Page 61 of Crescendo

It wasn’t new to me, but it felt so different listening to it here, without her. I felt like I couldn’t breathe.

God, I missed her.

Clara’s hand closed around mine, squeezing tightly, and that was when I realised I was crying. It would have been embarrassing if anyone else had noticed.

The piece finished and everyone clapped and cheered.

Bansi looked like he’d never been prouder of anyone in his life.

Though, of course, he looked the same way when Clara’s piece was played, when Dodge’s was, Rosie’s…

everyone that he’d formed any kind of friendship with over the last two months.

Bansi was a gift to the world and to music.

Nobody loved louder than he did, and the world always needed more of that.

“Up next,” Lorna announced after an unusual, underwater-sounding piece, “is Hannah’s!”

Next to me, Eliza tensed. She’d known this was coming, just like I’d suspected Lydia’s was, but I knew that didn’t make it better or easier.

The piece kicked in and I couldn’t help but smile. It was so very Hannah. She’d finally let go of everything she thought she was supposed to be doing and she’d just written music she loved. And it was all the better for it.

It was also clearly about Eliza. There was a thrumming bass that sounded like a heart beating, one that I could feel resonating inside my chest. It sped, panicked, chased something—or someone —through the song, fading out when it couldn’t reach them.

It was devastating.

Eliza shook and I saw her finally turn her head to look at Hannah, her eyes shimmering. Hannah, face bright red, stared straight ahead.

Clara had reached for me. I could reach for Eliza.

I found her hand where it was dangling down the side of the chair and squeezed reassuringly. She sucked in a breath like it was painful.

And, of course, the next piece was hers. The two of them still together, side by side.

I kept hold of her hand and she squeezed hard as the music swelled around us.

It was beautiful. A waltz. Two lovers dancing around each other, gliding over soft snow, a frozen lake, maybe.

It was prettier than anything Eliza had been feeling lately, just the hint of regret on the strings under the main melody.

It was the happy ending to Hannah’s song, and the room swooned accordingly.

A completely different tune, genre, and tonal quality, but two halves of a story everyone wanted to have a happy ending.

I’d told Eliza to pour her feelings into the piece and she’d gone with hope.

It wasn’t what I’d expected, but it was beautiful and, of course, technically perfect.

In my peripheral vision, I saw Hannah swipe at her eyes.

Music had torn Lydia away from this place—away from me—but maybe it could bring these two back together.

We sat through a couple more songs and, finally, it was my turn. My limbs felt like they were filled with lead, my head dizzy, my stomach sick. All of my feelings laid bare for the entire group. My clarinet playing about to be heard by an audience for the first time in so long.

Lorna moved aside again and the music started up.

It was so familiar and so alien at the same time.

And then the clarinets kicked in.

Clara gasped beside me, eyeing me like she instantly knew it was me and that meant something massive. Maybe she did. She had enough discretion to know everything and have never said a word.

My body shook, the music reaching down inside of me, tangling my insides and ripping them apart all over again. I’d never written a piece like this before—one where my heart was strewn across the floor, broken and beaten, yet somehow still pounding in my chest.

The clarinet cracked the piece open, poured out pain and loss and love, and more people than just me sniffled and swiped at their faces. Eliza squeezed one of my hands as Clara clutched the other, wiping quickly at her own tears.

The applause that followed every piece broke out as it ended—haunting, longing, devastatingly hopeless, and foolishly hoping. And none of it felt real. I’d done it, played the clarinet, written the piece, submitted it, survived it, and survived people listening to it, but it didn’t feel real.

It didn’t feel complete. Not without Lydia. Maybe if she listened, it would finally feel like a piece I’d written, rather than something someone else had done that just happened to connect with something deep inside me.

Lorna stood up again to announce the next piece and Dodge snorted quietly. “I wouldn’t want to be the one going after Ella.”

“What?” I frowned, looking his way.

He rolled his eyes. “Nobody wants to be the guy going after a piece like that. Your girlfriend’s probably the only one who can even remotely compete.”

“That’s not true,” I insisted quickly and quietly, turning to listen to the next piece.

“Yes, it is,” he laughed, and laughed harder when Lorna announced it was Florian’s piece. He really hadn’t warmed to that guy.

It wasn’t terrible. It was good, but even I could admit it felt like it was missing something important in comparison to the pieces that came before it—not just mine.

