hismelody | (no subject)

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Even now, after more than a year here and the rocky months that preceded his arrival, S still sometimes finds it strange that he barely plays the piano anymore. There is, of course, a whole ton of baggage that comes along with that, too, but every once in a while, he's simply struck by the oddity of it. For such a long time, it was such a huge part of his life, the thing that helped bring him and his boyfriend together, the path he'd chosen for his future, both his schoolwork and his leisure time largely revolving around it. Now he doesn't even play daily, though he works around instruments. At least he has a good environment in which to do so. Playing at home would be out of the question for numerous reasons, not the least of which is that they don't have and can't afford a piano. At work, he can get it out of his system, so to speak, get some practice in so he doesn't lose all his skill. It's not something he has the same drive to pursue anymore. As much as he misses it, he can't force that feeling back. This is enough — a perfect arrangement, really.

He just has to keep telling himself that.

As is fairly usual, it's quiet near the end of the work day, no customers around. With his coworker in the back, the store is momentarily empty, and that feels worth taking advantage of. Sitting down at one of the display pianos — a beautiful grand, far nicer than anything he ever owned or ever really expected to, he remains still for a moment, just breathing in deep, savoring the familiar feeling of it, his hands resting delicately against the keys and eyes closed. When he opens them again, he begins playing Tchaikovsky, the simple, lilting, bittersweet melody coming from him easily. He means to be paying attention to the store still, but with so little time left until they close up anyway, he isn't expecting anyone to show up. He winds up, then, immersed enough in the music that he doesn't notice when the door opens and someone walks into the store.

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Easier for S, J nearly says, but it's not entirely true. It was just a different kind of difficult for him. But for J, the terrible aching anxiety might have been eased sooner, and that's the problem. At the same time, S couldn't have known that; it would have been easy to assume talking about it would only make things worse. It's all so messy and complicated, but that's a good thing, too, J thinks. Hopes, anyway. Simply yelling at each other and not talking things out was less complicated, too, but ultimately so much worse. Sometimes messy is useful.

"It shouldn't be," he says, quiet and earnest. "It's ours. Whatever shape that is. And I — I don't want you to give things up for me. If I did, I'd say so." He already feels like he's wreaked too much havoc on S's life, complicated too many things. It's up to S whether or not that's true, and he knows S disagrees, but that doesn't keep him from wanting to make sure it never gets to that point. He wants to give S more, not less.

"I... I was scared to say anything, because it hurts, talking about those things." And if he never said anything, he knows, S could never confirm he was right. He was too much of a coward, too blinded by his worries. "But... we have to sometimes. Even if it hurts... I'd rather know what you're thinking about and worrying about. And if... something is too much for me or a problem, I promise I'll tell you, but... ask me. It's better to know for sure, even if it hurts, right? I'll try to remember. I should have said."

Put like that, it makes total sense, of course, the same thing that S himself has said on numerous occasions. He would rather know than not know, he would rather hear painful truths than be left to wonder about them, he likes knowing that they can weather any situations that come their way. Somehow, with this one thing, he just never considered it from that perspective. He felt so sure that he already knew where they stood, enough that no other possibilities occurred to hm. At most, he figured that J would probably tell him not to give it up, if S had ever admitted what was on his mind, but that it would then still be there, making them miserable, driving a wedge between them all over again. He never thought that they might both be unhappier not talking about it.

The problem, he supposes, is exactly what J has just said, in a way. It was theirs once, but it hasn't felt like it in a long time, not to S. That broke a long time ago, slipping through his fingers so quickly that it was all but gone already by the time he tried to grab hold of it again. Things are different now, and he holds no resentment over the way it was then, but he's never stopped seeing the piano, and in particular his playing and composing, as part of what went so wrong. Besides, he meant what he's said to J about it before. Somewhere down the line, he fell out of love with it. After J left, after he fucking died, of course that passion extinguished. He just wonders now if it never reignited again because part of him didn't want it to, thinking it was easier that way, better.

"I should have said, too," he murmurs, apologetic, dropping his head to J's shoulder for a moment. They both should have, but at least they have now. That, in his opinion, counts for a hell of a lot. "It is better to know for sure. Even if it hurts." With a slow exhale, he reaches over, blindly taking one of J's hands in his own. "And I know you wouldn't have wanted me to give things up. That you wouldn't have... asked for that, or expected it. I just thought it was right. Like maybe if it had been that way from the start..."

"No," J says, soft but firm. He'd shake his head, but he doesn't want to make S think he's shaking him away, his hand curling tight in S's. "It wasn't. None of that was right, Sihyun-ah." It hurts to think about, and J hates that, in some way, he was right. It's the shadow of what was that's made this so difficult, and he's all too aware still of the horrible things he said — not all of them, no, because he's sure he said things when he was upset that he's forgotten, but more often things stick, echoing in his head down the years, long after they've been forgiven. It just never should have fallen to S to think he could fix all this or that he should have had to choose differently to mend what's broken in J.

Besides, he thinks, a sudden clarity piercing the ache, it wouldn't have helped at all. "I would have hated that, too, I think," he says. His throat hurts a little, and he feels like his blood is pulsing in his ears, painfully alive at the pulse points in his wrists. Revisiting any of that time is horrible. That he does so all the time doesn't change that. "You don't understand. It wouldn't have been either of ours then. I was scared. Losing something that... made me me. And you still had it, and I didn't know who I was anymore... If you'd stopped, if you'd given it up... I would have felt guilty, but also I — it would have been a choice for you. I didn't feel like I had that. It was just... gone. Everything — I was so fucked up, darling. Nothing would have made me happy. Not that."

