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Nothing but key after key, note after note, song after song. It's all the pianist has ever known—the love of pressing down on the keys to create the music he loves so dearly. His button-up shirt was unbuttoned to the fourth one down, and his hair was tousled on his head. Drunk or not, he decided, he would play, since it is all he loved and all he knew to do.
The passerby was listening to the rain when he heard the sound of hammers beating strings. He fell in love with the sound immediately, hearing the sound of the rain mingle with the piano's song. He began to dance, his feet picking up off the ground with undeniable rhythm to the music, tossing his arms around as he pleased to the sounds of fingers against keys. He knew the pianist was there, but wouldn't dare enter the room to see them—not like this.
The pianist did not know the passerby was there, only focused on matching his hands to the sound of the falling rain. He watched it through the window, rolling down slowly. His grip on the keys tightened, and he began to play more harshly, his fingers bouncing off and onto the keys at a quick pace, rushing and rushing until finally, the rain trickled to a halt, and the music had a forte finish.
The passerby's eyes were shut when the music stopped, and his dancing stopped abruptly so he could peek out the window, finding the rain to be finished. It was silent once the music was gone, the rising volume had been like a build-up to a climax that never had an end. It was as if the passerby was left on edge, hanging and dangling, waiting for the piano to start making noise again. He took a deep breath in and began a brisk walk away, leaving his love behind.
Minho didn't ever think he would make it as a dancer. With the constant nagging of everyone he knew, it was no surprise that he gave up. All, even Minho himself, knew he would be better off as a factory worker—a normal, yet exhausting every-day duty. He didn't think he was fit for a tiresome job as such, no. He wanted to be someone. To do the one thing he enjoyed—dancing.
But giving up should've been a new start for him. He allowed himself a job at the nearest hotel, where he'd clean rooms and supply guests with meals. It was an ordinary hotel, columns upon columns of history, victorian-style rooms and a fountain to finish it off. It was beautiful, gorgeous even, but so normal.
Minho knew he could only wish to be a dancer, to be on stage in front of tens of thousands of people that would cheer for him and make him feel alive . That was all he desired. But here he was, cleaning the trash out of a hotel room and gathering bedsheets to be thrown in the laundry room, where they would be hand-washed and hung to dry. Here, in the hotel, no one cheered. Here, in the hotel, no one shouted encore .
All that he had was the open space next to the ballroom. He would dance as the pianist of the ball practiced, left, right, up, pointed tips of his fingers, pointed tips of his toes. His last step would be a leap, where he would step onto the windowsill, so near to the ground yet such a great, elegant leap, of which he wished he'd never return. He did not know how such a small windowsill could hold him up, and did not know such a beautiful view from the window would keep him there for about an hour before he was reprimanded.
Then, he would go back to his previous duties of checking rooms that did not have a sign of life and serving those that did. Later he'd return to the space by the ballroom where he'd wait to hear the piano once again. When he did not, he returned home, feeling practice had been poached from him. He loved the piano, and poured the entirety of his body into dancing when he saw the music trickling from the ballroom, through his fingers and throughout his body. He had to move for them, and took it through dancing, his gracious movements dedicated to adjusting himself for the music to flow as they pleased, if it was through him or around him.
He did not think there was enough here for him, as he desired to fall away and be swept up by the arms of his own body as they recede into themselves. They dance around the notes and his feet tap the ground softly with the rhythm until he must move them, and with that comes his leap, the final move. When he would leap to clear a path for the notes, he would leap away from the windowsill, catching himself on the toes of his right foot as he felt the music detach from him and fall away into nothing as the pianist would finish his work to the end of the piece.
On days such as this one, where it rained, he would become physically pained if he found that the piano would not be played. He even occasionally felt a burning in his naval for the music, the aggressive pressing of the keys, hearing the hammers pound into the strings, and driving his mind to the best kind of insanity. He would not allow himself to be whittled away by such things, especially things such as this, where he would not be willing to stop the music from flowing, sending shocks of pleasure through him without fail.
And the pleasure would never stop, no, not until the pianist was done with his work, finally and precisely, with the perfect key and tune. And once the pleasure was gone, Minho would kiss the back of his own hand and leave.
But what was extraordinary was that he never cared to know who played the music. As long as the piano was used, gently and beautifully, he couldn't care less who had been touching it. As long as the music caressed his every inch, he would be content.
He had soon noticed there to be a constant . The pianist began playing on Minho's favorite days, the days where the sky cried of nothing and everything, the days where Minho could not help but crave music. The pianist had only ever played pieces that Minho did not seem to know, leading him to assume that it was new. New and beautiful.
His work at the hotel grew ever so tiring, with every day becoming even more of a chore. He would wake, work, sleep—an endless cycle of nothing. He had lost the entirety of his desire to leave, and had succumbed to the dreadful work of a mindless man. He would daily, without fail, manage to work some sort of dance into his schedule, whether it be to the new pianist or only to the sound of his own heartbeat while he cleaned each room.
On a certain night, a terrifying night, he was finally alone. He heard the rain pattering against the glass, and as he grew closer to the ballroom, he could hear the pianist playing his unfamiliar music. It touched Minho differently than it had before, with its foreign sound prickling against his skin like needles on a rose bush. Though the rose’s needles were sharp, Minho couldn’t help but feel attracted to the beauty of it—its smooth petals, its red color, its perfectly folded shape. Nothing could hold his hand any farther from the music, as he couldn’t help himself when it came to the beauty of the sound. If he had ever gone deaf, he would kill himself, he reckoned.
For four months he allowed himself to be swayed to a weightless pleasure by the pianist, who in turn would keep his secretive identity of nothingness. A while of constant rapture before he was finally ill of waiting, and knew he must see the pianist so he could congratulate him on his absolute talent and beautiful manner of the piano. But how would he ever reveal to the pianist that, yes, he had been listening into his private practices and, yes, he had been dancing to said music?
