Chapter 4: You Say

But I feel so afraid,

Then I hear you say.

It didn't feel right.

The stadium was too big. Too big by far. It felt wrong to even step in it with the vague consideration of swimming, let alone to actually do it. Even so, Haru couldn't help but feel tempted.

It was Rin's fault. He was the one who'd suggested it and Haru had never been particularly good at saying no to a suggestion to swim. Or at least Rin had offered while at the same time appearing distinctly unnerved. Unnerved enough that Haru noticed, which was saying something because he knew he wasn't often understanding of expressions that were overt displays of emotion. Rin hid his well, but the memory of their conversation the previous night still rung in Haru's mind.

He really was sorry for what had happened. Mostly because it had upset Rin, but nonetheless, he was sorry.

As they'd changed, however, taking themselves into the aquatic centre change rooms that had absolutely no one else within, Rin had appeared to shunt his concerns to the side. He still spared Haru glances, sidelong stares that Haru thought he perhaps wasn't supposed to see but were a little difficult to ignore, but they were both distracted as they stepped back out to the poolside. There was an Olympic-sized pool before them, after all.

Haru would be lying if he said he wasn't just a little bit overawed. This pool had swum Olympians, had hosted world-class races, swum athletes who poured their heart and soul into every stroke. It felt somehow blasphemous for Haru to swim in it, despite desperately wanting to. He wasn't like those athletes. He didn't have what they had.

But Rin had said it was alright for them to swim. And though there was still a touch of hesitancy within him, though the thought of swimming in such a place was as daunting as it was breathtaking, Haru couldn't resist the temptation.

He spared a glance for Rin as he passed towards the bench, unslinging his bag from his shoulder. Rin paused in step, stared at him for a moment before smiling wolfishly and tipping his head towards the pool. "Well? What are we waiting for?"

Haru returned his gaze for a moment. He was almost surprised that Rin had 'let' him anywhere near a pool. He seemed far more worried than Haru was for what had happened at the Iwatobi pool which… which Haru felt sorry for as well.

Strange. He'd never really felt apologetic about all that much before. Rin seemed to be the exception, and not just in this instance.

Stepping up to the diving board, Haru stood tall and still for a moment, staring down the length of the pool. His eyes were drawn once more to where they'd passed before, to whom Rin had told him were the national team off to his right, if only to observe with a mixture of awe and curiosity. Haru might not entirely understand their drive, might even find it unfathomable how they could swim for nothing but the desire to win, but he could still admire them. There was something about watching an exceptional swimmer that was captivating to behold.

As he watched, switching his gaze between the glistening, faintly lapping pool and the team, a tall, blond man stepped up to the lane at his side. Haru barely came up to his shoulder, but he was far from intimidating for the easy smile he wore. He flashed that smile towards Haru as he climbed with practiced steps up onto the diving board.

Bending over into a preparatory fold, he flashed Haru a wink. "Hey, mate," he said, thick accent drawling the English slightly. "How's it going?" Then, with an exuberant shout of, "Let's go!" he dove.

Haru couldn't help but stare. He couldn't help but watch with a mixture of that same awe and longing as the blond man flew what seemed nearly half the length of the pool, body long and stretched like a torpedo, before arcing into the water. The splash was smooth and barely a disturbance before the man broke the surface and ploughed through the water like a speedboat. He swam as though he was made for it, as though he were born to be in the water.

Just like Haru. Haru had never felt more comfortable than he was when he swum. That thought, that recognition surpassing even his frustration for his 'dreams' and the confusion for his 'future', urged Haru towards his own diving board. In that moment, it hardly mattered. It didn't matter that he swum only for himself. It didn't matter that everything was too hard, too wrong, that it wasn't how it should be. That what Rin urged him towards wasn't the right reason to swim.

Haru wanted to. And in that moment there was no stopping him.

"Haru," Rin asked, momentarily drawing Haru's attention from the pool. He was smiling just slightly, tugging his own eyes from the Olympic swimmer to settle his gaze on him. "We should go too."

