Midnight Insomnia
Music Will Only Break Your Heart
He kicked the violin case away from him, an angry thump resounded as it hit the top of the seat in the row before. The instrument vibrated and clanked inside the vinyl and wood casing, seeming to mirror the scuff marks on the edge of the outside. No mar on that case could ever emphasize his contempt for himself at that moment. No blade could reaffirm him with the fantasy, ever stroke was mere cuts compared to the gash that had burst from his heart. Bleeding, ripping, everything from his desire, this contempt did, and sitting in that seat with its cliché theater red seats and gold trimming, Henry was trying to imagine what a dream was.
Three months of preparing for this audition, the pain of memorizing concertos, the sleepless nights, everything, all wasted in the seven minutes and thirteen seconds he had ruined for himself, unwittingly. Milan, the only goal he had fantasized about, with playing in their orchestra, lost, unfortunate, but cold fact. There was nothing else he could do, this school was his one shot to the far away city, and from within his grasp he had dropped it.
Stormily, he slumped over and held his head. The only saving point of the ordeal was that no one other than the judges had heard him flounder. And even though he felt bad about having that mindset, and couldn’t help but think it was the reason for his failure, it still brought a measure of comfort.
He could only blame himself. There was no blaming his violin this time; it was flawless in the auditioning room that drew out the full acoustic vibrations of every tremolo, and its tone left nothing to be desired. It was all him, all the flaws, and he knew it. Sitting in the waiting room/auditorium he could only think about his dismal performance, about how his fingers slipped from the correct positions, about how the bow was drawn but the sound was fragile, broken by the breeze of his own breath. A cascade of noise now, softly whooshing, yet louder than before, a torrent of screeches as the fingers slipped twice, four times, an entire run started off on the wrong note in the wrong key…
‘Asturias’ by Isaac Albeniz, a fierce song that he preferred to hear then to listen, but what a torture he thought of it to play. He could still feel the bow trembling in his fingers as it had before during practice, but this time was different; it felt like jello, sinking down in uncertainty but with the lethargic movement to pull back up, but it was too late, the jello had already solidified.
It was like that in his first duet, where the audience was cold as the snow that crunched underneath his feet. A loud applause but with empty meanings; ice statures that gave no feedback and no encouragement. They weren’t supposed to be emotional, but they were supposed to give a few signs of life, right? He remembered stepping on that stage, with a professional pianist, his accompanist, that he didn’t know held the future of this musical career within his spindly fingers.
A heat wave, much like the thundering of the cars pounded against his head. Like traffic, screeching without halting, screaming at him to move, but he couldn’t. He was afraid of jay walking, of taking a step forward onto streets that weren’t paved neatly for him, but that wasn’t true, was it? He grew up on the streets with nothing but a desire for music, so why couldn’t he move? Perhaps, if he thought rationally, it might have been because the cars were moving too fast; he was terrified of being hit, but even more terrifying was the thought that he might be stranded on that street corner smashed against others hoping, praying. He was more terror-stricken that he would never be able to move on. He couldn’t stay stranded by that “Don’t Walk” sign forever.
‘Music will only break your heart,’ he signed, finally realizing what his violin instructor had tried to teach him. He had loved music too much, he couldn’t see this far into the future, where it would run over his dreams with a semi and leave him gaping in the darkness under the seats of an auditorium. Scrunched up trying to access the damage done to his most precious possession his heart ached.
‘Step one of a heart breaking…’
“I hope it isn’t broken,” a voice perused curiously from behind him. A head poked, interested, into his personal space and rested on his shoulder. Space, he needed space.
Moodily he drew the case with its contents hopefully safe inside, back up with him, ignoring the other male. He rubbed off some of the scuff marks, but the tiny grazes still remained. Henry tried to look beneath his bangs but remembered that he had cut his hair before the audition so that he would look nice and well-groomed for the judges. There was no stopping that action now; he peeked at the person beside him with an absolutely non-sneaky glance.
Taller, slightly taller than him, with this goofy smile: rich looking, with a well tailored uniform and squeaky clean black shoes. He turned his head in disgust; it was always this kind that was picking on the less fortunate. Besides, he seemed like the weirdo who stalked people from across the street.
“Zhoumi,” the guy proffered a hand. Henry contemplated on whether he should shake it or not, but all those tumult emotions of being bullied when he was younger kept surfacing. Tears willed themselves to form but he shrugged them off; he didn’t cry before, and he wouldn’t now.
A broken string…
Fractured bones…
A wooden neck…
A neck of flesh…
…trampled.
A flinch, completely reflexive, a rub on his neck, seemingly innocent. Memories scar.
He refused the hand.