On the night of his final realization of his suffering of unknowing, he opened the door to the ballroom. The piano stopped, and for a moment, Minho thought the rain had stopped in respect to the music’s end. He inched himself into the room, his feet shuffling slowly into the room, his mind spinning over how he assumed the pianist must look.
What he least expected was to see a head of hair—brown, wavy hair—attached to the head attached to the neck attached to the slim frame of a boy. Sure, obviously he had seen male pianists, they were even more common than female pianists, but they never looked like this . The boy’s hair was cascading down his back, his gently entwined hair falling in front of his face as he stared down at the piano in disbelief. He had but the prettiest attire that Minho had ever seen on a pianist, with the ruffled wrists and scarf. He had still not looked up from the piano when Minho continued to slowly pad into the room, observing new things about the pianist with every step.
“What brings you in here?” The pianist spoke without looking up from the piano, seeming to still be flowing with every emotion as his fingers twitched above the silent keys.
“You bring me here.”
“And why is that?” There was but a small bit of shaking in the pianist’s voice, seeming as if he couldn’t emotionally handle the loss of sound. He was just as Minho was—lost without the hammers pounding through his veins and the strings tying his wrists together, forcing him to crave it.
“Your music is beautiful,” Minho whispered, unsure if the pianist could hear his small voice in the vast room, his voice but a small fish in the crashing waves of the silence. The silence was somehow louder than the music, with it constantly reminding Minho that there was nothing here for him to dance to—no voices, no radios, no bedsheets that he could turn into some kind of drum to at least have a beat of some sort other than his rapidly increasing heartbeat .
“That is what brings you here? My music? Do you even know of the songs that I play?”
"I do not,” Minho admitted, “but I cannot give up a chance to see the pianist that has my fingers running with blood as the rain runs down the windows.”
“You understand the rain? Surely not as I do, as I am in love with the rain.” The pianist was confident of this, as he had finally lifted his head to see Minho, holding back the sliver of a smile that tried to pry its way through his muscles.
“I may not be in love with the rain, but I am in love with your music.”
“No you are not. You cannot be in love with my music. You are in love with the sound of the music, but not the music. You have never heard music such as mine, am I correct?” The pianist’s aplomb tone had Minho’s fingers twitching with the need to prove him wrong . He needed to show the pianist that he was in love with his music, and not just the mere sound of it flowing through him.
“I may not have heard music such as yours, but it was like Romeo and Juliet . I immediately fell in love with your music. I have been a dancer since I was as young as five, and have never heard the music that you have played during your sessions here.” Everything Minho said was sure and honest; why would he lie when he was faced with the man who would play the pieces to make his knees weak?
“Music such as mine? The music that was rejected by you dancers who believed that the choreography was too difficult to even begin to try? Well, I am not too fond of your type.” The pianist kicked his feet together and turned his gaze back to the piano, where Minho could assume he would be working up the tolerance to face him again.
"Yes, music such as yours. I do not care that I have never heard it. I am in love with it, and I dance with it in the night as you play. I move with the way your fingers press to the keys, letting the piano sing its most beautiful song."
Admitting to dancing to the pianist's music was not in the least expected, as when it left Minho's mouth, he felt he couldn't breathe any longer. It was as if the breath left with his words, being tugged along by the inhuman urge to sacrifice himself. The pianist's face lit up as the dancer's words left his mouth, but he quickly caught himself, his expression fading back into something of disinterest.
"Well, then. Might I presume you'd like to hear more?" It was impossible to miss the complacent look on the pianist's face once again.
"Please, play. I yearn to hear it once again," Minho pleaded. He ignored the way his heart leapt when the pianist's fingers touched the keys again, only interested in hearing the music run through him once again.
And when it did, he was speechless. He could not feel a limb of his body, but at the same time felt as if every nerve in him was set aflame as soon as the music prickled softly against it. The music was a cactus, and he could not bear to touch it for longer than a moment, for it would give him a stabbing pain that he did not think could be fixed. He desired to dance, but did not desire to upset the pianist. He watched the pianist's articulate movements and expressions as the music filled the room once again.
He guessed the pianist could feel it too—the music, that is. With the pianist's passionate body movements and twitching to the piano keys' soft humming, Minho's desire to dance grew further, and he could not hold back any longer. He let his arms and legs fly to the flowing notes, throwing his hands above his head and his feet across the recently-waxed ballroom floor.
The pianist stopped abruptly for the second time that night, as did Minho's dancing. The pianist looked up from the monochrome keys to admire Minho's paused form, a single arm raised over his head and a single leg resting on top of his knee. His toes were once again pointed and his free hand ran through his hair, finding there to be the beginning of a sweat.
"Your dancing," the pianist croaked, "is wonderful." He stood up from the piano and Minho could see the entirety of his body—from his slim shoulders to his lanky legs. The pianist's body was different from Minho's own muscular, obviously worked limbs.
It took Minho a moment to register the comment that the pianist had made about his dancing. It was wonderful , the pianist had said, but what about his piano ability? Had the pianist never heard himself play such scripture?
"Thank you. As is your music." The two short sentences were all that Minho could let trickle from his lips, especially with the pianist looking up at him with such a look of admiration. After a lifetime of his dance's downfall, hearing even a single positive comment on his talent had him reeling. His palms grew sweaty and his nose grew itchy.
"You see music, do you not?" the pianist asked, and it seemed as if he knew that the question would send Minho's eyes growing to the size of Jupiter.
"How do you figure?"
"The way you dance. You dance around the music instead of through it. You don't touch the notes you know fly from the piano to pierce your skin and seep into your every pore. You're careful and elegant. Why are you here? Should you not be performing?"
Every word that spilled from the pianist's mouth turned Minho's mind to putty. He'd found someone who understood how he felt. It was a recherché meeting, with the sudden feeling of connection when he had finally found someone that sees through him. And that person happened to produce the music Minho had fallen in love so passionately with.
