“Forget it. We walked into each other. Nobody’s fault,” he said with a shrug and a near smile. “Glad your arm is healed. I need a coffee too, preferably to drink.” Now, he smiled.
Oh, heck. It made me weak at the knees. Where the fuck did that smile come from?
For a few seconds, he kept me in a form of visual captivity. I couldn’t break his hold. Each gigantic thump of my heart boomed in my throat.
“I’ll get that drink,” he repeated. With a click of his heels, he vacated the spot in front of me and left me hanging in mid-air, oblivious to the heat of the cup until it stung. I switched hands and backed away. I cornered myself, sipped on my drink and kept my back to the wall. Debbie pounced, interrogating me about my absence. I muttered responses.
The room filled with bodies. Stefan vanished behind a sea of musicians, and I gave Debbie my full attention. She updated me on Felix. The news sounded bad.
“Stefan responded to our call at short notice. His rates are reasonable. He’s certainly keen.” She flicked her gaze to one side. A tousled head of dark hair appeared briefly between two trumpeters then slipped away again. “Young, too,” Debbie murmured.
Stefan was certainly much younger than Felix, who must have been in his fifties. How much younger?
The second half of the practice session began promptly. I returned to my seat, picked up Nettie with a determined frame of mind—no more hiccups. I’d done the sight-reading stage, familiarity with the music growing with each run-through. I perched on my chair and licked my reed.
Stefan bounced onto the stand, fired with new energy, and flashed his coffee-stained shirt. “Right, enough of Spanish folk. Let’s have a go at the Mussorgsky.”
He changed the music. Shit. I fumbled with the sheets and, with a sinking sensation, found myself staring at another challenging clarinet part—Night On Bald Mountain.
Was he punishing me? Had my clumsy coffee spill instigated the selection? Surely, a worthy conductor would never be malicious or personal in his choices?
“Have you played this yet?” I asked Cordelia.
“Once through last week. We didn’t exactly excel at it.” She sniggered.
Stefan rattled his baton like a saber and waved the beat. I cursed again. Couldn’t he take it slower!
Forty-five minutes later, I folded my stand away. I rammed the tripod legs together, nearly catching my finger. My brain had expired. My only consolation was that Stefan hadn’t picked me out individually. Instead, he’d labored the French horns until the lead horn player, Mark, had seemed to deflate with frustration.
“Is he always like this?” I’d whispered to Cordelia during a short interlude while Stefan dissected the strings.
“What? Oh, a hard taskmaster, yeah.” She’d frowned. “But, we all agree we’ve achieved more in four weeks with Stefan than months with Felix. Poor man. He mustn’t know.” She’d shaken her head.
I assumed she meant Felix.
I took my time disassembling Nettie, cleaning out her insides. The last bus left a little after ten and with rain cascading down the windows, I was in no hurry to stand in a downpour at a bus stop for a second time.
Stepping out into the persistent cloudburst, I yanked up my hood, clutched my music case to my chest and resigned myself to being drenched yet again.
“Callie?”
I started. The name rang out from the roadside. I turned and saw him standing next to a sporty BMW parked by the curb.
“You’re catching a bus?” Stefan had the driver’s door open. He’d paused half in and out, a foot in the well.
I nodded.
“Where to?”
I hesitated. He flicked his hair out of his eyes. The rain fell heavier, pattering on the pavement. I told him the name of my street.
“Get in. It’s on my way home.”
Seriously? A big coincidence or a lie. I hardly knew the man. I shivered. The wind caught the tip of my nose and blew the hood off my head. I yanked it back down and stepped toward the passenger door. Stefan came around, quickly unburdening me of my stand and music case. He placed them in the boot. He didn’t take Nettie. A musician never parts easily from their instrument.
I gawped when he opened the passenger door for me. Suddenly, he was all gentlemanly.
“Hurry up, I’m getting soaking wet,” he said briskly. My little bubble burst. So much for courtesy.