Maybe if he'd been able to make himself talk sooner. Maybe if he'd told S the truth, found a way to explain how it felt like he was watching himself disappear, watching himself get replaced by someone who looked and sounded very much like himself, but animated by all his worst tendencies. Maybe if he'd been able to let S see him properly, to know that he was terrified and in pain, maybe then they could have done something. But he didn't know how. Even now, after over a year of pushing and trying and working and talking, some things are intensely difficult. He's had so long to think about all this, and it still feels like there are things he doesn't understand. And what he does understand, and what he can say, he says like this, by turns barreling forward and haltingly, trembling slightly and holding S's hand perhaps a little too tight. It's there. He puts it away as best he can and he lives where and when he is now, but that past is always there and he is always afraid that it will be here again, too, just as he is, that a day will come when, once again, he watches himself fade away. He felt it earlier this year and he survived it, but even that wasn't as bad as it's been before. Maybe that's because, this time, S pulled the words out of him. Maybe it's because he's been able to say things like this, to prepare S a little better to help him through. Or maybe that was a warning shot, a shadow version, letting him off light, but only for now. As awful as all of this is to say, as frightening as it is to say aloud, yet again, that he doesn't believe they could have changed what happened then, it needs to be said. Everything he thinks and learns about that time should be said, held up to the light, examined for clues so that next time, it can be changed. But that doesn't keep him from shaking, remembering all that fury and despair.

It isn't the first time S has heard J say something to that effect, but somehow it hits differently in context like this. For a long, long time now, S has been at least half-convinced that it would have been better if he'd never gotten into piano at all — if he'd tried his hand at a different instrument, perhaps, still enabling them to play together but without the sense of competition that developed on J's part, or if he'd had another interest entirely and just supported J in his music. He doesn't know what else that would have changed, though. They would have fallen in love regardless, he's sure of that, but it's difficult to imagine them doing so without it being at the piano, the song J wrote for him bright and bittersweet in the air. It was always there, a lovely constant between them. He's told himself this past year that it's nice to know that they don't need piano to get by together, and he really does believe that.

But it was so present before that the lack of it has been a practically tangible thing, and all he's really been able to do is try to avoid that space, keeping a careful distance so he could keep trying to believe that it didn't matter. J walking into the store today threw him headfirst into it, making him newly aware of how desperately he's missed what used to be there. Even now, he knows they won't get that back, not really, not exactly; that's undoubtedly for the best, given how wrong everything went before. He keeps thinking, though, that that doesn't mean it can't be anything. Trying to figure out what that might be is a strange, daunting prospect, but it's still better than keeping something he once loved so much at arm's length. At least now, he might — they both might — have a chance to love it again, maybe even to rediscover that together.

"It wasn't either of ours anyway," he murmurs, apologetic, still curled as close to J as he can manage with the two of them sitting here. "I didn't still have it. Once it wasn't yours... wasn't ours... it wasn't mine, either." It's not the same, but it's not totally different, either, or at least he believes it isn't. His hand clasping J's, steady but gentler, he lets out a long, slow sigh. "How could I love something that tore us apart?"

Maybe it's not fair. There were other factors, certainly, and it isn't as if music itself could have acted with any intention. It was the two of them making countless missteps, though he suspects they would point to different ones, both putting more of the blame on themselves, if asked. Music is where those first cracks appeared, though, at least the first ones he could see. Losing J just drove him further from it. In the time they've been here, he's been chasing after what it used to feel like, the way he used to love it. Today, just now, is the closest he's gotten.

"I wish I'd known how to help you," he adds, quieter still, trying to keep himself steady. J seems like he might be about to shake clear out of his skin; S can only try to counter that by being here. "I wish... I don't know."

A small sigh punches out of J, a possible precursor to a sob, though he tries to hold it back. He doesn't know if he can agree, but he doesn't think S is wrong either. It's not like music is what really ruined everything, but it played a role. He wouldn't have spent months avoiding it if it hadn't, if he weren't afraid that his desire to play would shake loose whatever evil still sits inside him. But it's not the music; it's his reaction to it, his need and his weakness. He still doesn't know entirely why it began to slip away from him. It felt, back then, like most things were pulling away, his confidence and courage with them.

"I do too," he whispers, chest tight and aching. "I wish I'd known, too. I wish I could have told you what to do." There was no cure for it, though — nothing, at least, they would have wiped it all away and freed him of it. If he'd been better able to communicate, if he'd had the words to explain, if he hadn't been so worried and ashamed that it kept him even from trying, maybe they could have done something. He didn't know, though, how to do it. It ate away at him and he didn't even know how to name it. He still doesn't, not really. It's not just a voice, after all. It's terrible feelings and something that at least sounds like himself, and he doesn't know how to fight himself when he can't tell which parts are lies and which are true.

"Isn't that what tore us apart though?" he manages after a moment. "Not music. Not really. I don't know. I feel like there would always have been something. Something wrong in me." This isn't quite the conversation he meant to have when he sat, but there's truth in what S says, no matter what J wants to believe, a clear line between music and madness, if only in his own reactions. Whether or not the piano is in any way at fault, his needs and fears around music fueled so much of how he behaved, a channel for all the confusion inside him.

