Chapter 2

Sforzando

I awoke to a muffled, yet still rather loud, crash. Followed by an equally muffled, yet loud, shout.

Forgetting about my glasses, I sprang out of bed and made my way to the source of the noise as quickly as possible, running through my apartment.

"Roderich, stop!"

Which I did, only when I felt a sharp pain in my foot shoot up the whole way through my leg. With a gasp I backed away from the doorway, the pain growing as the shard of glass dug deeper into my foot.

"Scheisse!"

"Shit, Roderich, oh god, okay, uhm… H-Here, don't move, I'll come to you, just- Fuck, I didn't think you'd run straight into it…"

I could vaguely see the small puddle of blood forming under my foot, letting Alfred help me to the bathroom as he sat me down on top of the toilet lid.

"Damn, that got you good… This is gonna hurt, so try not to move around too much…" I could hear him rummaging through my drawers until he found a set of tweezers, bracing myself as he prepared to pull the glass out of my foot. "Alright, three, two, one…"

I winced and hissed as Arthur inspected my foot, checking for any smaller pieces of glass Alfred may have missed. Alfred had called him as soon as my foot had stopped bleeding, not sure it was serious enough to warrant going to the emergency room.

"It's not as bad as Alfred made it sound over the phone, so you won't need any stitches." Arthur said, much to my relief. He glanced up at me as he began to bandage my wound. "Your foot is still going to be in pain for a while though, so try not to use it too much. And although it's nothing major, I'd still recommend having it looked at within the next week or so. Just to ensure there's no infection." He reached into his bag for a moment, pulling out his card and handing it to me. "My practice is located nearby if you don't already have a physician. Give me a ring if you need me to come by again."

He turned to Alfred and smacked him across the back of the head. "And you, none of this would've happened if you'd just called me last night instead of buggering this poor man needlessly! Kiku or I could've picked you up! You're lucky I don't have any appointments until this afternoon or I wouldn't have been able to help him! So if you insist on continuing whatever this ridiculous spat is going on with Gilbert, make sure you leave Roderich out of it!"

"Like hell you would've picked me up, I've known you longer than a day, Artie! You would've just told me to piss off and find somewhere else to stay, so I decided not to waste my time! And I didn't mean to drop the pitcher on the floor, just like I didn't mean for Roderich to cut his foot up like that!"

And once again, they continued to scream back and forth. This was turning out to be very similar to yesterday, and it wasn't even 8 o'clock in the morning. Exhausted and thoroughly enraged with the seemingly constant commotion in my apartment since Alfred had shown up the night before, I snapped at them.

"Can you two please stop bickering?! Ever since Alfred arrived here last night I have been plagued with a constant headache from your lack of manners and from your endless screaming! I attempted to be a good host by allowing you to sleep here overnight, but I now believe you have overstayed your welcome! I have had it up to here with this nonsense, and kindly request that you both leave my home at once!"

Both of the brothers turned and looked at me, eyebrows raised in surprise at my outburst. Well, at least they had stopped yelling.

They both gaped for a few seconds and then began stuttering guilty apologies, glaring at each other when they kept speaking at the same time. Neither of them really succeeded in a true apology though, the best being Alfred's with a "we were totally being rude just now, bro, no hard feelings."

After another few moments of awkward silence, Arthur cleared his throat and grabbed his jacket from the chair by the door.

"Right then, guess I'm off. Remember what I said about your foot, Roderich, and… erm… W-Well, try to rest…" and with a small nod he left the room, shooting another glare at Alfred as he shut the door behind him. I looked at Alfred, who was still standing a few feet away from the bed.

"Do you still need something? Because whatever it is I will have to say no. Please leave." I glared at him, waiting for him to finally leave me alone so I could go back to sleep.

He opened his mouth for a moment, as if to say something, but then shook his head and looked down at the floor, opening the door and shutting it behind him. I could still hear him in my house for a few minutes, presumably gathering his belongings, before I heard my front door shut again.

Finally, finally able to relax, I got back in bed and hoped this would all soon just feel like a bad dream.

