♮
♮ (natural)
ayeon/youngk
g, 1217w
ayeon silently says goodbye to the boy across the train tracks every night. (music majors!au)
a/n: a little brain dump that was rolling around in my head for a while. I'm crazy rusty.
On a bitingly cold night, with her cello strapped securely to her back and her gloved hands shoved deep into her coat pockets, Ayeon stares straight at the person standing directly opposite her on the other platform. His scarf is wrapped around the bottom half of his face, like her. His hands are in his pockets, like her. The case on his back is slim and guitar-shaped - unlike her.
The anaemic, blue-white light of the train station shadows his eyes. She can’t tell if he’s looking at her or looking at nothing. She fancies that he is looking at her, that the earphones in his ears aren’t playing any music and are just an excuse to ignore his surroundings - or look as though he’s ignoring his surroundings. Same as her.
Ayeon lifts her hand when his train barrels between them, a long motion blur of steel and electricity slicing through the still night. “Bye,” she whispers, the smallest amount of her breath slipping out through her scarf. It wavers for a fraction of a second, a white manifestation of her feelings, then silently fades away. It joins the ghosts of the other unspoken words that she whispers to him every night across the train tracks.
She allows the darkness to swallow him whole.
She’s average.
She isn’t cool like Yerin or spunky like Jimin. She isn’t beautiful like Sunmi or cute like Nayeon. She’s just Ayeon; a little boring, a little safe, a little timid. A little person lugging her cello through the hallways of music college looking like someone who’s found themselves in the wrong place and doesn’t have the courage to ask for the way out.
She asked for the way out once. From a boy with sharp eyes and a sharp face. Him, sitting on a chair in an empty room with a slim, streamlined bass guitar on his lap. Her, standing in the doorway with her clunky cello strapped to her back.
Her, terrified that she was going to be late to the first class of her semester.
Him, with a smile that made her think that might be okay.
Ayeon didn’t fall in the slow, poetic way she was used to portraying in her performances. No slow marches and melancholy longing. No, her fall was a sudden staccato, an irregular whole rest in the middle of a long symphony. She’d lost her place in the sudden change of tempo and she was sure she’d never be able to catch up again.
“I could introduce you to him,” Sungjin suggests when he catches her gawking from around the corner. “He’s a cool guy.” And Sungjin would know, guitar major Sungjin with a nose a little too big for his face, who made up for his physical shortcomings with a personality that screamed confidence, who Ayeon had once sat up with the whole night when his mentor had said that his fingers “weren’t nimble enough.”
“He’s in a band,” Sungjin adds.
“You know classical and rock never get along,” Ayeon mumbles half-heartedly.
“We get along just fine,” Sungjin points out. They both watch him shake his hair out of his eyes and head down the hallway. Ayeon notices new things about him every time she sees him - the chickenpox scar on the corner of his left eyebrow, the tiny mole on his right ear and today, the prominent dark circles shadowing his sharp eyes. She has always been so good at seeing everything from afar.
“I’m not a classical musician,” she replies absently. “And you’re not a rocker.” She watches him turn the corner and disappear from sight.
“Not yet anyway.”
“But he is.”
Sungjin pulls himself away from the wall and scuffs the toe of his sneaker against the floor. It sends a squeaky protest up Ayeon’s spine. She doesn’t need to turn around to see the hollow look in his eyes; she once spent a whole night trying to pull him out from its depths.
“He is.”
Sungjin leaves. Ayeon tries to whisper a final goodbye to circular dark circles and sharp sharp eyes.
The words don’t come out.
On a warm sticky evening Ayeon watches Sungjin bow to a screaming crowd. His eyes are still hollow but his smile is distracting enough to keep anyone else from noticing. He looks like a rocker. Ayeon simultaneously loves and despises him for forgetting that they were supposed to be in this together.
