Titolo: next to you
Fandom: Free!
Personaggi: Rin/Gou Matsuoka, menzione di Gou/Sousuke Yamazaki
Genere: malinconico
Avvertimenti: pwp, incest, what if?, future fic, in inglese
Parole: 1104
Note: Allo', questa è per la seconda missione della prima settimana del COW-T #5 @ maridichallenge (dovevo scrivere su un fandom o un pairing sul quale non scrivevo da almeno un anno, e la mia ultima Matsuokacest è del 2013 \o/)!! E filla anche il prompt 67 della Maritombola, "Sono incinta." / "Chi è il padre?".

They stopped doing that shit long ago. Roughly around the time Rin left again, this time to actually pursue a career. They stopped stealing each other kisses, they stopped with the teasing, and they stopped with the winking and nudging and whispering in each other’s ears. They quit all that when they realized the fun was over, that it was unhealthy for both of them to feel so much. They stopped one day when Gou burst in tears after fighting with him, and yelled that she wanted it over. She had felt disturbed, unhappy, and had started to resent her own brother for messing around and eventually realizing she had always had an unhealthy amount of love for him, love that was supposed to be different, enclosed within some boundaries, and love that was not meant to make her dream about kissing him hard, melting into him, be the only person in which he could confide. That was not her role, and those weren’t the thoughts she was meant to have. Her love never faded, but it masked itself, it turned her into a master of lying. It made his best friend fall in love with her, partially. Sousuke had always had good dynamics with her, always made sure to be by her side in case she’d need any help.

And yet her heartbeat and enthusiasm for everything had made him realize they could be something other than friends. Something tighter. It wasn’t just her badly concealed fondness for others.

She had let him in, into her arms, into her heart, into her body, over and over, to the point where their faces and gestures became awfully familiar to each other, and she knew that was good. That was finally something she could talk about, or rant about, or scream about. That was something she could proudly wave around, something that, eventually, had put her in that position.

Having a child is serious business, obviously, so she knew that sooner or later she would have to tell her beloved brother. She had distanced herself so much from him that she could not foresee his reaction. Had he changed?

Was he still jealous, and would he cry about it? She could not tell. They had spoken a few times in these years, but never too much, never touched the topic underlying all their interaction, they had pretended that nothing insane was between them; Rin had gotten good at that as well.

“Who’s the father?” He asked as soon as she told him. His voice was somewhat distant, and she immediately knew that he was pretending. She knew that news had taken some hope still living within him, and torn it to shreds. She knew that no marriage, no distance, no form of separation that could put an end to them like her having a baby. But right now, he surprised himself, intimately, for feeling so little. Of course, his life had gone on, he had not obsessed over not being able to be with his own sister, he had been happy so far. And yet, the sadness was slowly wrapping up around him. “Of course, it’s Sousuke, right?” He continued, with a bitter smile in his voice and on his face, and his eyes lowered to the ground, to Gou’s baby bump. He wanted to touch her, to connect with this. He was not ready to let go of her.

“Yes,” she replied in a whisper.

Rin could not say he was angry, or that he thought it was unfair. Their relationship had been tense all along, and yet so unhappy, always defined by the outside world and their fears of it, and by their own life events. That could not work, that had to be over. Sousuke made her happy, after all, as happy as an adult in the adult world can be. He smiled.

“I hope you’re going to be happy. Sousuke’s a good guy,” he said, with his hand trailing up to her cheek, his digits taking in her warmth, the sort of warmth that was unique to her. “I’ll always be there if you need me.”

Gou swallowed a ton of words. Unnecessary words. Her love would not be controlled, she knew it, and yet she pretended again, giving him a mirrored impression of his own face.

“Yes,” she simply agreed, lowering her eyes too, but hers watched as she englobed his hand between both hers. “You’ll always be my onii-chan,” she added. Maybe she would get over the kind of feelings she knew were wrong, and too hard for her to deal with, and that she was too tired to follow them, too old to rebel to their upbringing.

She locked their eyes again, took a deep breath, and nodded to him.

“So you’re getting married,” he added, taking a step back, and she kept still while nodding.

“Yes,” she repeated. “Would you be my son’s godfather?”

Rin stared at her, warmth rising up to his chest. Maybe it would take him a while to really stop desiring her. For now, though, that warmth filling his chest up had less to do with himself and more to do with her words.

“Would you… could I really… did you really ask…?” He mumbled, and immediately burst in tears, hugging her, holding her dear and tight to his chest, and the feeling of her breasts pressed against him making him uncomfortable subsided immediately, while sobs and tears kept coming up. She held him too, buried her face into his neck, smiled quietly against his skin.

“If you really want to.”

“Of course I do,” Rin immediately replied, pulling back only to look into her eyes. “I’m having a nephew. Shit. Wow,” he gradually realized, blinking surprised like he was seeing the world for the first time. In reality, he still could not believe how he did not notice Gou’s motherly glow at first, her inner radiance, and how her forms seemed to be all softer, rounder, in a gentle but strong way that could not be stopped from showing by her clothes.

She giggled, patting his cheeks between her hands, and nodded. “Yes. It’s a girl,” she continued, tilting her head in a smile.

“A girl,” he repeated, with a long sigh. “I’m so happy for you,” he finally said while looking in her eyes, just like his own, too strikingly similar to his own.

None of them was sure they would really be able to let go of it, but Rin promised he would try. Gou did the same.

Those were their vows.