I Giorni
I Giorni
Student/Teacher ;; Woohyun/Sungkyu ;; pg
Inspiration
100 prompt master list
Note: This is for the 100 Infinite prompt challege going on at dashidorawa.
Anything tagged as "Inspiration" in these stories is the song that I was listening to at the time that I wrote the story OR it is the song featured in the story.
Also, my goal with each of these pieces is to fullfill the prompt, but in a way that isn't completely expected. :3 Take this as you will.
Student ;;
- a person formally engaged in learning, especially one enrolled in a school or college; pupil
- any person who studies, investigates, or examines thoughtfully
Teacher ;;
- a person who teaches or instructs, especially as a profession; instructor.
***
Woohyun stares down at the piano from over Sungkyu’s shoulder, eyes narrowed in concentration as his friend’s fingers flash across the keys. The right hand extracts a flowing melody from the piano, counterpart dancing across the lower octaver, supporting the melody that hums and spreads and filled the room.
It’s a skill that Woohyun was wanted to learn for the longest time now, ever since the morning that Sungkyu played the Italian piece for him and their family and friends. It’s the one he’s playing now, where his hands flash across the octave up and around middle c, then another octave higher.
Beautiful, Woohyun thinks as he hums absently to the melody, a beautiful song. In a moment, Sungkyu’s hands come to rest on the keys, a blocking out a D major chord, the sweet sound echoing like the ending peal of a bell, and Woohyun smiles, wishing he could capture this instant forever.
He doesn’t take notice of how Sungkyu’s shoulders shake with every breath taken, or even how his hands tremble with the pressure with which he’s pressing the keys. Woohyun doesn’t notice the way Sungkyu’s breath comes in pained gasps, or even how they appear as they pass his parted lips, a puff of heat that dissipates into nothingness.
Woohyun leans forward, reaching out to touch Sungkyu’s back only to hesitate at the last moment.
But Sungkyu’s fingers falter against the keys, a discordant crunch of noise resounding in the room. It leaves a bitter aftertaste in his mouth as he leans back from the piano, staring down at his own hands as if he has no idea how they’d gotten into that position. And perhaps a part of him, disconnected and separate from the agony of reality, truly doesn’t know. But then he’s shaking his head, clearing cobwebs, and the tension returns to his back, shoulders levelling out in an abrupt manner that has Woohyun reaching out again before he can stop himself. This time he really does brush Sungkyu’s shoulder, and the elder boy flinches at the touch.
“Hyung,” he mumbles, gaze focused on the glossy whiteblackwhiteblackwhite keys. Sungkyu’s head inclines, and Woohyun purses his lips, sliding down from his stool. “Hyung, will you teach me to play piano?”
Sungkyu swallows hard. It takes him a moment to answer, to gather his wits from where they’ve been tossed so abruptly, but he finally manages a weak smile even as tears begin to streak down his cheeks. His “Of course, Woohyun-ah,” is soft, no more than a breath of air, and though the words are almost inaudible, Woohyun hears them and his lips stretch into a wide smile that is reminiscent of the days before, the days when everything was still okay.
“Thanks, hyung,” Woohyun chirps, settling beside Sungkyu with a delighted hum, fingers reaching out to caress the piano. If he notices that his fingers don’t quite have the weight behind them anymore to press the keys down all the way, he makes no comment, and Sungkyu doesn’t bother to correct him. Instead, the elder sits there and waits until Woohyun positions his hands on the C-D-E-F-G keys in the bass range of the piano.
“First,” Sungkyu fans his fingers out across the keys, thumb resting on C, pinky on G. “The C pentascale is always the easiest to learn. It’s all white keys, which means that they’re the main notes of the scale. So here we have C--” the key is pressed at the name of the note, and his figners ascend as he continues on up the scale, “--D, E, F, and then when you get to G, your pinky is holding the key down. Back down it’s going to be G, F, E, D, and then you end with your thumb back on C. Make sense?”
Woohyun nods, tongue stuck between his teeth and lips as he watches Sungkyu run the pentascale again, humming along absently.
“N-now you try,” Sungkyu says. He waits until Woohyun’s fingers rest on the proper keys -- “Pinky on G, Woohyun-ah,” -- before he counts them off and they begin to play.
The lonely C major pentascale hums into the room, downright haunting in the upper octave that it’s being played in, and Sungkyu’s fingers tremble against the keys as he watches Woohyun mimic his movements further down the piano, the younger male laughing in delight when pentascale he plays results in such a pleasant sound.
Somewhere deep inside Sungkyu’s chest, his heart breaks just a little bit more, and he turns away before Woohyun can see his tears.