Work Text:
Blue
Change can be frightening; however, as beings who are accustomed to the idea of stability, we follow our endless cycle of daily routine. Even with the knowledge that the world is in eternal transformation, we continue. Wake up, sleep, eat and repeat. Day after day after day.
A falling bomb can destroy everything around it with its effects continuing to be felt long afterward, despite happening as fast as the blink of an eye.
Porsche couldn't understand how everything went so wrong. The relationship was never the same after that day as a distance was created between him and Kinn. The feeling of being close and far at the same time was hard to handle; it created an emotional distance that gnawed at him from the inside. He was absolutely certain that he tried everything to understand what was happened and continue to happen.
Apparently, he failed.
He looked at his hands, which that trembled slightly. Tears never stopped falling no matter how hard he tried to hold them back. The worst part was his heart burning. A flame that was unknown to him, burned a little more each day with the uncertainty and today it spread intensely. Porsche had a relatively effective form of internal control, taught to him by the therapist he visited after the accident. All he needed to do was breathe deeply and focus on real things so that his troubled mind could realign itself.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Inhale.
Exhale.
The living room walls were yellow. The curtains were violet. The sofa was burgundy. The TV was black. The coffee table was made of wood. And this process repeated and repeated and repeated. He couldn't stay paralyzed on the living room floor like a boy abandoned by his fiancé, although perhaps that was exactly what he was at the moment.
His phone rang, and he cursed his treacherous heart for creating false hope. He shouldn't want Kinn to be calling, not now. Not when the fight was too fresh and the situation was more likely to worsen. He shouldn't want it, but for one damn second, he did.
Porsche turned off his phone, his friend could wait. Speaking seemed impossible at the moment. His words had died and his mind was trying to process without interruption.
The clock struck 10:00 PM. He had no idea where Kinn had gone or even if he would return tonight. A spike of anger grew inside him. Porsche was not at all to blame for the paranoia that grew in his fiancé's mind, and with every passing minute, he felt more like telling him to go to hell.
A metallic glint caught his eye on the living room table, and he noticed that Kinn had forgotten their apartment key. Of course, as always. Sighing, Porsche went to the door and locked it.
Let him stay out on the street then.
He returned to the living room and stopped in front of the cello. His instrument of sensations. He took it out of its case, sat down, tuned it, adjusted his posture correctly, and closed his eyes for a few moments, simply feeling the ambient sounds and trying to organize his mind.
And he played.
Someone You Loved.
A melancholy melody that translated everything he was feeling at the moment. Porsche transferred all the weight concentrated in his heart into the music. He was lost. It was as if he were sailing on the high seas, desperately trying to figure out where to go, his compass having burned in a fire. He opened his eyes and saw blue. Blue dots and lines that metamorphosed as the bow traveled across the strings. There were other colors too, the result of higher notes, but blue was predominant.
His colorful reality was different from others.
Porsche remembers what a shock it was to understand that not everyone saw the world the same way he did. In fact, very few people do, about 4% of the world's population. He had never met anyone else. At first, he hated being the weirdo and the liar, but upon studying music, he found therapy there. A way to understand his feelings visually. In this way, he also became a great musician. Associating sounds with colors allowed him to deepen the music to a very detailed level.
He moved to Paris.
He built a career in the City of Lights.
He met Kinn at a concert.
His synesthesia stopped being a burden and became a blessing.
It wasn't just that. His crossed senses provided him with several curious experiences, like the time he went to an ice cream parlor with friends and Porsche naturally said he tasted bitterness in the strawberry ice cream. They looked at him as if a horn had grown in the middle of his forehead at that moment, totally confused by his remark.
In reality, the ambient music was influencing his sense of taste.
Porsche continued playing the bitter melody for a long time, pouring out everything he felt. Various shades of blue filled the room.
Rust
He knew he was dreaming.
He was absolutely certain it was a dream because he recognized that setting. Nevertheless, he still despaired when he saw the fire licking the living room curtains. He tried to run to the bedroom, but his legs wouldn't obey him. He was slow, very slow. The fire was much faster.
Suddenly, he was in the bedroom watching the two figures curled up in bed. Porsche remembered arriving very tired the night before. His fiancé had given him a relaxing foot massage, and they had kissed for a long time. Soft, calming kisses that brought a low music to his ears. Then they fell asleep with that softness. Now it was like reliving a never ending terror.
