Chapter Text
Music, art for the ear composed of notes that are arranged in a way that is pleasing to the listener; performed by a musician who spends their time learning fingerings and memorizing rhythms. People like to discourage musicians by saying performing is a dead-end occupation.
A bow across a string, a steady stream of breath, quick presses on keys, or a collision with a drumhead are all it takes for somebody to make music, but a musician knows in reality it’s more complicated than just that. Training for years is expected, practice is mandatory, and even then people may not find it in themselves to care unless your name has been traced worldwide. Short bursts of passion are followed by even shorter bursts of applause and another eternity with a new piece of music, a never-ending cycle that’s altogether frustrating, tiring, and enjoyable.
Some instruments are famous for their ability to stand alone in a performance, like the piano, while others are known for their popularity, such as violin and flute; instruments like the cello have a rich and irresistible sound that turns heads. When two or more instruments play together, their sounds are amplified and exaggerated. The sounds become less raw but remain just as exposed, just as individualized.
Music is the backbone of everything. It dwells in car radios and shopping malls, in commercials and movies, in the showers of otherwise empty homes and in iPods and phones that can travel miles on a single song. Often it lies in the background of events happening center stage, but when the curtains open and the lights dim, the musicians get their opportunity to prove to their importance to the audience.
As the doors shut in the back of the auditorium, leaving an echo of wood and metal to right throughout the hall, the lights begin to dim and voices settle. The creak of folding theater seats ring in the open expanse of the room until it’s interrupted by applause as the last set of performers enter the stage. Intermission is over, and the show will resume.
Beethoven; Trio For Piano, Violin And Cello In D Major; Op.70, No.1. “Ghost.” It is a piece composed of three movements and played by a group of three experienced musicians. Sugawara Koushi, second year pianist, Azumane Asahi, second year cellist, and Nishinoya Yuu, first year violinist, have spent months preparing this piece for their spring performance.
Movement I, Allegro vivace e con brio; a quick-paced movement that begins in a fast unison, followed by a section where the melody seems to jump between the cello and violin. Steady and experienced hands keep time on the black and white keys behind them, playing their own melody. The piece slips back into unison for a phrase, and the three musicians look to each other with grins on their faces and a passion for their piece. They’ve fallen into a good rhythm, and are able to play with all of their ability.
Suga’s deft hands glide across the piano’s keys, following the experience and practice that he had put into them. Nishinoya’s eyes glint with a tinge of excitement that he leaves solely for the stage, keeping the others fired up even in the sustained passages of their brisk allegro. Asahi’s tone is mellow and fits nicely with the higher pitch of the violin, the low and full tone of the cello fitting like the final piece of a puzzle, letting the other sounds wrap around it and becoming one with the rest of the ensemble. As themes in the piece repeat and are re-articulated, the trio gets more confident, more at ease being in the bright lights of the stage. The crowd is less intimidating in the pitch blackness of the auditorium seating, even though that means every nuance or movement of the players is bolded, but the three students have seen each other so often in the course of the past couple months that every flick of the wrist and sway of their bodies in the heat of the music is familiar, etched into their memories like the piece itself.
Aggressive movements and confident sound sets the mood for the end of the first movement, while Suga, Nishinoya, and Asahi’s expressions are all reflective of one another; they look to each other for reassurance and clarification as they push the last unison section out in perfect synchronization. The mood changes almost instantly at the end of the first movement.
Movement II, Largo assai ed espressivo; a movement defined by its slower tempo and prime opportunity for the musicians to express emotion. At the start of the movement, the two string players outline the pianist’s melody with chords; the violin and cello create a sound that is contrasting, yet unified. Suga’s hands move easily over the notes, pressing with gentle certainty. The notes flow evenly into each other as the pianist maintains a tempo that seems to push forward even as it holds back. Soon enough, the melody begins to flow between the three of them like a river that has been alive for centuries. Though the piece is in D major, the color of the notes though the second movement suggest something of a darker nature. The melancholy chords of the cello and violin become the forefront of the piece. While most sections remain mezzo piano, the persistent pounding of forte phrases seem even more articulated, more intense, and overall more dramatic when the dynamics are brought back to a faint whisper through the music.
