Chapter Five: Discordance
Bang.
He had blown it, completely made an utter fool of himself. Lost any hope of a chance with him.
Bang.
Had he really been reduced to this, a mere human with a total lack of self-control? Where was the poised, sleek, charismatic sex god he once was?
Bang.
It was all over. The best he could wish for was that the incident wouldn’t spread through the whole orchestra.
Bang.
Knowing Kadaj, he probably didn’t even have that.
Bang.
“Jesus Christ, you think you could play something that sounds a little less like a cat strangling itself in your piano strings?”
Sephiroth sighed, his breath fogging up the black surface of the piano where his cheek was pressed and from whence the sounds of a strangling cat were emanating. Kadaj’s angry exclamation cut through his despair and moodiness like...like...like the sharp knife of rejection piercing through his soul. He let out another doleful sigh.
“One more sigh, and I swear I’ll suffocate you,” Kadaj said with a frown, leaning against the doorway of the music room. He had only gotten back a few minutes ago, but it was already two o’ clock in the morning. He thought Sephiroth would have been asleep by now; it was a good thing Yazoo and Reno hadn’t come up with him.
Sephiroth opened one glassy green eye to stare listlessly at his younger brother, and then closed it, sans sigh.
“I take it your night didn’t end well,” said Kadaj with a smirk.
Sephiroth didn’t respond.
Kadaj shifted around. “I see. Well, maybe if you had consulted with me first about this Cloud, you wouldn’t be sulking like a three-year-old child—”
“Like yourself, you mean,” Sephiroth hissed angrily, glaring at his brother. Before the teen could retort, Sephiroth cut him off. “Don’t even bother. Get out of my room. Now.”
Kadaj briefly considered sticking around just to piss Sephiroth off, but decided the man had already had enough.
Sephiroth was grateful when he heard Kadaj leave the music room and shut the door behind him. He was already miserable enough; he didn’t need to be in jail on charges of murder as the cherry on top.
Speaking of cherries...Sephiroth groaned as memories of the night came back full force. Things had started out fairly pleasant. He had been genuinely impressed by the blond’s enthusiasm for automobiles. He had been anticipating a successful evening, filled with subtle flirting, sly glances, and sexual undertones. Then Cloud threw subtle out the window, and Sephiroth’s self control jumped right after. There was no way the little vixen hadn’t known what an invitation he presented as he bent over to retrieve his jacket. Luckily, he had been able to make the excuse of getting the blond a drink in order to hide for a few minutes in the kitchen.
Then there had been the blond’s blatantly erotic show of drinking the water, head tilted back in careless abandon, the single drop that trickled down the side of his jaw to roll down the smooth column of his neck, the muscles there rippling with each swallow—
Sephiroth banged his head on the piano, regret for the action blossoming almost as immediately as the pain in his forehead. Rising from the bench with a grimace, he finally went to his bedroom for the night (or morning, as it were), locking the door behind himself and flopping onto his bed face down. It had been so embarrassing to be caught staring like that, not to mention his practically permanent state of semi-arousal. Semi, ha, he thought venomously. If he had so much as coughed, I probably would have come in my pants. But once again, Fate had seen fit to preserve his dignity for a few moments more, and he made it into the music room.
Until five seconds later, when Fate turned tail and left him alone with a gorgeous man performing obscene sexual acts with his flute.
He briefly considered suffocating himself with his pillow as the scene and the results of the rehearsal thereafter played out in his mind. Okay, so he might have gotten over the initial shock and arousal of seeing Cloud sucking off his head joint with a few sarcastic comments, and he was damn lucky he played the piano and was able to easily hide his erection from Cloud’s eyes, and most likely Cloud hadn’t noticed the few wrong notes every once and a while or guessed the reason why he kept losing his place, but all of that went to shit when Cloud knocked over his music.
Maybe he could have prevented it. Maybe, if he had been faster, he could have caught the papers before they settled on the ground beneath the piano. But as it was, Cloud seemed to be on a mission and would not have been satisfied until he saw its completion.
Well, I hope you’re satisfied, though Sephiroth callously. You’ve completely unmanned me. Because, really, he had frozen solid the moment he realized that Cloud meant to retrieve the papers himself. There was really nothing he could have done, Sephiroth rationalized, as the blond bent over and started gathering his music, the nest of soft spikes begging to be touched, the sliver of pale skin that showed as his shirt rode up, the way he looked so right down on his hands and knees. So really, when Cloud grabbed onto his thigh to help himself up, the blond really should have politely thanked Sephiroth that he hadn’t violated him right there over the piano. It was only with his last shred of self-control that he was able to quietly grit out Cloud’s name, bringing his attention to the rather obvious problem right beneath his face.
Cloud had only stared at him with his bright, electric blue eyes, lips parted just enough to show the sip of his pink tongue, until Sephiroth, unable to take the wide-eyed stare of shock any longer, suggested he take Cloud home. And if that hadn’t been the most awkward, tense, and generally uncomfortable car ride of his life. He wouldn't have been surprised if his car had spontaneously combusted from the sheer amount of friction between them. As they pulled up to Seventh Heaven, Cloud had bolted from the car with nothing but a hastily mumbled something--Sephiroth thought is sounded suspiciously like “I'm so sorry,”--and that was the dramatic conclusion to a night entirely ruined. Now he lay in bed, arm draped over his bare chest after having changed into a pair of silk sleep pants, staring up at the ceiling and wondering desperately what type of flowers Cloud liked. At least he could hang onto the hope that tomorrow would undoubtedly be a better day.