Unable to do anything more than to watch, he saw the fire through the crack in the door, smoke beginning to enter the room. Coloré, their cat, lept from his suspended house and landed on top of Kinn, who woke up startled. It would have been funny, if the situation weren't desperate, the way he looked around bewildered, his hair messy and his face crumpled with the mark of the sheet on his cheek. Porsche could see the exact moment he noticed the fire, the gears clicking in his brain and panic taking over his features.
Kinn woke his sleeping fiancé and quickly opened the drawer to grab two shirts. Both placed the clothes over their noses. Porsche picked up the frightened feline in his arms while Kinn opened the door to hell.
Everything was burning.
There was no way to climb down from the bedroom window, as they lived on the 12th floor of the building. The only exit was the front door. Kinn hugged Porsche, and together they tried to overcome the flames. Porsche watched helplessly as his dream-copy began to cough heavily from the smoke, his fiancé desperately trying to protect him, and the small yellow and white patch trembling with fear. He saw what those dream characters didn't see. The bookshelf was falling apart, and its pieces began to collapse.
Kinn was very close. The heavy, flaming wooden beam fell on top of him. The face with the sheet mark burning instantly. He pushed the object away, burning his hands in the process, but it was a little too late.
The rust-red shirt he was wearing caught fire quickly.
A curious fact about fire is that it has the same origin process as the decomposition of iron: combustion. In an aged metal, very slowly, the oxygen in the air combines with hydrogen and carbon, oxidizing the material and giving rise to the reddish-orange appearance of rust. However, in a fire, this process occurs at an alarming speed, and everything is swallowed by the flames as long as there is fuel to feed them.
Kinn began to roll on the floor, trying to stop the flames from spreading even further. Porsche dropped Coloré on the floor and tried to help put out the fire with the shirt he was using against the smoke. Deep down, he knew he shouldn't do that, the right thing would be to grab something heavier like a blanket, but he was desperate; he didn't care about anything else.
Later, he would notice that his own arms suffered some of the consequences, but at that moment, Porsche didn't even feel the pain of the burns. He needed to save Kinn.
When the two managed to put out the fire, he cried with relief. The world was still burning around them, but one thing had been resolved. They were going to get out alive. They had to get out of there alive.
He was dreaming.
And he tried to wake up from that nightmare. He had already gone through that once, he didn't want to go through it again.
But he couldn't. He had to relive all the affliction and anguish again.
The dream-Porsche tried to help Kinn get up and head toward the door. Coloré was nowhere in sight.
The present-Porsche could see the cat passed out on the living room floor. It was incredible how fertile one’s imagination could be. He knew he couldn't have this image in his head because the smoke was thick in the room and he hadn't been able to see anything that day. However, here in this nightmare, he could clearly see the small unconscious being, and it was impossible to reach him because the past cannot be changed.
All he did was watch his own version begin to panic again over the lost cat. His breathing quickened and made one more mistake in that fateful early morning. The flames try to monopolize the oxygen in the environment, pollutant gases and intense heat are emitted. His attempts to fight for the little clean air available were a losing battle.
Disorientation didn't take long to appear, his senses became confused. He needed to find the cat, he needed to help his fiancé and save them. He didn't know where to go, maybe he should go back to the bedroom, but which way was the bedroom?
Then Kinn vomited on the floor. His body lost its own battle with the smoke.
He knew what would come next. However, that wasn't real, and dreams can change however they want.
Kinn fainted first.
His copy fell to the floor trying to wake him. Anguish filling all his pores, visible in his frantic movements.
The pulse was low... Low. Low. Low.
Then nothing.
He screamed.
And a cloud of rusty dots flooded his vision.
Gray
Kinn didn't return in the morning. However, he had left a message on his phone saying he had slept in a hotel and gone straight to work. He would return at night, and they would both have The Talk.
Porsche left the house and wandered a bit through the streets of the Marais in search of a place for breakfast. He and Kinn had moved a year ago to the 3rd arrondissement, a trendy and pleasant neighborhood of Paname. He didn't understand the origin of Paris's nickname, but he was already used to hearing Parisians refer to it that way everywhere.
He stopped at the bistro Au Coeur du Marais and ordered tartine beurre confiture made with traditional baguette and a hot coffee to start the day.
