Chapter Text
For as long as he can remember, Aphelios has been a musical prodigy, although his parents rigorous and demanding education included much more than just musical training, the boy couldn’t help but be attracted by different musical instruments, showing great affinity with several of them, not to mention that it didn’t take long for his voice to impress the educators who insisted on the boy's potential when they had talks with his parents, since they didn’t have very good opinions about encouraging this area of knowledge to their son.
Alune had always accompanied and supported him, although music wasn’t her thing, she was always a big fan of many bands growing up listening to them with her brother. Alune was very aware that their parents didn’t approve of his brother devoting so much time to music but since his grades didn’t show a decrease in quality they didn’t bother to forbid him too much. Aphelios learned to play the piano, guitar and violin, a short time later he began to compose and use digital tools for his music, but he didn’t realize the small detail that Alune did notice, his brother's voice.
Secretly, both of them met continuously after classes in the music hall to enjoy the composition of different songs, Alune always insisted that he should publish his work on some social network or gain some money for them but Aphelios always refused, he insisted that this was something more personal for him, his safe place, he didn’t like the idea of other people listening or commenting about his music, although his denials didn’t make his sister stop insisting, she constantly launched that suggestion, sometimes more direct or bold than others. Aphelios refused, every single time.
The years passed and the twins were in their last year close to their graduation, both being young adults, as always, they had already talked on multiple occasions previously about what they were going to do in the future, which university they would choose. Alune never had problems with the academic demands that her parents had on her and her tastes in biochemistry added to management was only a greater incentive for their parent’s compliments since she received offers from good universities in the scientific area.
Aphelios was another story, he was determined to study something related to music and didn’t expect the approval of their parents, Alune knew it perfectly and promised to always be covering her brother's back. Y ou know I'm here for you Aphelios . She whispered in a kind way, holding her brother's slightly trembling hands, giving him a warm smile to calm his nerves. No matter how determined the boy was he didn’t take away the fact that their parents were a little scary.
They wanted so badly that everything would turn out well with them, but not everything can turn out as one wants to. Aphelios never found a good situation to talk to his parents and when he tried to subtly introduce the topic during meals and meetings, both of them would cut communication or change the subject in a blatant way, they showed no intention of discussing the situation which began to frustrate the boy over time, the days were continuing and at some point he had to look for the university he wanted, he couldn't lie about that.
He was more than willing to apply for a career in the area of musical arts, he practiced secretly hard day and night, he was convinced of one thing, he would achieve his goal even if his parents didn’t agree when the time came to tell them.
That was until that day came.
Alune and Aphelios always felt they’d been on their own, supporting each other without their parents' care or warmth but now it was going to be more literal than ever.
That night changed everything and left Aphelios with no time or possibility to tell his parents in the right way. The night was infested with large and imposing gray clouds in the sky, the rumbling of thunder and lightning didn’t take long to show up while strong rain fell heavily over the entire city.
"I told you we should’ve come back early today. I told you so!" Alune was complaining while hugging herself shivering with cold, she looked sideways at her brother who in the same position sighed frustrated averting his gaze, he had no argument, he was stubborn and now they were at school outside school hours, trapped by the guard for discovering them in the music room. Of course their parents must have loved that call from the principal.
"I already… told you. I’m sor-" Aphelios coughed without being able to finish the sentence, Alune far from pitying him, only increased her anger and proceeded to hit him on the arm.
"Besides, we shouldn't even have come today in the first place." she sighed, reflecting more her concern looking at her brother. "You haven't spoken to Mom and Dad for days because you've been feeling sick. It's not just a cold if it's so hard to heal. Look at you! It's a little colder and you can barely speak well anymore. Why do you have to be so stubborn?!"
Aphelios stood in silence, fixing his gaze on his own feet. She was right, there has been weeks since he started feeling sick and sore on his throat but he couldn’t practice music on the house at the afternoons and he really wanted to spend more time in the music room.
"You stayed with me anyway." Aphelios whispered with a shy smile.
"I wasn't going to leave you alone." Alune replied almost instinctively without ceasing to stare at her brother accusingly.
Aphelios heaved a heavy sigh hiding his face a little in his arms, swallowing some saliva with a little discomfort in his throat, he had been feeling bad for days and didn’t seem to improve much, he tried not to show it in his attitude but it didn’t go unnoticed by his sister, even so, he didn’t want to rest from his essays, prisoner of stress since there was not much left for the university entrance exams process.
