never, ever think that again.
Slowly but surely, the three bond, and after five years of stolen glances and averted gazes, light touches and hands held a little too long, Rin and Haruka manage to convince Makoto that it’s alright to be together with them, that he's not going to be smote down by the Heavens or dragged down to Hell by doing this, convince him that they'll never, ever leave him alone without warning, not again.
They kiss for the first time that day, in the middle of Makoto's kitchen, snow lightly falling outside.
They know it won’t be easy, not even a little bit, but they’ll make it work, like they always do.
――――――
Rin and Haruka start putting up wards and boards up the windows of Makoto's apartment, after Makoto steadfastly refuses to move away from his apartment, refuses to quit his job at the school.
Makoto knows they're just looking out for him, that having a deep connection with high celestial beings such as demons and angels have its own sets of dangers, that it would be safer for him to go into hiding, but Makoto doesn't want to give up his life, doesn't want to be a burden to the both of them, even if they tell him otherwise.
So they decide on doing this instead, filling every corner of Makoto's apartment with invisibility wards and masking wards and diverting wards, as a compromise of sorts.
As the sun sets outside, Rin claps his hands together, and admires his handiwork.
"All done," he proclaims, high-fiving Haruka, who breathes out a sigh of relief, and replies, "I'm going to go take a bath."
――――――
On a rare occasion when they're all together, when Haruka and Rin aren't on call and Makoto has a day-off, Rin is star-fished on the bed on top of the sheets, taking an afternoon nap with Haruka beside him, curled up and buried under the covers, with only the top of his head peeking out.
Makoto watches them, watches the light squeezing in from the gaps of their boarded up, warded windows, sunlight grazing Rin’s skin, picking out his arm muscles, burning the image in his mind.
He catches Rin twitch in his sleep, and Makoto holds his breath until Rin rolls over, arm smacking Haruka, whose face scrunches up and buries his head deeper in the sheets, until none of him is poking out, a white lump the only indication of his presence.
Makoto chuckles, and watches some more.
――――――
When Makoto unlocks the door of their apartment one day, bone tired from chasing children all around the playground, he abruptly slaps a hand on his mouth, the urge to be sick suddenly overtaking his senses.
He feels something heavy on his body, a pressure that’s squeezing his insides and wrenching out his gut. He makes his way towards the bedroom slowly, one hand on the wall to keep his balance, and hears loud voices inside their bedroom.
“― asking you right now, aren’t I? Why did you let that goddamn bitch get away with the artefact?!”
“I told you already. It’s none of your concern.”
Makoto has to lean on the wall to keep upright.
“‘It’s none of your concern,’ he says. None of my concern when the heavenly host come and flip every piece of dirt to hunt you down? Or maybe it’s none of my-- no-- OUR concern when they fucking find us? Don’t fucking tell me it’s none of my concern you dick!”
“Stop swearing so much, you’re supposed to be an ange ―”
“Stop trying to change the subj―!”
“Makoto?"
Makoto vaguely hears a thud, then nothing.
――――――
Later, after Haruka and Rin scrub every inch of their home free of excess cosmic energy, after they make sure Makoto is stable again, they smother Makoto up in pillows and blankets and their own bodies. They know the protocol. Scrub and Stabilize.
Rin remembers the first time it happened, in this lifetime, when Makoto attempted to stop Rin and Haruka from physically assaulting each other, only to pass out in the middle of their bedroom.
From then on, he and Haruka learn that Makoto is very sensitive to these things, to the cosmic energies that they both exude. They find out that on a normal day, it isn't dangerous to someone like Makoto. However, whenever he and Haruka get really fired-up and angry, waves of energies ooze out from them, and the sudden large amount can cause Makoto to pass out for a few hours at best.
Rin and Haruka are a bit worried, to be honest, since this is possibly the earliest time Makoto's sensitivity to anything cosmic reached these levels, compared to other lifetimes. They think it's probably connected to the fact that Makoto's powers manifested pretty early on, this time around.
