"Hi!"

Haru glances up warily. There's a boy staring down at him with gentle green eyes and wispy brown hair. He's got a big smile on his face. It's expectant, like he's waiting for Haru to reply.

He doesn't.

Rather he gives a curt nod before he returns to his lunch. The boy doesn't leave though. Instead, he takes a seat on the bench Haru's currently occupying and begins to unwrap his own lunch box.

Haru tries not to be too obvious when he glances at the other boy out of the corner of his eyes. He doesn't like to admit it, but he's a bit curious. It's been two weeks since kindergarten started and there haven't been many kids willing to approach him. He supposes some of it his fault, but it's too much work to try to relate to the other children anyway.

"I'm Makoto! You're Haruka, right?"

Makoto seems to take the silence as answer enough as the five-year old babbles on incessantly then, talking about his mom and dad and what games he really likes to play and how nice everyone is in the class. Haru mostly ignores him, as he does with the others, but he becomes increasingly agitated as the time passes. Why hasn't Makoto left yet? They always leave when they realize Haru can't be bothered.

Silence suddenly reigns and Haru blinks back in awareness. Makoto is looking at him, the smile still as wide as before, and Haru realizes he must have been talked to directly in the few moments he had spaced out.

"What?" He deadpans. Despite how rude it comes across, Makoto simply laughs.

"I asked, does Haruka like the ocean? Just because all of your notebooks have really cool pictures of dolphins and stuff! And I saw your drawing yesterday, about things that we like to do! Yours was about swimming, right? I like swimming too!"

There's a lot happening and Haru's young mind struggles to keep up with Makoto's fast paced questioning and he realizes with a jolt then that he's actually trying to keep up with the other boy's words and not simply shrugging them off the way he usually does with talkative kids. It's not unsettling really, but it still leaves Haru a bit confused.

"Yeah."

It's not an adequate response, but, truly, Makoto only had two questions woven into that narrative he spun, both of which had the same answer, so it wouldn't make much sense to supply anything else.

Makoto, strangely, understands this.

"That's really cool! Maybe we can go swimming together one day!"

Haru pauses in eating to finally study this strange person. Makoto seems completely sincere though. With those green eyes shining so brightly and the smile that stretches from ear-to-ear, it'd be hard to not be roped into friendship with Makoto.

Haru's not though. Really.

It's just that he wants Makoto to stop badgering him is all.

It has nothing to do with the fluttery feeling he gets in his tummy when he sees the other boy light up at his muttered affirmative.

Makoto sits with him at lunch the next day and the day after that and before Haru knows it, a month has gone by like this.

He has grown used to Makoto's presence at his side at almost all times. Whether it is nap time or story time or art time, the other boy is always there. Sometimes he's got a lot to talk about, even if most of it is mindless babbling, and sometimes he's content to just sit in the quiet with Haru.

Haru realizes that Makoto is his first ever friend when he starts to actively search out for the other boy at the beginning of the school day.

He's a bit flustered with his revelation. He doesn't know how to handle people very well, much less friends. They always seem to assume Haru is cold or uninterested, which isn't always the case. He just has a harder time conveying his feelings and he doesn't want to constantly speak about unimportant things.

Strangely though, he finds he wants to make the effort with Makoto, if that's what it's going to take. He doesn't want to lose that happy presence at his side, but he doesn't know how to go about keeping him near either.

Still, he does what he can over the next few days. He puts forth a little more effort when he and Makoto speak, tries to seem more interested than he ever has before. Makoto looks really confused at first, but he doesn't say anything about it. He does smile a bit brighter though.

Haru still doesn't feel like that's enough. He just didn't know what else he could do. Makoto was a sentimental kid, that much was for sure, so he supposed it wouldn't have to be anything big. Just talking back every once in a while was enough to get him bouncing in his seat, after all.

It's as he's poring over his favorite coloring book that Haru realizes exactly what he can do for brown-haired boy who never seems to leave his side.

When lunch comes about the next day, things go about the same as they usually do. Makoto begins to talk about a new book his mom read to him the night before and about how excited he is for the summer to come around. Haru supplies very little to the conversation.

He's too embarrassed to do much else.

When the teacher calls for them to finish up, Makoto begins packing up his lunch and Haru understands it's now or never.

Makoto has just turned to head back inside when Haru calls out to him. When he looks back, Haru has his eyes glued to the ground and he's holding something out to Makoto.

"Eh? Haruka?"

"Here. It's yours."

The sticker is of an Orca and has a shiny green material all around it. Makoto recognizes it as one from the coloring book Haru always has with him about the sea. It's his favorite one and for Haru to give him a sticker from it had to mean he really wanted Makoto to have it. It's enough to make the brunette smile so wide it hurts. His eyes shine with tears, always the emotional one, and he holds the sticker close to his chest.

"Thank you! I promise I'll treasure it forever!"

Haru's face reddens at the display of emotion from the dramatic five-year old and he looks away.

"It's not that big of a deal. Don't go crying."

Makoto laughs, rubbing at his eyes. He understood what Haru was trying to say and that's all that counts, even if Haru won't admit to the relief that he feels.

"Of course it is! Haruka is my very special friend, after all!"

Haru's face flushes even further.

"Shut up. We're going to be late." He snaps, walking quickly ahead of the other boy to the door of the kindergarten classroom.

Makoto can't help the grin that is plastered on his face for the rest of the day. He doesn't let go of the sticker either, except to grab hold of Haru's hand at the end of the school day so he can introduce him to his parents.

This is so embarrassing. I waged a war with myself on whether or not to post it at all because Free! has such amazing writers in their fandom and they have such a good grasp on the characters. I've watched the show three times now and I still can't figure any of them out, sIGh.

I figured I'd go for it anyway though. It's kind of confusing, I'm sure, but I wrote it at three in the morning so that's part of the reason. It's also a product of desperately craving MakoHaru fluff, but having very little inspiration seeing as how my days have been spent not doing school work and playing in snow.

So I apologize for this, I really do. Thank you for reading it at all and I hope it wasn't too weird and now excuse me as I go hide away under my covers.

Also any grammatical mistakes are completely my fault, but I tried to pick out all that I could.

xo