Work Text:
The Xavier mansion has a grand piano, which is probably some unwritten requirement for rich people. It takes Alex a few days to sit in front of it, a week before he finally rests his fingers on the keys. The muscles in his fingers remember the songs his mother taught him, what little music they could squeeze in before the church closed up for the night. His mind, though, it remembers that the things he touches tend to crumble to ash.
One day, though, is too beautiful to keep silent. Alex cracks open the window, sweeps the dust from the windowsill and watches it spin through the air. He's jittery, jogging his leg up and down as he sits on the piano bench. At least the piano room is in a deserted corner of the house. He'd have never have found it were it not for a few wrong turns one day.
The music starts off as a tentative C major scale, but that's way too easy even after eight years, so Alex switches over to some Nat King Cole that his mother loved so much. He's always been good at repeating what he hears, whether from stories or songs. It got him through school until he had no one to read his homework to him anymore. Alex closes his eyes, willing himself into the music and out of his sad, stupid brain.
"You're pretty good. I can even figure out what that song's supposed to be."
Alex whips around so fast that he almost knocks over the piano bench. He makes a sound that's supposed to be Darwin's name.
"Came in through the window in dust form," Darwin says, grinning. "Miss me?"
Alex is up and clutching his shoulders before it registers that Darwin is naked. "If you ever," Alex begins roughly, and finishes the sentence by kissing him. This is music, too, their mouths meeting (again, again) a song.