sing about me, i'm dying of thirst.
characters: jean, mikasa, others.
notes: for selena, once, on her birthday.
…
She looks so tiny is the first thought that surfaces as he watches her tiptoe towards him, her thin hands curled around the handle of his guitar case. She carries it like a heavy load, and Jean wonders if that misery is transferrable, if it is simply heavy for anyone who dares shoulder that burden.
But he smiles anyway.
She matches him, a rose-petal smile, shy in bloom, and when he takes the guitar from her hands, she rubs them carefully before she tucks strands of black hair behind her ear. Her hair is a beautiful midnight, a shadow; there are thousands of songs written for girls like this with smooth hair and gentle smiles and hands so thin they break hearts into tiny pieces.
"Why are you leaving it behind?"
Jean's lips press together. He wants to answer because there are a million reasons why—simply because there is too much pain in the lining of his rickety, faded black guitar case, because there is nothing but pain in his music, in his lyrics, in his life—but he only gives her one.
"I wrote these songs for my ex," his fingers tighten around the handle, knuckles burning white-hot, "and he's not coming back."
He can sense the slight shock on her features as they all widen, round the corners of her face into an innocent, cherubim expression. She nods slowly, as if she understands, and then turns to leave.
"I hope you've found something new," she says, turns her head slightly over her shoulder to glance at him, "something to bring you joy."
…
He doesn't notice her until she crashes into his door.
All Jean can see when he moves from behind the counter are the broken wheels of a pink bicycle, tapping against the glass. There is a loud swear and a frustrated scream before he opens the door and his new patron comes tripping over the threshold.
The bicycle narrowly misses him, but he catches an armful of clumsy woman, dropping one knee down to the ground to cradle her by her shoulders.
"I'm so sorry," she stutters with a bashful blush across the back of her neck, and when she cranes her head up, he catches the sight of her clear, grey eyes—and the recognition in them. "Wow, um—hi, again—I'm really sorry about this."
She looks different. Now that she isn't cast into the dingy lighting of an open mic, she looks radiant. Her hair is long and smooth, catching the light that falls through the windows behind her, and her eyes aren't lined with makeup; her voice isn't drowning out in the sounds of idle chatter and music in the background. The skirt she wears floats around her ankles, a sandy coral color, and her shirt is white and cut into a deep plunge around her neck.
Jean's eyes flicker over his shoulder and behind the counter as he stands, where his guitar is already beginning to gather dust. "I didn't expect to see you any time soon." His lips are quirked in a wry smile, one that simply screams the irony of the world in his face.
She smiles and it makes him nervous.
"Me either," she coughs slightly, straightening up and away from his grip, "thanks for the, um, help. I'm Mikasa."
Mikasa, he fits her name with her face, the way it is when she looked at him from the open floor as he sang, the way the lights fell across her cheeks and her hair fell into her eyes.
"I'm Jean." He moves over to the bicycle she brought in, lifts it and begins wheeling it into the back of the shop. "I assume you didn't come here for a song."
She laughs, a secret noise that barely leaves the back of her throat, and she steps up to the counter, leans her elbows onto it and tips herself over the edge to watch him. "No, I didn't, but you can sing if you like."
Jean smiles moments later as he catches her little quip, but he still disappears into the back room for a few minutes. When he returns, she is still leaning on the counter, her hair pooled in ringlets beside her elbows.
"That bike," he covers the chuckle on his lips with the back of his hand before it escapes his mouth, "it'll be a couple days, if that's okay? The frame is cracked and it'll take a little longer to fix."
He watches the deliberation in her features, and then she slides backwards, skips a step as she lands back on the floor. "That's fine," she says, "I'll come back to check on it as often as necessary. That bicycle…it's very important to me."
Jean nods marginally. "I understand; I don't mind at all." And as an afterthought as he watches her turn and head for the exit, "I'll take care of it, I promise."
