Songbird
Fandom: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series
Rating: FRT, for language.
Pairing: Chekov/Sulu
Length: ~2,000 words
Summary: Pavel likes to sing. Just--not in front of people.
Pavel’s mother was a classical pianist.
In her youth she was celebrated as a prodigy. She performed in all the grand recital halls in Russia, and was twice invited to entertain at state dinners for visiting Federation dignitaries, and would have had a truly stunning professional career, if not for Pavel.
After Pavel was born, his mother retired from the stage-initially only provisionally, to tend him through his infancy, but then in a more permanent capacity, as it became apparent that Pavel was gifted and would require more directed attention. The knowledge makes Pavel feel guilty and cherished by turns, to know that his mother gave up her art and craft for him, but if she ever resented him for it, she never showed it. She took a teaching position at the local conservatory, and would let Pavel sit in a corner of the classroom with his books and games while she gave private lessons to her students.
This is where Pavel learned to sing.
He never had any particular talent for the piano-or his fingers were too small, when he was young enough to want to learn, and by the time his hands had grown to an appropriate size, he had discovered the marvel of physics and math and never looked back. But singing came naturally to him. He would wander the halls of the conservatory, listening to the music coming from the various rooms, and then find himself absentmindedly singing those same sweeping passages, later, as he puzzled over something and chewed on his PADD stylus.
His mother caught him at it, once, and bundled him into her arms and kissed his cheeks and the curls on his head and called him her precious little songbird. And from then on, she always reserved the last song of the day for the two of them: Pavel tucked into her side on the piano bench, singing the chorale and turning the pages as her fingers danced over the keys.
So Pavel likes to sing.
He likes to sing, because it reminds him of his mama, whom he misses terribly, and of those old conservatory classrooms, where he felt so close to her. It makes him feel alive, and at one with the universe, and a little larger-than-life for a few moments.
But he doesn’t like to sing in front of people.
His singing is a private thing: secret, and sacred. Not something that he likes to do in public, like the Keptin and his bawdy showtunes or Mr. Scott and his drinking songs. Sometimes Pavel will find himself singing distractedly under his breath as he works over a particularly sticky bit of math or a puzzling mechanical problem, and he’ll flush with embarrassment and look around to see if anyone’s caught him at it, but if anyone has noticed they haven’t said anything.
The shower is really the only place safe to sing, with the soundproofing of his quarters to shield his voice from prying ears and no chance of a communiqué interrupting and catching him mid-phrase.
It is probably, also, his favorite.
Pavel always starts low and soft, a little timid and still locked in the back of his throat, but then it builds up, like thunder, and the echo of his voice-in conjunction with the gentle drumming of the shower water-swells all around him and makes the shower seem alive, like he’s singing with a full choir behind him. Pavel closes his eyes and breathes into it and really lets his voice go, loud and clear and unrestrained by his own embarrassment at the prospect of someone overhearing. It vibrates through the air like a living thing, made manifest separate from his body in the humid shower air and the beautiful harmony that he’s filled it with.
He feels transcendent, when he sings like this. Like he could reach out and touch the souls of the stars they fly through, like his voice will carry all the way to his mother, wherever she rests, now, and-
The computer chimes a two-note entry, signifying that someone’s just entered his quarters.
Hikaru.
Hikaru.
Pavel startles so badly that he cracks his skull hard against the tile of the shower stall. The sharp, sudden ache that wells up in response is thick and sour.
The room is still echoing with his last lingering notes, and it’s loud in the sudden silence, hanging in the air like an accusation. Hikaru must hear it, too, because there’s a long pause, and then he calls out, “Pavel?” And, more urgently, rising in panic, “Pavel?”
Pavel doesn’t know what to say. He can’t move, he can’t do anything except cower in the corner of his shower, because Hikaru must have heard-he must have heard-and he’s so desperate for Hikaru to not judge him for this thing, to not make light of something that is so precious and fragile to him.
In four long strides, Hikaru is at the bathroom door. The steam billows out around him, thinning the air and making Pavel feel suddenly more naked than he ever has in his life. Hikaru just stares at him, eyes wide and chest heaving, and neither of them say anything.
Pavel palms the shower off and wraps a towel around himself, feeling small.
Hikaru’s hands work in the air: short, abortive movements, like he can’t decide what he wants them to do, and so is trying to do several things at once. “I- You- Are you-okay?”
And Pavel thinks, suddenly, savagely, why? Because his voice was so horrible to Hikaru’s ears that his first assumption was that Pavel was dying? That it was something terrible, some strange, violent-drowning death throes, rather than something beautiful? The fact that it’s Hikaru thinking these things makes them all cut that much deeper, makes something wind that much tighter inside Pavel’s chest, and he feels flayed.
