"Nii-chan!"
Ren …
"Makoto!"
Dad …
"No, gods! Aki, do something! Makoto! MAKOTO!"
"Mom …"
He opened his eyes, heart pounding, chest tight. The pillow was wet just beneath his cheek, and he felt a stray tear slide over his nose to soak it further.
He blinked several times, hardly moving an inch other than the lift and fall from the heavy breathing of his shoulders. There was so much distress in his mother's voice, so much panic. It lingered, echoing around the room, squeezing his lungs in an unforgiving fist.
What happened?
He couldn't remember the dream. There had been nothing but darkness and voices — screaming.
His family … They were far away. Looking for him? Crying over his absence? Worrying?
I'm okay, he wanted to tell them. I'm fine. I'll be home soon, please don't worry. I just have to …
"Cross the ocean." The whisper left his lips and flattened the air in the room. Everything was silent, was still, and his mother's voice no longer lived there.
His fingers curled into fists. It took a long time to let his pulse calm, to begin breathing evenly, to stop the tears from welling up again, and eventually the knot in his throat unwound, and he exhaled a long and steady breath. He turned over on his back, blinked up at the dark ceiling, wondering what time it was. The curtains on the glass doors were heavy and didn't let in much light, but it was undoubtedly a new day. He could hear the caw of the seagulls outside.
He mindlessly watched the blades of the fan spin in circles for an amount of time he didn't process, until everything turned numb and he convinced himself that there was nothing to be concerned about. There was still time before he had to face the sea, and even when that time came, he would be resilient for the sake of his family, to get home to them. He needed to get home to them.
He sat up and let another breath fall out of his lungs, then finally settled in an accepted wakefulness, and looked over to find a note sticking halfway out from underneath the pillow. He pulled it out.
I'm going to town. I'll be back before sunset. Use whatever you need. Don't worry about it.
He read it far more than once and was surprised when he realized a small smile was quietly easing onto the corner of his lips. When he noticed it, he let it fall and folded the paper back up. He stuck it back beneath the pillow — simply because there was no other place to put it — then climbed out of bed and ventured out of the room.
It was much brighter in the rest of the cottage, as all the windows and doors had been left open. The sea was alive and loud to him, but he didn't acknowledge it, and instead walked up to the refrigerator to find another note stuck to the door with a dolphin magnet.
There's rice already cooked. The fish are fresh from this morning.
Makoto opened the refrigerator to find five carefully filleted slabs of mackerel, a container of rice, and endless seaweed options to pick from. There were also mushrooms, tomatoes, daikon, ginger, yuzu, pears, apples, cherries, and more boiled bamboo shoots. There was nothing along the lines of processed meats or things that came in bottles and packages. No eggs, no milk, no tofu, no noodles. There was what appeared to be homemade dashi stock.
He raked a hand through his hair, stomach already growling. He wasn't used to handling fresh ingredients. Ever since he'd moved to Tokyo, it was take-out and instant ramen, maybe scrambled eggs or a sandwich, but there was nothing convenient in here other than the fruit.
He munched on a handful of cherries as he opened cabinets and searched through the rest of the kitchen.
No bread. A bucket of uncooked rice. No cereal or chips. Plenty of spices — all of which were kept in reusable glass jars that had been labeled. No pastry snacks or sodas. Flour. Sugar. Sweet potatoes. No chocolate.
"Why?" he groaned, thumping his forehead against the edge of the cabinet before closing it and returning to the refrigerator.
He pulled out the rice, a bowl of kelp, and reluctantly grabbed a slab of mackerel. It took him a minute to familiarize himself with where all the pans and utensils were. And it took even longer of a minute to sniff at all of the spices and decide that he wouldn't make life complicated and just stick with salt. There was oil, thankfully, though he couldn't have guessed what kind, as it was in an unlabeled glass bottle sitting next to the stove. He sprinkled some in a pan, threw the fish in it, and dumped some salt on top. Then he stared at it.
Ten minutes later, he was squealing through his teeth and holding out a pan of flames at arms' length as he ran it out the door and threw it at the sand. It landed upside down and snuffed out almost immediately, but the smoke was still hovering around the entirety of the inside of the cottage and curling wispily out of the windows.
He whined and plopped down in the doorway with his arms up on his knees and his head hanging.
If he was in Iwatobi, his mom would have prepared tamagoyaki and salmon with a bowl of miso soup and pickled vegetables on the side — just in time for him to roll out of bed and indulge. Her timing was perfect. And then of course Ren and Ran would have complained about wanting soufflé pancakes until she gave in and filled the house with the warm scent of buttered syrup hardly fifteen minutes later — and he would have eaten that too.