Makoto starts to stroke their hair, propped up on the headboard with Rin and Haruka lying on his chest, hugging either of his sides. He can feel the apologies and guilt and regret rolling off of them.
"Really, it’s ok,” Makoto starts, carding his fingers through their hair, “I shouldn’t have gone deeper in the house when I first felt sick. I should’ve just went back out and returned in a few hours. And anyway, I’m fine now so there’s nothing to be ― Rin!”
Rin growls and throws himself off the bed, stomping and cursing his way out and slamming the door.
“Rin…”
Haru buries his head deeper in Makoto’s side, and tries to sleep everything off.
――――――
Sometimes, it hits them that what they have is not normal, that they themselves are not normal, in every sense of the word, in every sense of their physical and atomical make-ups, in every sense of their existence.
Rin thinks it’s romantic this way, how there will never ever be anyones or anybodies like them, how their story will never ever be replicated, because that’s how not normal they are. He thinks that this love story of theirs, as he always likes to put it, is one for the history books, one for the epics that withstand the test of time and transcend space.
Haruka thinks it’s stupid, thinks this whole thing is absolutely annoying, and that his life would’ve been so much easier without this “forbidden, love story” of theirs as Rin puts it, but when he really, really thinks about it, thinks about how his days would be, how he would be without this story of theirs, he realizes that what they have isn’t so bad after all.
Makoto thinks it’s… unconventional, to say the least. What they have is something no one will understand, something that he could never share with anyone, not to his parents, his siblings, his friends. He thinks it might be a little unfair. But at the end of it all, at the end of the day, of the year, at the end of existence as they know it, he knows that this...thing of theirs, all of this, is absolutely worth it.
――――――
“Yo,” Rin says, grinning as he materializes in the living room. “I'm back!”
He sees his lovers on the floor, Makoto still working on a lesson plan or whatever, Haruka looking like he’s trying to fuse with Makoto via body contact.
Makoto pushes his glasses up and glances at him, a tired smile flashing across his face, murmurs a quiet “welcome home,” before looking back down and jotting something on his notebook.
Haruka just stares at Rin.
He sighs and takes a seat across Makoto.
“Rin, tell Makoto to stop working,” Haruka says.
“Don’t tell me what to do,” he snaps, but tilts his head and tries to catch Makoto’s eyes. Failing, Rin frowns and tells him, “Makoto, I think you should take a break.”
“Mmmm,” Makoto murmurs, forehead wrinkling up in thought, pen scribbling something on the paper. “Just a little bit more.”
He didn’t even look at me goddamnit, Rin thinks, annoyed, and he hears a soft tsk from Haruka, who lets go of Makoto and is suddenly on Rin’s lap, legs on either side of his hips.
Haruka ducks his head and start sprinkling phantom kisses on Rin’s neck, who shudders and tilts his head back a little bit, enjoying the sensation of lips on skin, even though he doesn't really know what brought this on.
He feels Haruka murmur something across his neck.
“Wh-what did you — ?” Hands cup his jaw, thumb caressing cheekbones, as lips move their way up towards his ear.
“Shhh, act natural.”
“What the fuck do you mean by — ” Haruka bites his earlobe.
“OW!”
“Haru, play nice,” Makoto absentmindedly chides.
“Yeah, what the hell was that for you crazy son of a bitch,” Rin squawks, rubbing his ear as Haruka moves back, rolling his eyes. “You were talking too loud,” he whispers.
“What."
Haruka brings his lips back on Rin’s ear and breathes, “The headaches are starting again.”
Rin jerks his head back, eyes snapping towards Haruka’s, his own alarm reflected on glassy blues, and thinks,
It’s too soon.
――――――
Later, much, much later, Haruka thinks, not for the first time, that humans are so fragile, too fragile. He wonders if he should ever regret loving one, regret even loving in the first place. Demons weren’t meant to love after all-- in fact, they were meant to be the very antithesis of something as… as troublesome as love.
But then he remembers Makoto’s excruciatingly fond smile whenever Makoto thinks he and Rin aren’t looking, remembers Rin’s unbearably proud eyes whenever he or Makoto chooses the difficult, but right thing to do.
