Chapter Text
“Here’s the bow, and your thumb goes here, near this crook…” Brett stood beside Eddy, bringing the bow closer to Eddy’s line of sight to demonstrate how to hold it. “And then curl your fingers a little over this part like this,” continued Brett as he gestured to the specific point of the wood near the frog, and then offered the bow to Eddy for him to replicate the position.
Eddy cautiously took the bow from Brett and tried to imitate how Brett had held the bow with his right hand. It felt strange, with his thumb at that tiny awkward spot, and both his thumb and fingers were locking up, gripping the wood so tightly in the tenuous hold as to prevent it from falling out of his hand. Brett watched Eddy attempt the bow hold. He furrowed his brows when he saw how Eddy’s entire hand, forearm, and even shoulder were taut, imbued with far too much tension than was necessary.
“Relax your wrist more, soften the grip a little…” Brett started, but at that moment the bow fell out of Eddy’s fingers and clattered to the stone floor. Eddy gasped, swiftly reaching down and swiping it up before Brett could respond. Brett was in shock, instantaneously pouncing on the bow to examine it for any possible damage, peering carefully as he turned it around.
Eddy quickly removed his hands from the bow, cringing as he profusely apologised. “I’m really sorry, Brett, I’m really sorry!”
Eddy didn’t know how much these things cost but being a professional artist himself he knew that it was likely either expensive or it had sentimental value, and thus was far more valuable. He felt awful, all sorts of emotions coursing through him – panic, fear, regret, guilt – as the minute that Brett took to slowly examine his bow felt like forever. Longer than the hours he’d slogged away as an apprentice, carrying marble up slopes and staircases. Brett’s face betrayed no expression, only the intense concentration as he scrutinised.
Brett’s face however suddenly softened, the harsh intensity melting away like snow in spring sunshine as he looked up at Eddy. “Don’t worry about it,” Brett said, smiling. “It’s totally fine. I wasn’t too worried about it, the Guarneris do make solid bows that could very well survive a slight tumbling. I took my time with it just in case.”
Eddy’s lips were pressed together, and the smile that emerged was a tight-lipped one, barely reaching his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he said softly, this time. The tightness in his chest loosened up a little, but he couldn’t push it away entirely.
Brett looked at him, bewildered by Eddy’s persistent apologies and his distress, which he thought beyond proportional for what had happened. He couldn’t understand what the other was thinking, trying once again to extend the bow towards Eddy.
He was hesitant, his arm wavering as he accepted it gingerly, replicating the bow hold he had been taught. Now, it was once again too tense, Eddy gripping the bow so tightly, like a fragile item (it was, to him), like he would rather die than let go of it.
Brett sensed the anxiety creeping up on Eddy, and without thinking, he reached out his own hands for Eddy’s, adjusting his fingers and running his hands over Eddy’s arm to point out where he should relax his muscles. While correcting his fingers came rather instinctively, doing just like he did with the younger musicians that he taught, Brett was focused on what stood out from the usual: Eddy’s calloused fingers and palm, roughened by his work, had much more strength than Brett’s soft, delicate hands. They were so different from his, but also so entirely warm, that Brett’s own fingers lingered a little too long as he moved them in the correct position, before letting go.
For Eddy, his relief was palpable with Brett correcting the grip rather than leaving him to struggle and drop the bow once again. Yet, he was also trying to keep his calm, with Brett so near him, his fingers grazing Eddy’s and then touching.
It was so distracting to see Brett up close, that whatever he was supposed to ingrain into his memory of Brett’s adjustments flew out of his head. But the fear of destroying the instrument jolted him back to the reality, of focusing on holding the bow and recalling the sensations and how it looked. And so he did, trying his best to pull back his wandering mind. Somehow, ever since he set foot in Cremona, his mind had been wandering far too much for his own liking.
“Right, like this. So for reference’s sake, remember, the middle finger’s aligned to the thumb, and the pinky’s on the wood itself. And now, this angle, and this range of motion for the wrist,” Brett mentioned, while shifting Eddy’s currently floppy wrist. Eddy nodded, but already started feeling the discomfort of the position. And this was without the violin itself!
