Vol 2 Chapter 10 (1/2)

Chapter 10 – Feel

–– Before practice begins, I’d like you to come to the back of the pool.

Summoned by Ikuya, Haruka unwillingly walked after Makoto and Asahi with a reluctant expression. It’s bound to be something bothersome anyways. It stank of the presentiment that he’ll get caught up in something useless.

When they went to the back of the pool, Ikuya was standing there with a serious face. There’s a hole dug at his feet, and a cookie tin is placed inside it with its lid off. And a bunch of photos in Ikuya’s hand.

“Everyone, thanks for coming. Now, I’m going to break away from the past. So, I’d like you to see it through.”

Oh dear. Just as Nao had told him, it seems that he’s intending to reveal himself. He leaves the complaining to Asahi.

“Why do we gotta see it through? S’thing like this.”

“Aren’t we in the same first year boys’ group?”

Ikuya’s long eyelashes quiver.

“Like I care. Do it alone!”

Makoto grabbing his arm as he tries to turn on his heels, Asahi grimaced.

“All right, Ikuya-kun. We’ll see it through properly.”

From Makoto’s words, Ikuya’s stiff expression suddenly softens.

“Okay.”

Ikuya puts one photo into the cookie tin.

“Sports day.”

Then, he puts in another one and another one.

“Amus.e.m.e.nt park. Playing in the sand. Bath. New Year’s. Kite flying……”

There were three people in every photo.

“This is a photo of when Natsu-nii won a compet.i.tion for the first time. This is when Satomi’s essay won a prize. And this is when my picture got the Mayor’s Prize.”

It was a photo where they were holding a portrait of the three of them. Each of these are probably filled with memories, he thinks. He understands the sentiment, but couldn’t he put them all in at once? Also, he thinks that Makoto doesn’t need to nod after every single one.

“I thought that it’s enough if the three of us are together. I thought that I can live with just the three of us. I thought that I didn’t need anyone else. I thought that I… don’t need something like friends.”

While saying that, he puts in photos one by one. Watermelon splitting, and a photo of eating that watermelon. Tanabata, fireworks, the Milky Way. The stars don’t show on it, but it was written as such on the border of the photo.

“But, I’ve decided to stop being fixated on the past.”

Pancakes, ice cream, takoyaki.

“From now on, only forward––”

Snowman, snow hut, s...o...b..ll fight.

“I’m going to gaze at only the future!”

Photo of a pool.

“And when I graduate, the me who has grown will dig up these photos!”

Photo of a pool. Then, a photo of a pool again.

“Me, who’ll have grown enough that everyone can laugh away that I used to be fixated on the past––”

Putting a close-up of the three of them in last, he puts the lid onto those smiles. While making the ends of his long eyelashes glimmer just a little, Ikuya covers the cookie tin with dirt.

Makoto is watching over Ikuya with a kind look in his eyes.

Perhaps because he was influenced by Ikuya’s ceremony, Asahi is unusually tight-lipped with an earnest look on his face. All of a sudden, that Asahi raised his voice.

“I––. I overtook Haru in the medley, ya know.”

He’s been told many times.

“Then, in the semifinals, Haru overtook me…… At that time, I didn’t understand what I was overtaken by, at first. It sounds weird, but I really thought so.”

Ikuya looks up at Asahi with wet eyelashes and Makoto gently releases Asahi’s arm.

“When I was overtaken, Haru’s lane s.h.i.+ned. Some kind of big light came at an incredible speed, I was overtaken like pchoo, I got surprised, swallowed water, sank cuz of it, and pee–……, forfeited……”

Asahi doesn’t look at Haruka’s face. He wouldn’t look.

“Uncool and miserable, I was ashamed to look everyone in the face, ……and then, I became unable to swim the free.”

–– It’s your fault!

It felt like he’s shouting that again.

“Until I become able to swim it again, I’m not going back to Bandou SC. ……I can’t go back.”

