based on a headcanon by @scriptingsouls, of how MakoHaru’s first kiss might go in season 3′s upcoming episode 6 - i just added bells and whistles to the already very beautiful scene described to me ;-;
“Hey, Haru?”
Makoto’s voice is quiet, his gaze fixed into the distance as he leans forward, arms resting on the railing of the overpass.
“What is it?”
Haru’s words are curt, sharp, though he doesn’t mean them to be. He settles beside Makoto, brushing lightly against him in silent apology. It feels familiar, being like this, Makoto’s warmth by his side - though it’s the sound of traffic that accompanies them now, rather than the crickets of Iwatobi.
It had been almost too much of a comfort, seeing Makoto at the gates of his university. His breath had rushed out of him, tension draining, leaving only heavy, painful exhaustion.
“What are you doing here?” he’d struggled to say.
“I was in the area, and I haven’t walked with you in awhile.” Makoto had said with his small, worried smile.
Hadn’t they? Haru wonders now, distantly. He can barely remember the past few days, can barely remember what he’d done, where he’d gone. The last clear memory-
“Haru,” Makoto says, jerking Haru out of his thoughts.
He’s looking at Haru, gaze steady, smile sad now, and Haru still doesn’t understand how he smiles when he’s anything but happy.
“He’s wrong, you know.”
Haru’s breath catches. Don’t, he thinks, I don’t want to talk about this.
“He hasn’t been around, so he doesn’t understand,” But Makoto doesn’t relent, “Swimming with you, and being in a relay with you, that’s what helped Rin find his path again. The thing he’d lost sight of, the sight you showed him again, that was something only you could’ve done. You saved him.”
No, Haru would say if he wasn’t so tired, it was because of me he’d even lost his path.
“And he’s not the only one,” the urgency in the words draws back the gaze he hadn’t realised had drifted, “Haru, you saved me too.”
“The distance we swam everyday - the distance those fishermen couldn’t cross - every time I was afraid to try, I just had to look at you swimming beside me, and everything seemed so simple, so safe. I just had to go where you were.”
“Makoto-”
Makoto doesn’t - seemingly cannot stop. It’s as if he’s been holding all this back, so tightly, for so long, it’s impossible to.
“Do you remember, Haru? When my goldfish died? Seeing them floating like that, in the water they’d always loved... just like when you- when you almost drowned in that river -”
Makoto’s shaking now, hands clenched tightly around the railing. Haru watches him, almost afraid, Makoto’s name barely more than a breath from his lips.
“I had to see you. I had to see you - that was all I could think of. If I couldn’t hear your voice, feel your warmth, know that you were safe, I - I don’t know what I would have become.”
You never told me any of this, Haru wants to say, but then again, weren’t there many things he should’ve said to Makoto that he never did?
“I ran desperately to find you, and it was like everything was closing around me, my mind was going dark, and there was nothing except thoughts of finding you. Then,” Makoto smiles, voice painfully soft now, “you called my name.”
Haru remembers this, remembers Makoto’s wild eyes as he looked to where Haru was standing, remembers the way the sunset had coloured Makoto red, and his gaze dark.
“You were there. Like you knew. Like you were waiting for me. And you saved me then, just like you’ve been saving me since we were young, just like you saved me when I was being an idiot, jumping into the ocean in the middle of a storm.”
“It’s not like that,” Haru murmurs, glancing away. Because it wasn’t. Haru just happened to be there, at the right time - he wasn’t this... saviour that Makoto’s making him out to be.
“You’ve always been there by my side, Haru,” and Makoto’s stepping closer, hand reaching out, pleading, “Swimming with you was all I ever needed to feel safe. Swimming with you was all I ever needed to be at peace- so he’s wrong, Haru! For me, what I felt for Haru, swimming with Haru, is the opposite of suffering!”
Green eyes shine with unshed tears, and now, only now does Makoto look away.
And it’s as though there’s a break in the fog that’s been blanketing them for years - as though Haru finally sees what’s been waiting for him, what’s always been there.
He loves him.
He loves him.
Haru’s breath is unsteady, eyes wide, and his throat tightens as he watches parted lips take a single breath before Makoto turns back to him, smile pained.
“I still want to swim with you, Ha-”
Haru kisses him.
His hands grasp at Makoto’s coat, pulling him in, and Haru kisses him.
He wants that too - he wants to swim with Makoto. To go back to the freedom of childhood, when it was just the two of them, diving into the river in the middle of summer, fishing rods cast aside. When it was just them, peering at that same river that had frozen over in winter, Makoto taking his hand with a wide smile, assuring him that “It’s okay, Haru-chan! Spring will come soon!”.
When it was just them, and the water, no rivalries, no competition, only a child’s contentment.
And he wants the future, he wants to swim, knowing Makoto’s there with him, to feel that steady presence by his side, to see that hand stretched out towards him, to offer his own.
He pulls away, blinking up at widened green eyes.
“Haru...?”
“Makoto... me too. I want to swim with you too. Always.”
“Haru-” choked, awed, with a shuddering breath, “Haru-! I love you- I-”
And wasn’t that what they’ve been trying to tell each other for years? Words they haven’t been able to say for far too long, and of course Makoto would be the one to say it first, would be the one to give Haru the courage to say it.
“I love you too, Makoto.”
Hands grip at Haru’s arms as Makoto leans in, pressing trembling kisses to Haru’s lips.
“I love you, Haru-” he repeats with every breath, and Haru’s smiling, pushing in closer, closer, heartbeat against heartbeat.
They break away, Makoto’s forehead pressed to his, green eyes meeting blue. Makoto’s grin matches his, and then Makoto’s laughing through tears Haru hadn’t realised had fallen.
“It’s okay now, Makoto,” Haru says, echoing words he’d always said to a crying Makoto in childhood, reaching up to brush away the tears.
“Mm,” Makoto says, catching Haru’s hand in his, pressing a kiss to chilled fingers, “As long as Haru’s here, it’ll be okay.”
