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Haruka wasn’t quite sure what he was expecting when he began staying with Nanaha and Jin, but it wasn’t quite...this.
They had enveloped him into their family at an almost startling speed, and it was as though Haruka had always been there with the both of them. He frequently helped Nanaha with the cooking, and he was often sent out to the roof by Jin to help with feeding the chickens (though thankfully he didn’t expect Haruka to be around when he killed one of them for dinner, which he greatly appreciated.) It was incredibly strange, but Haruka couldn’t deny that he enjoyed it. After the initial anxiety, he actually felt himself feeling happier when he was with the both of them.
It was amazing how different a place could feel just because of the people. While he missed seeing Mizuki regularly, he couldn’t deny that the house that he had been in before, it wasn’t a happy aquarium like he had first thought. No, it was most definitely more of a cage than anything. Despite it being so large and airy, letting in as much light in as possible through large glass windows, it had been incredibly lonely. He knew their mother was trying her best to stop even Mizuki from visiting him regularly. When he went back there, even if it had been for such a short amount of time, had felt almost suffocating.
Jin and Nanaha’s home in comparison, was absolutely tiny. They had far less windows, and the ones they did have almost always had the blinds down or were covered with thick curtains. Everything was constantly casted in shadow, lit up only by lamps or some of Nanaha’s favorite scented candles scattered about the house, so the air hung heavy with perfumey smells and that day’s meal. Haruka was fairly sure he never saw it completely clean either. Oh, they certainly did clean, every single day. But there was simply not enough room to keep everything neatly and orderly put away that things just scattered naturally. And yet, this was the warmest most welcoming place he had ever stepped foot in.
He still sometimes felt a bit out of place though. Even now, none of the clothes he was wearing were his own. He had to leave home quickly, leaving not only Mizuki behind, but most of his clothing. He (embarrassingly) was wearing a pair of Nanaha’s jeans, an oversized t-shirt and a pair of socks from Jin, and one of Nanaha’s many shawls. (It was mostly green, but with red accents. He remembered Nanaha mildly commenting that it looked very nice on him.) He was also alone in the small apartment, and no matter how many times both of them had already insisted that he’s free to do whatever, he still just stayed in the same spot by the table. (‘his spot’ though he hesitated to call it that, despite it genuinely being the same place he sat at to eat every day)
Nanaha and Jin had both gone out to get them lunch at the nearby convenience store, both of them claiming that there wasn’t any food in the house. That was a bit of a lie though, as Haruka and Nanaha had just gone shopping the other day. He couldn’t help but suspect that there could be an ulterior motive to all this, but he wasn’t able to dwell on it for long as the door was unceremoniously kicked opening by Jin, who had his normal smug grin plastered across his face as he lifted up two plastic bags.
“Oden! Courtesy of the 7-Eleven down the road!” He set them down in front of Haruka, and behind him Nanaha appeared with her own bag and a new case of beer.
“We weren’t sure what you liked in it, so we got a bit of everything.” She set down the plastic bowl in front of him along with a bottle of milk tea.
Haruka watched the two of them intently as they dug into their food (noticing that Nanaha, like his own bowl, had a variety in her oden. Jin on the other hand, seemed to mostly have hardboiled eggs and noodles in his.)
“Aren’t you gonna eat? Don’t want you going postal on us, do you?” Jin teased, waving his chopsticks at Haruka.
He tensed at the words, trying to keep images of him losing control out of his head. He started eating, keeping his head down as much as he could.
“Haruka…” He heard Nanaha say. He looked up at her. “Your birthday is today, isn’t it?”
“E-eh?” His eyes widened. “How did you--”
Nanaha held up his wallet. “You left this in one of my pants pockets. I nearly washed it.”
“O-oh…” He looked down again.
“Well? Why the kicked puppy look?” Jin pushed him on the shoulder. “What do you want to do today then?”
“Huh?” He looked in between the both of them. “What do I...want to do?”
“For your birthday.” Nanaha elaborated.
Haruka went quiet. There it was, something else he wasn’t really used to. Sure, he got special things for his birthday from his mother and of course from Mizuki. But he usually wasn’t taken out somewhere. He had no clue what he even wanted to do...Wait. He remembered something. He stood up suddenly and walked over the tiny dresser that Nanaha had allowed him to claim and picked up a flyer that he had gotten over a week ago and walked back to the table, setting it down next to their bowls.