"And you? Do you see the music you so confidently claim I do?" Minho's body was rigid, growing increasingly irritated with anything and everything, and did not have a morsel of an idea why.
"I do not," the pianist admitted, "but I have met many of your type that are similar in demeanor and style. They danced like water in the sea, but did not stop for a moment to think about the music they danced to. They saw it but did not acknowledge it. I am pleased that you move for the music, but I am still not convinced you are in love. You cannot be in love with something you choose to avoid.
"I have never once truly fallen in love with someone, but I have watched the rain enough to know what love feels like. It is a yearning, a temptation, a curse, and you may never see yourself out. Though I have never truly loved, I know you are not in love. If you loved my music—"
"I do love your music!" Minho interjected, face crimson with anger. "I am in love with your music, you mangled pianist."
"I cannot believe you when you say such silly things. I do not like the way you speak. We do not even know each other's names, but we speak as if we've known each other for years. Why is that?"
"Because we are equally in love with different things. I am in love with your music, and you are in love with the rain. What isn't there to understand?" Being the one to belittle the other did please Minho, he had to admit. It was quenching to find someone else scrounging at their feet for a response once you've crippled them to nothing.
"You are continuingly unbearable, I believe. Why is it we can only be passionate for the things we love? Why, once those leave, we resolve our frustration with each other? Why must we argue?" The pianist's hands shook slightly and Minho watched from his spot on the ballroom floor, the spot he had not moved from since the music left.
"We are a metaphor. We are a painting of shattered love, my dear pianist. And we cannot ever be drugged up enough with pills to fix it."
"I am sure we could be. We just haven't found what we need to satisfy the scratching inside of us for more . Nothing is ever enough and everything is too much. Am I correct?" The pianist had stood up and proceeded to the door, leaving the piano behind.
"Where will you go?" Minho did not care if he sounded desperate; he needed the pianist next to him, accompanying him, playing him that fulfilling music.
"To my hotel room. I do hope you know I am a guest in this hotel?"
"You are not a measly pianist?" The joking tone in Minho's voice was impossible to miss, especially when you are someone as clever as the pianist that stood still at the door, bony fingers wrapped around the doorknob.
"I am but a useless pianist, but I am also a perennial guest of this hotel. So I would hope you could allow me to feel as if I make a difference for a moment, Minho."
Minho did not know how the pianist had figured out his name until he looked at his name tag and found his name scrawled across it in cursive. He choked on his saliva and covered the name tag with a hand, watching the pianist’s face light up in amusement. The pianist laughed with a hand covering his mouth and the skin around his eyes wrinkled to a sea of joy.
“You make me mirthful. What an expression that is,” the pianist whispered once he finished his chorus of chortles. “I cannot see it from here, so don’t worry. But do not underestimate my observation of those who interrupt my session of making love with rain.”
Before Minho could even nod, the pianist had disappeared behind the door and off to his hotel room. Minho stayed, silently mourning the loss of his newfound discovery—the loss of which would have him bury himself. He stood in the ballroom, alone, watching the contemporarily-untouched instrument collect dust in front of his eyes. If only he had begged the pianist to stay for even just a moment longer, he would be able to feel the music rushing through him once again.
He allowed himself to stay in the ballroom no longer, and pushed himself to clean one of the hotel rooms as he had previously been instructed to do before he was distracted by the beauty of modern art.
Well, modern , wasn't exactly a way to put it. When one thinks of something that is modern , they think of a popular design of the present time. For example, take this victorian-style hotel he resides in. It was named such because of the era of Queen Victoria and her fluctuating popularity. It was close to impossible not to respect your own queen, though.
Minho, personally, had no desire to take part in the movement to a more "modern" culture. If anything, it made him crave the pianist's music more when he remembered that the pianist's music was nothing more than indulgence in the music of a different country. Minho could not tell where the music could have been from, though he was sure that it must not be too popular if he, a dancer, had never heard it.
Though he dances, and he would like to consider himself a dancer, Minho really was not one. He was but a man who worked in a hotel that apparently housed people of such talents. People like the pianist, who would surely go far into their dreams while Minho rots away inside an inn. Minho had no objections any longer, not when he could listen to the piano's strings scream with absolute perfection.
As he cleaned rooms, he found numerous odd droppings across every surface—from the floor to the top of the dresser. Though embarrassing to admit, he did keep things he found to be worth taking, such as cigars and stone polish. He enjoyed collecting as much as he enjoyed dancing, what wasn't there to love about it?
He would take the odd droppings and place them along the wall behind his dresser, letting them catch dust and attract ants. He imagined the ants crawling on him as if he were one of the droppings, and would shiver. He always wished to have something like the ants crawl along his arms and his legs as he danced. He found that the piano's sound was the ants, and he was the anthill, and as he danced, the music would skitter across his body as he danced gently, so as to not disturb it.
He did not believe that there was anything that could stand between him and the music. When he was with music, it was just him and it, looking into each other's soul and holding each other gingerly. But this confidence of his relationship with music was humbled when he found that it was that of whom played the piano that controlled him and the music. The pianist, being the most powerful, had Minho dangling by his pinky finger, being pulled down by strings tied taut and pushed by hammers slamming down onto him.
When he met the pianist again, it was late at night. The pianist was sitting upon the bench as if it were a throne, and the keys his peasants that he could dwindle down to nothing to work for him. But, oh, the desire to take the pianist’s hands into his own, and hold them, and hope he finds that the pianist uses some sort of magic to play as he did. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, he knew that it was but a skill that the pianist had worked on for years, and a skill that the pianist would continue to work on as he played the music that had Minho folding.
But as he wandered into the room, all conscience left at the door, he had noticed that the pianist’s hands were still and his hair was messy. He was swaying a bit, side to side, and Minho had guessed that the pianist had gotten drunk. Sure, he had seen tens, hundreds of guests swayed like so, but had never guessed that he who had his heart tied up and shoved in a coffin made of wood, shaped like a piano, would be one who would.
