Free! doesn't belong to me. Neither does High Speed!

Prompt: "Prepare to be amazed."

Connected seas

.

Being unable to see had Haruka on edge.

He felt oddly vulnerable, afraid of falling with each step, not knowing where his foot would land. A salty smell told him the sea was close, but the wind hit him from both sides, lifting his jacket, dishevelling his hair. A clammy, trembling hand held onto his, pulling and squeezing and betraying its owner's uncertainty.

Haruka tripped over with what he took for a rock protruding from the ground, but Rin's other hand was on his shoulder before he fell, steadying him.

"Sorry," he muttered. "I'll warn you the next time."

Haruka lifted his hand to the blindfold (a handkerchief with cherry blossoms painted on it that apparently belonged to Rin's little sister), resisting the urge to tear it off. He wasn't even sure why he had agreed to do what Rin had asked him to. He didn't have to, but he knew Rin would leave the next day and he hadn't had the heart to refuse.

No, he corrected himself. I want to spend more time with him.

It was stupid. He was angry with Rin, he was upset by the way that annoying boy had come to his life and turned it upside down and now was going to be abroad for a long time, as if he were entirely innocent.

"Lift your right leg a bit more," Rin instructed. Haruka did as he was told, sensing the rock moulding into the sole of his foot. Then he felt Rin's hand on his shoulder again, silently asking him to stop walking. "We're here."

"Where?" Haruka asked, lifting his free hand to the pink handkerchief again. Rin grabbed his wrist and he huffed. "Now what?" He had things to do. His mother was spending the whole day home and he wanted to be with her before her work took her away from him again.

(He hadn't thought about that when Rin had approached him when the others were leaving, an excited grin on his lips, though.)

"I know you're going to miss me a lot," Rin started.

"I'm not going to–"

"–so I have an idea to solve that. Are you ready?" Haruka shrugged. "But ready-ready? Sure?" Rin let go of his hand, and suddenly Haruka felt very cold. He knew Rin was there, though, if only because he could hear his friend trying to untie the handkerchief. It took him some seconds before he managed to undo the knot. "Look!"

Haruka recognised the place almost instantly. Rin had taken him to a cliff, where he could see the waves crashing into the rocks and smell the salt the foam left in its wake. He looked further, further away, where the sea darkened before melting with the sky.

He turned around and looked at Rin.

"I've already been here," he stated. "Many times."

Pink spread across Rin's cheeks.

"Well, not with me," he defended himself. "But what I meant was," he breathed in the cool air and pointed at the horizon, "I'll be on the other side."

Haruka frowned. Not at the ridiculousness of Rin's words, but at the warmth he felt after registering them.

"But Australia isn't even in that direction." It was true. He had looked it up.

Rin groaned. "Why are you like this? Well, mind you, this isn't a closed sea. Which means it's connected to the sea in Australia. Which means I'll be right there." As he talked, his face went redder and redder, but he didn't stop. Rin, Haruka had come to realise, never stopped when he wanted something. Not even when that something was embarrassing.

He bit down his laughter, but couldn't help neither his smile nor his blush.

"I'll see you from here, then."