Chapter Text
"You know, Tachibana, with a little bit of work you could be a threat,” Sousuke says.
He leans against the wall in the darkened hall, expression cool. Makoto inclines his head.
“Yamazaki-kun.”
“Sousuke,” Sousuke corrects.
Makoto attempts to hide his surprise and pauses. A painful silence blooms. “Makoto then,” he allows finally.
Sousuke pushes off the wall, all liquid grace, and glides past Makoto.
“See you around, Makoto,” he exhales in a rush of teal.
“You’re fucking with Haru’s head.”
“Yeah? Well tell your little boyfriend to quit messing with Rin then. He needs to back o-“
Makoto slams a hand into his chest and fuck, if it isn’t weird to see Tachibana Makoto flushed and aggressive. Sousuke feels the perverse urge to laugh.
Makoto’s eyes won’t let up though, glaring into his like he’s looking for cracks, looking for some way to shut him off. Well Sousuke is not Nanase, he's not gonna bend over and take Makoto’s shit simply because Makoto uses those eyes on him. He stares back, giving as good as he’s got, Makoto’s hand wound in the front of his shirt.
Makoto eventually relents, releasing him like he would a leaf in the wind. He just lets go, dangling his open hand there for a second before he turns.
“Stay the fuck away from him,” he says in farewell.
Sousuke lets out the breath he’s been holding.
Fucking swimming, man.
Sousuke bounds up the steps to the train station two at a time.
”Oi, Rin! I gotta-“
He freezes.
Rin has Nanase pressed up against a pillar, going full dentist on him, by the sounds of it. Their hands are in each other’s coats and when Rin rolls his hips up against Nanase’s, that black-haired bastard makes a wet strangled sound in return.
Vaguely, he registers footsteps behind him.
“Excuse me, Yamazaki-kun, have you seen Haru aroun-“
Makoto steps up beside him, and chokes. Sousuke turns, wanting to do something, not sure if he should push Makoto back down the stairs or confess that he didn’t know either or laugh at how ridiculous this is because of course Rin would find someone else, Sousuke’s never been enough.
Makoto’s expression is fucking pathetic. He looks like he’s just been handed a box of dead kittens or something.
It’s the last straw. This expression is even worse than those damn puppy eyes Makoto does when he’s trying to be convincing. Sousuke stumbles back down the stairs.
Behind him, Makoto starts like he’s had a glass of water thrown in his face. He turns quickly and they descend in silence. At the bottom of the stairs he speaks up shakily.
“Sousuke…”
“Don’t.”
Fucking Tachibana Makoto and his unrelenting quest to feel sorry for everyone else, like he hasn’t just seen the boy of his dreams swapping spit with Rin.
Rin.
Soususke grinds his teeth to stop the tears stinging in his eyes.
He leaves Makoto there and doesn’t see him again for a long time.
Makoto is drunk. Soooo drunk right now.
Finally.
The lightness in his head and the pounding of his heart could almost be mistaken for happiness, for joy. He could be coiled at the starting block, awaiting the call. Maybe he’s laughing breathlessly with the twins, half-heartedly pushing away their sticky kisses. Maybe he’s even pulling Haru out of the bath, letting his hand linger in Haru’s, stomach fluttering.
He takes another drink.
Makoto puts down his pencil to peer at his buzzing phone. It’s Haru.
“Hey Haru,” he murmurs.
“I made it,” Haru says simply.
Makoto struggles momentarily. There’s so much he wants to say, but now is not the time.
This is about Haru, he reminds himself.
“Haru…I… I knew you could do it, you’re-“
He swallows, throat gone tight. He knows Haru is rolling his eyes right now, in that strange, affectionate way of his.
He clears his throat.
“Congratulations Haru,” he says warmly, proud to hear no tremor in his words.
Sousuke had forgotten what being around Rin was like. He’d exploded into Sousuke’s quiet apartment two hours ago, flushed and grinning and so damn loud that Sousuke had momentarily thought something was wrong.
It wasn’t, everything was perfect.
“The Olympics!” Rin had roared, before he’d tackled Sousuke in a hug that felt so right, so natural, even if it’d been two years since the last one.
Rin chattered constantly from that point on. He was going back to Iwatobi for a week, Haru was coming, please say you’ll come visit, we’re gonna have a party and everything…
And Sousuke sits back and watches the chaos, grinning like a little fucking kid.
Naturally, Haru had failed to mention the entirety of Iwatobi would be at this ‘little get-together’ Rin had planned.
It felt like that, anyway, Makoto muses, as he leans against the cool exterior of Haru’s house finishing his third beer. Haru and Rin had been at the center of a barely controlled maelstrom all night, friends and teammates and fans circling and smiling and bowing. Makoto isn’t sure how Haru’s doing it. The Haru he knew would’ve snuck away long ago, but he seems to be a different man now.
To be fair, Makoto is a different Makoto as well.
“Tachibana Makoto,” someone says dryly.
He looks up and it’s Sousuke on the steps above him, a case of beer in hand, trademark disinterested smirk present.
Makoto looks away.
“Yamazaki.”
He’s being curt and he knows it, but he can't shake the feeling that if he looks Sousuke in the eye he’ll be forced to recall unpleasant things. He doesn’t need that now. What he needs is…
“Another beer?”
Sousuke descends and presses one into Makoto’s open hand, not waiting for a reply.
“Thanks,” Makoto mumbles.
Sousuke leans against the house and looks out at the throng of people, softly illuminated by the dusky sky.
“So you’re being cheerful,” he smirks sarcastically. “Taking a page out of Nanase’s book?”
Makoto snorts.
“I wish,” he says (a little too bitterly, fuck Makoto, stop that), waving his beer in Haru’s general direction.
Sousuke’s clear teal eyes take in Haru’s pleasant smile and his crush of admirers and he lets out a small laugh.
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. Nanase Haruka: life of the party.”
He turns to Makoto, grinning easily.
“And there’s not even a pool in sight.”
Makoto laughs, feeling his chest loosen a bit. So he’s not the only one.
Somehow, he and Sousuke stay there the rest of the night, finishing the case of beer and then some.
Makoto calls him two days later.
“You going to the thing at Rin’s?” he asks when Sousuke picks up.
Sousuke wipes the sweat from his brow, sucking in a deep breath in an attempt to even out his breathing.
“Sorry,” comes Makoto’s hesitant tone, “Is this a bad time?”
“Nah,” Sousuke exhales. “Just in the middle of a run actually.” He huffs an exasperated laugh. “I’m so fucking out of shape…”
Makoto laughs.
“Hardly,” he says breezily.
Sousuke pauses. Innocent-puppy-Makoto says what?
“Well, are you?” Makoto repeats.
”Out of shape?” Sousuke replies, puzzled.
“No, going to Rin’s!”
Makoto is laughing again.
“Right. Uh yeah, why?” He stops walking, leaning his weight onto his right foot, hip cocked jauntily. “Are you just making sure I’ll have more beer with me this time?”
“Believe it or not, I’m not using you for your alcohol,” Makoto fires back. “I’m actually wondering if you needed a ride.”
A pause.
“I can drive now,” Makoto says unnecessarily.
For fuck’s sake, Sousuke thinks. A damn child.
But he’s grinning in spite of himself as he accepts.