Chapter Text
“Fanmail,” Sombra teased as she dropped the stack of envelopes onto Gabriel’s table. “Everyone just loves their bad boy, don’t they?”
Gabriel snorted at Sombra before he picked up the letters. The mail was always fun to read and he loved hearing from his fans. It was reassuring that they loved his work no matter what strange combination he tried out. Sure he was having fun, but it didn’t mean anything if the people he was trying to entertain didn’t like it.
One letter caught his eye and he picked the datapad up. It was a bulky piece of equipment, designed to be able to withstand the hardest drops, making it perfect for delivery by mail. Whoever wrote this had a pretty penny to spare as the damn things weren’t cheap. He turned the datapad on and started reading.
‘Dear Reaper,
My name is Hana Song and I absolutely love your music. It’s amazing to have playing in the background when I’m streaming and I know I’ve directed a lot of my viewers to your albums. You’re a huge inspiration to me and my friends and I have a small request to make.’
Below the first paragraph was a picture of a diverse group of kids all flashing peace-signs at the camera. There was a little arrow pointing to the East Asian girl in the center with pink marks on her cheeks and read “me” underneath. Gabriel smirked as he scrolled down a little further. He almost dropped the datapad in shock at the man lifting an eyebrow at the cameraman and, by extension, Gabriel.
Snow white hair covered the man’s head, but it was starting to recede around his crown. Brilliant blue eyes stared at him from behind wire-rim glasses and his dark eyebrows made them pop even more. His lips were thin, the top one cut into and pulled pack over his eye tooth by an old scar. A much larger and redder scar cut through most of his face, running from just above his left eyebrow and down across his nose.
The man was gorgeous and Gabriel was having a hard time looking away from the man. He generally tried to stay away from white boys after the heartbreak he’d experienced in his youth, but this one was captivating, more so than the dumb blonds that seemed to dominate the mainstream media. He wanted to know more about him and Hana Song was certainly about to deliver.
‘This is Jack Morrison, my music instructor. I know he looks like a fuddy-duddy, but he’s probably one of the sweetest men I know. He believes in us, even when the other teachers make us feel small and insignificant. He has an open-door policy and anyone that takes his classes know that he’d drop everything if they needed a shoulder to cry on.
He’s absolutely amazing and he loves you music too! He doesn’t like to go into details, but shortly after he got blown up while serving in the army, he was in a really dark place. Your music helped him to get his feet back on the ground and get his life in order again. Which finally brings me to my request; could I have a copy of the sheet music for ‘Thorns of My Rose’ tailored to the piano?
Jack promised us that if we could get him a copy of it, he’d play it at the next recital. It would blow everyone’s mind and we know he’d be amazing at it. So, if you could send a copy back to me that would be fantastic.
Thanks in advance regardless of what you choose.
Hana Song’
Jack Morrison; it couldn’t be, could it? It had been years since he’d seen him, but not long enough for Jack to be snow-haired. There were likely thousands of blue-eyed white boys with the name Jack Morrison in the country who had served their country and been blown up. Still, may as well exploit what delight he could from the whole ordeal.
Gabriel smiled and handed the datapad off to Sombra to read. She whistled and flipped the picture of Jack Morrison up off the datapad, grinning as she saved it. She waggled her eyebrows at Gabriel before scrolling down further.
“I can get her that music if you want,” Sombra said as she handed the datapad back. “Shouldn’t take too long.”
“Please do,” Gabriel smiled. “I am interested in this request.”
“Go figure,” Sombra smirked as she brought up the picture of Jack again. “Mmm, now that’s a good looking man.”
Gabriel waved her off and started writing out his reply to Hana.
‘Dear Hana Song,
Thank you for the letter. I greatly enjoy hearing from my fans and I’m happy to hear that you and your friends enjoy my music. I am more than willing to entertain your request. I just have two conditions…’
“Mr. Morrison has to sing the lyrics while he plays and I want a video sent to me,” Hana laughed as she read Reaper’s response to the class. “Best regards, Reaper.”
Hana shot Jack a huge grin and she watched him roll his eyes. He had been smiling since Hana started reading the short response. He was just as excited to play one of his favourite songs as everyone else was and to have the sheet music come from Reaper himself was amazing. Even the request to sing didn’t seem to faze him and Jack rarely sang to anyone but his class.
