Chapter 9
Sakura found Syaoran early in the morning at eight-o-clock in the same practice room playing on what seems to be the worst piano in the world. This time Syaoran managed to make it sound beautiful through some mysterious technique he picked up in the weeks they did not practice together.
Syaoran stopped as soon as she entered the room and smiled.
" Ohayo." He called.
" Ohayo." Sakura answered back. " Where's Eriol-kun?"
" Oh. He went downstairs to get breakfast."
" I see." Sakura answered.
" I can't believe this! I got a B from Yoshihara!" Yamazaki cried.
" You're in Yoshihara's orchestra?" Eriol asked.
" Iie."
" So...how did you get a B from him?"
" Oh. Yoshihara's my theory teacher."
" Yoshihara teaches theory?"
" Hai. Don't you know that?"
" But wait, I know he teaches conducting, musical history and the orchestra-"
" Iie! Not that Yoshihara! This dumb school hired about four Yoshiharas. I'm talking
about the other one."
Eriol paused. He swallowed thoughtfully.
" Ano, which other one?"
" The little fat guy."
" Yamazaki-san."
" Hai?"
" They're all fat."
" Oh, right. I'm talking about the short and fat guy."
" They're all short."
" Really? Oh, right. Ano, I'm talking about the guy that wears glasses, and always
wears a tie for some reason-"
" Yamazaki-san."
" Hai?"
" They all wear glasses. And they all wear ties."
" Oh. Right. The bald one."
" They're ALL BALD! Yamazaki!"
" Fine! You know the guy that always eats lunch in the corner with the other tall
and fat guy?"
" That's the conducting Yoshihara, Yamazaki."
" Oh. Oops. Ano...you're hopeless."
" What does he look like?"
" He's bald, short and fat, has a round face and a nasal voice."
" Yamazaki, they're all bald, short, fat, and they all have a round face and a nasal
voice. This isn't getting me anywhere."
" The annoying guy!"
" They're all annoying!"
" How's the Swan Lake going?"
" Pretty good." Sakura answered. " Byung finally got the trumpet part right.
Everything else is normal."
" I heard that they got rid of one piano up there." Syaoran answered. " Something
wrong with it. What happened?"
" One of the college students spilled soda on the songboard. That's what Yukito
said."
" Who would be stupid enough to do that?"
" He was a drummer."
" Oh, Sakura-san, that was mean." Sakura giggled. " Hey, it was a drummer,
whether the joke on them is justified or not."
" It's not." Syaoran chuckled. " I know plenty of drummers who are very smart."
" Well, that drummer wasn't. I wonder what they did with him."
" Probably didn't do anything. First of all, he's a drummer, so he wouldn't know
that the soundboard, and mind it's called a ' soundboard', not a songboard, is
capable of rusting, and perhaps it was some unavoidable accident."
" You really think."
" I really do."
" You are such a mean guy."
" How's that mean?"
" I mean, you make fun of drummers-"
" Hey, it was you who brought that up."
" Iie. I just mentioned he was a drummer. You were the one that brought up the
joke. And you make fun of violas-"
" Iie, you make fun of violas. You were the one that said they can't move their
fingers the other day."
" But it was you who brought it up."
" Iie, I was the one that said their part is simple. You were the one that said it's
because of their technical limitations."
' Iie. I just said that usually composers don't write hard parts for violas because the
violins got all the hard part."
" Iie, I remember everything correctly. You said exactly this, " Violas usually don't
get hard parts because they can't perform complicated technical fingerings." By the
way, you totally didn't make sense."
" What in the world are you talking about!" Sakura protested. " I'd swear your
memory is impaired..."
" Ano, Eriol?"
" Hai?"
" Are the Yoshihara's from the same family?"
" Yamazaki."
" Seriously, are they? I mean, I can't think of anything else to tell you."
" What color are his eyes?"
" Brown."
" Two Yoshihara's are brown eyed. And the other one's not the conductor.
Yoshihara has grey eyes."
" Ano...which Yoshihara?"
" The one with the grey eyes."
" And who is that?"
" The conductor!"
" There are two conductors! One's for the philharmonic, and the other is for the
reportory."
Eriol threw up his hands. " Yamazaki-san, I give up. Don't tell me who it is. I'll find out for myself."