"I'm sorry." Aphelios muttered a little ashamed of his behavior, dragging his sister directly into a discussion with his parents.
As expected, soon after a car arrived to pick them up, to their unpleasant surprise, that day their parents' schedules coincide so that both could pick them up after the wake-up call from the school management. The twins got into the backseat of the car and the screams didn't take long to appear.
Both Aphelios and Alune had the belt adjusted and clung to it due to the anxiety, sinking into the back seat of the car while listening to the monologue of screams and negative questions about the twins' behavior. The argument started to escalate in tone while their father continued driving trying not to take his eyes off the front as the glass was constantly getting wet and fogging due to the strong storm surrounding them.
The discussion had frustrated Aphelios with anger, he felt that his parents would never be willing to listen to him, much less would they try to understand him. He knew it wasn't going to work. He completely eliminated the idea of sharing his life plans with them. That's what he was thinking while watching them yell at him from the front seats. The twins’ parents, receiving no answers from their son and only angry looks, started to lose patience. Those silent snappy looks began to provoke their mother to increase the accusatory and furious tone towards him.
The woman took off her seat belt to be able to stretch out more towards the back seat trying to reach her son. Aphelios sank into the back seat, fearing a reaction of physical violence, although it was not usual, their mother's strong hand could hurt if she just thought about it. I did hurt those times in the past. He continued to move as far away from his mother as possible without allowing her to reach him.
His sister stretched to him trying to cover him from their mother joining the discussion in order to protect her brother. The screams could be heard even outside the car and their father, who could barely concentrate on the road, began to get distracted more than he should, turning to the back seats of the car, losing sight of the road for a couple of seconds.
One of those seconds was enough. Maybe not the first or second time he flipped, but it only took a split second for everything to change. The next thing the twins remember is the dazzling light flooding the car leaving everyone stunned. A truck hit the driver's side. The twins' family car was abruptly hit and thrown to the side of the street. It was only for a moment that their parents took off their belts and it couldn't have been a worse moment.
The impact happened too fast, terrified, Aphelios holds the belt over his body with the strength of both hands and closes his eyes stunned managing to see how a broken glass of the windshield reach his face managing to feel the small cut near his cheek and eyebrow. After that, only darkness, Aphelios can barely hear screams but feels too sore to open his eyes, his whole body is numb, Aphelios experiences fatigue like never before, feeling blood fall down his face and hands, struggling to keep his consciousness but ends up giving way, seeing for the last time the unconscious body of his sister with a bloody face and nose.
Everything seemed like a dream, a nightmare. He felt the reality slightly distorted, without distinguishing much between the feeling of reality and the feeling of dreams. When he became aware, a repetitive sound of a beeping next to a strong white light, received his awakening, sore all over his body.
Slowly, Aphelios began to open his eyes very heavily, even breathing felt difficult. When he managed to blink freely, he turned his face on the thin pillow, it didn't take long to realize that he was on a hospital bed. Under the gaze slightly petrified by the mental and emotional impact, it looked like a nightmare. A part of his heart began to beat with relief again when his gaze met her sister sleeping next to him, her body sitting on a thin chair and her torso settled on the bed by his left side. Alune was resting on her crossed arms, she had messy hair and hospital clothes, but she didn't seem to have major bandages or casts. Upon further analysis he was able to denote a couple of patches and bruises that stood out on her head and arms.
"A...lune?" Aphelios speaks with difficulty feeling a slight burning in his throat but he didn’t pay much attention to these discomforts, he wanted to talk to his sister first of all. Even though she was asleep, her brother's voice was more than enough to wake her up, as there was nothing else she would’ve been waiting for more than this.
"Brother!" Alune woke up abruptly sitting up in the chair watching her brother smile with difficulty, with tears in her eyes she took a deep breath to calm down, looking at her beloved twin, she knew that she wouldn’t be able to hug him yet, that would only be painful for his body. Very carefully, she took her brother’s hands watching him as he was slowly getting up trying to sit on the bed. "Let me arrange the pillows for you, it’ll be easier."
