Overture
by Stradiveritas
Kate Benson trudged down the steps towards the soccer field, carrying her large cello case on her back. The bottom edge of the hard case banged lightly against her calves and ankles with every step. This is when I wish I'd played the violin, she thought. Somehow, the organizers had managed to choose the field furthest away from the music building for tonight's concert—an outdoor event titled "Concert under the stars," showcasing—what else?—Holst's Planets.
Kate stopped a moment at the bottom of the steps to rub her legs. Whoever designed the backpack straps on her cello case clearly was taller than 5'2". I probably should have walked all the way over to the biology building and then cut over to the field, she thought to herself, noting the gentle slope separating the building and field in the distance. She stood back up and continued walking towards the stage that was already set up. She could see most of the other orchestra members were already there, milling about as usual, and she was surprised to see some people already sitting in the audience seats. She could never understand why anyone would want to come so early for a university orchestra concert. Well, she thought, at least it's a nice night. There were very few clouds in the dusk sky, and a gentle breeze was offsetting the earlier humidity of the day. It had been unseasonably warm the past few days, given that it was only the end of April. If they had to have a concert outside—which they did, given the fact that their usual auditorium was now being gutted for renovations—this was certainly a good night to do it.
Suddenly, she saw someone running towards her.
"Kate!" It was her friend, Eun-mi. She trotted towards Kate in a simple black halter top with lace trim that Kate had never seen before and slim-fitting black pants with strappy sandals. How was it that Eun-mi always managed to look so good? Kate felt positively frumpy in her loose black "cello skirt" and blouse.
"Hey, Eun-mi," Kate smiled. "New outfit?"
Eun-mi grinned. "Yeah, impulse buy at Bebe," she said. "Listen, Robert's been looking all over for you—he's kind of panicked."
Why?"
"I dunno. I think Jeremy's sick or something. Anyway, he's kind of mad that you're late."
Kate looked at her watch. "There's still like, 45 minutes before the concert!" she said.Robert always wanted them there an hour early, but Kate had never seen the point. Given that this was her sixth semester with the orchestra and the fact that she wasn't principal cellist, she didn't think it mattered.
She didn't have time to protest for too long, though, since Robert was striding towards them as they spoke. That was a bad sign. Robert was a big man and wasn't usually one for walking at a pace any faster than a mosey, or at best, an amble, tempo moderato.
"Kate, I need to talk to you—come with me," Robert panted as soon as he was within earshot, clearly concerned. Eun-mi raised her eyebrows at Kate. Good luck, the expression said.
"Hey, Robert, what's up?" Kate asked, trying to sound casual as she trotted up to Robert. They began walking briskly across the field.
"You really need to be on time, Kate," Robert reprimanded without looking at her. Before Kate could say anything in response (as if she would), Robert stopped and asked, "Can you play the William Tell solo?"
He was talking about the introductory solo in the William Tell Overture, the first piece on the program. It was supposed to be played by Jeremy Vogel, their new star cellist who'd just transferred to the school mid-semester for some yet unknown reason from Curtis Institute, a prestigious conservatory in Philadelphia. Kate hated everything about the piece —it didn't go with Holst, and it was ridiculous in itself. The only reason it was on the program was that it was a Jeremy showcase, Kate thought.
"What, you mean tonight? Isn't Jeremy playing it?" Kate asked, allowing a twinge of her deep-seated resentment about this fact to surface in her voice. Jeremy, who supplanted me as first chair in the middle of the season, Kate thought, before suddenly remembering that Eun-mi had mentioned that he was sick. Suddenly, she felt like she'd swallowed cement. Oh God. Robert, don't you dare ask me to play it.
"Jeremy isn't feeling well," Robert said, obviously winded from the walking. "He's having some allergy problems—he still might be able to play, but I need to know if you can do it. Otherwise, I'm going to have to think of a Plan C real quick."
"Uhh, well, I guess I can play it," Kate said tentatively. She'd played the solo before, in high school. It wasn't technically demanding, but it was a substantial solo and she knew that she wouldn't be able to play it well. If anything, it would be an embarrassment for her to go onstage and futz through it. The stone in her stomach grew colder and heavier. And yet—a second thought flickered for a moment in her mind. Jeremy has allergies? She pushed it away.
"You have run through it recently, right? You were supposed to be working on it as the understudy." There was a mild annoyance under Robert's forced optimism. They began walking again.
Kate bit her lip. The comment stung. No, she hadn't been doing her "duty" as an understudy, but it wasn't as if she were a paid musician or anything—this was just an extracurricular activity. Besides, Robert had made it perfectly clear that he didn't think much of her talent or her three years of hard work that she'd put out for him when he casually replaced her with Jeremy in the first place. Instead of responding to the comment, though, Kate asked, "where are we going?" They had now passed the stage.
"Biology building," Robert said. "You can play the solo for me there, and then maybe you can get the performance notes from Jeremy."
