Fandom: Free! Iwatobi Swim Club

Pairing: Rei Ryugazaki/Nagisa Hazuki

Summary: Nagisa decides to make Rei smile the best way he can while he's stressed about exams: with penguins and honest notes.

Disclaimer: I don't own this series or these characters!

Author's note at the end!

Rei knew that Nagisa wasn't the best at certain academic subjects.

Even before they started dating, Rei agreed to help the blonde study and do their homework together on certain days of the week after swim practice. He had offered instead of Nagisa coming to him for help, knowing that he would come to him eventually and would save a lot of time and begging for Rei to help, after he had been sulking after a test they had taken and he had gotten an exceptionally low score which made him worried that it would prevent him from participating in club activities. It helped that they lived fairly close to each other, and could easily meet up twice a week after practice, study, which did help Nagisa's marks improve.

The first thought that went through Rei's head was that it would take a lot of focus from the blonde and a lot of determination from himself to make sure that Nagisa was understanding the material. Nagisa would get distracted several times per study session, his questions sometimes not even relating to what they were studying at the time, but with a sigh and the thought of 'I'm trying to help out my friend', and Nagisa really was trying, so Rei tried to get him back on track.

"I just understand it better when you explain it to me!" Nagisa had said, showing off his last math test to Rei with a wide smile on his face. "Thank you, Rei!"

Change was minimal at first. Nagisa was more than happy when his grade would change by a minor detail, and then once it jumped up an entire ten percent, or sometimes greater, it would continue to climb. Of course with Rei's help, he made sure to ease Nagisa into study habits, like certain ways to remember the material easier and things to be relatable to subjects, and he even laughed when Nagisa had shown him the amusing note from their teacher on one of his biology assignments when the blonde had drawn a little alpaca with flowers to remember things about photosynthesis.

And after they had began dating, the after-practice study sessions became study dates and went from two days to four, and went on for longer. Studying came first, getting homework out of the way and making sure Nagisa understood as usual and once they were done the two would watch a movie and cuddle on the couch, fingers laced together and lazy smiles on their faces.

As Nagisa's grades improved, so did his confidence in the subjects. It made Rei's heart swell when the blonde would come to his desk with a wide smile, regardless about his recent grades or otherwise, and things would carry on as usual. Even once Nagisa offered to help Rei jokingly after he got back one of his essays that had a very pleasing note about his growth as a student at the end of it, leaning against Rei's desk and resting on his elbows, teasing his bespectacled boyfriend and watched as his cheeks became pink.

However once an important test came around, and both boys had to study extra hard, Rei would panic.

He was confident in himself that he could pass, easily, but would study extra just in case...and then there was Nagisa on top of that along with still attending swim practice. Exams were important, always of course, and how Nagisa was always calm about it made Rei all the more stressed out. He had even felt bad because he raised his voice to tell Nagisa to be quiet when he was trying to sort out what to study in what order for the better benefit and apologized soon after, but with a kiss and a smile Nagisa had said that it was alright. The day before their first exam was supposed to be had, Rei and Nagisa had set up their textbooks and papers as usual, spread out across Rei's bed, trying to make sure that everything that was going to be on the upcoming exams would be covered. And of course, Nagisa could see right through Rei and knew that his boyfriend was trying his best and inside was stressed out beyond belief and wearing himself thin.

While they worked it was in silence, both working on their respective assignments, pink eyes would slide over to watch Rei work. He had his eyebrows pushed together and it seemed like he was biting the inside of his cheek as he focused on the words he was writing and mumbling under his breath as if it was the only thing keeping him from having some kind of breakdown. Nagisa frowned, knowing that Rei was not only studying for his own sake, but also making sure that he understood as well out of his own kindness. All Nagisa wanted to do was to put his pencil down and crawl over behind Rei and give him a much-needed shoulder massage and to kiss him, but he knew that he wanted to focus on his work over anything else. And Rei, after everything he had done for the blonde, deserved to be anything but stressed out.

Which is why Nagisa had planned something in hopes that it would soothe Rei's stress, even just for a little bit.

"Hey, Rei?" Nagisa smiled when Rei looked up at him.

"What is it? Having trouble with something?"

Nagisa shook his head and licked his lips. "I was just going to get some water, do you want anything while I'm up?"

"Could you get me some tea, please? Chilled, extra ice?"

"You got it!"