His sister was trying to keep her composure but it didn't take too long to start shedding a lot of tears. Before Aphelios could ask what was happening, a doctor who would answer all the boy's doubts showed up in the room, after a general check-up to see his condition he waited to hear his patient's worries. Aphelios had bruises and cuts all over his body, a bandage on his right arm and a patch on his forehead, but he was responding well to the treatment, out of danger, just like his sister or so he thought.
When he tried to speak his voice came out with difficulty, he finally managed to say what he wanted but the annoyance turned into pain easily by forcing himself to speak. Confused and scared he asked first about his voice as the doctor had not mentioned any wound in the throat or similar area within the accident consequences.
"I hadn't mentioned it yet but I was about to get to that part." the doctor proceeded to hand a mirror to Aphelios who received it with a little difficulty to squeeze his hand holding the light mirror. When he saw his tired and wounded reflection he sighed to himself, his reddish eyes showed dark circles, under the patch a small scar was denoted on his eyebrow. But more important than all that, something left him more shocked, tilting the mirror down, he could see a bandage over his throat.
"A piece of the car glass hurt your throat brother, they managed to take care of you but thanks to it they discovered that your vocal cords have been too damaged for a long time, the accident allowed them to find it." Alune explained in a simpler way to her brother, holding his hands watching as his face didn’t finish processing what he was told.
"We have an operation scheduled, we were waiting for you to wake up soon. We need to do that operation so that your condition doesn't end up completely deteriorating your throat Aphelios." the doctor continued explaining with the papers of Aphelios’ medical record in his hands, the mentioned one just looked directly at the doctor, as if he was really understanding what he was hearing but he could hardly process anything. "But your voice will not be the same again, your vocal range will be significantly decreased and it may take you a little bit to formulate the words at first but you will be able to recover with the treatment to speak just as fluently. We hope you and your sister will be able to sign the operation papers soon."
"What about our parents?" Aphelios blurted out the question when that fact presented itself in his mind, he was so focused on him and his sister that he had forgotten them for a moment but he didn't forget that they were also in the accident. "Where are they? ." he turns around watching his sister waiting to hear that they are in another hospital room or even better than them, as he saw his sister almost recovered.
The answer is nothing close to what he thought. Hearing the news of the death of his parents ended up proving that this was a nightmare. An awful one. Alune was sobbing, hugging her brother carefully trying to bring comfort to both while her brother was crying with confusion and sadness due to the abrupt end. The twins survived thanks to the fact that they were both wearing the belts in the accident, unlike their parents who had taken them off. The crash proved fatal for them, the father died at the time of the crash, he was the one closer to the initial impact while his mother had died on the way to the hospital in the ambulance, although they had tried to revive her, it was not possible.
They could never speak properly about his dreams, they had died without even being able to speak it clearly. They had died in the middle of an argument , Aphelios couldn’t feel more frustrated and sad, he just dedicated himself to hugging his sister and sobbing next to her.
The next few days seemed like a dream, an annoying and empty one. The emotions overwhelmed Aphelios who in moments of anguish carried his hand up to his throat feeling his neck, thinking that, in a few days, the last part that was left of his life would be taken away from him. Although he felt glad to at least have his sister with him, he knew that losing his voice would be another heavy blow to his spirit.
He wanted to scream so badly, he wanted to cry out but he didn't know how to convey all these emotions, he didn't want to take it out on her sister, they supported each other and she didn't want to allow himself to fall apart in front of her. So, he pleaded for just one small favor to her. One last favor.
He knew that these days his voice had regained its normal tone, even if it hurt to speak and much more to sing, he managed to do it, he wouldn’t manage to do it after the surgery so these last days were precious to him. Alune listened to his brother's request, he wanted to record one last song, the last recording of his original composition with his genuine voice, before losing that possibility forever.
Her sister got everything she needed thanks to relatives attentive to her requests due to the delicate situation of the twins. The silence of the empty room of that hospital was the only witness of the boy's song that night, Aphelios sang with all his spirit under the moonlight that came through the window, recording those beautiful acapella sounds.
Feeling every pain as he articulated the words but nothing was going to stop him from singing his last song.
Thanks to his sister, Aphelios had access to his personal laptop to work on that song, which occupied his mind quite a lot since he didn't like to think about how soon the surgery was coming nor the proper ceremony for their parents passing. Before he could realize it both his work on the song and the wait for the surgery were over.