“I don’t like shaking hands with strangers,” he responded pointedly before picking up his things and moving on. He only stayed to see his results anyways, but he was pretty positive on those. The wooden case swung from his right hand, his grip so hard on the handle that if the case had been any older or any more dew-eaten and moldy, it would have cracked.
‘Don’t break,’ he prayed to the case, because with his current luck of failure and meeting awkward strangers, the handle would snap off or the locks holding it closed would unclick and all of its contents would spill out.
‘Thump’ his heart hammered just as his feet did, a pitter-patter of storms and stomps that conveyed his feelings. A fool. He would look like a fool if he didn’t get out of there immediately.
‘Thump’ the carpet sounded grated to his trained ears, like the accidental that he forgot to follow through.
‘T-thump’ and uneven beat, like in his audition.
‘Thump’ he wished that he could stop and rewind everything. He wished he could thrash at the posh building; bang against the walls and cry, but he couldn’t. That would be finalizing the ruin of his professional musical life that hadn’t taken off yet.
‘thump’ another person entered the room, a male. The gentle sliding of the great double doors was cavernous, carnivorous, devouring. They nibbled at him, just as fear would, the near silent slide a guillotine coming down upon his neck.
“Henry Lau?”
‘…’ he believed that his heart has stopped along with his feet.
“Here” The patterns in the carpet were so intricate, dancing leaves of oak and maple, embroidered with birds and pipes. The walkway was wide too, easily fitting two or more people. Probably for a piano.
“Your results” the words slammed down against his drifting away mind with the force of an out of tune chord played at fortississmo.
A manila folder is extended underneath his bowed head. He could not refuse as he did with the hand.
He knew that he had flubbed, that the results would only bring disappointment. He could feel it in his bones, an ache like arthritis, like osteoporosis, kind of like breaking up. But how could he take this back to his parents, who had reluctantly let him audition, even at the sight of the amount of money just an entrance fee would cost.
With a shaking hand he reached out to grasp the tabbed side and flicked it open.
‘I’m going to cry.’
Three separate evaluations sheets were practically saying ‘you suck’. He didn’t want anyone else to know about it, but this kind of thing you can’t hide easily. Shakily he went to tuck it under his right arm where there was another folder, slightly bigger, containing all of his music, in an effort to camouflage the results in plain sight.
A hand swiped his music folder away, and he was left clutching the manila
Music flies in all directions, much like confetti and beads do during Mardi Gras.
His only thought is that it is lucky that the results weren’t among the free tokens.
Zhoumi’s smiling face tells him that it wasn’t luck.
“You looked like you wanted to throw a tantrum, so I did it for you. No need to thank me, even if I just gained the title of a band geek jerk. I bet they were only a rumor, right? Nope, I’m right here.” Zhoumi tries to shrug off-handedly, but there is a light smile tugging at his lips.
Henry can only stand there, relatively stunned and aghast, completely oblivious that flies are entering his mouth. For a split second he didn’t know whether to kiss or slap the taller man. Instead, he hugged him, sobbing desperately into the blue blazer, crinkling it in his grasping hands.
“You have small hands,” the deep voice chuckled and his reply is Henry slamming his fist against the others chest.
“Jerk.” He wants to say thanks, but the situation is already awkward enough.
A hand began to pet his hand, rather affectionately, and it was almost as if the hand was radiating warmth. Or perhaps that warmth was from his cheeks.
“Do you remember me? I met you at the concert in Hangzhu, backstage, right?” he couldn’t remember. All he knew was that a teddy bear was talking to him and he wasn’t sure if they were supposed to.
The petting changed to tugging at tufts of his hair. Or what was left of it.
“You played brilliantly. I congratulated you, we shook hands…your hair was longer then,” there was a frown in that voice, Henry heard it, and as he thought about it, this man…
“I bumped into you on my way out, right?”
A laugh and a smile.
“Much like when you refused my hand and then hugged me, yes?” Henry could feel Zhoumi shake his head and he pulled back from the long-armed embrace. A sudden chill hit his neck as the taller male unwrapped his limbs and began picking up the scattered sheet music.
“You’re such a little kid,” he smirked triumphantly, a knowing smile dancing on his lips. Henry pouted unknowingly.
“You looked better then,” he stood up, and straightened his blazer before handing Henry his stack of papers.
Another mysterious glance full of mirth was thrown in Henry’s direction.
“You weren’t sobbing in my arms then either.” Five steps to the door, thump, thump, thump, thump…pause.
“This isn’t the only school for music, you know. I want to hear you perform again.” Thump
Heat rose up in his cheeks, but Henry kept collecting the rest of the music. Pursue music, right when he had already absolved to give up?
‘Music will only break your heart,’
‘….but it’ll end up mending it better than ever.’
He shook his head. Why was it that the old geezers always knew the answers to everything?
