Ash & Ichor [Friends with the King of the Underworld rewrite]

s i x

I snuck a glance from the sheet of music in front of me up to the large doors of the art gallery. I kept my fingers on the strings, moving them back and forth during a particularly long note with a vibrato.

The bustle of the people was comforting. They moved in and out of the gallery happily. The artist was a local and very popular. It looked to be a great success.

I cursed to myself when I didn't see anyone I recognized outside of my parents.

Of course, Leah was going to be late. Fashionably late, would be what she would say I imagined.

The ticket had been for eight. It was nearing eight thirty.

Damien was just as late.

God, they were made for each other.

It couldn't have been that she hadn't seen the ticket and Damien's "secret admirer" note. We knew she was in her dorm room when we knocked on the door then slipped both a note and ticket under. We had watched from down the hall as she opened the door, picked up the invitation from the floor and looked it over.

I insisted that Damien hand it to her himself, but he decided it was better if he surprised her 'with his good looks' instead.

I only rolled my eyes.

Everything had gone to plan but I was almost an hour late to practice with the quintet despite hurrying Damien along.

The rest of the quintet wasn't happy with me.

The two violin players rolled their eyes and my fellow cello player glared daggers at me from behind his glasses.

I ignored their collective sigh of relief when I arrived at the art gallery on time.

I began to play the cello when I was in middle school and fell in love with it. Time would fly when I practiced and for the first time in my young life, I found something I was actually good at.

I practiced hard for hours, mastering the instrument that played beautiful, mournful music. I moved to the head of the section in middle school then again in High School. I was given a scholarship once in college and I was able to pay most of my tuition with it. I was good in High School but once I was in college, it was completely different.

It drove me and motivated me to be better and when I was in my sophomore year, I was second chair.

My parents had been cheering for me the entire time.

Damien, not so much. He cheered for me until practice cut into our time together.

I looked at the doors again.

I finally recognized one of the patrons in the room and smiled to myself, looking back at the sheet on the music stand in front of me.

I finally let myself relax.

Damien arrived dressed for the night. When we would meet he dressed casually, wearing jeans and a shirt. Other times, I would see him in his royal fae garb complete with doublet and all.

I never saw him dressed for a date.

He dressed in black slacks and a black button-down dress shirt. He let his dark hair fall over his dark skin and light blue eyes, not bothering to brush it away as it crowded his vision.

While what he wore was not out of place to what the other men wore around him, even from where I sat in the corner of the room, I could tell that the fabric was much finer than everyone else's. I wondered if he used some glamour or enchantment on them.