Her hand catches the door and she turns to glance at him, and all Jean sees is the pearl-white of her smile that blinds him before she slips through the door.
…
She returns to his shop the next morning. Jean isn't sure how he recognizes her so readily, with flowers messily threaded through the sideways braid in her hair, like a band that disappears behind her ear, petals wilting and floating down into the collar of her shirt.
"Good morning," she leans herself onto the counter again, elbows pointed against the surface, and the long braid of her hair falls down her shoulder. He can't see anything else other than the heart shape of her face, and the grin on her lips. "I know there's nothing to expect yet, but I honestly couldn't think of anywhere else to go. And maybe you could sing to me, anyway."
Shock spreads across his face first as she hops down from the ledge and heads to the corner of his shop, weaves through the rows of bicycles to grasp his guitar by the neck. And even though he was ready to leave it on the stage the other night, ready to leave it out of his life for good, something about watching her hold it against her body and pluck the strings gently made him ache to hold it again.
Mikasa hums and it brings him hurtling back to Earth. "Hey," a wry smile quiet on his lips, "I didn't know you could play."
His guitar engulfs her; holding it up to her body is a task all its own, and she plays the strings clumsily, crookedly. "Nothing as great as you, you know. Just enough." Her tunes are very simple, but her voice is smooth, like a river of silk, like a dream.
He can't help but watch her for a little while longer before he approaches her to reclaim his guitar. He holds it close, hesitates for a moment before he strums a few chords calmly. "It was a great way to pass the time when I was little, just sitting here in my father's shop." Jean smiles at the memories, at the bloody slices on his fingers and the struggle for melodies and sounds to be harmonious, and glances back at Mikasa.
"I don't want to keep you here listening to stories, though. I should get started on your bicycle and you—"
"And I," she swipes strands of hair away from her face, "am fine listening to your stories, actually. I have nowhere to be, at least for a little while. Sing for me."
Jean can feel his cheeks bleed with color, a bashful flush that makes his face glow. But Mikasa smiles warmly at him, folds her hands together expectantly so that he can hardly help but start to play a little more resolutely. His voice is still raspy and harsh, but she gives him the look she'd given him the other night, like his voice was a lullaby long fated to put her to sleep.
He sings bits and pieces of the song he sang under the dimming lights for open mic night, replaces bridges with happy hums and smiles, watches the amusement in her face. And then she is humming along, matching harmonies with the low scratchy pitch of his voice, smiling and twisting her fingers through her plaited hair.
"You could write such beautiful songs." She admits quietly, leaning against the wall, her palms bracing her. "You shouldn't ever give that up, you know."
It is when she says those words that Jean finds himself at a loss of his own, simply strumming with his mouth agape wordlessly. The irony is latent; he had been ready to lay down all associated with music on the night she chose to save his music—chose to save him. He wonders if it's worth it; he's wondered that ever since he lost Marco.
Mikasa smiles and holds her hand up harmlessly to wave at him, and then she is disappearing through the threshold.
…
It shouldn't surprise him so much that he sees her. But what does surprise him is that she is holding the hand of a little girl whose eyes are so wide he can see the whole world in their reflection. And he can see the entire reflection of Mikasa's face, because she is her whole world, and the smile that is so bright on her lips.
"Sing another song," the little girl asks, skipping beside her, and Mikasa is still smiling as she opens her mouth to sing.
Her voice is incomparable in sound. And maybe, to anyone else, it is pleasant to say the most; but to Jean, it is an ethereal sound, a beautiful resonance that cannot be explained in tones and pitches. Her words are almost so soft that he can't hear the story in her melody, just the warmth in her voice.
The little girl squeals at the sounds, stares up at her. "Such a pretty song," she croons, swings their clasped hands even harder, "it's such a pretty song!"
He doesn't have the heart to call out to her; not now, not while she sings such a gorgeous song.
