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“Truth,” Rin and Rei declare at the same time, throwing the word like they’re playing a game of jan-ken-pon.
Nagisa pouts at both of them. On the other side of their skewed circle, Kisumi takes a moment, tapping one finger to his chin.
“I’d like everyone to tell me about their first kiss,” he says, finally. He’s all business, cat’s cream grin sharper where the starlight leaking down onto Makoto’s porch touches his teeth.
He watches three faces blanch in perfect unison, leans in automatically at the sight. Rei, Nagisa and Rin all tilt towards one another, just a fraction, as if this act of solidarity might give them the safety of a makeshift fort.
Kisumi raises an eyebrow.
“Why are you here again?” Haru heaves the question out on a sigh.
“Haru,” comes Makoto’s chiding voice from besides Kisumi. That tone is Kisumi’s favourite. Or almost favourite. The ‘giving in’ voice might rank a touch higher.
“I was here already, spending time with Makoto.”
Though most would call Haru impassive, Kisumi has to say that it’s fascinating just how expressive he can be with only the barest twitches of his features. This look, Kisumi imagines narrating in a magazine, features the barest drooping of his lids, the slightest downwards slant at each corner of his mouth. A moment’s musing brings Kisumi to the conclusion that the most apt descriptor would be the face of one who has just accidentally caught a person picking their nose.
It’s as hilarious as it is exceptionally unjust considering Kisumi is cute as a glittery button. Makoto would agree. That thought makes Kisumi smile, and so it is easy for him to stare Haru dead in the eyes and continue. He must look angelic to warrant the slow dawning horror on Rin and Rei’s faces.
“Spending time with Makoto, my boyfriend.”
Haru looks at him with the interest one would regard white paint swatches for a wall.
Which really, has the potential to be very compelling. If Kisumi was a white wall, his shade would be cosmic latte. He presses.
“You know, Makoto really likes whip—“
“No,” Rin whispers.
“—ped cream.” There’s a downwards rush, the air of a relieved sigh having just dropped. Kisumi smiles sweetly and continues, “It was on sale so I bought a can just for him.”
“Who does that?” Rin asks, grimacing just as, absentmindedly, Nagisa’s hand flutters up to touch where the fabric of Rin’s sleeve bunches around his elbow.
“How sweet,” Nagisa says, beaming. Rin glances down at his hand, for barely a moment, and doesn’t say a word.
Interesting, Kisumi thinks.
“Literally,” he says, grinning at Nagisa. “Don’t you think it just completes a dessert?”
“Makoto isn’t good at making desserts,” Haru says, voice quiet, cutting the noise anyway.
“Oh, I wasn’t really referring to the type of dessert you make.”
Rei looks confused, Nagisa — knowing. Rin is looking cautiously to Haru.
Kisumi thinks if Haru had a dustpan and broom, Haru might actually try and sweep him into it.
“Kisumi,” Makoto groans, squeezing Kisumi’s hand in warning. “Stop that.” He sighs, shifting his pointed gaze from Kisumi to Haru.
“Haru, there’s no whipped cream.”
Kisumi bumps his shoulder against Makoto’s, feels him teeter like a domino.
“Kisumi, be nice.”
“I am nice.” He raises Makoto’s hand, fingers still twined with his own, to dust a kiss over Makoto’s knuckles. He knows to look up to catch the soft smile that Makoto regards him with.
There’s the sound of a throat being cleared. Haru’s wholly unimpressed gaze flickers easily at the sound. Rei fidgets, meeting Haru’s stare for a second, before clearing his throat once more. “I think we should get back to the task at hand.”
“Of course! I haven’t forgotten,” Kisumi hums, giving everyone a second in his line of sight, a warmer violet than the dust swirling the night sky above them. “The rules of all-in truth or dare are, as you must know by now, that you have to spill no matter what. So don’t worry about ordering yourselves!”
He’s met with silence. Rei’s mouth is opening and closing like he’s searching for his earlier statement to swallow right back down.
“Wow, must have been pretty special first kisses for all of you to hold onto them this tightly.”
Rin sighs wearily; Kisumi looks towards him in an instant, watching as his lips part.
“It was Nagisa,” Rin says, simply.
Or it would be simple. Except what comes is two voices. Around the same name.
Immediately, Rin and Haru both whip their heads towards each other.
“Rin, that’s rude. I can speak for myself,” says Haru, frowning slightly; just as Rin gasps: “Wait, you’ve been kissed?!”
“Oops,” says Nagisa.
Rei watches in morbid fascination. Kisumi does the same; besides him, Makoto looks like he might be praying.
“Oops?” Rin echoes. “You were both of our first kisses.”
Nagisa huffs now. “Wow, you make it sound like it’s so impossible.”
Immediately, Rin backtracks. “N-no, hey, that’s not what I meant. If you’re talking about it like that then—“ Rin looks up, away from everyone and hisses out a shaky breath. “Oh my god.” His cheeks are flushed when he manages to turn towards Nagisa and continue. “I mean it’s not surprising that you’ve kissed us both; it’s surprising that you’ve kissed us both. Haru, really? Haru?!”
“Hey,” Haru says.
Nagisa’s eyes widen. “Rin-chan…”
Rin tugs his sleeves back down to hug his wrists. “Yeah, well…”
“Wait,” says Rei, suddenly. “If Nagisa-kun was both Rin-san and Haruka-senpai’s first kiss, then who was Nagisa-kun’s first kiss? He should tell his story first.”
“What if it was neither of them?” Kisumi asks, laughing now. Makoto is silent, watching with a subtle curiosity Kisumi can only hope to contain just as skillfully. He certainly hadn’t expected this game to yield these surprises.
Rin clicks his tongue against his teeth. “If it was neither of us, I swear to Go—“
“Rin-chan,” Nagisa answers, immediately. “That was my first kiss too.”
Rin melts visibly, the words deflating, pink at his cheekbones. It’s a pretty sight, really.
~
After the final relay, the first final relay, they stumble to the locker room together; trailing four sets of dark footprints, droplets of water from their hair. Nagisa is still dizzy, mind full of bright mist, the weightlessness of victory. He laughs, because it’s the only thing he can think to do. The sound is light; rising from him effortlessly to bounce against the walls. And Nagisa thinks it’s only fair to lend some warmth to these hallways when it is this club that brought them together in the first place. He wonders if Rin, Haru, Makoto or even himself, had held so much as an inkling of the bond that would grow between them.
