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moonshine-nightlight · 2 years

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Free Piano: Haunted - Part 1

When you drive by the piano on the way home from a job across town, you almost don’t stop. But your kid’s been wanting to learn how to play—a desire that’s stuck around for the last few months, a rarity—and this one’s free. It needs some TLC and while you’ve no experience with instruments, you’re good with your hands. On impulse, you pull over. Soon enough, you’re loading the free piano into the back of your truck. You barely give a passing thought to the “haunted” part of the sign.

Perhaps you should have.

Inspiration post: Haunted Free Piano Pic

Modern, enemies to friends to lovers, ghosts/spirits/specters, male monster x male reader, M/M, Part 1 of 8

Part One [Part Two]

You’re on your way home from a job across town when you see it.

You’re waiting at a busy all-way stop-sign intersection, counting your turn, when you see something big and wood on the side of the road. While people occasionally leave old or unwanted furniture out on the side of the road for either the garbage collectors, or anyone really, to take–it's not often.

The first time you ever actually stopped for one of these was with your grandpa, who was driving you home after baseball practice. He’d decided not to take the chair home that time—he said never take anything with upholstery because who knows what sort of bugs or vermin could be in it—but you two had stopped a few times after that.

You’d helped him take home an old record player cabinet, once. He’d even let you stick around while he fixed it up–the first time you’d ever done any work like that in your life. Even though all he had you do was hold things for him for the most part, it had earned his trust in your abilities, leading to a few other projects he’d drafted you for. It was the only project you’d gotten to work on with your gran, she was the one who knew how to restore the record player to functioning.

You still had it in fact, now that you had their house. Your parents hadn’t expected to inherit it, hadn’t really known what to do with it, but well, then came your divorce. It had made you feel like you belonged, that you weren’t just sneaking into their house–reminded you that you had contributed to the house with them. You’d still felt like a trespasser those first few weeks, there without Grandpa, but looking at the record player cabinet, and other spots you’d helped with at Grandpa’s side, helped ease that feeling.

You carried on with the habit, picking up an old TV stand for your college apartment with some buddies and a nightstand for your first apartment after that—easier to come by in the city you were living in at the time.

You pull yourself from your memories when your turn comes and on impulse, you go right instead of going straight. You’re just curious enough to want to take a closer look and it’s not like you have anywhere to be.

When you get close enough to pass by it, you’re surprised to see it's not furniture—it's a piano. Before you realize it, you’ve pulled into a driveway and turned around, coming up behind it on the correct side of the street. You don’t play, but your kid’s been wanting to learn. You’ve been considering getting an electronic keyboard, but they’ve never sounded right to your ear. Besides, while not as bad as a real one, any good instrument is expensive.

This one is free.

Well, you think as you hop down from your pickup to take a closer look, it doesn’t look like it's in great shape. The wood’s beat up and covered with what looks like water stains, discoloring and mildly warping the finish. But it's got a matching little bench, with a beat up, damaged design of what you think are supposed to be flowers or vines of some kind.

And then there’s the sign.

Ductaped together and to the piano itself is what looks like the side of a cardboard box with a piece of printer paper taped on top that in big, but neat print says “Priceless Antique”. Under that is another panel with very dark, large block letters merely saying “FREE”. Finally, under that is a third pane, looking even more hastily tacked on than the first two parts, stating “HAUNTED” in the same print as “FREE” but this word is underlined-twice. You appreciate the contradiction of “priceless” and “free”. The ‘haunted’ part causes you to raise an eyebrow: why would someone trying to get rid of something purposely label it haunted?

Restoration on this, even just the wood, will probably cost a fair amount—let alone any sort of specialist, mechanical restoration it’ll need.

But you’re a contractor by trade, which means you at least have access to more tools and supplies than most and you know the right people to ask for help—hell, isn’t there a youtube video for everything these days anyways? It's probably still cheaper than buying one.

