Chapter 2: Forget It
Disclaimer: I do not own Free! Iwatobi Swim Club
"I'm…WHAT!?" Gou shouts.
"Gou are you okay!?" calls Makoto from the outside.
"I'm fine just… reading a text from Chigusa! Continue swimming!" Gou answers. After a moment of silence, Makoto gives her an okay and leaves.
"What the hell are you talking about Bo?!"
"I knew it! When you grabbed my shoulder, I felt electricity going through me! It means that you and I are connected! Things are a changing!"
"Don't avoid my-" Gou starts to say until she started to wheeze. Her gills began to flare up and she starts to gasp for air.
"Gou relax!" Bo says as she rushes to Gou's side. She gently rubs her back.
"Gou you have to calm down. Just breathe in and breathe out through your nose. Pretend that these gills are not here." Bo says gently as a mother who is telling her children that everything is going to be alright. Gou listens and takes deep breathes. Eventually her fin turns back into legs.
"Are you alright?" Bo asks worriedly.
"I'm…I'm fine." Gou wheezes. "How did you-" Gou starts to asks until she saw Bo's flipper-looking feet form back to human feet. Veins were showing, muscles were moving in a way that questioned if that they are supposed to move like that, her nails went short, and the webs sunk in-between her toes. Gou gasps at the sight of this. She was about to scream till Bo covers her mouth.
"If you scream, I will beat the crap out of you." Hearing that, Gou slowly closes her mouth.
"How did-What-Huh!?" Gou starts to question but couldn't form one. Then, shouts from the other side of the building calling Bo's name.
"Watanabe! Come out come out wherever you are!?"
"We're not done with you! "
"Come out and play!"
"God damn it, motherfucking, cock sucking, bitches." Bo mumbles under her breathe. "Look, just meet me at the docks after your club okay?" Without Gou giving an answer, Bo quickly runs out of the room. Gou sits there collecting her thoughts till Makoto's voice reaches her ears.
"Gou, are sure you're okay?" he asks.
"Yeah I'll be there in a minute." Gou answers. She quickly gets into her red track suit and leaves for the pool.
Finally, the club was over. At the road in front of the school Gou looks over at the direction of the harbor where the docks are. 'Should I go?' Gou thought till Rei's voice interrupted her train of thought.
"Gou-chan, where are you going? Your house is this way." said Rei. Gou is silent for a moment. She looks back to see that she is already going in a different direction than the others.
"Sorry, just daydreaming." Gou says. "Let's go home." Gou forces a smile, turns around, and starts to walk the other way. 'No, I'm not cursed. I don't need help. This will blow over and eventually go away if I ignore it.' Gou thinks to herself. Then, Makoto goes walks right next to her with a serious look on his face.
"Are you sure you okay? You know you can tell anything right?" he says to her in his gentle, worried voice of his. Gou felt her face flush and quickly looks down at her feet.
"N-No, I'm f-fine, thank you." Gou says as she raises her head and gives him a smile. Makoto looks sad for a moment but in a flash he smiles back.
"Get a room!" shouts Nagisa.
"Nagisa!" Gou and Makoto shout back with bright pink faces. They all walked home laughing and enjoying their time together.
But, every day since then, Gou's problem became worse and worse. One single drop of water turned her into a mermaid. Every time it happened, the process of turning normal hurt her. The gasps for air became frequent and her lungs felt like they would stop every time. She went to the swim club everyday but stayed far away from the pool as much as possible. She wore very think and elbow-high gloves to wash the dishes but when the water splashes, she turns into a mermaid. She started to take more baths causing the water bills to go up. She did everything in her power to not feel that excruciating pain again. As the days go on, she discovers more about this thing Bo called a curse.
"What the hell?!" Gou shouts in the kitchen. The water in the sink became ice while she was washing the dishes. "How did this happen!?" She felt shivers down her spine. Her hands and legs began to shake violently, scared of what the curse has become. She drops everything and dashes up the stairs to her room. She covers her face with a pillow, weeping. 'First turning to fish now freezing water! My life is over! I can't tell anyone about this or else I might become an experiment or something! No one can help me….wait Bo seemed like she knew. Of course she does, I saw her 'flippers' turned into feet. Maybe she can help… I need to talk to her.'
In the morning, Gou hurriedly walks up to Bo's desk. She slams her hands onto Bo's desk with a serious look on her face.
"May…I help you?" Bo asks confused. She raised one of her eyebrows at Gou.
"Meet me at the docks today, after school!" Gou says and leaves a very surprised Bo in the mists.
"What was that about?" asks Kairi.
"Don't worry about." Gou replies. Her friends looked at each other puzzled by this. Then, they start to talk gossip like they always do.
"I have you seen Nagisa-kun being all over Rei-san. Like oh my god it's like gross. He is such a slut, going after someone else's boyfriend like that." said Hana. Gou sits up straight hearing this.
"I know right! Chigusa, aren't you dating Rei-san?" asks Kairi. Chigusa nods.
"Yeah and I am getting sick of it too. He's all over my boyfriend! Like get someone else to rub all over. Rei's mine. I'm the one who's dating him. People who like that shouldn't even exist." Chigusa says harshly with disgust. 'How dare she talk about Nagisa like that? I have to say something but… damn it, I can't. Ugh!' Gou struggles with this as her friends go on to a more serious topic.
"Have you heard about the rapes that are happening around town? I heard there was a fifth victim over at the harbor again yesterday." Chigusa saya as she files her nails.
"No way! This is getting ridiculous! The police are getting lazier by the day." said Hana.
"They are giving the rapist a name now. They call him the "Iwatobi Harbor Rapist" or something." said Kairi.