By the time Aphelios woke up, his eyes instinctively filled with tears falling down his cheeks, now no voice came out of his lips louder than a whisper and the small scar on the lower part of his throat, constantly accused that reality.
° ° °
Thanks to the care and benefit of the twins' relatives, both were able to access studies and since they were both almost nineteen years old, they were allowed to live together in an apartment. They knew that the best thing for them now was to have each other. None of them talked much about the death of their parents, it has never been an easy topic to talk about even among themselves, although each one devotes certain thoughts to the small altars of their parents that are arranged in the living room of the twins' apartment.
At first Alune became completely attached to Aphelios, maybe even overprotecting him a little, after a year, her brother didn’t stop her in her desire to enroll in a university, after all her relatives would finance everything until they could fend for themselves after such a loss and trauma. Alune wanted her brother to advance as well and thought that continuing with his desires to study at university would help him improve his life, accept and move forward.
But Aphelios didn't want to, he had no intentions of enrolling to study music. Although he was still addicted to music with his headphones, he composed at his own time by his own taste and did not even let his sister listen to the mixes he created, besides he only worked digitally, barely and was encouraged to take an instrument other than the mixing keyboard.
Sometimes he felt doubts and wished to follow that path, enjoying the life of music but when his almost inaudible voice echoed in his mind, he remembered, because he didn't want to think about it. Two years later, everything stayed the same. Aphelios was, today like many days, looking at his phone while it was connected to his wireless earbuds, he balanced his body slightly on the side of the table with his abdomen and arms resting on it.
He hummed the song quietly while sliding the list of songs on the screen, until he saw the reflection of his sister on the phone screen which caused a small jump thanks to the fright she gave him, for a second he thought she was a ghost.
"Don't scare me like that…" Aphelios whispered looking accusingly at his sister turning his face towards her, she smiled amused as she approached her brother leaving a bowl of cereal with milk on the table, next to his.
Alune ate some cereal while watching her brother sit down properly and start having breakfast with her, leaving one of his ears free to listen to his sister, without putting a pause to the songs playing from the headphones.
"Sorry if I'm silent, I'm kind of lost in my thoughts." Alune commented moving the spoon inside the bowl of the cereal making little sounds, then she sighed looking at her brother who was raising an eyebrow curious about his discomfort.
'What happened? Are you having problems at college?' Aphelios was pointing with sign language by moving his fingers, making signs at a moderate speed while chewing and swallowing the cereals to continue taking out another spoonful.
Although Aphelios could speak properly even if it was in a low tone, there were many days when he felt discomfort with his own voice, other days he didn’t feel encouraged to speak or there were even days when his tone of voice was not loud enough to be heard in several places. He finally ended up using sign language that he learned after the surgery until his voice was better. With time even using his hand a lot more than his voice.
"Not exactly…" Alune began to explain herself while thinking about how to order the words. "Phel, you've done nothing but lock yourself in your room, listen to music and compose and yet you don't let anyone listen to it. I know that you don't like to be listened to heh." she laughed slightly a little nervous, before that Aphelios stopped eating slightly concentrating more on what his sister was talking about without understanding what she wanted to get to.
"Do you remember the last song you recorded?" Alune abruptly dropped the topic after her failed attempt to come in to talk about it thanks to her nervousness. And rightly so, his brother's immediate reaction was annoyance.
'Why are you asking about that?' Aphelios answered one question with another, he didn’t want to talk about the topic, because he just wanted to let out his emotions on that recording, nothing more. He didn't even want to hear a voice that he couldn't do anymore.
"Look. I don't want you to get mad at me, Phel. I didn't mean to. Seriously, it happened by accident-"
"What accident? What did you do?" Aphelios insisted again with questions in the face of his sister's sudden explanation, when they ask you not to get angry in advance there is usually a good reason to get angry.
"It was unintentionally." Alune emphasized those words. "That song was on my personal list and.., sometimes I share music with my friends in college, nothing massive. I had no intention of showing your song but…" she sighed tensed at the continuation of the story. "I accidentally shared your song to a friend and she, well, she liked the song, thinking it was just another song of the artists I shared with them and she may have shared the song inside the class or maybe with her friends…"
Alune was staring at her brother fixedly as his tone started to sound more and more insecure and fearful as he finished telling the story. She didn't know how her brother would react, it was completely accidental, she didn't plan to share his song, she didn't think other people would spread it like that either.
"Phel...?"