Haru stared at him for a moment. He wasn't sure if it was his imagination, but he thought there was just a little more emphasis on the 'we' in his statement than was necessary. Upon the statement itself. He was left with the impression that it wasn't so much a sprint up the length of the pool that he was referring to.

Haru didn't question it, however. Instead, he only nodded shortly, uttered a decisive, "Yeah" and climbed up onto the diving board.

With a flying leap of his own, Haru sprung free. There was a moment, a brief moment in which he soared through the air before he curved into the pool. The cool slap of water pricked his skin as it slid over his fingers, his arms, across his shoulders to wrap around his entire body like a skin-tight suit. It was cool, quiet but for the hollow echoes of Water itself, the gurgle of the bubbles that Haru breathed out in his dive.

It was comfortable. It was the world. It seemed to embody everything that Haru wanted in its cool embrace, and even without thought he felt his body surge into motion.

This. I want to keep swimming in a place like this forever.

If there was one thing Haru was certain of it was that.

Breaking the surface, his arms reached forth in rapid, powering strokes. His feet kicked in sharp snaps behind him, their splashes muffled by the water that flooded his ears. It was instinctive, natural, perfect, and just as it always did, just as Haru let it do, the water and the swim washed everything away. Even if only briefly, it would relieve him of the grasping numbness, of the confusion and the frustration and even the anger that had arisen so often of late. It shook loose the rising wave that threatened to overwhelm him, to crash upon him and drag him down, but instead gave him fins to surf upon the wave and escape its grasping claws.

Haru couldn't explain that to anyone. He wasn't sure anyone else would understand how much he not only wanted but needed it. Swimming wasn't a hobby or a job to him. It was as integral as food, as breathing air. Precious few people in the world would likely even contemplate such a fundamental purpose.

The swim was too short. In what felt like only a second, a second of the tensing and stretching of muscles to throw himself through the water, the speed with single-minded focus not towards The End but to dive into the thick embrace of water itself, it was over. Haru's hand sliced through the water to graze against the wall and he was done. It was ended. And yet when his feet dropped to the ground, his head rising from the water, it was to a peaceful release the likes of which he hadn't known he'd needed until that moment.

Water flooded from his face, dribbling from his hair and down his cheeks as Haru stood tall, hand rising to flip his borrowed goggles aside. He was breathing heavily, perhaps more heavily than the fifty meters warranted, but it hardly mattered. It was freeing, relieving, and for the first time in days it felt like he could truly breathe again.

Turning, Haru caught sight of the blond man halfway back up the pool, already turned and making his second lap. He saw the rest of the national team stepping up to their own diving boards, a man in a blue cap taking a flying leap into the pool and surfacing into white-foamed splashes of butterfly. Yet more specifically Rin caught Haru's attention as he sped the length of the pool down the lane at Haru's other side, familiar red hair just poking from beneath his cap darkened to almost black by the water and arms powering strongly with every stroke. Haru couldn't help but stare. Rin's swimming style was different to his own, was more fiercer, more demanding, but it was still captivating to see. He'd always found it that way.

Rin's had slapped into the wall as he drew alongside Haru, dropping his feet to rise from the water and his other hand reaching up to flip his own goggles onto his forehead. He turned towards Haru, and there was but a moment of something that was almost concern flashing in his eyes before a wide grin rose to take its place. Rin's smiles, those ones in particular – wide and almost feral – were taunting and somehow amused in their own way. They posed a challenge without words, spoke a joke or a taunt with a twitch of his lips. Haru had long been familiar with that smile. He'd missed it when Rin had been gone. It had taken a long time for it to return but when it had it was even brighter for its absence.

"Good?" Rin asked expectantly, leaning an elbow on the edge of the pool.

Haru spared him a moment of staring before replying. "You have to ask?"

Rin's grin widened further. "Well, it's hard to tell with you. You don't exactly give a whole lot away when it comes to, you know…"

Haru blinked slowly. "Know what?"

"Smiling and all."

"There's nothing wrong with not wanting to smile all the time."

Rin's grin became a smirk. "I know. Good to see you've reconciled yourself to letting it happen every now and again."

