a little foolishness (3/5)
title: a little foolishness and a lot of curiosity
pairing: jaykhun
rating: pg-13
warnings: swearing
a/n: comments are mucho appreciated♥ (see? i'm mixing it up a little ;D /lame)
summary: it was quite possibly the worst piano lesson in the history of piano lessons. but at least jaebum could take one thing away from it: he did learn how to play the piano.
a little foolishness and a lot of curiosity
Three.
And now I'm keeping my head in the clouds
And it's not so tragic
If I don't look down
-As if By Magic, La Roux
Jay glances up at the shiny black numbers bolted to the side of the building, then back down on the hastily scrawled address on the flimsy napkin. The numbers are the same, but Jay is still suspicious. A building like the one that now faces him, a building so clean and shiny and modern-looking, cannot possibly be the residence of a man who plays chipped pianos in seedy clubs.
Jay rubs his eyes, thinking he must be going crazy, and wonders what the hell he’s doing here for about the fifth time in this past hour. He’d debated this decision over and over again in his mind, asking himself if it was really normal to go over to the house of a guy he’d only met in a dirty, cheap club to learn how to play the goddamn piano, of all things. Jay debates his dubious decision making skills again, contemplates leaving, decides that running away is the smartest course of action, throws the napkin into the shiny and perfectly clean trash can, and walks over to the crosswalk.
The annoying little red hand is waving tauntingly at him, and Jay’s suddenly feeling nervous. Calm the hell down, he thinks viciously. It’s not like he even knew you came. Just go home and pretend like this never happened. Jay nods at his mind’s wise words and leans against the street light. But he can’t stop his foot from tapping anxiously.
Jay sees the inviting white man beckoning him to cross and he breathes a sigh of relief, until he hears someone behind him (someone awfully familiar, even though Jay really shouldn’t remember the voice of a person he’s only met once) call his name.
Panic blooms in his chest, and Jay decides to ignore it, pretending that he’s deaf or something, and walk the approximately five steps that will bring him into the intersection, where Nichkhun won’t follow him.
One step. Two steps. Three steps.
Shit. Jay’s foot is just about to connect with the curb when a hand shoots out and grabs his arm with surprising force, yanking him back to the sidewalk. Jay turns slowly, examining the cracks in the cement, unable to make eye contact for reasons he can’t explain.
“I thought you were running away on me for a minute there,” Nichkhun says airily, as if they both don’t know that that is exactly what Jay was doing.
Jay doesn’t know if this guy was born without manners, or if he just has no common sense. Maybe, he thinks, he’s one of those people that just can’t take social cues-he knows there’s a scientific name for it (he learned it in health class), but he can’t remember what it is.
“Oh I was just in the neighborhood, out for a walk.”
Jay feels Nichkhun’s gaze as it travels up and down him, noticing the perfectly clean (and two sizes too large) tennis shoes, the pin-straight designer jeans, and the dark hoodie that currently hang from Jay’s slight frame. Jay squirms under Nichkhun’s observation.
“Oh,” he says. Jay almost flinches from the disappointment that the other boy hadn’t even bothered to hide hidden in that single syllable. “I guess I’ll let you get back to that.”
Jay nods, still staring fixedly at the floor, and waits until the edge of Nichkhun’s Vans disappear from his view before the guilt bubbles up inside him. “Nichkhun, wait,” Jay calls.
The younger man turns around and Jay glimpses his face for the first time since that night in the club. His hair is styled haphazardly, like he’d given up somewhere in the middle of getting ready and had just mussed it up. Somehow, it still looked perfect. His clothes were clean and well-matched, though his pants were a bit tight. But he had dark circles under his eyes-he looked stressed.
Jay felt the small bubble of guilt grow into a boiling Jacuzzi inside his chest. Being rude to Nichkhun felt like what kicking a puppy must feel like… Jay didn’t feel any safer by pushing the other man away, he just felt like an asshole.
“Um, actually I came for that piano lesson you owe me. I was just gonna drop by and see when you were free, but I dunno.” Jay clears his throat, hoping that Nichkhun won’t make him explain.
