#omgsfshbsjbfs

[sleepypaladiknight]

OK FIC IDEA:

that one au where you can hear your soulmate singing out loud in your head- but leopika

leorio wasn’t much of a singer as a child- the impoverished corner of the world he lived in didn’t have much music to sing to, either. the closest he’s got were the staticky, muffled and clipped tunes that rattled out of the neighbor’s radio. that’s why he’s always preferred listening- listening to his soulmate’s songs.

it was in a language he didn’t understand, but it was the clearest, sweetest music he’s ever heard. he memorized those humble tunes and lullabies, tracing the foreign syllables over and over with his tongue and humming the melodies nobody but him and his soulmate knew. he carved his soulmate’s voice into his mind, bragging to Pietro about his melodic partner and how he couldn’t wait to meet him.

then one day they stopped.

he found it coincidental- that it was on the same day Pietro passed away from illness. but it was fitting- it was a day where all the music and life left him.

as years went on his hopes of hearing his soulmate’s comforting tune dwindled away, but the music and the tunes he cherished so much as a boy remained, even as he learned new songs to sing to in the world around him. he’d sing out as loudly as he could, the raunchiest and most irritatingly popular songs he knew on some days, hoping offhandedly to lure the music from his partner again and hear that kind, soft voice just one more time. it never worked.

so, he swore to never sing that song, that one soft melody, until he heard it from his soulmate themself.

then he met kurapika. a guy who didn’t sing at all, and whose expression alone sang out his melancholies. his voice was prim and strict, the annoying, uppity kind that made Leorio’s blood boil, but it was familiar.

in the confines of trick tower, the topic began to stray.

“your soulmate must love your singing.” he teased.

the blond seemed to hesitate, and didn’t meet his eye. “i don’t care about soulmates.” kurapika’s voice sounded almost sad. “it would be for the better if mine never meets me at all.”

“yeesh, that’s real positive of you.”

“and what about you?” he said almost accusingly. “what do you think of your soulmate?”

“i don’t care about my soulmate, either,” he bit out, “but it’s for a good reason. mine stopped singing to me.”

“they must have their reasons.”

“which are probably as pompous and bratty as you!”

then they were back to their usual bickering. life went on, and his ambitions neared with every step of the journey he completed. their little group parted ways to chase after their own interests and dreams, and for around a year, leorio never saw one of them face to face.

then kurapika showed up on a cloudy evening, after billions and gazillions of ignored calls and texts left on delivered. they exchanged apologies and grievances and angers, embraced each other and shared glances that lasted a few seconds too long as they talked.

for some reason, kurapika had a strained look on his face when leorio began to sing the lyrics to some queen song. he wouldn’t even look at him, but leorio shrugged it off as usual angsty behavior.

they found themselves on the rickety balcony of leorio’s cheap apartment, looking out over the city.

“so, still given up on your soulmate?”

kurapika said nothing.

“well, me too, i guess.” he sighed out. “i lied to you- back at the exam when i told you i didn’t care about my soulmate. i,” he laughed, a bittersweet sound, “i actually cared a lot. it just felt easier to deny it. it’s... pretty damn hard facing the idea that maybe my soulmate really doesn’t care anymore, doesn’t want to meet me. maybe they’re gone. maybe they hate my voice or something- from what i remember, they were a hella good singer. nice, bright voice and everything. maybe they didn’t wanna end up with someone musically talentless like me. maybe that one time i sang ‘call me maybe’ in the shower was the last straw.”

and to his delight, it drew a soft chuckle from the blonde leaning against the railing next to him, arms brushing and shoulders touching. his hair looked like silver in the moonlight. still, kurapika didn’t reply.

so leorio forged on.

“i, uh, already told you my soulmate stopped singing. like, completely. but i still remember the songs they used to sing. they were a huge comfort to me when i was little, when things were hard and a little bit of song was something people couldn’t even afford. i didn’t even know what the words mean, still don’t, but all i know is that they meant the world to me.” leorio glanced at kurapika with a sheepish smile. “wanna hear? so maybe you can hunt down the bastard that left me hanging?”