"Bon Appétit, Monsieur," the waiter left the order and walked away.
Porsche was a bit nervous. The effects of the horrible dream from the night before were still lingering. However, it was a scene created by his brain after the whole bad experience of the fight with Kinn. It wasn't real, at least not the end.
On that day, he had fainted first and only knew what happened from the firefighters' reports. Apparently, a resident of the neighboring building saw what was happening and called emergency services. He and Kinn were rescued in critical condition due to intense inhalation of toxic gases. The recovery was painful, but the worst came later.
For a long time, everything was gray.
When they returned home, things changed. Porsche, fortunately, had not suffered much from the fire burns. His arms were the most affected, and today they had strings of flowers and musical notes covering the marks. He tattooed a Phoenix on his back as a reminder of surviving the fire. However, Kinn suffered worse. His chest was badly hit by the flames, and his face was marked by the glowing beam that fell on top of him.
He never wanted tattoos or plastic surgeries. He simply stopped existing. For months he had night terrors, waking up sweating and screaming for help. Sometimes he would grab Porsche and not let go until he fell asleep again.
This cycle improved when he began having systematic meetings with a psychiatrist. Porsche knew nothing of what happened in the sessions, but he noticed Kinn's behavior changed positively. He seemed to be emerging from the post-trauma limbo.
They moved to the 3rd arrondissement, or just 3ème, in a building with a great security system. He even checked if they had a contingency plan against accidents. The apartment was on the 1st floor, they preferred to be closer to the ground after what happened.
Porsche sipped his coffee slowly, remembering when he and Kinn found the bistro one night. Happy Hour was underway, and they took the opportunity to drink a lot because of the discounted prices. It seemed that cozy little restaurant never closed.
That day wasn't gray for the first time in a long time.
But the gray continued to exist afterward. It wasn't as dull anymore, but it was still there. Gray can be the color of smoke or a cloudy sky. Both announce danger. "Where there's smoke, there's fire," they always say, "Even if you can't see it." His relationship with Kinn was burning slowly, and Porsche could see the smoke rising slowly and spreading, poisoning everything it touched. What he couldn't see was the focus of the fire to put it out.
They were under an eternal rainy sky with droplets falling and falling and falling. Until everything collapsed. The problem with looking up and seeing a gray sky is that if you haven’t prepared for the storm, you’re going to get wet. And sometimes not just a little.
He tried not to get bread jam on himself, but he was unsuccessful. When he finished his petit déjeuner, Porsche continued to walk through the neighborhood streets, watching students coming and going, hurried families, and lonely souls walking through the world with their chimneys lit. This addiction he stayed far away from now.
He passed by the Saint-Jacques Tower, which was closed at the moment. It wasn't as well-known to tourists as the Eiffel, but from the top of the tower, one had a very wide view of the city. He and Kinn had paid for a guided tour once and had an enriching experience. There are rumors that it is one of the city's energy points. Skeptical or not, you really do leave a bit full of vitality.
Continuing along Rue Saint-Martin, he stopped to breathe on the Pont Notre-Dame and watched the waters of the Seine River travel without haste. There he could even sigh and imagine that nothing was wrong, that today was a yellow day and his relationship was not sinking in the violent storm that fell upon them. But today was a gray day, and he would have to deal with it.
When he reached Rue Chanoinesse, he smiled a little, remembering a legend his fiancé had once told him.
"Do you know the legend of the barber?" Kinn asked him when they passed in front of the police garage on the Île de la Cité.
Porsche shook his head, and Kinn continued telling the story.
"Legend has it that right here where this police garage is, there was a barbershop and a pâtisserie," Porsche laughed a bit at the macabre tone Kinn tried to put in his voice. "This region was always very popular among students, especially foreigners, because of its proximity to the Cathedral."
Notre-Dame was indeed a few meters away.
"The problem is that some students began to disappear mysteriously. They left no traces, they just vanished," Kinn leaned against the wall to tell the story. Some police officers in front looked over briefly but soon ignored them upon hearing the story. "And then everything was unmasked because of a dog, Puppy."
"Puppy? The dog's name was Puppy?" he asked, slightly amused.
