[ interlude; fic ]
It was only a few short blocks to the harbor; the river could be seen from the apartment window, after all. It was a manmade river leading to a manmade bay where manufactured sand lined a small stretch of beach that no one was on this late at night; but as far as Sheryl was concerned, there were worse things for humans to build than rivers and beaches.
She leaned against the low fence that divided the small boardwalk from the beach, staring vacantly outwards. She'd learned that it grew cold enough to snow on Frontier for two weeks around Christmas to set an atmosphere; other than that, it was temperate enough for her to be fine in her terrycloth shorts and long-sleeved shirt.
Singing.
What was it?
Was it standing on a stage in front of thousands? Was that what singing was? If it was, she'd lost it already. She didn't have to give it up.
What was she losing?
Frontier's dome was transparent at night. She didn't know any of the stars reliably, not from this angle, maps were hard to conceptualize when you were traveling through them. But the brightest one wasn't Polaris, that much she knew. She didn't have her phone with its convenient star map, but it had struck her, the last time she'd looked at it in detail, that the northern star, what Earth sailors and navigators had tracked by for centuries, the brightest star in the sky, no longer mattered here.
She wondered if it would care.
She wasn't really crying any more; there was something calming about being here. She wasn't angry, either-- and she'd been so angry, knowing Kamina was right. She knew singing was a part of her, no matter why she had started. But if singing was singing for those thousands, what was she? What had she wanted from them?
What did she want from Kamina?
The first was easy. She'd never wanted much from her fans, except that they listen to her sing. The more fans she had, the more she could sing, the greater things she could do with singing. Were fans and singing separate? Were a career and singing separate?
Maybe the second was easier. She stretched her hand up to the sky, into that now-familiar plane gesture Alto was always making, framing the star between her fingers. It didn't feel as silly as it should have.
Kamina had grown up not knowing the sky, so she'd shown him hers. By comparison, he had the much more difficult task of worrying about her, of taking care of her this past week-- and she had let him. It was really the worst sort of time to realize that you loved someone, when you were leaning on them so heavily that you kept erratically drawing back for fear they would crack. She didn't want that sort of relationship, not in general, but right now she was welcoming it, and fighting herself the whole way.
She didn't have a way to process that, to come to terms with herself, not if she was giving up singing.
And yet--
And yet--
Not five minutes later it had become too much to ignore, and she had vaulted herself over the fence, kicking off her shoes as she ran barefoot towards the water, falling on her knees where the sand was wet from the tide the river had this close to the sea.
After all, she hadn't brought any paper with her.
tatakau you ni koishita
hitasura ni yume wo hotta
sono hoshi ni oritakatta
kimi no sora tobitakatta
shukumei ni yobimodosareta hokkyokusei ga naiteru
She sat back on her heels, hands wet with sand. Five lines, written in sweeping characters, smudged in places where the sand didn't lend itself to detail-- but now that she'd written them, she'd remember them.
She didn't have a tune, she didn't have the rest of the lyrics, but she had a song.
She leaned against the low fence that divided the small boardwalk from the beach, staring vacantly outwards. She'd learned that it grew cold enough to snow on Frontier for two weeks around Christmas to set an atmosphere; other than that, it was temperate enough for her to be fine in her terrycloth shorts and long-sleeved shirt.
Singing.
What was it?
Was it standing on a stage in front of thousands? Was that what singing was? If it was, she'd lost it already. She didn't have to give it up.
What was she losing?
Frontier's dome was transparent at night. She didn't know any of the stars reliably, not from this angle, maps were hard to conceptualize when you were traveling through them. But the brightest one wasn't Polaris, that much she knew. She didn't have her phone with its convenient star map, but it had struck her, the last time she'd looked at it in detail, that the northern star, what Earth sailors and navigators had tracked by for centuries, the brightest star in the sky, no longer mattered here.
She wondered if it would care.
She wasn't really crying any more; there was something calming about being here. She wasn't angry, either-- and she'd been so angry, knowing Kamina was right. She knew singing was a part of her, no matter why she had started. But if singing was singing for those thousands, what was she? What had she wanted from them?
What did she want from Kamina?
The first was easy. She'd never wanted much from her fans, except that they listen to her sing. The more fans she had, the more she could sing, the greater things she could do with singing. Were fans and singing separate? Were a career and singing separate?
Maybe the second was easier. She stretched her hand up to the sky, into that now-familiar plane gesture Alto was always making, framing the star between her fingers. It didn't feel as silly as it should have.
Kamina had grown up not knowing the sky, so she'd shown him hers. By comparison, he had the much more difficult task of worrying about her, of taking care of her this past week-- and she had let him. It was really the worst sort of time to realize that you loved someone, when you were leaning on them so heavily that you kept erratically drawing back for fear they would crack. She didn't want that sort of relationship, not in general, but right now she was welcoming it, and fighting herself the whole way.
She didn't have a way to process that, to come to terms with herself, not if she was giving up singing.
And yet--
And yet--
Not five minutes later it had become too much to ignore, and she had vaulted herself over the fence, kicking off her shoes as she ran barefoot towards the water, falling on her knees where the sand was wet from the tide the river had this close to the sea.
After all, she hadn't brought any paper with her.
tatakau you ni koishita
hitasura ni yume wo hotta
sono hoshi ni oritakatta
kimi no sora tobitakatta
shukumei ni yobimodosareta hokkyokusei ga naiteru
She sat back on her heels, hands wet with sand. Five lines, written in sweeping characters, smudged in places where the sand didn't lend itself to detail-- but now that she'd written them, she'd remember them.
She didn't have a tune, she didn't have the rest of the lyrics, but she had a song.