“sure.” his voice was scratchy, almost pained.

and leorio began gently. kindly. he was sure his accent was off- it didn’t roll off his tongue as fluently as it did for his soulmate all those years ago. but the sounds and the tune was the same- the one that he’s devotedly committed to memory, the one that he hastily wrote down on a piece of binder paper as a reminder of the comfort his soulmate used to bring, the one that he swore to never forget- it was his soulmate’s last song.

when he tapered off into absentminded humming, he realized kurapika was crying. his eyes were blown wide, flecks of magenta shimmering across the deep, scarlet hue of his irises. tears rolled down his soft, pale cheeks, glinting like diamonds in the moon’s embrace, falling on a dampened shirt that clasped trembling shoulders. leorio felt clumsy and dumb, trying to soothe kurapika, asking him what was wrong, if he was okay- then kurapika began to choke out words, rubbing away at his eyes with his arms.

“how do you know that song.” it wasn’t a question, it was a demand.

“i already told you, my soul-“

“no. you don’t understand. it’s a very personal song. a traditional song.” kurapika teared up again, liquid sadness welling up in his eyes. “it’s a song- a lullaby- that i’ve forgotten for the longest time. it’s my mother’s.”

leorio gaped, “your mom was my soulmate?!”

“no, you idiot!” Kurapika couldn’t help but laugh through his tears, beating a fist against leorio’s chest. they burst into a fit of laughter, boisterously cackling in the silence of the night, overpowering the honking cars in the streets below and the sound of their worries adrift in their heads. nothing but them existed.

kurapika’s hand remained there, on leorio’s chest, starting to clench at the fabric of his dress shirt. they were silent, for seconds, minutes, maybe hours, until Leorio’s hand drifted up to meet it, brushing gently against the soft, scarred skin of Kurapika’s slender fingers.

“i’m sorry.” kurapika whispered softly, barely above his breath. “i wasn’t fair to you. you were always trying, always singing to me.”

leorio couldn’t speak.

“i’ve been hearing your voice for years now. you and your- your stupid songs-“ he laughed out, but it sounded more like a choked sob.

leorio couldn’t breathe.

“i didn’t mean to make you lose hope. but i was hoping you would, so you wouldn’t chase after someone like me.”

leorio couldn’t think.

kurapika was leaning closer, voice growing quieter and quieter until they had to be inches apart to hear, to exchange words.

“i couldn‘t bring myself to sing. i didn’t have a reason to, not anymore. not after what happened to my clan. i noticed you stopped singing for a time, too. but it only took months before you began again, gaining more momentum with every song. i envied you and your strength.”

kurapika had started to shake, small frame shuddering against leorio’s. without thinking, he brought his other hand up to thumb away a tear that had begun trickling down kurapika’s face.

“i wanted to sing to you too, but all the songs i wished to teach you had disappeared from my memory. i was so preoccupied with my goals, that i... i began to forget the things that mattered more. what the faces of my family and my old friends looked like. what the lukso sunlight felt like on my skin, or how the grass felt underneath my feet. what the croons of a happy piko bird sounded like, or how beautifully blue the sky was on a sunny day. what my mother’s voice sounded like, what the words to her songs were, i, i-” kurapika sobbed, “i betrayed myself and my entire clan. i thought i had truly lost them and the part of myself that i swore i wouldn’t let die.”

their foreheads fell together, touching reassuringly. kurapika’s eyes fluttered closed as he spoke, body rendered as fragile as his voice, his feelings, his heart. leorio held each with careful, treasuring hands.

”i’d become a monster. a stranger in the same body i walked my home with. i thought- i thought that my soulmate didn’t deserve someone like that. someone like me.” he heaved out, chest shuddering with every quiet breath, “you don’t deserve someone like me, and i could never-“

and leorio shut that bullshit up with his lips.

they slotted together perfectly. call him disgustingly cheesy, sappy, any romantically insulting insult you could throw- but it felt like harmony. it felt so beautiful, his emotions crescendoing and his heart thrumming mercilessly in his chest as it fitted against kurapika’s. those soft, slightly chapped lips, damp from the tears that had trickled past them, felt perfect on his, like his lips were made to meet them. and just as easily as he had lost the music and life all those years ago, it was returned to him, in the form of a blond, pressed up against him and demanding for more, more, more with his mouth, hands all over his shoulders, fingers tangled in hair, breathing in each other, kissing like it was the very last thing they could do.

when they parted, leorio let himself get intoxicated by the sound of kurapika’s panting, drunk on the soft sounds that spilled past his lips like music.

”cut- cut the crap,” he breathed out, pulling kurapika closer by the waist and burying his head in his head of gold. ”for the rest of my life, stop talking. and start singing.”