S doesn't know if that's true or not. That, too, is something he's heard before, or at least something close to it, but it's hard to know what to say, the hypothetical impossible to play out. Maybe there would always have been something, but maybe it wouldn't have been as bad if there weren't something pitting them directly against each other, if the professor hadn't been pouring poison into J's ear. If J hadn't used his piece as inspiration for the fucking Gloria Artis. Regardless, he refuses to see it the way J does, as something wrong in him. There's nothing wrong or broken or anything like that. There just is, perhaps, something neither of them has figured out how to care for yet. He's better at it now than he was back then, but that has less to do with having an actual understanding, and more to do with having a better idea now of what not to do. Like so much else, there are no easy answers here. If he wanted easy, though, he never would have been with J in the first place, and actually being with him is easy, as natural as breathing and just as vital.

"It felt like it was," he says, a gentle amendment to his own words. It seems like the best middle ground, leaving neither of them right and neither of them wrong. He doesn't know if it's true that there would always have been something, but he doesn't know that it's not true, either. He just knows the way it did play out, with the thing that once brought them together driving an ever-growing wedge between them, their shared love of music ultimately a breeding ground for resentment. Of course he couldn't love music anymore when his playing and composing only seemed to make things worse. Of course he could barely bring himself, after J left, to sit at the piano where they shared their first kiss and so much else besides.

His thumb strokes the back of J's hand, soft and reassuring, contact just for the sake of it. It's definitely past the end of his shift, but he doubts anyone is going to come wandering in when they would usually be closed right now, and he can quickly send them away if they do. As much as he would rather be at home right now, he's not going to cut this conversation off in the middle. It's taken them too long to discuss this in any depth at all. "It was part of it. The only part I really knew about then."

J feels a pang of guilt at that, realizing he's yet again gotten too caught up in his own hurt to see he was missing the point. It's not about whether or not music caused the rift between them or simply worsened it. That connection existed regardless, and of course S reacted that way, felt it that way. Sniffling, he shifts a little so he can turn toward S, head tucked onto his shoulder. It's frightening, how many ways he's still the same as he was then. He's gotten somewhat better at managing it all, and some of the pressure that made him worse has been taken away, but it's all still there.

"I didn't see it that way," he murmurs. "There was a lot I didn't see. I should have, but..." He sighs, eyes closing tight, and focuses for a moment on what he can feel: the soft warmth of S's breath, the gentle pressure of his thumb against J's skin, the solidness of his shoulder beneath J's cheek and pressed into his side, the way their bodies jut into each other, not awkward as they should be, just right. He's here now, sitting at a piano finer than any he could have ever hoped to own, and what he did then is past. It won't ever go away, but it's over now, and it doesn't matter very much what he should have done. As hard as it is to make himself remember and believe, it really doesn't. He can't change any of it. But S is still here, still real and whole, still loving him, and they're okay. "I couldn't have. I didn't see anything the way it was then. But I knew I was losing... this. I thought it was forever. But it's not, it wasn't, or we wouldn't be here now."

If he'd known back then, he thinks, that there was a version of his future that looked like this — well, doubtless he wouldn't have believed it, for a vast number of reasons, but if he had, if he'd known, this wouldn't have needed to exist at all. But that's the problem, he thinks. Back then, what he thought he knew wasn't real, just a lot of fears both rational and mostly otherwise bundled together into what he thought was true. If he'd been able to see to the actual fact of what was around him, he wouldn't have been so afraid to tell S how afraid he was of everything else. Changing that, being able to talk to S about all of this, even if it's still intensely difficult sometimes, has made all the difference.

S instinctively shakes his head, though it's not much of a movement when he doesn't want to pull away or put any distance between them. He knows, because they've talked about it at length, that J came to believe a lot of things that weren't true back then. To him, though, this one is the most unfathomable, and the most heartbreaking. Even now, a year later and having been told otherwise, it's hard not to wonder what he got so wrong for J to think he could ever lose this. After the painful mess that everything was before, after J attempting to kill him, after he did kill others, S is still here, and he wouldn't have considered being anywhere else. Back then, of course, he didn't have the first idea what was ahead of them, but in not being able to imagine it, he would have said the same thing he'd say now — that J could never lose him, that there's nothing that could change his mind.

"You never lost me," he murmurs, because he can't say nothing. Lifting their entwined hands, he brushes a kiss against J's knuckles, absent and tender. "You never could." After J left, he was still there, still waiting, still his. Maybe it was pathetic of him, but he never had it in him to give up or walk away. On the contrary, he thought he lost this. He knew without a doubt that he did, those last few months before he got here, facing down an existence without J in it at all. Like J has just said, he thought it was forever, too. He could never be half as relieved to be wrong about anything else as he is to have been wrong about that, and he's been wrong about so much. "There was a lot I didn't see, either."

On some level, he knows that he couldn't have. All he could do was work with what J was willing to tell him, to show him, and they weren't talking back then like they are now. When he knows that's part of what's made this past year so good, their relationship stronger than it's ever been, he feels stupid all over again for not having said what was on his mind about piano, but he can't fix that now. There's nothing left to do but be glad it's out in the open at last, no matter how much crying it might have involved. "At least we're smarter now. Still very stupid, but smarter than we were then."

