2022-06-04: Selfish

• Log: 2022-06-04: Selfish
• Cast: Kaworu Nagisa, Akane Shinjo
• Where: Tsutsujidai High School - Music Club Room
• OOC - IC Date: 0096-06-07
• Summary: The day after Shinji Ikari's birthday party, Kaworu Nagisa comes to Tsutsujidai to take his frustration out on the school's piano.

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<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        Throughout Tsutsujidai High School, from the furthest corner to the nearest classroom, a beautiful piano plays. It's early in the morning, barely past dawn, so the summer heat hasn't reached its usual oppressiveness; instead, a breeze blows through, carrying warmth and music with it.
        
        But "warmth" doesn't necessarily mean "comfort," and this music, though beautiful, plays anguished notes. It's fast, it's frenetic, sweeping up an octave and then down again, before slowing into a dirge, rising up into a lament, and sprinting forward again, a streaming symphony of notes that would only be possible with the swiftest of hands crossing and uncrossing and recrossing. Chopin would be proud.
        
        It's not specifically one of Chopin's pieces, though it is highly reminiscent of his Fantaisie-Impromptu. There's more frustration in here. More despair. And if someone were to walk into the music room, they would see its source--Kaworu Nagisa--at the bench, playing with a stormy, troubled frown. A far cry from his usual faint, easygoing smile, and certainly nowhere near the joy with which he usually plays.

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

"... oh, I can definitely hear where you could do interesting choreography with that."

"I'm kinda surprised! I thought you were too busy to think about Dance Club, lately... did something change?"

"My dad is asking for proof I'm doing Dance Club and not getting into trouble, since one of the times I said I was... I wasn't. It came up when we were talking about what's going on at your house."

"Eesh. I didn't realize it got that far! That sucks."

... wow, Akane thinks. It's really that bad, huh. ... It's one thing to clean up after a kaiju or Alexis, but cleaning up totally mundane stuff like this feels... disrespectful, almost. Marusan deserves better than that.

... Marusan kind of deserves better friends, in general, Akane thinks.

"So who *is* our mystery piano player?" Akane asks, playfully, before poking into the music room experimentally. "... Huuuuuh," she starts, blinking a little. She scoots into the room, asking, "Marusan, have you met Kaworu?"

Marusan -- with brown-black hair down a little past her shoulders, and near-perpetual bags under her eyes -- shakes her head. "Ako mentioned him... she took to him pretty quickly. I didn't think she got along with guys very well."

"Nice playing, though, uh... you're really going at those keys," Akane points out, a little haplessly. "Anyway, uh -- hi there. To be honest, I wasn't expecting anyone in the practice building this early... Marusan and I were going to the Dance Club room to check on a couple things, but we overheard you."

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        At first, Kaworu seems not to notice Akane and Marusan as they peek into the music room and whisper between themselves about him, then greet him more directly. However, as they'd approached--before they'd even opened the door--his play had shifted from something akin to Fantaisie-Impromptu to Beethoven's "Pathetique" No.8 in C minor, Op.13. It's a rather slower, more melancholy piece while still allowing for moments where he can simply slam the keys--or at least the portion of it that he's playing is.
        
        Then he reaches the end of a beat and stares at the keys for a moment. He looks up at Akane and Marusan; there's tension in the lines under his eyes, and even seeing the two of them, he still doesn't smile.
        
        "I see," he says quietly. "I apologize for bothering you two."
        
        So he says, but he returns his hands to the keys and resumes play, picking up where he'd left off with a bit more speed and vehemence--yet somehow quieter than before. It must take some immense control to be able to play something so much like a whirlwind of frustration, and yet keep it restrained.
        
        He doesn't look like he's enjoying himself.

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

"... Hey, uh, Marusan, can you go on without me?" Akane asks, a little nervously. She gives a strained smile, saying, "I... get the feeling we might have something to talk about one on one. I wanna catch up with you a little more soon, but I get that your dad will kill you if you start missing *class*, too..." She chews at her lower lip, settling for, "... when's the next day you're free?"