The expression lies not only in the music itself for the second movement, however. The body language of the musicians producing those sounds stand out just as vibrantly in those blinding stage lights, and causes the true intent of the piece to reach the audience. Though their expressions are intense, it’s different than the intensity given off by athletes during a match or heavy gazes between lovers. The musicians’ eyes are alight with something else, a passion for their craft that can’t be matched by those who haven’t felt the vibrations of their music travel through their fingertips. Music is the outlet that allows the musicians to release their emotions; it is an outlet that, once refined, can be used to express anything that the player wishes for it to. Chords dripping with these emotions are what make the second movement what it was written to be: largo assai ed espressivo - very wide and expressive.
Movement III, Presto; the final movement to a piece of sentiment and fervor, a movement that seems almost rushed yet still retains a sense of balance. It is a movement of passing melodies and quick riffs that fly by in an instant if they aren’t appreciated the moment they appear. The students’ drive has returned with all of the excitement as the first movement. They set an exciting and fiery pace, one they’d used countless times in the practice rooms of the school building and in bedrooms and park pathways and in their heads as they hummed it on the way home.
Nishinoya and Asahi grin at each other as the measures keep flying by with the accuracy they had trained for, and Suga keeps them going with swift presses to piano keys and an unshakable smile on his face.
The smile is unshakable until about halfway through their final movement, when Asahi misses his note and falls behind a beat. It’s not like it hasn’t happened before, they’d planned for a slip up like this to happen; the problem is that this time Suga tries to fix it. In the pressure of the performance Suga tries to slow down enough for Asahi to get back on track, which would work if Asahi hadn’t already skipped ahead a beat while Noya continues as he is, trusting that Asahi will be able to fix it on his own like he had during rehearsals. But Suga isn’t thinking, and he tries to fix it, and the three of them fall out of sync.
There is dissonance and anxiety running high through the stage as the trio tries to get themselves back together, and while rhythms and pitches fail to match up Nishinoya chooses to hold his own, keeps going where he is, and lets the other two eventually find their places This works once they figure out how to right themselves, but then the piece is over. Though the last few measures felt good, the ones previous still weigh heavy on their thoughts. Their faces tell each other that they’re all thinking the same thing, and as they all stand to bow, the audience seems conflicted as well. The piece is a decent length, about 25 minutes long, and the part of it that’s sitting with everybody in the auditorium is the ending. They get the roaring applause they’d been hoping for, but they can all tell.
They can tell that the audience was expecting a big finish, though the one they received was fairly different than what they had been hoping for.
Suga, Nishinoya, and Asahi’s performance had been one of spectacular emotion and intensity up until the very end, and as they all bow and walk off the stage, hands still clapping as they walk through the stage doors, the three of them know that their last performance of the school year will sit like lead on their shoulders for a long time to follow.
“You got the list, right?”
“Yep,” Daichi confirms, hands in his pockets as he and Suga walk down the school hallway toward the music wing. “Looks like only four first years are interested in continuing, though.”
He looks out the passing windows and sighs, and Suga can’t control his own defeated expression, staring down at his feet and watching the light from the windows as it enters and leaves his path. “That’s even less than last year,” he mutters.
“Well, with any luck they’ll stick around. We can use all the members we can get.” Suga nods in agreement and Daichi hands him the list, and as he looks it over the two of them hear a very loud flutist by the name of Tanaka Ryuunosuke approaching from behind. He catches up to the duo in no time and pushes himself over Suga’s shoulder to read the list in his hand.
“Are those the new members? Gimme that,” he says with a grin and snatches the sheet out of the pianist’s hands. “Only four? That’s a bummer.” Suga just rolls his eyes and lets him look over the sheet; they’ll be meeting the first years soon, anyway.
As the three of them get closer to the main music room, used mostly for meetings and larger rehearsals, they hear a faint sound coming from the room; they hadn’t expected anybody to already be using the room for practice, it was only the first day of the school year, after all. The two third year musicians look at each other questioningly before Tanaka pushes between them and opens the door himself, and what they hear once they step in is the dark tone of a cello.
“Bach’s Toccata?” Daichi inquires softly, and they stand in the doorway as the student continues. The sound is experienced and mature, a full sound that gives the impression of countless hours of practicing and instruction.
He’s a prodigy, they think; the cellist is playing the fugue with such precision, skillfully playing two notes with the angle of his bow and making the music that much more rich. It sounds like it was meant to be played on his cello.