"Wow, that's a dumb name. Whoever made that up is really stupid?" says Chigusa and all of them laughed at the statement.
'Seriously, do they have no sensitive bone in their body?' Gou thinks this and hopes for school to start.
During lunch she goes to look for the guys. She goes up the stairs to the roof. She opens the door to find them all eating. Then, she sees Chigusa with her arms around Rei's arms, talking to Makoto. Gou hesitates to go over to them after hearing that conversation with the other girls this morning. Makoto sees her and calls her over.
"Gou! Come sit with us!" Makoto says as his face lights up like child who got a new toy. Gou nods and slowly sits next to him. She opens her bento and starts to eat her octopus-shaped hot dogs. After one bite Gou suddenly felt nauseous. She spits the hot dog out into a napkin. 'What the hell? I made these this morning? Did the hot dogs expire?' She takes another bite but spits it out. The taste in her mouth reminded her of metal, making her gag.
"Gou! Are you okay!?" Makoto freaks out.
"I'm fine just…" She starts to say and starts to blush, embarrassed of what she is going to say. "Can you try this for me? I don't know if it is good or not because I just learned to make them." She lies as her face became red with more embarrassment and guilt of lying to Makoto. Makoto stares at her for a minute. Then he grabs a hot dog and pops it into his mouth.
"They are really good!" he said as he turns bright pink.
"I want to try!" Nagisa says and pops a hot dog too. "Ha! It's really good! You're really good at cooking!"
"Thank you." Gou thanks him and looks down at the ground. "Oh yeah, I can't come to the pool after school today. I have an errand to do." Gou says still staring at the ground.
"Yeah to go talk to Mrs. Freak, Watanabe Boboa." said Chigusa as she laughs.
"What!? You're going to talk to Boboa!? The Watanabe Boboa!?" shouts Rei. Gou nods.
"Why, did she hurt you!?" asks Makoto as he freaks out again.
"No! It's only to talk! I had a great time the last time I chatted with her. She's really cool." Gou smiles at the thought of the talk they had last week. Then, Chigusa laughs at Gou's remark.
"That's funny! Oh please Gou, Watanabe is a freak. There's no way that she's cool." Chigusa continues to laugh.
"She's not." Haru finally speaks up. "She's kind, honest, and strong. She's everything that you're not."
"Excuse me!" Chigusa says on the top of her lungs.
"You can't even get your true feelings across to someone." Haru says as he stares at one of the guys. Gou couldn't tell where he was looking. Wherever he was looking at, it wasn't at Rei that's for sure. 'Something strange is going on? It isn't like Haruka-senpai to speak up like that.' Gou thought.
"Whatever! Anyway hey Makoto try some of my dumplings!" Chigusa gives a dumpling to Makoto.
"Oh um…thanks." Makoto says awkwardly. The rest of the lunch, everyone was quiet with an awkward atmosphere.
After school. Gou rushes outside to get away from everyone. She runs to the harbor at the speed of light. She gets to a dock that goes out towards the sea. She sits down on the edge and waited for Boboa. 'It's weird coming here.' She thought. 'This is where my father died. A memory that I will never forget. Something that will always be there within me…in my heart.' Her thoughts were interrupted by a hand on her shoulder causing that same electricity feeling.
"Gou? Are you crying?" Bo says to her noticing the tears on Gou's cheek. Gou quickly wipes her face and looks away.
"Sorry." She apologizes.
Bo abruptly sits next to her. "So, what did you want me for?" It was silent for a few minutes. The only thing heard were the waves hitting the shore and the seagulls crying. Finally, Gou says something.
"Help me." Gou says in a quiet voice.
"What?"
"Help me!" Then, Gou starts to cry. "I can't live like this! I can't shower, bathe, or anything that's got to do with water! It hurts to not breathe! Water turns me into an oversized fish! I don't even think I can eat meat anymore! It tastes like rusty metal! I can freeze water now!" Gou cries and cries about what has happened to her to Bo. Bo sits there, taking it all. Finally, Gou stops crying.
"My life is over." Gou says grimly.
"No it's not."
"Yes it is!"
"Gou, listen to me. You can live through this. We will figure out how to break this curse. Together we can come up with something. Two is better than one." Bo says.
"How long have you been like this?" Gou asks as she sniffs. Then, there was a moment of silence. Finally, Bo speaks up.
"All my life."
"What?"
"All my life Matsuoka. My family has been cursed for generations."
"Ho-How many generations?" Gou begins to panic.
"…For the last…400 years?"
"What does that mean? You can't help me?!...Then… that means…you can't help me can you?" Gou starts to get up. Then, Bo grabs her wrist.
"Wait, Gou we can talk about this!" Bo shouts. Gou shakes her hand off her wrist.
"No you can't! You've been like this longer than I have! You can't help me!" Gou starts to cry again and runs away.
"Gou! Wait! There's a dangerous man out here!" Bo calls out but Gou ignores her and continues to run off.
By the time Gou stops running, she's sees that she's lost. She can still hear the sea so she is still near the harbor. Gou starts to walk with her mind lost in her thoughts. 'My life is gone now. No one can help me. There's nothing that I can do. There's nothing that anyone can do.' She thinks this over and over in her head. Then, a hand grabs her arm and pulls her into an alley. With a great force, she smacks into a brick wall.
"Let go!" She shouts.
"Stop moving. It will be over soon." A deep voice says to her. She looks up to see a strange man with only a deep red eye looking right at her. It was too dark to see anything else. She felt an itchy sensation on her arms and wrists where the man was touching her.
"Get off!" She fights back as hard as she can. But, the man is too strong. 'What do I do!? Someone help me!'