"Saturday, at this rate," Marusan says, a little lamely. "I think it'd be kinda weird if I showed up to the Dance Club room with you anyway, so... yeah, okay. I'll see you later, Akane. It was nice to meet you, Nagisa-san, even if it was only for a little bit... I hope I see you again." She takes a half-step back, then another, then turns.

Akane, for her part, moves to sit down next to Kaworu. She glances down and to one side, trying to figure out her approach -- and then, with a little more directness than she's used to giving, just goes straight for, "... I didn't think you were much of a keys-banging kinda person." She admits, "I'm the same way, but I only had an electronic keyboard... it's just not the same as going to town on the real thing, right?"

She glances down at the keys. Wait, crap, sitting this close means he's gonna expect me to start playing -- oooghhh it's been two years since I bothered, I'm probably *terrible* now --

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        Kaworu doesn't respond by voice to Marusan's farewell; his body sways in a way that might be a nod of acknowledgement, but might also be just him moving to his own playing. It's probably actually the former. As previously mentioned, he doesn't seem like he's enjoying himself, and that includes enjoying himself enough to get swept away in his own sound.
        
        So in the same way, he doesn't respond when Akane approaches and sits down. Her remark, though, gets a bittersweet, ironic sort of smile out of him. His fingers slow, then stop.
        
        "...I suppose I'm not, usually," he murmurs. "This isn't like me. It really isn't like me..." He falls silent for a moment, seeming to not even hear what she says about having played in the past. After a moment, his fingers move once more, but in a slower, more outwardly serene song. Debussy's Clair de Lune, she might recognize. However... though it should be a serene song, something about the way he plays it might make one want to burst into tears.
        
        "True," he says then. "Electronics are a marvel in their own right, but it can't quite capture all the subtleties of a wood-and-wire piano." He pauses for a moment, though not in his play. He still hasn't looked away from the keys.
        
        Then:
        
        "...Say, Shinjo-san. Did you know the Moon is in love with the Earth?"
        
        It might be a strange question, but perhaps that's still better than expecting her to play too.

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

"I think I get it," Akane says. It's not that she fully gets it, mind -- but, well. Her entire life is a little bit structured around the idea that you can express through art what you can't or won't express otherwise.

... Speaking of which: that song is *powerful*. Akane's heart is pretty numb, but for an instant, it feels like she's finally out of her own head; she doesn't know what to *do* with that, at the moment, has no momentum on applying that sense of freedom from her world of self toward any particular... issue. But it's not a bad feeling, even if it is, perhaps, melancholy and confronting.

"... I get it," Akane reflects. She has to approach it from the academic perspective first -- she is, after all, the ace of her class -- but... "The Earth is always spinning, facing however many different ways, but the moon is always looking at the Earth, right? Tidal locking, or something like that." ... She can tell this is getting heavy fast -- it's a little out of her depth.

... Is Kaworu the moon, then, or the Earth? Both of those positions are kind of sad, Akane thinks -- never being able to notice who's really important to you, always looking at someone who can't bear to look at you in the same way...

Well: there's an easy way to find out, and -- maybe it's the music that gives Akane the power to ask. Rather than leave it open, though, she even asks from her gut. "... Are you the Moon, Kaworu?" A beat, before she appends: "... I'm guessing 'cuz of the watch."

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        Art *is* powerful like that, isn't it? A song can move a heart of stone; a sculpture can rend a city to glass. Though Kaworu may have abandoned passion in terms of how hard he hits the keys, there remains a tender passion in his softer play. It's an honor to be able to move the heart of a God, but... it's such a small world here.
        
        Maybe that's why he came here. To find a small little box where he can express the feelings he can't out there.
        
        She says she gets it. Maybe she does, and maybe she doesn't, but... then she applies scientific knowledge to it, and from there, asks Kaworu if he's the moon--because, specifically, of the watch.
        
        His hands still once more. As Akane has observed, he still wears that metal wristwatch. It's on his left wrist, and it's there that his gaze falls, away from her. He breaks into a small, quiet laugh. In another context, it might be a sob. Even so, he smiles. It might be heartbreaking to look at.
        