The questioning look in Nichkhun’s eyes makes this possibility unlikely. An awkward silence stretches between them, casting shadows on the cement blocks. Nichkhun waits, staring straight into Jay’s eyes (Jay tries not to think about the fact that Nichkhun has to look down to do so, mainly because his pride has been hurt enough today). The discomfort finally becomes too much to bear, and Jay says, “I chickened out, I guess.”
He expects Nichkhun to shoot him an annoyed glance, maybe even laugh in his face for being scared of something like that. Instead, Nichkhun’s face opens up again and a smile is firmly in place on his lips, though it looks a bit like a smirk from the right angle.
“Oh, well you could’ve said so,” Nichkhun says, and Jay can practically feel the grin in his voice. Jay’s body responds without his permission, and before he realizes he’s done it, he is grinning back.
“Well if you’re still interested in that piano lesson, I’m free right now,” he says.
Jay nods and follows him into the building. As they’re walking down a white granite and mahogany-paneled hallway, Jay suddenly remembers something. He looks over at Nichkhun and asks, “How did you know I was here, anyways?”
Nichkhun grins. “I saw you from my window.”
“Oh.”
The door to Nichkhun’s apartment is nothing like its owner. Where Nichkhun is practically an honorary Powderpuff Girl, filled with sugar and spice and everything nice and all that jazz, his door is actually rather imposing. It takes up almost an entire wall, and is the darkest black wood Jay has ever seen. The door, like the wooden panels on the walls of the downstairs hallway, is embellished with intricate carvings. But where the downstairs’ wooden panels were decorated with flowery, knotted designs, the door has a more serious air.
Jay can’t make out what exactly is carved into the door, but he catches hints of swirling, spiraling things and what looks like scales.
Jay wonders what could’ve possibly motivated a man like Khun to decorate his house with something like that.
Nichkhun turns the key into the lock and beckons Jay to come inside. Jay inches slowly into the room, expecting it to look much like the door. He finds that Nichkhun has found another way to shock him today (he thinks the count it up to about four times by now), because the entire apartment is white.
The floor is a white marble or granite (Jay’s not a geologist, actually, he failed Earth Science). The walls are painted bright white, the kitchen counter to his left is white stone, the leather couches to his right are white, and so is the baby grand piano sitting right next to a wall of windows that comprise roughly half of the wall space in the room. A narrow white hallway faces him, which he assumes leads to the bedroom(s). Jay stands in awe for a few seconds before he notices that the ceiling is the only thing in the room deviating from the all-white color scheme. The ceiling is painted pure, midnight black.
But even the ceiling cannot distract from the brilliance of the apartment. Jay has never seen a living space this bright before, and his eyes are aching a little bit when Nichkhun opens the refrigerator (it’s stainless steel, one of the only spots of color in the house) and asks him if he’d like something to drink.
“Oh, yeah. Thanks!” Nichkhun looks at him questioningly, and Jay realizes that he hasn’t told him what he’d like to drink. “I’ll just have a… water.”
Nichkhun shoots him a “suit yourself” look over his shoulder as he closes the refrigerator door with his foot, a glass of water and a beer, one in each hand.
Jay takes the glass gratefully and gulps down half of the drink in one go. How has he not noticed how dry his throat is until now, he wonders? He goes to set the glass down on the counter, but it slips from his grasp and almost spills. He manages to save it in time. He rubs his hands against his jacket, trying to ignore their sweatiness.
“So, should we get started then?” Nichkhun asks.
“Um, yeah. That’s probably a good idea.”
Nichkhun leads Jay to the piano and sits down on the piano bench. Jay glances around for a few seconds, trying to find something to sit on. Nichkhun stops arranging sheet music to look inquiringly at Jay.
“What?” Jay asks defensively.
“Why are you standing there like an idiot?”
Jay glares. “I can’t find anywhere to sit. It’s not my fault that you’re a weirdo who doesn’t like portable furniture. Ever heard of a chair?”
Nichkhun snorts. “Are you saying I have a big ass?” He asks, gesturing to the empty space beside him on the piano bench. “Because the last time I checked, this bench was big enough for two.”