The pianist turned around, and Minho could see that his face was red, all the way to the tips of his ears, and his scarf was strewn across his shoulders. He smiled at Minho, and it was the first time in the two times they had met that Minho had seen a genuine smile come from the pianist. The pianist pushed himself from the bench, swaying side to side, as if his stomach had just had a sword pushed through it.
“I feel as if I’m drunk on love, rather than alcohol,” the pianist said, staring Minho in the eye, but really only looking through him. “I am drunk on the rain. The pounding of the rain on the windows has my gut running with the most pleasurable feeling, and I can not bring myself to interrupt its one-note tune.” He spun in a circle and leaped closer to Minho, messily, but in a way that Minho himself had jumped onto the windowsill.
"I am drunk on you," Minho whispered to himself, watching the pianist spin around as a dancer would, tips of toes pointed and fingers dancing elegantly through the air. He turned to the window and began dancing towards it, and Minho watched the rain's song dig through the pianist's skin. He itched to reach out and pull the pianist along with him to dance to the rain as Minho danced to the piano.
"Won't you join me, Minho?" the pianist asked, as if reading his mind. Minho wondered if he could. Read his mind, that is. With his wonderful talent and beauty and intelligence, Minho would not doubt the pianist had also learned the art of reading minds. The pianist, not waiting for a reply, leaped at Minho, taking his hand into his own and tugging him toward the window with him.
"Wait, I won't, I…I cannot," Minho gasped out into the dry air, purged of the rainwater that rolled down the window as the sweat rolled down Minho's forehead. The pianist stared at him, admired him, and Minho could not help but become a victim in the hands of his killer. Minho did not let go of the pianist's hand, and the pianist took this as a sign to continue, to drag Minho to his level, to drive through the music as if it would not rip them apart.
"But you must. You dance, do you not? Please, show me the dance you dance so often as you listen to me play. Let me douse myself in your form and your rhythm as you weave through the music and sow a gorgeous stitch. Show me the stitch, my dancer. Show me the stitch I desire so much to see." The pianist had let go of Minho's hand and had stood back to watch, when Minho took his hand back into his own.
"No, sir, please. I will not dance alone." Minho stared into the pianist's eyes, admiring the greens and browns and blues that he could pinpoint inside of them. It was beautiful— he was beautiful. "I will not dance alone," he repeated, squeezing the pianist's hand and beginning a slow waltz, minding the music and minding the look in the pianist's eyes. Though he was drunk, Minho knew there was something left of the pianist that he despised so much. He knew that the one that controlled his love was still inside somewhere, where Minho would never find it—locked away to keep him far gone. Minho wanted nothing other than to tear the pianist to pieces, peeling him apart to find his real self.
"Jisung," the pianist whispered, staring into Minho's eyes as he would the rain. Minho's world stopped for a moment and he almost leaned in closer, close enough to embrace the pianist and make him become his own. Oh, how he would love to keep the pianist as his own. He would have him play the piano and the pianist would watch him dance, and they would be in love with not each other, but each other's passion.
"I beg your pardon?"
"My name," the pianist said, "is Jisung."
"Jisung," Minho repeated, testing the name on his tongue. He already loved it, and he had only heard it thrice: twice from the pianist's tongue and once from his own. And he loved it, the way that the weight of the word sat on his tongue like the weight of the hammers sitting on the strings as the pianist would hold a note for so, so long, and Minho would hold his form for just as long until neither could hold it any longer, and they would both fall to what they used to be—nothing to themselves and everything to each other.
Jisung's hand felt light in Minho's, his fragile fingers sat pliant on top of Minho’s. Minho pulled them across the floor, watching the fire in the pianist’s eyes, the fire burned through Minho’s shirt and into his heart, and crisped the edges tenderly. Once Jisung was done Minho’s heart would be thoroughly cooked through, a knife just enough to cut through its tender shell. He would let the pianist cut into his heart and admire him as he did so, as he killed Minho slowly and lovingly until neither of them could feel themselves any longer.
“Minho,” the pianist gasped into the dry night air. “Please, let us go outside. I want to dance in the rain. I want to feel the rain on my back as I feel your hand tickle mine softly. I want to be drenched completely in that I love as I watch you become soaked in the same. I want to feel my clothes stick to my skin and our skin stick to each other as we watch the night rot away slowly in the moonlight.”
“Jisung,” the dancer murmured in return, drawing their bodies closer. “I want to, I want to feel you stick to me like there is nothing that could pull us apart.” He looked into Jisung’s eyes to find something, anything that would make him stop. He did not want his relationship with Jisung to go this far, and he wanted a sign of what to do. But looking into Jisung’s eyes he found nothing but the urge to do more —to spill himself into the form that stood ready in front of him.
Minho pulled Jisung with him out the door of the ballroom and down the staircase to the entrance door, not letting go of his hand for anything. He let his other hand fall to Jisung’s waist and pushed his head down once they reached the front door of the hotel that Minho had come to love so much. He pushed open the doors and pulled Jisung out with him onto the damp pavement, watching the pouring rain immediately douse Jisung in itself. Jisung lifted his head up and smiled, a gorgeous smile that Minho would long to see again and again.
“Minho,” Jisung muttered, “it’s the rain.” He pulled Minho into a hug and Minho let him do so, even knowing that the next day, they would continue their familiar relationship of pianist and passerby, or maybe even dancer, if the pianist would allow him to show up after all this. Minho let himself bask in the feeling that came over him in that moment and lifted Jisung up into the air, watching him laugh powerfully—powerful enough to help Minho bring him back down and into his arms. Minho brushed Jisung’s long hair out of his beautiful eyes, bringing a handle to cradle his face softly.
