Chapter Text
Alhaitham had always been a man of few words and few friends,
He had always preferred his own company as he worked much better in solitude. His grandmother used to say, "a good friend could change his life"; but it wasn’t that he wanted his life to change. In the books he read as a child the main characters were often burdened by the actions of others and Alhaitham never understood the logic behind clinging to people that clearly made your life a nuisance.
His social skills were... lacklustre to say the least but, up until now this hadn’t been a problem as Alhaitham’s belief that friends were unnecessary never wavered.
Until an intelligent, sociable young man with a bright future in architecture sat down across from where Alhaitham was sitting in the library in the House of Daena. He introduced himself as “Kaveh”, a Ksharewar scholar while smiling warmly at him. Alhaitham studied his face for a long while. People often came to speak to him while he was reading but it was usually to ask to be partners on a research proposal or something similar.
He’d never been approached by someone who didn’t seem to want anything, other than to simply speak to him before.
And so, for the first time since his grandmother’s passing,
he considered the benefits of having a friend.
Alhaitham placed his book gently on the table, introducing himself, with a strange feeling of warmth flooding his senses as Kaveh’s eyes lightened.
Over the passing months the two grew closer than ever, bonding over loss of family, pursuit of knowledge and a deep passion for their respective majors. Alhaitham had never understood the point of studying the arts or aesthetics, yet he understood Kaveh; he could see the passion flood his face whenever Alhaitham asked what he had been working on over the last few days, the way he threw his all at every single project he worked on while still keeping his bright smile.
Alhaitham had always considered logic when making a decision, deciding the most efficient outcome, yet with Kaveh he found it didn’t always matter so much. Initially it seemed logical to him that he should ignore Kaveh just as he had with everyone else, but he felt as though Kaveh was different, he radiated his passion for his studies and it was almost contagious.
He had made his very first true friend, his Best Friend.
Two years pass, Alhaitham may still have only one friend however, one thing he had in abundance was the desire to seek knowledge; it came to him like a sixth sense. And so, when his time came to leave his mark on the Sumeru Akademiya in the form of one final group research project before his graduation, he found himself lost , in a sense; and not just because he had always detested group research.
It wasn’t that he couldn’t handle Akademiya stress or had overestimated his abilities, that would be absurd, Alhaitham knew he was capable of answering extremely complex questions that many people couldn’t even hope to understand. Yet the one question that had completely stumped him recently was, “Why was Kaveh (an extremely intelligent and capable man, as well as his closest friend) allowing the two other members of their group to completely disregard their responsibilities, and shoulder the burden himself? ”.
Alhaitham had always had faith in Kaveh’s capabilities as a scholar, but as with many things, people change as they grow older. Kaveh seemed to develop this idea that he could help everyone, do his part to make the Akademiya a place where all someone needed to be successful was passion and hard work. This ended up taking its toll on Kaveh as he often did far too many favours for others.
Alhaitham had asked Kaveh why he felt so strongly about it but Kaveh only said it was “just the right thing to do”. Alhaitham never felt the need to press him about it until Kaveh began to grow distant as he was constantly making more work for himself by worrying too much about other people. He was exhausting himself and they were bickering often lately.
Alhaitham ended up boiling it down to Kaveh being stressed about their final project.
Kaveh sat alone at their usual spot in the library, practically tearing his hair out as he worked tirelessly on his (and their two classmates’) share of the project. Alhaitham was sat next to him, occasionally glancing away from his, nearly complete, thesis when Kaveh would sigh dramatically, groan or otherwise indicate his distress.
Ironically, this was something Alhaitham appreciated about Kaveh, he was easier to read than most other people as his emotions were always outwardly displayed no matter how hard he tried to mask them, and Alhaitham had always had a hard time reading people anyway, it was refreshing to spend so much time with someone who made it so easy for him.
As Kaveh sighed again, leaning back in his seat to crack his knuckles, Alhaitham decided he should probably acknowledge his best friend’s discomfort.
“You’re going to work yourself to death if you keep this up, you know.” Alhaitham stated, bluntly.
Kaveh shot him a displeased glare, Alhaitham knew that look by now, Kaveh understood what he was saying but something, maybe stubbornness, stopped him from admitting it to himself.
“I’m just saying, this could’ve been avoided if you’d been firm with them.” He added, picking his pen back up to finish his closing paragraph, his intention had been to reassure Kaveh that he understood he was stressed, perhaps encourage him to share his emotions on it. Alhaitham had missed out on Kaveh’s lengthy rants recently and had unfortunately grown to miss them.
He soon realised he mustn’t have come across that way when Kaveh retorted, “God, Alhaitham, I know! Can you just drop it, already?” He threw his pen on the table, leaned back and sighed deeply before continuing, springing forward to face Alhaitham, “Everyone is stressed about this, okay? I’m just trying to make their lives easier and take a little work off their shoulders. Do you have to be so ignorant ?”
Oh. Kaveh was definitely annoyed, that much was obvious with the way his brow furrowed and his hands curled into fists atop the table.
Alhaitham paused for a moment as he tried to put together the pieces of Kaveh’s emotions; like a jigsaw puzzle without the centre piece. In this case, the centre piece was understanding the root of the problem, Alhaitham had told Kaveh countless times to just give the workload back to their other classmates because it was clearly too much for him to handle on his own.
Alas, he didn’t, arguing that “wisdom should be uncovered by many people”, as well as grumbling something about Alhaitham acting pretentious again.
Alhaitham didn’t understand what Kaveh meant. Well, partially; he understood he was often seen as being pretentious, but he didn’t care about that. What he didn’t understand was Kaveh’s inability to see that his selflessness was destroying him,
people could only go as far as their talent and hard work could take them; the other members of their group had little talent and even littler will to work hard. Kaveh was exceptionally brilliant and Alhaitham couldn’t understand why he would waste that brilliance on taking care of other peoples’ responsibilities.
“I’m not ignorant, Kaveh I just understand the need for accepting reality, you ought to be less forgiving to people like them.” Alhaitham stated calmly, looking back down to his thesis.
Kaveh opened his mouth to speak but found that he couldn’t get the words out, he stared at Alhaitham for a moment before he felt all of his emotions rise from his feet to his chest, Alhaitham glanced up again to see Kaveh furiously turn away from him before scrambling to carelessly shove his books back into his bag, storming out of the library.
Alhaitham just blinked at where Kaveh had been working mere moments ago,
He assumed Kaveh would be back tomorrow, after he had calmed down, and silently packed his things too.