He made a mental note to toss out one of his sketches from earlier – it did not look like what he was seeing right now, in front of him. Without warning, Brett slipped his own violin onto Eddy’s left shoulder, tugging at Eddy’s left hand to prop it up and adjusted them to the right position before tugging at the bow Eddy was already holding, to land on top of the violin’s strings.
Fascinated, Eddy didn’t wait for Brett’s instructions but tried to pull the bow across the strings with some force, just like he thought Brett did. What came out, however, was the most awful sound he had ever heard in his entire life, a sharp and uneven screech, a wail apt for waking up his ancestors. He was so shocked that he started laughing, the tension from his previous worries flowing away as he cackled over how ghastly his first attempt was. Brett had made it look so easy!
Brett was suppressing a giggle of his own as well. Eddy was exactly like a new student, in how the overflowing enthusiasm collided head on with the reality of the instrument for beginners. Despite how appalling it was for Eddy, he couldn’t stop laughing, as he tried again, the second bow stroke no better than the last one.
Brett moved closer to Eddy, rising up on the balls of his feet to try and reach over Eddy’s shoulder comfortably enough for his hands to land on Eddy’s arm so that he could guide him. While Brett wasn’t that much shorter than Eddy, it was indeed a tad bit uncomfortable.
Adjusting the trajectory of the bow on the A string and shifting it neatly in between the fingerboard and the bridge, he then placed his hand on Eddy’s bow hand, and guided him, pulling it downbow. A slightly shaky, but otherwise resonant sound came out. Shifting the trajectory the tiniest bit, Brett deftly pulled it upbow, the string crossing to the D string smoothly.
“Wow!” Brett looked up a little in Eddy’s direction, to see his eyes alight again. Eddy didn’t understand exactly how, but the weight and pressure applied had changed and somehow, Brett’s steady hands had produced a proper sound with flourish. At this point, Brett was bobbing up and down a little unsteadily on his tiptoes and he had to stop, swapping over to standing in front of Eddy. Blasted height difference.
For the rest of the hour, Brett instructed Eddy on how to play the open strings, trying to refine his understanding of the intricacies of the instrument. If the hand-touching bothered either of them, they didn’t show it. But unknown to the other, they each had to repress these strange – but not unpleasant – feelings towards this situation and that thought niggling at the back of their mind that they wouldn’t mind if this had went on for a bit longer.
All too soon however Eddy’s arms were exhausted by the constant repetition and the sun was beginning to set, meaning that Brett had to go off soon. He still hadn’t practiced what he said he had to for the evening, so Brett had to call a halt to the lesson. Eddy had been so distracted that the fact that Brett had to disappear off soon eluded him.
That fear and guilt which had plagued him at the beginning rose up again, at the thought that he’d taken up an offer that was nothing but a hassle to Brett. First almost breaking his bow, and then eating into his practice time. The last traces of his smile evaporated, replaced swiftly with a stressed frown as he quickly pushed the violin back to Brett and retreated a distance away to pick up his sketchbook again.
“I’m sorry,” Eddy said in a serious tone, softly. He felt horrible. He was truly asking for too much.
This time though, Brett was not having it. He moved closer to Eddy, compelling him to look him in the eyes, before he said:
“Look, you’ve said this to me so many times today. I agreed to help, I’m putting in a hundred percent for you, and I won’t do it unless I’m certain this is what I want to do. If you’re not certain however, then we can stop.”
Eddy’s eyes widened at the last bit, delivered with a little more acridity than what he had been used to hearing.
Brett suddenly felt that his tone was unwarranted. In trepidation, he quickly added, straining to ensure that his tone would not reflect any sort of harshness: “I didn’t mean to scare you. I’m sorry. I just want you to be confident. We’re partners in this, Eddy. I know you’re concerned and I’m ever so grateful to you for being so considerate. But you have my word that I will not overly inconvenience myself because of this. Alright?” He instinctively reached out for Eddy’s hand and enveloped it in his. It was still smaller than Eddy’s, but strong, squeezing it in reassurance.