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“Sephiroth!” Thump, THUMP.
“SEPHIROTH!” Thud, thud. “SEPH, GET UP!”
“SEPHIROTH!”
Tiny tendrils of alarm crept through the sleep-drugged haze of Sephiroth's mind, but given that the voice behind the alarm was Kadaj's shrill tone, he was rather inclined to ignore it.
“SEPH!”
“SEPHIROTH!” Bang, BANG.
“SEPH, YOU DUMBASS, OPEN THE GODDAMNED DOOR!”
Said dumbass sighed, sorely tempted to pull his pillow over his head. He always forgot how hard Kadaj was to ignore.
With a heavy sigh, he wearily rolled out of bed, pulling away strands of hair that were stuck to his mouth. He stared impassively at his brother as he opened the door and was punched in the chest by Kadaj's wild knocking. Kadaj froze, and then grabbed Sephiroth's wrist, babbling frantically.
“Seph, we need to get out of here now—I can't believe you didn't hear me before, what the hell were you, dead? Or were you just fucking ignoring me?—It doesn't matter anyway, we need—”
“Is that smoke I smell?” Sephiroth cut Kadaj off with a crisp tone, glaring him in the eyes.
Kadaj threw his hands up in exasperation. “YES! That's why we—”
Sephiroth didn't bother listening to the rest of Kadaj's sentence. He shoved the teen out of his way and rushed down the hallway with growing dread as the scent of smoke grew stronger. He almost blacked out at the sight that greeted him.
“My...kitchen,” he whimpered softly. The entire corner of the kitchen was on fire, and it was spreading quickly. Even ten feet away, Sephiroth could feel the heat starting to dry out his skin.
Kadaj stood nervously behind Sephiroth. “Ummm...Seph...”
Sephiroth only acknowledged the boy with a soft but deadly, “Why didn't the fire alarm go off?”
“BecauseIneverchangedthebatterieslikeyoutoldmetocanwegonow?” Kadaj's words spilled out of his mouth like water off a cliff in his haste and panic. He worriedly glanced over Sephiroth's shoulder at the steadily advancing flames, fidgeting as Sephiroth continued to stand still.
It wasn't until a small explosion came from the kitchen and Kadaj screamed that Sephiroth turned around. “Go,” he said quietly, the firelight reflecting in his eerily calm eyes. “Out the fire escape, now.”
Kadaj opened his mouth to protest, but Sephiroth grabbed his arm and steered him to the balcony doors. “I will be out within five minutes. You need to get out now,” he said roughly.
Without bothering to look back to make sure Kadaj left, Sephiroth turned towards their bedrooms, rifling through them to gather clothes and other important items. Quickly throwing on a sweatshirt and sneakers, he headed down the hallway, two duffel bags in hand, only to find that flames were partially blocking his escape.
“Shit,” he muttered, dropping the bags to wrap his hair into a messy bun. Flipping the hood over his head, he dashed down the hallway, managing to get through with only minimal searing on his face. He slammed open the front door to see that other occupants of their floor had poked their heads out to investigate the smell, but, curiously, none had pulled the fire alarm. With a exasperated groan, he reached out and pulled the switch, activating a loud siren and floor-wide sprinkler system. He ran back into the apartment, slowly being destroyed now by water as well as fire, and ran through the balcony doors, scrambling down the metal staircase to where Kadaj waited below.
_________________________________________________________________________________
Hours later on what was, for all other intents and purposes, a beautiful Sunday morning, Sephiroth found himself staring up into the sky at the billowing smoke coming from his penthouse apartment as firefighters finally subdued the blaze. Kadaj stood next to him, visibly shaken, but trying to remain calm. After letting out what seemed to him like the millionth sigh in the past twelve hours, Sephiroth turned to his younger brother.
“You’re not hurt, are you?”
Kadaj shook his head. “No, I’m fine,” he said quietly, still gazing at the fire. “I’m...sorry. Please don’t be mad at me, but I understand—”
“I’m not mad at you,” Sephiroth said. He ignored Kadaj’s immediate look of disbelief. He might have been mad at the teen in the moment, but now, after the fact, after thinking about what could have happened, Sephiroth couldn’t remain angered with him. “I’m not mad at you.”
Kadaj slowly turned his face back towards the apartment building, letting the sounds of sirens and shouting firefighters wash over him. “Okay,” he murmured. “Thanks.”
Sephiroth gave a small “hmm” of agreement before saying, “Just try not to be so unbearably idiotic next time.”
“Maybe next time you should try not to sleep like the dead,” grumbled Kadaj, shooting Sephiroth a quick smirk.
Sephiroth shoved Kadaj with his shoulder, and then slung an arm around the boy’s waist in a rare show of affection. Kadaj leaned his head against Sephiroth's chest.
“Where will we stay?” he asked.
Sephiroth thought for a moment. “Angeal doesn’t live too far from here. I’m sure he won’t mind if we stay with him,” he said. Resisting the overwhelming urge to sigh yet again, Sephiroth instead tightened his hold on his brother, mentally preparing himself for everything he was about to have to deal with. It was going to be a very long week.
