Soul Eater shorts: Life in the Scythe Apartment

Seven: Lessons

Maka and Soul's apartment was alive with sound. Music from a record player drifted throughout as the two tried to concentrate on their task. Maka gave a little grunt as she shifted, sweat running down her forehead. Soul watched her intently as her fingers moved up and down the smooth length clumsily. His eye twitched with every off movement, wincing at the particularly bad ones. He eventually got fed up.

"Okay, okay, stop! You're killing me here."

Maka pouted as she ceased her ministrations, removing her hands and crossing her arms.

"Well excuse me for not being any good."

"Here, it's like this."

Soul expertly mimicked her actions, but moved much more smoothly and fluently. Maka looked on with a mix of awe and annoyance.

"You seem like you do this often."

"Of course I do! Who do you think I am? It's not cool for me to do otherwise."

"Yeah, yeah, you and your coolness; I swear I'm going to Maka Chop you someday from getting sick of hearing it," the blonde grumbled. "Let me try again."

"All right; no, put your hands here. There, now go slow at first then pick up the pace when you feel you have the hang of it."

Maka went about fiddling again, moving her hands slowly to get used to it. She soon started to speed up, but she continued to make mistakes. Her brow furrowed in irritation, and she made a little noise to voice it.

"Arg, that's it, I can't take it anymore!" she growled in frustration. "I'm about ready to snap this thing in half!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, don't you dare! I need that!"

Maka snorted.

"What, to pick up chicks?"

"No! It's precious to me, like my bike!"

"Whatever, I just don't want to do this anymore!"

Soul sighed.

"These things take time, Maka, you can't expect to get everything right away."

"Says you! You were born with that kind of talent weren't you?"

Soul scowled at his partner.

"You're acting like a child, Maka."

"Fine then, I am a child! Just get that thing away from me."

"Hey, don't call Beaumont a thing!"

The blonde technician directed an incredulous and unimpressed look at her partner.

"Beaumont? You named it?"

"Yes I did!" Soul replied indignantly.

"…What kind of name is Beaumont?"

"It's a cool name, damnit, and I'm not going have you ridicule it or me anymore!"

The scythe didn't miss Maka trying not to laugh.

"…Don't you dare laugh…"

Unfortunately, his threat just set Maka off into fits of laughter.

"Beaumont…Beaumont! You named it Beaumont, of all things!" she cackled.

Soul blushed, grumbling about how he was no longer telling his meister anything. A few minutes of Maka's laughter echoing over the sounds of the finished record player later, Maka calmed herself down.

"Okay, okay, I'm sorry, I really shouldn't laugh at that," she said, but she was still biting back snickers. "You have an awfully fragile ego, after all Soul."

"Maka, just shut up. Please."

"Right, right. Hey, can I try once more? That put me in a better mood."

"No. You made fun of me and Beaumont."

Soul glared at Maka as a snort escaped her lips, and the smaller teen clapped a hand over her mouth in an effort to stop any more. He scowled resentfully, huffing.

"C'mon Soul, I'm sorry."

"No," he replied curtly, looking away and shutting his eyes.

"Please…?"

Soul slowly opened one eye to peek at Maka from the corner of his eye. She had a cute pleading look on her face, and she seemed genuinely apologetic. He frowned deeply for a bit before releasing a long sigh.

"…Fine. But if you start laughing again or get angry, we're trying this next week."

"Yay!"

Maka grabbed Beaumont and began moving her hands along him, being mindful of where she placed her fingers. Soul watched as Maka started smiling as picked up her speed.

"I'm doing it Soul! I got it!"

"Yeah, good job; ready to try something harder?"

"Oh no, I've had enough of this for now. I'm not a genius at this kind of thing like you."

"I'm not a genius."

"Of course you are! But I guess when you come from a family of musicians, you pick up things like that naturally…"

"C'mon Maka, learning how to play the guitar isn't that hard."

"Says you! You learned it just last month!"

"Ehh…okay, that's true."

"See!"

Their mild bickering continued on for the rest of the afternoon, the maroon-coloured Les Paul guitar forgotten about on the couch.

(Dark: ha! Another short finally finished! Why does it say seven? Because as I said, I had ideas for six originally, but I didn't like where I was going with the third one and I can't remember what I was going to write for the other three. So, stuck in a writer's block, I moved on to another idea that happened to pop into my head. Why didn't I name that one three? I dunno...it didn't seem right. So it stays at seven.

Did you think dirty thoughts during this chapter? That was my aim (just so you know, I'm grinning like the Cheshire cat right now). One of my English teachers once said that someone wrote a personal essay that, at first, sounded like they were describing having sex with a lover, only to find out in the end that they were playing a guitar. I liked that idea. Recently, I was reminded of that, and I wanted to use a similar idea eventually. Then I remembered Shinigami comparing technicians and weapons to electric guitars and amplifiers. I couldn't imagine Maka actually being the kind of person who would learn guitar on her own, or even really being someone to play one. However, I can imagine Soul sitting in his room, plucking at the strings absently during his free time. It helps that he has extensive backgrounds in music (he comes from a family of musicians, after all), and considering how much he likes being cool, I thought he would find guitars something a cool guy would have and play (he also seems to have an affinity for punk, metal, grunge and classic rock bands, which adds to the theory). On that note, I came up with this.

Beaumont? Honestly, I had the idea of Maka being amused at Soul naming his guitar, and happened upon that name. Almost as soon as I typed that name in, I saw Maka snickering at the strangely sophisticated (and totally unsuitable) name, and found myself giggling at it too...things went downhill from there. Why a Les Paul? Because those are cool guitars, and Soul has to have a cool guitar. And not all crazy whacked-out like some bands out there, just a simple, yet elegant and sophisticated (in a way) classic guitar. To be honest, I don't know guitars all that well, so don't ask me more information. That's what Wikis are for :D

Anyway, thanks again for reading, and again, I'm open to any suggestions! Thank you to those who suggested things before, as while they are decent ideas, I can't find any way to creatively work with them. Thank you nonetheless, and I hope you enjoy what I came up with instead.)