"No, I made that up to give the story more credibility," Kinn said, waving his hands as if it didn't matter. "Anyway, Puppy spent days barking at the barbershop door waiting for his owner, who went in for a haircut and never came back. Nothing would make the dog leave, and that caught the neighborhood's attention," he made a dramatic pause.
Porsche rolled his eyes but paid attention. After all, it really was getting interesting.
"The neighbors gathered and pressured the barber, who ended up confessing his scheme to increase profits. He killed his victims with a razor cut to the jugular and, through a trapdoor, threw the bodies into his basement. This basement was connected to the pâtissier's. He prepared meat pies and sold them to the canons and other officials of Notre-Dame. There are stories that King Charles IV ordered many pies regularly."
"And what happened to the killers?" Porsche asked.
"They were burned alive in an iron cage and their houses totally destroyed," Kinn shrugged and then turned to the nearest police officer. "Is it true that the pâtissier's stone block is still in the back of the building?"
The scowling officer looked at Kinn and Porsche for a while, replied with a short "oui," and went back to ignoring them.
"Wait, so there's proof?" he asked, confused.
"No, it's a legend," Kinn replied. "But they say the only thing left from that bloody era is this stone block that was used for cutting the victims by the pâtissier." Porsche for a moment imagined the scene of pies made with human meat, and his stomach churned slightly. "Did I manage to scare you?"
"Of course not. It takes much more than that to scare me," Porsche said petulantly, although he really was a bit scared, and Kinn laughed, held his cheeks, and gave him a quick peck.
"Come on, let's go to the Cathedral square."
While remembering the story, he arrived at the square and looked for a bench to sit on. It was still morning, Kinn was at the office, and he would have one last rehearsal in the afternoon. Tomorrow was the big day. He had a huge performance to give, and his life was falling apart.
Porsche stayed in the square for a while just enjoying the view. He heard the sound of birds and appreciated the colors that formed. It was summer, Paris was beautiful, the sky was not cloudy, and the green shone more intensely.
The cloud hanging over his head dissipated for a moment.
Violet
Violet light is the one with the highest frequency in the electromagnetic spectrum, therefore it also has the highest energy. The night before, both were vibrating at similar frequencies, and the clash of these energies exploded into a fight that was in neither of their plans.
It all started because Porsche arrived home much later than usual. He had stayed longer at the music company rehearsing. After all, July 14th was coming, and he would perform a cello solo accompanied in the background by the National Orchestra of France. Every year, on July 14th, Bastille Day, there is a grand classical music concert at the Champ de Mars, in front of the Eiffel Tower.
France has parties everywhere on that day, and Paris becomes even more illuminated with fireworks at the end. It would be a great opportunity. He was known in the French classical music world for his talent, and it would be a great honor to be able to perform a solo in front of thousands of people on such a special day.
So, he had to train hard to be impeccable. His colorful world helped him, but it didn't make him immune to mistakes.
Kinn didn't seem to understand that.
When Porsche arrived, Kinn was already radiating impatience. He questioned him about the delay and paced back and forth restlessly.
"I already told you I was rehearsing. July 14th, Kinn. I need to be perfect!" He didn't have much patience. His day had been very long and stressful, he had messed up the solo twice that day, and that shouldn't be happening two days before the concert.
"You are already perfect. You are spectacular," he retorted, his voice a bit higher than normal. "Were you with him?"
Porsche blinked.
What?
"What?" he repeated aloud, caught off guard by the strange question. "With whom?"
"Elliot."
"My friend? Yes, I was. He's also in the company. I don't understand where you're going with this." He crossed his arms.
In truth, he did know. However, it was such an absurd idea that Porsche needed confirmation.
"You two are together all the time," Kinn said, as if that explained everything.
"Yes, I see him almost every day because we're in the same music company, as I said a minute ago."
"And you're exchanging messages all the time!" Kinn raised his voice, but Porsche remained somewhat static at the confirmation of the accusation.
"Maybe because I need to talk about my work? And also because he's my friend? Is having friends a crime now?" Porsche continued with a bit of mockery. He knew this would only add fuel to the fire of the argument, but he couldn't help himself.
"Porsche, you know he doesn't want to be just your friend," he replied angrily, "and you're leading him on!"
What on earth? Where did all this come from?
"You're jealous! Kinn, for God's sake, I've never given you any reason for this!"