The relay was a turning point. Nagisa knew, intuitively, in the way the water had carried him as he pushed. Without searching, he’d found momentum from the flare of four promises. His thoughts shifted to a steady backbeat of for yourself, for Makoto, for Haru, for Rin. And he’d been so happy to know that he was swimming towards them. Those names had served to speed him up, the water vowing more and more for his efforts. And for as right as it felt to give chase, his heart filling with each sweep of his arms; he couldn’t help but hold a pocket of futile hope that this could only last longer.
The light had been so pretty. He’d been sad to see it go before he’d even pressed his fingers to the wall.
Now, when the door to the locker room shuts softly behind them, Nagisa finds a lump in his throat as he thinks of laughing with everyone. They’re all winding back to themselves, slowly, as they move for their personal belongings. Nagisa understands it’s a necessary process. The relay had broken them each open to pour gold fire in one other. On land, with the world buzzing onwards around them, it’s a little bit scary to hold that fire where others might not treat it so preciously.
Still, Nagisa wishes he could stay open. His sisters have always told him, with cheek pinches or patronising pats to his head, that he loves too readily, too wholeheartedly.
But it’s hard not to. What else can Nagisa do when there is so much to admire? He gulps now, as it begins to dawn on him where exactly all of these thoughts are heading.
He wants to hold hands with everyone again. They’re the rays of the crudely drawn suns scribbled in the margins of Nagisa’s notes; reaching for a more powerful light between them.
He wants to keep them where they are. And he hopes that the stubborn curl of worry colouring the edges of his love fades fast. But Makoto and Haru are going to graduate, will continue to walk side by side; just as Rin will leave to orbit the Earth, draw secrets from each sea change.
And Nagisa loves. Nagisa is loved. But it doesn’t stop the fact that he might be left behind.
He’s fidgeting with his goggles when Makoto and Haru leave the locker room. Makoto glances back with a smile to say, “We’ll be waiting outside.” Everything Makoto says sounds like a promise. Now, it’s all Nagisa can do not to cling to the way wait settles in his voice like an anchor.
“You’re weirdly still,” Rin says, and Nagisa can’t turn to look at him without biting his lip. His fingers fumble, grip slackening around his goggles. He jumps as they clatter against the floor. When Rin sees his face, he looks horrified.
“What’s wrong?” he asks, fearfully, the words searching. “Did you hurt yourself while you were swimming?” He’s given up zipping his jacket halfway to let his hands flutter anxiously around Nagisa’s shoulders.
Nagisa sniffs messily, and then he feels his eyes well up and he hates how counterproductive it is to want to cry for how badly he doesn’t want to cry. He shakes his head, rubbing the tears away with the heels of his palms. He has no reason to be upset after something so special; he should be happy.
“No, I didn’t hurt myself,” he manages, but he hiccups around the words.
Rin’s eyebrows slant upwards like Makoto’s; he brings both hands down to rest on Nagisa’s shoulders decisively. “Are you sure?”
Nagisa only shakes his head again. “Rin-chan cries when he’s happy.”
Rin huffs. “I’m only gonna let that comment slide because it’s you.”
Things never hit Nagisa immediately. But when they do, it’s sudden — always in a rush, gravity crashing down on him in a single burst. What if he never sees Rin again? He doesn’t want to face a new year without Rin’s force; his livewire smile and his chiding voice, sometimes that’s everything Nagisa needs to make it through spots of trouble. If he can’t handle the thought of a year without Rin, how might he face an entire lifetime? He feels his bottom lip tremble, chest seeming to shudder under the weight of his heart.
“H-hey now, Nagisa don’t cry. Like you said, I’m the crybaby of the group so you shouldn’t do this as well.”
He headbutts Rin’s stomach.
“What am I gonna do without Rin-chan?” he asks, and he feels tiny.
There’s a moment, a weary sigh, and then Nagisa registers hesitant fingers coming to rest lightly atop his head.
“There’s always coming back, you know,” Rin says. Nagisa stills. “And you’re gonna get better because you have to get better. When I come back, I’ll probably be well-trained in all sorts of strokes. So you better be good enough to beat me at breast.”
“I won’t be good enough, you’re gonna leave me behind!” Nagisa wails. His voice warbles like the dying notes of a gust of wind but there’s a sense of relief in articulating the feelings too tangled for him to figure out earlier.
“Oi!” Rin flicks the top of Nagisa’s head. Reluctantly, Nagisa straightens enough to peek up at his face.
Rin’s brows are drawn in tight, the line of his mouth is hard and determined. “Don’t talk so lowly of yourself! As if someone could just forget you.” He shakes his head with a tiny, irritated huff. “The Nagisa I know could only be remembered by everyone he comes across.”
The worry is still there but Nagisa will never be one to deny fledgling hope. He takes that from Rin’s words, so that his next concern seems feeble even as he voices it. “But there’ll be much better swimmers in Australia than us here.”
“Yeah, so?” Rin grins now, bright and assured. Nagisa’s heart seizes when he realises he won’t see that same smile for a very long time. Rin laughs lightly, confidence brimming, “Besides, I’ll make sure to be better than them! So it doesn’t matter, we’re all gonna stay friends anyway.” He furrows his brows. “You just have to make sure not to slack off.”
Nagisa is trying not to think of what it means to leave in concrete terms, of flights and distance and a life packed away. But Rin is not only daring him to confront it, but to have faith in him, believe in what will surely come after. It would be disrespectful to ever doubt the force that is Matsuoka Rin, this Nagisa knows as fact. He swipes the back of his hand over his runny nose.
“Are you sure?” he asks, though he thinks he already has the answer.
“I wouldn’t say it if I wasn’t.”
Rin is so certain. Of himself, of their future. Nagisa wishes he could hold a measure of that faith, carry its beating spark close in his chest to push him past the current.
“Rin-chan, you have to promise. Pinky swear?”
Rin hums thoughtfully. “Oh, if you need assurance I have a better idea! Something even stronger than that.”
Nagisa cocks his head and stares inquisitively up at Rin.
“We’ll kiss. That’s like… stronger than a blood pact.”
“Really?” Nagisa barely turns the thought over in his head before he feels himself smile, shaky at first but warming to a beam; tentative hope reaching shyly to take hold of his heart. Rin might not technically be able to share faith, but this is something that he can give, something Nagisa can take and keep safe. “Okay, let’s do it.”