Haru was confused for a moment, and it took raising a hand to his lips to realise what Rin was talking about. Smiling – did he really wear such an expression so rarely that it was worth commenting on? It probably wasn't, in all actuality. Rin felt the need to comment on just about anything anyway.

Rin was climbing from the pool as Haru contemplated, but as soon as he heaved himself to his feet he turned back towards Haru and bent to a crouch. "Come on then," he said with a tilting gesture of his head.

Haru stared up at him with questioning regard. "Come on what?"

"Let's go again."

Haru gave a soft snort that was barely more than a sharp exhalation. "You sound so excited when you say it."

With a shrug, Rin surprisingly took the veiled condescension without rebuttal. "Not every day you get to race someone in a real Olympic pool."

"You make it sound like it's a proper race."

"Isn't it?" Rin raised an eyebrow expectantly, as though surprised Haru didn't think it otherwise. "If not 'proper', it's at least in preparation for the future."

Haru bit back the urge to frown and grumble an irritated reply. Always the future. "Rin," he began, but Rin cut him off with a raised hand.

"I know. I know what you're going to say – about not having a future like this and all that, but let me just put this to you, Haru: you love swimming."

"That's some impressive deduction skills you've got, Rin," Haru couldn't help but quip. His annoyance was being rapidly prodded into wakefulness.

Rin smirked once more. He seemed to have perfected the art of assuming an expression that was the perfect combination of derision, amusement and reprimand. "What I mean is that you're thinking about this too hard."

"I'm not thinking about it at all, actually," Haru said. Any guilt that had arisen within him from last night was rapidly fading beneath his irritation as it rose like a bubbling wave of its own. "I thought we agreed to lay off on this, Rin."

"We didn't actually agree," Rin corrected. "It was more by unspoken agreement."

"Which is still agreement."

"But not formally."

"Most people with common courtesy would accept it as good as."

"I'm not a particularly courteous person," Rin said was a hint of a laugh.

Haru stared up at him flatly. "Yeah, I've noticed. I have just found myself in the middle of a pool in Australia."

"You say that like you don't like being here."

"The pool or Australia?"

Rin ignored him in favour of drawing the conversation back on track. "You're thinking too hard. About all of this. And me, being the incredible friend that I am, am going to help you out."

"That sounds ominous," Haru said, pursing his lips. He glanced sidelong at the Australian swimmers as a pair of them streaked towards the wall, flipping in a dizzying turn and slapping the wall before pushing off in an exchange respectively.

"It's not," Rin said. "I'm just going to lay it out like it is, okay? So don't interrupt me." Haru glanced back to him as Rin settled more firmly on his haunches on the pool deck. His grin returned as Haru simply stared for a long moment. "Right, so I have an idea."

"You have an idea?"

"I can hear your condescension, you know," Rin said easily. Once more he didn't sound annoyed as he would have become only last year had they been having a similar almost-argument. Or at least an almost-argument on Haru's part. Haru doubted Rin saw it that way. "Look, you say you don't have a dream. You don't have a future. Well, that's bullshit."

"Thanks for summing up my loose ends so accurately," Haru said with a roll of his eyes.

Rin ignored him. "You're just not seeing what's right in front of you. You say you don't want to swim for the crowds, for the numbers and the records?" He paused expectantly as though awaiting a reply. Haru didn't give him one so after a moment continued. "So don't. Swim as you always have."

Haru stared up at him blankly for a moment. He didn't want to talk about this right now. He didn't want to talk about it ever. Annoyance was thickly welling within him, yet on the borders of that the tingling numbness that would threaten to sweep it aside and replace it with something worse. Haru didn't want that to happen. He sorely wanted to avoid that at all costs, even if it meant being angry instead. He'd taken his meds that morning, the meds that Rin had very pointedly packed for him, because he'd felt guilty for not doing so. Because Rin so obviously wanted him to, and in that moment that had been a good enough reason. But they wouldn't kick in so fast. They never did straight away.

