A/N: Okay, just as an FYI, the formatting might be a bit screwy on this site. I'm uploading these through documents saved on my computer, and that works fine normally, so I really don't understand what the problem is. If the formatting bugs you, you can find this fic on Archive Of Our Own with the same title by SonictheHedgehog. You can also find it on shootingstarstories at Tumblr under the tag Outta My Head. Either way, happy reading!
xXx
Another day, another practice. Soul sat on the stool, just like before, hands on his knees as he waited for the word to try the next song he'd play at his recital.
"Again," spoke his father. And with his hands raised slightly up, Soul, the pianist in training, brought them back down and began playing. It was the most basic song in the world – Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata – rearranged to sound more powerful, lower in tone.
Still, his glance at the keys was sorrowful as the song resonated with him more than before, as the deeper keys made the stool vibrate just a tad with its tone.
Because of that, his drive to play was stronger, and he could feel the reason he wanted to play come back from the creative stifling he faced. He let the song take him, feeling the fire he felt from his father's criticisms turn to passion as he played. He became absorbed; enamored.
It was a change from the higher pitched stuff that would be put in front of him, and he wasn't prepared for how much it would end up freeing his locked soul, but he welcomed it. Any change was good change if it spared him of the wrath of his father. Words that came out calm, yet stung like daggers. A lie of calm that hid the truth of his anger.
A few last notes, hold it… and he was done. Hands back on his lap, and…
"Good. Very good, son." His father praised, yet there seemed to be a desire for something more in his voice. Once again. It wasn't enough. The fire he had dwindled, and ice took over his heart once again. "You've made big changes in your faults. While there's still room for improvement, you've made progress. And it's better than what you started with.
"Why can't you be more like your brother?" His father spoke with a sigh, "He understood his instrument and his sheet music right away. Such a prodigy."
Never enough. That was all he got from his words. He tried. He felt the fire. Yet his judgement hadn't changed. Soul Evans knew better. Out of the corner of his eye, he got the courage to watch his father strut away from the wall and towards the door.
"Stay here and practice a little more," he said as his shoes clacked and he stared daggers into his son's skull. "I want to see further improvement tomorrow."
A few more clacks, the opening of the door, and his father had left the room.
Now finally alone after a few clicks behind the door, Soul turned back to the instrument that had wormed its way back into his heart once again, and sighed. He had to take his father's word that he had made progress. For the sake of his grandma. He took his hands off of his lap and placed them ever so delicately on the white and black keys. Pressing a few, he was reminded of the tune he heard Wes stepping to by accident in the back of his mind… how did it go again…? 1… 2-3. 1…. 2-3. 1-2-3… 1. Something like that. He played the rhythm out on the keys; the keys that resonated with him before. 1… 2-3. 1.. 2-3. 1…
.. Something felt like it was missing, the twelve-year-old thought. He decided to play with the higher keys. Pressing two, or three… and suddenly, the higher ones resonated with him as well. So strange, considering he didn't like the other songs he played before, but now it worked… somehow.
He combined the two, a smile falling on his face as he played faster, composing… creating. He wished he had sheet music on hand.
What he was making was so full of discord, discord he had to release, and yet–… and yet he–…!
He was no longer alone. With a loud bang that made his music stop in a banging on the keys much more messy and frightened, his father had re-entered. His shoes thumped against the tile, intimidating and frightening as he was almost red in the face with his teeth bared in anger. The albino boy was scared instantly, turning around and almost shaking – he had never seen his father so angry before…!
"STOP! STOP WITH SUCH HORRIFYING NOISE!" … Horrifying? He didn't think of his music as horrifying, he– "SOUL! Don't you DARE play that music again! You hear me?! You do that at the recital, and you won't be allowed near a piano EVER AGAIN!"
His father came closer with his red face and teeth that matched his hair. Soul was afraid… more afraid than he'd ever been before. Once he was reached, his hands were grabbed and he was pulled away from his instrument, the instrument that was finally feeling like it really was his again. The keys were shut away, and he was pushed out of the room.
"That's enough for today! You won't be allowed to practice by yourself anymore. I will be with you for all of your practices from now on, to keep you from wasting your talents!" his father bellowed as he continued to force him out, letting himself out and slamming the door to the foyer shut behind them. The boy's smile was long gone after that, looking at his shell shocked mother and brother who stood by, passively observing his forced removal.
They did nothing – frozen in fear like he was. There were many practices after that day… day after day, up to his recital… he was sure, that after that, the piano would never resonate with him again. The enjoyment in it was forever gone.
xXx
The clapping he got after his name was announced for all the world to hear felt undeserved as he stepped onto the stage. Once he bowed, knowing that the crowd wouldn't be able to see his plea to be free in his eyes, he went to the same stool as ever, and waited for his father's instruction behind the curtain to play.
Once he received it, he began playing along the assigned list – a peaceful song here, a peaceful song there… now that he was thinking about it, his father had saved the best for last – Moonlight Sonata, with the edits that made him enjoy playing again. At least he'd like one of those songs, he thought as he cringed at the dainty song he was currently playing.
It was over with faster than he realized, and the clapping felt empty rather than undeserved this time. As if it was out of obligation.. but the show must go on.
It was onto the next song. Slower, but still high pitched – a song made for a duet recomposed for a single person. A song originally for love. His father had a way of twisting music, he realized.
Luckily, that song, too, was over before he knew it. And the clapping was more empty this time than it was the last. Was his father right? Was his music bland and uninteresting because it didn't have that certain fire to it..? He glanced backstage as the clapping went on. His brother seemed interested, his mother seemed to be wishing him luck… while his father was growing red in the face and enraged. Figured. Next song.