“Jisung, why do we never get along like this? When you are sober you hate me. Why are we like this now?”
Jisung seemed to fight with himself for a moment, eyes scrunched and mouth hung open in thought. He closed his mouth to swallow and opened it once again to speak, when he fell limp into Minho's arms. Minho looked down at him and listened to him breathe softly into the moist air, even over the screaming rain. He paused for a moment, just watching Jisung, and began to cry. He cried to the rain and cried to the moon and cried to whatever laid beyond.
"Jisung, you are horrid. I wish to dig my hands into your own and rip them apart. I hope when you sleep in your bed tonight, you choose to never wake up. Jisung, please, I beg of you." Minho sobbed, face turned to the sky and arms wrapped around Jisung's small body. He pushed the hotel doors open again and tugged Jisung inside and up the stairs to his room, dripping rain as they moved, as if still dancing, to the room where Minho would hope to leave Jisung for eternity.
For the next nights, Minho did not return to the ballroom. He did not believe that Jisung was worth wasting precious time to visit. He continued his work of cleaning hotel rooms to the absolute finest, picking up small pieces of anything, especially things that would remind him of the selfish, delusional pianist. But was Minho the delusional one, always believing that perhaps Jisung would change for the better? Perhaps Jisung would allow him to climb into that piano-shaped heart of his?
For a while, Minho believed that maybe he had finally begun to like that pianist of his. He had fallen in love with Jisung's music long ago, but had he then decided that perhaps he liked the pianist just as he loved the music? It would make sense, as he longed to see the pianist just as much as he longed to hear the piano's song. He longed to feel Jisung's hand in his own again, dancing through the rain as Jisung's smile blinded Minho's already blind eyes.
On a night he decided to return to the ballroom to try and find the pianist. When he arrived at the doors, he heard not only a wonderful piano, but a violin. He pushed open one of the heavy doors of the entrance and stood, befuddled, as he watched Jisung and a violinist play in harmony, their music blending into something that Minho could only describe as the most beautiful thing he had ever heard. The instruments mixed perfectly, and there was nothing better to be heard. The only problem was that the person who stood beside Jisung, making gorgeous art with him, was not Minho, but some new violinist.
Minho did not dance. He did not think himself worthy enough to dance to something of the music that they created. He did not believe he deserved to dance to the harmony that Jisung could create with someone else that was not himself. And though Minho felt a burning weight in his stomach as he watched the two of them paint a mural, he knew he couldn't interfere, since he did not believe he would be right to put a stop to it, especially if it was for his selfish desire to have Jisung all to himself.
He looked out the window, past the pianist and his violinist and piano and saw there to be no rain. He could see a lack of passion in the pianist; in the way that he sat almost still, his hands only lifting into the air as they needed. Jisung was not in love with the moon or the stars or the night sky—he was in love with the rain. He knew that Jisung must miss the rain dearly, as he had never seen Jisung play the piano on a night that had been without rain.
"Why must we play on a day such as this?" Minho heard Jisung whisper gently over the music, as if not to shatter the loose music flying about, though Minho knew Jisung could not see it as he could. The pianist stopped his playing and stood up from the bench, allowing himself to slowly approach the violinist.
"I shall ask again. Why must we play on a day such as this when the rain is asleep? Why not practice on a day when the rain is dripping down the windows? Please, answer, for I am not sure I can handle another moment without the rain." Jisung's hands were on either side of the violinist's hips, pulling them towards him. The violinist let their instrument fall from their neck, both the bow and the violin itself hanging from their limp arms.
"The concert will not have the rain you desire. If you cannot play without the rain, then I advise you to go back home. If, without the rain, you are useless, I do not wish to see you anymore. If, without the rain, you do not want to play piano, I do not think our relationship should continue. Do you understand?" The violinist pushed Jisung's hands off their hips and spun around towards Minho. Though Minho did not move, the violinist jumped back in surprise, mistakenly rutting his back into Jisung as they did so.
The violinist's shoulder-length blonde hair was half-thrown up upon their head, and their piercing blue eyes shot through Minho from behind small oval spectacles as a rose bush shoots through skin. Though Minho could not tell whether the violinist was a man or a woman, he decided they were objectively beautiful. Of course, not as beautiful as the pianist's music as it would cascade down Minho’s back and between his shoulder blades, lining the creases with its frigidity. Minho’s eyes flicked down to the violinist’s hips—the ones that Jisung had just laid his hands upon.
Minho once again felt the burning of jealousy in the pit of his stomach, his eyes locked with the violinist’s. The violinist hurried out of the ballroom, pushing past Minho as he did so, and Minho did not dare look back. He watched Jisung, unmoving, hearing the massive doors of the ballroom slam shut behind the violinist. Jisung turned towards Minho with a wobbly smile, throwing himself into Minho’s arms. Minho caught Jisung, his arms around his slender waist and his face in Jisung’s weave of hair.
“Where had you been?” Jisung asked into Minho’s chest, his tears soaking through the thin fabric of the hotel uniform and the cold buttons pressing into Minho’s warm chest, warmed by Jisung’s small body enclosed around him. Minho pressed Jisung close as he cried softly and Minho brushed his fingers through his hair. He loved him, if only for a moment, and loved to feel him against him, even if tears continued to fall from his eyes like rain from the sky on a day that he would love so much.
“I had been away,” Minho had answered, pulling Jisung away from him by the collar of his shirt. Jisung did not seem to wish to look at Minho, with the way he let his head fall to allow his hair to encase his face and tears. He glanced up at Minho and Minho saw the rain, the sky, and the clouds in his eyes, the tears building up like water from the clouds and falling from them just the same. He pulled Jisung close again and allowed him to continue to cry into his chest, feeling all his emotion pour out upon him, staining his shirt in such a way that he would not mind.