Jay swallows, debates sitting on the bench, wonders why he’s suddenly feeling claustrophobic, tells himself that he’s being an idiot, glares at Khun, and sits down beside him on the bench, his ass almost falling off the opposite side of it. He is careful to leave three inches of space between their bodies (he can’t have the five inches he’d prefer, but since his new teacher owns a rather small piano bench, he can’t have that extra two inches without falling flat on his ass on the floor).
“Alright,” Nichkhun says authoritatively. “We’re gonna start with the basic position of your hands. It’s the most important thing-if you get it wrong, not only will you look like a complete dumbass, you’ll also fuck up every other note.” Nichkhun places his fingers on the piano keys, his wrists perfectly level with his knuckles, his long fingers spread out across the keys. Jay looks at Khun questioningly, wondering if he’s supposed to mimic the movement. Khun nods and Jay attempts to copy his position.
Nichkhun smacks his hands until they’re perfectly level.
When Jay finally gets the position right, Nichkhun smiles approvingly at him and says, “Good. Now we can move onto the actual playing part.”
Jay is expecting to learn scales or exercises before Nichkhun teaches him how to play songs, but Nichkhun, Jay finds, is a very unorthodox teacher. Nichkhun opens a ratty practice book and Jay catches a glimpse of a C scale, when Nichkhun gets an almost wicked gleam in his eyes and closes the book with an abrupt snap! Nichkhun stands up and walks behind Jay. He leans over him and opens a much newer book to the fourth or fifth page. The paper is a maze of lines (straight and curving) and dots (shaded and empty inside). It looks like something YoYo Ma would play at a White House charity benefit, and Jay is about to say something along the lines of I’m not a goddamn piano prodigy, Nichkhun, so what the fuck is up with the Mozart here, but every voice in his admittedly crowded mind goes eerily silent when Nichkhun leans over and places his hands on top of Jay’s.
His voice sounds the tiniest bit strained when he says, “I’m gonna count you in, then we’ll play it together.”
Jay can just tell what’s going to happen. He knows that the second the word “three” leaves Nichkhun’s lips, his brain is going to short circuit and he is going to go into horrible spasms and possibly die on Khun’s disgustingly sterile floor. Jay is as rigid as Nichkhun’s ridiculous black door when Nichkhun starts to count.
But when Nichkhun whispers “three!” into Jay’s ear, instead of dying a horribly spastic death, Jay finds himself clumsily playing the notes and chords in time with Nichkhun’s. Nichkhun’s fingers are pressing down on his, while his fingers are pressing into the piano keys. To Jay’s shock, by the third bar he is playing the song passably well. By the eighth bar, he sounds almost like he’s done this for a while.
The end of the song comes much too soon for Jay’s taste, and when it’s over and Nichkhun’s warmth leaves his back and arms, Jay’s sanity returns full-force.
Nichkhun sits back down next to him on the bench, but before his body can make contact with the seat, Jay is bolting straight up and walking away. Nichkhun starts to ask what is wrong with him, but Jay somehow knows what he’s going to say before he says it.
Suddenly, he’s regretting ever coming here. He’s wishing he’d never talked to this stupidly attractive boy, wishing he’d never had the balls to walk to his apartment, wishing that the bastard hadn’t caught him before he could cross the street.
“Don’t,” Jay snarls, before Nichkhun can ask him why he’s leaving. “This was a mistake. I shouldn’t have come.”
Nichkhun has the guts to look hurt, and Jay almost gets that feeling like he’s kicking a puppy again, but he forces it down viciously before he can feel guilty.
“What are you talking about?” Nichkhun asks, looking and sounding genuinely confused.
Jay is already walking for the door when he replies, “What the fuck are you playing at, making me sit close to you and shit? Why the hell did you have to friggin hug me when we played that song?”
Nichkhun rolls his eyes. “I was teaching you, you asshole.”
Jay glares at the taller man. “Yeah, well most people teach from a safe distance away, and they don’t hug their students from behind. I didn’t sign up for this shit. Thanks anyways, and bye.”