He kicked the violin case away from him, an angry thump resounded as it hit the top of the seat in the row before. The instrument vibrated and clanked inside the vinyl and wood casing, seeming to mirror the scuff marks on the edge of the outside. No mar on that case could ever emphasize his contempt for himself at that moment. No blade could reaffirm him with the fantasy, ever stroke was mere cuts compared to the gash that had burst from his heart. Bleeding, ripping, everything from his desire, this contempt did, and sitting in that seat with its cliché theater red seats and gold trimming, Henry was trying to imagine what a dream was.
Three months of preparing for this audition, the pain of memorizing concertos, the sleepless nights, everything, all wasted in the seven minutes and thirteen seconds he had ruined for himself, unwittingly. Milan, the only goal he had fantasized about, with playing in their orchestra, lost, unfortunate, but cold fact. There was nothing else he could do, this school was his one shot to the far away city, and from within his grasp he had dropped it.
Stormily, he slumped over and held his head. The only saving point of the ordeal was that no one other than the judges had heard him flounder. And even though he felt bad about having that mindset, and couldn’t help but think it was the reason for his failure, it still brought a measure of comfort.
He could only blame himself. There was no blaming his violin this time; it was flawless in the auditioning room that drew out the full acoustic vibrations of every tremolo, and its tone left nothing to be desired. It was all him, all the flaws, and he knew it. Sitting in the waiting room/auditorium he could only think about his dismal performance, about how his fingers slipped from the correct positions, about how the bow was drawn but the sound was fragile, broken by the breeze of his own breath. A cascade of noise now, softly whooshing, yet louder than before, a torrent of screeches as the fingers slipped twice, four times, an entire run started off on the wrong note in the wrong key…
‘Asturias’ by Isaac Albeniz, a fierce song that he preferred to hear then to listen, but what a torture he thought of it to play. He could still feel the bow trembling in his fingers as it had before during practice, but this time was different; it felt like jello, sinking down in uncertainty but with the lethargic movement to pull back up, but it was too late, the jello had already solidified.
It was like that in his first duet, where the audience was cold as the snow that crunched underneath his feet. A loud applause but with empty meanings; ice statures that gave no feedback and no encouragement. They weren’t supposed to be emotional, but they were supposed to give a few signs of life, right? He remembered stepping on that stage, with a professional pianist, his accompanist, that he didn’t know held the future of this musical career within his spindly fingers.
A heat wave, much like the thundering of the cars pounded against his head. Like traffic, screeching without halting, screaming at him to move, but he couldn’t. He was afraid of jay walking, of taking a step forward onto streets that weren’t paved neatly for him, but that wasn’t true, was it? He grew up on the streets with nothing but a desire for music, so why couldn’t he move? Perhaps, if he thought rationally, it might have been because the cars were moving too fast; he was terrified of being hit, but even more terrifying was the thought that he might be stranded on that street corner smashed against others hoping, praying. He was more terror-stricken that he would never be able to move on. He couldn’t stay stranded by that “Don’t Walk” sign forever.
‘Music will only break your heart,’ he signed, finally realizing what his violin instructor had tried to teach him. He had loved music too much, he couldn’t see this far into the future, where it would run over his dreams with a semi and leave him gaping in the darkness under the seats of an auditorium. Scrunched up trying to access the damage done to his most precious possession his heart ached.
‘Step one of a heart breaking…’
“I hope it isn’t broken,” a voice perused curiously from behind him. A head poked, interested, into his personal space and rested on his shoulder. Space, he needed space.
Moodily he drew the case with its contents hopefully safe inside, back up with him, ignoring the other male. He rubbed off some of the scuff marks, but the tiny grazes still remained. Henry tried to look beneath his bangs but remembered that he had cut his hair before the audition so that he would look nice and well-groomed for the judges. There was no stopping that action now; he peeked at the person beside him with an absolutely non-sneaky glance.
Taller, slightly taller than him, with this goofy smile: rich looking, with a well tailored uniform and squeaky clean black shoes. He turned his head in disgust; it was always this kind that was picking on the less fortunate. Besides, he seemed like the weirdo who stalked people from across the street.
“Zhoumi,” the guy proffered a hand. Henry contemplated on whether he should shake it or not, but all those tumult emotions of being bullied when he was younger kept surfacing. Tears willed themselves to form but he shrugged them off; he didn’t cry before, and he wouldn’t now.
A broken string…
Fractured bones…
A wooden neck…
A neck of flesh…
…trampled.
A flinch, completely reflexive, a rub on his neck, seemingly innocent. Memories scar.
He refused the hand.