The others can do nothing but stand and listen as he plays, not realizing that they had entered and being so wrapped up in his music that he makes it to the end without interruption. It takes Tanaka’s cough at the end to alert him to the three who had just witnessed his private performance, and when he sees them there he nods. “Hey.”
The upperclassman finally approach the first year as he places his cello in the case beside him and stands to talk with them (Suga hadn’t thought the cellist would be so tall and in all honestly would prefer that he sit back down).
Daichi, who had reclaimed the new member list, was the first to address him. “You must be Kageyama Tobio.” The cellist nods and the others smile in greeting. “I’m Sawamura Daichi, but you can just call me Daichi, everyone else does. I’m the club president and I play clarinet.” Kageyama gives another nod. “That’s Sugawara Koushi, third year and our pianist, and Tanaka Ryuunosuke, second year flutist.”
Tanaka puffs up his chest in pride and Suga offers him a welcoming smile. “You can call me Suga.”
“I’m… obviously a cellist,” Kageyama says a bit dumbly, but he isn’t really sure what else he can add to the conversation. He was never really good with introductions, preferring to simply answer whatever is asked of him; everything goes a lot smoother that way. While he waits for some kind of continuation, he can’t help but notice the air of familiarity between the three upperclassman.
“How long have you been playing?” comes the voice of the pianist, and Kageyama thinks he might hear the door open, but he ignores it. The others don’t seem to hear it, either.
“Since I was four,” he responds and the three look amazed by his answer. Kageyama had been playing since he was big enough to do so. “I started taking private lessons about the same time.”
“Are you like some kind of genius?” Tanaka asks, and though Daichi knows there isn’t any malice behind it, he wants to smack him over the head for saying it.
“Excuse me!”
The four of them all stop at the sound of a voice, and turn to see wild orange hair, a frustrated face, and a small case clasped tight in the boy’s hand. Once he realizes he has four startled musicians staring at him, he composes himself and stands tall - well, as tall as he can.
“My name is Hinata Shouyou and I’m a first year. I play the oboe, and I want to be a chamber musician.” Kageyama all but scoffs at him.
Daichi looks over the list he was given that morning to confirm that the enthusiastic boy with the fiery hair was, indeed, on the member list, and he’s about to say something when Hinata cuts in instead. “You!” he all but shouts, pointing a finger at the tall boy with black hair behind the group of upperclassman. “I feel like I know you from somewhere.”
Kageyama just raises an eyebrow at him, and mutters something along the lines of, “As if.”
“No,” Hinata continues, and the other three students seem forgotten as he directs the entirety of his attention on the cellist, “I’ve heard you play before, in the park. You were amazing, some of the people who were watching called you the ‘Grand Maestro of the Stage.’”
Something seemed to snap in Kageyama then, and he stepped forward, towering over the smaller boy, and narrowed his eyes dangerously. “Don’t call me that,” he said with a growl in his voice, and Hinata seemed helpless in his presence; it was overwhelming and frightening to say the least.
“Why not? It sounds like such a cool name.” Hinata ignores Kageyama’s persistent glare in favor of pressing him for more information. “I heard you say you take lessons. That’s so cool!” The cellist could feel his patience running dry.
“What do you mean ‘that’s so cool?’ Taking lessons is expected, they’re a necessity. You can’t become a good player if you don’t train under somebody.” He’s met with a blank stare.
“I’m a self-taught musician, though. I’ll become better than you if it means proving you wrong.”
“Are you kidding? There’s no way you’d become better than me. I’ve been doing this all my life.”
“This isn’t the time to be fighting,” Daichi says, but it’s lost to the other boys.
“You’ll see, just because I don’t have a teacher doesn’t mean I can’t be as good as you.”
“Except that it does, and there’s no way you’ll ever surpass me.”
“Oh yeah? Watch me then!” Hinata kneels on the floor, placing his instrument case hastily down in front of him and pulling out a reed and placing it in his mouth as he assembles his oboe. Kageyama watches him from above, interested in him only because he’s sure that Hinata’s ability doesn’t come close to his own. To the side of the two-man showdown, Daichi looks like he’s about to yell again, but Suga puts a hand on his shoulder and shakes his head.
“Let him play. I’m a little curious, aren’t you?” Suga’s voice is quiet behind the clatter of metal clasps and keys, and Daichi can’t help but admit that he too wants to hear what the little oboist is made of. Tanaka has already taken to placing himself in one of the chairs off to the side and observing the pair. The third years are surprised he hasn’t cut into the first years’ heated conversation yet.