And to the side, sharp eyes and a sharp face. The ghosts of a year’s worth of unspoken words swarming around his head in a halo of byes and I like your hair todays and do you think you could maybe love me back?s. Shackling her to him with a chain of what ifs and what could bes.
She is still not a classical musician. She is still average, and her hands still shake during recitals. His hands shake too before performances, she’d noticed earlier. Same as her. There have been too many times that he has been the same as her when there shouldn’t be any at all.
He’s a rocker. She’s not yet a classical musician.
So before she crosses that line, before the time comes when she will find that one irreversible instance where they can no longer be the same, when it is all too late for either of them, Ayeon hoists her cello further up her shoulders and walks up to him.
Tonight - cropped hair and a pimple just grazing his hairline.
There is only one word hanging around his head now, peeping from behind his jet black hair, dazzling her with its simplicity. He smiles like he knows they’ve been trading silent conversations across the train tracks every night. Like he has a cloud of unspoken words crowded around her head, same as her.
The first words she has spoken to him in a year: “Hi.”
The first words he has spoken to her in a year: “Hey.”
The second words he has ever spoken to her: “Are you taking the train home tonight?”
On a bitingly cold night, with her cello strapped securely to her back and her gloved hands shoved deep into her coat pockets, Ayeon stares straight at the person standing directly opposite her on the other platform. His scarf is wrapped around the bottom half of his face, like her. His hands are in his pockets, like her. The case on his back is slim and guitar-shaped - unlike her.
“I like your hair today!” Ayeon calls across the train tracks. It glides through the air and sticks itself to his skin, slipping comfortably among all the other words she has said to him.
The train tears the night apart with its clatter, and in the chaos she misses his words. She waits to see him board the train. He doesn’t. And when the dust settles, he is still there on the other side, eyes shadowed but smile bright.
“And I like my hair when I’m with you!” he yells back.
Ayeon learnt a while ago that there will always be times when she loses her timing, skipping too far ahead or lagging too far behind. But during those times, even if she never finds her place in the music again, Younghyun will always be there. Waiting for her to catch up.
*
ayeon/youngk
g, 1217w
ayeon silently says goodbye to the boy across the train tracks every night. (music majors!au)
a/n: a little brain dump that was rolling around in my head for a while. I'm crazy rusty.
On a bitingly cold night, with her cello strapped securely to her back and her gloved hands shoved deep into her coat pockets, Ayeon stares straight at the person standing directly opposite her on the other platform. His scarf is wrapped around the bottom half of his face, like her. His hands are in his pockets, like her. The case on his back is slim and guitar-shaped - unlike her.
The anaemic, blue-white light of the train station shadows his eyes. She can’t tell if he’s looking at her or looking at nothing. She fancies that he is looking at her, that the earphones in his ears aren’t playing any music and are just an excuse to ignore his surroundings - or look as though he’s ignoring his surroundings. Same as her.
Ayeon lifts her hand when his train barrels between them, a long motion blur of steel and electricity slicing through the still night. “Bye,” she whispers, the smallest amount of her breath slipping out through her scarf. It wavers for a fraction of a second, a white manifestation of her feelings, then silently fades away. It joins the ghosts of the other unspoken words that she whispers to him every night across the train tracks.
She allows the darkness to swallow him whole.
She’s average.
She isn’t cool like Yerin or spunky like Jimin. She isn’t beautiful like Sunmi or cute like Nayeon. She’s just Ayeon; a little boring, a little safe, a little timid. A little person lugging her cello through the hallways of music college looking like someone who’s found themselves in the wrong place and doesn’t have the courage to ask for the way out.
She asked for the way out once. From a boy with sharp eyes and a sharp face. Him, sitting on a chair in an empty room with a slim, streamlined bass guitar on his lap. Her, standing in the doorway with her clunky cello strapped to her back.
Her, terrified that she was going to be late to the first class of her semester.
Him, with a smile that made her think that might be okay.
