the other version

volume disguised in silence

ᴛᴡ ɪɴ ᴏᴘᴇɴɪɴɢ ᴀᴜᴛʜᴏʀ'ꜱ ɴᴏᴛᴇ

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sapnap is tired.

he thinks he might be making himself ill.

he stayed up all last night, trying to finish a project for science that his group had left practically wholly to him. he was going to get an A, he knows, which is good, but he hates that the other three people will get just as good a grade, despite doing none of the work. plus, the stress of the music project was really starting to cut in.

it was past halfway through the time they had now, and sapnap hadn't even finished his half.

of course, he will finish it. he has to, no matter what, even if it means more sleepless nights like the one he'd had yesterday. even if it means forcing mouthfuls of coffee that taste more and more awful each time, just to keep his eyes open. even if it means his heart feels heavy from exhaustion. even if, deep down, the workload he forces onto himself makes him feel like he's rotting.

it'll be worth it in the end, for the praise and happiness of his parents, for the love he will finally receive, for the feeling of self-worth that only comes from the scribble of A's that will stain his report card.

but, even if it will be worth it then, it doesn't feel worth it now.

it feels almost like he's screaming, constantly. his chest is low on oxygen and his throat is burning dry and his head is ringing from the volume of his own frustrated screams, but he's dead silent.

he's silent, not just because his dad always says he needs to stop complaining and get on with it, stop being lazy, but because he doesn't have a partner.

everyone around him in his music class, sitting with their partner, is working hard on their work, probably miles ahead of him and feeling good about what they've created. he, on the other hand, is falling behind like he never has before, and he hates everything he's done.

it's probably good. it's probably great, even, but it's hard to think that when he hasn't got anyone he can run through his ideas with.

he doesn't even want to think about george's half of the project, still untouched, sheets empty.

oh, he's so so angry.

he hates being angry, and that somehow makes him angrier.

sapnap knows he is smart. he is good at school and he understands quicker than others and he can juggle multiple responsibilities at once, but it's fucking hard to play the guitar and takes notes about the guitar at the same time.

especially when the room is full of noise and he's too self-conscious of his instrumental abilities to play it loud enough for it to even sound nice.

he just really needs to work out the tune for the back of the song. it doesn't have to sound amazing, it just has to look good on paper, but it doesn't.

no, it looks like a sea of scribbles, every idea being crossed out seconds after he writes it.

it looks like pages torn out of his book and shoved into his backpack to discard later.