Jay almost misses Nichkhun say “He’s in denial” as he shuts the hulking door behind him.
pairing: jaykhun
rating: pg-13
warnings: swearing
a/n: comments are mucho appreciated♥ (see? i'm mixing it up a little ;D /lame)
summary: it was quite possibly the worst piano lesson in the history of piano lessons. but at least jaebum could take one thing away from it: he did learn how to play the piano.
a little foolishness and a lot of curiosity
Three.
And now I'm keeping my head in the clouds
And it's not so tragic
If I don't look down
-As if By Magic, La Roux
Jay glances up at the shiny black numbers bolted to the side of the building, then back down on the hastily scrawled address on the flimsy napkin. The numbers are the same, but Jay is still suspicious. A building like the one that now faces him, a building so clean and shiny and modern-looking, cannot possibly be the residence of a man who plays chipped pianos in seedy clubs.
Jay rubs his eyes, thinking he must be going crazy, and wonders what the hell he’s doing here for about the fifth time in this past hour. He’d debated this decision over and over again in his mind, asking himself if it was really normal to go over to the house of a guy he’d only met in a dirty, cheap club to learn how to play the goddamn piano, of all things. Jay debates his dubious decision making skills again, contemplates leaving, decides that running away is the smartest course of action, throws the napkin into the shiny and perfectly clean trash can, and walks over to the crosswalk.
The annoying little red hand is waving tauntingly at him, and Jay’s suddenly feeling nervous. Calm the hell down, he thinks viciously. It’s not like he even knew you came. Just go home and pretend like this never happened. Jay nods at his mind’s wise words and leans against the street light. But he can’t stop his foot from tapping anxiously.
Jay sees the inviting white man beckoning him to cross and he breathes a sigh of relief, until he hears someone behind him (someone awfully familiar, even though Jay really shouldn’t remember the voice of a person he’s only met once) call his name.
Panic blooms in his chest, and Jay decides to ignore it, pretending that he’s deaf or something, and walk the approximately five steps that will bring him into the intersection, where Nichkhun won’t follow him.
One step. Two steps. Three steps.
Shit. Jay’s foot is just about to connect with the curb when a hand shoots out and grabs his arm with surprising force, yanking him back to the sidewalk. Jay turns slowly, examining the cracks in the cement, unable to make eye contact for reasons he can’t explain.
“I thought you were running away on me for a minute there,” Nichkhun says airily, as if they both don’t know that that is exactly what Jay was doing.
Jay doesn’t know if this guy was born without manners, or if he just has no common sense. Maybe, he thinks, he’s one of those people that just can’t take social cues-he knows there’s a scientific name for it (he learned it in health class), but he can’t remember what it is.
“Oh I was just in the neighborhood, out for a walk.”
Jay feels Nichkhun’s gaze as it travels up and down him, noticing the perfectly clean (and two sizes too large) tennis shoes, the pin-straight designer jeans, and the dark hoodie that currently hang from Jay’s slight frame. Jay squirms under Nichkhun’s observation.
“Oh,” he says. Jay almost flinches from the disappointment that the other boy hadn’t even bothered to hide hidden in that single syllable. “I guess I’ll let you get back to that.”
Jay nods, still staring fixedly at the floor, and waits until the edge of Nichkhun’s Vans disappear from his view before the guilt bubbles up inside him. “Nichkhun, wait,” Jay calls.
The younger man turns around and Jay glimpses his face for the first time since that night in the club. His hair is styled haphazardly, like he’d given up somewhere in the middle of getting ready and had just mussed it up. Somehow, it still looked perfect. His clothes were clean and well-matched, though his pants were a bit tight. But he had dark circles under his eyes-he looked stressed.
Jay felt the small bubble of guilt grow into a boiling Jacuzzi inside his chest. Being rude to Nichkhun felt like what kicking a puppy must feel like… Jay didn’t feel any safer by pushing the other man away, he just felt like an asshole.
“Um, actually I came for that piano lesson you owe me. I was just gonna drop by and see when you were free, but I dunno.” Jay clears his throat, hoping that Nichkhun won’t make him explain.
