Chapter 13.5

All That Glitters Is Just Goldfish

Seijuurou's pencil tapped against Makoto's open textbook, golden eyes watching Makoto's face change as he struggled with the English text in front of him. It was a perfect day to study outside and with Seijuurou's suggestion to help Makoto a bit with his homework, the brunette agreed and found themselves sitting in the grass, the sun and cool breeze being the perfect aid to the two swimmers. He didn't mind helping Makoto with a struggling subject, it just took more patience and it made him happy that he could help his boyfriend better himself at bettering himself at something that he's doubtful of getting right. Sometimes the redhead was the brunette's confidence, and even though Seijuurou would just deny it because Makoto was already full of confidence and more, it made his heart swell that he truly was that important to Makoto.

"Now this," Seijuurou leaned forward slightly, pointing to the next sentence. "It is a nice day and the sky is blue."

"I-It is a-" Makoto paused, trying to grasp the sounds and syllables. "...n...nice day..."

"And?"

"And the sky...is b-blue."

The redhead smiled, kissing the side of Makoto's head. "That was close to fluent, sweetheart. Just a bit more practice and you'll be talking perfect English in no time. And then you could be better than Rin."

"I hope so...and better than Rin? That's setting the bar pretty high." Makoto sighed, removing the book from his lap and set it next to him. "I'll be right back, okay?"

With a groan Makoto stood up, stretching slightly and disappearing into his home. Seijuurou grabbed the textbook from the grass, flipping through it to find another easy section to help Makoto with next, but instead his eyes got caught on a small shrine-like area and raised an eyebrow at such an odd thing to have in a backyard, and why he's never noticed it until now.

He heard the door slide open again, turning his head in hopes that Makoto had come back but instead was Mrs. Tachibana holding a tray with drinks and snacks on it.

"Makoto's helping Ren and Ran with something, he said that he would try to be out again as soon as he could." Asako smiled at the redhead, setting the tray on the ground next to Seijuurou. "He asked me to take these out for him because he thought that you were getting thirsty."

"Um, Asako?" Seijuurou asked and nodded his head towards what he was looking at. "What...exactly is that, over there?"

"Oh, Makoto didn't tell you?" The blank look on Seijuurou's face was a good enough answer for Mrs. Tachibana. "It's a grave, for his old goldfish."

"Goldfish...?" Makoto had mentioned goldfish once before, but nothing overly specific like the small grave in his backyard. "But why?"

She crouched down, resting on her knees and turned to Seijuurou. "Well...I know it would be better to hear it from Makoto himself, but if he hadn't said anything yet..." Asako tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "It was when Makoto was little, and there was this kind fisherman..."

Golden eyes stared up at the ceiling, recalling what Makoto's mother had told him earlier. His heart ached, imagining how scared, how sad Makoto must have been, and especially for it to happen when he was young.

"Why didn't Makoto tell me any of that...?" He frowned. "Could he be embarrassed about it or something? Of course Haruka would know...and maybe Nagisa and that blue-haired kid...what about Rin?" Makoto had told Seijuurou about Rin in the past, how they were all friends and what had happened with him and Haruka racing, all the history behind that, and then up until the present time when they had finally gotten along again.

"But why didn't they just talk about it?" Seijuurou raised an eyebrow in confusion. "Instead he just made himself seem like a huge jerk."

Makoto only smiled, playing with the hem of the shirt he was wearing. "I don't understand it either, but that's how those two have always been around each other. But what matters is that everything is resolved now, and we're all friends again."

"You know, I don't think I'll ever understand Matsuoka." With a sigh he ran a hand through his hair. "All I know is that he needs to stop scowling all the time with those scary teeth showing."

The redhead rubbed at his face, groaning and trying to think of anything else other than a sad, young Makoto in his mind. He remembered that his mother had told him that if something was stuck thinking about something the best way would be to talk about it until he was satisfied and could easily go on and think about something else. Seijuurou found his phone that was temporarily lost in his blanket, opening it to send a quick message to Rin and sighed.

Come over for a sec? Gotta talk about something.

He waited for almost exactly three minutes before there was a knock at his door, and Seijuurou got up from his bed, opening the door to see Rin standing with his arms crossed, hair a mess as if he was already in bed. The captain let him in, closing the door once he was in the room and Rin seated himself in Seijuurou's desk chair, Seijuurou retreating back to his bed.

"Well? What is it?"

Seijuurou sighed, resting his elbow against his knee and put his head against his hand. "You...knew about the goldfish thing, right? With the fisherman, and when he died, all of that?"

"This is what you wanted to talk about?" Rin sounded slightly annoyed. "Makoto and fish?"

"Makoto's mom was the one to tell me about it."

Rin's face softened, unfolding his arms to rest his hands in his lap. "Oh."

"Oh is right. Why didn't he tell me himself?"

"I don't know, Makoto's...weird sometimes. Even now. Maybe because he knew that he would have to tell you about the water thing-"

"...What water thing?"