The rest were good too, but, when they were all done and we were being dismissed for the night, Eliza shot me a look.

“Well,” she said, something resigned about her tone. “Looks like you did it.”

“Did what?” I frowned, tilting my head to look at her.

She rolled her eyes. “Such a sore winner you’re going to make me point it out?”

“What?”

She laughed. “Jesus, Ella. Don’t make me tell you you deserve it.”

I blinked, staring at her. “I don’t… understand.”

She sighed, her expression transforming. “Your piece is stunning, perfect. It’s going to win.”

“We don’t know that. Your piece was amazing—so were all of the others.”

“You and Lydia are such a weird pair. You can’t shake her confidence no matter what you say, and you can’t get you to own yours no matter what happens. Is that why you work? Two sides of the same coin?”

“Uh…”

The others filed out of our row, giving me and Eliza a minute alone, and she shook her head, looking at me with an oddly fond expression for someone she was accusing of defeating her. “You told me to put my feelings into the piece—”

“And you did! The regret, the hope, the beauty of a couple dancing together… it was all in there.”

She nodded. “Your story was stronger. You emotionally destroyed basically everyone in the room.”

“I… don’t really know what to do with myself right now.”

She laughed again. “You tell Lydia she was right, that she helped unlock something in you that was better than anything I was doing by clinging to the rules and what I thought I was supposed to do.”

I breathed a laugh too. “Olivia told her to do the ugly things sometimes.”

“Yeah. That’s it, isn’t it? Music’s beautiful, but, sometimes, the best thing you can do with it is express the ugly thing.

” She stared off towards the stage, now empty.

“Hannah did it, too. Her piece was so much braver and more beautiful than mine because she… wasn’t afraid of who she was or what she was feeling. ”

“You don’t have to be, either, you know? You’re not going to lose all of this by being who you are.”

She shot me a deeply sceptical look. “That’s easy for you to say.”

“I know. And I know it’s hard, but you deserve to make the music that really speaks to you.”

She blew out a long, slow, heavy breath. “I… don’t even know where to start. Feels like I left all of that in Liverpool.”

“You didn’t leave Hannah there. Play what sounds like her.”

She scowled at me. “Are you suggesting Hannah sounds ugly?”

“What? No! Oh, my god. Come on.” I grabbed her wrist and pulled her off towards one of the practice rooms.

“Wow. Okay. You can let go, I was just messing with you.”

I shot her a look, letting go once we were in the room, and I gestured to the instruments. “Tell me what you’re feeling drawn to.”

“Lydia’s worn off on you. Bossy streak much?” she muttered, but she turned to look at the instruments. “The bass, obviously, but I’m not much of a bassist.”

“So, you can do the ugly thing or you can pick something you know how to play more confidently to really pour the ugly out on.”

She pursed her lips before scowling at the bass like she had a personal bone to pick with it, and she lifted it up, settling it over her body. “You better not tell anyone how shit I am with this.”

I held my hands up in surrender. “Not a word. I promise.”

And she played. But she wasn’t really shit at all. She wasn’t the bassist Hannah was, but she was good. I imagined Hannah had given her a few lessons, back in a happier time. Maybe that wasn’t how Eliza had learned but I liked to imagine them like that—happy and playing together.

It took a minute for her to really let go, but then she was playing something.

It was raw, almost guttural. It was ugly, but it was beautiful.

It had the same angry energy she’d had when I’d followed her out of class.

And then I realised it went with Hannah’s piece.

This wasn’t the happy ending that came after it, this was the battle.

This was loving someone and not understanding what was going on between you.

This was all of the crossed wires and forced dates and misunderstandings.

The door cracked open and I worked to stifle a smile as Hannah slipped through the door, shut it softly, and leaned against the wall, watching Eliza play.

Eliza was facing the opposite direction and too wrapped up in playing to notice Hannah, but she kept playing for her all the same.

The longer it went, and the softer Hannah’s expression became, the more I felt like I was intruding.

I checked the time. Still a little early for LA.

Maybe Lydia and I would never be on the same page again, but Hannah and Eliza could be.

Here they were, in the same room, finally almost on the same page, racing ever closer with every strum of the bass.