You carefully flip up the lid to reveal the keys. They seem in better condition than the wood, only one or two looks damaged. You press a finger down on what you think is middle “C”. The note that rings out is clear and at the right volume, at least to your untrained ear. You don’t want to mess with it too much here on the street, but you hit two more keys at random, above and below, and they sound good enough—nothing obviously discordant or muted thuds from a hammer hitting wood instead of string.

You turn towards the house. No one’s come out to yell at you for messing with it, still… You shut the lid and reluctantly make your way over the house’s front door. It’s probably best to at least ring the bell and check with the current owners.

The bell rings louder than you expect and you’re already regretting deciding to voluntarily talk to strangers. You stand still, resisting the urge to fidget, until you start to think it's been long enough that you can just walk away when you hear footsteps from inside the house.

“Hi, sorry to bother you,” you say to the harried looking brunette a decade or so older than yourself who opens the door. “I just wanted to ask you about the piano?” You jerk your thumb over your shoulder in case she’s unaware of the free piano in her own yard. You’re glad when recognition blooms in her eyes before you can feel too silly for the gesture.

“Oh! Really? Great,” she says, sounding relieved.

“It’s still available, yeah?” You didn’t want for someone to have already claimed it, but just not gotten around to moving it. No way did you want someone to accuse you of theft of their free item. Not again.

However, the woman just nods. “Yeah, definitely. You can take it. We’re moving to another state and there’s just not enough room. Besides, none of us can play it—my mother-in-law used to, but the arthritis means that's not a good idea anymore.”

“What sort of condition is it in?” You don’t know how much that’ll change your mind, but it can’t hurt to ask. A quick question with the owner can save time down the road—like if a drawer is locked and the key lost or where it was purchased from or what they’ve used on it before. Any extra info is helpful with these types of things.

She frowns a little and you can’t tell if it's because you’re bothering to ask when it's literally free or because she’s trying to remember. “It got a bit damaged when the roof leaked a few years ago, but we made sure that the strings were alright—no rust or anything. I think it needs a tune and doesn’t look the prettiest, but,” she shrugs, “that’s why we’re just giving it away.”

“This the mover?” an older woman asks, her short white hair falling back from her face as she straightens from a bit of a stoop. She moves to stand in the doorway, the tennis balls on the four feet of her cane keeping her steady as she looks you over.

“No, but they might be taking that piano off our hands,” the woman replies, a bit of a warning in her tone.

The grandmother’s eyes sharpen as she stares at you. “Are they now?” She looks past you and spies it on the side of the road. Her eyes go a bit hard when they narrow back on the woman. “Did you just drop it on the side of the road?”

“Mike was careful when he put it out,” she retorts defensively. “And no matter what you think, no one’s gonna pay money for it. Even this guy’s asking questions, despite it being free—no offense.”

You smile, glad you have practice with acting like everything is fine while family members get passive-aggressive. “None taken.” You wish you hadn’t bothered to knock.

“Do you play?” the older woman asks while her daughter-in-law squints passed you at the sign taped to the piano, as if just noticing how long it is.

You shake your head. “No, but my kid’s been wanting to learn.”

She gives you a measuring look before nodding slowly. “It’s a good one for a beginner, given they’re polite.”

You frown, opening your mouth to ask what that means when the daughter-in-law cuts off whatever you were going to say with a muttered curse. Turning, she yells back into the house, “Emma! What did I say about messing with the sign on the piano!?”

“What?” a faint but defensive voice comes from deeper in the house. “Gotta warn the people!”

You can’t help but smirk at the joke. That sign makes a lot more sense if they made the teenager write it.

The daughter-in-law turns to point a finger at the now smirking grandmother. “This is your fault for encouraging her.” She turns back to you with a brittle smile, “Look, take or don’t. I’ve gotta finish packing this whole house and if you don’t want it, garbage will collect it Monday.” With that said, she walks off into the house.

You turn to the grandmother and raise an eyebrow. She raises one back. “You’re the one who stopped. I’ve had that piano for many years, my brother played it too. It’s been around since my parents’ got it. If you think you can spruce it up and have your child play it, please do. If not,” she shrugs, “I’m sure someone else will take it. A piano like that won’t end up in the trash.”