His stomach growled.
He pushed himself up with a sigh and resigned to being a vegetarian for the day.
He let the smell of smoke gradually clear out of the cottage before he grabbed the pan from outside — kicking sand over the burnt fish with bitterness — and then closed all of the windows and doors.
He spent half an hour scrubbing the char out of the pan, ate a second helping of plain rice, then wandered through the cottage and pondered every corner and crevice there was to look at.
Haru's grandmother seemed to have been fond of using the seashells for art projects, as there were plenty of figurines — mostly of dolphins — and framed sculptures and ornaments on the walls. Also there were hundreds of them just around, piled in baskets, displayed in small windowed cabinets, lining the entire boarder of the ceiling. He found a collection of books stacked on an end table, all dedicated to the labeling, symbolism, and origins of seashells. So he plucked up the one on top and curled up in the corner of the couch to read it.
Hours later, this turned into him circling the room with one of the books open in his hands, glancing back and forth between the shells and the pages, learning their identities and what they represented. He got hungry again at some point and so ate his fill of fruit and yet more rice, and then returned to learning about the shells.
Time seemed to warp in the cottage, moving neither fast nor slow, possibly not moving at all. He was simultaneously bored and slightly appreciative of the quiet and lack of adult things to do. He usually didn't spend much time at home. If he did it was just to sleep and shower and sometimes do homework.
Day-to-day, he was normally found attending classes, studying in libraries, or working part-time at the local aquatic center as a lifeguard. His free time was usually spent treating himself to cakes and coffees at cafés and sitting at the outdoor tables, especially with friends or classmates, or visiting pet shops to pet the cats and whistle with the birds. Sometimes, he conceded to going clubbing or bar hopping, though he wasn't particularly inclined to initiate nights like that. He just went if he was invited and tried his best to stay sober, so as not to embarrass himself. (Things had happened once or twice. And that was one or two times too many.) Karaoke though, he was fond of, and it was definitely a regular suggestion he offered whenever any of his friends asked how they should spend their time.
He'd never realized how constantly in motion his life was. It seemed like this was the most time he'd ever spent pacing in circles alone.
He used to enjoy lazy days at home when he was living with his family. Those days usually meant playing video games with his siblings, helping his dad clean out a new corner of the attic, only to get lost in photo albums or love letters that his parents had written to each other as teenagers, and/or watching his mom make chocolate cake and licking all the spoons clean before Ren or Ran could get to them. He enjoyed family movie nights, ordering pizza and playing board games, or just lounging around in the living room with his parents while the twins ran in circles around the house.
In Tokyo, he lived in a tiny apartment with himself and his reflection in the bathroom mirror — there wasn't much to stick around at home for.
He sighed, closed the book in his hands and set it back down on the end table as he crossed over to the front door and opened it.
The sun was still rather high, though it was starting to creep into the evening hours of the day. The sky was clear again, bright blue and harmless. The sea was even and unbothered, a much deeper, richer blue in constant motion. The breeze was light and cooling.
He frowned when a small ache blossomed behind his ribs.
It was all a beautiful and familiar sight, one that he used to love staring at for hours on end. One that, not at all long ago, had been a source of comfort and nostalgia rather than tension and reluctance. The sea used to be one of his favorite things — but looking at it now, it felt so unfamiliar, so foreign and deceptive, and it saddened him, how quickly that had changed.
He closed the door and returned to reading … and some more hours later, this turned into him sprawled out on the couch with all of his limbs hanging over the sides and the book covering his face. He wasn't sleeping. He was just lamenting time.
The door opened.
He popped his head up, the book flipped over onto his chest, and he found himself having a staredown with Haru who was halfway inside, peering at him with those blue eyes — like Makoto had gone and knocked over his grandmother's urn on purpose.
And for a good long time that was it. Haru didn't say anything, and neither did Makoto, and he eventually had to push himself up onto his elbows to save his neck from pulling, but he elected to be stubborn and stay silent simply because he was starving and irritated from having absolutely nothing to do all day.
Haru narrowed his eyes just the smallest bit, and then very intentionally made a show of pushing the door all the way open, keeping his gaze locked on Makoto all the while. He stepped fully inside and made an even bigger show of opening the windows, still staring Makoto down as though daring him to say something about it. Makoto did not, but he also didn't look away from Haru either.
"There's burnt fish in the sand," Haru said, once all the front windows had been opened. "The seagulls didn't even want it."
Makoto willed the blush not to rush up to the tops of his ears, but that was a useless thing to plea for, and it always had been. He rolled his lip between his teeth, then just decided to own it. "I can't cook."
