Title: Sweet Surrender
Prompt: Day 4 / Music
Fandom: Hirunaka no Ryuusei
Character/Pairing: Mazume, hints of Shizume
A/N: I need to work on yesterday's prompt. Anyways, this takes place after Mamura's birthday, with Suzume still feeling a little down about the breakup. I'm going with "music is the universal language" and "music is healing" as themes here.
Summary: This, this is rare. She had thought those headphones were glued to his head, but here they were, temptingly sitting in front of her.
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This, this is rare. Suzume looks around furtively. The librarians are busy shelving and around her, the other students have their heads down, completely engrossed in their books. There's a test around the corner and she should probably be looking at the practice English questions Mamura left her. Or at least study too.
But his headphones are sitting innocently on the table, still attached to his mp3 player. Still attached to that mysterious music that he listened to at all times of the day. If she hadn't bought those headphones herself, she would have sworn he was born with them.
But they are here. And so is she. Without another quick glance, she swipes the headphones and quickly puts them on. Heavy metal? Punk? Pop?
Maybe he liked to listen to old music, from the 80s.
Her chuckling stops when her ears are met with silence. Of course he stopped the music before he left—why waste the battery like that.
Only...she looks at the mp3 player. It couldn't be that hard to turn it on. Pressing a button, she almost drops the device in surprise when the music starts.
She can only hear the end notes of the song, not enough to tell her anything. There's a brief silence, the changing of tracks, and she taps her fingers impatiently on the table as she waits. Eventually, a piano sounds in her ears, the soft striking of keys.
It's a low sound, a sad sound. A voice chimes in, no more than a whisper, and she can't understand the words.
Just…just the sound. It's sad, almost lonely. It quietly fills her, the sorrow, the loss. The emptiness. Her heart aches as she makes out a word. Two. Love. End.
No, I don't.
A tear slips down, two, and she hastily wipes her eyes before anyone can say anything. Before anymore can fall—but it's too late and it's raining when she turns her head to look out the window.
She had promised herself she wouldn't cry over him again. "Yuyuka's going to be mad," she mumbles as she wipes her eyes again. "Mamura's going to ask questions."
The tears won't stop and she hunches over on her chair and just lets it all out. Seeing him in class, passing him in the corridor, hearing the other students whisper his name in a fit of giggles.
Looking up at the sky for a shooting star.
"Why?"
She's not sure if she's asking herself or him the question.
-x-
"What are you doing?"
A hand yanks the headphones off her ears, interrupting the melodic voice as it pours into her ears. Surprised, Suzume turns around to see Mamura, his face beet red as he grabs the mp3 player as well.
"Listening," she responds honestly. "Who's that last singer?" As she waits for an answer, she pats her eyes gingerly and is a little surprised to find them dry.
It's not like she could cry forever. It's not like she wants to. This might not change anything, but the thought, the thought is something bright. Something new.
A step forward, maybe.
Happy, she returns Mamura's dark look with a smile.
"You..." Mamura glares at her, but it's more of a deep frown than anything angry. She takes it that as sign he isn't too upset. He's still red though, and she doesn't quite understand why.
"She sounds nice," she compliments in hopes of placating. "All of your songs sound nice. You're really good at English to listen to them."
For some reason, it works. He calms down, the red almost entirely disappearing from him. Almost, but for the faint traces she can still catch on his ears, neck, the tip of his nose. With a sigh, he looks down at the mp3, at the song still playing, and mumbles something she can't understand.
"What?"
"Sarah McLaughlin" he repeats, and she tries out the sound in her head. "The song is Sweet Surrender."
"She has a nice voice…" A soothing voice. She thinks nearly all of the songs in Mamura's playlist are like that, comforting. Warm. She almost tells him but the red hasn't left his ears yet and she knows this time he'd get angry.
He sits down beside her, relaxing slightly as he takes the book they were studying from. The mp3 player is beside him, still showing the playlist, and she leans over to take a better look.
A title is in blue—the song she was listening to probably. It takes her a few minutes to recognize the letters, to form them into words in her head.
Sweet Surrender
Next to it, the singer. In the row below, she can spot that name again, and curiously Suzume looks at the title.
It's even longer than the last one and she's tempted to poke Mamura so he can read it for her.
"L…lovi…loving y…"
As he flips through their textbook, he corrects her. "Loving you is easy."
A second later, his face, his neck, his arms turn a dark red. Before she can ask him, he buries his head in the textbook and starts quickly copying notes.
It takes him an hour for him to lift his head from the book. Two till he speaks to her. It's another month before she can get him to talk about music and even then he shuts down whenever she asks him for that artist's name.