For a few moments, J thinks he's gotten himself under control, but that sets him off again, his lips pressed tight together, tears too hot down his cheeks. He was so stupid. He was stupid and cruel and blind, and they paid so dearly for it. If he knew nothing else in all the world, he should have known S would never stop loving him, and he can only call it proof of how far apart he fell that he ever thought otherwise. Even now, he wants to believe he'd never make that mistake again, the evidence of this last year too powerful to deny, but he's not sure. It's hard to imagine now that he could ever doubt this again, but he would have thought, in the months before he started to crumble, that he could never doubt it at all. It's scary to know how easily everything he relies on can break down, if only and most potently within his own mind.

"A little," he says, hoarse, trying hard to crack a smile, though it comes out embarrassingly wobbly. He sniffs, struggling to find his words or even the ability to speak, his throat gone rough and tight. "I'm trying not to say," he admits after a moment, "that I don't deserve that." The loyalty and love S has shown him, the depth of grace and forgiveness — J knows it for what it is now, an act of devotion and courage at the same time that it's as natural and automatic and unthinking as breath, and he doesn't know how to show how thankful he is that S has that strength and that instinct alike. It's hard to think he's done or been anything at all that would merit that. He's done an awful lot that wouldn't. At the end of it, though, it's S's choice and S's heart, and he knows S sees in him so much that J simply can't. He's trying so hard just to let himself have this, not to argue or debate, just to let S love him.

He's worked, too, to be better and do more so that, whether or not S thinks it's necessary, he can feel for himself that he's more worthy of the luck and love he's been given. It can't be like before. "It doesn't matter," he adds, "if I do or not. I want it either way. To be loved by you like this. With or without music."

At least on that last part, the two of them are entirely in agreement. It was true for S long ago, too, from the very beginning, but it's only become truer this past year. Between getting this impossible chance to have a life with J again and having spent the last year or so believing that giving up the piano was the best thing he could do, he's acutely aware of both parts of that — that he wants this, and he wants it with or without music. From where he's standing, he didn't walk away from it because he felt forced into it or because he thought J would want that of him. He chose it for himself, and even when he sometimes desperately missed playing, he was no less content and knows he would have stayed that way. It doesn't matter if he makes music or not, if they have money or they're flat broke, if they're out or closeted. A life with J is all he's ever really wanted. Everything else is an incredible bonus, nothing he takes lightly but nothing that would ever begin to change his mind, either.

As for who deserves what, he's not sure that's something he can determine. He is sure, however, that he doesn't care. It's not about that and it never has been. Likewise, he can say without hesitation that J does deserve better than the world gave him, and that for his own part, he feels the way he feels, an unshakable, instinctive adoration that's followed him since they were children, long before he knew the depth of or had the words to define it. They know what they want, and what they want is each other. That, as far as he's concerned, is the beginning and the end of it.

"Good," he murmurs, voice little more than an exhale, any attempt at levity falling completely short. As much as he doesn't want to put any distance between them, he shifts just slightly, enough that he can turn his head and look at J, one hand lifting to J's cheek to brush away a few stray tears. "Because you'd have it either way. I couldn't change it if I wanted to, and I'd never want to." Not for the first time and almost certainly not for the last, he thinks that if nothing has made that happen yet, then nothing ever will. "It's all I want, too. With or without music. Just this. You."

For so, so long, J felt uncertain of nearly everything except his own failures. Here, though, little by little, he's had the chance to regain his confidence. If there's anything he's sure of, it's this. Tipping his head into S's cheek, he nods, his gaze lowered because if he meets S's eyes before he's pulled himself together, he'll probably start sobbing for no reason at all. It's just that this has been such a long time coming, something he thought he'd never have again. He was so certain it was his own fault. To some extent, it was, because he was too afraid to make his worries clear or voice his fears; this could have happened much sooner if he hadn't let guilt get the better of him. He's really tried to tell himself that it doesn't matter how long it takes them to get somewhere as long as they get there, tried to curb the regret of all the lost time, and he's mostly succeeded, at least most of the time. It still takes a while to apply that understanding to each new occurrence.

Even so, there's relief, too, a lot of it. They made it here when he thought they never would. He was wrong, as he so often is, but in a way that makes him thankful to have been wrong. And when S is so close that J can feel his breath when he speaks, when he's saying such sweet things, it's a little easier to let himself get distracted from the lingering hurt that he's still trying to pull away from. Instead he leans closer, nose nudging S's, resting their foreheads gently together. "I love you," he murmurs, brushing a soft kiss against S's lips. "You can have both. If you want it. We can have both. But you're all I need."

The last year has proven that pretty thoroughly. On one hand, J knows, they've been incredibly lucky and that's extended past the impossible and into day-to-day things he didn't think they'd get to have that have made life much, much easier. In every material way, they're better off than they were before. Money is less of a concern, their safety isn't the worry it once was, and their home is more than spacious enough for two. But he knows even so that he'd take the cramped studio and a hidden love in a heartbeat, even if they never played again, as long as he could have S. He made a mistake before, he knows that. But he also knows now that he can survive things he didn't think were survivable, and that he can live happily without the piano. He still feels its absence, but not in any way he can't handle. Not like he feels S's absence when they're apart. It's not a trade he'd ever make again.