        "Well intuited. Yes," he replies. "I am the Moon, and this watch came from the Earth." He rests his right hand over it with delicacy, with reverence--with sorrow. "...It was his birthday yesterday. I wanted to make him happy, so I arranged a celebration." He pauses, smile fading. "...it gave him a flashback."

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

... Love is an intrusion, Yuta had said.

Akane definitely feels like an intruder. It does not feel much like how she understands love to feel, when she sees that painful, wracking laugh.

"... Oh, wow," is all Akane can bring herself to say at first, when Kaworu says she's successfully intuited this. That felt kind of like a stab in the dark, but... god, what does she even say to that? She doesn't feel like she can comprehend the depths of that pain.

A kaiju, after all, can't form those kinds of connections. They hurt people just by moving, even if what they're doing is in accordance with their unalterable nature. Yet here Kaworu is, slamming his pain into the keys, only stopping out of consideration for others.

... Maybe Akane really shouldn't think of him as a monster, even in part.

She breathes in for a moment. Closes her eyes. "... Well, I don't know if I've got great advice here," she admits, with a slightly pained smile of her own. "My track record sucks here, too. I was gearing up to do something for someone and then I skipped school for a week and ghosted her for months..."

It's the closest she's gotten to admitting it. She still can't, quite, put those words in that order. But... for this human-hearted monster, this kaiju that resembles a person...

"... Did you come here 'cuz you couldn't take it? Like... you're just gonna break stuff and hurt people you care about, no matter what?" she asks. It's... a telling question.

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        Love shouldn't be like that, should it? It shouldn't be active, voiceless suffering, reined in because even then it was too noisy. But it also shouldn't be causing pain to they whom one loves. It shouldn't be the realization that one keeps causing them pain. That they aren't the one who make it better; that someone else entirely does.
        
        Kaworu doesn't think of himself as 'human,' though he has a human form. Since Akane called him a monster, he has freely described himself the same way. A 'monster' is a fine way to describe what he is, after all. And yet... the more time he spends among Lilim, the more the shape of his heart resembles their own. It's like that every time. If he goes back to being alone--if he stops pretending to be human--then his heart will return to that of a 'kaiju' (read: Angel).
        
        "It's all right. You don't need to trouble yourself with that," he reassures her quietly, resting his hands between his knees, letting his fingers tangle with each other. He does at least finally look over at her with sad, sympathetic eyes as she mentions her own sins--only to look away again at her question.
        
        It *is* a telling question. He lifts a hand to rub, briefly, at a line along his neck, as if there were something there. But there's not. There's nothing.
        
        "...I'm worse than useless to him. All I ever seem to do is cause him pain. Even the moments when we can smile together are but a prelude to further suffering," he says softly. "Even so, he thanked me. He's so kind..." He lifts his head and gazes at her in quiet agony. "How could I face him again after that?"

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

Well. Akane can't match Kaworu's speed, his intensity -- certainly she doesn't have his grasp of classical music. "I mean, if you're gonna come lie in my garbage, I kinda do have to trouble myself with it!" Akane's delivery sounds sweet and practiced, but Kaworu can pick up the undercurrent of worry behind it.

"Again, you're *really* asking the wrong person for advice on this one," comes Akane's ultimate admission, at the assertion that all they can cause each other is suffering. "But... I feel like I get you a little better. To tell you the truth, I kinda built you up in my head... like, oh, here's this kaiju that knows exactly how to live like a kaiju!"

It's Akane's turn to laugh ruefully. She only allows herself one such laugh, though -- pulling out of it in short order in favor of resting her hands on the keys. She sure can't join in with Kaworu, but...

Akane's rusty, and she has to take this one slow, but she starts playing...

... the OP to Tarabaman X4. Maybe a little bit of melancholy creeps into her play, too -- or maybe it's just the natural effect of taking a piece slower, softer, more tentatively than intended. ... her sense of rhythm isn't perfect, either.

Playing clears Akane's head just a tiny bit, gets her a little bolder -- a little more willing to offer something she isn't sure on. "Maybe you two aren't ready for each other yet."