"He seriously didn't tell you that, either?" Rin scoffed.

Seijuurou was starting to get confused. "No, seriously, what water thing?"

"Well it has to do with the fisherman thing." Rin sighed. "I mean, Makoto didn't tell me at first either, because it was when we were starting to become friends again, but after that apparently it like...messed with his head or something."

"How?" Seijuurou leaned forward. "Like...what, he didn't get like a phobia or something, did he?"

"Scared of the ocean, yeah. That's exactly what happened." Rin simply shrugged. "But the kid still swam even with that hanging over his head."

"Why wouldn't he tell me that either?" Seijuurou fell back on his bed, legs dangling off from the edge. "Eugh, Makoto, I swear..."

"But you love him, so shut up." Rin rolled his eyes. "But I was really surprised y'know, because they showed up to train too on that island and my first thought was if Makoto was really okay with it. And I thought that it was weird that they opted to sleep on the beach and when I saw that they were sleeping on the shore in their swimsuits when I was jogging in the morning..."

"Why don't I know anything about this?" Seijuurou whined. "I think it's important, don't you? And I'm his boyfriend and all-"

"And then I had to find out weeks later, after we all made nice, that he almost fucking drowned trying to save that Ryugazaki kid from drowning because he thought that it would be so smart to go out at night by himself with no one knowing-"

"Wait." Seijuurou sat back up, staring at Rin with wide eyes, paling. "What?"

Rin sighed again. "Should I just stop and let Makoto tell you all of this himself? I feel like I should stop because this is a touchy subject."

"Maybe." Seijuurou just shrugged. "I...don't know?"

With a groan Rin got up from Seijuurou's chair, resting a hand on his captain's shoulder. "Well you'll be seeing him in a few days for joint practice. Ask him then? Could be better in person. Would love to stay and chat some more about things your boyfriend hasn't told you, but it's getting late and I was going to sleep until someone woke me up."

Seijuurou looked down at his phone and heard Rin close the door behind him, biting the inside of his cheek. He hesitated, reaching out and wanting to call Makoto, but instead left it alone and layed back down in bed with a heavy sigh.

"After practice it is."

"Oi! I know you can dive better than that!" Seijuurou clicked the stopwatch around his neck, groaning when he saw the time that his teammate had gotten. "You feeling okay? Because I know for sure that you can cut this time in half easily."

"Sorry, captain!"

"Just make sure you definitely improve your time, alright? Next up!"

The redhead sighed as the next swimmer stepped onto the block. He didn't hate doing time trials, it was just that it took up quite a bit of time to get through all of his swimmers and make sure that they're doing their absolute best. Seijuurou understood that sometimes they had bad days, like the last member did, but with a small competition an arm-reach away, he needed to make sure that everyone was in top-condition.

He blew the whistle and started the stopwatch as the swimmer dove into the water, watching closely as he stroked through the water and turned once he got to the end of the pool. Stopping the time once his head breached the water, Seijuurou gave an approving nod and looked to the group that still needed to be timed. Golden eyes found the Iwatobi team just mere lanes away, listening as Gou was finishing up rallying off numbers and schematics. Gold found green and the other captain smiled at him, giving a slight wave before his attention going back to the younger Matsuoka.

Seijuurou sighed, feeling the weight of asking Makoto about the goldfish, and what had happened during the training camp coming from the back of his mind. When he had arrived with his team Seijuurou had asked if Makoto could stay after for a little while, not mentioning exactly what he wanted to talk about and Makoto happily agreed with a smile and kiss, saying that it was fine as long as he wouldn't be late to catch the last train home.

Oh hey Mako, thanks for telling me about your large bodies of water fear, nice.

Does that mean we can't go to the beach together? Or is it fine now?

Why didn't you tell me sooner? You swim almost every day, and with Nanase around it's like you're always around water. Why?

I'm your boyfriend, Makoto. I should know these things.

You're important to me, what if I didn't know and you had a nightmare or...worse, if you were to almost drown again?

Snapping out of his thoughts he shook his head, he blew the whistle signaling for the next member to come on up and be timed, and once again for him to dive. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the Iwatobi team getting ready to start timing on their own and a tall, familiar brunette walking towards him. Seijuurou smiled, the whistle loosely hanging from his mouth and raising his arm to greet his boyfriend, but his smile slowly fell when he saw Makoto stumble and with a yelp he fell into the pool, everything moving almost as if it was playing in slow motion from the moment Makoto slipped to when he hit the water. Seijuurou's eyes widened, ripping the stopwatch from his neck and raced to dive into the water, heart racing as he scrambled to pull Makoto to the surface.

Sputtering and trying to breathe normally, Seijuurou put his hands on Makoto's cheeks, staring into dilated green eyes and swallowed the lump in his throat. He only tried to ignore how tight his chest felt and the tears stinging the corners of his eyes as he watched Makoto's chest heave and his body shake.

Please, PLEASE be okay...