This past year, S really has been convinced that that couldn't be true. Really, he started to feel it long before then. As piano started coming between him and J, his efforts to recapture what seemed to be slipping away from them only ever making things worse, S wanted to show J somehow that it didn't have to be a choice. Instead, he wound up with neither music nor his boyfriend, only a gradually increasing sense that he should have walked away from piano sooner. It would have been worth it to be with J. It has been here, such that he hasn't really thought twice about it. Even when it's hurt, even when he's missed it, nothing has ever made him question that choice. The idea now that he could have both if he wants to — he has no way of being able to determine if he does, so convinced has he been that he couldn't.

He doesn't want to talk in circles, though, or to make J feel guiltier. Emphasizing just how certain he was that that wasn't a possibility seems likely only to do both. The decision he made wasn't forced on him, after all. He chose it for himself, and he doesn't want J to think that he blames him for it at all. S knows better now. All they can do is go forward from here, whatever that winds up looking like.

First, for now, he thinks it means being as honest as he can. Leaning his forehead against J's in turn, S takes a long, slow breath, just savoring their closeness for a moment. They've sat just like this so many times, tucked close together on a piano bench, angled toward each other. If absolutely nothing else, it feels right to be here again now. They wouldn't have needed it, but that doesn't mean it isn't nice to have it.

"I don't know what I want," he admits, brushing back a strand of J's hair, anything to keep idly touching him. "I don't know what it would look like now if I did have both. But you're all I need, too. That's the part that really matters." It isn't as if he's lost music entirely, after all. He plays at work, the very thing that started them having this conversation in the first place. Really, he's not sure he could stomach pursuing the career he once wanted if J wasn't doing so, too. Just the thought of it makes him feel like he would be stealing something. Maybe that will fade, though. Maybe this can be something for both of them again. "I love you. So much."

After all the crying and the wild emotions, even the best outcomes leave J feeling small and fragile. It's hard not to be overcome by the moment, lost in how S touches him, gentle and absent; even if he hadn't said that just now, J would feel it, how loved he is. Before they met, J didn't know what that could feel like, having someone at his side no matter what.

He hasn't known either, all year, what he wants. It's hard to know. There's been so much to work through and against, and so much of what he loved most in his life has been tainted in some way or another. He was so sure for so long of who he was and who he wanted to be, what he wanted to do. Figuring out how to live with that while not wholly distracted by his own mind falling apart is a struggle, but he's trying. "I love you," he whispers, voice thick, and swallows hard. "You'll figure it out. Whatever you find yourself wanting, I'm here."

S did that for him, after all, practically from the moment they met. He had a faith in J that J has never understood, and he believed in J even when J was breaking down, losing his own certainty. Changing their future isn't as simple as just willing it to be, as announcing his intentions, but it's a start, and he's determined to do better.

"I know," S murmurs, nuzzling against J's cheek for a moment, his voice quiet in the emptiness of the room around them. Still in the back of his head is the knowledge that he needs to finish closing up so they can go home, but this has all been far too important to rush, and he's not ready to move away yet. It's not likely anyone will come wandering in when they'd typically be closed, anyway. They can sit here a while longer, like they used to so often, like they haven't in so long, taking in this simple, seismic shift. He knew he missed this, but he didn't know how much.

He's said that, too, he's pretty sure, but the fact and the extent of it keep catching him off-guard. It seemed so impossible that he put it out of his head, but now, being here, he realizes how much difference this alone makes. Even if he never does anything more than occasionally play for fun, at least he can do so now with J beside him. That's all he ever really wanted in the first place.

Brushing the ghost of a kiss against the corner of J's mouth, S leans back just enough to look at him, to meet his gaze. He needs J to know how much he means this, how deeply sincere he is. "I know you are." In the time they've been here, J has been nothing but supportive, and while there may have been a time when that wasn't true, it was ages ago now — in J's case, a literal other lifetime. Whatever he does, J will be here, the way it always should have been. "Me too."

J can't, however much he wishes he could, control the way he trembles, jaw shaking slightly, eyes wide, heart aching. He doesn't know why that affects him so much, why it means so much, not off the top of his head. He only knows that it does. After all they've gone through together, after all he did to them, it matters deeply.

He can't hide that. For a long time, he tried once again to bury his emotions, afraid to let himself be so vulnerable, even with S. Even when he first came here, his passionate outbursts weren't motivated so much by openness as an inability to keep things in when he was hurting so terribly. He doesn't want to hide things anymore, though, not from S. He hasn't wanted to in a long time, except when he's done stupid things like keep his feelings on this matter to himself, thinking he was helping them. Maybe that's what it is. He spent so long doing anything but supporting S. Then, here, he's tried to be there for him, but sometimes he feels like it's backfired or he simply hasn't been very good at it, too exhausted or emotional or lost in his own head to be as present as he wants to be. And it's not like it surprises him that S sees it all the same, but there's such an overwhelming sense of relief at knowing he does.

"I know," he murmurs, nodding. He draws in a sharp, shaky breath, sniffling quietly, and shakes his head. "I'm glad you know." Taking a moment, he closes his eyes tight, nose wrinkling up in an expression at once frustrated and resigned. "Ah, can't I talk about anything important without crying? I'm just glad, darling. I really did think I — ah, I don't know, I thought it was another thing I broke. And I hoped it was enough, but I didn't know. I feel like I'm not good at it anymore. There's too much in my head for me to be very supportive. I'm glad I am anyway."