“I’ve already prepared a lot for tonight’s piece, just a run through or two will work. Listen for me, please?” Brett asked, placing the violin on his shoulder and readying his bow, all while still looking at Eddy with the warmest, most imploring look in his eyes. He wasn’t sure at all of Eddy’s feelings, but he didn’t want him looking so… vulnerable in front of him. So unconfident and hesitant, the complete opposite of the passionate man that had captured his attention to the extent that he, Brett Ziani, was standing here at this very moment instead of being at home, all alone. If his playing could light up his eyes again, then he would do it.
“Sure.” This time, Eddy smiled in return, feeling that lightness return to him once again. Brett was sometimes intimidating and rough at the edges with his expression, but he was so gentle, and the confidence with which he just spoke to Eddy was so convincing. Gripping the pencil, his hand was poised, his eyes on Brett, who nodded.
“Claudio Monteverdi. Chiome d´oro.”
With that, Brett started, pulling out a melody so bright and light, like flowers springing to life and carefree faeries fluttering around them. The notes were skipping around, every pause in the music like a breath inhaled before jumping towards the next note.
Eddy was enchanted, as always, but his hands were moving, flipping back to the page he had worked on earlier that day of Brett and flowers. He then quickly worked on refining them, the shape of Brett’s closed eyelids, the tranquillity that settled on his face as he played, and added new sketches to shape the movement of his wrists, now that he knew slightly better about it. The short lesson had opened his eyes to the minute details – ideal shapes and positions of each finger, the upper body positions, a dozen things that controlled the ever-changing pressure that Brett’s small but determined hands exerted on the bow.
All too soon however, the piece drew to an end. Eddy’s hands were working furiously to process what his eyes saw, and continued even after Brett had returned his instrument to his case. Once he was done, he eagerly showed the page to Brett.
“That music was so exquisite, light and flowy! Like a sunlit garden, and this is what came to mind.” Eddy was excited – his previous reservations about showing him that page had vanished with how perfectly Brett had given life to his whimsical imaginings.
Brett’s jaw dropped. Eddy had captured his visage so carefully and accurately, first of all. In fact, he probably paled in comparison to the perfection of the features. Secondly, the flowers. Unknowingly, Eddy had drawn Brett’s favourite flowers too – irises. It wasn’t anywhere around where they were in the garden, so at random, Eddy had gotten it? Thirdly, the flowers and nature itself that Eddy depicted showed that he saw the music the same way that Brett did. They had the same image come to mind with the same rhythm. Eddy was a brilliant artist, but the coincidence sent Brett reeling in shock. Intuition? Luck?
“Eddy, you’re an amazing artist! And…. you know, I thought of that too, as I played. Flowers, birds flying, the garden.”
Eddy’s wide smile only grew, in his unabashed amazement and delight that Brett loved his work and that he had pinned down the music, which he thought might have eluded him. After all, Brett was the musician.
“Irises are my favourite flowers too, incidentally.”
“Ah, well, yeah… nice coincidence, isn’t it? But I’m glad you like it! And that the flowers were to your liking!” Eddy’s response was enthusiastic, and he tucked that information away in his mind. For what reasons, he didn’t know, but it was something about this enigmatic man, at least.
“Thank you for today, Eddy. I really did enjoy myself, and your work gives me much pleasure. We can meet again next week?”
“It really should be me thanking you, Brett, but I think you know that already. I’m relieved you enjoyed yourself. Write to me, when you’re free.” Eddy replied, starting to pack up as well.
The last of the sun’s rays cascaded down, filtering through the large trees in the park in beautiful pools and slowly faded away as the sculptor and the violinist parted ways with a firm handshake. Once again, they held on to the memory of each other’s hands, but that day, they took away with them the memories of the afternoon, that were equally warm as the memory of the other’s touch. Like this, they found their way into each other’s minds, replaying the memories, thinking of the other fondly, while waiting for their next meeting.