Ikuya had finished covering it with dirt, and as he’s about to say something while standing up, he swallows it. Perhaps it was consolation, or sympathy, or maybe words that he was about to direct towards Haruka.

–– It’s your fault.

Ikuya’s voice that sounded like a spell is revived in his ears.

“I played hooky a lot to begin with, so, probably no one’s worried, I’m sure they think it’s just as usual.”

The feeling that he wants them to think that is in his words.

“Ya know, I was pretty good in the SC, even if I didn’t practice much. I didn’t remain until the finals, but I thought it’s fine like that and doesn’t really matter. There’s a name for this kind of thing, right?”

King of the castle. Frog in a well. Planarian stuck to a rock.

“At the compet.i.tion, Sakuyuki told me. Why do I continue swimming even though I’ve become unable to swim. Why do I continue, for someone who hates practice. ……I don’t know why, either. He told me to come to practice if I like swimming, but I don’t really get it. …..I can’t remember the first time I swam the free. I wonder how I swam it. I wonder what I should do so I can swim it again……”

Asahi drops his gaze onto the soil where Ikuya had buried it. Makoto gently put his hand on his back.

“Sometimes, I become unable to swim, too.”

Asahi and Ikuya direct their eyes towards Makoto. Raising his brows, Makoto was showing a good-natured smile.

“I get hopelessly afraid of the water, and when that happens, I become unable to swim anymore.”

Makoto’s hand leaves Asahi’s back, and he tightly grabs onto just the bottom edge of Haruka’s clothes.

“You know, a little while ago, too, the rubber boat my siblings were riding in was carried away by the sea…… But, I was scared and couldn’t go save them……”

Still smiling, Makoto’s grip gets stronger.

“In the end, Haru saved them for me. I can’t do anything unless Haru’s there.”

After tightly gripping once more, Makoto releases his hand and directs his gaze toward Haruka.

–– Haru, what do you think?

Makoto asks a question. He can’t answer. He doesn’t understand anything about Makoto.

Asahi looks at Haruka while the wind makes his spiky hair sway.

–– Haru, why do you swim?

If there’s a reason for swimming, he’s given it up long ago.

Ikuya stares at Haruka, with light still gathered on his long eyelashes.

–– Nanase, where are you trying to move towards?

He doesn’t know if there’s anything beyond swimming. He’s just swimming, feeling the water.

While understanding that the three of them are asking him questions, Haruka turned to the side and averted his gaze. He thinks it’s ridiculous. He doesn’t know what they’re expecting, but he’s getting the worst of a stray blow. He got caught up in quite the confession tournament. ––He can’t go along with it.

“Makoto, let’s go to practice.”

Only saying that much, Haruka turned around on his heels and started to walk.

“……Haru.”

While hearing the sound of Makoto’s footsteps coming along with him, he felt it on his back that the other two were standing still. If they want to be there, they can stay there until they’re satisfied. It has nothing to do with him.

On the way home after practice, perhaps because she had sensed Ikuya’s refreshed mood, Satomi asked somewhat delightfully.

“What happened? Ikuya-kun.”

“What?”

He says on purpose. It’s showing on his face, he himself knows that much.

“Did something good happen?”

It did. His new self took a step and his companions accepted that from him, he thinks. Probably……

“I decided to become strong. I vowed that to Nanase and the others today.”

Satomi smiled from Ikuya’s words bubbling with hope.

“Really? I’m happy. You finally came back to being the Ikuya-kun you used to be. Aiming for the Olympics with Natsu-nii––”

She was about to say ‘Like you did back then’, then swallows her words.

“I am. Because it’s our dream, right? For the three of us.”

“––Yeah!”

Satomi replied vigorously and cheerfully. It really is good when Satomi’s cheerful, he thinks. A sunken expression doesn’t suit her. However, it’s none other than Ikuya himself who had made her make such an expression. At the same time as feeling a pain in his chest when he thinks about it, he felt something like a sense of duty welling up that he must protect that smile.

“For the sake of that, I left the past behind.”