Pursuing Miss Introvert

Chapter 8. Strings To My Heart

"You ready?"

Claire asked for the third time in just half an hour.

Her friend was nervous. Her usual perky demeanor vanished and was now replaced by panic, judging by the way she paced the corridor back and forth without rest.

"Girl, if you continue doing that, we won't make it at all."

Milly commented with a soft sigh.

"You're making me even more nervous, can you please just settle down a little?"

Her voice quivered from the nerves she felt waiting for the audition hall to open.

Today was the audition day for the music department's musical organizations. The entire school was conducting simultaneous auditions for the different musical ensembles and being first-timers, the two of them were in serious trouble unless they kept their cool and somehow survived the first round.

Claire was eyeing the show choir. She had been part of her school choir in high school and Milly really loved the texture of her voice after hearing her rehearse several times during the past week. She had that broadway quality voice; bright, clear, and crisp. While Milly desperately wanted to get into the school orchestra. That would be a dream come true if she could. Although she had been playing the piano for several years, training non-stop, being a part of a school orchestra or passing its auditions was no small feat. There were hundreds of students in their department alone, what more the entire school.

When she saw the ad a week ago, her otherwise gloomy start of the week brightened relatively from excitement. But then was immediately replaced by the growing pressure of being able to deliver her performance well to be even selected. She rehearsed for hours on end, some days with her music teacher, some days just by herself, alone at home. Milly wasted no time at school, after her classes finished, she would hurry back and spend hours rehearsing over and over until the time day she finally felt she was confident. But all those seemed to have melted away today.

Struggling to refocus her mind to positive, she stood and wandered away from the crowd of students waiting outside the audition hall.

She had to stretch her limbs and relax while waiting, or she would absorb the nervous energy from the crowd around her. Her piece was good, she had been playing that piece for over a year.

Fifteen minutes later, the Saint John College's grand hall opened. It was a stand-alone building on the western side of the campus, adjacent to a part of the river that ran through half of the city. Outside, it didn't look as big as it was inside. The grand hall's auditorium could most likely cater to about six hundred to eight hundred seats in its full seating capacity, and its oval stage was wide enough to maybe fit a thirty-person orchestra or several number of dancers at one time.

Milly sat with Claire on the left side of the hall, near the entrance door. On the left side of the stage was a grand piano, standing elegant and majestic against the spotlight directly above it.

But the true marvel of today's event was the school's apparent search for new talent all across genres of music. After all, Saint John college came highly recommended for its music and art department.

Laurence scanned the crowd several times over the course of an hour, wondering where she might be seated. To say he had growing feelings for Amelia was an understatement. It had been more than a week since he saw her. He came to the art building several times to get a glimpse of her and how she was doing, but she hadn't been there. Casually asking Ryan, his friend didn't know either, although he suspected she might be somewhere towards the front, but couldn't be sure.

They were merely spectators today, he didn't think a three-point shot from him would entice the members of the jury one bit, Laurence thought. Craning his neck, he spotted her right away just when her name rang over the speakers hanging on the front wall.

"Hi."

Amelia's soft voice echoed as she spoke on the mic.

The one-shoulder peach long-sleeved top she wore over her black leggings and high-heeled boots exposed her slender frame but enhanced that obvious elegance in her posture that seemed so naturally effortless. She clipped one part of her hair to the side, exposing her collarbones and a glint of silver dangling earrings. Laurence didn't know how she could do it. How she could look so fragile and innocent, yet so alluring and subtly sensual, without even trying.

"Hello, what's your name?"

One member of the jury asked.

"Hi, my name's Amelia."

She answered with a slight bow of her head, acknowledging the crowd.

"I'm a first-year music major."

Several of the guys on his row were clearly checking her out, judging by the obvious interest in their faces and the subtle tapping of shoulders when she spoke.

"Alright, what do you have for us today?"

The same jury asked again.

"I'm gonna play Rain Siren by Alpacae in C minor."

Laurence realized he had it bad when he felt goosebumps on the back of his neck by just hearing her recite the name of the song, although he didn't have any idea what that was exactly.

"Alright, good luck."

The professor signaled her to proceed and a student assistant momentarily approached her to get the mic.

Confident in her strides, Amelia walked to the grand piano and gently sat in front of it, calmly caressing its surface, as if to let it know she was in command, taking her time, before slowly turning her head sideways, facing the audience once more, a small smile playing on her lips. She already held the audience captive, before she even struck a single chord.

Amelia closed her eyes for a second, before gracefully moving her fingers over the keys, and she began with a soft melody that spoke of a woman's journey of love and surrender; to a lover, she thought answered the call of her heart, a lover who possessed her in complete abandon, but then as the chords progressed, tension and longing replaced the sweetness; as she fell in despair and loss, her lover, no more, lost, forever.

Amelia, graceful in her slender form, seemed lost too, in every single stroke of her fingers on the keys, the song became her song, the woman's despair became hers, and the longing in the melody she created, became the strings that pulled her audience into a trance, mesmerized, until her last note echoed in the auditorium.

Taking a second to compose herself, she stood, and bowed, just as applause and shouts erupted in the big hall.

Smiling timidly, Milly thanked the audience once more, before walking down the stage, and out of the concert hall.