"I don't want you near him anymore," he spoke in a tone that signaled the end of the conversation. This only made Porsche's blood boil.
"Do you really think I'm going to submit to such a baseless request?!"
There was violet vibrating in every corner. Even in the curtains that fluttered with the cold wind, announcing the impending storm.
"I don't accept this. If it were the other way around, you wouldn't accept it either."
"Kinn, listen to what you're saying!" he was revolted. "Jealousy? Mon Dieu, jealousy!"
"He looks at you differently. You two spend a lot of time together, you go out for drinks."
"With our friends!"
"You exchange messages all the time," he continued as if Porsche hadn't interrupted him. "You smile at that phone!"
Porsche opened and closed his mouth.
He was completely shocked by all of it. In four years of dating and two of engagement, they had fought, of course, but nothing as absurd as this.
"You're always talking about movies and laughing at inside jokes," Kinn started pacing back and forth again, his voice rising. "You're talking about ‘music this’ and ‘music that’ all the time." He stopped in front of the cello. "You even play the same damn instrument! You match him in everything!"
Kinn continued talking about how Elliot seemed like the perfect guy for Porsche, but Porsche wasn't listening anymore. His ears were ringing, repeating in an eternal loop the bitter way Kinn had referred to his instrument.
He wasn't going to lie. It hurt more than he expected.
Deep down, he knew it was the anger talking. In stress, you do things you shouldn't and regret them later. But at that moment, his chest burned with the disdain for his work in the voice of one of the people he loved most in the world.
"Aren't you going to say anything?" Kinn asked, indignant at the lack of response.
Porsche only stared at him.
"So that's it, you're going to choose him?" His voice sounded betrayed and a bit desperate, yet Porsche remained stoic.
I choose you every second, he thought. But he said nothing.
Irritated, Kinn brushed past him huffing, grabbed his wallet, and checked it. Apparently satisfied with what he found, he went into the bedroom and returned with a hooded sweatshirt.
The sound of the door closing was another stake in his already bleeding heart.
He went to the window and closed the lavender-colored curtains.
It was thundering.
Graphite
The gray returned with more force during the night.
Kinn didn't come back.
The cycle of comfort that became routine, despite Porsche’s best efforts, began again.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Inhale.
Exhale.
The living room walls were yellow. The curtains were violet. The sofa was burgundy. The TV was black. The coffee table was made of wood.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Yellow
July 14th.
The show was about to begin.
Porsche was very nervous. Outside, there were no fewer than 500,000 people. He was going to play in front of hundreds of thousands of people! He had played for large audiences before, but nothing on this level.
"Breathe, Porsche," Elliot appeared. "You're going to kill it!"
"Oh heavens. I can't mess up!" He was a bundle of nerves.
"You won't. Take it easy."
"It's not an on-off switch, Elliot." His friend looked at him for a few seconds and then raised an eyebrow as if to say: Is the freak-out over? "Sorry, it's just the biggest opportunity of my life. It's hard to stay calm."
"Go in there, get settled, close your eyes, and feel the music. Forget the audience," he advised. "You'll do fine. I'll be behind you anyway. If you mess up, I'll mess up louder, then people won't notice you."
Porsche laughed a little. Elliot was one of a kind.
"Now I have to go, give a kiss to Margot and Hector before she goes down to the box." Elliot approached and hugged him. He gave him a kiss on the forehead.
"So little Hector came?"
"Yes, you have to see him. He's a cutie in red and blue." Porsche smiled, imagining the baby dressed for the occasion.
Elliot left, and he remained alone, trying to emanate positivity.
When his turn came, he walked onto the stage with trembling legs. However, he feigned total familiarity with the crowd. France was beautiful. Paris was spectacular. The French Revolution marked the transition from the Early Modern to the Contemporary Age, it was to be expected that the cradle of the revolution would be bubbling with nationalism that day.
He sat in his place, adjusted the cello, held the cat-shaped pendant, a tribute to Coloré, and took a deep breath. Porsche glanced quickly at the crowd, looking for Margot and Hector in the box. They were there. Hector was safe in his mother's arms, looking like an 18th-century French baby. Porsche smiled at that.
Then he froze.
When his eyes met brown eyes so familiar to him. The yellow aura so well-known around someone he missed dearly. Kinn.