It hurts a little-in his throat and behind his eyes-but Pavel forces his expression into a blank, and pushes past Hikaru into the greater room. “I’m fine.”
Hikaru looks confused and a little wounded. “Hey. Hey, no. Wait.”
“I’m fine. Really.” His voice feels hollow. When Hikaru reaches for Pavel’s hand, Pavel shrugs out of it, pretending instead to be intensely focused on pulling clothes from his drawers.
“I just. I thought I heard-I don’t know. I don’t know what I heard.” Hikaru ducks his head around to try to make eye contact, which Pavel firmly avoids. Hikaru persists. “I was worried.”
Pavel doesn’t mean to respond. He doesn’t want to argue with Hikaru about this-he doesn’t want to talk about it at all; he’d rather be left alone to feel out this misery until he can get his emotions under control. But a derisive scoff rips from him, from the back of his throat and from the fountain of dark feelings gathering in his chest, and once it’s out, Pavel can’t take it back, can’t force it all back down.
He rounds on Hikaru, furious. “I was singing, Hikaru! I wasn’t-drowning, I didn’t need you to come save me. I was singing! I’m so sorry that you had to suffer hearing that.”
Hikaru’s eyebrows rise in confusion. “What? No. I- What? I’m not- It sounded like you hit your head or something. In the shower? And then you didn’t say anything, and I-fuck, okay, yeah, I think maybe you must have, because you’re bleeding.” Hikaru’s eyes slide to Pavel’s hairline, and when he lifts one hand to gently touch the side of Pavel’s head, right where the sharp ache in Pavel’s skull lives, Hikaru’s fingers come away pinkish with water and blood.
All Pavel can think to say is, “Oh.”
Hikaru takes Pavel’s head in his hands and turns it, parting his curls to examine the injury in the light. “We should get you to sickbay.”
“I don’t need sickbay, Hikaru. I must have caught it on the corner of the shower fixture.”
“It could need stitches. It’s bleeding a lot.”
“Head wounds always do. Will you get me the kit from underneath the sink?”
Pavel dresses while Hikaru fetches the med kit, feeling wooden and clumsy, and only half-heartedly trying to keep blood off his clothes. He sits on the edge of his bed and allows Hikaru to treat and dress the wound, feeling a little mortified by his own irrational behavior and overreaction. But it’s too late now, because Pavel’s already sold his secret, and he can’t take it back.
When Hikaru announces that his work is done, Pavel turns to face him and rests their foreheads together. The small space between them fills with the sounds of their breaths, and it feels like a safe place for confessions.
“I’m sorry I yelled at you.” Pavel stares down at their hands, and twines Hikaru’s fingers in with his own. “I thought you were-making fun of me. I just-I like to sing.”
Hikaru runs a thumb over Pavel’s knuckles. “I know.”
“You know?” Pavel pulls back, surprised.
Hikaru folds into a fond smile. “Well, yeah. I mean, I figured. You sing all the time.”
“What? I do not!”
“Pavel, you-” Hikaru laughs. “You sing all the time. You’ll be lying in bed reading PADD messages and, like, singing those awful, catchy pop songs under your breath. Or when you’re at your desk reviewing the starcharts and humming to yourself. And when you’re on the bridge, plotting our course? Have you really never noticed how everybody goes really quiet, sometimes? I don’t think you realize you’re doing it, but I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want you to stop. I like listening to you.”
“Hikaru.” Pavel is scandalized. Absolutely mortified. “No. No.”
“Yeah. You really didn’t realize? It’s freaking adorable. Kirk is, like, halfway in love with you. I’m pretty sure he only sings those stupid songs just to get them stuck in your head. And how he’s always asking you to plot alternative routes, hoping to get you distracted, so you’ll start singing again?”
“Hikaru,” Pavel breathes, feeling his skin crawl with embarrassment and shame. He wants to melt right through the floor. All this time? In front of the Keptin, and Commander Spock, and the crew down in engineering? No-no no no. He wants to burrow under the blankets and never emerge; he can’t bear it.
“You had to know I moved that Benzarian Feeler over to your side of the bed in my room because of you. It practically blooms every time it hears you, now. You really didn’t know?”
Pavel gives him a scandalized look, and Hikaru wraps an arm around Pavel’s neck and pulls him close enough to kiss.
CREDIT: This was written for deathishauntedbyhumans, who posted this in the #chulu tag: "Chekov singing in the shower with his accent in an incredibly off-key voice and right as he’s getting out Sulu bursts in all concerned and Chekov is confused and so is Sulu and then Sulu says he thought he heard someone yelling and Chekov gets all sad and goes “I vas singing,” and then Sulu feels bad and then cuddles."