Kate's head spun as they marched up the grassy slope towards the building's side entrance. Through the glass door, Kate could see a shadow that she recognized instantly as Jeremy behind a cello. She could recognize that posture anywhere—he had perfect posture and form. Opening the door, they could hear the full, honey-colored sounds of Jeremy's overture solo resonated through the empty lobby. Kate bit her lip. As much as she tried to convince herself that she disliked Jeremy because he was arrogant, or because he was distant, or because he didn't take being the university orchestra's principal cellist seriously, Kate had to concede in that moment that it was possible that a lot of her dislike really stemmed from one thing: jealousy. It wasn't fair that Jeremy got to be principal when he just joined. It wasn't fair that he never seemed to be around practicing. It wasn't fair that he was...so damned good. Sweet Jesus, he was good.
In that same moment, a mild terror welled up inside her. I can't play like that, Kate thought. I could never play like that, even if I had several weeks to practice. Robert's asking me to make a complete idiot of myself onstage. I...
Kate's train of thought stopped as Jeremy stopped playing abruptly and turn to his right, sneezing four times over his shoulder.
"Huh-TSCHH! Hehhh...Hih'kkshhuhh! CHHmmph! Huhh...heh-ESSHHOO!"
The bow in his hand trembled as his body pitched forward with each powerful sneeze.
"Feeling any better?" Robert asked feebly.
"Dot really," Jeremy said, his voice cracking slightly with congestion. He cleared his throat, put his bow down, and then pulled a few crumpled tissues out of his pocket.
He looked pathetic. Somehow, the fact that he was dressed in a tux with his hair obviously styled neatly before the repeated sneezing disheveled it accentuated the fact that he looked positively miserable. There were faint circles under his eyes, which looked bluer than usual due to the redness around them, and his nose was swollen red with irritation. He blew his nose carefully in the remnants of tissue, but less than ten seconds after he finished, he doubled over in another batch of sneezes.
"Hhhh...hhh'TCHOO!...CHHSHHuhhh! Hngk'tchoo!! TSCHHHuhhh! Hep-tchhuhh! Hah... HeiTCHHOO!"
An electric surge ran through Kate's body and she stood, transfixed as Jeremy pulled another tissue out of his coat pocket this time and straightened back up with it pressed under his nose.
"What?" he asked sharply, noticing her staring. He sniffled wetly, and then added, "I dow I look like shit, okay, so don't sdare at me lige that."
Kate, now fully flustered, fumbled to take her cello off her back. "I-I didn't mean to...I mean, I...I was just..." she stammered wildly before taking a breath and regrouping. "Sorry. Are you okay?"
"Yeah," he said, a bit softer, sniffling and wiping his nose. "Sorry I sdapped. I just feel like ass."
"You're sick?"
Jeremy shook his head. "Allergies. They're killig be," he cleared his throat. "I've beed ad this sidce four add it's odely gotted worse."
"So...you don't think you can go on at all?" Robert asked. This was about as nervous as Kate had ever seen Robert. After all, there was the Tell, the Holst, and the Thomas Tallis on the menu, and missing Jeremy would really throw things off.
Jeremy rubbed at his eyes and sniffled. "Well, if I could stop sdeezig, then baybe..." Already, though, his breath was starting to hitch, and his jaw had gone slack. "Scuse be," he said quickly, and put his cello down and and started walking away down the hall towards the restroom, sneezing six times along the way.
"Oh, my god," Robert muttered. "Hurry and get tuned," he told Kate.
Kate took out her cello, snapped out the endpin, rubbed a bit of rosin on her bow, and began tuning immediately, using the hallway bench as a seat. She could faintly hear Jeremy in the bathroom, struggling through an impressive sneezing fit. She'd never witnessed anyone sneeze so much in her life, and it was having a definite, strange effect on her. She always knew that she enjoyed hearing people sneeze—she found it exciting. But this...for some reason, it had taken her a moment to register it as such, but she realized that Jeremy's sneezing was arousing the hell out of her. It's too bad Robert's standing right there, because if he wasn't, I'd run over to the bathroom and jump Jeremy, she thought, and then stiffened. Where did that thought come from? She was increasingly aware of how uncomfortable it was to sit with her legs wide open, straddling the cello with her orchestra conductor standing there. Finally, he moved.
"Just get warmed up," Robert said over his shoulder. It seemed that he was going to go and check up on Jeremy, who was still sneezing in spurts.
Kate nodded. As soon as Robert was out of sight, she put the cello aside and squeezed her legs together. She was just about to touch herself when she realized—What the fuck?! She was in the lobby of the biology building. There were glass doors. Robert and/or Jeremy could come out of the bathroom any minute. One of the grad students or researchers upstairs could come downstairs from lab any minute...
She struggled to regain composure. What is going on? You don't even LIKE Jeremy! she told herself. He was an asshole, acting like the orchestra was beneath him (which, Kate had to admit for the first time, it probably was... but then why be in it?). He went through rehearsals with that slacker attitude that Kate hated, and to top it off, he was just... unfriendly. It was exasperating. Kate doubted that they'd exchanged more than a dozen words over the course of the entire semester, even though they sat next to each other in rehearsals three times a week. Kate had made an effort—several, in fact—to be nice to him, inviting him to have dinner with her and some friends after rehearsal and such, but he'd always turned her down. In fact, he didn't have any friends that she knew of—not that she knew much about him at all. It wasn't that he was just quiet or shy. Kate was convinced he had a serious attitude problem. So why am I suddenly drooling over him? Kate wondered.