Before you can reply, there’s an indistinct shout from inside and she sighs. “I better go help. Be a dear and shut the door. Have a good day.”

“You too,” you reply as you obligingly close their door and head back to the piano.

You walk around it, and even take a look under it—mostly looking for anything like big holes or something—before you just sort of stare at it. Are you really doing this? What makes you think you can do fix it up? That it won’t still be too much money. That by the time you fix it, Kit won’t have moved on to some other interest. Even optimistically, you can’t finish this by his birthday—it’ll have to be for the winter holidays in a few months.

Will it fit in your shed? Will you be able to move it around without breaking it?

You shake your head, scowling as you try to banish all your second guessing. It’s free, it's right here. If you take it home and figure out after some research it’s too expensive or impossible for someone not a professional, you can throw it out yourself.

No harm in doing that much, right?

Decision made, you hop into your truck bed, moving things around until you’ve got enough space for it. It’ll be good for you to have a project again, you think. Now that the house is more or less fixed up, you’ve been finding the evenings on the days you didn’t have Kit too empty. You always feel better when you’ve got something to occupy your mind as well as your hands.

The space made, you frown as you try to get a feel for its weight. Just as you’re trying to decide the best way to move it yourself, a man comes jogging out of the house. “Hey!” he says as he raises a hand in greeting. “My mom says you’re gonna help take this off our hands—least I can do is chip in to get it into your truck.”

“Thanks,” you reply as you reassess how to do this with another person to help, “that’d be great.” What did the woman say her husband’s name was? Mike? Regardless, he’s taller than you and seems fit enough so with two people…

“You mind if we do the piano first? We can always squeeze the bench in wherever,” you say, glancing at the other man to see if he wants to take over the job of moving it or if he’s willing to go along with you. Frequently, when you go to work on a project, the man of the house wants to show he knows what he’s doing, that he’s only hiring someone like you because he doesn’t have the time to bother. Those types never seem to have a clue and are more trouble than they're worth.

Luckily, Mike just smiles broadly, “Sure, makes sense to me. I swear I’ve moved more furniture in the last month—even though we’re not taking much with us—than I have in my whole life before this.”

“I bet, moving’s never easy,” you reply generically, correctly guessing that Mike doesn’t need much from you to continue talking about the move, where they’re going, and why. All you need to do is grunt every once in while to show your listening and he fills the silence, which honestly is your preference—you’ve never been much of a talker.

You pick up your side, noting the wood feels noticeably cold, odd given it's been sitting out all day in the sun, but it feels solid enough that you focus on that instead. You’re more than willing to listen as Mike helps you drape a tarp over it, secure it down with bungee cords, hold things out of the way while you get everything all settled.

The only time he falters is when he gets a good look at the sign stuck to it. “What the…?” You see him mouth the word ‘haunted’ as he pales. Quickly, he reaches out and pulls the sign free, folding it up and then tossing it near the other trash they have out. “Kids,” he says vaguely when he sees you looking at him. “Always joking around.”

“Right,” you reply, not sure what else to say. You shrug and turn to check that it's not blocking too much of your rear mirror. Then you make sure everything else in the truck bed is secure before you gesture that Mike can jump down.

You follow, squinting in the sudden burst of wind that blows dust and dirt into your face. Once you blink your vision clear, you give the other man a nod. “Thanks for your help.”

“No problem,” Mike replies, hands in his pockets, staring up at the piano. “Sad to see it go, but it’s not like anyone was playing it here. Good luck.”

“Thanks,” you say and after a moment of silence, head around to go. “Bye.”

“Bye,” Mike replies.

As you drive away, you see him by the trash bins, breaking down the cardboard sign surprisingly thoroughly before stuffing it under the lid.

Your eyes flick to your new, free piano. Possibly haunted? You roll your eyes as you focus back on the road. Nah, the only scary thing is how much effort (and money) it's gonna take to get this thing up and running again.

Well, you’ve got plenty of time for it at least.

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