Haru didn't want to risk an argument that would result in the rising wave of numbness crashing over him. He pressed his lips together and struggled to suppress it. Maybe he should just swim. "What are you talking about?"

Rin shrugged easily, dropping his arms onto his legs to lean further forwards. "You love water. You love swimming. So make something of what you love. You don't have to fight so hard to find a dream exactly. Just do what you love. That's what a dream is anyway, isn't it?"

Haru could feel himself frowning slightly as Rin spoke. He made it sound so easy, which it wouldn't be. Nothing was ever that easy. He told Rin as much.

Rin rolled his own eyes this time. "Now you're just making life hard for yourself. Anyone would think you want to be miserable." He paused after his words and winced slightly, likely hearing them for how insensitive they were considering Haru's circumstances. That in itself was strange, given that Rin didn't usually care if he offended anyone. Not ever. He shook his head abruptly. "Sorry."

"I don't care," Haru replied in a mutter.

"What I mean is, stop trying so hard. Just let it happen. You want to swim? So swim. However and wherever you can. And," Rin adopted a smile that was less of a grin this time and more of something else. "Do it with me."

"With you or for you?" Haru found himself asking before he'd even realised what he was going to say.

Rin gave a huff of amusement that was perhaps just a little sheepish. "Maybe both?"

"Selfish," Haru muttered, though surprisingly he felt his annoyance waver slightly, the fringes of the listless numbness retreat just fractionally. Rin's bluntness might be infuriating at times, but at least he spoke how it was.

"Very much," Rin agreed readily. "It's entirely selfish, of course, because I want to swim with you. It wouldn't be the same if you weren't there."

"So selfish," Haru repeated.

"Is that a problem? If you get to do what you want to do?"

Haru regarded him silently. Rin's face was open, expectant and almost eager. He was offering a hand of support, and though Haru wasn't entirely sure where he would lead him, it was suddenly very tempting to take it. He shrugged just slightly.

Rin rolled his eyes. "That sort of ambivalence is going to make people just do what they want, you know."

"I don't care."

"Then good," Rin said, as though Haru had answered some sort of unspoken question. Maybe he had and hadn't realised it for in an instant Rin was reaching forwards, stretching a hand into the water and before Haru could even think to draw away from him was grasping his arm. The same arm he'd held for most of the night before. It seemed almost instinctive the way his fingers tightened, his grip fastened as though it wouldn't let go.

Rin flashed him a smile as Haru lifted his gaze from his captured arm. "Then all you've got to do is hang on and I'll drag you the rest of the way there." Those words, a repeat of those he'd said on the beach the day before, rung with confidence. As if making good his claim, Rin straightened and with a tug dragged Haru with him.

Rin was different to Makoto in that regard. Makoto would always offer a smile of support, always lend a hand to help should it appear needed. Not Rin, though. Rin saw a struggle and he didn't wait to be asked. He latched on like a leech and didn't let go until he saw the situation rectified.

Just like the day before, Haru found himself being drawn in Rin's wake as he skirted the pool at a quick step, grin flashing over his shoulder, and dragged him back towards the diving boards. It was so typical of Rin to mask sincerity in selfishness and crassness, yet to somehow impress his particular brand of help on the situation. When Haru thought about it, that sort of help tended to be the best kind. For him, at least.

Quite without his intention, Haru found himself smiling again even before they dove back into the water. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad to be directed just a little in this case. Rin's words, ringing resoundingly in his head, were somehow more reassuring than he'd ever thought possible. Fierce and demanding yet somehow supportive.

Just hang on.

The midday sun was just cresting by the time they left Sydney Olympic Park. Since then, Rin and Haru had wandered through the city, train hoping as much as they used their own feet. As the sun began to set, it was to a poignant view of Sydney Harbour, the pink sky painting the water in pastels and darkening the Harbour Bridge into blacks rather than greys.

Rin leant against the railing, back towards the view and staring instead up at the skyscrapers that sat at a distance back from the boardwalk. The clutter of pedestrians had thinned when peak-hour had died but there were still an admirable proportion of city-goers for a weeknight. Rin watched them pass with a detached eye. Detached, because his attention really lay on Haru.