Rating: FRT, for language.
Pairing: Chekov/Sulu
Length: ~2,000 words
Summary: Pavel likes to sing. Just--not in front of people.
Pavel’s mother was a classical pianist.
In her youth she was celebrated as a prodigy. She performed in all the grand recital halls in Russia, and was twice invited to entertain at state dinners for visiting Federation dignitaries, and would have had a truly stunning professional career, if not for Pavel.
After Pavel was born, his mother retired from the stage-initially only provisionally, to tend him through his infancy, but then in a more permanent capacity, as it became apparent that Pavel was gifted and would require more directed attention. The knowledge makes Pavel feel guilty and cherished by turns, to know that his mother gave up her art and craft for him, but if she ever resented him for it, she never showed it. She took a teaching position at the local conservatory, and would let Pavel sit in a corner of the classroom with his books and games while she gave private lessons to her students.
This is where Pavel learned to sing.
He never had any particular talent for the piano-or his fingers were too small, when he was young enough to want to learn, and by the time his hands had grown to an appropriate size, he had discovered the marvel of physics and math and never looked back. But singing came naturally to him. He would wander the halls of the conservatory, listening to the music coming from the various rooms, and then find himself absentmindedly singing those same sweeping passages, later, as he puzzled over something and chewed on his PADD stylus.
His mother caught him at it, once, and bundled him into her arms and kissed his cheeks and the curls on his head and called him her precious little songbird. And from then on, she always reserved the last song of the day for the two of them: Pavel tucked into her side on the piano bench, singing the chorale and turning the pages as her fingers danced over the keys.
So Pavel likes to sing.
He likes to sing, because it reminds him of his mama, whom he misses terribly, and of those old conservatory classrooms, where he felt so close to her. It makes him feel alive, and at one with the universe, and a little larger-than-life for a few moments.
But he doesn’t like to sing in front of people.
His singing is a private thing: secret, and sacred. Not something that he likes to do in public, like the Keptin and his bawdy showtunes or Mr. Scott and his drinking songs. Sometimes Pavel will find himself singing distractedly under his breath as he works over a particularly sticky bit of math or a puzzling mechanical problem, and he’ll flush with embarrassment and look around to see if anyone’s caught him at it, but if anyone has noticed they haven’t said anything.
The shower is really the only place safe to sing, with the soundproofing of his quarters to shield his voice from prying ears and no chance of a communiqué interrupting and catching him mid-phrase.
It is probably, also, his favorite.
Pavel always starts low and soft, a little timid and still locked in the back of his throat, but then it builds up, like thunder, and the echo of his voice-in conjunction with the gentle drumming of the shower water-swells all around him and makes the shower seem alive, like he’s singing with a full choir behind him. Pavel closes his eyes and breathes into it and really lets his voice go, loud and clear and unrestrained by his own embarrassment at the prospect of someone overhearing. It vibrates through the air like a living thing, made manifest separate from his body in the humid shower air and the beautiful harmony that he’s filled it with.
He feels transcendent, when he sings like this. Like he could reach out and touch the souls of the stars they fly through, like his voice will carry all the way to his mother, wherever she rests, now, and-
The computer chimes a two-note entry, signifying that someone’s just entered his quarters.
Hikaru.
Hikaru.
Pavel startles so badly that he cracks his skull hard against the tile of the shower stall. The sharp, sudden ache that wells up in response is thick and sour.
The room is still echoing with his last lingering notes, and it’s loud in the sudden silence, hanging in the air like an accusation. Hikaru must hear it, too, because there’s a long pause, and then he calls out, “Pavel?” And, more urgently, rising in panic, “Pavel?”
Pavel doesn’t know what to say. He can’t move, he can’t do anything except cower in the corner of his shower, because Hikaru must have heard-he must have heard-and he’s so desperate for Hikaru to not judge him for this thing, to not make light of something that is so precious and fragile to him.
In four long strides, Hikaru is at the bathroom door. The steam billows out around him, thinning the air and making Pavel feel suddenly more naked than he ever has in his life. Hikaru just stares at him, eyes wide and chest heaving, and neither of them say anything.
Pavel palms the shower off and wraps a towel around himself, feeling small.
Hikaru’s hands work in the air: short, abortive movements, like he can’t decide what he wants them to do, and so is trying to do several things at once. “I- You- Are you-okay?”
And Pavel thinks, suddenly, savagely, why? Because his voice was so horrible to Hikaru’s ears that his first assumption was that Pavel was dying? That it was something terrible, some strange, violent-drowning death throes, rather than something beautiful? The fact that it’s Hikaru thinking these things makes them all cut that much deeper, makes something wind that much tighter inside Pavel’s chest, and he feels flayed.