Hinata stands with his assembled instrument, pulling the reed out of his mouth and placing it into the top and taking on a stance that he deems correct for performing, and takes one breath to calm himself, one as he raises the instrument to his lips, and then one right before he starts playing.
Smetana’s Moldau, written to showcase the beauty of the Vltava River as it flows from the Bohemian forest to Prague. The notes flow like the water it was meant to symbolize, rolling over each other like the fluid motion of water jumping over rocks at dusk when the moon makes the ripples shine. It’s intense like the waterfalls that send rocks crashing down into calmer lake beds, and dramatic like sharp turns and catastrophes.
Hinata’s Moldau sounds like autumn after the leaves fall and the sun shines through empty branches and onto them. It sounds melancholy and drips with enthusiasm for a piece developed in a lonely bedroom and mastered over time. The group can only stop and watch as he performs the main theme of the piece, the melody embodying minor chords and bass tones, as his hair falls in front of his closed eyes because he’s swaying with his music, as he plays with incredible support and impressive vibrato, and as he completely blows away any doubts the other students had for this oboe player who had yelled for their attention.
After playing a couple phrases, he stops and takes a couple deep breaths to catch himself, and his eyes are shining with a staggering sense of accomplishment. It takes Tanaka a moment to realize that his mouth has been hanging open, and the third years need to snap out of their own amazement before they begin clapping for him. Hinata gives a triumphant bow and shoots Kageyama a grin as he stands, one that makes the cellist dig nail marks into his hands as they’re clutched tightly at his sides.
“Where in the world did you learn that?” Kageyama demands (cutting off Tanaka, who was about to fawn over the small performance), getting into the shorter boy’s face with a sneer, but the effort is quickly thwarted because he leans down to put his oboe back in its case.
“I taught myself,” Hinata replies, and it sounds so nonchalant that it makes Kageyama fume that much more. “I learned all the fingerings for the notes, and then I started listening to music, and then I learned it.”
“Let me get this straight,” Kageyama starts with narrowed eyes, “you learned the Moldau… by ear.”
“I guess so. It was kinda just like,” the oboist starts as he closes his case and stands up, and then he makes a jumble of hand movements that make no sense to anybody in the room except for Hinata, and then he just shrugs.
“I can’t believe you. There’s a lot of time and dedication that goes into being a good musician, and what have you been doing? Sitting by yourself and learning music by ear?” He won’t admit that Hinata’s tone is impressive. “What’s the point if you’re going to do everything half-assed?”
Tanaka looks like he could knock all of the taller boy’s teeth square out of his face, so Daichi holds out a hand and speaks up in his place. “Cut it out, you two, this isn’t the-”
“I worked hard to get where I am!” Hinata breaks in, all wide-eyed fury and frustration.
“What a joke. You can barely call yourself a musician.”
“Guys-”
“I just played didn’t I? That was music! I am a musician.”
“Have you ever even touched a piece of sheet music?”
“Well, I-”
“And what about playing with other people, huh? Have you ever done that?”
“No, but-”
“Guys,” comes a low voice, and the air in the room suddenly runs cold as Daichi stands between them, all broad shoulders and dark aura, and the first years shrink back. Even the other two upperclassmen know well enough to take a few steps toward the back of the room.
“If you two are going to bicker like children instead of get along with each other, how do you expect to join this club?” The two first years look at each other anxiously. “If you want me to accept your forms, you better get your asses in gear and act like you have what it takes to play with others,” Daichi finishes, and he turns to head into a room connected to the main one they’re standing in.
While Daichi ruffles through cabinets, Suga and Tanaka rejoin the two younger students. “I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced,” Suga says to a still-frightened Hinata, and gives him a smile, born of sincerity, that seems to make the boy relax a bit more. “You can call me Suga, I’m a pianist; this is Tanaka, our flute player, and Daichi is our group president. He plays clarinet.” Hinata nods excitedly, and then the door off to the side is being closed, and said clarinetist is holding sheets of music in his hands.
“You two,” he asserts, pushing the music into the first years’ hands, “are going to learn this piece and perform it for the club next week.”
“This is…” Kageyama starts, timidly, looking over the music and then glancing over to the other boy’s hands, where the label “OBOE” is written, “This is an oboe and cello duet?”