At his side, leaning his elbows upon the railing, Haru stared across the harbour with his own distant gaze. Strands of his hair curled just slightly with residual dampness from the swim, the last already dried from his skin and shirt, but still… Rin couldn't help staring.

Something had changed. He wasn't sure what it was, but that much was apparent. Something within Haru had changed when they'd been at the aquatic centre, and Rin wasn't sure if he should take the credit for inducing it. He'd like to think he had. He'd like to think it was he who had put the touch of a smile upon Haru's lips, who had eased his expression just enough to be noticeable and into something distinctly softer. There wasn't the listlessness that Rin so hated to see, but there wasn't frustration or anger or even withdrawal as he might have expected after what he'd said at the pool.

Rin was relieved for that. He was sorely relieved. He'd spoken on a whim, letting his tongue do the work before his brain caught up and only really contemplating that it could have ended in disaster as he was dragging Haru back around the pool for another race.

But it hadn't. If anything, something had clicked. When Rin raced him, it was almost as though Haru were back to normal, except that it was more than that. There was something more. Some drive that Rin hadn't seen before, and it caught his attention and wouldn't release it from the moment he'd noticed it.

Rin had been staring at Haru from the corner of his eye for what must have been hours now. Even when he wasn't actively doing so, as they passed through the town, stopped for lunch, partaking in customary sightseeing, he found himself watching. Now, before the glow of the sunset, Rin couldn't help but stare.

He'd never been captivated by anyone before. He'd never really even considered anyone attractive but in the basest, most clinical sense. But in that moment, when he saw the flush of pink sunset warming Haru's face, saw the faint, upwards curl of his lips, the almost calming, relieved closing of his eyes before he blinked them open to stare across the harbour once more, Rin thought he might understand that captivation. It only hit him once more, almost as powerfully though not as brutally as it had days before, how much he liked him. Really liked him.

They hadn't spoken much. That in itself wasn't atypical of their relationship; Haru had always been quiet, and far quieter than Rin. Rin was more often than not the voice of their conversations, speaking his opinions or observations to Haru's short, murmured replies. But staring as he was, distracted as he was, Rin found he didn't have all that much to say anyway.

Except that he wanted to say something. Something in particular that had been niggling at him for some time. With all this talk of dreams and futures, he couldn't help but call to mind one of the primary reasons he'd decided to come to Australia in the first place.

Rin found himself suddenly less sure in that reason, however. It was his dream, what he'd chased for years, but now… now he wasn't entirely sure how much he wanted to pursue it. Coming to Australia, moving away from Japan once more – how could he do that? Not only because he was worried for Haru, which Rin considered he likely would be for some time, even if he did end up telling Makoto, but because he didn't want to. He didn't want to leave.

Was it possible to have two dreams at once? What did people do when they conflicted so frustratingly?

Swallowing down his irritation, Rin cleared his throat. "The coach who trained me while I was studying in Australia wrote to me recently. He asked if I'd consider swimming here again."

Haru glanced at him sidelong, not speaking but affording Rin his attention nonetheless. Rin swallowed once more, pressing his lips together in a brief flush of frustration that he tamped down before continuing. "Before we head back to Japan, I'm going to see him and ask if I can join his team. Even though I took one heck of a detour getting here, I've decided to..." Decided? Had he really? Rin did want to come back to Australia, he really did, and he wanted to swim with his old coach again, but…

Forcing aside the melancholic thought, Rin drew a smile onto his face. Perhaps it was a little wider than it should have been, but he hoped Haru didn't notice. "I'll get there. Just you watch," he said with more enthusiasm, more decisiveness, than he felt.

His gaze was drawn towards the harbour, towards a passing clutch of seagulls that swirled overhead in a discordant ring. It was only when Haru's silence stretched that he deliberately drew his gaze back towards him. It was to find Haru watching him curiously, the faint play of his smile still upon his lips. There was something in that smile, some contentedness yet decisiveness that Rin didn't think he'd ever seen before. He couldn't look away.