Ayeon didn’t fall in the slow, poetic way she was used to portraying in her performances. No slow marches and melancholy longing. No, her fall was a sudden staccato, an irregular whole rest in the middle of a long symphony. She’d lost her place in the sudden change of tempo and she was sure she’d never be able to catch up again.
“I could introduce you to him,” Sungjin suggests when he catches her gawking from around the corner. “He’s a cool guy.” And Sungjin would know, guitar major Sungjin with a nose a little too big for his face, who made up for his physical shortcomings with a personality that screamed confidence, who Ayeon had once sat up with the whole night when his mentor had said that his fingers “weren’t nimble enough.”
“He’s in a band,” Sungjin adds.
“You know classical and rock never get along,” Ayeon mumbles half-heartedly.
“We get along just fine,” Sungjin points out. They both watch him shake his hair out of his eyes and head down the hallway. Ayeon notices new things about him every time she sees him - the chickenpox scar on the corner of his left eyebrow, the tiny mole on his right ear and today, the prominent dark circles shadowing his sharp eyes. She has always been so good at seeing everything from afar.
“I’m not a classical musician,” she replies absently. “And you’re not a rocker.” She watches him turn the corner and disappear from sight.
“Not yet anyway.”
“But he is.”
Sungjin pulls himself away from the wall and scuffs the toe of his sneaker against the floor. It sends a squeaky protest up Ayeon’s spine. She doesn’t need to turn around to see the hollow look in his eyes; she once spent a whole night trying to pull him out from its depths.
“He is.”
Sungjin leaves. Ayeon tries to whisper a final goodbye to circular dark circles and sharp sharp eyes.
The words don’t come out.
On a warm sticky evening Ayeon watches Sungjin bow to a screaming crowd. His eyes are still hollow but his smile is distracting enough to keep anyone else from noticing. He looks like a rocker. Ayeon simultaneously loves and despises him for forgetting that they were supposed to be in this together.
And to the side, sharp eyes and a sharp face. The ghosts of a year’s worth of unspoken words swarming around his head in a halo of byes and I like your hair todays and do you think you could maybe love me back?s. Shackling her to him with a chain of what ifs and what could bes.
She is still not a classical musician. She is still average, and her hands still shake during recitals. His hands shake too before performances, she’d noticed earlier. Same as her. There have been too many times that he has been the same as her when there shouldn’t be any at all.
He’s a rocker. She’s not yet a classical musician.
So before she crosses that line, before the time comes when she will find that one irreversible instance where they can no longer be the same, when it is all too late for either of them, Ayeon hoists her cello further up her shoulders and walks up to him.
Tonight - cropped hair and a pimple just grazing his hairline.
There is only one word hanging around his head now, peeping from behind his jet black hair, dazzling her with its simplicity. He smiles like he knows they’ve been trading silent conversations across the train tracks every night. Like he has a cloud of unspoken words crowded around her head, same as her.
The first words she has spoken to him in a year: “Hi.”
The first words he has spoken to her in a year: “Hey.”
The second words he has ever spoken to her: “Are you taking the train home tonight?”
On a bitingly cold night, with her cello strapped securely to her back and her gloved hands shoved deep into her coat pockets, Ayeon stares straight at the person standing directly opposite her on the other platform. His scarf is wrapped around the bottom half of his face, like her. His hands are in his pockets, like her. The case on his back is slim and guitar-shaped - unlike her.
“I like your hair today!” Ayeon calls across the train tracks. It glides through the air and sticks itself to his skin, slipping comfortably among all the other words she has said to him.
The train tears the night apart with its clatter, and in the chaos she misses his words. She waits to see him board the train. He doesn’t. And when the dust settles, he is still there on the other side, eyes shadowed but smile bright.
“And I like my hair when I’m with you!” he yells back.
Ayeon learnt a while ago that there will always be times when she loses her timing, skipping too far ahead or lagging too far behind. But during those times, even if she never finds her place in the music again, Younghyun will always be there. Waiting for her to catch up.
*