SOTUS Drabbles and One-Shots

19. Rain falls endless

Sick!Arthit AU

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The summer rain falls steadily down, leaving wet kisses along his skin. Kongpob closes his eyes, palms open, upwards, facing the sky. They gather water that overspills, tumbling down over the edges, the spaces between his fingers, creating mini waterfalls.

Kongpob opens his eyes.

Vacation, the long summer weeks, stretch boundless ahead of him, and Kongpob breathes them in, taking note of all the potential. He's got calls and texts from Aim, all asking about when he can next come over, the summer after a new year of life, freshman year of college, leaving them feeling like adults but yearning for the simplicity of childhood. Kongpob has similar messages from Kern, a fellow student in the Faculty of Economics, but Kongpob leaves them unanswered, deciding he'll respond when he feels like it.

His sisters are back home, too, though Kik, the younger, childless sister has never moved particularly far away, and his eldest sister, Nina, is always at the phone during real life, constantly awaiting their calls. But still, it's nice to have them back, in the flesh, ready to smother him with hugs. Sometimes, however, Kongpob wishes they treated him more like a brother, and not some son they get to coddle and coo at, especially now that he's nineteen.

Nineteen.

He thought eighteen would be the big year, the one where he'd become an adult, feel the same as soon as he wakes up on his birthday. But he didn't. He still felt young and dumb and insecure, and he felt that way all throughout his freshman year, though plenty of girls asked him out and he was even nominated for Campus Moon. (He won the popular vote and the title, and he was grateful, pleasantly surprised, yet the sash sits in one of the boxes in his closet, the feeling of winning nice but also fruitless.)

Eighteen felt like the big escalation up to adulthood, and, on the morning of his nineteenth birthday, he realised this is the age in which he's really grown.

The rain has stuttered to a stop, more a light drizzle that leaves him with tickles on his cheeks and nose, and his mom has come out of the house to yell at him, telling him to get inside before he catches a cold.

"A bit late for that," he says as she hands him a towel, the pair of them standing in the entryway. "The water is warm, too, so does it matter?"

"Warm outside, but cold inside," she says, tossing the towel over his head when he gives it back to her, her hands immediately pressing it flat to his head before she rubs them back and forth, drying his hair. "Be more safe, will you? You're near a grown man, now."

"I will," Kongpob reassures her. "And, Mom, I am a grown man. I became one last year."

His mother clicks her tongue, but she doesn't argue. She wears a troubled frown as she gives him a once over, a crease between her brows. Kongpob lifts a hand to smooth it out. When she looks up at him, he gives her his best smile.

"Don't want you getting wrinkles," he says.

She swats him with the towel. "Don't be ridiculous," she chides, but she's smiling.

Kongpob smiles too before she's taking his hand and leading him deeper into the house, where they come across his sisters and father sitting on the couches, talking such and such and so and so.

"There he is," Nina says with a smile. "Like a ghost, you, just slipping out like that."

"Early bird gets the worm," Kongpob replies. "What's wrong with me wanting to run? I avoided the Freshman Fifteen that way, you know. You could've done the same."

"Don't get smart with me, boy," Nina scolds, though she's still smiling, eyes bright.

Kongpob lifts his hand in surrender. "Alright, I won't. Good morning, Dad, P'Kik."