A raven haired boy strolls across the campus of Michigan State University, his nose buried in sheet music as he hums along to the written notes on the page.
"I need to make sure I double check this with the piano when I get there. Professor Feltsman will have my hide if I don't turn this piece in on time," He mumbles to himself. He returns to humming, making mental notes of places to double check as he reads the lines, walking with more focus to his apartment building off campus.
"Heads up! Watch out!" a voice scream before the musician is knocked on the back of the head with a flying disk, sprawling him forward, his sheet music flying across the sidewalk as he falls face first into the concrete below.
From where the musician is laying dazed, he hears two sets of footsteps run up to him, both yelling and asking about his condition. He pushes himself up to his knees with a groan, readjusting the glasses on his nose that the fall had made crooked.
"I'm so, so sorry! The wind caught my disc and sent it…...Yuuri?" The first set of footsteps stops right behind Yuuri and he starts to pick up his sheet music, "Oh good, for a moment I thought I hit someone else and was really in trouble."
Yuuri looks up and sees Phichit reaching down for him, offering to help him up. Yuuri takes the offer once all of his music is picked up and stands with a sigh, "Now I'll have to go thorough it again and make sure the pages are in order…"
"Sorry about that," Phichit apologizes. When Yuuri is fully standing, his and Phichit's faces are mere inches apart, both of them smiling at each other. No matter what happens, they can't ever be mad at each other.
A click and a flash draw their eyes apart to look toward the seemingly forgotten second person who was running to help. When their eye contact breaks, the look over to see Chris with his normal sassy smile, looking to his phone to check the quality of the photo he just took.
"You two have been best friends since you were five, you spend nearly all your free time together, and when you are apart it seems you both seek each other out…..When will the wedding bells be ringing?" Chris teases.
"Don't be an idiot!" Phichit and Yuuri yell simultaneously at their friend.
Nearly everything that Chris said had been true though. Yuuri and Phichit met in year one when Phichit's family moved to Japan for a fresh start. They grew up together, going to the same middle school and high school. When they both graduated, they moved to Detroit for college. They had been roommates the first three years, but decided to get separate apartments in their last year. Both decided it was best if they learned how to live on their own for a bit. Who would have thought their apartment buildings would be next door to each other, their windows facing each other's rooms across the alleyway.
"Let me make it up to you, I'll buy you ice cream at that shop on the way home," Phichit offers, picking up his disk and nodding in the direction of home.
"Ah sure. Sure," Yuuri agrees.
"I don't know how you handle it Yuuri, with everything Phichit gets himself into," Chris smiles as they all fall into step together. Chris had known them since middle school and had become so close they all decided to move to detroit together.
"Hey! I'm not that bad!" Phichit scolds with a pout, smacking Chris's arms lightly.
Yuuri giggles at the both of them, "Well…..I guess you could say that Phichit acts like he's my wild and crazy older brother. I just go with it."
The three of them continue walking, stopping at the ice cream parlor before Chris walks off in the direction of his own apartment, leaving Yuuri and Phichit to walk to their alone.
"So what were you working on? All that sheet music," Phichit asks as he licks the drips from his cup of peach sherbet.
"An assignment for Feltsman's class," Yuuri responds as he takes a bite of his vanilla ice cream.
"I heard the piano last night. Are you going to start playing again?" the Thai man asks with a glimmer of hope sparkling in his dark eyes.
Yuuri shakes his head with regret, "No. I was just checking some parts for this assignment. I can't play anymore. I've come to accept that."
Phichit gives him a forlorn look, before he notices how upset Yuuri looks. He has to cheer him up, knock him out of this mood that Phichit has to admit, has been hanging around Yuuri all day.
Phichit steps right in front of Yuuri determined, facing him and stops, jabbing Yuuri's chest with one of his fingers.
"Stop right there! You've been in this weird distant mood all day! You're 23, you should be having the time of your life! Where's the sense of adventure? Your eyes should be sparkling!" Phichit lectures, trying to pull Yuuri to his senses.
"Ah I guess I've just been too focused," Yuuri concedes. He knows his anxiety and depression can get the better of him without him even noticing, and Phichit always calls him out on it, "Maybe I'll call home tonight, it should help."
Phichit agrees and they both continue to walk down the blocks, in silence.