…
The bell on the door is the only thing that keeps him from being startled by her presence. He has her bike turned on its handlebars, the seat pressed against the rug, and his back completely to her. His frame twitches at the disruption and he turns to look over his shoulder at her.
"Sorry," she murmurs, and it is the silence in her voice that alarms him, "I'll come back another time. Tomorrow," she corrects, and he finds himself speaking before she can slip through the door.
"Wait." Jean rubs a spot on his cheek, squints his eyes back towards her. "Are you all right? You can stay—that's not a problem, you know."
Mikasa stands by the door because it is a problem, he can see it in the way she lingers there. Her face is gentle, vulnerable, and his eyes soften at the sight of her weaknesses so blatantly displayed in front of him.
Her shoulders lift and fall in a shrug and Jean is at a loss for what to say. She looks lost, wandering past the threshold with an empty look in her grey eyes. Jean waits, and then waits a little more before he approaches her, leaving the pink bicycle in the center of the room.
"Do you want to talk?"
She shakes her head ardently. Jean is almost ready to give up entirely and let her sulk in whatever terrible things are going on in her personal life, but she wanders aimlessly towards his guitar, scrapes her nails along the strings. He watches her for a moment, wonders about the sadness in her eyes before she looks at him.
Her eyes are like the shadow of the moon, grey and clear. "Play something for me," she says gently, begs quietly with her moon eyes, "I just want to sing."
There was never any choice but to oblige her. Jean allows her to pick up his guitar and carry it over, and when he sets it in her lap, her shoulders slump with a heavy sigh. His tempo is slow, lethargic; Mikasa doesn't so much as hum until a few seconds later, her voice squeaky and absent of anything for a little while.
Her voice is sad, but beautiful, and Jean listens to her. There is a story hidden in the song she chooses to sing, but he doesn't have time to siphon out the true meaning of her words. He can tell there is something comforting in singing, in the sound of the guitar, and he wonders if it helps.
…
He doesn't see her until he is wheeling her bicycle from the back of the shop. He is singing—there is something about her presence that makes him want to sing—and she is smiling with those cherry-red lips, but she is not alone this time. There is a little girl tangled in the sway of her skirts, winding herself between her legs and pulling at her fingers and squirming around.
"It's all better!" Her voice is a loud shriek as she skips over to the bicycle, her braids swinging behind her, and she climbs atop the seat of it, the tips of her toes barely touching the ground.
Mikasa laughs, and all he can think of is how beautiful he finds the sound.
"I suppose I have no good excuse to visit you anymore, you know," she says when she saunters up beside him, her eyes innocent but full of warmth. Jean smiles down at her, roots around for the right words for a few moments.
And then they come. "How else will I sing to you, if you don't?"
How else will he sing without her, without her to pick up his guitar and remind him to fall in love with it again, without her to fall in love with? There are so many words he wants to sing, songs about finding love after he thought he was bereft, after he thought he was done.
There are so many things he wants to tell her.
"Hana and I—we're not here to stay. We were never here to stay; I have to take her back to her father." And though her words are soft, he feels the weight of them threaten to crush those words, those lyrics down his throat again.
He smiles and it is full of pain, like this is the night of his last song all over again, and it is foolish to fall in love within the span of days like he has. But he can look at her and know he's not the only one.
"One more thing," he says before she wheels the bicycle away, before she disappears for an indeterminate amount of time, and he captures her attention completely. Mikasa's eyes are bright and wide and he memorizes them as he speaks.
"Promise that you'll keep singing."
She doesn't smile this time. There is something sad in her eyes this time, something curious and forlorn, and he remembers what it was like to look into her eyes when the lights were dim and his throat was raw and the pain of his loss was real.
"Only if you do too." Mikasa doesn't wait for confirmation, for an answer of any kind.
She looks so tiny, he thinks again as he watches her walk out of the door, but there is no grand moment under the spotlight, there is no stunning salvation or return of inspiration or revival of music.
She is simply gone.