To Build The Bonds That Tie by ThatFeanorian

A Break In Melody

Maglor loves mornings. So early that the weak light of dawn is all that exists to lead his way. There is pure beautiful silence and not even the birds are there to interrupt him as his thoughts turn slowly from prose to poetry and staff markings. Downstairs, across the house from his parents’ bedroom, Maglor has a small white room, whitewashed and empty except for a single large window and a grand piano. Two years ago, Maglor made Maedhros paint the door until it was covered in colours, all meshing together into something that approximated the images he sees in his mind as the music flows through him and onto the piano keys.

Morning light makes Maglor’s mind buzz, a million colours and thoughts and music notes appearing and filling his mind like sand until the only thing he can do is leap out of bed and run for the music room where he can release the pressure building up from all the unsung songs. He plays until the birds join him and his fingertips are smudged with ink from all of the notes he has written and written and written again, always revising because it can never quite come out perfect. He stares at the papers, his illegible handwriting looking back at him, full of the hopes and dreams he had poured through his instrument just moments before, and which now he only understands by a fraction. Outside the sky is finally blue and the birds sing joyfully, and Maglor shuffles the papers into order, standing in front of the piano so that he can reach both the pedals and the keys. It makes him angry that Celegorm, who is two years younger than he, has already surpassed him in height and can reach the pedals while seated without any issue.

Hesitantly, his fingers find the keys and then they fly, a small fluttering which swells slowly into song. The notes are beautiful, but out of key, fractured, broken in some places so that Maglor has to stop and pick the melody back out of the chaos he has left on the paper behind him. The damp spring air beyond his window presses to the glass, dewdrops sliding one by one down the glass. The birds have gone quiet again, or perhaps Maglor can not hear them beyond the fractured hope of his own music. As the last notes hang in the air, Maglor hears a loud screech and several bangs as something small and dark-haired barrels around the corner and through his open door. Junior skids to a stop inches from Maglor’s piano and plops himself down looking directly up at Maglor with huge blue eyes and screaming one single high shrill note seemingly without end.

“Junior, shut up! You’ll wake Mom and Dad up!” Maglor exclaims running to shut the door to the music room, but Junior pays him no attention, only altering his voice to shriek a little louder and higher until Maglor, cringing at the noise, grabs the little boy and pulls him into his arms, stumbling backwards with the weight of his younger brother until he can sit on the piano bench. Immediately, Junior’s mouth shuts and he gazes sweetly up at Maglor, popping his thumb into his mouth and giggling around it,

“You play music loud.” Maglor glares at his youngest brother and checks his watch. 5:18. On any normal day, he would have had another hour to play and play and play, rewriting everything until the song no longer sounded broken and empty. Now, he will be surprised if he doesn’t see the rest of his family downstairs within ten minutes.

“Junior,” he complains, not caring that he sounds whiny and young himself, “Why can’t you just be normal? I wasn’t even being that loud.”

“You were too loud.” Junior asserts again, stretching out his hand towards the piano and slamming down a tiny fist, sending a disjointed clash of sound into the air with an evil-sounding laugh. Maglor wants to throw him out of the room and lock the door, to hide and go back to the dawn silence and aloneness that allows him to think. Junior reaches out a hand and slams the piano a few more times with wild giggles before a frown crosses his face, pouting as he looks up at Maglor and whines,

“You better.” Maglor can’t help the smile that crosses his face at that and Junior reaches down, struggling to lift one of Maglor’s hands and drop it onto the piano.

“You.” He says, glaring stubbornly up at Maglor as if there is some possibility he might say no to such a request. Maglor glances over at the smudged ink papers in front of him, wanting nothing more than to go back to trying to fix the song, but instead he picks up a light easy melody, one Junior knows well and now sings along brokenly to, getting half the words wrong and happily tugging hard on Maglor’s hair with every downbeat. Outside the room, Maglor hears a creak on the stairs and turns around just as Maedhros enters the room holding a half-asleep Caranthir. In response to his unasked question, Maglor quickly responds,

“No one was hurt, Junior was just being annoying.” Junior gives another sharp tug of his hair and Maglor winces.

