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Love in the Air: Sky’s Nonchalance is a Front

Sky has a tendency to say things he doesn’t truly mean, or say things that are at complete odds with his actual feelings. To truly understand Sky, you always have to deduce the implicit things he doesn’t say, and read between the lines.

He often makes rebuttals that may come across as uncaring or disregarding. But we know better. He explicitly mentions this to Rain in Episode 4, “Every time I say you’re annoying, I never mean it.” Yes he may be the friend who rolls his eyes and emanates an air of sassy, dead-pan annoyance but he does care, and he cares greatly. 

It’s only when Sky is in a vulnerable position, that his honesty tends to reveal itself. Usually this occurs when he’s not in a position to objectively filter or control his thoughts and feelings (such as when he is sick and/or tired).

Interestingly enough, Prapai has now seen Sky when he is both at his most sick and his most tired, and knows Sky does this. He knows better than to take what Sky says on face value. Prapai has proved to have an uncanny knack for seeing straight through Sky’s verbal and non-verbal contradictions. Now even more so since he’s gotten to know Sky better, and he’s even more attuned at picking up on this sensibility.

The first example of this in Episode 11 is when Sky lets Prapai into his dorm, despite being almost half-asleep. He always behaves as if Prapai’s presence is a nuisance or an inconvenience, and never fails to shirk him off upfront. But as Prapai is putting him in bed, he reveals that he stayed awake in order to ensure he could let Prapai in and more importantly - that he wanted to. This is very telling. It shows that Sky does truly care and is being considerate in his own way, forcing himself to stay awake so he could see Prapai.

Then immediately after, he makes an adorable and candid comment about the drawing Prapai left on his palm, which instantly reveals how much Sky treasures it, despite pretending at the time that he wasn’t affected by the gesture. Prapai is incredibly moved. Sky doesn’t say these types of things freely or easily when fully conscious, and so when Prapai does get to hear these comments, it makes him incredibly happy. He’s immediately overwhelmed with his love for Sky, because these are all signs that prove Sky reciprocates his feelings.

The other clear example we get is when Sky gets seemingly ‘annoyed’ by Prapai’s apparent clinginess the morning after, and he retorts “I slept with you so that you’d stop pestering me”. Now we know for a fact this isn’t true. And so does Prapai. I almost feel like Sky is aware of how obvious a falsehood this is, but can’t help himself from saying something flippant anyway because he’s so uncomfortable with sentimentality.

Sky doesn’t just use nonchalance to feign strength and togetherness, but he also uses it as a front to project indifference. Because that suggests he’s not as invested and therefore ‘compromised’ as he would like to be. Indifference projects a sense of impenetrability. Like nothing you say or do can affect me, phase me (or hurt me). As soon as you care about something or someone, there’s a chink in your armour. There’s potential ammunition that someone could use against you or to hurt you. That’s why feigning an air of nonchalance makes it very hard for someone to target your real weak spots.

Having been a victim, I think it’s even more natural that Sky projects an aura of tight control and agency over himself and his feelings. By playing tough, you’re trying desperately to convince the whole world and yourself that you are as such. That you cannot and will not be easily compromised.

As Sky falls clearly more in love with Prapai, we see his true feelings slip through more and more frequently. He’s no longer able to maintain that air of nonchalance as seamlessly as he used to. His genuine responses are slipping through because his feelings for Prapai are overriding his ability to keep up appearances.

Sometimes Sky’s nonchalance has more of a playful or teasing air to it. Like he’s deliberately dangling his real feelings over someone for his own amusement. This often is the case with Rain particularly. And we are beginning to see this more laidback nonchalance creep in with Prapai too. That indifference is leading towards more of a sparring or bantering dynamic where Sky withholds his true feelings as a bargaining chip to get a desired response from Prapai. As seen in Episode 10 when Sky retorts “Whether now or later, I’ll always win”, (I’ll always have the upper hand because I don’t care as much as you do). Which Prapai responds with, “What choice do I have? I already lost to you.” Sky’s is secretly delighted with his answer, because he wants (and enjoys) hearing how much Prapai adores him.

As an interesting comparison, Prapai use his playfulness and teasing as a form of front also. But it’s not used in the same way that Sky does (as a defence mechanism). Prapai’s front is often used to mask his more serious and sincere traits. I think this helps Prapai be somewhat disarming, and allows him to benefit from the element of surprise. Most people will assume he’s dumber and less switched on than he actually is in reality, and therefore sorely underestimate him. This allows Prapai to out-manoeuvre someone without them even realising.

But when they are together at least, Prapai is candidly upfront and direct about how he feels, and is sincere almost to a fault. This compliments Sky really well, because he needs someone whose intentions are crystal clear. Similarly, Sky needs someone who can discern his true feelings, despite his impulsion to contradict himself via his nonchalance, which Prapai does really well.

#attack him when he least expects it.

Is the way Sky was expecting Pai to say that he wanted to have sex as a “reward” for having taken care of him…

…just to be surprised when Pai said that he only wanted a chance to be by his side and pursue him.

Is the way Sky was expecting Pai to ask for sex in exchange for having taken care of him during the night…

…just to be surprised when all Pai wanted was for him to smile.

Is the way Sky was a bit hesitant about having Pai kiss him…

…just to be surprised when Pai got up and asked to use his bathroom, leaving Sky alone in the room.

Is the way Sky was expecting for Pai to be honest about his sex life…

…just to be pleased and happy to hear that Pai had not sleep with anyone in the last two months.

Is the way Sky got visibly surprised when Pai said that he would introduce him to his siblings…

…and then felt happy.

Is the way Sky was, again, hesitant about the idea of Pai kiss him…

…just to be surprised and then happy when Pai said that he would wait until Sky was ready for it.

Is the way every time Sky was expecting for Pai to disappoint him, to show his real colors, to justify his reticence about letting the older man get into his life, to break the new image his brain was forming in his head about Pai, and the way Pai managed to surprise Sky by showing that, even if he’s not exactly perfect, in the end, amidst all his imperfections, he wants to make Sky happy, wants to show Sky to his family, wants to be present in his life, want to have a chance to show that he’s capable of loving him the way Sky deserves, that Sky is allowed to show to Pai all of him and Pai will accept it, no judgement, no pretense, no lies and no masks.

Is the way Prapai, without realizing, managed to break every single one of Sky’s expectations and go beyond his wildest dreams.

Is the way Sky, bit by bit, is allowing Pai to push away all the dark clouds from his life and give room for the sun to shine.