Rin grins right back at him. Nagisa nods, lets out a determined huff, puckers his lips and straightens.
“M-maybe don’t make that face,” mutters Rin.
Nagisa tilts his head. “Huh, why not? This is how you kiss.”
“You look like a fish.”
Nagisa goes cross-eyed trying to look at his own mouth. The space above where his brows furrow is beginning to ache when he feels Rin’s fingers light against his chin. Immediately, his features soften, the whisper of an exhale slipping from his lips. A moment’s surprise flits over Rin’s face, his mouth parting. He closes it just as Nagisa notices, and the tips of his ears are coloured bright red.
“There. Better,” mumbles Rin. By now the blush has spread to his cheeks, the same faint pink of the strawberry jam stains Nagisa’s mother can’t quite lift from his white shirts.
Rin frowns, the picture of concentration. Nagisa feels like his nerves are fizzing, the silence between them forging a stillness Nagisa doesn’t know what to make of. Both he and Rin are most comfortable in motion and so it’s as if there’s an unspoken understanding between them when he cranes his neck up just as Rin leans down. Their lips press for maybe a second, both lighter and heavier than what Nagisa expects. His skin tingles when Rin pulls away, grinning proudly.
“Alright. All settled!”
Nagisa laughs, unexpected but welcomed with relief all the same. The last of his worry lightens bit by bit. Now, he feels just as he does when he tries to curl his fingers around airborne pollen in a spring breeze.
“The others are waiting. Let’s go bury that time capsule,” Rin says, holding out one hand.
And just like that, the muted weight of an impending farewell returns to Nagisa. It’s really a kind of homesickness, knowing that even without being the one to leave, things will be different for all of them. But it’s an easier hurt than before; there’s anticipation folding its way in there with the knowledge that Nagisa will have something to wait for.
He takes Rin’s hand, tangles their fingers tight so it’s all he can feel.
“Remember, we’re burying it just so we can dig it back up,” Rin says.
Nagisa nods, draws the emotion tight to his chest like the strong ten year old he is, and walks with his shoulders pushed back. They make it to the door when he stops for a second, to tug at Rin’s hand.
“Huh? What is it?”
Nagisa lifts his chin defiantly, eyes set like a warrior’s.
“I promise too.”
He tugs Rin down, kisses him firm and dutiful; they’ve been learning about stars in school, and he thinks there’s a red giant in his chest.
Rin is a red giant.
Nagisa has been entertaining thoughts of becoming an astronaut. He’ll tell the aliens all about Rin and his friends, this relay; all of the moments they have to come.
He smiles, tears clinging to his lashes. He can blaze as well. Rin will come back to see it.
~
Kisumi watches as Rei lifts his glasses a touch to wipe at his eyes.
Nagisa has dropped his head to rest on Rin’s shoulder. Rin blows out an exasperated breath, but Kisumi catches how naturally he shifts to accommodate Nagisa, fingers coming to thread in Nagisa’s golden hair.
“I-I’m so glad you all found each other again,” Rei says, voice thick.
Rin raises an eyebrow, letting out a subdued sort of chuckle. “I am too. And um, you know I guess we owe it to you too.”
Rei gasps. “No, all of you went through such hardship for each other. It’s so admirable.”
Rin grunts softly. “Jeez, just accept it, would you?”
Kisumi’s eyes widen when he notices Haru, quiet, watching the three of them from the side; eyes gentle in a way that most reserve for photo albums, swingsets and blushed knees.
One year. Makoto, Rin, Haru and Nagisa had one year together and yet they’d built an entire childhood’s worth of memories with each other. Kisumi has to admit, running his thumb over Makoto’s, that what they all have is something undeniably special.
Rin raises his free hand to rub the back of his neck, looking a little embarrassed now. “Anyway, yeah. I guess now it’s Haru’s turn. Seriously, I can’t believe you’ve been kissed. How…how did anyone actually manage to plant one on you?”
“I was the one who kissed Nagisa,” Haru says, simply.
“Wait… you kissed Nagisa? Like, of your own volition?”
Nagisa squints. “Rin-chan, I don’t think you have room to say that considering you too, as everyone knows now, have kissed me of your own volition.”
Haru looks at Rin like he’s missing the most obvious detail in the world. “Is it so surprising? Nagisa is Nagisa,” he says.
That sparks a general air of assent among everyone, Makoto laughing around the word “true” just as Rei nods emphatically.
One side of Rin’s mouth pulls up easily. “Yeah, yeah. Fair.”
Nagisa turns to bury his face in Rin’s arm.
“Okay wow, stop. You flatterers,” he whines. Rin laughs softly, pats Nagisa’s head twice.
~
They’re sitting by the pond of a local park, arm pressed to arm as Nagisa tries to lure fish to him with a twig. Haru is content to watch the ripples, water shifting in rings before calming again. It’s quiet today, a Saturday morning Haru has promised Nagisa without explicitly saying so. They’re going to watch a documentary about the Atlantic ocean together.
“Haru-chan?” Nagisa asks, fidgeting slightly against Haru.
“Mmm?”
“Do you like poetry?”
Haru shifts his gaze from the pond for a moment, to look at Nagisa.
“Why do you ask?”
Nagisa turns his head, flashes his teeth in his honest, open smile. “You’re quiet so I feel like you might.”
Haru mulls over the words, a lighthouse’s rays scanning the ocean. “I like it when it’s about water.”
Nagisa laughs. Nagisa is always laughing. Not in a cruel way. The sound is never antagonising. Haru thinks that Nagisa laughs like the world is soft, like it is something to delight over — a snow globe, shaken to see waves of blue glitter.
“But you think everything’s about water, don’t you, Haru-chan?”
“Only the things that can measure up to it.”
Nagisa’s lips part in a small, curious ‘o’ shape. “Huh? Like what? Oh! Don’t you think the sky at night looks like it could be an ocean?”
Haru hums thoughtfully. Watches Nagisa spin his twig over the surface of the water. Unbidden, he imagines that if the night sky was an ocean, Nagisa reaching up might set ripples shivering along it.
“You can tell me later!” Nagisa says, eyes crinkling warmly.