"Rin," Haru said quietly, almost so quietly that he could have been talking to himself. "I think… I've found it too."

Rin almost gasped at those words, at the meaning embedded within them. A sheer upwelling of triumph rose within him, triumph that Rin had somehow been the one to induce that in his friend. But more than that was relief. Haru might not be better, might not ever get better, and they would have to do something about that. Together, they would have to work something out. And yet, in that one simple phrase, Rin saw change. He saw the potential for change, for a future he'd longed for and desperately struggled to drag Haru towards alongside him.

Rin only realised in that moment, when Haru confirmed his accompaniment, how very much he needed him when he took his own steps. Sousuke had told him, had said on a whim that he wondered how much Haru's participation counted for. That he wondered if Rin would be half as motivated if Haru wasn't swimming with him as both a companion and a rival. Rin supposed that now at least he had his answer for that.

Surprisingly, it was Haru who broke their momentary silence, the stillness of staring and quiet, unspoken exchange. "So you're coming back to Australia?"

He didn't sound upset. He didn't sound anything but curious and a little questioning. Rin wasn't sure if he was relieved or saddened by that fact. Did he want Haru to miss him when he was gone? He'd never even asked if 'missing' was something Haru had associated with him in his time in Australia. Did he want to be missed? Did he want Haru to regret he was going and leaving him again?

Yes, Rin realised. Yes, he really did. He wanted Haru to miss him as much as he abruptly realised he would miss Haru in return.

Rin dropped his gaze down to his feet, leaning further backwards onto the railing. "I guess," he said.

There was a pause in which Haru waited expectantly before speaking. "You don't sound particularly enthusiastic."

Huffing in a feeble laugh of amusement he didn't feel, Rin closed his eyes briefly and offered a smile that was a struggle to produce. He wondered if Haru noticed that too. "I'm not unenthusiastic, just…"

"Just what?"

Opening his eyes, Rin glanced towards him. Haru was watching him was that open curiosity, more inquisitiveness than he had been for perhaps anything in Rin's memory. What was that all about? It couldn't have been the medication, surely, for even had he taken it that morning Rin new it didn't take effect that quickly. Was it whatever epiphany he'd undergone? He somehow seemed far more attentive, far more driven, than he had in… ever?

"Where's this curiosity coming from?" Rin asked instead of answering him.

Haru blinked guilelessly for a moment before shrugging. "You just seem kind of disinclined."

"Disinclined."

"Mm." Haru nodded. "I would have thought you'd be happy about coming back."

"I am."

"But?"

"Why does there have to be a 'but'?"

"Because there obviously is."

Rin couldn't help but shoot Haru a frown. Haru wasn't particularly perceptive most of the time, so where was this coming from? It was as disconcerting as his modest enthusiasm was relieving. "It's nothing."

"It's not nothing."

"Why do you care?"

Haru shrugged. He leant forwards slightly on the railing, fingers curling around the metal. "Because I care about you, I guess."

Rin found himself staring once more. He realised detachedly that any attempt at a smile had faded from his lips but he didn't care. He felt his eyes widen, his eyebrows rise incredulously. Haru had never said anything so… so blunt before. Nothing so sincerely open, which was saying something because he often didn't withhold his bluntness. Rin registered at the back of his mind that it was a mirror of his own words, of his own admission but yesterday, but the thought hardly spared consideration.

Because I care about you.

"Will you tell me what's wrong?" Haru asked, glancing at him sidelong even as he turned back towards the harbour.

Rin shook his head. "Nothing's wrong, exactly."

"But?"

Rin huffed once more. That damned 'but'. He didn't think there was going to be any way of getting around this. Haru was stubborn in more ways than one. He didn't get aggressively demanding, not as Rin knew he sometimes found himself, but he had his own manner of persistence.

Maybe I should just tell him, a quiet voice murmured in the back of his head. The thought was terrifying but Rin couldn't help but agree with the sentiment. Maybe he should. Maybe he should just…

"I just think I might not be as keen to leave Japan as I was before." As I was quite literally a week ago, he thought to himself.