"Makoto are you okay? Are you hurt?" He pulled Makoto to the edge of the pool to the shallow end, so that they could stand. "Can you breathe? Do I need to take you to the infirmary-"

"I-I'm fine, really, I just fell is all-" Makoto coughed, giving Seijuurou a reassuring smile but his face twisted in pain once he applied pressure to his leg.

"Makoto!" Seijuurou looked at Nitori, eyes wide and frantic. "Help me out here, Ai!"

"R-right!"

Nitori sped on over, outstretching his arms to help Makoto get out of the pool carefully. Once they had him so that he was sitting on the edge, Seijuurou pulled himself out, crouching down to sling Makoto's arm over his shoulder so that he would be the one supporting most of his weight off of his injured leg.

"I expect for the rest of you to be timed by the time I get back." He nodded towards the small silver-haired boy.

Seijuurou watched as the nurse checked and bandaged Makoto's leg, confirming that nothing was broken (but could have easily have had more damage leading to a fracture), the brunette had just slammed it against the edge of the pool and that he would be fine within a few days as long as he didn't get back in the pool until he was checked again and he was confirmed to be alright. Once she had left Seijuurou alone with Makoto to make the incident report (and to come back to have both boys sign it, with Makoto being the one injured and Seijuurou being the captain and the one who acted on it), the redhead placed a hand on the bandaged leg, trying to not apply heavy pressure.

"Hey..." He started, staring into half-lidded green eyes. "That painkiller kicking in?"

Makoto nodded, leaning his head against Seijuurou's shoulder. "Thanks...I guess I'm more clumsy than I thought, huh? Sorry for ruining practice."

"It was just an accident, it's fine. Everything's fine, really. I'm just...really relieved that you're okay."

The brunette just hummed, staring at his bandaged lower leg.

"I know we agreed to talk after practice, but I guess it came a bit sooner, huh? And this is probably not the best time to mention it because you're hurt and look like you can fall asleep at any moment, but..." Seijuurou wrapped his arm around Makoto's waist and sighed. "...Your mom told me about your goldfish and the fisherman because I asked about the little grave in your yard, and Rin told me about what happened during the training camp to confirm it all." He felt Makoto stiffen against him, and the redhead sighed. "To be honest I was a bit irritated that you didn't tell me something important like that, but it's okay."

Makoto was silent for a moment before speaking.

"...You don't think it's stupid, do you?"

The Samezuka captain was almost stunned that Makoto would say something like that. "Makoto, no, why would I think that it's stupid?"

He only shrugged against Seijuurou. "It's just been with me this long and to tell someone who...I really like, who is brave all the time to be dating someone who is sentimental about goldfish and is afraid of the ocean and then is also scared of well, scary stuff, really...I don't know..."

"Makoto Tachibana." Seijuurou rested his chin on Makoto's shoulder, pulling him close. "It's not stupid at all, and who says that I'm brave all the time?"

"It's just that, you're so confident most of the time-"

"Mako." Seijuurou smiled and kissed Makoto's skin, tasting chlorine. "I swear, what am I ever going to do with you?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Remember when we watched scary movies at Haruka's house? I don't know if you were trying to block out the entire conversation, but we all started talking about what was scarier, and as soon as Haruka mentioned something about ghosts and thought that for a week his house was haunted I wanted to get out of there was fast as I could."

"...Are you serious? Ghosts?"

Seijuurou nodded, feeling his cheeks heat up. "And...of course, there's one other thing I'm afraid of, too."

Makoto tilted his head so he was looking down at Seijuurou, eyebrow raised. "What?"

"I'm afraid of losing you. As soon as you fell into the pool, I didn't know what to do other than jumping right in to make sure that you were okay, because of the chance that I might lose you."

The Iwatobi opened his mouth to say something, heart beating rapidly against his chest but the nurse had come back in the room with a clipboard and smiled at the two swimmers. He felt Seijuurou squeeze him again, but letting an arm loose so he could grab the clipboard with a nod.

"Nanase, make sure he gets home safe, alright?"

Haruka nodded, adjusting the strap of his backpack and his grip on his and Makoto's swim bags. Seijuurou turned back to Makoto, brushing his bangs from his face and sighed.

"I'll call you when I get back home." Makoto smiled, easing into Seijuurou's hand. "Please don't worry too much, I'm in good hands from here on out."

"Alright, I trust you two..." Seijuurou leaned forward, pressing their lips together. "I'll check your leg at the next joint practice to make sure that it's healed properly."

"Looking forward to it." Makoto hesitated pulling away, biting his lip. "...Sei?"

"Yeah?"

Makoto wrapped his arms around Seijuurou, hugging him and buried his face into his shoulder.

"I'm afraid of losing you, too."

Author's note: so this little thing is for the lovely Pandaphil who suggested the original idea of Seijuurou learning about the goldfish thing, the best Panda pretty much around! I hope that this is to your liking and that writing this at one in the morning was actually a good idea, ahah! ^^;