Blood, Sweat, and Schradieck

Chapter One - Will

"Again!"

Will holds in a sigh and plays the passage yet again, focusing on complete accuracy. 

"Better," Halt finally relents, and Will actually does sigh, this time in relief.

"So change the fingering there so the voicing is more coherent, and watch the balance between the soprano and alto voices," Halt directs. Will obediently grabs his pencil and marks the spot in the music, quickly drawing in the new fingering he and Halt have devised.

Halt glances at his watch. "Okay, that's all we have time for," he says. "Gilan should be here any minute for his lesson."

Right on cue, there's a knock on Halt's closed office door. As Halt gets up to answer it, Will quickly gathers his music, not even bothering to put it back in his backpack before slinging it over his shoulder. He's just going straight to his practice room anyway.

"Hey, Halt," Gilan says. Will passes his friend and grins tiredly in greeting, bumping shoulders with Gilan since both of them have their hands full.

"Hi, Gil," he says. Then he turns to start down the hallway toward his practice room. "Bye, Gil."

"Will! Wait!"

Will turns and looks inquisitively at Halt. "Yeah? Did I forget something?"

"No, there's something I forgot to tell you." He motions Will back into his office and shuts the door once he's inside. "And it involves Gilan."

Will and Gilan wait patiently while Halt rummages through a stack of papers on his desk, muttering to himself.

"Here it is," Halt finally says, holding up a sheet of paper. "The Junior International Music Competition just announced that they're holding a composition division, starting this year."

Gilan's eyes light up, and he says, "Can I audition?" at the same time that Will says, "Can Gil audition?"

Halt gives them both an impatient look. "Hold your metaphorical horses, I'm getting to that. Because this division was announced after the first round for the instrumental division, the directors decided to do it a little differently. Instead of holding auditions, they'll just have the faculty of each school nominate their school's representative. This student will compose a piece for some combination of the five instrumental representatives, and the instrumental representatives will perform the piece during the national auditions. The judges will pick one composition student to advance to the international competition."

"And?" Gilan says impatiently.

"And," Halt says slowly, "I wanted to make sure you're okay with doing it before we nominate you."

Gilan's mouth drops. "You wanted to make sure I'm okay with it? You wanted to make sure I'm okay with doing it? Surely you know I would jump at the opportunity!"

Halt regards him patiently. He says calmly, "I wanted to make sure you'll be able to complete an original piece for untraditional instrumentation in less than a month."

Gilan taps his fingers against his chin in thought. "Piano, violin, percussion, trumpet, and flute." He ponders for a moment, and then breaks into a wicked grin. "What could possibly go wrong?"

Probably many things, Will thinks to himself, but he doesn't voice his thought. He knows that Gilan's nomination is incredibly well deserved. His friend is a very talented composer, although his music is on the more unconventional side.

"All right, Gilan," Halt says. "I'll let Mr. Baron know you're okay with it, and he'll make the official announcement tonight."

"Cool!" Gilan says. He grins at Will. "I won't make your part too hard, so you can handle it on top of your competition workload."

Will rolls his eyes. "I'll be fine, Gil," he says. 

Gilan doesn't seem to hear him. His eyes are alight with excitement, and Will can tell his mind is going a million miles a minute. "Maybe I can build off the phoenix theme I used last time. No, I want to go completely original. Something they've never heard before. Otherwise it will blend in with everything else..."

Halt rolls his eyes to heaven. "I knew I shouldn't have told him before his lesson," he murmurs to himself. "Now he'll never be able to focus." He raises his voice to cut through Gilan's thought process and get his attention. "Gilan!"

Gilan jumps guiltily. "Yeah, Halt?"

"I'll let you off your lesson today so you can get started on your composition. Goodness knows you won't be able to concentrate on anything else. Get the parts to your instrumentalists at least two weeks before the competition."

Gilan salutes smartly. "Sir, yes, sir!" Then he grins happily. "Thanks, Halt. This will be fun."

He's out the door before Will even notices he's moved.

Halt rolls his eyes again, but Will can see him hiding a smirk. "That boy..." he says.

"Can I tell Alyss and Jenny, or is it a big secret until the official announcement tonight?" Will asks.

"What?" Halt asks, as if Will's startled him from deep thought. "Oh - yes, go ahead and tell them. They might as well get a fair warning before Gilan pops in on them out of nowhere to ask them what their favorite colors are."

"What?" Will asks in confusion.

Halt smirks. "Last year Gilan composed a piece for two violins, cello, flute, and percussion entitled Speaks the Rainbow. He insisted it was necessary that he knew everyone's favorite color before he wrote the piece."

"Sounds like Gilan," Will comments. He smiles fondly. Gilan may be erratic and sometime utterly ridiculous, but he's a brilliant composer and pianist. And above all that, he's one of Will's best friends.

"All right, you monkey," Halt says. "Go practice. You have less than a month before nationals."

Will scampers out of Halt's office and down the hallway obediently, only turning around once to give his teacher a cheeky grin in farewell.

A/N: So there it is, the first chapter!! As you can probably tell, I have no willpower, and so my plan to write several chapters before posting any obviously just went out the window. :)