"Why?" Haru asked. It wasn't a push. There was no demand in his words, and yet whether it was because of his feelings or some other unfathomable reason, Rin found he couldn't help but feel compelled to reply.

"Because things have changed," he said quietly. He couldn't look at Haru anymore, staring hard at his toes. To look at him would have been too embarrassing. "Because – because I don't really want to leave."

"You don't want to leave –"

"You," Rin finished with a sharp exhalation. God, but it was embarrassing, but he continued anyway. "I don't want to leave you. Because I like you."

Haru fell silent for a moment. For a long moment, in which Rin found he still couldn't look at him. He didn't know what he was going to see, didn't know if he expected confusion or surprise or perhaps – horribly – disgust. Would it seem wrong to Haru that he admitted he felt such a way? Would it change their friendship that -?

"I like you too. So what?"

Frowning, Rin glanced up at him. "What?"

Haru shrugged, his expression as unsurprised and unremarkable as ever. "Why does that make a difference?"

Rin struggled to find words. He didn't understand what Haru was saying, couldn't understand what he meant until his mind tidied the muddled mess his thoughts made of his comment. "No, I mean that I actually like you."

"Yes," Haru said with a nod. "And I like you. Why does that make a difference?"

Frown deepening, a flicker of frustration surfacing – because Haru clearly didn't understand what he was trying to convey – Rin turned more fully towards him and straightened, arms folding across his chest. "I mean that I like you as not just a friend."

"Okay."

"I mean as more than that."

"Okay?"

Rin sighed, even more frustrated. Was Haru being deliberately obtuse? Was he teasing him? That was a low blow if he was, though Rin didn't see Haru as the sort of person to do that. "I don't think you're quite understanding what I'm –"

He was silenced in a second. In a second because a second was all it took for Haru to step towards him, to raise a hand to the back of his head as though it was entirely natural to do so, and to lean towards him. A second in which Rin barely had a chance to draw a surprised breath before Haru leant into him and pressed his lips against his own.

It was only a brief touch. A brief press of warm softness against Rin's lips, the gentle nudge of a kiss that was entirely unexpected and so short that Rin didn't even have the chance to return the gesture before Haru was drawing away. He took half a step back, though his hand remained on the back of Rin's head for a moment longer. It remained as Rin could only stare back at him, eyes wide in surprise and blinking in confusion before it slowly slipped back to his side.

"I'm not stupid, you know," Haru chided, though without a touch of indignation that would suggest him affronted by the reality of his assumption. His expression still held that vague curiosity, that touch of openness that he'd worn all morning. "You've liked me for a while, haven't you?"

Had he? Rin could only continue to stare, stupefied in surprise as what had happened, what Haru had just admitted and exposed, slowly made sense to him. Had he liked Haru for a while? Probably. He probably had and hadn't even realised it. The reality of how deeply he did had only hit Rin recently, but it wasn't altogether unfamiliar. Perhaps he had known it in the back of his mind before then, an understanding just waiting to be realised.

And Haru had noticed. Haru, the unperceptive one, the person who had all the observation skills of a blind fish, had noticed. Was it that obvious? Rin didn't know. But more importantly than that, to the forefront of his mind, Rin realised…

Haru had just kissed him. He'd said he liked him back. He'd quiet literally declared as much in the middle of a public boardwalk in more than just words for anyone to see. He wasn't disgusted or deterred, nor even surprised. Apparently he'd just been waiting for Rin to say something.

Why didn't he say something then? Rin grumbed to himself, but even that thought was negligible. Little else could pervade his thoughts when he was staring at Haru's expectant gaze. Haru had just kissed him. He'd kissed him and said he liked him and – and –

"You like me?" Rin asked

"Yeah."

"Why didn't you say something?"

"Why didn't you?"

"Because –" Rin cut himself off. The list of reasons he hadn't was too long, yet in the face of reality and what could have been realised by the both of them – or by Rin at least, as Haru had apparently somehow already known both of their feelings all along – it seemed ludicrous that he hadn't spoken out.

Rin couldn't find his tongue, yet for once Haru appeared to take pity on him and lift the baton of speech. "Why would it matter to your plans if you liked me or not?"

