(Hi, this is my first one shot I've officially published on this website, feel free to offer any writing advice or suggestions. I made this on a whim after reading If I Stay for the tenth time. Gayle Forman doesn't play the cello, so I wanted to rewrite the audition scene with how Mia would describe it. Mia and the other characters belong to Gayle Forman, along with the original idea, etc.)
The conductor must have woken up, because the orchestra suddenly rose up in a crescendo of sound and emotion. At the very climax of the song, when everyone pours out their hearts until they can't feel their arms anymore, I glanced over at Gramps. I don't know if it was the creaky radio, or because I was the only classical musician in the truck, but he didn't seem to notice anything abnormal. I was used to this with Adam, when I fervently tried to explain the emotion without words that he only seemed to experience through rock music. With Gramps, we hadn't spoken for the past hour on the road so I didn't bother asking him if he could feel it. And that was okay. The silence was helpful in fact. My audition to Juilliard was only ten minutes away.
The pieces of music bounced around my head like annoying song lyrics you just can't forget not matter how hard you try. I always worry about forgetting my music on the stage, the three judges huffing out of impatience and time wasted. Still, I trusted the music in my head. It was a wall I could lean back on and just allow the cello to speak for itself. I also trusted Professor Christie. I knew she wouldn't have let me leave the house if she didn't think I was ready
The girl before me just started her last piece. She was good, really good. The intonation of the notes was razor sharp, her tone was beautiful, and most of all she looked utterly relaxed. Unlike myself and the rest of the auditionees in the waiting room adjacent to the stage. Juilliard was a dream for us, and the three judges had the option of either giving it to us or shattering it into a million pieces.
All my thoughts about Adam, my family, my future, started to fade once the echo of the girl's heels started heading towards me.
I stepped out onto the stage, lowering my gaze at the floor so I wouldn't look the judges in the face. The cello weighed heavily in my hand until I nestled it between my knees when I sat down. Thankfully, they had had an identical chair in the waiting room so there would be no need to change the height of my pin on the bottom. I rubbed my right hand on my knee, my good-luck-starting charm in a way, took a deep breath, then began.
I'll admit I sounded really good. The acoustics of the stage were professional, so it could've been that. I made every bow stroke, every flick of my wrist, every position change mean life or death. Even when I played a very quiet cadenza I pretended it was the climax of the piece, like with Gramps earlier. I pretended he was in the audience, and my job was to grip him with so much emotion he would understand what I always tried to explain.
I ended the final fermata with the last vibrato energy my left hand could offer. When I stood up, I was exhausted and so alive at the same time. The judge on the left clapped a little after I stood up, something extremely rare from a Juilliard judge, and I could make out the smallest smile on her lips. I felt so happy, so at peace. Although it took only a couple seconds of standing there to bow, I could see myself ten years from now doing the exact same thing. Trying to share my heart through music, ultimately changing theirs.