It hurts a little-in his throat and behind his eyes-but Pavel forces his expression into a blank, and pushes past Hikaru into the greater room. “I’m fine.”
Hikaru looks confused and a little wounded. “Hey. Hey, no. Wait.”
“I’m fine. Really.” His voice feels hollow. When Hikaru reaches for Pavel’s hand, Pavel shrugs out of it, pretending instead to be intensely focused on pulling clothes from his drawers.
“I just. I thought I heard-I don’t know. I don’t know what I heard.” Hikaru ducks his head around to try to make eye contact, which Pavel firmly avoids. Hikaru persists. “I was worried.”
Pavel doesn’t mean to respond. He doesn’t want to argue with Hikaru about this-he doesn’t want to talk about it at all; he’d rather be left alone to feel out this misery until he can get his emotions under control. But a derisive scoff rips from him, from the back of his throat and from the fountain of dark feelings gathering in his chest, and once it’s out, Pavel can’t take it back, can’t force it all back down.
He rounds on Hikaru, furious. “I was singing, Hikaru! I wasn’t-drowning, I didn’t need you to come save me. I was singing! I’m so sorry that you had to suffer hearing that.”
Hikaru’s eyebrows rise in confusion. “What? No. I- What? I’m not- It sounded like you hit your head or something. In the shower? And then you didn’t say anything, and I-fuck, okay, yeah, I think maybe you must have, because you’re bleeding.” Hikaru’s eyes slide to Pavel’s hairline, and when he lifts one hand to gently touch the side of Pavel’s head, right where the sharp ache in Pavel’s skull lives, Hikaru’s fingers come away pinkish with water and blood.
All Pavel can think to say is, “Oh.”
Hikaru takes Pavel’s head in his hands and turns it, parting his curls to examine the injury in the light. “We should get you to sickbay.”
“I don’t need sickbay, Hikaru. I must have caught it on the corner of the shower fixture.”
“It could need stitches. It’s bleeding a lot.”
“Head wounds always do. Will you get me the kit from underneath the sink?”
Pavel dresses while Hikaru fetches the med kit, feeling wooden and clumsy, and only half-heartedly trying to keep blood off his clothes. He sits on the edge of his bed and allows Hikaru to treat and dress the wound, feeling a little mortified by his own irrational behavior and overreaction. But it’s too late now, because Pavel’s already sold his secret, and he can’t take it back.
When Hikaru announces that his work is done, Pavel turns to face him and rests their foreheads together. The small space between them fills with the sounds of their breaths, and it feels like a safe place for confessions.
“I’m sorry I yelled at you.” Pavel stares down at their hands, and twines Hikaru’s fingers in with his own. “I thought you were-making fun of me. I just-I like to sing.”
Hikaru runs a thumb over Pavel’s knuckles. “I know.”
“You know?” Pavel pulls back, surprised.
Hikaru folds into a fond smile. “Well, yeah. I mean, I figured. You sing all the time.”
“What? I do not!”
“Pavel, you-” Hikaru laughs. “You sing all the time. You’ll be lying in bed reading PADD messages and, like, singing those awful, catchy pop songs under your breath. Or when you’re at your desk reviewing the starcharts and humming to yourself. And when you’re on the bridge, plotting our course? Have you really never noticed how everybody goes really quiet, sometimes? I don’t think you realize you’re doing it, but I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want you to stop. I like listening to you.”
“Hikaru.” Pavel is scandalized. Absolutely mortified. “No. No.”
“Yeah. You really didn’t realize? It’s freaking adorable. Kirk is, like, halfway in love with you. I’m pretty sure he only sings those stupid songs just to get them stuck in your head. And how he’s always asking you to plot alternative routes, hoping to get you distracted, so you’ll start singing again?”
“Hikaru,” Pavel breathes, feeling his skin crawl with embarrassment and shame. He wants to melt right through the floor. All this time? In front of the Keptin, and Commander Spock, and the crew down in engineering? No-no no no. He wants to burrow under the blankets and never emerge; he can’t bear it.
“You had to know I moved that Benzarian Feeler over to your side of the bed in my room because of you. It practically blooms every time it hears you, now. You really didn’t know?”
Pavel gives him a scandalized look, and Hikaru wraps an arm around Pavel’s neck and pulls him close enough to kiss.
CREDIT: This was written for deathishauntedbyhumans, who posted this in the #chulu tag: "Chekov singing in the shower with his accent in an incredibly off-key voice and right as he’s getting out Sulu bursts in all concerned and Chekov is confused and so is Sulu and then Sulu says he thought he heard someone yelling and Chekov gets all sad and goes “I vas singing,” and then Sulu feels bad and then cuddles."