“Is there a threat to hunt you down if you don’t send the video?” Jack teased as he got to his feet.
“Nope,” Hana grinned before she downloaded the sheet music to her tablet and printed them off the printer in the corner of the room. “This is so cool! Reaper is the greatest man ever!”
Jack let out an odd noise of agreement as he picked the sheet music up. He tapped on his thigh as he headed for his precious piano, humming along to the music playing in his head. Hana and Jesse grinned at each other before they hurried to grab their guitars in case Jack needed to hear something other than his piano.
“And my blood was never as red as when I touched the thorns of my rose,” Jack sang as he sat down at the bench.
“You’re singing it like a love song,” Jamieson wrinkled his nose.
“I always thought it was one,” Jack smiled. “A very sad love song, one about the loss of something precious.”
“So some girl’s virginity,” Fareeha rolled her eyes and rested her saxophone against her thigh.
“Oh, nothing so mundane,” Jack teased. “No, I always saw it as a lament over the loss of someone’s love. Perhaps a harsh fight that happened because of his ‘rose’.”
Hana frowned and tilted her head as Jack scratched at his chin. She could have sworn she heard him say “but I did always prefer carnations”. That didn’t make any sense, but maybe it meant something to him?
“Alright, let’s see how this baby sounds on piano,” Jack chuckled.
Gabriel barely had time to properly wake up as his Twitter feed went crazy. He checked to see what the chaos was about and followed the link Hana Song had left for him. Apparently, she had decided to livestream the entirety of her school’s concert with the one hour mark carefully flagged for “Jack Morrison and ‘The Thorns of My Rose’”.
He had five minutes to set his television up to watch the performance and get himself something to drink. He sat down just as a blue-clad figure strode out onto the stage just behind a piano. Gabriel swallowed, staring at the snowy haired man. Fuck, he was a dead ringer for his golden boy, but he had to focus. No point in focusing on something that wasn’t going to happen.
Jack Morrison sat down on the bench and flicked the tail of his coat behind him. The man had gone full formal, looking like something off of a Broadway musical rather than a music teacher. Gabriel smiled as Jack Morrison started playing ‘Moonlight Sonata”, silencing the cheers and whistles instantly.
Jack Morrison had clearly played this piece a lot. There wasn’t a moment’s hesitation in his movements and the music never faltered. Gabriel tapped the chords on his knee, humming along to the beautiful music. The song came to an end and the audience cheered and clapped.
The screen went black for a moment before returning with a much closer image of Jack Morrison. A girl with spiky brown hair was grinning as she helped set up a microphone. Jack adjusted it a few times before thanking her and shooing her off the stage. The girl flashed thumbs up at the camera before hurrying off.
Jack Morrison set his shoulders back before he started playing ‘The Thorns of My Rose’. The first twenty seconds were just the deep notes of the piano before Jack Morrison lifted his mouth to the microphone.
Gabriel almost dropped his glass in shock as his golden boy’s deep voice echoed through his living room. He stared at the screen, his heart in his throat as Jack, his Jack, sang the heart-broken song almost like he had been in the studio when Gabriel originally recorded it. He let out a stuttered breath before he pushed his face into his hands.
He reminded himself to breathe, sucking air in through a very tight throat. Jack’s voice had never sounded more beautiful. He was hitting each note perfectly, his fingers playing the melody as if it had always been meant for the piano.
When he finished, Gabriel was in tears. He wiped angrily at his face, listening to the crowd go wild as Jack flexed his fingers. He heard Hana shouting for Jack to give his adoring fans a smile. Gabriel looked up as Jack turned to face the camera. His face had changed, but that beauty was still there.
Jack smiled, a mischievous little smirk that Gabriel knew all too well and stuck his tongue out. There, sitting in the middle of his tongue, was a steel barbell with a raven on top. Tears poured down Gabriel’s face as his gift to Jack before he left on his first deployment overseas vanished back between his pale lips.
It took him almost a half-hour to recover. He toyed with his phone as he turned off the television, staring at the number on the screen. He took a deep breath and hit the “dial” button, pressing the phone against his ear.