A slight summer breeze picks up and whispers past Haru’s sun-warmed skin to wind through the treetops. There’s a simple sort of contentment that comes with sharing a moment to watch the leaves rustle together, until Nagisa shifts the quiet and Haru’s attention floats easily back to him.
“Haru-chan, that reminds me! The other day Rei-chan was in the library studying. And I thought I’d keep him company.” Haru inclines his head to peek down at Nagisa, wordless affirmation that he is listening. When Nagisa continues, his hands flutter as he speaks. “But you know Rei-chan does that thing where he like… becomes one with the book. So anyway, I was completely bored so I wandered through the fiction section and there was this super cool looking mystery book with a guy in a trench coat on the front, like by a stree—“
“Nagisa,” Haru sighs.
Nagisa smiles a little sheepishly, seeming to reign himself in before starting up again. “Oh. Right. Yeah so anyway, I was reading it and there was a kiss scene and the author described it like… drowning? And I couldn’t stop thinking ‘no, how terrible!’ I wouldn’t want a kiss to feel like drowning.”
Haru frowns. “That doesn’t sound appealing at all.”
“Kissing? Or drown-kissing?”
“Both.”
Nagisa shakes his head. “Both?”
Haru doesn’t repeat himself, but he tips his chin, lets his gaze flicker briefly to meet Nagisa’s.
Nagisa’s eyes widen, and then he giggles, shaking his head. “Oh what, no, kissing is the best!”
“It seems so unnecessary,” Haru says, after a beat. He tilts his head, feels the hair of his fringe shift across his forehead.
Nagisa grins, eyes twinkling like he’s about to impart a great secret. He leans in slightly, and his voice is hushed when he answers. “Exactly. That’s what makes it so special.”
Haru tries to grasp the words, but he doesn’t feel the confusion smooth away from his face. And when he says no more, Nagisa grins — bright and matter-of-fact like he’s just received a gift — and makes to continue.
“It’s nice for a moment to just feel how much you like a person. And that it’s the same for them! It’s assurance,” he says, as if he is delivering a presentation.
As someone who has often been the audience for Nagisa’s presentation rehearsals, Haru knows firsthand that Nagisa has an odd style.
“Assurance?”
Nagisa nods. “Exactly!”
Inexplicably, Haru thinks of sunshine glinting off the pool, of honey, and stars in the sky; blinking up at him around his knees, the water at night. He thinks of, “Haru-chan is always smiling on the inside!”, slowing his pace for gold hair to find his line of sight; eyes transparent, opaque, somehow at the same time.
The bright idea to start a high school swim club. This time, Nagisa caught up all by himself.
“Assurance,” Haru says, quietly to himself. And then he directs his voice to Nagisa. “Would you like to?”
“Eh?”
“Kiss?”
Nagisa’s eyes widen, planetary. “Haru-chan…”
Haru stares at the water, warmth rising in his cheeks, up to his ears.
“Of course I do!”
And when Haru turns, slightly dazed, a misplaced flutter in his stomach, Nagisa is already leaning towards him with that ready smile.
It makes it a little easier. Nagisa has always made the most bothersome seem to take less effort.
Haru watches Nagisa’s eyes flicker shut, and he stays still, breath halting for a moment before he makes to close the distance — like reaching for the wall of a pool. When he touches his lips to Nagisa’s, he feels Nagisa smile, and the flutter spreads into a warmth so easy, Haru might be smiling a little too.
Nagisa is all bright light when they pull away from each other, dimples and warmth and Haru thinks just maybe that was how it feels for waves to break; sending slow seafoam to brush a kiss against the sand.
He lets Nagisa settle back into his side.
Everyone likes Nagisa. Haru likes Nagisa.
It feels like Nagisa likes him too.
~
“Ah, Haru. He was a prince in middle school as well,” Kisumi says with a wistful smile.
“I really wasn’t,” Haru deadpans.
“Of course you were! People thought you were hot.” Kisumi touches his finger to his bottom lip in thought before adding, “in a kind of mean way, though.”
Rei coughs. When everyone looks towards him, his eyes widen. Gulping, he pushes up his glasses and manages to speak with a surprisingly level voice. “Haruka-senpai isn’t mean.”
Kisumi laughs. “No? But he is pretty, isn’t he?”
There’s a deep blush spreading across Rei’s cheeks that Kisumi finds particularly fascinating. And if the way that Haru peeks from the side, tilting his head minutely in Rei’s direction, is any indication, Kisumi thinks it’s fair to say that Haru is interested in the answer as well.
Rei gives a cursory nod. “Yes, Haruka-senpai is beautiful.”
He says it so frankly, Kisumi wouldn’t think to read further into the words if it weren’t for the way Rei’s eyes dart towards Haru. The glance is so hopeful; bashful from under his glasses, Kisumi almost imagines they’re actually in a shoujo manga.
He wonders what else he might not know about Ryugazaki Rei.
Kisumi smiles slyly. He’s looking at Haru when he directs his next question to Rei. “So… Rei, would you like to tell us your story next?” He almost throws in a wink, decides to be merciful when he sees how, impossibly, Rei seems to straighten his already impeccable posture even more.
“Yes… well… you see—”
“We don’t see,” Kisumi says, resting his palm against his cheek. “Which is exactly why you should tell us.”
Haru isn’t even trying to be discreet about it now, angled blatantly towards Rei’s voice.
Rei huffs out a long suffering sigh. “I really don’t understand why you insist on being so pushy about it—”
Nagisa reaches out to flick Rei’s arm. “Fair. We’re being fair about it.”
“Fine. Fine.” Rei directs his gaze to the sky like he’s hoping he might float up into it. Kisumi can’t help but laugh quietly to himself. Good luck, he thinks.
Rei straightens the fabric of his shirt, clears his throat and after taking a deep breath in, he finally speaks. “Haruka-senpai was my first kiss.”
Nagisa hoots and both Makoto and Rin turn to Haru so fast Kisumi feels dizzy. Rei is looking back up at the sky like he’s begging for protection.
“Haru? Again?!”
Kisumi can’t place whether Rin looks more betrayed or terrified.
“Are you trying to make it a goal to kiss your entire team?” he hisses.
Makoto blanches.
“Oh my God, Makoto, why are you making that face? Why do you look like that? Please don’t tell me you’ve ki—”
“No!” Makoto squeaks, sweat beading at his forehead. “No, no, no. We wouldn’t, would we? No!”