Rin's mouth opened and closed several times before he could draw utterance. In the deepening glow of the sunset, the unfamiliar setting of the middle of Sydney and the situation itself, everything seemed just a little surreal to him. He couldn't even discern if he was ecstatic or simply flabbergasted by the realisation. "I… because…"

"Just because you're going overseas again doesn't mean that would change, does it?"

Rin stared at Haru, at the curiosity and vague confusion in his expression as though he were truly wondering what the problem was. As though he couldn't see it at all. And maybe he couldn't. Maybe he didn't think there was all that much that would change if Rin moved away. Would Rin really be able to pursue his feelings, to embrace both of his dreams, if he followed the path of one? The possibility seemed too good to be true.

"I don't know," he said hesitantly. "Would it?"

Haru shrugged. "Not for me. I'd still like you if you were living in Japan or moved Australia. Just because we wouldn't see one another as often doesn't mean that would change."

It couldn't be that simple. Surely it couldn't be so ideal. And yet in that moment, Rin felt as though he'd been given a gift all over again. At Haru's words, at the reiteration of his feelings spoken so offhandedly as though they were common fact rather than something tentatively explored, he felt a sudden upwelling of… something flood through him.

Rin didn't know. He didn't know if he could do it, if he could leave, and certainly not right away. Not after everything that had just happened and when the realisation of his feelings was so new. And yet the possibilities that suddenly spread before him filled him with unexpected excitement. A hesitant exposure of a possible future he hadn't contemplated yet seemed infinitely brighter spread before him.

"You really think that, don't you?" Rin said, a little stunned. He shook his head as Haru only shrugged. It was a gesture as good as a nod of agreement from him.

"You always seem to want to complicate things, Rin," Haru said.

"I'm the one who complicates things?" Rin raised an eyebrow. "After the fuss you've kicked up these past weeks?"

Haru regarded him mutely for a moment before replying. "The way I see it, it's simple. I just want to swim. You're the one who adds so many complicated layers."

"Complicated –" Rin began, but cut himself off. He wouldn't argue this. Not now. Not after what Haru had just said, after what he'd just done. Rin still couldn't quite believe it, and yet the increasing lightness in his chest bespoke an unconscious understand that was rapidly filling him with joy.

Shaking his head, Rin took a step towards Haru, closer, until there was barely a handbreadth between them. He didn't even care at that moment how it would look, what anyone would think. It didn't matter, and least of all because they were in Australia and away from the rest of the world. "Whatever," he murmured. "How about you just shut up?"

"You're the one who started it," Haru replied, staring at him openly and easily, as though Rin weren't close enough to feel the touch of his breath against his cheek when he spoke.

"Seriously, could you just shut up?" Rin said again, though he couldn't help the beginnings of a smile from touching his lips. That joy rising within him was impossible to ignore. "You kind of ruin the moment with how blasé you are about everything. You just told me you liked me the same way I like you and then decide to talk about something else? Back on track, please."

"I'm ruining the moment?"

"Shut up, Haru," Rin said once more, then didn't give him a chance to reply. He raised his own hand to the back of Haru's head as he drew towards him and, when Haru didn't protest, leant in for a kiss.

It was soft, gentle and hesitant and unlike any other kind of interaction that the two of them had ever shared. Theirs was always volatile, excitable, competitive, even, though mostly Rin would admit because of his actions. This was different. This was… this was in many ways just as good. Possibly even better.

Rin closed his eyes to the feeling of what barely days before he hadn't even contemplated. He lost himself in the moment, in the feel of Haru's lips on his own, the softness of hair curled around his fingers, the feel of Haru's hand as it settled against his waist as though it was entirely natural for it to be there.

Maybe it was. Definitely it was. Rin didn't think anything could possibly feel more right.

There was time for everything else. Time to think about Australia, to worry about the future. To consider what Rin would do about what had happened at the pool but days before, because something would definitely have to be done. But not right then. Not in that moment.

Right then, the rest of the world ceased to exist entirely.