“I don’t like shaking hands with strangers,” he responded pointedly before picking up his things and moving on. He only stayed to see his results anyways, but he was pretty positive on those. The wooden case swung from his right hand, his grip so hard on the handle that if the case had been any older or any more dew-eaten and moldy, it would have cracked.
‘Don’t break,’ he prayed to the case, because with his current luck of failure and meeting awkward strangers, the handle would snap off or the locks holding it closed would unclick and all of its contents would spill out.
‘Thump’ his heart hammered just as his feet did, a pitter-patter of storms and stomps that conveyed his feelings. A fool. He would look like a fool if he didn’t get out of there immediately.
‘Thump’ the carpet sounded grated to his trained ears, like the accidental that he forgot to follow through.
‘T-thump’ and uneven beat, like in his audition.
‘Thump’ he wished that he could stop and rewind everything. He wished he could thrash at the posh building; bang against the walls and cry, but he couldn’t. That would be finalizing the ruin of his professional musical life that hadn’t taken off yet.
‘thump’ another person entered the room, a male. The gentle sliding of the great double doors was cavernous, carnivorous, devouring. They nibbled at him, just as fear would, the near silent slide a guillotine coming down upon his neck.
“Henry Lau?”
‘…’ he believed that his heart has stopped along with his feet.
“Here” The patterns in the carpet were so intricate, dancing leaves of oak and maple, embroidered with birds and pipes. The walkway was wide too, easily fitting two or more people. Probably for a piano.
“Your results” the words slammed down against his drifting away mind with the force of an out of tune chord played at fortississmo.
A manila folder is extended underneath his bowed head. He could not refuse as he did with the hand.
He knew that he had flubbed, that the results would only bring disappointment. He could feel it in his bones, an ache like arthritis, like osteoporosis, kind of like breaking up. But how could he take this back to his parents, who had reluctantly let him audition, even at the sight of the amount of money just an entrance fee would cost.
With a shaking hand he reached out to grasp the tabbed side and flicked it open.
‘I’m going to cry.’
Three separate evaluations sheets were practically saying ‘you suck’. He didn’t want anyone else to know about it, but this kind of thing you can’t hide easily. Shakily he went to tuck it under his right arm where there was another folder, slightly bigger, containing all of his music, in an effort to camouflage the results in plain sight.
A hand swiped his music folder away, and he was left clutching the manila
Music flies in all directions, much like confetti and beads do during Mardi Gras.
His only thought is that it is lucky that the results weren’t among the free tokens.
Zhoumi’s smiling face tells him that it wasn’t luck.
“You looked like you wanted to throw a tantrum, so I did it for you. No need to thank me, even if I just gained the title of a band geek jerk. I bet they were only a rumor, right? Nope, I’m right here.” Zhoumi tries to shrug off-handedly, but there is a light smile tugging at his lips.
Henry can only stand there, relatively stunned and aghast, completely oblivious that flies are entering his mouth. For a split second he didn’t know whether to kiss or slap the taller man. Instead, he hugged him, sobbing desperately into the blue blazer, crinkling it in his grasping hands.
“You have small hands,” the deep voice chuckled and his reply is Henry slamming his fist against the others chest.
“Jerk.” He wants to say thanks, but the situation is already awkward enough.
A hand began to pet his hand, rather affectionately, and it was almost as if the hand was radiating warmth. Or perhaps that warmth was from his cheeks.
“Do you remember me? I met you at the concert in Hangzhu, backstage, right?” he couldn’t remember. All he knew was that a teddy bear was talking to him and he wasn’t sure if they were supposed to.
The petting changed to tugging at tufts of his hair. Or what was left of it.
“You played brilliantly. I congratulated you, we shook hands…your hair was longer then,” there was a frown in that voice, Henry heard it, and as he thought about it, this man…
“I bumped into you on my way out, right?”
A laugh and a smile.
“Much like when you refused my hand and then hugged me, yes?” Henry could feel Zhoumi shake his head and he pulled back from the long-armed embrace. A sudden chill hit his neck as the taller male unwrapped his limbs and began picking up the scattered sheet music.
“You’re such a little kid,” he smirked triumphantly, a knowing smile dancing on his lips. Henry pouted unknowingly.
“You looked better then,” he stood up, and straightened his blazer before handing Henry his stack of papers.
Another mysterious glance full of mirth was thrown in Henry’s direction.
“You weren’t sobbing in my arms then either.” Five steps to the door, thump, thump, thump, thump…pause.
“This isn’t the only school for music, you know. I want to hear you perform again.” Thump
Heat rose up in his cheeks, but Henry kept collecting the rest of the music. Pursue music, right when he had already absolved to give up?
‘Music will only break your heart,’
‘….but it’ll end up mending it better than ever.’
He shook his head. Why was it that the old geezers always knew the answers to everything?