The questioning look in Nichkhun’s eyes makes this possibility unlikely. An awkward silence stretches between them, casting shadows on the cement blocks. Nichkhun waits, staring straight into Jay’s eyes (Jay tries not to think about the fact that Nichkhun has to look down to do so, mainly because his pride has been hurt enough today). The discomfort finally becomes too much to bear, and Jay says, “I chickened out, I guess.”
He expects Nichkhun to shoot him an annoyed glance, maybe even laugh in his face for being scared of something like that. Instead, Nichkhun’s face opens up again and a smile is firmly in place on his lips, though it looks a bit like a smirk from the right angle.
“Oh, well you could’ve said so,” Nichkhun says, and Jay can practically feel the grin in his voice. Jay’s body responds without his permission, and before he realizes he’s done it, he is grinning back.
“Well if you’re still interested in that piano lesson, I’m free right now,” he says.
Jay nods and follows him into the building. As they’re walking down a white granite and mahogany-paneled hallway, Jay suddenly remembers something. He looks over at Nichkhun and asks, “How did you know I was here, anyways?”
Nichkhun grins. “I saw you from my window.”
“Oh.”
The door to Nichkhun’s apartment is nothing like its owner. Where Nichkhun is practically an honorary Powderpuff Girl, filled with sugar and spice and everything nice and all that jazz, his door is actually rather imposing. It takes up almost an entire wall, and is the darkest black wood Jay has ever seen. The door, like the wooden panels on the walls of the downstairs hallway, is embellished with intricate carvings. But where the downstairs’ wooden panels were decorated with flowery, knotted designs, the door has a more serious air.
Jay can’t make out what exactly is carved into the door, but he catches hints of swirling, spiraling things and what looks like scales.
Jay wonders what could’ve possibly motivated a man like Khun to decorate his house with something like that.
Nichkhun turns the key into the lock and beckons Jay to come inside. Jay inches slowly into the room, expecting it to look much like the door. He finds that Nichkhun has found another way to shock him today (he thinks the count it up to about four times by now), because the entire apartment is white.
The floor is a white marble or granite (Jay’s not a geologist, actually, he failed Earth Science). The walls are painted bright white, the kitchen counter to his left is white stone, the leather couches to his right are white, and so is the baby grand piano sitting right next to a wall of windows that comprise roughly half of the wall space in the room. A narrow white hallway faces him, which he assumes leads to the bedroom(s). Jay stands in awe for a few seconds before he notices that the ceiling is the only thing in the room deviating from the all-white color scheme. The ceiling is painted pure, midnight black.
But even the ceiling cannot distract from the brilliance of the apartment. Jay has never seen a living space this bright before, and his eyes are aching a little bit when Nichkhun opens the refrigerator (it’s stainless steel, one of the only spots of color in the house) and asks him if he’d like something to drink.
“Oh, yeah. Thanks!” Nichkhun looks at him questioningly, and Jay realizes that he hasn’t told him what he’d like to drink. “I’ll just have a… water.”
Nichkhun shoots him a “suit yourself” look over his shoulder as he closes the refrigerator door with his foot, a glass of water and a beer, one in each hand.
Jay takes the glass gratefully and gulps down half of the drink in one go. How has he not noticed how dry his throat is until now, he wonders? He goes to set the glass down on the counter, but it slips from his grasp and almost spills. He manages to save it in time. He rubs his hands against his jacket, trying to ignore their sweatiness.
“So, should we get started then?” Nichkhun asks.
“Um, yeah. That’s probably a good idea.”
Nichkhun leads Jay to the piano and sits down on the piano bench. Jay glances around for a few seconds, trying to find something to sit on. Nichkhun stops arranging sheet music to look inquiringly at Jay.
“What?” Jay asks defensively.
“Why are you standing there like an idiot?”
Jay glares. “I can’t find anywhere to sit. It’s not my fault that you’re a weirdo who doesn’t like portable furniture. Ever heard of a chair?”
Nichkhun snorts. “Are you saying I have a big ass?” He asks, gesturing to the empty space beside him on the piano bench. “Because the last time I checked, this bench was big enough for two.”