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        Kaworu tilts his head as Akane points out she has to trouble herself if he comes here to suffer, as she pastes sweetness over concern. For a moment, he simply gives her a miserable stare; then, despite everything, he smiles. "...You're so much like him," he muses quietly, and does not explain how.
        
        That smile remains, a contrast to his blue demeanor, as she repeats that she can't advise him. "True. You did say that," he acknowledges, nodding once. He looks away as she describes her previous impression of him. "...Is that how I seemed?"
        
        However, when she rests her hands on the keys, he glances back at her, then moves over to give her room to play. He doesn't try to interrupt her or join in with her, but he does listen in silence, eyes shut, as if absorbing her awkward play. It might not be perfectly played, but the edge of some of the anguish on his handsome features softens. Perhaps he's accepting what she's willing to offer.
        
        'Maybe you two aren't ready for each other yet,' she suggests. With a faint snort of an ironic laugh, the corners of his lips twitch up. "Perhaps you're right," he concedes. "I really need to stop being so selfish."

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

"... Hmmm. Not sure how I feel about that one," Akane admits, with a slightly rough chuckle. She worries a little that she's setting herself up to take a role in Kaworu's life that she can't quite manage, when she hears it -- and yet, she... decides to keep going. If Kaworu can not know how to get through this one, maybe Akane can not know, either.

"Yeah. You had really good advice with Anti -- it worked, when I tried," she admits -- with the implicit admission, perhaps, that she hasn't always been trying, lately. "And you always seem pretty self-assured, even when you don't know what's up. Seeing you like this is... pretty different."

Akane finishes up the song. She looks a little dissatisfied with herself, afterward, admitting, "... That sounds *nothing* like it does in my head," before turning to look at Kaworu a little more pointedly. "You can stay here as long as you want, even if it does kinda mean it's my business now," she offers. "This is... kinda where selfish, unfair people go, I think."

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        "It's a compliment," Kaworu reassures her, and adds, "and no one could ever replace him." Meaning he means it in only the nicest way possible, and he isn't going to try to project his (unrequited?) feelings for him onto her just because it, seemingly, is not working out. (Obviously both of them are way too gay for that anyway.)
        
        He does pick his head up when she brings up Anti, though--that he had good advice, that it worked 'when she tried.' He gives her a level gaze at that and says nothing. He's already generally aware of this thanks to having spoken with Anti directly recently. When she points out that this is unlike him, though, he rubs his wrist, along the edge of his wristband. He already knew that too, of course; he said as much earlier.
        
        But when Akane finishes up her song, then makes her offer, he actually looks a little surprised, red eyes going wide--before he breaks into his first genuinely happy smile of the morning. It doesn't erase everything else he has going on emotionally, but... "Thank you," he says quietly. "If it really isn't a bother, I'll take you up on that. Just for a short while."

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

That level gaze gets a slight grimace. Akane does her best to avoid flinching, but slower, more subdued expressions of self-chastisement... those creep up on her. She isn't... able, isn't ready, to be the person that Sayla, that Kaworu, that Renais want her to be. She can't do that alone, and it's just... humiliating -- and unfair to Alexis -- to ask for help with problems she created, right?

"... Yeah, that's fine," Akane says. She's got a comfortable distance from a first-year, anyway. "You know, if you wanted, you might enjoy poking around the Dance Club a bit! I bet they'd be excited to have live accompaniment, and Marusan might... well, I'll let her pitch it if she needs something." It's... still a little difficult, perhaps, for Akane to fully accept simple companionship -- she always has to turn it into *something*, overthink it *somehow*.

A thought clicks, after that. "... I kinda wanna hear your take on that song I played at some point! I bet you'd do a better job with it. ... It's the Tarabaman X4 opening." A beat, before she offers, "I watch stuff in my room, so that's out, but I do have the recordings if you wanna borrow them."

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        At least he doesn't say anything--but one doesn't need to speak to communicate an emotion, do they? All this piano-playing has made that clear. Besides which... clearly Kaworu doesn't have it all together, either. He might give her that look, but he also doesn't push her.
        