Tanaka moves to stand behind the two to read the name of the piece they’d been handed. “Oh, Piazzolla's Historie Du Tango.”
Suga smiles, mostly to himself, and tries to recall the last time he heard that piece. “I remember the other duo who played that piece; the cellist arranged that herself.” Daichi made a good choice in picking that particular piece, the pianist thinks, because the sheet music isn’t particularly hard, and will showcase Hinata’s sound if he can co-operate with Kageyama enough to make it through to the end.
As the two look over the music, they can both agree on at least one thing: they’re both skeptical as to how good an cello-oboe duet can really be.
“You and the other two first years who will be joining the club will be playing next week, so you two better spend your time wisely if you want me to see your true potential,” Daichi says, and the two somehow manage to nod in unison.
Early mornings find two musicians in the practice rooms of Karasuno’s instrumental wing as the sun rises and other students have yet to wake up, and the faint sound of birds sounds through the window as their stands are lit with artificial lighting and the sun that shines in. There is more yelling than actual productivity as Kageyama gets angry at Hinata for not knowing how to read half of the notes written on the page (though he’s able to find the pitch if Kageyama can find it in him to play the note on the piano).
By the end of their first morning practice session, Kageyama is able to play through his short solo opening and the first two phrases of the duet before he has to restrain himself from getting up and tossing the oboe out the window. Hinata manages to keep his enthusiasm all the way through their hour-and-a-half long rehearsal.
During lunch break, bright orange hair and a bundle of energy find their way down the third-year hallways until he finds the room with the pianist with the soft grey hair. He manages to get Suga to practice with him during lunches for the weak and skip out on eating with Daichi; he can’t find a good excuse as to why he’ll be missing them, especially with it being the start of the year, but he figures if Daichi didn’t want him to help the two first years, then he would stop him.
Hinata is grateful to Suga, helping him learn how to read music and setting tempos for him. The oboist was astounded to learn that the tempo that he and Kageyama had been practicing at that morning was nearly double the intended tempo for the piece, and he rubs it right into the other boy’s face as he sets the bow on the string for their practice the next morning. During scheduled rehearsals, the upperclassman don’t see the cello-oboe duo or the other two first years, though Daichi tells them later that they already picked their piece and that they lock themselves in the practice rooms when the other members of the chamber group are there. There are always two doors closed when rehearsals start.
Kageyama’s homicidal urges decrease over the course of the week, mostly because Hinata is picking up the notes with Suga during lunch practices. The cellist can tell he doesn’t know anything about style in relationship with different composers, though, and he has to stop him more than once to correct note length or phrasing.
Suga has been stressing over making sure Hinata is improving, and so during the practice time he gets with the others, he usually isn’t focusing on his own music. Daichi and Tanaka can tell when they practice with him on their own piece that he’s still worrying, and the clarinetist nearly hits him over the head when he zones out and misses an entrance because of it.
“Stop zoning out. An accompanist is no good if he isn’t accompanying, is he?” And Suga nods and apologizes before jumping right back into the music.
Tanaka ends up joining the first years’ rehearsal on the fourth morning before the official start of the school day, not that it’s really a well-kept secret that the two rehearse before anybody else gets there. They’re rightfully surprised to see him open the door to their practice room, but the atmosphere around the flutist as he steps in to join them changes the mood changes.
Notes played from tired repetition become more open, more alive. When Tanaka pulls out his flute and plays along with Hinata’s part, theres a call and response between Kageyama’s part and theirs that is unlike something the oboist has ever experienced before. Music that was before simply notes rendered from the page now become part of a musical conversation between low string and woodwind that’s significantly different.
“You shouldn’t underestimate your underclassmen,” Tanaka says, all pride and radiant energy. “We have the experience.”
When Hinata goes wide eyed and thanks him with the most enthusiastic bow the second year has ever received, then goes on to tell him, “You’re so amazing!” and, “I want to learn more from you, Tanaka-senpai!” even Kageyama can’t help getting caught in his excitement.
Tanaka thinks he might like this couple of oddballs.
“You know, I don’t think Mozart did that,” Daichi says casually as he walks into the central music room where Suga is sitting behind the grand piano, stand light shining brightly upon the keys and the music that’s in complete disarray beneath it; when he looks up at Daichi, the little lamp frames his face in yellow-white light and, even under the dim ceiling lights, makes his surprise that much more evident. The metronome on top of the piano is still ticking, and the sheet of paper in the musician’s hand is completely covered in marks, some blue and some red, both emphasized by bold black. There’s a marker cap in his mouth.
