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moretinyideas · 8 hours ago

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Listen - [P x reader] short fic

Notes: A vague backstory of the reader is implied. LOADS of fluff!!! you might get cavities from reading. This is totally self indulgent. I'm very insecure about this fic and had it in my draft for so long now, but it's time to share. TW: mention of alcohol abuse and violence

It wasn't the first time you had wandered around the Hotel rooms. Everyone in Krat knew the legends that swirled around that building, and you were no exception to its mysterious and sinister charm.

In its gloomy and solemn reality, the hours passed slowly. Despite the cordiality of its few inhabitants, you often felt like an outsider, alone, light-years away from that intricate and luxurious microcosm.

So you filled the voids by exploring, perhaps also to escape the inevitable questions of those who would have wanted to get to know you better. That's why, when you had finally inadvertently stuck your nose in Geppetto's study, the man's invitation to come in had caught you by surprise.

You hadn't said much to each other. Nothing in truth. He had remained silent, behind the heavy cherry wood desk, studying your interest in his work.

The more you looked, the more his talent seemed incredible to you. The elegance of those designs was undeniable, and even more so their execution. On the simple workbench at the far end of the room, a golden glow caught your full attention.

"This... is his heart, right?" you said, approaching him cautiously from behind.

"In a way. The P-Organ." he explained with undisguised pride, as your eyes traced the soft and elegant lines of the model.

Before you could realize it, a bitter grin had escaped your lips.

"Is this amusing to you?" he retorted, keeping his composure, but his face betrayed a certain tension.

"No, no, it's not that. It's just that, you know, I may not have your talent or your extraordinary ingenuity, but my father was a violent man, he drank, and as a result he was a pathological liar. So I know a liar when I see one."

You were challenging him, you were aware of it. The reason was not entirely clear to you, but it certainly had something to do with your connection to his creation.

"That boy, you call him son... You're lying. I just don't understand why." The man looked at you, more intensely than you had ever been scrutinized before.

A tight smile beneath his neatly trimmed gray mustache. His watery blue eyes, however, betrayed an unknown feeling. You didn't recognize its exact nature, but you suddenly felt vulnerable, exposed, violated.

That man, if he had the opportunity or the means, would have done harm. Perhaps he had already done so.

The thought made you shiver. You tried to hide the discomfort lodged in the back of your throat by returning his smile. You didn't trust him.

Your fingers brushed the steel surface of the heart on display on the pedestal, cold, distant, motionless. Despite its apparent fragility, you knew what it was capable of. You had felt it.

It had suddenly seemed to you an intolerable injustice, a cruel mockery of reality.

He who that heart belonged to was no longer just a mere exercise of craftsmanship. Not anymore. He felt.

"You created something so human that it has a heartbeat. And yet..."

The thud of the double inlaid wood door had shaken you. In the darkened crack, a flash of blue eyes and the now familiar mop of dark hair. The boy entered more silently than his heavy and eternal body would have suggested.

"Son. Come."

He was greeted by the man's voice at the desk, a note of tension hidden in the paternal tone.

He approached with slow, measured steps, and a shiver ran down your spine. It wasn't fear, but something deeper, a connection, perhaps. He held his eyes on you for a handful of your breaths, nothing more.

You had been about to retreat. You didn't want to witness whatever they would say, any orders given. You owed him your life, it would be too painful.

"Our guest was just talking about you. My son, my most precious creation. Come, see for yourself."

The invitation had taken you by surprise, as the creator accompanied Pinocchio to the upholstered armchair at the side of the room. The boy sat down without protest, impassive, while Geppetto bent down to his white chest between the folds of his shirt.

A wave of repulsion rose up in your throat uncontrollably. You would have wanted to see him rebel, not allow that unknown liar to violate him in that way, but he remained still, his head down, as his fingers intruded on his skin, opening a small hatch that exposed his metal heart.

You pushed back the tears that stung your throat, but your cheeks were burning with indignation.

The man looked at you, again more intensely than you would have expected. He seemed to grasp your refusal, but he prepared to mock it with a smile of benevolent compassion, as he would have done with a child in the throes of a tantrum.

"No harm done. Son, I beg you to escort our guest out of my room, I have matters to attend to elsewhere."

