Archive of Our Own ^beta

The first time they have sex, Haruka drowns.

It feels different than what he remembers from elementary school. Granted, there wasn’t much to be remembered in the first place, with his fever having clouded his mind even before he slipped on the river bank. But still, the sharp coolness of water caressing his heated skin felt pleasantly numbing, even liberating in some twisted way.

The sex does not.

Which is just as well because, even though being with Makoto has always felt as freeing as swimming, the feelings both evoke in him are hardly similar. Being in water, moving through something so effervescent feels like taking a fresh breath of air after spending hours in a stifling classroom. Being with Makoto… Well, it’s still hard to put into words how being with Makoto feels because ever since he was a baby, Haruka almost never separated from his best friend. And the times he did only further convinced him that living without Makoto was something he never wanted to experience.

Desiring Makoto is, however, a different story.

He doesn’t think he will ever get used to the heavy burning sensation of arousal melting his insides and fogging his mind. It scares him, how hard it is to think in this state, how quickly his body betrays him. The thoughts he does have are scattered, almost primal, and it takes every ounce of his self-control to keep them at bay, not let them overwhelm his already weak will and, most importantly, Makoto.

He should’ve known it would be impossible to stay afloat.

But Makoto’s kisses are too sweet, stealing his breath away, making Haruka’s skin flush and sweaty. His hands, so strong their friends often joke that Makoto could bend metal if he tried, card through Haruka’s hair as if sifting through silky strands; careful in their caresses, painfully adoring. His breathing is ragged when he pulls away, immediately pressing his lips to Haruka’s jaw, nipping a trail of burning kisses up to his ear.

“Haru,” he pants, voice barely above whisper, but Haruka still feels the tug in his chest grow stronger, pulling him down to the unfathomable depths as if in answer to a hypnotizing call of a siren from the old tales.

Only Makoto isn’t a siren. There’s not a trace of cunning in his eyes as he gazes up at Haru, his pupils blown apart not in hunger for a new prey but in broken adoration. If anything, he himself is a drowned man, has been one ever since the same feeling slithered its way into his lungs. But unlike Haruka, he never resisted, instead letting it overwhelm him fully, body and soul alike.

And as he watches Makoto part his legs, the skin of his inner thighs soft and pale, so different from his blushing dazed face, Haruka thinks: Of course. Whether it was saving Rei in the middle of a storm or finding a dream for himself, or falling in love with Haruka, — he always dove right in without a second thought even if it meant losing a part of himself he would never get back.

Makoto has always been the bolder one between the two of them, really.

His hands tremble as they slide up Makoto’s legs, but it’s alright because Makoto’s whole body is trembling too, and Haruka can pretend that he’s still in control of himself just for a little while longer. He kisses Makoto’s shoulder, then his mouth. He’s stalling, it’s obvious, but Makoto only deepens the kiss, one of his hands gripping Haruka’s shoulder while the other covers Haruka’s hand on his thigh, urging him to move until Haruka’s fingers dig into the soft flesh of Makoto’s cheeks and then dip into the hot crease between them.

It’s quiet, surprisingly so, as he slides his slicked fingers into the warmth of Makoto’s body. He’s soft, pliant, he must have prepared himself earlier, and the realization is strangely suffocating, even more so than the feeling of being inside Makoto. Haruka startles when he feels Makoto’s body move, one of his hands coming up to cup Haruka’s cheek as Makoto raises himself to kiss the side of his face. Not a small part of him feels guilty — it’s his job to make Makoto more comfortable, not the other way round — but he still turns his head to catch Makoto’s mouth into a kiss, the tender familiarity of his lips putting him into a peaceful trance.

He is drifting, letting Makoto pull him lower as he pushes his hips against Haruka’s fingers. Up and down, back and forth, like the endless cadence of ocean waves. But it doesn’t last long. Haruka doesn’t know what sets it off. Is it the almost silent whimper Makoto lets out as Haruka’s fingers rub against his walls just so? The wild stutter of his hips? The numb pain piercing Haruka’s lip when Makoto bites it? He doesn’t know, and he can’t bring himself to care, not when he's so hard and throbbing that he feels like he’ll go mad if he doesn’t fuck Makoto right this second but especially if he does.

“Please, Haru~”

And why would Haruka refuse him now if he had never been able to do this before?

It’s impossible, Haruka thinks as he finally pushes into Makoto. It’s impossible not to listen to him, not to follow him, not to love him, not to want him like this, spread out so openly, eagerly, with a body so hot and so tight that Haruka feels he is going to burst if he moves even a little bit, so he doesn’t. He can’t push in and he can’t pull out, he is stuck in this delicious whirlwind of intoxicating pleasure, not able to do anything, not even breathe in, so sure he’ll sink, and what happens to him then? He doesn’t know the answer and he’s too much of a coward to find out.

