The following day was Makoto's day off. He had planned to spend some of the day on sleeping in and then he had thought it would be a good idea to visit his parents, to have them introduced to Rin and Haruka as soon as possible.
But the former plan was cut short when someone came running down the hallway and tore the door to Makoto's room open, causing Makoto's eyes to snap open and he sat up quickly.
"What's going on?" he asked as he saw Rin standing in the doorway.
"Haru's taking up the bathtub and refuses to leave!" Rin exclaimed. The irritation was obvious on his face.
"His bath was cut a little short last night," Makoto said, taking it fairly easy.
"That's not what I mean!" Rin was frustrated because of Makoto's attitude towards the problem. In his opinion it was a really big deal. "He has been there for over an hour and a half!"
Makoto looked a bit surprised. He knew some people liked taking long baths, but over an hour and a half seemed a bit too long, even for a long bath. Suddenly he felt worried and decided to get up and check on the blue-eyed boy in the bathroom.
There was no reason for him to be worried. Once he entered the bathroom, Haruka's head rose from the surface of the water and he turned his head to look at Makoto with irritation.
"Rin says you've been in here for a while?" Makoto asked.
Haruka shook his head.
"You've been here for over an hour and a half," Makoto stated.
"That's not long," Haruka stated.
Makoto smiled. "Look," he said as he approached the tub. "Everyone needs a bath so you need to get out now and get dressed." He reached out his hand to help Haruka out of the tub, but the boy didn't take it. Instead he pushed it aside and got out of the tub on his own.
Makoto couldn't help but feel a little hurt by this action, but he didn't say anything as he watched Haruka leave the bathroom. At least he had done as he'd been told.
They left the house a little before noon and headed towards the station. Nagisa spent the entire walk speaking to Makoto and Rei joined in on the conversation at times. Rin and Haruka were walking behind them. Neither of them were saying a word. They didn't speak while riding the train either. Actually they didn't speak until they had walked half way from the station to Makoto's parents' house.
"Where are you going?" Rin asked.
"Over there," Haruka directed Rin's attention through his eyes. It seemed he was looking at a pool belonging to a private high school.
"Don't," Rin said. "It'd be trespassing,"
Haruka didn't seem to care. He just started walking off in the direction of the pool.
"Idiot," Rin said before following his twin.
"What are they up to?" Makoto wondered.
"Trespassing," Rei answered. He had been listening to their conversation. He figured he would need to learn as much about their enemy as possible.
"That's really bad!" Makoto exclaimed before he started running after Rin and Haruka.
Rei and Nagisa exchanged looks before they too ran after Makoto and the others to see how this would end.
Once Makoto reached the pool at the private high school, an interesting sight met him. He saw two small piles of clothes lying by the poolside. As for the owners of the clothes, they could both be located in the pool. It appeared they were racing.
"This is bad… this is really bad…" Makoto said as Rin and Haruka made the turn and started swimming back. Sadly Makoto wouldn't dare to do anything other than wait for the two to return.
"Nii-chan!" Now they could hear someone come running from behind as well and Nagisa turned as the first one with an excited smile on his face as he recognized the voice.
"Ran-chan! Ren-chan!" Nagisa yelled as he smiled widely at Makoto's younger twin siblings.
"Ren, Ran?" Makoto now turned as well to look at the two.
"What are you doing here?" Ren asked as he and Ran entered the school grounds.
"Eh…" Makoto trailed off before looking down at the pool which Rin and Haruka were now climbing out of, well aware that they had done something they shouldn't have.
"We were on our way to visit mom and dad when Rin and Haruka, whom I adopted yesterday, ran off to here," Makoto said.
"So those are the new ones?" Ran asked interested.
"Yeah," Makoto said.
"Mom did say you might come by today to introduce the two to them," Ren said. "We won't miss that for the world!" he smiled.
Makoto smiled too. "Do they know you're coming by too?" Makoto asked.
"We've already been there and were sent down to buy sodas for everyone," Ran said. "Hey, now that the boys over there have gotten dressed, let's get back!" she added excitedly.
Makoto turned to see that indeed Rin and Haruka had gotten their clothes back on. Rin looked shamefully down at the ground while Haruka kept looking back at the pool.
"Why are you looking like that, Rin?" Makoto asked.
"Aren't you angry? We went trespassing and started racing in the pool and instead of stopping Haru, I just followed," Rin said. He then turned to Haruka. "Way to go off with first impressions by the way. We were only just adopted yesterday you know!"
Haruka turned to look at Rin. "As you said, you should've stopped me," he answered.
"Keep yourself in check. I'm not here to do it," Rin answered.
"Then stop acting like you are," Haruka answered.
"I'm not!" Rin yelled.
"You are!" Haruka answered a tiny bit lower.
"Stop arguing," Makoto said, trying to break in between them. "I'm not angry with you or anything. I'm not going to deny that what you did was wrong, but as long as you realize that, it's fine." He smiled at both Rin and Haruka. "Now, let's get going. It seems my parents are waiting."
Rin and Haruka nodded before Rin remembered something and looked up at Makoto and then at Ren and Ran.
"So… who are those two?" he asked.
Ren and Ran looked slightly surprised before they turned to Makoto with reproachful expressions. Makoto got a guilty look on his face as he introduced his younger siblings to his two new children. Then they headed to Makoto's parents' house and more introductions were made.
Ren and Ran took over with the cooking while Makoto's parents spoke to Makoto and all his children. This resulted in Rin and Haruka starting a new argument because Rin didn't think Haruka was making an attempt to get to know Makoto's parents to which Haruka denied.
Makoto stepped in and stopped the argument but then Haruka started accusing Rin for causing trouble and Rin shot back at him with the incident at the private high school. It took Makoto way longer to stop this argument than the other one and it ended up resulting in Haruka walking upstairs. Makoto's mother followed him but came down shortly after.
"How is he?" Makoto asked.
"He's not crying or anything," the mother said. "He asked politely if he could borrow our bathtub and I told him yes and showed him to the bathroom."
Makoto looked thoughtful at that. "I wonder what that means," he said. Then he looked to Rin, who shrugged in response.
"I don't know why he does that," he said. "But it's not unusual for him to do after some of our fights. Either that or he goes for a swim." Rin now smiled. "Sometimes, I think he feels more at home in the water than on dry land."
"That's kinda like a fish," Nagisa said.
"Or a mermaid," Ran butted in from the kitchen. "Mom… are these non-wash rice?" she asked.
"No… Ran did you not wash them before boiling them?" Makoto's mother asked.
Ran didn't answer, but the silence and the way she had asked could only be interpreted one way.
And so the lunch was delayed because of Ran's mistake and Haruka got a little more time in the bathtub than expected.