“There should be a drum kit in this room,” Eliza yelled over the music. “If you’re going to have me pour my feelings out, I really need a drum kit. Although, maybe Hannah would be disappointed in me resorting back to that person.”

“She wouldn’t be,” Hannah said, and Eliza gasped, the music cutting off as she turned rapidly to stare towards the door.

“What are you doing here?” Eliza asked, eyes wide.

Hannah smiled, tilted her head. “What do you think?”

Eliza froze for a moment. “Eavesdropping, I guess.”

“Well, if you’re going to avoid me, this is what I’m left with.”

“I’m not avoiding you.” She winced. “Any more.”

Hannah raised her eyebrows, nodding slowly, and I could see the hope fighting to break out of her. “Well, okay.”

“Your piece…” Eliza’s breathing was racing and she fidgeted with the bass, stepping closer to Hannah. “Your piece was really beautiful.”

“Well, it wasn’t exactly classical enough. I didn’t do what you wanted.”

Something inconsolable flashed across Eliza’s face. “I just… wanted to make you proud. You said things had to be different, that I had to prove myself here.”

“What?” Hannah frowned, her eyes teary. “I thought that was what you wanted. You wanted to come here and leave Liverpool behind us, to… make it here.”

“I do want that, but I… I thought if everything was different, if I made it and could be good enough as a composer, then, maybe we’d… maybe I’d be… good enough for you. Then it wouldn’t be like before with—with the band and everything that went down.”

Hannah let out a wet laugh. “I just wanted you to be happy. For you to have everything you dreamed of here—I wanted to help you get that.”

If they hadn’t been standing in front of the door, I’d probably have slipped out and given them a moment alone, but, since I was stuck with them, I at least tried to be small and unobtrusive. This was a conversation they’d clearly needed to have for a long time, and they deserved to have it.

Eliza stepped closer to her again, swinging the bass around her back. “You said… we couldn’t be together because of what happened before, because we’re friends.”

“I thought that was what you were saying. And I don’t wanna lose you or our friendship, that’s true, but the feelings din’t go anywhere just because I was tryna let you build the life you wanted. And… we ended up here and I was losing you anyway.”

“That date you set up—”

“I wanted you to be happy.”

Eliza let out a sound somewhere between a laugh and a cry.

“I had a terrible time. Spent the entire night wishing I was out with you, wishing I could win this whole thing just to show you that I’d done it, that I’d changed, and maybe then you’d want to be with me.

And I thought you just wanted me out of the way so you could hang out with Lydia. ”

Hannah reached out, her hand finding Eliza’s cheek, her thumb rubbing gently over her skin. “It wasn’t like that. At all. I wanted to tell you, wanted you to be there, but I thought you’d hate me for… hanging onto the past.”

“None of this is worth anything without you,” Eliza said softly. “We’d just… talked about it so many times—”

“Without really understanding what the other meant,” Hannah said, sounding frustrated with herself.

“I guess so.”

She laughed and tears ran down her face. “Hey, Eliza?”

“Yes, Hannah?”

“I think I want to have this conversation again—with us both on the same page.” She glanced down at the bass. “And I want to know what those drums would sound like.”

Eliza laughed. “Not like anything that would get me into the Royal Albert Hall.”

She looked at Eliza seriously. “I don’t think that’s true. I think you can get there with the drums, if that’s what you want.”

“Yeah? You wouldn’t be too disappointed in me?”

“ Never . Besides, classical composition with some sound drums? You’d smash it.”

They smiled at each other and Eliza’s piece came back to me, the happy ending they both deserved, but this was a little messier than her piece, more real. And it was better because of it. A million words had been said through the music and now they were saying them out loud, finally, to each other.

Music really did have the power to change lives. I’d come here looking for something like that without realising just how much it was going to do. And I was just glad someone here was getting a happily ever after.

Still, I slipped my phone out of my pocket, foolishly hopeful that there would be a message from Lydia.

Life was so messy and so ugly and so beautiful, and Hannah and Eliza had somehow managed to navigate that.

So long as that was true, maybe there was a chance Lydia would message me back after all.

Hannah cleared her throat. “By the way, Eliza, d’you reck we should tell Ella to leave?”

“Ella’s here?” Eliza asked, sounding a little spacey and blushing when Hannah laughed, and she scowled at me.

“Ella. Get out.”

“On it,” I laughed, rushing to leave the room and them alone.