Andante con Brio

CXXV

This was possibly the earliest he had ever been to any rehearsal. The other guys were even still downstairs, eating the last of their lunch, but he had been too restless for chatting. Maybe the music would be on the stands already? Maybe he could at least sneak a peek? He looked around him at the wooden auditorium and the big stage. It felt quite normal to walk up there by now, to put his case down on the side, to take his violin out. But this time he would be walking to a different seat. 
He waited around a bit awkwardly. There was no sheet music yet, of course, what had he been thinking, and he didn't even know which desk he was anyway. He should have just waited downstairs, sat with his friends and joked around like a normal person. 
"Ah, you wanted to check the notes, Eddy?"
He felt himself shrinking a little as Theo's voice came from behind him. Fuck it. Theo had seen through him again, hadn't he?
"Here, go on. You're fourth desk, second chair."
Well. What choice did he have now but to own it? He turned around and smiled feebly at his favourite teacher, shaking his head subtly at himself as he took the little stack of paper Theo was handing him. 
"Thanks." he mumbled. "Yeah, I thought maybe I could look it over a little."
Theo nodded. "Of course."

He walked up the stage and sat down on the chair he now knew was his. A little thrill ran through him. Okay, so now that the awkward encounter with Theo was over he was starting to get the excitement back. First! He was first! And the notes looked pretty doable. 


Two hours later he knew he would be okay in this section. Oh man, it had felt good! No, in fact it had felt great to play the melody in a good orchestra, to have his sound absorbed with the other violins... to be honest, he was on a cloud. And he didn't miss Theo's wink either, as he walked down the steps and to Brett. 
"So, how was that?" Brett said, his eyes twinkling. 
"That was cool. Mate. Finally!" 
"Cool. Hey, I'm just gonna run and get a key from downstairs, okay? Shouldn't be busy yet. You wanna come to a practise room with me? I have an idea."
"Er, sure?"
He blinked in surprise at Brett's back. He was already jogging to the stairs, before he could even ask him anything. What the fuck was he planning? He shrugged as he picked up Brett's violin and his own and went to wait by the auditorium doors. 

It seemed to take only seconds before he saw Brett, running back up the last steps and coming towards him at speed. He triumphantly held up a key.  
"Got it! You comin'?"
Eddy held out Brett's violin case to him and put his own one on his back. 
"Yeah, you gonna tell me what we're actually doing at any point?"
Brett was clearly excited about something, because he was already walking off again, heading quickly towards the practice rooms. Eddy had to hurry to keep up with him. 
"So, you know how we've both been looking at the Tchaik, yeah? And that cadenza?"he said as he took the stairs two at a time. "Well, I was watching some guys mucking about with a video, posting it on YouTube. I was thinking maybe we could do something like that."
"What, make a video?"
"Yeah, what do you think?"
Brett stopped in front of a practice room on the second floor and opened it quickly. 
"I'm game, sure." Eddy said as he stepped into the room after his boyfriend. "What do you have in mind?"

I mean, he had been spending more and more time recently, watching videos on YouTube, so the idea of being on it? Well. That was pretty cool. 
 "You know what?" he said suddenly. "We could each play one note, and the other plays the next note. Go through the cadenza like that."
Brett started laughing. 
"That's genius. Wait, I'm texting Todd, he needs to come and tape this then."
"Cool!"