So Haruka decides to willingly give himself to this, like he always does, an infinity times over, no matter how idiotic, no matter how troublesome.
No matter what, until the very end.
――――――
When the white noise filling Makoto's head grows impossibly louder, he's alone in their home, Rin and Haruka both off doing jobs for their respective bosses.
His head is pounding again, a little bit more this time, and he can hear the never ending static in his head, getting louder and louder and more painful, the longer the day goes, and he doesn't know what to do nor does he exactly know what's happening.
He goes to the bathroom because he thinks he might be sick, moaning and groaning and scared and desperately wishing Rin and Haruka would come back soon, but at the same time wishing that they don't see him like this.
“Please,” Makoto begs, hands clasped tightly over ears, soft whimpers echoing around the bathroom, “Please make it stop.” He ends up curled on the bathroom floor, cold tiles piercing his skin.
――――――
When Haruka gets home, he finds Makoto on the bathroom floor, curled up next to the toilet bowl.
“Makoto?”
His knees hit the tiled floor, a dull thud bouncing around the walls.
He gathers Makoto on his lap, presses two fingers on Makoto’s neck, and, feeling a weak beat, moves on to place the hand on his forehead. It’s sweaty and slightly feverish.
“Makoto,” Haruka says, lightly tapping Makoto’s cheeks.
“Makoto,” he tries again.
“Makoto?” He repeats, gently shaking the too limp form in his arms.
“Makoto.” Alarm and panic start to creep in.
“Mako-to!” he says, louder this time, voice cracking a little at the end. Nothing.
Haruka feels like crying.
He clenches his fists, nails biting and leaving crescent marks on his palms.
Calm down.
He gently shifts Makoto off his lap, and transports him to the bedroom.
Calm down, he tells himself.
He’s still alive.
――――――
“I-I’m-It’s fine, Haru. I just felt dizzy all of a sudden,” Makoto leans on Haruka’s shoulder and sighs.
“Really, it’s nothing. I must’ve eaten something bad last night or something.” Haruka slides an arm around Makoto’s waist and squeezes a bit, planting a kiss on Makoto's hair. He knows Makoto's lying.
Makoto chuckles weakly and nuzzles closer, breaths slowly getting deeper as sleep and exhaustion claims him yet again.
Haruka hugs Makoto a bit tighter, hand moving up and down Makoto’s sides, and desperately wishes Rin would come home soon.
――――――
“How long,” Rin says, slowly, anger and worry mixing and churning in his gut, “how long have you been having these headaches?”
Makoto tries to make himself smaller, trapped and scared in the corner of the bathroom walls. He knows Makoto can feel the energies he’s giving off, and while it’s not enough to poison him, it’s enough to cause fear for humans. Rin hates it, hates the look on Makoto’s face, hates the fact that he’s the one who’s making Makoto feel uncomfortable and scared, but he absolutely has to know.
Haruka’s beside him, twitching to go and comfort Makoto, but he knows how important this is too, even if Makoto doesn’t.
“I—um—a few weeks?”
“Bullshit.”
“But,” Makoto starts. Rin’s eyes flash, and Makoto sighs and gives up.
“Ok, it’s been going on a few months,” he admits. He feels Haruka stiffen beside him.
“How many months," Rin asks, "are a few months exactly?” He manages to sound calm, even though his insides are screaming for him to stop the fuck now.
“Um.”
“Spit it out, Makoto. And don’t think about lying.”
“I don’t see why that matte ― “
“How. Long.”
Makoto swallows. “About… six?”
A flash of pure despair passes by Haruka’s face, a look that Rin’s never going to get used too, no matter how many times it happens.
――――――
“Is there really nothing we can do?”
“Yes.”
“Can’t we just suppress it again?”
“You know it’s gone on for too long.”
“But—“
“Fuck, what do you even want? Huh? We should’ve seen the signs, hell, we saw it, we were just selfish brats who pretended everything was ok and now it’s absolutely too fucking late. Are you fucking satisfied?”