The boy limited himself to nodding, his heavy steel hand already gripping the inlaid armrest to lift the weight of his slender body. Curiously, he waited for his father to walk away with slow steps towards the double dark wood doors before approaching you.

You smiled, instinctively, when the clear blue eyes of him met yours in the silence of the room.

You knew he wouldn't say a word, but you had learned to appreciate his quiet, towering presence over you.

You felt the heat of anger leave your face, your breathing slowed as you waited for him to accompany you. Instead, he remained still, his irises suddenly darting away, to that chair he had abandoned just moments before.

You felt an uncontrollable tenderness for him, something you had never felt before. It overflowed from parts of your soul that you didn't remember having after so much pain.

"I don't think you're so different from me. And to understand that, you have to know yourself. You can't do that if your father treats you that way. Here, listen." You blew out a smile, gently taking his heavy mechanical hand and placing it between the folds of his white shirt, at the center of his chest.

You watched his reaction, holding your breath, you realized it too late.

That unguarded thought shook you, when had you allowed yourself to feel anything like that for him?

As you watched him listen intently to the rare and irregular beating of his mechanical heart, you were almost on the verge of touching his cold face dotted with pale freckles, but you gave up. Then, suddenly, his watery blue irises locked onto yours, silently, but laden with a message that was almost desperate, an unknown warmth.

His pale lips moved just a little, empty, not a breath, but an unspoken request. At that point you understood.

"Do you want to feel my heart?" you smiled, your eyes soft on the delicate features of that young, achingly beautiful face. He nodded.

Without further thought, you took his cold fingers in yours again and placed them on your chest. You took a breath, then another, breathlessly.

Suddenly aware of those too-frequent beats that echoed in your ears, you felt your face flush. You had been foolish. His gaze seemed unbearable, you felt vulnerable, caught in the act of that most genuine feeling.

How long had it been happening? How long had his mere presence made your heart race?

You felt the tall boy's body approach, towering over you, almost impassively scrutinizing the reactions of your burning face. It was too late to back down now. You waited.

As your heart pounded under his fingers, Pinocchio avidly weighed every contour of your face, the watery languor that animated your eyes, the flush of redness that spread across your cheeks, the slightly faster breath that escaped your lips. That must be true beauty, he thought.

"Listen... it's my heart beating for you," you whispered then, softly.

Suddenly, he felt an unfamiliar warmth in his chest, something deep, visceral... human. He didn't know the words to describe it, but it was enough to guide his body. He felt a shiver run down your warm skin as he brushed against your face, your heart skipped a beat, your breath became more labored.

Pinocchio wanted more. He wanted to know, he wanted to feel, he wanted to experience. He wanted you. What was that spark in the depths of your irises? Why was your heart beating so desperately? Were you expecting something from him? No... not that, it was something more authentic, elusive, incalculable.

"If you hadn't found me that night, I don't know what would have happened to me. The truth is, I just wanted it all to end. Not to feel pain anymore. But now... you saved me."

Pinocchio felt those words sink so deep inside him that he thought they had carved into the metal. There was pain somewhere, a faint, sweet sadness.

Under the steel palm, pressed against the soft skin, the muffled vibration of your pulses was awakening something in him that was both terribly ancient and familiar at the same time. He wondered what he should do. The undeniable reason for which he had come into the world imposed on him to move away from you, but there was another part, more instinctive, obtuse, that desired everything from you, of your perfect humanity.

Not only that, he wanted you to see him, to want him in return. His fingers moved again instinctively, gently grasped your hand and from your chest led it to his. That silence inside him suddenly seemed unnatural, artificial, he would have wished for a more tangible proof of his emotion.

Instead, he let time pass, counted the beats, let them trace unexplored paths within himself.

Pinocchio listened to your heart for long minutes, a spark of awareness in his blue irises that you had never seen in him before. Although it was now clear that his presence was not indifferent to you, you were happy to have fulfilled his desire, whatever its purpose.

Those feelings, whatever they were, were and would remain one-sided. You knew that well. In another time, perhaps far from him, you would have been afraid of them. Not now.

You smiled at his beautiful, motionless, silent face.

"It's better if I go now."

Pinocchio let you go in silence, your bodies moving away as if they had never been close, but a curious tension remained in the air, an unfamiliar intimacy.

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