Even before J has finished speaking, S shakes his head, though he listens, waiting until J has finished before he speaks up. For him, though, that couldn't be further from the truth. Yes, there was a time when things weren't good between them, when J seemed to feel threatened by or angry about anything he did rather than supportive or encouraging. In the grand scheme of things, though, that was only a tiny fragment of their relationship, a significant but ultimately short span of time, easily outweighed by all the rest of it. Not prone to the same dramatics as J, S wouldn't go so far as to say that he wouldn't have survived his parents' deaths without J there with him, but he would have been much worse off, alone in the world and without any choice but to leave home. Except for that one bad year, J has always been there for him. That, at least, is how S has always seen it.

"I think you're better at being supportive than you think you are," he murmurs, lifting his hand so he can brush an errant tear off J's cheek with his knuckle. "You're here. And when something matters to you, you care so much." Ever since they were children, S has considered himself lucky to be on that list. It was one of the things that made him realize he'd fallen in love with J — how passionate he could be, how dedicated. His being supportive is just a different aspect of the same thing, really. "You definitely didn't break it."

What's held S back has been himself, really. Maybe some of it may have been for J's sake, but not because he thought J wanted it a certain way or that he might get angry. The few times it's come up, J has been the one who wanted him to have that option. That, he thinks, unquestionably counts as being supportive.

J really wants to calm himself down. He wants to go home and stay wrapped up in S's arms all night, and he can't leave this place until he's a bit more put together, but he didn't mean to make S come here and stay late at work or keep him from closing up. He doesn't want to budge, not when S is gently wiping away his tears and looking at him like that, but, really, S can do that at home, too.

It's just not likely to happen any time soon. Try as J might, he can't keep from tearing up yet again. It's not his fault, he's pretty sure. He doesn't see how anyone could help it in the face of something like this, S speaking softly all the things J's been afraid to want to hear. It's such a relief it doesn't quite feel real and it hurts and it's wonderful, all at the same time. Granted, that comes out of him in these stupid little whimpers and hitching breaths as he tries not to let himself get overwhelmed and only succeeds in further overwhelming himself. He's just fucked up so much and so badly in so many ways that it's hard to believe, sometimes, that he hasn't ruined everything, even when the proof is sitting in front of him, real and beautiful and his. He doesn't know if he'll ever entirely move beyond that, but it's progress enough that they can sit here at all and that he can believe what S says is true.

"You matter to me," he manages, shaking his head, after a few moments of catching his breath. "And you think I'm better at a lot of things than I do. I'm..." He takes a deep breath, trying to figure out what he's trying to say. Sighing, he shrugs a little. "I miss when I believed in me so much." Even then, he knows, he had his doubts. He was better, though, at pushing his way through them, and better at recognizing the things he did well. He felt a need to prove himself, but he didn't doubt he was capable of doing so. He knows S liked that confidence, admired him for it, and it's both comforting to find that S doesn't like him any less now he lacks it, even if he wishes he didn't need to know that.

Sniffling again, he lets out another sigh, leaning close to press his forehead to S's. "I missed this, too," he says, soft as an exhale. "Just being with you like this. Hearing you play. It means so much, darling."

S feels pretty stupid now for how unexpected the very fact of that is. Until today, he wouldn't have thought J would want to hear him play, and certainly not that he would be so touched by it. As much as it's hurt to get here, though, old worries laid bare, this might just be the best possible outcome. Forehead resting against J's, he nods just enough that he won't have to pull away to do so, fingers finding J's again, giving his hand a gentle squeeze. At least the first part of what he's said isn't surprising, as much as it hurts to hear. S still doesn't know what happened there, what changed, only that J went from being anxious but confident to just anxious. He would find a way to change that if he could, but he doesn't want to make it sound like he preferred J then. It's for J's sake that he wishes he could find a way to bring that back, not his own.

"I miss when you did, too," he admits, leaning in to press a kiss to J's cheek. "But I'll just have to believe in you enough for both of us." He does; he always has. Even when they were children, there was a part of him that wanted to protect J, but a part that was awed by him, and by getting to be around him. For S, that's never changed. No matter what either of them chooses to do next, whether the piano is part of it or not, he knows that will never change.

Taking a breath, he weighs his words for a moment. The last thing he wants is to make them both even more emotional again instead of helping them settle down, but he can't hear something like that and not address it. "And it... means a lot to me that it means a lot to you," he says, nose scrunching a little at the awkwardness of how it comes out. There's no good way to say it, really, but it's true. It means the world to have J sit here beside him, wanting him to play, not making it a source of arguments or resentment anymore but instead saying he's grateful for it. S meant what he said before, that he didn't know how much he missed this, that he didn't let himself. He could never touch a piano again after this, and it would still feel like something has been set right, put back the way it should have been. "Really. I... Knowing that you want that..."

Gently clasping S's hand, J closes his eyes, letting the words sweep over him with all the hurt and gratitude they bring. It would be nice if he could just say that of course he does, of course he wants to hear S play, just as he did when they were kids. It would be nice, but it would be ridiculous. He's blind to a lot of things, but it's impossible for J to be oblivious to this. He's too keenly aware of the damage he caused before not to understand why S isn't used to this anymore, why he couldn't have assumed that J would want this, no matter how J has tried to encourage him since he came here. Even with that, after all, there must be a difference between knowing J accepts his playing and understanding J would want to hear it. It hurts that he caused this, but at least maybe this means they've moved past it somewhat.