“But if we just take away his memories like last time we can still let him—”
“Oh my god, shut up! It’s too late ok? Too fucking late.”
“…”
“There’s nothing we can do anymore.”
――――――
They're a tangle of limbs on the bed, naked and satisfied and relaxed. Makoto is lying face down on the bed, and Rin props his chin on Makoto's back, traces a finger at the rippling muscles as Makoto shifts to accommodate Rin.
Makoto yawns, and rubs his eyes.
"Sleepy?" Rin whispers.
"Mmm."
"Sleep," Haruka murmurs from his position beside Makoto, tangling his fingers in Makoto's hair and massaging his scalp.
"Mmm."
Rin wishes they can stay like this, forever, and sends a prayer that he knows won't get answered anyway. He feels Makoto's breathing start getting deeper, and he closes his eyes, feels the rise and fall of Makoto's back, a reminder that he's still alive, that they're still together.
――――――
It comes to a point where Makoto has to quit the job he worked so hard for, where Makoto can't go through a single day without blacking out for hours.
Makoto is on the bed, having passed out while they were eating lunch, lying still and looking dead, except for the slight rise and fall of his chest.
Haruka can hear Rin outside, thunder crashing on an empty lot near their home.
Haruka thinks it's ironic that for all the powers he and Rin has combined, ultimately, when it comes down to it, they can literally do nothing but watch and wait.
――――――
In the end, Rin and Haruka lay Makoto on their bed, barely there, eyes unfocused, reduced to muttering gibberish and perpetual sobbing, a shadow of the bright, warm light that was once Tachibana Makoto.
Rin and Haruka have already said their goodbyes, accepted what fate brought them, this time.
――――――
Rin and Haruka pack up Makoto’s belongings, after they salted and burned his bones.
There isn’t much, Makoto was never one to buy unnecessary things, and later, they'll drop these off at a nearby charity. It's not like they need these things anyway.
Rin keeps Makoto’s glasses though, as something to hold on too while they wait.
They take off the boards and scrub out the wards, scrape out every last trace of them and their lifetime together in this tiny apartment they shared.
When all’s done, Rin and Haruka leave, without so much as a glance behind.
――――――
The sky is crying, and he feels like joining in too.
“How long do you think it’ll take for him to come back?” A flash of lightning.
“How many times do I have to tell you, I don’t know.” A clap of thunder.
“But I hope he comes back soon, seven years was way too short.”
The rain continues to pour.
――――――
Sometimes they like to remember past lifetimes, when the feeling of missing Makoto gets a little bit too much.
“Remember that time Makoto was a girl? Man, that was so weird. We didn’t even know that was possible. The shock on your face was absolutely priceless.”
Or,
“Makoto would like these. He used to have something like it that lifetime when he was an athlete. You remember that right? We could all get matching sets. Maybe I’ll give it to him the next time we see him.”
――――――
Haruka drops his mackerel, and Rin bolts upright from his nap.
They share a look of disbelief, before Rin’s face splits into a smirk that hasn’t been there for a long, long time.
“Fucking finally,” Rin exhales as they grab each other’s hands.
A child thinks he sees two people walk off a cliff before disappearing, air crackling in excitement, the scent of ozone piercing through the air.
――――――
On a quiet day, in a quiet place, Makoto lies, face down, on Rin and Haruka's laps.
Pages rustle. Buttons clack.
Inhale, exhale.
And then,
“Haru-chaaaan!!! Rinriiiin!!!”
“Rinrin?” Rin coughs out.
“Drop the -chan,” Haru murmurs.
“Harurin!!!”
Rin pauses his game, brows drawing together as he looks down, and asks,
“... Makoto, are you alright?”
Makoto flips around and looks at them both, grinning from ear-to-ear, warm eyes crinkling into tiny slits.
Haruka lowers his book.
“What is it?” he whispers.
Makoto’s face glows impossibly brighter.
“Nothing,” he replies.
“I just have a really good feeling about today.”
―― end ――