"I was talking to Mila earlier. She told me something that really sounded beautiful. 'She said "When you fall in love, the world just seems more colorful.' Pretty don't you think?" Pichit speaks, trying to draw Yuuri's attention to other thoughts.
"That sounds nice, but I don't think I'll ever experience that. Not after last time," Yuuri whispers, just loud enough for Phichit to hear, "I bet the world looks to colorful for you, Peach, but for me, life is monochrome, black and white, like piano keys. I doubt I'll ever experience the world like you do."
Phichit doesn't have a response to that so they walk the rest of the short walk in silence, only speaking when they have to part ways as they reach Yuuri's building.
"Oh I wanted to ask you something," Phichit says, suddenly remembering, "There is this guy that wants me to introduce him to Chris. If they hit it off, I'll totally be the third wheel. Will you come with us?"
"What? Me? Why?" Yuuri asks somewhat shocked.
"Well between you and me, We can be third wheels together. Not to mention, I hear he's a classical musician," Phichit taunts, knowing that'll get Yuuri's attention, and it does Yuuri's eyes change from nervous, to almost excitement, "You play the piano and He plays the whatsitcalled, so you can always pick up the conversation if it gets awkward, give Chris a time to regroup."
Yuuri thinks about it for a long moment, before sighing, "Ah Fine, I'll do it."
"Great! I'll text you the time and location tonight," Phichit smiles and waves as he starts walking excitedly to his own building.
"What am I getting myself into," Yuuri mumbles to himself, as he opens the door and walks up to his apartment.
Yuuri's fingers dance across the keys, speedily, in perfect time. The music score on the piano in front of him barely being glanced at as he plays from mostly muscle memory. The notes of the instrument fill the otherwise silent room. The audience of the competition sits enraptured, impressed by the musical abilities of the 15 year old boy.
Mozart's Moonlight Sonata. An intense, fast paced piece, that this young 15 year old boy has mastered to perfection, playing the score specifically as written. This is what earned him the nickname, "The Human Metronome" slave to the score.
Yuuri plays confidently, robotically, glancing out to the crowd only once as he plays, causing his focus to crash. Out in the audience, in the upper left corner, Yuuri sees a ghostly white haunting figure, the cruel smile on its face a mirror image of the one that he'd been practicing under for 10 years. His heart starts pounding, panic setting in, but he continues on. The longer this goes the more he feels like he is drowning. Yuuri fights, but the tempo is erratic now, his fingers slipping until something inside of him snaps.
He plays the keys, pounding on them, harder and harder, rushed in a panic until he stops altogether, his hands coming up to cover his ears, tears streaming down his face and all he can do is whisper in horror.
"I can't hear them. The notes. I can't…. I can't hear the notes! Someone help me….help me please….. I can't hear…...someone help me!"
Yuuri sits up heaving for breath, a cold sweat dripping down his back. He looks around, reorienting himself before collapsing back onto his pillow.
It had been 8 years. 8 years since he played the piano in competition for the last time, 8 years since he fell apart, a gear slipping lose in his head, 8 years since his mother, the one who traumatized him with the piano, died in the hospital, leaving him alone and isolated.
Yuuri looks at his watch impatiently.
"And like always I'm the only one on time, really guys?" He sighs exasperated. He starts walking along the path of the park, because he may as well find a place to sit while he waits. He continues walking, looking at the spring blossoms in the trees until he comes across a sight he'd never even thought he would encounter.
Up on the lowest branches of the white blossomed tree hang two shoes, and a pink jacket.
"Who leaves their shoes in a tree?" He questions, pulling them and the jacket down. He decides he better find the owner, so he takes them with him as he walks, lost in thought.
A sound distracts him. The playful, childlike sound of a melodica, playing a soothing melody in the near distance. Yuuri is drawn to the sound, an invisible lasso wrapped around, pulling him in. The Japanese man follows the sound, until he finds the source, the sight making him hide behind a nearby tree to avoid detection, if only so he could watch a bit longer.
On the children's jungle gym, standing at the top, swaying to the beat of the tune, is a silver haired man, slightly older than Yuuri, playing the melodica. The sweet music fills the air as Yuuri watches, enraptured, until it comes to the end. Taking the melodica out of his mouth, the silvernet's eyes look around, and Yuuri can see from the distance as tears fall down the porcelain skin of the man's cheeks.