"I do," he murmurs. "I have for a long time. I'm sorry I didn't say so." He has to bite his lip to keep himself from continuing. There's no point in saying again that he didn't want to pressure S or that S doesn't have to play for him after this if he decides he doesn't want to. They've covered that, and, anyway, it's pretty clear that S is perfectly willing to play now they've crossed that bridge. For that matter, it's probably ridiculous to keep apologizing, but he can't help it. It's regrettable that he kept it to himself for so long. He just has to hope that, next time, he actually learns from this.

He has learned, he thinks, no matter what he said before. Maybe it's less than he'd like, but it's happening. "It's better, you know," he adds after a moment. "I don't know if I'll ever feel like I did before, but... you help me believe in myself a little more. And maybe this —" He gestures to the piano briefly with his free hand, bringing it back to cover S's a moment later. "Won't be either, but... this feels good."

The last thing S wants right now is another apology, but he bites back the instinct to say so. It wouldn't be worth talking in circles again about it, and the fact of the matter is, he does wish J had said so sooner, even if he understands why he didn't, just like he wishes he'd said something sooner himself, and knows he had a good reason to hold back. Even now, they're a mess. He stands by what he said a little while ago, though. Maybe they didn't get this right, but they've worked their way through it now. They do learn, just more slowly than they probably should. In all fairness, they've been through hell, too, both together and apart. Of course they might struggle with things that once came easily; of course certain subjects might be more difficult to broach. They've both tried, he thinks, him encouraging J at Kagura, J giving him sheet music for Christmas, but without talking about it, of course they both would have made the assumptions they did.

It's easier to cut himself a little slack in that regard when he thinks about it being true for both of them rather than something he got wrong. As much as it hurts to think about what J mistakenly believed instead, S knows he had every reason to think that J wouldn't be comfortable hearing him play. With all the trouble it caused between them for so long, he's still not sure how he feels about what to do next. He does, though, think that they'll be better for having it out in the open, the biggest hurdle behind them now.

"Good," he replies, hand curling around J's again. What he doesn't say is that he thinks it's probably better for both of them if it wasn't what it once was. At least this way, letting it be something new, there's a chance for it to be something at all. "Both of those things. That has to count for something, right? That it feels good."

J nods, small and quick, heart stinging but soothed. "I didn't know if it ever would again," he says, his voice soft, as much from how wrung out he is by all the crying as from a kind of nervousness that comes with talking about these things. S will listen well, he knows, but there's something almost superstitious in his head about it, like he'll undermine their good work if he acknowledges certain kinds of progress. He bites his lip, shrugging ever so slightly. "It's still so complicated, and I was so worried. I thought maybe we could never sit comfortably like this again. It counts for a lot."

For a little while, he felt alright about playing — better than alright when he was actually at the piano, though he restricted himself to simple pieces for brief whiles at Kagura — but a spell of his old moods and the closing of Kagura have put a dent in that. It's better than it was, but having not had the chance in a while, he's feeling the uncertainty again. At least now he has concrete proof that he can play without it being a problem. He just isn't sure what happens if he lets himself do more, if he finds a way to play more often, if he ever tried to write again. He's not sure he should want to or if he does want to or if he even could. In spite of everything this last year, though, he also still feels like he's trying to figure out who he even is. Music defined him for so long, and he doesn't have anything like that anymore. Photography has, mercifully, stayed simply a hobby — one he's been fairly passionate about studying, but not all-consuming, just enjoyable. He doesn't really know any other way to pursue something, is all. And now the only thing in his life that really fills his days, his attention, his dreams, is S, and he can't be that. Loving S helps to shape who he is, and he builds his future around that, but it's not his whole identity, nor could it be. But to let music be that again would be to court disaster. Maybe it's dramatic to consider it as something that could be dangerous. Certainly, since he came here, he hasn't felt any kind of an impulse to harm anyone other than himself. But he's not sure it's all that dramatic, and it's not something worth taking big risks on.

S isn't wrong entirely. He has to admit that. If S truly pursued playing and J didn't even let himself try, he'd be jealous, and that would be a problem. After all, before this, when he was first feeling that way, he knew it was his own inadequacy that upset him. Surely the same would be true if the thing restraining him were madness rather than mediocrity. But he also knows S enough to know that it's unlikely he'd ever seek out the kind of career that would make J really envious, and maybe with it being a slightly less fraught subject in at least one way, he'll feel better equipped to keep trying, too. Besides, they're better equipped in other ways, he's certain of that. He may have kept this to himself, but he's improved, he knows he has, at telling S when something's wrong. If he can maintain that honesty, they'll be okay.

"Ah," he says after a moment, shaking his head, "but how do you feel? You missed it, you said. Was it good?"

Even now — even having been the one who was playing in the first place — S isn't expecting at all to have the focus swung back to him and how he feels. For him, it's never really been about that, which is maybe part of the problem. He's never let it be. Missing it is one thing, and playing here in fits and starts, but doing so with something like intent and J at his side after so long is very, very different. That last time when he went to see J, despite what he'd said on his way over to the piano, S thought that would be the last time after all, ending definitively and painfully, with nothing but discord. As glad as he is to have been wrong, there's an extent to which he still hasn't processed it yet. This whole last while, since J first found him in here, has been so fraught and emotional, and though his current composure may be somewhat more steady than J's, underneath that, he still feels shaken. It's not a bad feeling, really, just that he hasn't caught up yet, struggling to find equilibrium after dealing with something so huge.

