Chapter Text
Your name is Lapis Lazuli. Lapis is a fun thing to name your child when your last name is Lazuli, and when your name is Lapis Lazuli, blue seems like a nice color to dye your hair. It's fortunate that blue is your favorite color, that you manage not to despise it after all the blue you've been surrounded by all your life. You dyed your hair to match your eyes, which match the ocean on a clear, sparkling day.
Your name is Lapis Lazuli, and you live right next to the ocean. Blue, sparkling waters in front of you, blue sparkling sky above your shiny blue head; a small, skinny blue wraith surrounded by blue. The ocean is the one thing you love about this place. It gives you an old, nostalgic longing to listen to the waves breaking on the shore.
It saddens you that you can never step foot in the water again.
You're terrified of submerging yourself. It's one of your greatest fears. At least your fear of water seems rational to other people. Not like your fear of mirrors. Seeing a mirror makes your small, frail body tense up, accompanying the irrational feeling of being trapped. It's the opposite of your fear of water. Because the water makes you feel free. It's the only place where you feel alive and happy, like you're truly yourself, with the world muffled all around you. You're scared of the water because you know, if you ever felt that euphoria again, you would never come back up. One more of true happiness would be your last.
~ ~ ~
You preferred to play with your eyes closed. At least then you could pretend that you were alone, and no one was watching you. You could still hear the sounds of people splashing, screaming, and loudly enjoying themselves. But in those moment when you managed to connect to your instrument, those voices were dimmed. Almost like you were underwater.
You get a weird sort of pleasure from purposefully ignoring people, completely absorbed in your violin, letting them know they are not worth your attention. But sometimes, people fall silent when you play. It unnerves you a bit to know they are actually listening. You don't play for anyone but yourself.
Buy Lapis a violin if that'll give her something to do, they said. Maybe if she gets a hobby, it'll lead her on the right track. Well, you hate to admit it, but it might actually be working. You show up for school sometimes, often just for music class. The only class you have perfect attendance for. You don't even know if you're that particularly good at it. You started out on the piano, which everyone insisted you were brilliant at, but you wanted a violin. You wanted most everything that could make a beautiful sound. So far you could play the violin, the guitar, piano, flute, and the cello, because those instruments were the only things they would willingly give you.
Your parents. Your mother, wherever she was, still praying you had some hope left in you. Your father, buying you a small, digital casio, thinking it could replace the living, wooden piano that you had to give up. If only they'd give up the one shred of hope they had. You're not worth it.
It was nice to have a portable instrument that you could take with you to the beach. It gave you an excuse to stand at the water's edge, using the waves as background music. If only it weren't littered with so many annoying people. Like the ugly little pest who's been hanging around you for the past few weeks. You try not to notice him, but his enraptured, starry gaze pierces right through the back of your head. He has enough decency to stay quiet until you're finished playing. But his presence is distracting. Unfortunately, no song lasts forever, and after the last long, drawn-out note, you allow yourself to open your eyes. The boy immediately starts applauding. "Yaaaay! Play another one!"
Ugh. Everything about that voice makes you cringe. Today is just going to have to be the day that you acknowledge him, because he's clearly persistent. "Please don't yell like that."
"Ohh, sorry, I hope I didn't ruin the mood!"
"You did."
"Oh," he says, then his face stretches into a ridiculous, strained-looking smile. "Could you play another one?"
"Go away," you sigh under your breath.
"What'd you say?"
"Nevermind." You pack up your violin in its case and turn to leave.
"Wait!" the kid calls. He stumbles clumsily after you. "You're still coming back tomorrow, right?" You whip around to face him.
"What do you care."
"I just like your songs. They're really good."
"Thanks," you reply stiffly. You start to walk away again, but the boy hurries to catch up with you.
"I especially like it when you play the flute," he says. "Are you in a band? Where'd you learn how to play so many different instruments?" You feel your face redden. He really has been watching you every day.
"Have you been following me?" you ask.
"No, I live here. My house is right on that hill." He points to a very high hill close by. Just behind it, if you squint, you can barely make out the edge of a roof. "I used to just listen from the porch, but I really wanted to meet you. I guess you could call me a fan."
A fan? This is the last thing you expected. You never asked for fans. "I have to go," you blurt. You start to run.
"Hey, wait!" the kid calls. You run as fast as you can until you reach the street, turn a corner, and run behind a building. You expected him to follow you, but when you look around, trying to catch your breath, you don't see him anywhere.
It's pointless to go home this early. You know you'll be back at the beach tomorrow, and that kid is going to be back. You can't explain to yourself why he makes you so nervous. Other people have talked to you before. Thrown money into your violin case, thinking that was why you were playing. But no one's ever called themselves a fan. And no one's ever returned just to listen to you.
You make it back home in double time, slamming the door and locking it, because you still have the irrational fear that the kid is following you. Your dad can still get in if he decides to come home. You think he has a key. And if he doesn't, well, he can find somewhere else to spend the night.
After setting down your violin, you flung off your clothes right in the hallway, ready for a good long shower. Spending that much time around the ocean always made you crave water. And your dad's tiny apartment didn't have a bathtub, for obvious reasons. It didn't have a mirror, either.
You walk into the bathroom, automatically looking to the blank, ugly patch of wall where the mirror used to be before you shattered the glass. As proof of your lapse of sanity were the scars on your knuckles.
It was tricky to dye your hair this way. The only option was to do it in school. It worked out well enough for you. And well enough for everyone else. Because no one was willing to try to fight you.
You set the water to the coldest temperature, and let the freezing water burn your skin. The ocean could be colder than this on a day when no one was allowed to go swimming. It could be this cold at night, when you could stare for miles into the endless abyss of darkness that the ocean led to, wishing it could take you there. For now you only have the coldest shower setting to help you feel alive.
You stand under the shower for an hour, when through your eyelids, you see a pair of yellow eyes staring back at you. Your eyes snap open, and only see the tiled wall in front of you.
Without another thought, you shut off the water.
You step out, wrap a towel around your slight frame, and curl up on the floor. When did the feeling of water become associated with her? "Go away," you groaned, clutching your temples. It didn't matter what you did. You could get her out of your head, but you would be seeing her again anyway tomorrow.
That settled it. You would be taking another day off.