“The new aquarium?” Nanaha picked up the flyer and looked at it.
“It just opened last week.”
“Well, that settles it. Finish eating and we’ll head over there.” Jin grabbed one of his boiled eggs and popped it into his mouth. Whole. (though really, that shouldn’t surprise Haruka much anymore, as he did it practically every day.)
The trio quickly finished their lunch and bundled up, Nanaha nearly dragging Haruka back to wrap another shawl around him, bluntly stating that it was probably going to get chillier when they were out. Haruka gave her a small smile as they went out the door together. They probably were quite a picture, a strange ragtag family walking down the street together.
The aquarium was luckily not as crowded as it had been the week he had passed by it, so when they walked in, there were only a few couples here and there and some school groups walking around. Haruka couldn’t even stop the corners of his lips turning upwards as he looked around at the large tanks of fish swimming around. They were a sharp contrast to the tiny aquarium he had had in his room. They were so big that he couldn’t even see the back of it, it just faded away into dark blue. He was in awe about the whole thing, not even paying attention to where Jin and Nanaha were as he made his way deeper into the aquarium.
In reality, Jin made sure to follow behind him, though hanging back away from the tanks rather than as up close as Haruka was. (He was fairly certain the younger man had his cheeks pressed up against the glass at some points.) Nanaha had wandered off to observe a cylindrical tank filled with jellyfish with surprising interest, but Jin had never been too fond of fish unless it was for eating, and even then he’d still probably place eating chicken above it. But he had to admit, it was kinda funny watching Haruka get really into watching fish. Nanaha appeared next to him, now holding a rather cartoony looking green stuffed jellyfish.
“Isn’t it sweet?” He asked, pointing Haruka, who had almost overenthusiastically shoved his hand into one of the petting tanks and splashed water all over his shirt. “I almost feel like a proud father.”
“We might as well enjoy this while we can. I feel like you and Haruka will be getting busier as time goes on.” Nanaha walked away from him and towards Haruka, and he watched Nanaha hand him the stuffed jellyfish as Haruka no doubt explained something about the mantaray that he had just been touching.
After leaving the aquarium, they stopped by a ramen place to eat and at Nanaha’s insistence had stopped at a thrift shop for a while and had gotten more shawls and some proper clothes for Haruka. By the time they left the sun was already starting to set and it was getting colder by the minute. Besides now having three shawls wrapped around him and clinging onto the stuffed jellyfish for dear life, Haruka was still shivering by the time they got back to the apartment. Unfortunately, walking in didn’t do much to help the situation. He could hear Jin grumbling about the cold as they settled in.
“Goddammit.” Haruka watched Jin throw his head back in frustration. “The heater’s busted.” He kicked the space heater that was in the corner in the room. “Looks like we’re huddling for warmth tonight.
“...Huh?” Haruka watched as Jin moved the table to the side and Nanaha began grabbing piles of blankets.
Jin shoved a couple of blankets and pillows into Haruka’s arms and grinned. “Welcome to the cuddle puddle. Now help us spread these out.”
There was no wonder about comfort or not even without the futon, because it seemed like they owned enough blankets to create a futon and then some. But Haruka could still only stand awkwardly to the side as Nanaha and Jin began settling into the new makeshift bed for the night. It wasn’t until Jin patted the spot next to him and said ‘Come on, honored guest gets to stay in the middle where it’s the warmest.’ and even then it was a surreal experience. He could feel body warmth radiating from either side of him. Both of them had fallen asleep almost immediately, leaving Haruka stuck in between them and lost in his own thoughts. But he had to admit...this was nice. A bit weird still, but nice. He had always been incredibly alone in that big empty house. Being in such close quarters with people was oddly comforting. Even if Nanaha’s incredibly cold feet kept finding Haruka’s thighs and Jin was drooling a bit on his shoulder. At least he knew he wasn’t alone.
And maybe that was good enough, at least for now. That was enough to ease his mind, and he could feeling drowsiness finally washing over him. Haruka settled back and closed his eyes, letting the sounds of breathing coming from his newfound family lull him to sleep.