Suga takes the piece of plastic from between his teeth and places it back on the blue marker that it came from so that he can greet Daichi with a warm smile as he walks up to sit beside him on the piano bench, picking up some of the scattered pieces of music and putting them back in order. “It’s already dark, you know,” he says, and it’s as soft and as distant as the night’s cool air outside.
Suga hums in pensive confirmation and glances down at the piece of music still in his hand as he pushes a hand through his hair and out of his face. “Why did you stick around, then?”
“I was going to wait to walk home with you, but you’ve been playing for so long now I figured I’d come in. I was just listening. Takeda-sensei said we could stay as long as I lock up.” The metronome leaves heavy clicks when silence hangs over them, as Suga puts the music back on the piano, as Daichi pulls down the cover for the piano keys and turns of the stand light; it keeps ticking until tired eyes follow the clarinetist’s hand up to the offending object and flicks it off.
“The competition is in 12 days,” Suga says, and it sounds like a plea.
A plea to continue, a plea to improve, a plea that makes Daichi’s lips turn down and his eyebrows knit together, one that carries the resonance of notes that have long stopped ringing.
“One more time,” Hinata says, eyes scanning the lines and dots on his stand, practically bouncing on the balls of his feet as his fingers press keys spontaneously.
“Maybe if we didn’t have to keep stopping for you to remember a damn fingering, I wouldn’t be so tired of this piece,” Kageyama growls out. It’s Friday afternoon, the last time they’ll have to practice before they play for the group at Monday’s rehearsal. Though he knows he has to get this right and play it well in front of the upperclassmen, he’s sick of repeating the same sections over and over countless times. He feels like a record that keeps skipping back over the same ten seconds on an endless loop, and he thinks Hinata has gotten a lot more tolerable with the way he’s playing and actually reading the music. It’s just the oboist’s nature to be persistent, and he wonders how the small embodiment of energy has the endurance to keep going without a single complaint.
“I’ve been doing really well, though! We haven’t had to stop at all this rehearsal.”
The clicking of the door opening makes them both turn their heads to see two boys with instrument cases hanging at their sides. Kageyama sees his reflection in the glare from the taller musician’s glasses.
“It’s about time we caught a glimpse of you two,” the blond one says, and Hinata is standing there with a look of confusion until something seems to come together in his head.
“Are you the other first years?” He asks excitedly, and the boy scoffs.
“Yeah, we are,” the other says, freckles and dark hair moving gracelessly up and down as he nods.
“I’m Tsukishima, and that’s Yamaguchi,” he says and motions with his thumb for emphasis. “We’re string musicians too; try not to be too jealous.”
“Tsukki has the best vibrato,” Yamaguchi says, earning him an elbow from Tsukishima. “Sorry.”
Hinata hasn’t met many string players, but the rumor he’s heard about them all being pretentions hasn’t necessarily been disproved yet, and he doesn’t like the first impression he’s getting from them.
“So, an oboist and a cellist, huh? What a pitiful combination. What’s it like playing with the Grand Maestro, huh?”
Something ignites in Kageyama at the mention of his previous title, the one that he carried from junior high and sends him practically staggering up from his seat to confront the blond who had mentioned it.
“Don’t call me that, got it? Why don’t you get lost,” he asserts with a shove. The glare he receives isn’t sharp like daggers, but rather framed with arrogance; he’s teasing, but he’s doing it well and getting exactly the reaction he wants.
“So it’s true. He does get pissy when people call him ‘maestro.’”
“Why don’t you shut your mouth?”
“I’m here, too,” Hinata says timidly, but goes completely unnoticed.
“Why don’t you tell him how you got that title, huh? I bet he’d love to hear.”
“Get lost,” Kageyama says, louder this time.
“You wish.”
“I’m here, too!” Hinata all but shouts this time. “You’re interrupting, so why don’t you stop calling him that and leave so that we can prepare to outstage you on Monday, alright?” Kageyama feels like he should commend him, until Tsukishima shoots the smaller boy another one of those glares and he nearly melts into a puddle of anxiety on the floor.
He huffs out a laugh before turning and gesturing for Yamaguchi to follow him out. “If you want to prove something to the others, maybe we’ll dumb down our performance for you,” is the last thing he says before the door is pulled forcefully shut.