Interesting…
Rin’s breath falls in a harried sigh. And then he turns back to Haru, eyes narrowed.
Haru shrugs. “I just felt like kissing Rei.”
“Rei-chan?”
Kisumi shifts his gaze to the side to find Rei with both hands pressed to his cheeks, Nagisa tugging at his arm.
“Would everyone be quiet,” Nagisa says sternly. Then, when the circle hushes obediently: “Rei-chan, you don’t have to talk about it.”
Rei takes a deep breath in, draws his hands away from his face and frowns. “No, it’s fine to talk about.”
Haru raises his eyebrows.
“It was a nice moment,” mutters Rei.
And Kisumi thinks that Haru might just look proud of himself. How sly.
~
Rei watches Haru, knees pressed to his chest, arms around his shins. He watches Haru swim laps, languid, always stretching, the water chasing him.
He can’t imagine anyone getting sick of watching Haru swim.
For Rei, even after over a year, it still inspires him just as much as it pits apprehension in his stomach. It’s hard not to feel like surely he must belong anywhere but in a swim club when he’s watching how naturally Haru moves in the water.
Sometimes he catches himself trying to apply calculations to Haru’s movements, measure his reach, the speed of his kick. But the numbers always fall short; he knows by now that freedom isn’t supposed to be cut and confined to equations. Still, old habits die hard and Rei is endlessly fascinated by trying.
Haru turns sharply now, so that suddenly his arms are moving towards Rei. Rei has grown accustomed at this point, to the inwards scramble whenever Haru approaches him. The best way he can think to describe it is logic losing its way somewhere in the reverberations of his beating heart, thrown and bent out of shape before the might of the sound, how it rushes in waves.
The human body truly is amazing.
And sure enough, when Haru surfaces — eyes somehow more blue than the pool, hands coming to grip the ledge between Rei and the water; Rei swears his body glitches.
Bodies can’t glitch, he thinks. Except his cheeks are burning and there’s blood rushing in his ears and he feels like he weighs nothing; even as he’s never been more aware of his presence here, in front of Haru. Haru shapes seconds into hours; the ground into a seesaw.
It has nothing to do with gravity.
He wants to say something like, “Excellent swimming as always, Haruka-senpai,” but he’s tracing the slope of Haru’s neck to his shoulder and somewhere the words get confused so all he can hear is rise over run rise over run rise over run.
“Excellent collarbone, Haruka-senpai!”
Haru raises both eyebrows. “Thank you?”
“Not a problem!” Rei says, smiling, even as he imagines curling in on himself and hurtling head first into the pool.
He thinks he catches Haru trying to glance down at his own collarbone and now it is with a touch of envy that he imagines in the same situation Nagisa might be able to play it cool by announcing ‘CANNONBALL!!’ only to promptly, well… cannonball.
“Uh,” says Haru.
Yes, uh.
Rei brings his hand to his mouth, pushes his sigh into his palm. “Haruka-senpai, I’d meant to say excellent swimming. I think your swimming is excellent.”
Haru’s eyes flicker up to him; Rei can’t tell if it’s the light that catches the blue or the other way round. In any case, they’re so clear, so deep all at once.
“Thank you,” Haru says again. His tone doesn’t give much away in terms of gratitude, but he doesn’t sound bothered either.
He lets go of the ledge for a moment, treads water to glance behind his shoulder at the length of the pool. He turns back to Rei then, kicks forward and reaches for the wall once more, closer than before. Rei gets the impression he plans on staying a while, and so he unfolds his legs so he can dip them into the pool. The water is warmed by the sun, barely rippling.
“Why aren’t you swimming?” Haru asks.
Rei gathers that’s why Haru made his way over here in the first place. “I… ah… I felt like watching for a bit.” He blushes, knowing that both he and Haru know full well there’s only one person he could be watching.
Haru huffs. “You should swim.”
Any other day, he thinks he’d be able to hold it in. But right now it is just Haru and him and he’s feeling particularly vulnerable; the light shivering across the pool making it seem right to be honest.
“It still doesn’t feel the same as watching you when I swim.”
Haru’s eyes widen. “It shouldn’t.”
“It shouldn’t?”
Haru shakes his head, looking oddly concerned. “You can’t be free if you’re expecting it to feel like something else.”
Rei frowns, the beginnings of a headache starting in his temples. “Are you saying… to be free I have to not try to be free?”
Haru nods sagely, inching in a little closer and shifting so he’s resting his forearms on the ledge. He tilts his head up at Rei. Inexplicably, Rei feels his cheeks warm.
“You can’t try to be anything if you want to be free.”
Rei frowns, juts his bottom lip outwards. “But then I’ll never improve.”
Haru takes a moment, gaze returning to the poolside as he seems to turn his thoughts over in his head. A moment later, he looks back up, peeking at Rei from under his lashes. Rei thinks that on anyone else, he’d call such an action coy.
“You’d calculate when you pole vault.”
Rei nods.
“What would you think when you let go of the pole?”
Rei barely has to measure the words. “Nothing.”
There’s the whisper of a smile curving the line of Haru’s mouth and Rei thinks for as cool, refreshing, calm as he is; Haru is also undeniably warm.
“See?” Haru says.
“It’s different being in the water than it is to be in the air,” Rei says, perhaps only to be petulant; though he’d never admit that.
Haru’s smile grows a hint more pronounced. “Is it?” He looks like he’s in on a secret. “You fall or you sink. Either way you have to fly.”
Rei tips his head back, lets out a strangled sounding groan. “Haruka-senpai, why are you always so certain of such cryptic sentiments?”
“You’re reading too far into it,” Haru hums quietly. And then he pulls away from Rei to push himself down, underwater.
“I just don’t think I can take to it like the rest of you,” mutters Rei.
He doesn’t expect Haru to hear the words, but suddenly he’s breaching the water, arching like the world’s most blasé siren, shaking the strands of soaked inky hair out of his eyes.
“Is something else the matter?” He asks, bringing himself back to Rei in one fluid movement.
“O-of course not, Haruka-senpai!”
“Then come swim.”
Rei groans again. “The water will be better without me,” he laments, probably more dramatically than he really intends to.
Haru just looks amused. “No, it won’t,” he says. So simply that Rei can’t figure out how to rebuff him.
“We do better with you,” Haru adds, and then he quiets, directs his gaze away almost shyly.