It had been a week since I had last seen or heard from Alfred or Gilbert, so I assumed they had patched things up or decided to finally leave me alone. My foot had all but healed, walking didn't cause me much pain anymore. I did end up making an appointment at Arthur's practice, and I received a much more formal apology for his behavior while I was there. Not from Arthur himself, but from his husband Kiku, who also worked as a doctor there.

Life went back to normal it seemed, work picked up when I got a new client and I wasn't able to finish all that needed done before it was time to go home. Well, I had the whole weekend to wrap it up at least, maybe I would even stop by the café while I worked…

My thoughts halted when I saw Alfred on the stairs in front of my apartment, half-asleep on my doorstep with a package of some sort in his lap. His head jerked up when he heard me approaching and he flashed me one of his signature grins as he stood up.

"Rodster, my man, how's it going? I know my apology is a bit on the late side, but it took a whole week for this to be delivered. I wanted to say sorry for breaking your pitcher last week! You forgive me, right? Thanks dude, you're a real friend!" he shoved the package into my hands and grinned again. "I hope that's the right one, it looked really similar in the pictures online. Anyway, I gotta run, I'm taking over Feli's shift at the café and I'm already late. Catch up with you later!" And just like that, he was gone, leaving me just as bewildered as I got every single time I interacted with him.

I nearly dropped the package reaching for my keys, opening the door without further incident however and setting my bag on the couch before opening the box. Inside was a pitcher very similar to the one he had shattered, the main difference being that the original had once belonged to my mother and was probably not even half the price of what Alfred must've spent on this. The original was glass, but this one was pure crystal, wrapped with loads of bubble wrap and tissue paper to keep it intact. Where had he gotten the money for this? Did Gilbert borrow some from Ludwig? Did they steal it from somewhere? Could I even accept such a gift?

Not knowing what to do, I set the pitcher on the kitchen table and took a deep breath. As if on autopilot, my legs carried me to the piano. Some casual playing always helped me clear my head in times like these, and I hadn't had a chance to play all week. Sitting down and positioning my feet at the pedals, I let my fingers do the thinking as they immediately began to glide across the keys. My thoughts whisked away in a whirlwind of Mozart, I simply inhaled and exhaled in time with the music.

The Piano Sonata in C major. It was always the first piece my fingers came back to, the first one I had ever mastered. It brought me back to simpler times, when my father was alive. Before my mother remarried, before Gilbert and Ludwig and Alfred and crystal pitchers and mud on my floors.

My father was my first teacher. I had only recently turned six years old, and my first piano concert was less than a week away. I didn't remember much of my father, but I remembered the piano lessons. He was strict, efficient, and accepted nothing short of perfection. Even so, I remembered our piano lessons fondly. I had great fun in learning the chords and nothing made me happier than seeing the pride on my father's face each time I played a piece correctly.

We were still living in Austria at the time, and the grand piano stood in the corner of the formal sitting room. My father, being an entertainer, often had guests over and threw frequent parties. It was during one of these parties where I watched him play a short piece on the piano and was able to play it almost exactly just from watching his fingers. I was four years old at the time, and my parents were thrilled that they had a musical prodigy for a son. From that day forward my father gave me lessons daily, and sometimes we would spend hours in the sitting room playing.

Just over a month following the concert, my father died suddenly of a heart attack. The doctors blamed it on his heavy smoking. We moved to the United States shortly after the funeral, to be closer to my mother's remaining family. My strongest lasting memory of my father being that piano lesson a week before my concert. The day I finally got it perfect.

You'll do fine, Roderich, he promised me.

Du schaffst das schon.

I always lost track of time while playing like this, finally letting my fingers come to a stop almost a full hour later. Deciding to accept the pitcher instead of returning it to Alfred, I stood up to make myself some iced tea before returning to my work. For some unknown reason, Alfred's grin crept into my mind as I poured the tea into the glass.

I took my tea back to the living room, getting comfortable on the couch before pulling out my paperwork. Gathering all the necessary information on new clients and setting up their accounts was always a tedious and exhausting process. Turning the television on for some background noise, I got to work. Ignoring every time that damned grin popped into my head...