"He's crying," Yuuri whispers, still entranced.
"Where are the birds?" A small voice asks, and Yuuri only then realizes there is a group of three children watching the musician from the bottom of the jungle gym.
"They didn't come?" The stranger speaks, a lilting russian accent, gracing Yuuri's ears, sending sweet chills down his spine.
Another child responds, "Of course not! It has to be a trumpet!" The girl accents her sentence with her hands on her hips.
"Ah the birds don't care about that," the older man laughs, "Maybe we should try playing together! Then they'll come."
The children laugh and pick up their instruments from where they had set them on a nearby bench. The russian counts them off when the children are ready and they play. The tune definitely the same, but more filled out, and rounded with sound as the children as the flute like sound of a recorder, the the jingling of a tambourine, and the clicking of castanets. The music is beautiful, and watching the silver man interact with the children clicks something in Yuuri, but just what, he doesn't know.
At the end of the song, to the children's squealing delight, a flock of pigeons flies down and lands all around, coming in with the breeze that tousles the silver fringe of the man's hair as the children climb down.
"I have to take a picture, this is too perfect, too beautiful not to capture," Yuuri whispers pulling out his phone and snapping the shot.
The flash attracts the attention of the older man who looks over and sees Yuuri hiding behind a tree. 'Taking photos without asking? That's weird.' The man climbs down, an annoyed look on his face as he walks over to confront Yuuri.
"What are you doing taking pictures without permission?!" He snaps, "Are you some sort of pervert?" They are in detroit and the older man can't help be feel protective of his music students who are still playing with the birds.
"I uh… It's not what you think!" Yuuri tries to defend himself, his arms coming up as he falls back, including the hand with the shoes and jacket.
"And you're stealing my shoes?!" his annoyance turns to anger and he raises the arm still holding the melodica, bring it down to hit Yuuri with it, He hits him a few times, Yuuri trying to explain himself as he holds his arms up in defense.
"Viktor," Yuuri hears a familiar voice call out, both men turn to look in that direction to see Phichit and Chris walking up from further down the path.
Viktor's eyes brighten with a smile as he immediately pulls back and runs to his friend.
"And Yuuri?" Phichit asks confused when he realizes that Yuuri is on the ground, sitting up and trying to brush himself off.
The thai man turns his attention back to Viktor and Chris with a smile as he let's Yuuri recompose himself.
"Viktor? This is Chris, that guy I was telling you about, and Chris this is Viktor!" He introduces, leaning over to whisper in Chris's ear, "See I told you he was cute."
Viktor's entire demeanor has changed from how he was interacting with Yuuri, becoming something more flirtatious, and sweet, " It's so nice to meet you, Chris!"
"And this," Phichit continues, walking over and gesturing to the now standing Yuuri, "Is Yuuri, but we'll just call him 'Friend A'."
"Oh my gosh I'm so sorry!" Viktor runs over, apologizing to Yuuri, he surreptitiously gives Yuuri a look that makes Yuuri's nerves tingle.
Phichit looks at his watch, "Hey it's almost time, should you be getting in there?"
"Oh you're right!" Viktor realizes, as he takes his shoes and jacket from Yuuri.
"Getting in where?" Chris asks confused.
Viktor points to a nearby building, one that Yuuri recognizes as the Campus's Music Auditorium. He walks over and grabs a case from the bench where the children had left their instruments before, talking to them and watching for a short time as they run to the auditorium building ahead. He swings his instrument case over his shoulder and turns to the group.
"If you want to find me look on stage! I'll be up there, playing this violin!" He speaks confidently, his mood changing again to one of self confidence and excitement.
There's that click in Yuuri again as he watches Chris and Phichit run ahead to the building. Viktor stays behind though, noticing Yuuri dazed in thought.
He gives the japanese man a soft, smile, grabbing his hand and pulling him along as they run.
Yuuri looks at Viktor, can't take his eyes off of the silver hair, or the eyes that he notice now in their proximity, are a gorgeous, sparkling blue, like the oceans of Hasetsu.
In his daze, Yuuri can't help but notice when he looks around. The world has never been this colorful before.