“I just want to be the best I can when I swim with you all,” Rei admits. He finds that he wants to look away afterwards as well.
“Then come swim.”
When Rei doesn’t respond, Haru reaches out and taps his index finger to the ball of Rei’s wrist and no, Rei’s brain waves begin to melt. He imagines watching a microwave and feels nothing but pity for himself.
“Do you remember, last year how we all saw something? That brought Rin back to us.”
Rei warms at the memory, at the sight of Haru’s face when he mentions Rin, always equal parts gratitude and familiarity. The expression of one having checked the lost and found every day, of one who searched from the highest vantage point only to recover what they were searching for from the greatest depths.
Rei nods, unable to find the appropriate words.
“This year, you’ll see it too.”
What if I don’t?
“And it’ll be better with you,” Haru says.
Rei looks down to meet Haru’s eyes, quietly imploring. And with a great sigh, he slips into the pool.
When he surfaces, Haru is already there; not even a flicker of victory clouding the earnestness with which he regards Rei.
“Would it help if you had some—” He pauses, slides his arm further up the ledge and pushes closer to Rei in the water, “Assurance?”
Rei cocks his head, feels his nerves flare, heat blooming across his skin, at their proximity. “Assurance?”
Haru makes no move to touch him, but he tilts his face up towards Rei’s, his eyes still open, cautious. When he’s less than a second, a centimetre from contact, he speaks, and Rei feels the words fall against his mouth like a breath. His own lungs seize tighter with the sensation.
“You can say no,” Haru says.
Rei wants to shake his head to say no, I don’t want to say no, but this is too surreal and he can’t bring himself to move lest he slips and becomes part of the pool floor.
“Alright,” he manages, more a squeak than a word.
Haru takes a moment and then, in a touch that feels like a test, he brushes his lips against Rei’s.
Rei is trying not to die in place, trying to figure out what on earth the correlation is between kissing and assurance, kissing, kissing, he’s trying to figure out so many things but then Haru’s lips are smooth and Rei doesn’t know what he was expecting considering, really, he wasn’t expecting anything and there’s so much going on that finally it all just—
stops.
He wants to breathe the word alright into Haru’s mouth. He shifts so that he is closer, so that the angle allows him to press back with the least demanding pressure his weak heart can muster.
If there’s one thing Rei can pride himself on being, it is a fast learner.
A swimmer’s lungs, he thinks, and then he threads his trembling fingers through Haru’s hair and tries to give him a taste of his own assurance.
“I like swimming with you,” Haru says, when they pull away. He’s slightly out of breath, eyes brighter than what Rei is used to, and just like that; he’s moving away, body cutting through the still water like an ocean’s wave.
~
“Assurance,” Kisumi whispers, and then he’s giggling through his fingers, Makoto poking him in the side.
“Look what you started, Rin-chan!” Nagisa says, laughing softly as well.
“To be fair,” Rin says, and now he looks very pointedly at Nagisa. “That’s not the type of assurance I’d intend to give just anyone.”
“Rei isn’t just anyone,” Haru says. “He’s our teammate.”
He frowns, glances over at Rei, who looks surprisingly touched, and the crease between Haru’s brow only deepens. He shakes his head, just barely, and turns so that he’s facing Kisumi and Makoto.
Kisumi thinks Haru has some figuring out to do of his own; gets the feeling that Haru knows this full well.
Rin inclines his head towards Kisumi’s side of the circle. “That leaves the two of you for stories.”
Kisumi grins broadly at Makoto, loves the way the action pulls a small smile from Makoto as well. “Makoto, would you like to tell the story or do you want me to?”
Makoto raises both brows. “Wait, that was your first kiss as well?”
If Kisumi could read the telepathic conversations Makoto and Haru so frequently have, he thinks Haru might be saying something like, hey, so you’re my best friend and I love you and I know that we’re like soul buddies but also how could you do this, I would prefer you were dating a bucket of slime.
Alas, Haru has never been so verbose.
“Well, yeah,” Kisumi says, in response to Makoto’s question. And there’s a certain giddiness he feels for knowing that Makoto, who has shared so much with the people around them, has taken this from Kisumi.
“You tell the story,” Kisumi says, slinging an arm around Makoto’s broad shoulders. He presses his nose to the skin between Makoto’s ear and jaw, falls in love all over again with the way he feels Makoto exhale, airy chuckle rising up to the sky.
~
Makoto is always struck by how well Kisumi fits against sunsets. They’re both fifteen, graduating soon, and the future seems like it’s pausing to present him this moment. Their school shirts are too thin for the breeze but Kisumi pushes a little closer to Makoto, so that there is a line of easy warmth from where their arms are pressed. Makoto wonders how Kisumi constantly seems to know, intuitively, of all the things Makoto wants but cannot quite voice.
“We should make a move soon,” Makoto says, though the thought of going home isn’t particularly appealing when it’s Kisumi’s presence he’ll be leaving.
“Stay a while longer,” Kisumi replies, lazy and appealing. All the things Makoto might also want to be in this instant.
So he settles further back against the solid brick of the wall. Kisumi smiles, languidly, like they’ve just closed a deal, and it’s all too easy for Makoto to mirror the movement.
“Moving to high school will be weird, huh?”
Makoto hasn’t figured it out yet — just why whenever Kisumi asks him something, he feels his heart beat a little faster to chase the answer. Kisumi makes him want to know things, if only so Kisumi will continue to turn questions his way.
Maybe it’s something in the way Kisumi’s voice touches him, eyes drooping so it’s like his focus is settling to something more gentle, confined to Makoto all the same.
“I’d have thought you’d be looking forward to it,” Makoto says.
Kisumi hums, “Oh, I definitely am!” He turns to look Makoto in the eyes. “But you know, there are some things I’ll miss.”
The thing is, and for as much as Haru might think Makoto doesn’t realise, he knows that Kisumi is a charmer. He likes watching Kisumi speak to people for this exact reason, the way he captures them through little more than being genuinely interested in the first place.
Of course it doesn’t help that he’s attractive, what with his easy smile, his shiny hair, violet eyes.
It’s too easy for Makoto to feel like he’s receiving special treatment under that gaze. If he’s being completely honest, he’s not opposed to the idea. But Makoto considers himself fairly perceptive and the fact of the matter is that Kisumi is a people person, thriving off the company of others. Just like Makoto, though not quite. Always with a certain magnetism; where Makoto seeks, Kisumi pulls.