“You had left me,” Jisung sobbed, “You had left me alone and banished me to fall away to nothing in the hands of yourself. Why would you do such a thing?” Minho had felt a damp spot where Jisung’s mouth lay and guessed that through speaking, Jisung expelled saliva onto his uniform and let it soak through to his skin, coating him in his everything as they held each other close. He thought for a moment about Jisung’s piano and his playing and wondered if it was only rain that Jisung would come to love. He wondered if there was any other way that Jisung would play his piano to him.
“I am sorry.” That was all that had left Minho’s mouth, with the thoughts running through his head of defiling and tainting Jisung and his piano and his talent and the way that Minho would do anything to hear it in this moment. He thought to beg the pianist to play, even if there was no rain, and even though he knew the pianist loved it so and would not want to do such a thing on a day such as this, of which he hates with his everything. He thought to tell the pianist of his newfound love for him that buried the hatred he had felt many nights ago. He thought he should not.
“But you are not sorry. You had left me with such a person as Hyunjin instead of your warm arms for me to fall into. Surely you had not believed that I had forgotten that night we had spent together? Surely you had not believed that I did not find love for you, buried beneath the petals of my heart? Surely you had not believed that I had not loved you that night, out in the rain of which I proclaim my heart has been taken by? I knew you were foolish, but I did not think you were as foolish as this. Minho, please, I promise I did love you that night, even if it was just for that night, and even if I did let myself fall unconscious into your arms. Please, believe me, and believe that we had been one that night, so many nights ago.”
Minho was taken by his emotion. It felt as if Jisung had swept him off his feet, into the sky, into the rain, even as they would become soaked in each other and their love for each other. But he did not believe that he and Jisung were really in love with each other, as it would be foolish to believe so. They could not be in love, as Jisung loved the rain and Minho, himself, loved Jisung’s piano’s sound. He would give all he has in the world to hear the piano once again, and he wanted to be sure that Jisung knew it to be so.
“Jisung, please, play me a song,” Minho requested, his voice gentle.
“But, Minho, I cannot. You know that it is the rain that I must play for. I cannot play if there is not rain—”
“Jisung, do not tell me such false things. I know you can play when there is no rain, and you will play for me, right at this instant. I had heard you playing earlier, with the violinist. I know you can play when there is no rain. I do not care that your playing would lack passion. I need to hear it. I feel as if I am an addict with withdrawal from your music, and I yearn to hear it flow through me once again. I have come to love nothing else, my pianist.” Minho held Jisung from him at arm’s length, looking into his hazel eyes and finding there to be nothing but a storm.
“You must understand. I must play when Hyunjin is present. I am Hyunjin’s pianist! Can you not understand such a simple thing?” Jisung pulled his eyes from Minho’s, casting his glance towards the piano and the window that sat but a few millimeters from it. Minho wondered how often Jisung would sit at the piano and wait, patiently, for the rain to begin. Surely, he would wait hours, if not days. It did not rain daily, of course, and Minho knew it to be so.
“I will not sit idly, cast aside, as you say that you are the violinist’s pianist. You are not the violinist’s pianist. You are my pianist. Jisung, I will have you know that I think about you day and night, waiting for the rain to come, just as I know you do the same. I know that you await for me to listen, for me to dance to your music just as I had done many times since you have been in this hotel. Knowing this, how would you understand the feeling of being cast aside as if you do not matter?” Minho glared into the gorgeous hues of Jisung, feeling his gaze pierce through his heart.
“No, it is you who does not understand the feeling!” Jisung punctuated his sentence with a shove to Minho’s chest, effectively pushing him away. “Why do you not understand? All I have wanted for all of my life is to be the center of the stage! I do not want to be anyone’s pianist! I wish to be my own pianist! I want to show the world that a pianist can play unaccompanied! I refused to be the accompaniment for Hyunjin, but he told me I wouldn’t make it on my own! Now, I am stuck here as Hyunjin’s pianist, and your—I can’t even begin to think of a word to describe us!” Jisung was heaving, out of breath, glaring into Minho.
“Jisung, please, I do not wish to fight, not again. I just wanted to show you that you mean to me what the rain means to you. I just wish to hear you play once again for me as you have played for me many times. Though I know it is not raining, I know your talent can still flow unto the keys and create a sound that I kill to hear. For, Jisung, I thirst for your fingers to press down upon the piano keys once again. I beg of you, please, let me hear it.”
For every plea that flowed from Minho’s mouth, he knew that Jisung was beginning to crumble, with the way that his eyes softened in a manner that showed nothing other than remorse and his mouth curved back up into a small smile that showed love in its purest form. Minho had adored Jisung, and for good reason, with his long hair engulfing his frame with that of a mother bird’s wing, holding Jisung close and dear as if he were a child.
But Minho knew better than to bring Jisung into his own arms in the way that Jisung’s hair unconsciously did to him. He knew that Jisung was no better than the stem of a rose of some sort, with its thorns always prominent and erect. He knew that should he take Jisung into his arms like that of a lover or a child he shall forever be scarred by the rips in his skin from the thorns of Jisung’s disposition. For this reason, Minho swore to himself that he would not become close to Jisung, no matter how desperately he ached to.
“No, I will not play the piano. I will not follow orders of he who is not myself. It would be treason to myself to do as you say, Minho. So, please, allow me to excuse myself, for I cannot bear to see someone like you for any longer. I refuse to continue to see one who does not allow me to see myself for whom I should become, rather than what I am. I want to be seen as one with potential, not one who has reached his final peak. I know that I have more potential than what meets your eye, and I will show it to you.”
And with that, Jisung was gone once again, leaving Minho to his lonesome with the piano, of which was useless without the pianist. What was a piano without a pianist? A piece of wood sat to rot, its keys slowly breaking out of tune as the strings are untightened and the hammers cannot bear to hit them any longer? Without a pianist, is a piano even worth existing?
Minho could not bear to witness the piano rot in front of his eyes any longer and allowed himself to leave, vanishing back to his duty of cleaning hotel rooms to escape the smell of rotting wood that filled the ballroom air.