“One more time,” and Kageyama nods.
“We’ll be playing Amazing Grace,” Tsukishima says, and Tanaka has the gall to snort before Daichi smacks him.
Nobody expects them to sound as experienced as they seem to be, a first year violinist and a first year violist who are almost always together and play like honey and morning dew on overgrown grass. They don’t expect for Tsukishima to play the entirety of the first phrase as a solo, or for him to do it with such confidence and stability that he looks almost uninterested in the music when everybody else is. A harmony line from viola enters, a base for the violin as the notes keep coming and they seem to draw their composure from each other.
The viola’s sound isn’t as developed as the violin’s, but with Tsukishima playing with an elegant sound and Yamaguchi playing steady and supportive harmony for the contrasting melody, it’s warm and gentle and resembles that of a pink sunrise. The subtle grace notes and undertones make the music seem alive, adds life to the simple annotation of wide notes and repetition. It doesn’t seem dissonant or exaggerated at any point throughout the music, and they seem to trust each other with every phrase, every note that they play. They bring out the best in each other, these two, and there’s no doubt in anybody’s mind that that’s what makes them so inseparable.
They bow at the conclusion to their piece; it wasn’t long, wasn’t anything difficult, but the upperclassman, and admittedly the other first years, will agree that it was the best arrangement of Amazing Grace that they ever heard. Hinata is still clapping when Kageyama nudges him to stand in because he evidently forgot that he will also be performing, even with his oboe sitting in his lap and a reed between his lips (which he nearly drops when he stands up).
“Good luck,” Tsukishima says as they pass each other, and Kageyama can hear all of the malice laced in his speech. “Not that you’ll need it, of course.”
It’s as Kageyama is pulling up his chair and retrieving a stand for Hinata that he notices fidgety fingers and bouncing, and he only then considers the fact that he may have never played in front of an audience before, besides the spur-of-the-moment thing he pulled earlier with the Moldau, and his chances of having played with somebody for an audience is about one to a million. Unluckily for Hinata, Kageyama has never been good with motivational speeches.
“Hey, stop being so shaky, it’ll just mess you up more than you already might.”
The air seems frozen for a moment, which is mostly due to Hinata actually freezing and then completely denying the fact that anything is wrong. “I’m not shaky, and that was mean.”
“Hinata,” a voice comes from the seats in front of them as he almost drops his music. It’s Suga, giving him a smile that seems to be telling him, everything is going to be alright. “Remember what we’ve been working on, okay?”
The oboist’s entire expression changes into that of sunshine and enthusiasm, like it was on that first day in the music room, when he emanated like the bright oranges of fall, because that’s how Hinata is, like the cherry blossoms that bloom in the spring and the leaves that fall off months later, his fervor is beautiful but fragile; just a shift and it’s gone.
When he looks to Kageyama then, it’s with an eagerness that makes the cellist want to start before it disappears, like the pink petals of seasonal flowers in the spring, and colored leaves that will soon be buried in the first snow of winter, and so he starts before the wind can pluck those petals from their stems.
Kageyama’s cello sounds like remorse and longing when he starts, emotions that are not only audible, but visual as well. The movement of dark hair across closed eyes and the way he conveys his emotions through the motion of his arm exerts something upon the audience that transcends the music itself, and the feeling he pours into the phrase flows through the room like smoke, coating everything in its discernable color, covering Hinata in its relentless push and pull, dragging him along when he, too, begins to play.
Cello and oboe, a combination so unknown that it receives a reaction from the audience for simply being, for existing and resounding throughout the music hall with such exuberance that it sounds piercing, a sharp contrast that isn’t as inconceivable as its made out to be; it’s a sound that leaves you wanting more with nowhere to go.
With the drive from the aura that Kageyama had influenced, precision and drive are both at their peaks, higher than they’ve ever been when they rehearsed in practice rooms bathed in sunrise and inevitable starlight. Hinata’s oboe echoes steady reds accented by harsh greens, and Kageyama is working less to match intonation. In other words, it’s the best they’ve ever played together.
The ending chord strikes their audience with a desire for more, more of the unique timbre of a duet that was never meant to exist, not by traditional standards. With the induction of four first years, two who are like pillars for each other and two who play as if they’re competing, the group feels more united.
More united, perhaps, but Suga can’t help but continue to feel a little empty.