Sonata No.9 | MYG 🔞

11| Sorbonne

Soundtrack: From Holberg's Time, Op.40: I  Praeludium: Allegro Vivace by Edvard Gried

The day of the Sorbonne's Contest finally arrived. The outcome of the performances was going to determine which musicians were going to be selected for the Juilliard Sonata Competition and which were going to be kicked to the curb. The contest was in two parts. The first round was in the morning, eliminating the amateurs from the start, and the second part, only for the selected musicians, was in the afternoon. Only the first-place winners would receive an invitation for the Juilliards.

Yoongi thought that the time had passed just a little too fast. It had already been two months since he had started to practice with Victoria, but he wasn't sure they were ready yet to reveal their music to the world. However, things had gone pretty smoothly lately during their practices, and Victoria was now able to perfectly interpret both Chinese Tambourine and Gitana without a hitch.

Their relationship was way more relaxed now, they were joking around, smiling and high fiving after particularly good practises. However, a slight tension was always there, a thin barrier preventing them from really becoming friends.

Yoongi thought that it was because of the age gap.

It wasn't.

Still, even if the violinist had been exemplary in her performances lately, the pianist was not too hopeful about joining the Sonata Competition. He knew that there were chances Victoria was going to mess up. The crowd, the spotlights, it was often overwhelming, and he knew that one mistake would probably cascade into many more.

At least, they would pass the first round. Gitana, the first piece they were going to play, was easy enough, and Victoria had been able to play it from start to finish without a hitch for weeks.

"There are going to be journalists, Yoongi," announced Hoseok has he drove the two musicians to the Sorbonne's Music Hall, "Are you prepared? Did you practise your answers like I told you?"

The pianist yawned. It was 7:30 in the morning and he was not fully awakened yet.

"Yes, yes, I'll be fine." He turned his head sideways to his friend, "you're going to be there anyway, right?"

Hoseok nodded.

"I will try to be with you the whole time, but I can't guarantee some journalists aren't going to try to ambush you backstage."

Yoongi pinched his lips in a thin line. Hoseok had sent an article to a trusted newspaper the day before, announcing that the pianist was back in business and was going to present a piece at the Sorbonne's contest. This meant that there was probably going to be a lot of people there to see him specifically and it didn't please Yoongi at all.

He still thought that him playing on the same stage as casual participants was rather humiliating but had decided to suck it up for the sake of his career.

Outside the car, Paris was rather bleak. Beige buildings that all looked alike succeeded themselves and the sky was grey from the pollution. The hot air, lack of wind and dry weather was making the atmosphere heavy and the smog descend on the city.

Yoongi caught a glimpse of Victoria in the rear-view mirror. She was anxiously looking outside at the streets of Paris, clutching her violin case, which was resting on her knees. Her nervous expression seemed like a bad omen to the pianist, but then again, maybe she was just fearful of ending in a car crash. Hoseok's driving was a very good reason to be scared.

He shifted his body around to look at the girl.

"Hey, you okay?"

She looked at him with big concerned eyes and nodded, suddenly looking very young with her braided raven hair and her black concert dress.