“Good evening, Bloomington’s Finest Flowers,” a man answered.
“I have a special deliver I’d like you to make tomorrow,” Gabriel said. “You do still do deliveries, right?”
“Of course,” the man laughed. “Wouldn’t still be in business if I didn’t. Now, what can I get for you?”
Gabriel smirked. “How’s your Spanish?”
Jack came to a dead stop as he stepped into his classroom. Sitting on his desk was a bouquet of brilliant red and blue carnations in a stunningly gorgeous vase. His students were looking at him expectantly, practically bursting with excitement. He chuckled and closed the door behind him.
“Okay, which one of you brats did this?” he teased as he set his books down on the desk.
“They were here when we arrived!” Hana shouted. “Honest!”
“I find that hard to believe,” Jack chuckled as he lifted the head of a blue carnation and took a deep breath. “Mmm, but I do love carnations.”
He spotted the tag and plucked it from the green stems, turning it over to read. His breath caught in his throat and he stared at the neat writing.
“To: Mi sol perdido
From: Tu luna perdida”
Jack felt tears burning his eyes and he smiled. He set the tag down on his desk and picked up one of the red carnations. He snipped back the stem with his scissors, ignoring the confused looks he was getting from his students, and slipped the flower behind his ear. He touched the petals fondly, pretending for a moment that he was far away from Indiana and in the arms of his lover. He took a deep breath and returned to the present, immediately starting his class as if nothing had happened.
There was a message waiting on his phone when he got home. The number was private and he was tempted to delete it, but curiosity won out. He was happy that he did decide to play it.
“Hey, Jack,” Gabriel’s voice filled his living room. “Um, I realize this might be strange to you. It has been, what, almost fifteen years? Anyways, I, um, I wanted to talk to you again. Could you give me a call back? If you want to. I mean, I get if you don’t; we didn’t exactly part on the best terms. Um, I hope you liked the flowers too. I thought you deserved them after that performance last night. I hope to talk to you soon.”
Gabriel read off his phone number before hanging up. Jack played the recording a few times to make sure he had the right number. He listened to Gabriel’s voice drift around his house before he dialed the number. It rang three times before Gabriel answered.
“Hello?” he asked, sounding groggy.
“Oh, I’m sorry, did I wake you up?” Jack asked.
“Jack!” Gabriel gasped. “Well, I was asleep, but I don’t mind.”
They were silent for a long time before Jack sighed. “I owe you an apology, Gabriel,” Jack murmured. “You didn’t deserve what I did to you.”
“You were in pain, Jack,” Gabriel reassured him. “I got that. I never blamed you.”
“Gabriel, please, just let me explain,” Jack smiled.
“Go ahead.”
“I hated myself,” Jack murmured. “I got blown up and I was pieced back together and I felt…so ugly.”
“Jack,” Gabriel murmured.
“Let me finish,” Jack shook his head. “You were so loyal and I hated it. You were holding my hand the whole time, humming your songs as if nothing was wrong. I couldn’t stand to think that I was holding you back. You were starting to make a breakthrough with your music and I was holding you back. So I…I wanted you to live. I wanted you to have your life. I lashed out, I drove you away.”
“But my music helped you through the darkest part of your life, according to your student,” Gabriel murmured.
“It did,” Jack laughed sadly. “Hearing how well you were doing with your life and how much everyone loved your music made me feel better. I knew that my miserably existence hadn’t dragged you down.”
“I want you back, Jack,” Gabriel said.
“I want that too,” Jack admitted. “Wanted it for years. I thought that you might have hated me for what I did.”
“Never,” Gabriel reassured him. “Never, mi sol.”
“Less of a sun now,” Jack chuckled as he ran his hand through his hair. “Let’s take this slow, though. We’re different people.”
“I’m willing to go at whatever pace you want,” Gabriel reassured him. “I just want to hear your voice and your laugh again. Fuck, Jack, I missed you.”
“I missed you too, mi luna,” Jack murmured as he sat down on the couch. “So, what’s life like in the big city?”
Gabriel chuckled and Jack smiled. “Hectic, but worth it. I’ll show you sometime.”
“I’d like that,” Jack smiled.