It might not have gotten so big, though, if they'd just fucking talked about it sooner. With that in mind, he figures the best thing he can do is be honest. "I think so," he murmurs, glancing down for a moment at where his and J's hands are entwined, his thumb brushing against J's knuckles. "I'm not really sure how I feel yet. I know I don't feel bad. It's just... a lot." Realizing even as he speaks that those words could be too easily misconstrued, he lifts their hands then, pressing a soft kiss to the back of J's. "Not because of you. This... the being here with you part, that feels good. It's just me and the piano that I still have to figure out, I think."

After all, it's been so long since he loved it. Before J moved out, he was trying to get back to the way things used to be, wanting to remind J of what was good between them, but his passion for music was already fading. Maybe that started even before the first cracks formed in their relationship. That much might well have been the professor, and the knowledge that the pieces he wrote, someone else would be taking credit for. He still played after J moved out, but his heart wasn't in it. Then, recovering from surgery, not knowing yet what actually happened, he could barely stomach having the instrument around at all. When he finally did start playing again, it was to play J's stolen piece, and that was out of sheer determination. The music broke his heart, but he played then for J, not for himself, not really. That much, he still has to find again. "But it's... it's nice to at least know that I can. Not just try to shut myself off from it."

Despite all they've discussed, J has to steel himself for S's response, unsure of what he means until he explains himself. The truth of it hurts, too, but it's better than his instinctive fear, the uncertainty that comes from inside of him, and he's thankful he managed to hold himself together. He trusts S in a way he still doesn't and might never trust himself, but that doesn't always mean much against the weight of irrational fear — not, at least, as much as he knows they both wish it did.

He's busy wishing, too, that S had never had to feel that way, feeling, as always, a little guilty for his role in it, until something about the wording turns on a light in the back of his head. It's familiar, is what it is, and he nods absently before he's pieced together his words. "I think," he says, slow even though he's really thinking out loud, "I'm still doing that." He has to. And the thing is, he doesn't, not really, but if he rushes in all at once — it's frightening and it's too much and he's steadier than he once was by far, but he's still unsure and shaky even on his better days. If he lets it all in, he doesn't know how he'd cope or what he'd do, and he's too afraid to find out, but keeping it all at bay doesn't feel natural either.

"It's a lot," he echoes, nodding again. When he's entirely rational about it, after all, he knows that the piano wasn't the real problem, and so keeping himself apart from music serves little real purpose. But that's worse, actually, much worse, and it's not like the piano helped. "But you can. And you have time. You'll figure it out when you're ready, darling." He hopes he will, too, but, these days, figuring out much of anything feels a long way off.

Although it's hardly a revelation in itself, something they've talked about enough for him to have already been aware of it, S still finds himself slightly surprised by what J says. Until now, he never considered it like that, the two of them, as they've so often done, winding up in the same place, just taking entirely different routes to get there. J, he knows, has been worried about what might happen if he leaned wholeheartedly into music again; as much as S trusts him, he can't blame J for not feeling secure in that. For himself, it's just seemed easier to keep it at a distance. He hasn't loved it enough to feel like he was losing anything in not pursuing it anymore, but he hasn't let himself love it, either. This, here, despite how emotional they've both been, is the first time in a long time he's felt even a fraction of what he used to when they played with or for each other.

It's still hard to know how to go forward or what he wants. Even when things were at their best, he never really had J's ambition, and he has even less interest in acclaim now than he did back then. It wouldn't feel right to stoke that fire. Any playing he does will be for himself, for them. That's all he ever really cared about anyway.

"We both will," he murmurs, giving J's hand a gentle squeeze. "We'll figure it out together." Maybe that's the piece that's been missing for both of them, that's made this feel so insurmountable. They've both tried to encourage each other when they could, but if having this together seemed so off-limits, it's no wonder he's been at such a loss. "I really have missed this."

It's been a strange journey, figuring out where he stands in regards to music, and he has a lot more to learn and determined. It still feels wrong to J that it's like this, but he knows it's something where he really can't just rush back in. That hurts, too, not just because he devoted so much of his life — too much of it — to music, but because it's tinged so many of the happiest memories of his life with uncertainty. It used to be where he felt safest and most confident, and now it's entirely the opposite. When he does play, he feels a little of that again — not the confidence, necessarily, but the sense of it being right that he missed for a long, long time. Even so, it's too complicated for him to dive back in and start playing again or writing all at once.

This, though, this is simple, all of the complexity nudged aside in the face of what S says. He nods, small, leaning his face against S's shoulder. "Me too," he murmurs. S's patience with him and his quiet support are the main reasons, he's fairly sure, that he's able to sit here at all, at peace enough not to be frightened of the very fact of sitting in front of a piano. Tilting his head up, he leans forward, pressing a soft kiss to S's jaw. "Next time," he adds, just as hushed, "let's play together."

He wants that, he thinks, very badly. And maybe that's why he spent all this time afraid that S didn't want him here, that he'd only think of that last time they played together — because he wanted it. Because he wished he could go back and do everything differently, that he hadn't slammed the keys or walked away. Right now, though, despite how well this has ultimately turned out, his emotions are too wild, his nerves shot, and he doesn't think he could handle playing at all, never mind taking such a big step. Still, it feels good to talk about the future in any form, and to think that they could have that.