perfect fifths

"Can I have just celli, please? Ah...celli and bass. We need to tune this chord, it's a little..." Zeke made a motion of shakiness with his left hand, turning zany eyes back to the rest of the orchestra to show self-awareness and attempt bonding, but the strings just smiled uncomfortably and the winds (apart from the brass who'd already fallen asleep) showed completely blank faces.

All except for Miyabi, the utility flute clutching her piccolo as she waited (and waited, and waited) for her first entrance, who nodded and gave her most encouraging look to the (currently groaning, and audibly) second-stand-inside cellist. It hadn't been her idea to bring her father in as guest conductor, but she'd supported it wholeheartedly. How fun! Just for one week. How was she to know that all of a sudden, when given an entire ensemble under his baton, he turned into Mr. Attention-to-Detail?

Glimmer, especially, had no patience for conductors who stopped for the slightest thing - just in general! but this was insult upon injury, because they hadn't even finished reading through the first movement, and he was asking them to tune open strings. Somehow it would be less irritating if he'd just asked Padraig to stand for another A from Kite. Which wouldn't fix the problem, obviously. Garvel, sitting directly behind her, had passable technique, but couldn't tune to save his life. And of course Glimmer wouldn't do it for him.

So they played, and Zeke frowned, and they played again, but with Zeke pointing past Monica's left shoulder at the instrument lockers instead of over her right, toward the door, and Glimmer stared at Miyabi, and Miyabi made sympathetic faces at Glimmer, and eventually Zeke gave up and told them to take a look at that at home. Glimmer could have put her forehead through her fingerboard.

Sometimes she considered quitting this whole community orchestra thing, and going back to a normal extracurricular, like lacrosse, or field hockey, or whatever it was girls did in high school. Maybe tennis. You were allowed to hit people, in tennis, and pretend it wasn't your fault. And you got to wear cute skirts.

But, however fortunately or unfortunately, Miyabi was dead-set on becoming a principal flute someday, and if she had to wait for Maxis's carpal tunnel to catch him out, she would. And because Glimmer was such a good best friend that she'd become Miyabi's girlfriend, she had agreed to keep at it too. If Lorithia wasn't such a witch, she might even enjoy this cello section. Aegaeon was a perfectly peaceable stand partner, and Agate, though not the strongest player, more than made up for Garvel's various indiscretions. Ethel would be a great replacement principal, too...

It was a long season, and a lot of Friday nights, but with Miyabi there, Glimmer figured each rehearsal could double as a date.

So Glimmer would daydream, and be the only one who actually paid attention to a subito drop in dynamic when the piccolo finally got to play her proudest flourish in the last movement of a symphony, and look for Miyabi's eyes when she stood, wobbling but so, so proud, to take her bow.

(She'd even snuck surreptitiously out into the lobby at intermission to find Nikol, slip a handful of bills into his back pocket, and arrange for him to hand a bouquet up to the stage once Miyabi had collected her things and scooted over to Glimmer's seat.)

"All set, Bee?"

Miyabi blushed, embarrassed to hear the diminutive used in public even though Nikol was the only one paying attention.

"All set," she echoed. "A-are we going to get food?"

"Last concert of the season, and it's hot outside." Glimmer shrugged her cello case over her shoulder, leaving the other hand free to grab Miyabi's (and leaving Nikol to take care of the flowers once more). "I think it's time for ice cream."