tampered | ( open )

Entry tags:

( open )

When: September 2-3rd, daytime.
Rating: G.
Characters: Spock (

logistical) & OPEN.
Summary: Someone has acquired a lute and is playing.
Notes: Wrote in [action] but prose is also welcome.
Log:

[ Spock hasn't yet installed a door to cover that "magnificent hole in the wall" (as Jim has dubbed it. McCoy was far more less forgiving), and claims it is due to lack of sufficient currency. That is true - he prefers to save rather than spend right away - but he is getting quite comfortable simply being a busybody and listening to the goings-on of the other apartment. The transition was inevitable and he shouldn't be putting it off, but the displacement to the City, even with the crew, had not been easy. He found living in a metropolitan area constricting considering he had spent the majority of the past few years on board a spaceship, where they could leave at a moment's notice. He'd have taken the expanse of Vulcan's deserts over this in a heartbeat, and not for purely sentimental reasons. ]

[ However, there's no longer a home except the Enterprise, no family save for her crew, and while he has made an attempt to make his residence presentable he has no intention of getting to know the City. Walks are limited to exercise - though he needed little - and his routine is strict, but offers little comfort or intellectual stimulation. ]

[ Even work is progressing frustratingly slowly. Unlike Jim, who finds other outlets for the restless energy, Spock diverts his into more projects. He would read, but since Khan was at the library, Spock avoids it as much as he can, and he occasionally skims the books Nyota has finished and placed on the shelf to be returned as soon as possible. ]

[ So one day, he quite spontaneously decides to find himself a lute. The exact object wouldn't be present in the City, but there was wood, and strings, he could make do. When he's satisfied, he sits in the middle of the living room, and begins to play. ]

[ Maybe you are visiting. Maybe you are walking by, or coming home and wondering what the music is. Or maybe you are an angry neighbour who wants to know when that racket can stop. In any case, the sound carries. ]

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[Even though she has a key to his apartment, Uhura rarely visits, preferring that he come to her where there's no hole in the wall and they're afforded some type of privacy that they can't get anywhere else. Today, though, things are a little different when she stops by, grocery bags in hand, and slides the key in the door, pausing when she hears faint harplike sounds through the door.

A turn of the lock and Uhura's slowly pushing the door open, not sure what she's expecting to see behind it. Spock's apartment is usually quiet, silent except for Jim's booming voice through the curtain or the turning of a page. She certainly doesn't expect a Vulcan in the living room with a lute. A particular lute that one would think it be impossible to find in this place.]

[He finishes the song (it's only polite, she's always enjoyed the music), and then looks up at her.]

Do you require assistance with the groceries?

[She shakes her head, closing the door behind her with a kick of her foot and makes her way over to him. A few moments pass before she begins speaking, giving respect to both the song and the man who played it.]

Where'd you get that?

I made it. Materials were not difficult to acquire.

[He holds it out, in case she wishes to take a closer look.]

[For someone who uses words the majority of her day, touch is just as important to Uhura and if there's a chance to explore things through feel, she's grabbing onto it. But before she takes the offered lute, she sets her bags down and rubs her hands against the legs of her jeans, not wanting to dirty Spock's handiwork in any way.]

It looks just like the one you have at home.

[There's a particular lilt of excitement in her voice as she talks and gently plucks the strings. It contrasts with the out of tune attempt at actually playing out a song, but it's obvious she's loving the fact there'll be familiar music in the house now. And that he now has something else to occupy his time.]

Are you taking requests? [And like it's gold or something much more precious, she hands back the instrument, cradled in both hands.]

[Her joy, as always, is infectious, and the care with with she treats anything of his elicits a smile. He sits still as she examines the lute and plucks its strings. This too, is familiar, the first time she heard him play, she had also examined the instrument. And then she'd offered to sing, which was new as well.]

[He doesn't intend to settle, but this is definitely home, of a kind.]

I am indeed. Do you have one in mind?

[She loves it when he smiles. It's so rare, even when he is happy and she can feel it through their connection. A smile from Spock means something, just like her treating any belonging of his with the utmost care. He doesn't get sentimental over many things, but he was missing his lute enough to make one. How could she not respect that?]

How about the first song I ever sang for you?

[The little ditty about an alien with devil's ears and devil's eyes.]

[It's a sentimental choice, but he's being sentimental now, isn't he? He can't say no to that, not to her joy at his own moments of happiness.]

A fine choice.

[And he starts to play, the tune as fresh in his mind as if it were the very first time all over again.]

[The nod of her head, matching the beat of the song, is automatic, almost as instinctive as her sitting down next to him and going from a hum of the melody to the actual lyrics.]

Oh, on the Starship Enterprise,
There's someone who's in Satan's guise,
Whose devil's ears and devil's eyes
Could rip your heart from you!

[ Holing up in his bedroom for the better part of the day as he works over problems with the new phaser-fire on his homemade PADD, at first Jim thinks that Leonard has left the radio on (Jesus, a radio, he can barely believe where they are sometimes until thoughts like that cross his mind) in the living room. It's not a disturbance but it is distracting, coaxing him out into the apartment proper on bare-feet, a thicker than usual scruff of blond and grey hairs on his jaw as he slides the PADD under an arm and stuffs his fingers in the pockets of jeans. When it becomes apparent that the noise is echoing in real-time, he curiously brushes the curtain between his and Spock's domain aside, briefly suffused with the memory of sharing a bathroom on the Enterprise and giving cursory knocks. He's silent now as he paces inside and finds his attention zoning in on Spock ... with a lute, almost Vulcan were it not for the fact it's obviously been rigged up with the same happenstance grit that Jim's PADD also owns; an approximation of the real thing, clever and unique in its variation.