And so when Kisumi says things that seem to hide softer sentiments, or weightier ones, Makoto always finds himself stumbling to figure out just how much he can reach for, whether or not he’s really just dizzy in the stardust haze of Kisumi’s disarming smile. There’s this thing Kisumi does, where people look at him and find what they want to see.
Except when Makoto looks at Kisumi, he finds that he always wants to see more.
“What sort of things?” Makoto asks. He kind of wants to apologise for just how badly he’s hoping for a very specific answer.
Kisumi looks sharper for a moment, almost calculative, before he smiles at Makoto — just barely, not a grin but rather a subtle, feline curve of his mouth. “I’m more interested in what you might miss,” he says.
Makoto bites his lip, can’t help the impression they’re treading a very tenuous line. He’s surprised to find that he kind of enjoys the way it makes his heart tick faster.
He tries to smile, smooth, unhurried; like he’s smiling just for the sake of it. Like Kisumi would.
“It’ll be odd not playing basketball,” he says. With you, rests in the air between them.
Kisumi leans a little closer, tips his shoulder to Makoto’s. “We could always play on weekends.”
“I’d like that,” Makoto says, cheeks warming as he feels a giddy flutter beat its wings against his chest.
“So would I.”
Makoto is caught, suddenly, by the urge to say Kisumi’s name. The hard k falling to give way to the sweet sounding s, an expectant m ready, in wait. He remembers when Kisumi had introduced himself, his name sounding as silky as the sight of his hair. Makoto had wanted to call his name then as well, if only to see if it would roll off his tongue as gracefully. He wishes now that he’d said it more during their three years together.
Better late than never. “Kisumi,” he says, without much of an idea of what comes afterwards. That’s embarrassing, he thinks. But Kisumi has a way of smoothing things over.
“Yes?” he says, in that lilting voice of his.
Makoto has wondered, on occasion, if Kisumi will be popular in high school. At times like now when Makoto is in Kisumi’s presence, it seems ridiculous to even ponder such a question.
Kisumi will attract people wherever he goes.
“Do you think they’ll have a different cheer for you there?” Makoto asks, blushing at the thought of the cheer the girls here have created for him.
“I think it’ll be difficult to replicate this one.” Kisumi laughs good naturedly, tilting towards Makoto as he does.
“Perhaps they’ll go for something a little more simple?”
“Ah, like what?”
Makoto folds his torso down slightly to run his hands from the top of his thighs to his knees, tries not to fidget too much. “Your name just sounds like it’s meant to be cheered.”
“Does it really? How so?”
“It has a nice ring to it.” He’s glad for the golds of the sunset, it helps to pretend the fading light covers Makoto’s blush when he attempts to whisper-cheer, “Ki—su—mi, Ki—su—mi.”
When he looks up, glancing to his side, Kisumi is laughing through his fingers; painted in colours so warm he looks like dawn against the sinking sun.
“Kisumi,” Makoto whines, feeling oddly self conscious at the sound of his pretty laugh.
When Kisumi stops, he looks at Makoto for one contemplative moment. “You know, it really does sound like you’re saying ‘kiss me, Kisumi.’”
Makoto’s breath catches, ears burning like the bullseye of a target. He could’ve been saying that, it would be so easy to go with it.
It’s hard not to think of kissing Kisumi when people are constantly commenting on the pun his name makes.
At least six times a day, really.
And if there’s one thing Makoto has been taught to do well, it is watch. He watches his siblings, he watches his friends, watches the descent and rise of each season so he can better watch whether or not the people in his life are protecting themselves from illness. He watches his classmates, the plants, calendars, every clock he comes across.
He’s been watching Kisumi for three years now. At thirteen he’d seemed so much younger, still round faced, small framed, his hands slightly chubby. But now they’ve raced each other for growth spurts and Kisumi’s long fingers look elegant curled around a basketball, his jaw is sharper where it leads to the line of his neck, hair curling unruly at his nape. The width of his shoulders is the same as Makoto’s, his calves and arms flex when he’s on the court, hints of wiry muscle growing less subtle by the month. And worse still are things like how Kisumi’s voice is deeper where his laugh is still light like spun sugar, eyes the colour of the purple dusk trying to curl its way around the fairy floss pinks and caramels of the sunset. Makoto has always had a sweet tooth; what is he supposed to do when Kisumi’s lips are cherry-red, always faintly glazed...?
He’s a walking valentines day ad, really. Makoto is weak.
And he’s imagined saying Kisumi in the locker room, before parting ways after class, after Saturday victories when Kisumi is panting, sweat rolling down his neck, and Makoto imagines they could drink each other down on an abandoned court. He and Kisumi are always the only two left.
He’s fifteen. This isn’t his fault. Even now, he still finds himself skittering away when those fantasies get more out of hand.
More than anything, he likes the way Kisumi gives him his words, laughs easily at his jokes, keeps the notes they’ve passed in class in the pocket of his binder.
Makoto wishes the thought of kissing Kisumi didn’t make him feel so guilty.
“Hey, Makoto?” Kisumi says now.
Makoto shakes his head, swallows thickly. They’re graduating soon. It’s just hit him that time isn’t stilling to give him this moment, it’s pressing in heavier.
“Would you want to?” He asks, his own voice too loud in his ears.
Kisumi raises both his eyebrows. “Want to what?”
Makoto imagines all the noise in the world rushes forth to die right here. He exhales, slowly, tries his hardest to curve his lips, warm his eyes for Kisumi as he looks at him. If this ends in heartbreak, Makoto can trust to hide himself well enough with benevolence and a smile. He’ll soothe his wounds behind closed doors if need be.
“Kiss me?” He says, short as the catch of his breath, friendship in the balance.
“Yes, what is it?”
Makoto shakes his head, because no, not quite.
Kisumi’s eyes widen when he realises, his mouth parting slightly and Makoto can’t help but worry his lip between his teeth because Kisumi is looking unflinchingly right at him.
“Oh,” Kisumi breathes, like the wind has just been knocked out of him.
“Yeah,” Makoto says, letting his gaze flick down to rest where their thighs are almost touching. “If you want to.”
“Oh.”
Makoto is resolute in keeping his head down.
“Ma—ko—to.”