He would've tried with his next piece, the third in the set, but he found it difficult. There was no drive. No fire. He guessed he wasn't interested, but his father wouldn't take that. The clapping was lessening. He was almost done for, he was sure of it.
The fear, he found while he was playing, sped up the piece the more and more he thought about it. Would it count as a replacement for the fire he was lacking, his anxiety-ridden mind thought? He would find out when he was done, and it came fast – more clapping than before, and more anger from his father.
The boy swallowed. Nothing was working. Yet again, it was proven he was not enough. His gran was out in the crowd out there, probably positively frightened. He'd try harder with the next piece – it was more up his alley, but not quite there.
Looking over the sheet music intently before he started and during his performance, the boy tried his best to follow it to the letter, not even looking at the keys. He hoped this was enough, that the crowd would love it, blissfully unaware that he had missed about five notes along the way by a good margin.
When he realized recovering wasn't easy, the shock that he messed up that badly and what his father and granny thought hung heavy on his mind, and he almost missed even more notes. He was sure the people that clapped there were the people his father considered to be "ignorant with no music taste." Damnit.
But now it was time for his trump card. Moonlight Sonata. The only song on the list he was sure he could play right… and within the first five notes, he was hooked again. The piano and him were in perfect sync…
And his father's demands were left at the door, leading to no encore in sight.
xXx
"HOW DARE YOU, SOUL EVANS. HOW. DARE. YOU!" His father shouted at him within mere seconds after he walked backstage, "Playing that accursed dark music at your recital. In front of that crowd, in front of your grandmother!"
The boy visibly retreated into himself, hands in his pockets and shoulders raised as he looked into red eyes that held no love, only spite.
"I should've known to delay your recital for the next month or so and let this phase of yours run its course so you could play properly and not drift off into that dark aesthetic of yours."
With every word, the fire in his chest came back, but it was different from the last few times. It wasn't the fire he could channel into his music, that passion he had when he played his discorded songs…
"I suppose I should be grateful you kept your even more horrifying mouth shut. Those teeth.. Imagine what you could've done if you showed that to the audience! They'd run in fear!"
The embers roared within his heart at each and every knife thrown at his self-worth. Deep within him, there was a voice, speaking to him, coaxing him. Fight back, it said. But how could he? His lip quivered as he debated it. How to do it…
"I'm very disappointed in you, Soul," his father continued more calmly, a dagger in disguise once again, "I had faith that you could be the next great Evans musician, but unfortunately, I was very wrong. As you know, I am a man of my word. All of them. Your career with the piano ends here, son. Think of another instrument you wish to learn, because you won't play piano ever again from here on out."
The voice that wanted to rebel grew with every word he said - next Evans musician? Yeah, right. That dubious honor already belonged to Wes… but as soon as he stated that the instrument that had resonated with him was being taken away… it flew out like a geiser. No more internal backtalk. It had now become external.
"WHAT?! You can't do that!" he shouted back, his love for his instrument apparent in his voice, "The piano was the only instrument I was able to play properly! You know that!"
"We'll find you something else. Guitar, perhaps. But you've lost your right to the piano. You can't disgrace your ancestor's talents with that god awful music! You'll ruin our honor. Our fame!"
"Is that all you care about? Our fame?!" Soul snarled back after years and years of keeping it in. "What about all that crap about music being the window to the soul, or using it to say things you can't?! Music is an art in the eye of its creator. That's what I was taught. Was everything I was taught a lie?!"
"There was a reason we fired that tutor of yours, Soul." His father sighed as he spoke, his anger manipulating the wrinkles of age he was gaining on his face. And it was age, not the stress he was giving his father, he had to re-teach himself. "She was filling your brain with hogwash like that!"
"Cut the act, old man," he growled, catching his father off guard. If he thought that was startling, nothing would prepare him for what came next. "Just say it's shit. I don't need this damn baby talk anymore!"
There were gasps all around him at his swears, all these fancy folk he always secretly felt like he didn't belong with. Wes didn't seem to mind, but he looked just as shocked as everyone else (Kind of,) but almost everyone had their mouths covered in shock. Not like he cared about that anymore. And his father…? His face was growing more red with every passing second.
"... My boy," he grumbled, voice ruined by one too many cigars, growling down and towering over his twelve year old child. "Is it your goal to continue to disappoint me? Because you keep on managing just that."
The sharp teeth his father always and forever didn't want to see flashed in Soul's scowl, red eyes burning with his anger, his rage. He'd enough. He was done with being chewed to pieces and told what to do. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw someone being escorted backstage, but he didn't care. He was too busy breathing in for his next few words, pulling his arm next to his head -
"I DON'T GIVE A DAMN WHAT YOU THINK OF ME!" he yelled, loud enough for everyone to hear as he swung his arm out across his chest swiftly. He thought of how he wanted the words to cut his father just as his words had cut him. The result was a metallic sound, making him think that he hit something in the process, but… his arm felt stiff. Wide eyes and shocked faces had warped into pale, longer ones; as if he had threatened his father's life… What happened? What did he do?
"... Soul.." A familiar voice spoke to him, and he had a chill go down his spine. He turned his head to the left, and yes. Sure enough, there was his precious Granny; standing there with her hair the color of her pearls, wrinkly hands shaking, her face just as shocked as the people around her… There was something black out of the corner of Soul's eye, too. Shimmering in the lights backstage… Just a glance and-... Oh, god…
There was a blade of some kind in place of his arm.
He was stunned… but not as stunned as they were. How was this possible, how could he have changed his arm-...?
"... Soul." His father spoke once more, and he listened and turned his head, his bloodless face looking up at judgmental, still angry eyes. What had he done wrong..? He didn't know what this was…!
"What in the devil's name are you…"