Poetry and Lyrics
Nick Jay hadn't realized just how much of his time was taken up by his relationship with Red Nya until they split.
Admittedly, not all of the time they spent together was relationship-based. They also spent a lot of time together building machines, arguing about coding, and just sharing their love of technology. Nya was the first person to 'get' his love of inventing outside his parents, and he now realized he'd taken that for granted. Not to mention all the other things they'd done together. He knew he needed to give her space to sort things out, but he lamented the loss of having someone to share his interests with.
His friends were sympathetic and did their best to help him fill the void. Zane took him with him to visit Dr. Julien so that Jay could talk machines with him, Kai and Lloyd both invited him to play video games when they thought he was being idle, and Cole was being the best friend Jay could ever hope for by dragging him out to get sweets and just listen to him when he was feeling melodramatic. But despite their best intentions, these were all things he'd once done with Nya, and while he appreciated his friends' efforts, it just wasn't the same.
He needed something new. Something that wasn't tied to his relationship with Nya.
But what?
Partially to try and find the answer, and partially just to get away from everything, Jay often found himself in the other Ninjago. While he and his team had become frequent visitors by this point, traveling there wasn't really something he and Nya had done together, so it was free of those constant reminders.
He'd been trying to find excuses to go over there when he could. His AED training with Freckles Jay had been great for that, and focusing on learning that new skill had been a great distraction for a time. Even now that he wasn't training with Freckles anymore, he still found himself flying over on Ultra when he felt the need.
Unfortunately, Freckles Jay and Luh-Loyd were both busy that day and Tiny Echo was off with the Lil'Terrors (probably causing havoc), and considering they were the three that Jay knew best in this world, it left him a little lost on his lonesome.
Thus, Nick Jay found himself sitting in a park not far from Freckles' house writing sad poetry in a notebook as he tried to think of what to do, and trying not to think of Nya.
He was so lost in his thoughts he didn't realize he had company until a shadow fell over him.
Looking up, he was surprised to see DJ Cole standing over him, cocking his head as if trying to read his poetry upside down.
"Uh, hey DJ?" said Jay slowly.
"Hey," said Cole shortly, still apparently trying to read Jay's (admittedly) chicken scratch handwriting.
"Uhhh, can I help you?" asked Jay slowly when the Earth Ninja didn't offer anything more after that. He admittedly had felt pretty awkward around this particular Cole after flying off the handle and accusing him of stealing his girlfriend several weeks ago in an (admittedly) poorly thought out move.
Cole was quiet like he hadn't heard him for a long moment, but just before Jay could ask again, he finally looked the Master of Lightning in the eye and said, "Can I see what you've written?"
Jay blinked at him while that request caught up to his brain. When it finally did, he held out his poetry filled notebook with a, "... Sure?"
The DJ took the book and turned it so he could read it properly, and Jay could see him mouthing the words of the poem silently to himself. Jay couldn't help but feel anxious about it even as he watched. Poetry was something that he dabbled in, but none of his friends had ever taken any interest in it, and while he'd occasionally write a poem for Nya, he'd never had the courage to share them, and Nya had never seemed to express an interest in poetry either. As such, Jay had always kept his poems to himself.
But this Cole did seem interested, and suddenly Jay was feeling very anxious if he thought it was any good or not. Writing for himself was one thing, sharing it with other people was something else entirely.
After seeming to read the poem five times to himself, Cole finally looked up from it and glanced at Jay. "You wrote this?" he asked.
"Er, yeah," said Jay with what he hoped was a nonchalant shrug. "It's a hobby."
It might have been Jay's imagination, but he could swear Cole's normally dry expression shifted to appear almost impressed.
The Earth Ninja then sat down next to Jay and reached into a backpack he'd had swung over his shoulders to pull out a laptop. Pulling up a music program on the computer, Cole said, "Listen to this," and used the program to play a soft melody.
Jay blinked, totally lost. "Okay," he said, wondering what this had to do with his amateur poetry. "That… that sounded nice."
Cole, seeming to notice his confusion, huffed, and gave a small smile. "Here," he said, "listen again."
Cole played the melody again, but this time softly sang the words of Jay's poem along with it.
Jay's eyes widened and his jaw dropped. The poem had matched the melody's beats and tone almost perfectly. In fact, with a few adjustments already springing to mind, it could fit the melody like nothing else.
"Whoa!" said Jay, impressed. "Did you make that just now?"
Cole shrugged. "Yeah. It kind of came to me while you were muttering your lines as you wrote them, but I wanted to take a closer look to be sure."
Jay flushed, not realizing he'd been saying his poem out loud as he wrote.
"I thought it was pretty good," said Cole, snapping him out of that. "With a little work, I could see myself making an entire song out of this." He glanced over at Jay with an eyebrow raised. "Would you want to do that?"
Jay stared at him. "What?"
Cole shrugged again. "Well, to make a whole song, it's going to need more lyrics. You got it started, want to finish it?"
"You really think it's good?" asked Jay. "No one else has ever liked my poetry. Well, aside from my parents. But they're my parents, they basically have to like what I do."
Cole smiled. "Well, you're no Robert Frost, but I think with more practice you could make a pretty good song lyricist. And even if it stinks, it'd still be fun to try." He thought a moment, then added, "My friends were never that interested in writing music with me either. They appreciate what I write myself, and are happy to help me play and record the songs once I've come up with them, but they never really tried to take part in the writing process. Music comes easy to me. Words… words are harder. It'd be nice to collaborate with someone else for a change."
Jay took the moment to digest that. He could definitely relate to having a hobby and no one to share it with. Working with someone else on his poetry sounded… nice.
The more Jay thought about it, the more a smile spread across his face. This was just what he needed. Something different. Something not connected to Nya that he could enjoy. Something fun to get him out of his slump, and if he could help DJ Cole along the way, all the better.
With a wide grin, he held out a hand to shake. "Then you've got yourself a partner, partner," Jay said. "We'll rock both worlds with what we come up with."
Cole blinked at his enthusiasm, but then smirked and shook his hand. "Sounds good to me." He then glanced back at the notebook. "So, got any other poems that you think might make good songs?"
"None of the Nya ones," said Jay immediately, only to turn red as he realized what he'd just said. Quickly snatching the book back, he rapidly flipped to a different page. "Th-This one might be good. I thought the rhythm was nice when I wrote it."
Cole thankfully made no comment on the Nya thing and leaned over to look at the poem.
After that, a very melodious friendship was born.
A/N Sorry this is late, and the next chapter might be late too. I might start posting every other week if this keeps up. I've just got a lot of projects recently, and they've been cutting into my writing time. Anywho, Nick Jay makes a new friend. Until now I've mostly been keeping the Ninja's dimensional interactions to be with either the Lloyds or with their own counterparts. It's about time I start having some bonding with others instead. Nick Jay and DJ Cole are both total opposites and make too much sense at the same time. On one hand, their counterparts of each other's best friends, on the other hand, the ever chatty Nick Jay paired with the super quiet DJ Cole has its own odd couple fun to it. Thinking about it now, Freckles Jay and Cliff Cole could also have some fun bonding, I'll have to write something for that. Still, this came out great, and it was fun to expand on Show Jay's almost throwaway line about 'dabbling in poetry' from the pilot.
A big thanks to Kay Hau as ever for Beta Reading, and offering suggestions. The part where Jay reminisces about his AED training is from her.
Next Time: (In progress) Sensei Wu reminisces on his relationship with his brother, and the woman they both love.
