It was on the first day after summer break. It was still early in the morning and Makoto had just gotten out of bed to get ready for the new day. He had no concerns so far. Rin and Haruka had been enrolled in the same school as Rei and Nagisa, in their third year.
Makoto was in the middle of pulling on his pants when he heard running footsteps in the hallway and his door was torn open only moments later.
"Makoto!" It was Rin in the doorway. "Haru has taken up the bathtub and refuses to leave!" he exclaimed.
Makoto sighed. He had almost adjusted to this. It wasn't the first time Rin came running to him with this problem. He had to go get Haruka out of the bathtub now, he knew as much.
He went past Rin and to the bathroom where he opened the door to see Haruka's head raise from the surface.
"Good morning, Haru," Makoto said as Haruka looked at him through the corner of his eye.
As expected, the boy didn't respond.
"Haru, I hate to say this, but the others need access to the bathroom as well so you need to get out of the tub."
Haruka just turned to face Makoto fully. He lowered his head as his face was half under the surface and Makoto let out a small sigh. He went over to the bathtub and extended his hand towards the black haired.
"Come on," he said. "You need to get up. You have school today like the others," he said, smiling.
Haruka's hand slowly showed from his surface and before Makoto realized it, Haruka had placed his hand in Makoto's extended one and he pulled softly, signaling for Makoto that he could go ahead with his action.
Makoto made a surprised face before he tightened his grip around Haruka's hand and pulled the boy to a standing position.
He looked down at the boy to see that he was wearing a pair of swimming trunks while in the bath and he smiled, slightly surprised by this as well.
"Isn't it the point for one not to wear a swimsuit when in the bath?" Makoto asked.
Haruka looked down at himself and then stepped out of the tub. "I feel better wearing them," he said as he went past Makoto and grabbed a towel.
Makoto stood still, staring at Haruka's back as he was about to exit the room.
"The others needed to use the room," Haruka stated before walking out. This was clearly a demand for Makoto to get out as well and Makoto had no choice but to do just that while keeping down chuckles. He couldn't believe that he was being ordered around by a nine-years-old.
Makoto left the room as well and went to finish getting himself dressed while Rin, Rei and Nagisa took turns going to the bathroom.
It had been about the third or fourth time he had been doing this since he had had that conversation with Haruka, right after adopting him and Rin. Haruka had done as he had been told from the first time, but it wasn't until today when he had accepted Makoto's outstretched hand. What did this mean though? Clearly it was a sign of development in their relationship, but Makoto wasn't sure how much he should read into it. He was aware that he might be the only one who could extend his hand to Haruka and expect it to be accepted, or could he? Was this just once in a life-time or was there something more to it? What did it even mean? Could it be that Haruka was more obedient now, or did it mean he felt they were close enough to do this? As Makoto finished dressing himself and came out of the bathroom after brushing his teeth, he was still thinking about the matter.
Once they had had breakfast and washed up, everyone went to put on their shoes and then left the house. Makoto locked the door behind them and went to the hospital, trusting that Rei could take care of leading Rin and Haruka to the school and take care of Nagisa.
Rei did lead them to the school and to the faculty room because none of them knew what class Rin and Haruka would be in. After this, Rei and Nagisa went to their own classes.
Rin and Haruka were lucky, they ended up running into their homeroom teacher just before he left the faculty room and they walked with him to the class. He told them to stand at the front while he wrote their names on the board. Thankfully they were put in the same class.
"These are the new students who will join our class starting today," the teacher said. "Please introduce yourselves," he told Rin and Haruka.
"Hi, I'm Matsuoka Rin," Rin said as he had been told. "I'm from Shino Elementary. I know my name sounds girly, but I'm properly male. It's nice to meet you!" he said and finished with a wide grin.
"I'm Nanase Haruka from Shino Elementary. Nice to meet you," Haruka said in a much lower volume than Rin.
"It's nice to meet you too," the teacher said. "Matsuoka-kun, you can sit over there by the wall, Nanase-kun, you can sit in the far corner by the window," he instructed the two to take their seats and waited for them to do so before he began the class.
"Lucky you," Rin whispered to Haruka as they went to their different seats. Haruka didn't give a response. He didn't care where he ended up sitting. It wasn't any important anyways.
As the day progressed, Rin seemed to make more friends. He spoke to everyone sitting around him and was drawing all the attention towards himself with his cheerful attitude and open personality. Haruka, on the other hand, was just sitting by himself, not socializing with anybody
Makoto was home late in the afternoon, he noticed how only two pairs of shoes were left in front of the door. He could recognize both Rei's and Nagisa's shoes but he wondered where Rin and Haruka had disappeared to.
"I'm home!" he called.
"Welcome home!" Rei called back from the living room. When Makoto entered, he could see that Rei and Nagisa were busy studying.
"Where are Rin and Haruka?" Makoto asked.
"Don't know," Rei answered. He looked to Nagisa who looked up with questioning eyes.
"I don't know either…" he said.
"You said you ran into them after school, right?" Rei asked.
"I saw them, I didn't speak to them," Nagisa answered.
"Where?" Makoto asked.
Nagisa smiled sheepishly and placed a hand at the back of his head. He let out a soft laugh before speaking. "Sorry Mako-chan, I don't remember," he said.
Makoto nodded, feeling worried. He wondered where Rin and Haruka could have gone off to and where Nagisa had seen them. Surely they couldn't have gone far. He had faith in them. He had faith that they would come back. Rin had said so, and he had made great progress in his relationship with Haruka… or so he thought at least.
He decided to go cook, but couldn't help but continue to be worried until the point where the door opened, right before he was about to serve the food and Rin and Haruka entered, both completely out of breath.
"I beat you! I was first!" Rin declared.
"Whatever," Haruka breathed as he took off his shoes. "We're home," he said.
"We're home," Rin said too.
"Welcome home," Makoto answered. "Where were you, I was getting worried," he said.
Rin looked at him from the door into the kitchen. He had removed his shoes and was now standing there with a bag over his shoulder. "Didn't Nagisa tell you?" he asked. "We went to the swimming club for training!" he said this like it should be obvious, but Makoto had heard nothing of this until now.
"Since when did you start that?" Makoto asked.
"We've both been swimming since we were very young," Rin replied. "First on teams to learn how to swim, but we're too old now and are free to just train whatever we feel we need. However, we were taught the butterfly stroke today!" he smiled excitedly.
Makoto smiled too. "That sounds interesting… when did you run into Nagisa?" he asked then.
Rin thought. "He had a lesson when we came in. They stopped in the middle of practice to watch me and Haru race for some odd reason," he answered.
Makoto turned around to look at Nagisa who pretended to be buried in his textbook. "Is that true, Nagisa?" he asked.
"Oh yeah! Now I remember!" Nagisa exclaimed. "We stopped practice at some point…" he trailed off before going back to his homework. He didn't say another word and Makoto didn't ask him further.
At the moment, the man was just happy that Rin and Haruka were home, safe and sound, and hadn't left him.
Another chapter will be published later today, if I remember. The timeline is somewhat parallel with this one. You'll know what it's about once it's up.
If I, against most odds, should forget to publish later on or tomorrow, I want to tell you that I will not be publishing until Friday next week because I'm going on a trip with my class early Sunday morning and I won't be home until late Thursday night. Now you know.
Thanks for reading.
Jackie