Each syllable feels like a tap to his spine. Makoto shivers; warily, he looks up.
Kisumi is smiling, sweetly. Maybe even deceptively so considering the way Makoto feels pinned in place, the word dusk, dusk, whispering like a breeze behind his ears. Sure enough, the sky is darkening, lavender to violet to majestic rich blue, all swirling heavy amidst the pink, trailing stars where the colour folds into burnt orange. But it’s not that. It’s Kisumi’s eyes, the way they promise Makoto what he doesn’t know of the night.
His hand comes to cup Makoto’s cheek, the other moving to press against Makoto’s thigh. “Have you done this before?” Kisumi asks.
Makoto shakes his head, heart racing.
Kisumi doesn’t say anything, but Makoto feels his fingers twitch twice against his face. He realises, belatedly, that they are trembling.
Then his eyes flutter closed, lashes casting shadows that disappear as soon as Makoto notices them because his own eyelids are slipping and he can feel Kisumi’s nose bump against his. The fingers at his cheek angle his face upwards; Kisumi’s mouth fits against his own in a way that makes Makoto wonder why they’ve never done this before.
He feels like his bones have been fashioned from air and so he falls, without leverage, into the warmth of Kisumi’s body, lips tentative, pliant and searching all the same. His heartbeat is a flitting thrum as Kisumi’s fingers move, his touch feathered, from Makoto’s face to his chest, like the wisps of pink clouds neither of them are looking at.
They break away, both out of breath, heads full of gossamer, heady smoke. Kisumi pushes further with the loss of contact, as if to compensate, so that he’s a touch away from draping himself over Makoto.
“Thank you,” Makoto says, because it’s all that his mind has room for. He’s brimming with sunset haze, the crisp scent of Kisumi’s cologne.
Kisumi only skims his nose along the length of Makoto’s cheekbone to whisper a hushed laugh against the skin by Makoto’s ear.
Makoto feels liquid, beaming so easily he can barely tell he’s smiling. Kisumi’s hair is softer than it looks. He kisses sweeter than the sound of his voice.
Makoto already wants to try again.
~
“That was sort of uneventful,” Nagisa pouts. It appears Rin has had an aneurysm.
“It’s better that way,” Haru says, looking mildly disturbed.
“Hmm, there truly is some intrigue in young love.” Rei pushes his glasses up and Kisumi almost expects him to procure a notebook and pen.
“Mako-chan, you should’ve given more detail.”
“I thought it was quite a detailed recount.”
Kisumi winks at Nagisa. “If you want details via practical experience, just say the word!”
“Kisumi…” Makoto starts.
“That is the word!”
Rin drags a hand down his face.
“Honestly though, you’ve all indirectly kissed one another save for Makoto and I. We could change this!” Kisumi adds. His lashes fan, heavy-lidded, when he directs his next words to Rin. “You should totally bring Sousuke by as well, it’d be just like old times.”
Rin looks like Kisumi has just suggested he throw himself in a blender. “That was never — Sousuke, you, and I didn’t — we never…” The horror dims enough for Rin to just look mildly despairing. “Why are you like this?”
“Oh well, no, the kissing would be new of course!”
“You have a boyfriend,” Rin hisses. “Makoto aren’t you bothered by this?”
Makoto shrugs. “Kisumi is faithful.”
Kisumi turns to look at him like he’s hung the stars in the sky. They lean against one another in tandem. The others look a mixture of queasy, done, and unfazed.
“I’ve indirectly kissed Rin,” Haru says, eyes set on the distance, lips pursed like someone has just shoved raw bitter gourd in his mouth.
“Oi!”
Haru sighs. “Well, if it can’t be helped.”
“Hey, I would be totally grateful to indirectly kiss myself!”
Haru raises a brow.
Kisumi sighs. He doesn’t understand why this group has to make things so difficult for themselves. “Just kiss each other. I’m telling you, you’d all benefit.”
Makoto bumps his head against Kisumi’s. “I don’t think that’s what we’re really going for,” he says.
Too bad, Kisumi thinks. He’s watching the way Makoto nervously darts his tongue out to wet his lips and he can’t help but feel that it’s exactly what they should be going for.
When he scans the circle, it looks like everyone is at the very least contemplating it. Nagisa is smiling brightly while Rei manages to look terrified and slightly interested at the same time. It’s all in his brows. Haru is only looking at Rei. And Rin — well, Rin is scowling but also nodding to himself. Like he’s processing the idea and hating how he’s not entirely opposed to it.
Kisumi’s had tougher crowds to work with in the past. This shouldn’t be too difficult at all.
He drags out a sigh, like a tired movie heroine, and tries to lighten all traces of pressure from his voice. “Well, I guess that’s too bad. Moving on, it’s another dare round!”
“How come you get to pick every time?” Haru asks, eyeing Kisumi distrustfully.
“Remember, I won pin the flipper on the dolphin?” Kisumi passes his fingers over Makoto’s forearm. “So I get to run this,” he adds, complete with a beatific smile directed back at Haru.
Haru doesn’t say anything but he leans back, huffs quietly. Tiny victories are victories all the same and Kisumi is not particularly fussy. He lets his gaze sweep over everyone now.
“I dare you all to….”
It’s worth pausing for the power of having five gazes held warily on him. He almost laughs, just to drag this out further.
“I dare you to kiss each other!”
There seems to be a collective exhale among the group and then Rin is rolling his eyes, Nagisa laughing lightly.
“Ah… that would just be Spin the Bottle, Kisumi-senpai. Perhaps a more appropriate dare is needed?”
Kisumi grins at Rei. “Oh, no! That won’t be necessary.”
Rei furrows his brows and opens his mouth to speak but Kisumi is fast, cutting him off before he even gets the chance.
“I guess we’re playing Spin the Bottle!” Sure enough, from behind him, Kisumi whips out an empty bottle of ramune.
And because he can’t resist, he throws a wink Haru’s way. “It wasn’t very hydrating.”
Faintly, Haru shudders.
Kisumi takes everyone’s shocked silence as assent. Slowly, he moves to set the bottle down, revelling in the way Rei’s throat moves as he gulps, the slow parting of Rin’s mouth, slight widening of Haru’s eyes, Nagisa’s determined smile, Makoto’s hand tightening around his own.
The bottle clinks against the floor, sits unavoidable like a beacon between everyone. Kisumi smiles delicately. This is their dice.