As if the rain was a cue, Minho found himself in the ballroom once again, watching Jisung play. It was as if this was his only reason to live anymore. If he could only dance while the pianist played, why live at any other time of day? Why not just perish and allow his spirit to dance when the opportunity displayed itself? Minho had wondered this many times, staring at himself in the bathroom mirror of a hotel room.
He had chosen this hotel as a compromise with his loved ones. In this hotel, performers stayed. Performers such as dancers, violinists, vocalists of the opera, orchestras, pianists . Pianists were Minho’s most favorite, as they played music that his body could not help but move to, lifting off the ground with such passion and such precision that it would be as if he were one of the guests, staying at the hotel for a short period to accommodate for the location of his stage.
He ached to speak with Jisung once again, but knew that he should not, for if he did he was not sure that either of them would forgive themselves, or each other. Every time that they had recently spoken an argument had sparked, bringing Jisung to tears and bringing Minho to his knees once again to pick up the broken pieces. Their relationship was a vase, and with every argument the vase gained yet another chip, another crack, and Minho could do nothing but apologize, apologize, repair. It felt hopeless anymore, and Minho wondered when the day would come that Jisung would not forgive him and they would go back to being strangers. He had hoped that day would not come.
He had opted to just watch the beauty of Jisung’s talent unfold before him, and the telltale swaying of his frail shoulders should have been enough for Minho to know to leave him. He should have known to leave him before he would notice that he was there, and as he was drunk, throw himself upon Minho. And Minho would allow him to do so because he believed that he had once loved him, even if it was for a moment those many nights ago, the last time that Jisung had drank himself into foolishness.
It was not that Minho had believed that Jisung was foolish, not at all. It was that he believed that Jisung would not know better than to thrust himself upon Minho, as if he knew he would accept him every single time. Jisung was absolutely irresistible to Minho. It pained him to acknowledge that Jisung was not Minho’s but his own, and would not allow Minho to believe that he had him all to himself, as they both knew well that he did not.
And as Minho had almost stepped forward onto the polished wooden floorboards, to begin to dance for the music that Jisung so gracefully produced, the door had opened behind him and the violinist had appeared, their hair once again thrown atop their head and their eyebrows cinched together as if in disbelief of what they were hearing. Minho had been thrown to the side by their entrance and stared, eyes wide, as they bravely stepped upon the floorboards and towards Jisung, where they would meet him at his piano.
Minho once again felt the burning desire inside himself to lock Jisung far away for eternity, to make him become his, so that only the dancer himself would be able to hear his breathtaking music. But the violinist had persisted in speaking to Jisung, so much to the point that Jisung could not turn them away, and stopped himself from playing in favor of turning on the bench to face the violinist, his own face red from the alcohol.
“I have no interest in being your accompanist at the moment, my dear Hyunjin. So, please, leave me be so I can make love to my rain in peace. I refuse to do as you say on a day such as this, when I love the rain so dearly. I’ve decided I was never your pianist, and I will not be now. Leave,” Jisung had demanded, his fingers still hovering over the piano’s keys gingerly. He had not seen that Minho had still been standing at the door, watching the entirety of the situation before him.
“I will not ask that of you. I have come here to tell you that you sound lovely, and I do not doubt that you could play alone on stage, not as an accompanist but as the performer, yourself. But as of now, the rest of the world does not believe so, so I advise you only practice with I, who will be the one to allow you onto the stage. Without me, the stage can never be yours. So, please, even if it is only for one night, be my pianist.”
“Hyunjin.” Jisung’s eyes lit up with that of admiration and perhaps love, as if he had been swoon rather than insulted. “For what do you ask of me? I cannot provide for you what you desire, for I am but a pianist, only in love with the rain. Please, tell me what you desire of me so I can give to you, as I have given to you so many times before.” Jisung had drawn his hands from the piano and reached them out to the violinist who took them gently. The violinist kissed each one slowly, as if they were a lover, and allowed them to fall back to Jisung’s side.
“Allow yourself to become one with me, Jisung, and together we will take upon the stage and show the world that you are the most wonderful pianist,” the violinist assured softly, holding a hand out to Jisung.
“No, I cannot. I have found another, Hyunjin. One who can see the music and dances about it as if it were his paramour. I had watched him dance so many times that I, too, had desired to dance with the rain. And he had taken my hand, and…and showed me.” Jisung let out a breath and turned away from the violinist. The violinist threw themself upon Jisung, holding his shoulders.
“I will not have come here for you to tell me that you have been taken by another. I will not allow myself to hear it. You are my pianist, do you understand? Without me, you are nothing . Without me, you cease to be the pianist you had dreamed to be since you were a child. I would know, Jisung, as I have known you our entire lives. We had grown out our hair together since we were young, even though we are both sons of our fathers, who had been tailors and advised us to keep our hairs short to draw in clientele. We had not, and now here we stand, your hair long enough to become a shirt, and mine long enough to toss upon my head. Now, of all times, you cannot tell me that there is another. For our entire lives, it had been just us. I cannot bear to listen to you speak of someone else as if I had not been yours.” The violinist spoke desperately, as if he were hoping that Jisung would be caught on every word.
"It is a shame that you had thought that I was yours as you were mine. I cannot bear to be your shadow any longer, Hyunjin. It has been too many years that I have been cast away, behind you, in a way that you could not even think the feeling of. And our hair was not a rebellion of our fathers, and you know this. I had always wanted to be yours. You would not let me. I had let you become mine years ago, begging for you to do the same, but you had not. I had grown my hair out to attempt to get the attention from you that you would give the girls in our town. You had only done the same since I had done it, though you knew nothing of the story behind it. So now here we stand, you atop a pedestal as the star, and I, as your accompaniment. How pitiful had we led our lives to arrive here? Surely you did not think of that." Jisung glanced around the ballroom after he spoke for dramatic flair (as Minho had guessed) and had caught the eyes of a certain dancer who had wooed him over the past months.