" What are you playing?" Sakura asked.
" The Pavanne by Ravel." Syaoran answered. " Remember I told you that I had to
get this ready in two weeks? I'm still messing up on this part."
He gritted his teeth and played that part really sloppily, but everything else
was perfect. Sakura blinked at how fast he had learned the piece.
" Dlgah." Syaoran groaned. Sakura giggled.
The door suddenly bursted open and Touya came in.
" Ohayo Li-san. Ohayo kaijuu. Ow, the cello is cocky today." The tall boy set the
cello down. " The breakfast is making me sick. Sakura, do you have any rosin?"
Blinking, Sakura handed her brother the rosin and watched as he put it on his
bow. Syaoran had stopped playing.
" You know, those two friends of yours are discussing about Yoshihara." Touya told
Syaoran as he sat down to rest for a while.
" Oh?" Syaoran blinked. " Which ones?"
" The British guy and his smiling friend."
" Oh." Sakura giggled. " Eriol and Yamazaki."
" Why in the world are they talking about Yoshihara?"
" Said something about there being four Yoshiharas, which is true."
" There are four?" Syaoran blinked.
" Hai. There's the theory teacher, the philharmonic conductor, which was your
teacher, the kiddy orchestra conductor, and another one that's a flutist."
" Oh dear." Syaoran knew those two well. " They'll be discussing it like crazy. Say,
Kinomoto-san, have you seen Yukito? The other day he borrowed my pencil and
disappeared. I forgot to bring another one so I have no writing utensil."
Sakura burst out laughing and Touya scowled.
" Hai. And he does not have your pencil. Here, I'll lend you one, but remember,
never lend Yukito anything for more than two minutes. He never returns things, not
because he doesn't want to but because he never remembers."
Syaoran laughed. " And I thought Yukito was a goody two shoes kind of
guy."
" Isn't that for girls?" Sakura asked.
" I don't know. That's the only thing I can think of at the moment. Oh kami! It's
nine! I have to go upstairs." Syaoran grabbed his stuff and went.
" Oh, by the way!" Sakura called to him. " Did you get the Chamber music form
yet?"
" Hai! I wanted to ask you," Syaoran stopped. " Do you want to be partners?"
" Of course!" Sakura nodded. " I'll write your name down!"
" Same here! Ja!" Syaoran left.
Syaoran went out of his chamber class with Shigeru and went down the hall
to where his next class was. Putting down his bags he sat next to a girl named
Marie. She came from France but could speak Japanese decently, although Syaoran
could hear a distinct accent.
" Did we have any homework?" Syaoran asked.
" We had to do all of exercise 10-9 and 11." Marie answered. She wanted to be
called Minako, but that didn't work because the Japanese students, for some reason,
liked the name Marie better because of the funny way it sounds. Of course, it ended
up being " Malie."
" I did it. Let me look for it."
" Hai, right, Syaoran, winner of the competition. Sure you did the homework."
Marie rolled her eyes.
" I did it. Honest. See?" Syaoran showed it to her. " I just forgot which one it was
because I did it during class and didn't bother with it."
" You what?"
" I did it during class. Remember? Sensei usually leaves the homework for last, but
last week she put it on the board."
" Okay, whatever you say." Marie went back to her work.
" Where is the sensei, by the way?" Shigeru asked.
" Out. We're having a substitute." Marie answered.
" In that case," Syaoran whispered to Shigeru, " Can you tell the sub I'm going to a
concert? for me? I mean, I have to go, I had to go anyways, so just do me this favor
this once. Onegai?"
" Fine." Shigeru rolled his eyes. " But if it turns out to be someone you know, I
won't say a word."
" Deal." Syaoran hurried out. He didn't leave anytime too soon.
" Finally!" Syaoran sighed. " I got out of that class. It's a good thing they have
Music Hour Concerts. Sweet sweet Music Hour! What piece was I supposed to play
again?"
Pondering briefly, he suddenly remembered and went down to the second floor towards Takenouchi Hall. It was one of the worst halls in the school, other than the Motou Hall, and although the piano there was excellent the sounds were just terrible.
Even so, Syaoran would do anything to get out of that theory class. He wasn't going to go back there again.
" Who's up?" He asked a friend, whose name was Tasai.
