Da Capo

Chapter 23

Chapter 23

It was Tuesday morning, and Stephanie walked into the Royal Academy, clutching the handle of her violin case. A large part of her wished fervently she would've stayed at Lydia's place again today.

Stephanie wouldn't deny the fact that she was avoiding Kyle. The last thing she wanted at the moment was to talk to him or for him to confront her, and so she proceeded to avoid the Royal Academy all of yesterday, even though she was itching to practice her violin. Monday passed by in a pretty boring manner, and by Tuesday Stephanie couldn't handle another moment of sitting around alone in the apartment, bored out of her mind. She decided going to the Academy to practice her violin was worth the risk, despite her reluctance to run into Kyle.

Stephanie walked down the corridor, passing by students and teachers as she went. She was about to head toward the practice rooms, but before she could turn toward the staircase leading toward where they were, she saw Chloe Alistair emerge from around the corner.

Stephanie hadn't seen much of Chloe since the news of her argument with Kyle was leaked to the public. From what Stephanie had heard, Chloe had chosen to just ignore everything and pretend that she hadn't been caught in an argument with Kyle insisting on faking a relationship with him just for the public's attention. Stephanie had overheard some students in the past few weeks talking about Chloe in rather unflattering terms, so she had assumed Chloe had decided to lay low for a bit after her name had been proverbially dragged through the mud.

Stephanie couldn't bring herself to care too much about the story, however. It was hard to feel too bad for a woman who'd essentially dug her own grave.

Chloe passed by Stephanie in the corridor, casting her a dismissive glance before doing a double-take, glaring at her as she went. Stephanie wasn't quite sure what to make of that, so she kept walking forward, keeping her eyes focused ahead. She wondered vaguely if Chloe knew about her and Kyle, but figured it likely didn't matter much anyway since she and Kyle weren't exactly on speaking terms right now. Chloe couldn't really do anything to hurt their relationship anyway.

Stephanie decided to avoid going down to the practice rooms, where Chloe had just been, and instead decided to find an empty performance hall upstairs to practice in. She wasn't sure why, but the practice rooms just didn't really appeal to her at the moment.

Pretty much all the small performance halls were empty, and Stephanie picked one that didn't appear to have any upcoming classes or workshops on the schedule. She walked up to the dais at the front of the room with the piano and music stand, and set down her violin case in a nearby chair so she could set up.

Stephanie had a hard time picking out what music she wanted to practice, but ended up settling on Der Erlkönig – one of the hardest pieces in the violin repertoire, and probably the most difficult thing Stephanie could have attempted to play. She had bought this sheet music on a whim a few months ago since she wanted to challenge herself - she likely would never be able to play the whole piece, but she figured she could at least try to learn the first few lines. 

Stephanie wanted a challenge today, and focusing all her energy on learning the notes on this one piece would help her take her mind off of Kyle and her whole complicated relationship with him.

Der Erlkönig

Stephanie attempted to play the first few lines of the piece, and she felt herself struggling quite a bit. The music was written to sound like two violins playing simultaneously, so she had to rapidly play chords while also bowing the melody on the same strings, bending her fingers in an awkward manner that almost made her cramp up. After trying and failing to play the first line, Stephanie shook her hand out and flexed her fingers before putting them back on the violin so she could try again.