Work Text:
In part, it's cruelty. So much of what she does is rooted in cruelty, and she knows it hurts him to hear her play, that reminder that she's trapped and won't talk to him, decades stretching slowly in front of them, many more still to come, until it becomes maddening, unbearable, as everything between them always becomes. Mostly, it's love, or obsession, she isn't sure that she even knows the difference anymore, or if she ever did. Maybe he doesn’t know it either, or he feels both, and they are all one and the same. She demands to have her presence acknowledged for the same reason that he gave her the piano, the same reason that he sits outside and tortures himself listening to her, the same reason that she kept on finding him. They do this because they can't stop, they hurt each other, but they can't let go.