"I can see that."
Makoto sat all the way up as Haru made his way to the back of the cottage and opened those windows too. The sound of the ocean filled the entire room now, and Makoto could feel the hair standing up on his arms.
"Why don't you have a TV?" he accused, not at all wary about his tone and the irritation that slipped out through his voice.
"Why do you need a TV?" Haru shot back, venturing over to the coffee table in front of where Makoto sat. Though now he'd dropped his gaze as though half pretending that Makoto wasn't even there. He plopped down a laden sack.
"I can only read about seashells for so many hours."
"You could have gone for a swim," Haru said, and by the intentional way that he glanced directly up at him, Makoto knew that he knew what he was saying. But before Makoto responded, Haru looked away again and added, "Or, you could have learned how not to burn fish."
Makoto bit at the inside of his cheek. He knew if he spoke right now his words would not be pleasant, and even if in the moment he could've cared less about that, he knew looking back in hindsight later on, he'd feel bad about it. He still had to stay in the same cottage with Haru for a little while longer. He would rather it not be anymore awkward than it already was. So he said nothing at all. And, with a sigh, Haru dropped it as well.
He opened his sack and started tossing things at Makoto's face. "Shorts, shirts, underwear …" He pulled out a pair of sandals and stuck them out under Makoto's nose with an unamused look on his face. "Your feet are big. This is all you get."
Makoto took them. "Fine. Sorry to have inconvenienced you."
Haru turned his gaze away and didn't respond. Makoto could swear he caught the faintest eye-roll and him shaking his head to himself though. "The one at the store said something about unlimited messaging and a 30-day data plan, but it's like ten yen for every six seconds of a call."
He pulled out a cellphone, and Makoto immediately forgot all of his annoyance and snatched it out of his hand, standing to walk around the couch, heart pounding.
"There's a squid boat going to Chibu the day after tomorrow," Haru's voice said somewhere distantly. "They said they could take you."
"Oh … Okay." He was already dialing his mother's number. He put the phone up to his ear.
"We're sorry. The number you are trying to reach is unavailable. Please try again later."
He pursed his lips, hung up, and dialed the number again, this time paying extra special attention to the keypad to be sure that he didn't press any of the wrong buttons.
"We're sorry. The number you are trying to reach is unavailable. Please try again later."
He sighed, hung up, and dialed his dad's number.
"We're sorry. The number you are trying to reach—"
"What?" He growled, redialed, and got the same exact response.
He was hardly aware of Haru's eyes watching him as he walked in circles around the cottage, holding the phone out, searching in different spots just in case the cell signal was bad. It didn't appear so on screen, but every time he tried dialing one of his parents, he received the same generic automated message, and the calls never even rang once.
He was standing on top of one of the end tables by the time he puffed out a breath and gave up. His parents' were the only phone numbers he had memorized. Everyone else had always just been a contact in his phone that took hardly two taps to get to, so he'd never needed to have them memorized. But his phone was probably at the bottom of the ocean somewhere — who knew — and he had no other numbers to call but the two.
He dropped his arm down by his side and glance over to Haru who had at some point taken a seat on the couch and crossed one leg over the other as he waited. Now he was leaning his elbow on his knee with his cheek in his hand, staring up at Makoto standing on top of his furniture, but all he had to say was, "Did they not answer?"
Makoto stepped down from the table and plopped on the opposite end of the couch, back falling despondently against the cushions. "It didn't even go through. I think the service out here is shit."
Haru looked away with a breath and tipped his head further into his palm.
They sat like that for a long time, neither of them saying anything.
The sea breeze weaved through the room with the smell of salt and misty humidity. The sound of the waves, for just that moment, became white noise in the background and he stopped hearing it. The despair was too loud. His chest was pinched too tightly.
He just wanted to talk to his mother.
He closed his eyes and heaved a breath. "What were you saying about a squid boat?"
"There's one leaving for Chibu the day after tomorrow."
Makoto's brow bent on its own. That was such a long time from now — to not be able to tell them he was okay. How long had it been already? How much time had they spent worrying so far? How did he get here?
He slumped forward and buried his face in his hands. "I want to go home," he moaned, quietly and more so to himself than anything. A knot tried to push its way into his throat.
Haru was quiet for a minute, and Makoto didn't have the mind to care or read what was in that silence. After a while though, he asked, "What do you want to eat?"
Makoto scoffed out a lamenting sigh and slumped forward even more, this time dropping his face into his knees. "Chocolate."
"… What do you want that's not chocolate?"
His shoulders sank. "I don't care," he mumbled.
There was a pause of hesitation, but then Haru got up and went into the kitchen.