The soothing, almost warm vibrations shiver harp-like through his skin and set the hairs on the nape of his neck on end, leaning back against the wall to watch strong fingers flutter across strings, their docility a counterpoint to the attentiveness of the player. It's beautiful, and a part of Jim that feels strangely alien aches with the knowledge the source of that music is gone. Even after all this time, unobtrusively letting the song wash over him, he can recall an old Vulcan's sorrow and longing for home, rekindled again like a stolen photograph in his grasp while immersed in the moment.

Blue eyes travel up from clever digits along bowing wrists, watching Spock's expression as he plays. It could hardly be called emotive by any passer-by, but Jim reads the empathy in his friend's dedication and decides not to interrupt. His shoulders slide down the wall after a minute spent dutifully silent as a one-man audience and it's there behind bent knees that the blue lights of his PADD glimmer back to life, content to work in the wake of Spock's artful harmonies. ]

[Spock didn't hear him, which is unusual.]

[He puts it down to simply being out when Jim had returned to the flat, but he'd even been so quiet in the bedroom that Spock wonders what he might've been up to, in there. He'd talked a mile a minute faster than the usual since getting out of that dome, as if to make up for lost time.]

[Jim pokes his head through the curtain, and Spock doesn't look at him. He is meticulously playing, fingers plucking on makeshift strings, part of him always wondering if the instrument he's built is as durable as the one he has back home, aboard the ship.]

[He has no time to ponder extensively. The music is... enough, as is the companionship. Once he finishes playing, he does a few quick breathing exercises, before turning his attention to Jim.]

I am not disturbing you?

[ He looks up from his PADD when the music draws to a close, waiting until he's addressed before shaking his head and replying. ]

I liked it. Can you play it again, or something else?

Perhaps something else.

[A pause.]

Previous audiences [one person is an audience ok] have made requests.

I want to hear what you want to play.

[ Simple as, really. That and the fact he hasn't got a clue what he'd ask him to perform. ]

Mind if I stay parked here?

You may remain.

[Equivalent to a plea for company, but it is not fitting of him to request someone's presence unless he's under great emotional strain. This is.. a way of getting around it.]

[And with that, he begins another piece, faster, more lively, than the previous one. He's determined that the strings can handle it, and he feels like pushing the instrument a little, to deliver its best for his listener.]

[ He doesn't get much progress done on his work while he sits in as the audience, smiling to himself as he sways his knees to the jaunty tune. There's an insistence to Spock's playing which demands all of Jim's attention, and eventually he lays the PADD at his side and folds his arms as he slouches, head tilted to listen. ]

Did you make that here yourself? [ — asked once the piece draws to a close. ]

[In turn, Spock maintains his satisfied expression - content. He pays attention to Jim's body language, noting the cues. It has taken a while, but he catalogues them, each reaction is specific. He knows what they mean, but he has yet to fully understand what inspires them.]

[He lowers the instrument slightly.]

Yes. The local music shops did not have one.

[ He feels the same sense of general well-being, even in their silences which aren't at all strained. It's nice not having to talk at a mile a minute or fight to put a point across, even more rewarding when it's halfway picked up on before a sentence is finished. Jim is willing to bet Spock might not expect what he suggests next, though. ]

If I find a guitar sometime, do you want to see if we can put something together? I'd re-learn the chords, I don't really remember them now but I once messed around in a bar where I got to play. Could pick them up for you.

[ It would probably be a disaster for a while. ]

[Jim is right. Spock looks momentarily confused, not expecting the request. It seems... mundane. Pointless. Sentimental.]

I am acquainted with this instrument. I would be happy to instruct you.

[Things he misses: being an teacher. He was an intimidating one, that was for certain, but Jim was fearless, and Jim could take it.]

[ His smile broadens for a moment — of course Spock moonwalks over every stringed instrument known to their respective cultures. That's what Jim's going to choose to believe from now on, anyway. ]

Happy, huh? Alright, that'll work. [ He waves a hand and settles back, chin tipped up. ] Play me another song? Three time's a charm.

[In reply, he picks up the lute again, and this time, plays a slow song. It is inappropriate for the situation - it seems that way, the notes are deep and mournful. It is sadness, and longing, but the kind one can wrap up, put in a box, and keep safe until it can be taken away, like clouds covering the sun.]

[ That isn't a song that gets his feet tapping, instead rooting him to the spot with each sound that sinks through his skin to hold in the marrow of his bones. It makes him aware of each breath, of not to be too loud or break the woefully woven spell of the notes in case they end prematurely, like sitting alone at a window once the other person in an old house is finally asleep and feeling completely content to watch a horizon of distant stars over miles of endless fields. It sounds like wanting to bridge a distance.

Without taking his eyes off him, Jim paces over to perch on the arm-rest just to be that much closer, arms folded as he observes and lets the fresher notes find him with far greater ease, as he likes to think they want to. ]

[Sadness, Spock thinks, is a lot like walking on a planet with different gravity. Sometimes it is heavy, and every step takes more effort, other times it is light, barely present, but provides no solid anchor. It simply is.]

[He has learnt to let go. Anger is the only emotion he cannot yet quell, but grief has been there long enough for him to compartmentalise and understand. To lock the box away, and keep the key within reach.]

[Jim's presence is steadying. Spock wonders if he sings.]

[ Right up until the song ends he sits perched on the arm-rest attentively, his gaze swinging between Spock's artistic fingers and the middle-distance as his thoughts inevitably wander. The close of the piece earns a round of hollow applause in the large room, no less enthusiastic as Jim beams down and claps him lightly on the shoulder right after. ]

That was wonderful. How often do you have to practice to get that good?

Frequently.

[He's pleased at the praise. This is not a part of himself he shares with others, and for someone as perceptive as Jim even the choice of song can be extremely telling.]

I have not had the opportunity, recently.

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