Okay, this might be the most peculiar synesthetic individuality. However, he knew he wasn't the only one. In Brazil, a synesthetic young man saw golden auras around the women he fell in love with. His case was one of the rare ones and sparked scientific curiosity about other possibilities of synesthesia.
In Porsche's case, it was yellow. The color brought him joy, spirit, and life because it reminded him of the sun. Sunny days were much better than rainy days, with their dark, thick clouds.
Kinn joined his own hands, interlacing his fingers, kissed them, and brought them to his heart. Their signal for Je T'aime.
His heart felt much lighter.
Porsche nodded once in recognition and closed his eyes. He felt the melody flow through his fingers.
The song from Titanic was beautiful on its own, but the energy of the crowd, the national orchestra behind him, the weight of the revolution, and the relief in his heart made everything more sensitive. More palatable. The notes were sweet in their own way, a bit more bitter here and there, but smooth for the most part.
We will stay this way forever You are safe in my heart.
When he opened his eyes, the City of Light was shining.
Rainbow
The positive side of a storm is that it can put out fires. Excessive heat in the atmosphere often results in nature burning. It is very dangerous to put out environmental fires, but help can come from the heavens. The poured raindrops make this work infinitely easier.
"Forgive me," that was the first thing Kinn said when he met Porsche for the first time in two days. "I was an idiot. I was crazy and insecure. I took it all out on you. But these days I spent away served for me to reflect a lot, and the conclusion I reached was that I was a complete imbecile." His voice pained. "Forgive me. It doesn't have to be now, or tomorrow. I just need you to know that I am very sorry."
"Do you believe me now when I say that Elliot is just a friend?"
Kinn sighed and sat in a chair in the dressing room. He ran his hand over his face and messed up his hair a bit, then looked at Porsche. He looked lost. Porsche's heart ached to see that.
"Yes, I believe you," he said and continued: "I talked to him."
Okay. That was new. Elliot hadn't mentioned that to him.
"I talked to him, and the way he spoke about Margot was so simple and passionate that I realized how stupid I had been." Kinn shook his head. "The way he spoke about his wife is the same way I speak about you. For a moment, I saw a mirror before me."
Porsche didn't say anything for a moment because he was a bit in shock. He felt a strong urge to put a stone over everything and forgive him, but he held back and let Kinn speak.
"I know it was wrong for me to only believe after talking to him. I know how fucked up that might seem, but I was so confused." His voice broke a bit, and his eyes filled with water. "We had a good life…" He brought one of his hands to his scarred face. "And then everything changed. I became a burden to you, I needed therapy to deal with my own fears and couldn't look at myself in the mirror next to you."
Now Kinn was crying.
Small salty drops rolled down his face with the confession.
"Beauty and the Beast," Kinn spoke with bitterness. "That was how I felt, and over time, my mind entered a huge spiral of self-pity. I snapped. I didn't deserve you. I still don't."
"Stop," Porsche interrupted.
He was wrong. He was so wrong.
"Baby, I choose you every second of everyday. I choose your smile, your look, your annoyances." Porsche laughed a little through the tears. "You are perfect for me even with these marks. In fact, you're even better with them because you were trying so desperately to save me that you didn't worry about yourself." Now Porsche was really crying. His voice was a wet mess. "You keep me steady."
Kinn stood up and grabbed him.
"You are my heart, Porsche. Losing you would be losing myself."
Kinn hid his face in Porsche's neck and inhaled. The two stayed there for a long time, letting the emotions flow, their heartbeats synchronizing as if they were one.
When Kinn kissed him, he heard the fireworks outside go off. Nothing mattered besides Kinn in his arms, the kiss was sweet, his yellow aura was shining, and the love in Porsche's chest ached. It seemed not to fit inside him.
The kiss was intense, full of longing. Full of tears too. A mess. But now, Porsche understood Kinn's fragilities, and with that, he could work on the focus of the fire. Maybe he had messed up at some point, but he would never again let Kinn feel insufficient.
"Kinn, I love you. You are perfect for me. I love all your shades," Porsche caressed his fiancé's face.
"I love you too, Porsche. Forever and ever."
The sky of France was illuminated and very colorful. The crowd was in ecstasy, smiling at the pyrotechnic show. But Porsche was safe in his private sky.
A paradise that had all the colors exploding like a watercolor.