Attachments (Tronnor AU)

Adversity

noun

       • trouble, misery, misfortune. 

adjective - adverse

       • hostile; contrary or opposite; unfavourable. 

"Seventeen?" Connor repeats, whistling as he raises his eyebrows and rocks back on his heels. Troye flutters his fingers over the tattered keys of the piano, drawing out the moments before he responds with the gentle sound of Goldberg Variations, Bach's revered composition coming as easily to him as breathing in the crisp morning air. A woman passing by drops a toonie into the empty coffee cup at their feet, smiling warmly as she grasps her daughter's hand. Troye doesn't bother looking up from the music he's been playing on and off for nearly two hours now, all the while chatting amiably with his near constant companion of the past week.

"Is that surprising?" he replies absently after another two bars, snagging on a repeat he doesn't feel like replaying. He switches to an acoustic attempt at the song that's just finished flowing from a nearby store's outside speakers.

Connor's voice is quick, rising over the muted hums of mezzo-forte keyboard echoing gently through the relatively busy square. "No, not at all. I mean, yeah, but no. I'm just surprised you can play like that and still be in high school, is all."

Troye frowns. "I'm not in high school."

Connor's expression lights up as brilliantly as a Christmas tree, so pleasantly surprised that Troye almost feels bad for him. "So you skipped a grade? Or finished early? That's so cool, I didn't know we had that in common, too."

Troye wants to laugh, feels it bubbling vicious and vindictive up his throat, fire flicking against a surface so flammable he's surprised he hasn't combusted already. The four feet between them is a mirrored chasm reflecting back their differences, pinpointing every contrast with saturated sunlight and pinpricks of polarity.

Connor doesn't know the world the way Troye does, doesn't know the meaning of abandonment or abuse. Connor sees life in shades of brilliant neon, bright lights flashing as welcome signs, where Troye knows black hues best and the faded white of warning signs.

Connor is all miracles and optimism and the naive belief that loves comes easily to all and Troye suddenly feels like the night sky trying hard to block out his brightly burning sun. Troye knows adversity in every line scratched across his palms, every callous on his fingers and silver stitch on his skin. He knows misfortune and malaise better than he knows the name he was given at two years old.

Part of him resents the man in front of him for his fortune. Part of him knows it's not Connor's fault.

"I didn't," he comments softly when the silence stretches briefly too long. "I didn't finish school early or skip a grade. I just never went in the first place."

He tries not to feel a little vindictively satisfied when Connor's face falls like maybe he's beginning to take note of the darker shades in life. It almost works.