He waited for Rei to look back down at his textbook to grab his backpack and slide out of the bedroom, not even going to the kitchen as of yet and instead, crouched down on the outside wall of Rei's room near the door. Slowly, the blonde unzipped his backpack, taking out one of many penguin wind-up figures that had a pink piece of paper taped to it (he had stayed up late the previous night putting it all together and he really was proud of it all), winding it as slowly as he could so Rei wouldn't hear the noise. Nagisa peeked his head to look back inside, smiling when Rei was still focused on what he was writing, and placed the first wound penguin on the floor. He watched eagerly from his hiding place as it slid across the floor and bumped into Rei's foot, stopping it from it's swaying trail. Violet eyes blinked in confusion as he reached down to pick up the blue penguin toy, peeling the note off and glanced at the door where he thought it must have come from, and sighed.

"Nagisa?" He called out, but the blonde didn't respond from his hiding place, mouth firm over his mouth to prevent him from responding. "Nagisa, are you there?"

Rei folded open the pink note, identifying the handwriting as definitely Nagisa's, but reading the words made him pause and felt as if his stomach was tightening into knots.

I love the way how you smile at my jokes even though I know that you think they're dumb!

The butterfly swimmer felt another object hit his foot and upon looking, there was another penguin with a pink note attached to it. Setting the original note and plastic toy aside Rei picked the new addition up, taking the note off and again, it was from Nagisa.

I love the way you look in the morning!

And soon enough, with every note he read, seemed as if another penguin would show up almost immediately. All with a similar pink note attached, with the same handwriting.

You look beautiful in the water!

I never get tired of hearing your voice!

You never get mad at me when I fall asleep on you~

I'm always excited for our next date because you always know the best places to go!

Every time you look at me, I get the happiest feeling in my chest and in my heart and I know that feeling will never go away.

It makes me really, really happy to be able to hold your hand and kiss you.

"Nagisa, you can come back in now." Rei smiled, collecting all of the notes and setting them aside on the bed. He heard a small 'oof!' from the hallway and soon enough, in came Nagisa with his backpack over his shoulder and a glass of barley tea with ice in his hands, shyly smiling at his boyfriend.

"Ah, your tea!" Nagisa handed the glass to Rei, face turning pink when their fingers touched. "So..."

"Nagisa."

The small boy glanced up, not being able to contain his own smile. Rei closed his textbook with his pencil keeping his place, motioning with his head for Nagisa to come his way. Of course Nagisa understood, dropping his backpack to the floor in his original spot and crawled into Rei's lap, wrapping his arms around the tallest's waist and pressing his head against Rei's chest.

"I know you were the one to write those notes, if it wasn't painfully obvious enough." Rei ran his fingers through soft blonde hair, making Nagisa sigh happily.

"Are you happy now, Rei?"

A blue eyebrow was raised in question. "Of course I'm happy. Why?"

"It's just that...I know you're really stressed out about all this studying because tests are really important to you and with helping me study too, you just seemed like you were getting more and more...freaked out." Nagisa tilted his head to look up at Rei. "So I had to think, 'what would make Rei happy and smile?', and I had a few ideas but I liked this one the best so I went with it!"

"Nagisa..." Rei pulled his boyfriend close, pressing his lips to Nagisa's forehead. "I adore you. And thank you. It really...it really means a lot to me that you were concerned and wanted to do something for me."

"Well it's only fair, you've really helped me a lot!"

"How about we try to finish things up, and we'll go out to eat?"

Nagisa leaned forward, pressing his lips to Rei's, and could only smile. "Sounds perfect to me."

The week of panic was finally over once the last exam was finished and handed in. Both Nagisa and Rei were more than relieved along with their other students, and both had a good feeling that they would receive their desired grades on all of their tests. It wasn't easy, Nagisa having a few slip-ups and forgetting some of the more complicated questions that Rei had gone through with him several times, and even Rei as well had a hiccup here and there, but in the end were satisfied with their hard work.

Once the results had been posted and their classmates had gathered around to look at their scores, it was no surprise that Rei had gotten an almost perfect score. While it wasn't perfect, Rei was still glad that he got through the stress and it was over for a period of time until the next round in a few months. Some of his classmates stood at his side, asking him what was his studying secrets, and how he managed to get information through Nagisa's thick skull (with his scores being above average this time), and Nagisa watched with a smile as Rei spoke and told some of his tips and tricks.

Because before their tests when Nagisa would look down at Rei's desk, he saw a familiar shade of pink paper sticking out from one of his notebooks.

Author's note: first little Reigisa thing! I had this idea for months and it was half done, so decided might as well finish it even though it's not the greatest!