He bites his lip in frustration and to hold back the inhuman sound threatening to spill out of his throat. Haruka is so tense, muscles taut and aching as if fighting against the merciless currents of the stormy sea. He's weak, so weak but he simply can't give up, so sure he'll never recover if he does.

But then he opens his eyes, his vision blurry and his lashes wet, almost as if he is actually underwater, and sees Makoto, his hands twisted in the sheets, his skin glistening, his head thrown back into the pillows, baring the flushed neck and chest, completely at Haruka’s mercy.

He has never seen anything as beautiful in his entire life.

Distantly, he remembers hearing somewhere that the most difficult part about drowning isn’t the lack of oxygen itself or the realization that you’re about to perish. It’s the unshakable urge to take a breath, to give up on your life knowingly, to let death into your lungs when all your body is seeking is salvation.

But wouldn’t giving up be a salvation on its own? The sudden thought strikes him unexpectedly, his mind a jumbled mess of overwhelming sensations. Isn’t embracing the water’s deathly caress better than suffering from unending pain for eternity? Is it really worth staying in this suffocating limbo when everything in him screams to let it go, to breathe in, to be free? 

He watches a bead of sweat slowly slide from Makoto’s clavicle down his chest, leaving a glistening trail in between his pecs. Haruka heaves out a shuddering sigh and leans forward, presses his dry lips to Makoto’s skin, follows the salty trail lower with his tongue. He hears Makoto’s sigh and feels his fingers running through his hair affectionately.

It’s okay, Haruka doesn’t need to hear the words spoken aloud to know that’s what Makoto means, and this simple gesture makes him press his face even harder into the firmness of Makoto’s chest, raining kisses onto his skin. Makoto trembles and arches his body into Haruka’s caress, and Haruka opens his mouth in a silent scream as he feels himself sliding even deeper into his beloved.

“Makoto,” he rasps as his hips stutter forward until he’s buried to the hilt.

“Makoto,” he practically whimpers as his groin pulses from heat and pressure, making him gulp for air but all it does is fill his senses with Makoto’s scent and taste, and it's such a sweet agony.

He mouths at Makoto's skin, tasting, kissing, sucking, as he gives his first real thrust. It's clumsy and he's too weak to actually leave the tight heat of Makoto’s body, so his second and third thrusts come right after, and Makoto's breath hitches, his long, firm and perfect legs squeeze Haruka’s middle, wrap around his waist, his heels digging into the small of Haruka’s back. It brings Haruka so impossibly close to him that he finally gives up on trying to hold himself back, lets the feelings he repressed for so long take control of him, and it feels so fucking good to sink deep into Makoto, deeper than he already is, and Haruka would laugh at how ironic it is, but he's too busy sucking on Makoto’s nipple and chasing the heat of his body.

“Makoto Makoto Makoto,” he sobs silently into Makoto’s neck as he grabs his boyfriend's hips and grinds into him, feeling Makoto's hardness slide wetly against his abdomen. Makoto moans brokenly, his fingers digging into the skin of Haruka's back and ass as if trying to push him even deeper.

It's surreal. He's drowned, yet he feels more alive than ever. He's wrapped in Makoto completely, sinking with him into the unknown, but he never wants to leave this sweet trap even if it means he never gets to feel the warmth of the sun on his skin. But he doesn't really need it anyway; nothing matters when Makoto is here with him, when Makoto is already his everything.

He feels the body around him tense and shudder, sucking him into the depths of his own orgasm, and Haruka loses himself. He feels weightless, boneless, non-existent, like how he thinks one's supposed to feel after drowning. Only he is alive, and he's in Makoto’s embrace, and it's Makoto's lips kissing the wetness off his eyelids and it's Makoto's hand wiping away the tears spilling from his eyes.

They are still wrapped up in each other, so close Haruka doesn't know where his body ends and Makoto's begins. There's a peculiar fullness inside him, threatening to overwhelm him, and he remembers seeing movie characters coughing up water after drowning. He reaches for Makoto then and presses his mouth to Makoto’s lips, breathing him in as Makoto sighs into the kiss, but it only makes him feel fuller, almost filled to the brim.

It seems strange, but it's not, not really. Everything with Makoto has been a constant give and take, from the moment Haruka first held his hand to this. Even if he knows he has just given up a part of himself, willingly sinking to the bottom of his desires, he isn't alone. Makoto is with him, and whatever Haruka has given to him during their love making, Makoto has returned just as much, if not more. 

And as he feels Makoto’s breathing even out, he thinks that it's alright. He's not afraid of sinking if it's with Makoto.

Haruka will willingly drown himself time after time if it means he gets to feel Makoto's body shudder in pleasure against him again.