Jay swallows, debates sitting on the bench, wonders why he’s suddenly feeling claustrophobic, tells himself that he’s being an idiot, glares at Khun, and sits down beside him on the bench, his ass almost falling off the opposite side of it. He is careful to leave three inches of space between their bodies (he can’t have the five inches he’d prefer, but since his new teacher owns a rather small piano bench, he can’t have that extra two inches without falling flat on his ass on the floor).
“Alright,” Nichkhun says authoritatively. “We’re gonna start with the basic position of your hands. It’s the most important thing-if you get it wrong, not only will you look like a complete dumbass, you’ll also fuck up every other note.” Nichkhun places his fingers on the piano keys, his wrists perfectly level with his knuckles, his long fingers spread out across the keys. Jay looks at Khun questioningly, wondering if he’s supposed to mimic the movement. Khun nods and Jay attempts to copy his position.
Nichkhun smacks his hands until they’re perfectly level.
When Jay finally gets the position right, Nichkhun smiles approvingly at him and says, “Good. Now we can move onto the actual playing part.”
Jay is expecting to learn scales or exercises before Nichkhun teaches him how to play songs, but Nichkhun, Jay finds, is a very unorthodox teacher. Nichkhun opens a ratty practice book and Jay catches a glimpse of a C scale, when Nichkhun gets an almost wicked gleam in his eyes and closes the book with an abrupt snap! Nichkhun stands up and walks behind Jay. He leans over him and opens a much newer book to the fourth or fifth page. The paper is a maze of lines (straight and curving) and dots (shaded and empty inside). It looks like something YoYo Ma would play at a White House charity benefit, and Jay is about to say something along the lines of I’m not a goddamn piano prodigy, Nichkhun, so what the fuck is up with the Mozart here, but every voice in his admittedly crowded mind goes eerily silent when Nichkhun leans over and places his hands on top of Jay’s.
His voice sounds the tiniest bit strained when he says, “I’m gonna count you in, then we’ll play it together.”
Jay can just tell what’s going to happen. He knows that the second the word “three” leaves Nichkhun’s lips, his brain is going to short circuit and he is going to go into horrible spasms and possibly die on Khun’s disgustingly sterile floor. Jay is as rigid as Nichkhun’s ridiculous black door when Nichkhun starts to count.
But when Nichkhun whispers “three!” into Jay’s ear, instead of dying a horribly spastic death, Jay finds himself clumsily playing the notes and chords in time with Nichkhun’s. Nichkhun’s fingers are pressing down on his, while his fingers are pressing into the piano keys. To Jay’s shock, by the third bar he is playing the song passably well. By the eighth bar, he sounds almost like he’s done this for a while.
The end of the song comes much too soon for Jay’s taste, and when it’s over and Nichkhun’s warmth leaves his back and arms, Jay’s sanity returns full-force.
Nichkhun sits back down next to him on the bench, but before his body can make contact with the seat, Jay is bolting straight up and walking away. Nichkhun starts to ask what is wrong with him, but Jay somehow knows what he’s going to say before he says it.
Suddenly, he’s regretting ever coming here. He’s wishing he’d never talked to this stupidly attractive boy, wishing he’d never had the balls to walk to his apartment, wishing that the bastard hadn’t caught him before he could cross the street.
“Don’t,” Jay snarls, before Nichkhun can ask him why he’s leaving. “This was a mistake. I shouldn’t have come.”
Nichkhun has the guts to look hurt, and Jay almost gets that feeling like he’s kicking a puppy again, but he forces it down viciously before he can feel guilty.
“What are you talking about?” Nichkhun asks, looking and sounding genuinely confused.
Jay is already walking for the door when he replies, “What the fuck are you playing at, making me sit close to you and shit? Why the hell did you have to friggin hug me when we played that song?”
Nichkhun rolls his eyes. “I was teaching you, you asshole.”
Jay glares at the taller man. “Yeah, well most people teach from a safe distance away, and they don’t hug their students from behind. I didn’t sign up for this shit. Thanks anyways, and bye.”
Jay almost misses Nichkhun say “He’s in denial” as he shuts the hulking door behind him.