Title: Parent Life
(Fic Series): A Life Worth Living
Fandom: Free!
Pairings: Sousuke/Rin
Rating: T
Word Count: ~29k over all
Warnings: N/A
Summary: Post-Free! Eternal Summer Fic

A series of chronological glimpses into Sousuke and Rin's lives as parents.


Chapter 9: Japanese Lessons (Age 12)

"And then we had to talk about what we wanted to be when we grow up," she finished. Hana was sitting at the coffee table in the living room writing in her Japanese workbook. Sousuke was fast asleep on the couch, taking the entire space. Rin sat down next to her on the floor, sitting his drink down on a makeshift coaster he made out of a paper towel.

"You could have waited until I came back," he whispered. "What if you woke up Dad?"

Hana looked up at him with the dullest look he had ever seen and he bit down a grin, it was the same face Sousuke would give him when he had thought Rin had said something stupid. She went back to her workbook, flipping the page and starting on the next one.

"Anyways," she said, causing Rin to snicker, "I told them I want to be a teacher when I grow up."

"Oh yeah?" Rin hummed, folding his arms on top of the coffee table, leaning forward to see her progress. "What kind of teacher?"

"A Japanese teacher," Hana answered and Rin looked up at her in shock. "I was teaching my friends today how to introduce themselves too."

"Really now," Rin said, mostly to himself. Hana finished the page and flipped back to the other, pushing it towards Rin for him to correct. She handed him out her special purple gel pen to make corrections with. He took it from her and started reading her work. He was surprised to see no mistakes on the first page, and only two mistakes on the second, forgetting her grammar. He circled the spots and gave her back the book.

"Well you certainly could be one," he laughed. "Do you see what you did wrong or do you want me to explain it to you?"

"Hold on," Hana said, putting up a hand as she reread what she wrote. She wrote under it and handed it back and he grinned to see she fixed the order.

"Looks good," he complimented her. She grinned and put her workbook away. Pulling out a journal she was keeping. Rin's eyes widened when he saw it was filled with Japanese characters instead of English. Everything was pretty basic, talking about what she did at school and what she saw. He looked back up at her and smiled.

"Can we go shopping for kids books?" Hana hummed as she wrote. Her script was still slow and a bit staggered, but Rin could still easily read it which was what really counted. "And maybe speak more Japanese at home?"

Hana looked up at him with hopeful eyes and Rin's heart swelled. He was sure that if Sousuke was awake he'd be so happy to hear it. Even after using English all of these years, Japanese came more naturally to him.

It wasn't until Hana moved in that they stopped using Japanese all together at home. It was only when they were in their room or talking about something particularly difficult that they would slip back into it. It was all Sousuke's idea, because he didn't want Hana to feel left out since she didn't understand it. Still, he knew that Sousuke felt better using his native tongue, and he'd be over joyed at hearing Hana's enthusiasm in truly learning it.

"Yeah," he chuckled. "We can definitely do that."