Sobering up a little, Kate put the cello back into position and began to play scales. She played through about three of them before realizing that she never really did scales to warm up. What do I usually do to warm up? she wondered. She'd completely forgotten.
All of this raced through Kate's mind in less than a minute, and she had just barely started playing something halfway musical when Robert emerged from the bathroom with Jeremy, who was looking considerably less tidy—his brown hair was disheveled, tears streaked across his flushed cheeks, his eyes were puffy, and his nose now looked positively chapped. "Okay, Kate, here's the deal," Robert said seriously. "Jeremy's not playing tonight, so I need you to take over as principal. So let's go over the solo—I don't care if you can only just play the notes. Jeremy, give her your score. Now, we need a stand..." Robert trailed off and wandered down the hall as Jeremy pulled out his music.
"Robert." Jeremy called him back. He walked over to a bulletin board across the hall, and pulled a pushpin out. He walked back towards where Kate was sitting on the bench, and then moved his cloth-covered cello case in front of her. He tacked the music on to the back of the case. "Higher or lower?" he asked, moving the music up and down.
"A little lower," Kate said, smiling. It was an ingenious idea.
Jeremy's music was meticulously annotated in small, tidy handwriting. In addition to the usual phrasing, fingering, bowing, and dynamic markings, he'd written in editorial commentary like "pull like taffy," and "molto melodramatic." It took Kate by surprise, actually—it didn't really go with the slacker image she had of Jeremy.
Aware that her audience of two was waiting, Kate took a deep breath and started playing through the solo. She was just thinking about how she'd need at least another run- through or two in order to incorporate some of the notes when Jeremy started breathing irregularly again.
Oh, shit, not now. Kate struggled to keep her concentration.
Jeremy walked away a bit and stifled a sneeze almost silently. And then another. And another. And another. They were getting less and less stifled.
Kate's pulse quickened and a shiver ran up her spine. Her hands shook, and her bow wavered. Shit.
"Wait, wait—what was that?" Robert stopped her.
"Sorry," Kate mumbled, trying to regain control as Jeremy was finishing out his string of eight. Shit, shit, shitshitshit! She felt her face burn hot as she tried to hide behind the neck of her cello. Why is this turning me on so much?
"Jeremy, maybe you should..." Robert began, but Jeremy was already moving away.
"I dow, I'b sorry," he said, and then gasped audibly as yet another fit began: "Hhh- KKSSSHHH! Eh-TCHHHHOO! Huhh...huhh-TCHHHHH-SHHOO! Huhhh... Hiht'TSCHHHT! Hiht'SSCHHUhhh!" He was going back down the hall towards the bathroom again. As the door closed, the sneezes grew instantly softer, but both Kate and Robert could still hear the fit continuing.
After a moment's pause, Robert shook his head. "I don't think I've ever seen a person sneeze so much," he muttered. "Take it from measure 18," he said.
Two run-throughs later, they were packing up again. "Not bad, Kate," he said, obviously pleased. He looked at his watch. It was 10 minutes to 8pm. "Take your time—we can start at 8:15," he said. He then added (somewhat unnecessarily) that Kate would take first chair that night, but that she should continue to play her usual parts for the other pieces--especially the Vaughn Williams.
Jeremy, who had returned several minutes earlier, put his cello away and sat down silently on the bench. His last sneezing fit had obviously taken a lot out of him--he was now wheezing slightly and he surreptitiously took two sips from an inhaler he produced from his cello case when he thought no one was looking. He looked like he really needed to go to bed.
"You going back to your room?" Kate asked.
"I don't live on campus, but yeah, I'm going home," Jeremy said.
"Well, drive..." Robert began, and then stopped. "You aren't driving like this?"
Jeremy shook his head. "My mom's supposed to be coming to the concert, so I'll call her," he said, taking out his cell phone. "She's probably in the audience right now." He sighed, a shuddering, exhausted breath, and brought the side of his hand up to his nose again.
"Okay...you take care of yourself," said Robert, seeming to want to escape before Jeremy started sneezing yet again. He began ushering Kate out the door.
Jeremy nodded, a single, tired sneeze escaping as he flipped open his phone. Before dialing, though, he looked up. "Kate," he called.
Kate stopped and looked over her shoulder.
"Thanks for saving my butt—I owe you one," he said, and offered a grateful smile. "You sound good. Break a leg."
"Thanks," Kate said, a little surprised. Those were probably the first genuinely pleasant words Jeremy had ever spoken to Kate. It was hard for her not to pity Jeremy, looking so vulnerable and miserable on that bench. She offered a smile in return. "Feel better," she said sincerely, despite herself.
As she opened the door, she could hear the strains of the orchestra beginning to warm up in the distance as the first stars appeared in the evening sky... one overture finished, and another just about to begin.
A college orchestra outdoor concert. A somewhat standoffish soloist with severe allergies. A reluctant replacement who is surprised by what all this sneezing is doing to her...This story's been spinning in my head for a while. Based a little on actual events, but mostly it's based on what I wished had happened.