“No,” Junior says fiercely, and Maedhros carefully sets Caranthir down on the bench next to Maglor before scooping Junior into his arms, gently untangling Maglor’s hair from his sticky fingers as he replies,

“That’s good —silly, we don’t pull Káno’s hair, that hurts!” Junior lets out another shriek of laughter as Maedhros pokes his stomach. Curled against Maglor’s side, Caranthir pulls his knees up to his chest and buries his face in them mumbling,

“He knows, he’s just mean.” Internally, Maglor agrees, but in the hopes of gaining his older brother’s favour, he remains quiet, watching as Junior’s eyes narrow evilly and he bites Maedhros’ finger with his tiny sharp teeth. Taking advantage of Maedhros’ yelp of pain and surprise, Junior leaps from his brother’s arms and Maglor’s hands are already half-way to his ears when his youngest brother lets out a shriek and then begins to wail as he lands squarely on his bottom.

It feels very suddenly too loud, all of this explosive sound and colour after the grey of being alone. Inside his head and his music, Maglor can make the silver-blue of Maedhros blend seamlessly into Junior’s maroon while Caranthir’s pale green sings a soprano tying them together. Here, beyond the confines of what he can control, they are all dissonant, a chaotic clamour with no melody at all. Silently, Maglor picks up the sheets and scoots slowly towards the door, slipping out the door as Maedhros frantically bounces Junior, jumping back and forth between cooing words of comfort and barely restraining his frustration. He hurries down the hall and into the kitchen, sheets clutched to his chest like some secret treasure and flops down in his chair, pulling a pen from his pocket and staring down at the scribbled notes. They seem nearly incoherent now, far from the perfect symphony of sound he had intended and Maglor slumps backwards letting out a huff of annoyance and looking up to see his mother already standing at the kitchen counter making coffee.

“Good morning sweetheart,” She says with a knowing smile and Maglor scowls in response, still able to hear Junior shrieking in the background.

“No it isn’t,” He grumbles stubbornly, “Stupid Junior didn’t even let me get anything done.”

“Let me see?” She asks, and Maglor reluctantly hands her the messy sheets, self-conscious and more than aware that they are terrible. Not good enough for her and certainly not good enough (never good enough, he is never good enough) for his father. Junior toddles around the corner, his thumb in his mouth, but somehow still screaming for help as Nora picks up the sheets and she glances up, quickly gathering him into her arms and laughing. Junior reaches out, pushing the papers from her hand and to the floor, leaving the corner slightly crumpled, and Nora reaches down to pick them up again, only to be attacked from behind by Cel, who has appeared from somewhere outside with grass stains in his hair and one of his teeth in his hand, knocked clean out of his mouth,

“Look, Mom!” He says proudly, “Huan knocked it out for me!” Nora takes in a deep breath through her teeth and asks,

“That’s wonderful sweetie, was it wiggly to begin with?” Celegorm shakes his head,

“Nah, Verkeneldo says it’s an adult tooth.” He says with a gap-toothed grin, and Nora looks up as Náro enters the room, stepping carelessly ontop of Maglor’s music as he scoops Junior from Nora’s arms, the dirt on the bottom of his work shoes smearing over Maglor’s messily scribbled notes.

“Náro, make sure you call in another dentist’s appointment for Tyelko,” Nerdanel calls as Fëanor passes her. Maglor jumps up, determined to get to his music before it is ruined any more, but now Náro his hurrying back, kissing Junior on the cheek and placing him on top of Maglor’s papers as he turns around and hurries out the door. Maglor pushes Junior off the papers and gathers them back safely into his arms, only to turn around and have Celegorm dump a glass of orange juice straight onto his head.

Maglor can feel it dripping down onto the music sheets, sinking into the messy notes and smearing the ink slowly down the page. No one notices, no one cares. Junior is crying on the floor, Caranthir is yelling angrily at Celegorm, and Nelyo is on his phone in the corner, hiding from the chaos of the rest of the family.

Giving Celegorm a look which cannot even pass as a scowl due to the tears already spilling out of his eyes, Maglor vanishes up the stairs, slamming the sheets down onto his desk and rubbing his eyes angrily, staring down at the blurred and illegible notes on the top half of each sheet.

The papers were useless to begin with; terrible, disjointed, worthless attempts to explain the music in his mind. Maglor doesn’t even know why he is so upset over their destruction, except for perhaps the fact that they are his. Maglor’s. Maglor reaches down and attempts to split them out from the soaked pile, but instead the top sheet rips across the top, the soggy paper leaving him with nothing but scraps by the time he has finished prising the sheets apart.

Broken, just like the notes of his song. Grasping at the strains of song that remain in his mind, Maglor grabs paper and begins to scribble, but within moments Maglor drops his pen again and crumples up the sheet he had been writing and hurls it at the wall. There is no music. Somehow, during the clamour and dissonance and chaos of his brothers, the melody has fled from his mind and left him with nothing but an empty buzzing sound.

Maglor buries his head in his hands and cries.