        "The Dance Club?" he echoes. He looks down at his hands, then nods. "...It would be nice to play for a large audience again. It feels like I haven't done that in a long time..." He chuckles a little and brushes back his hair. "But it was actually fairly recently. A friend of mine sang in a park, and I accompanied her on the piano. I felt... very happy, back then."
        
        And Shinji wasn't there. The only other Child who *had* been there was Zoia, someone who has rarely appeared in the timelines he's experienced. ...maybe it would be good for *him* to spend some time apart from Shinji. How can he make him happy if he can't make himself happy? If nothing else... it might help clarify his feelings, or at least let him come to terms with them. And in a far more peaceful way than--well, the last time he needed to do something like this. Even if it turns out this time around is a wash in terms of what he can do for the one he loves, he can still turn it into a learning experience.
        
        After all, there's always next time.
        
        So he also nods when Akane expresses an interest in hearing his take. "I'd like that. I'd be happy to play for you too, if that's your desire," he replies. "What's the song called?"

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

"I'm not gonna volunteer you, but, you know, a lot of the Dance Club was third years last year. Now's a pretty good time to get in there... it's not that they're *hurting* for members but they haven't exactly gotten a ton of uptake. So yeah -- maybe it'll be good for you!" Seeing whatever has its grip on Kaworu's heart start to ease a bit seems to ease Akane's worries about getting over-close with him, in turn.

"Hero," Akane answers, in English, after a few moments. "... Usually I don't like to lend my stuff out, but you can borrow the whole show for as long as you want, not just long enough to hear the song or whatever. I still have current stuff to catch up with... X4's one of my favorites, though."

... OK, yeah, she's gonna gush a little bit. "Yeah, I *definitely* wanna hear that song. There's a bit where... after they switch opening songs, they play an instrumental of that one during a kaiju attack... it's a *really* good callback!"

With a grin, she says, "Thanks. And -- don't worry about banging on the keys. You didn't need to apologize earlier. Go at it as hard as you want! I mean, I invited you to rip the place up if you needed to the first time you stopped by. Getting a piano out of tune is pretty tame in comparison."

<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.

        He certainly is more at ease compared to when Akane walked into the room. That melancholy still ravages his smile--but he *is* smiling. And if Akane is happier because she's able to help him... then that makes Kaworu happier, too. It's nice, knowing that you're able to make a positive difference in someone's life.
        
        "I'll see about dropping by in the afternoon," Kaworu thus says. He does pause a little when Akane suggests she lend him not just whatever CD or SDAT tape she has the song itself recorded on, but the entire show. He doesn't really understand what she says about callbacks either, but he does like to listen to her enthusiasm as she conveys what she loves, and that keeps a smile on his lips, too.
        
        The reminder that he has permission to outright rampage in Tsutsujidai gets a laugh out of him, too--a genuine one. "Very true," he replies, smile warming. That original offer is a little tempting, too, and he indulges in a moment to imagine what it would be like--but no; Gridman and the other Vessels of Light would definitely show up to stop him, and that would be one hell of an awkward conversation. Besides, he shouldn't... he shouldn't.
        
        "Thank you for letting me have a place here," he thus says here. "Tsutsujidai has become... comfortable, to me." He leans his head back, eyes shut, as he scoots one foot up to balance on the edge of the piano bench and drapes one arm along his knee. "Perhaps it's because of the fine company." He turns his head her way and opens his eyes, smile now bright.

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

The truth is, Akane's relieved that Kaworu doesn't seem that tempted by that offer; she'd made it when she was just a little less precious about her heart than she was, a little less... it's hard to call her current state 'hopeful,' and yet...

... it inspires something complicated in her. Her city (read: heart) has become comfortable, even precious, to someone else. It's hard for her, as she is, to feel like that's a good thing for either of them, but by the same token... isn't that what she wants? To feel like she has something to *offer* someone?

"Ahaha, you're just having me on a bit..." Akane protests, but it's good-natured protesting rather than stressful. "I think I wanna hear you play one more time, but I really can't afford to miss another full day... whenever I miss lately, they assume I'm getting bored so I end up with extra lessons. ... it's... a lot."

Still -- she can enjoy a little peace and quiet in the music room with a person like Kaworu.