ext_51982 (![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png)
treeflamingo.livejournal.com) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
31_days2011-02-16 12:36 am
treeflamingo.livejournal.com) wrote in 31_days2011-02-16 12:36 am
[Feb 15] [Nodame Cantabile] I Know At Least This Much
Title: I Know At Least This Much
Day/Theme: Feb 15/The denotation of your words, the connotation of your affection
Series: Nodame Cantabile (anime: up to beginning of Finale; manga: chap 101-ish)
Characters: Chikai(xNodame)
Rating: K+
A/N: First person but no recognizable character voice, introspection but obvious - this is utter and total self indulgence.
I don’t know how I used to be so convinced. She said over and over again how she loved me, and she came over every night, nagged me for food and attention, and I assumed that translated to attachment. She was so strange – she is so strange – and I was willing to believe any truth about her unless it involved daily bathing or academic rigor. And I was always willing to believe a woman when she said she loved me.
And then I fell in love with her. I grew habituated to her eccentricity, and to the daily reality of having to take care of her. I worried – absently – when I was gone, whether without my ministrations she would eat and bathe (and breathe properly, because I secretly believed her incapable of happiness without me, and so I was more arrogant and more in love than I knew, because my thoughts of her drove me to distraction). That old bastard Stresseman told me to make a clear distinction, so I did. It became the source of my troubles.
She wasn’t there when I wanted her to be. She didn’t pander to me instinctually. She didn’t tell me everything, didn’t need my approval for her decisions, for anything. Still doesn’t. And I stopped believing her. Because she didn’t worship me the way I thought she did, and I was just too afraid to give her any more of my heart, not if she wouldn’t cherish it.
(But by that point I was already lost, already needed her, might have lost even my music without her, because she is the only person I know of who can make a piano sing.)
When I kissed her after returning from my first tour, it was for her – I thought I could fix her with so simple a gesture. When I kissed her after the recital at St Malo, it was a different thing entirely. She’s such a child; if she came to me for food, perhaps she would stay with me for a kiss. (And I was entranced, by her piano and her spirit and her music, and I wanted to know what she tasted like.) Perhaps an honest kiss could put her back on my leash. (But she’d never been on a leash to begin with, not mine or anyone else’s. Not even Mozart’s, bless her, damn her.) Perhaps a real kiss would leave my mark on her, brand into her brain that she was mine, that she had to come back to me (because if she didn’t – but at that point I couldn’t think about those consequences (too arrogant, still, and too afraid, always afraid, even though she is nothing like my father.))
I felt guilty when I took the new apartment without telling her first, but only because I’d done it on purpose. I didn’t want to see her disappointment until the deed was done. And if she wasn’t disappointed, I wanted someplace ready to run to (psychologically, I suppose, because it’s not like I moved in immediately). But then she had tears in her eyes and I embarrassed myself and the piano tuner both (God knows Nodame wasn’t embarrassed). And I told her that we would still eat together and that she could come over whenever she wanted, and when she asked for a spare key my heart thumped a little harder.
Thus I know at least this much: no matter what she says, I will have to work to keep her; no matter what she doesn’t say, I have not lost her yet.
Day/Theme: Feb 15/The denotation of your words, the connotation of your affection
Series: Nodame Cantabile (anime: up to beginning of Finale; manga: chap 101-ish)
Characters: Chikai(xNodame)
Rating: K+
A/N: First person but no recognizable character voice, introspection but obvious - this is utter and total self indulgence.
I don’t know how I used to be so convinced. She said over and over again how she loved me, and she came over every night, nagged me for food and attention, and I assumed that translated to attachment. She was so strange – she is so strange – and I was willing to believe any truth about her unless it involved daily bathing or academic rigor. And I was always willing to believe a woman when she said she loved me.
And then I fell in love with her. I grew habituated to her eccentricity, and to the daily reality of having to take care of her. I worried – absently – when I was gone, whether without my ministrations she would eat and bathe (and breathe properly, because I secretly believed her incapable of happiness without me, and so I was more arrogant and more in love than I knew, because my thoughts of her drove me to distraction). That old bastard Stresseman told me to make a clear distinction, so I did. It became the source of my troubles.
She wasn’t there when I wanted her to be. She didn’t pander to me instinctually. She didn’t tell me everything, didn’t need my approval for her decisions, for anything. Still doesn’t. And I stopped believing her. Because she didn’t worship me the way I thought she did, and I was just too afraid to give her any more of my heart, not if she wouldn’t cherish it.
(But by that point I was already lost, already needed her, might have lost even my music without her, because she is the only person I know of who can make a piano sing.)
When I kissed her after returning from my first tour, it was for her – I thought I could fix her with so simple a gesture. When I kissed her after the recital at St Malo, it was a different thing entirely. She’s such a child; if she came to me for food, perhaps she would stay with me for a kiss. (And I was entranced, by her piano and her spirit and her music, and I wanted to know what she tasted like.) Perhaps an honest kiss could put her back on my leash. (But she’d never been on a leash to begin with, not mine or anyone else’s. Not even Mozart’s, bless her, damn her.) Perhaps a real kiss would leave my mark on her, brand into her brain that she was mine, that she had to come back to me (because if she didn’t – but at that point I couldn’t think about those consequences (too arrogant, still, and too afraid, always afraid, even though she is nothing like my father.))
I felt guilty when I took the new apartment without telling her first, but only because I’d done it on purpose. I didn’t want to see her disappointment until the deed was done. And if she wasn’t disappointed, I wanted someplace ready to run to (psychologically, I suppose, because it’s not like I moved in immediately). But then she had tears in her eyes and I embarrassed myself and the piano tuner both (God knows Nodame wasn’t embarrassed). And I told her that we would still eat together and that she could come over whenever she wanted, and when she asked for a spare key my heart thumped a little harder.
Thus I know at least this much: no matter what she says, I will have to work to keep her; no matter what she doesn’t say, I have not lost her yet.