"Jisung, I did not—" Hyunjin halted as Jisung pushed him away and stood up from the piano. He stepped towards Minho, who still stood by the door, watching patiently and waiting for his turn with the pianist. Once Jisung had reached him he threw his arms around him, and Minho could smell the alcohol rushing out of his every pore.
"Jisung," Minho breathed out, his eyes flicking towards Hyunjin, who seemed defeated, as he drew himself away from the piano and rushed out of the ballroom, leaving a heavy feeling in his wake. He suddenly could feel Jisung's warmth in a way he had never before, even when he had carried a drunk Jisung to his room, hoping and wishing that he would perish in his sleep to prevent a situation such as this, where Minho knew he could not control himself.
"Minho, it is raining again. Please, take me outside to dance in the rain as you had before. Or take me down the streets. Let us take upon the world while the night is young—while the rain is soaking the Earth. Please, I would do anything. I want to spend the night with you, not as we had before, but as lovers. As I am with the rain, and as you are with my music. I know that you love me, Minho, and I will not sit upon my throne that is but a piano bench and watch you not reciprocate. Take me outside," he demanded, his long, soft hair hanging in front of his face. Minho brushed the thin strands out of Jisung's face and leaned in close, feeling Jisung breathe on his skin.
"You hate me when you are not drunk. How do I know this is not a trick of yours?" Minho had asked, his eyes flicking down towards Jisung's lips, and he had finally observed them for the first time. They were quite thin, but you could still see the pink that reflected on them. Pink—as if they were colored in by some fancy makeup, though Minho knows that if he were to kiss Jisung in this moment he would know them to be bare.
And with the lack of a response from Jisung, he had almost leaned in, as if there was nothing stopping him from doing so, and there wasn't. He contemplated kissing Jisung for another moment, watching his eyes darken as he licked his lips slowly, preparing himself to be taken completely by Minho.
But, then, the door opened, and the head of the hotel had entered. The first thing he thought to do was stare Minho dead in the eyes, though Jisung's face was just centimeters from it, and Minho could feel Jisung's warmth seeping through his skin. It was as if they were having a stand-off of sorts, where Minho knew he would lose.
"Minho, what in God's name do you think you're doing? Are you not working? Are you not supposed to be cleaning the rooms of this hotel? Why would you think now would be high time to fraternize with the women of this hotel? Have you gone mad? Tell me, Minho, what is your excuse?" He looked as if he was fuming—it was as if there were puffs of smoke shooting from his ears.
"Sir, please, I can explain," Minho pleaded, gently pushing Jisung away, who only huffed. He knew he could not let Jisung turn around and see the man, so he held Jisung's head between his hands, even if he knew that Jisung would take it as an invitation to kiss him, he had no other way to stop him from turning around.
"I don't want an explanation. If I don't see you cleaning room sixty-seven in the next five minutes I'll just let you go. Do you understand?"
"Yes, I understand. Thank you." Minho knew he sounded defeated— deflated , even—from the terror of being found almost kissing a pianist. Now that he thought about it, he wondered exactly why he had leaned in in the manner he had. It’s not as if he loved the pianist as he loved a woman, but he did love the pianist as you would a close friend or a sibling, even if the pianist was not close to him in any definition of the word.
The man left, and Minho was once again alone with Jisung, who looked at him with a remnant of a sparkle in his eye, his mouth slightly parted in a way that Minho did not think he could resist any longer. But would he regret it? He guessed not, with the way that Jisung looked at him with a glance that begged for something . He leaned in and Jisung mirrored him, and soon they were face to face, their lips parted, faces all but inches away from each other, and Minho could feel all the air leave his lungs.
He was absolutely gorgeous. Even more so than when Minho had first found him, sitting at his wooden piano bench, playing his beautiful song. But he knew he should not kiss him. Not when he was drunk, not when he didn’t love him like he did. He knew that it would be too much for Jisung to put his lips upon Minho’s own, especially in a way that lovers did. He could feel Jisung grow weaker on top of him, and regretted his halting, but knew that it was better to halt than to not.
“Minho, please, kiss me, for I feel as if I’m going to pass out. I desire to kiss you before I fall asleep in your arms in a way such as this. I cannot take it anymore, damn it—” Jisung had paused to take a breath, and Minho basked in the way that Jisung’s voice broke off when he swore, and Minho swore he would get Jisung to make a noise such as that once again.
Minho gave in and let his lips fall upon Jisung’s gently, like petals falling from a flower, and felt as if his entire heart were exploding. He knew that Jisung did not feel the same and it pained him to think in that way, but he knew that he should not allow himself to get carried away in the same way he would if he were drunk too, of which he did not want to imagine, especially when the pianist in question was kissing him.
Their lips parted and they stared into each other’s eyes, and for the first time, Minho really felt as if they were one. A dancer and his pianist, a pianist and his dancer. Minho reckoned they were meant to be, and his heart began to grow at the thought of really loving Jisung. But he knew he had to be back to work, and he knew that Jisung truly belonged to the violinist, no matter how many times he denied it.
“I must be going,” Minho told Jisung, and the pianist began to cry, tears beginning to run down his pale, porcelain face. Minho knew that Jisung did not want him to leave, and Minho desired to stay just as much. He ran his thumb across the soft skin of Jisung’s cheekbone and hauled him off, dropping him to the ground in the same manner he would drop from the windowsill all those nights ago.
“Please, visit me in my room tonight. I do not think I can bear to not see you,” Jisung begged, his legs giving out. He dropped to his knees on the floor in front of Minho, and Minho did not know if he fell deeper into love or if he pitied the man before him, who did not do much besides drink himself to nothing and beg for Minho. A horrible life he had led.
And that night, after all of his work was done, Minho did not visit Jisung.