" Some guy named Ran. Weird guy. He looks like a nerd." Tasai answered.
" He's a french horn player?" Syaoran blinked. " Uglh. This room can make a harp
sound bad."
" Tell me about it." Tasai answered. " Whoa, I'm next. Wish me luck."
" What luck do you need?" Syaoran whispered back, surprised. " This is Music
Hour, for heaven's sake!"
" Still, I have a bad case of stagefright."
" So do I."
" Iie. You just go up there and play. I go up there and screw up."
Syaoran laughed quietly as his friend took his flute up. Tasai was a good
flutist. The only problem was that he sounded horrible because of the room.
Syaoran sighed. Acoustics are very very important.
Tasai and Syaoran left the terrible room.
" I sounded so awful!" He cried.
" It's the room. You were perfectly fine. How do you make such fast notes and not
mush them together?"
" It's technique."
" You're good."
" I was bad."
" It's the room." Syaoran chuckled. " Hey, do you want to go downstairs to buy
some chips from the snack machines?"
" Take my advice. Never trust those snack machines. They ate my dollar and didn't
give me anything more than once and I'm not falling for it again."
" Well, they do sell candy, by ounces, without really giving us a scale which was
stupid. We'll buy those."
" Hai!"
Syaoran arrived in the room when the cellists and the violas were moving the
piano. He dropped his bag on one of the audience seats and ran up to help.
The hall was the main hall of the entire school as well as the largest hall, fully equipped with broken lights and tattered floors. There were no windows and one of the microphones was starting to fall off. It was the grandest hall of the school as well as the scariest one because it was usually so dark, and usually silent save for Terada's battering and Yoshihara's scoldings, ( both of them) so the students often nicknamed it " The Haunted Hall".
Even so, Syaoran often felt it a great privilege to play in that hall, and he had greatly envied Eriol when he saw his friend playing proudly in front of the orchestra while he sat in the audience.
The stage was also decorated with the remains of gum and squished candy, despite the best efforts of the supervisors and the janitors. Although usually the singers, wind and brass players don't have gum or anything in their mouth save for teeth and tongues, that didn't really stop the string and drum players from finding something to chew on during the lesson. The stage was made of yellow painted wood and there were scratch marks on it from cymbals and drumsticks falling as well as cello endpoints and violin bows, and music stands being dragged over by the irresponsible students. Indeed, it was a wonderful stage to play on, with the light of the few lights that weren't broken shining right into Syaoran's eye whenever he played.
The acoustics were good; the walls were red with ridges so that the sound waves wouldn't echo too much. The audience seats were luxurious-with red velvets; some stiff because of soda that was spilled on them, some torn up by toddlers. There was a second floor above the leveled one and most people were too scared to go up there because it was so tall. Most of the seats therefore, are bright red and the velvet was mostly new. Although one was burnt-one of the lights fell and started a brief fire several months ago during a weekday and they had to evacuate the school until they realized the fire was about an inch tall when they finished.
None of the students really minded the decorations because they did not come to this school or the stage to admire the hall's looks. They came here to make music, to perform and please the audience the best they may, and the audience came here to please themselves and try to babble how good their children were. Most people avoided stiff velvets, though, because those things were never to be made right again.
The piano was brand new and was a D sized Steinway, directly imported from Germany since the New York one was too expensive. Syaoran liked the D sized Steinway pianos because they were first of all, the longest ( more than nine feet in length), and therefore the loudest, ( which was why most pianists have a B sized at most, which was only six feet in length.) and the lower notes of the piano were the deepest of all the other sized pianos. But Syaoran mostly liked the piano because it was a Steinway, and most of Steinway's pianos are much better the the old tattered Yamahas they had here.
After lifting the cover of the piano Syaoran sat down to adjust the chair while
the violas and the cellos went back to their seats with their masters. Syaoran
warmed up by playing through the piece briefly at a rapid pace while the conductor,
having broken his baton, grumbled about while borrowing one from a Yoshihara.
" And to think, that baton costed me seventy yen." Terada grumbled. Syaoran
looked at the audience. There were several people watching. Blinking at a sudden
whim he waved at them.
The audience, not sure what to do, timidly waved back.
The cellos must have thought the waving was for them, because they waved.
So did the violas.
Presently everyone was waving.
The rehearsal was a disaster.