Brett was warming up, together with the other performers, the sopranos, the harpsichord player, the lute player and his second violin. It was almost like clockwork, really, given how often they’d worked together as part of the same guild, going to their music engagements together. He was hardly a fan of casual conversation, especially when he had to be focused. But this time round, he had an unexpected source of distraction as he wriggled his fingers and played a few scales: Eddy de Fidellis.
The simple scales reminded Brett of the afternoon with the sculptor, running through simple scales for him, and with him. Brett found himself playing the scales a lot more slowly than he’d usually do, as the wheels in his head ran and worked out how he could break down this process to show his student. He’d remind him, to keep his fingers here, to adjust the pressure when he felt this bump here, and…
The harpsichord player, Ludovico, was tapping at his shoulder. “Let’s go,” he said simply, pointing Brett to the rest of the ensemble, already raring to go. He quickly turned towards them and waited for the cue to start playing. Starting off, Brett had to consciously focus, concentrating on the precision of the music in order to distract him from his thoughts rather than losing himself in the emotion of the music.
The very same piece of music that Eddy had just heard, and his exquisite drawings that Brett was reminded of with this piece.
And gradually, as Eddy’s smile emerged in his mind’s eye, Brett submerged himself into the music, reaching for notes that could recapture the brightness of the afternoon. His fingers were no longer tense, focused on poise and precision but rather flowing and running across the fingerboard as Brett weaved his own music, tinted with the joy brought forth from within him. And in this way, the performance flew towards its conclusion and was met with thunderous applause from the ballroom, for an especially passionate performance.
Brett was breathing heavily – for such a short piece, he had never been this tired before. But with the sudden inspiration, in the form of Eddy, he had felt so charged that he poured everything into it, playing with so much more vivacity than he was used to. It was an entirely foreign but electrifying sensation. What was different, then? After all, it wasn’t like people had never told him how much they liked his music, so what difference did it make to hear it from Eddy?
But then again, Eddy’s sudden presence in his life had changed Brett’s everyday schedule. Instead of the silence that hung about him as he did his afternoon practices or teaching children, he was teaching a grown man, and for the unexpected purposes of sculpture.
He knew very well that he couldn’t place a finger on the exact reason why he extended his radical, impulsive proposition to teach Eddy how to play the violin. He meant what he said, that working with Eddy was a unique opportunity that would, in all likelihood, not come by again. And given how recent the invention of the violin was – only a little over a century – there wasn’t going to be many statues of violinists around, so Brett would literally be the model for many more such statues to come, in the future. Wanting for it to look the best it could, was that Brett’s only motivation to give Eddy all the assistance he could?
But Eddy was someone he’d actually found interesting, though they haven’t yet had much opportunities for anything more than small talk. But Brett knew that nothing was the same, and the way they were going, things would just keep developing and changing. The stirrings deep down in his heart, however, provided Brett with the vague, intuitive feeling that perhaps, he did so because he wanted to spend more time with Eddy.
And of course, he couldn’t blurt that out. That was embarrassing. So, he then proceeded to blurt out something else way more roundabout. The whole afternoon, he had been trying to make sense of the unfamiliar tugging insistence in his heart, forcing him to fix his eyes on Eddy, linger on his words, and flooding him with every emotion of joy possible in his presence.
That night, Brett sat down at his desk and began to write. In a dimly-lit room, of half-melted candles supporting the flickering flames, he eagerly penned the letter he would dispatch off to Eddy the next morning:
Dear Eddy,
I must emphasise that it has been a real pleasure to work with you today. Do not worry about the possible inconveniences that it may cause me. I promise that I will work with my schedule as best as I can. I -
The paper was bleeding ink from how hard he had pressed down, trying to pull out the next word from his head. Failing to do so, Brett scrapped the entire thing altogether. Why did it sound so formal and detached? He didn’t want to seem imposing. He wanted to genuinely know Eddy better.
He reached for another sheet of paper, and started scrawling at it, stringing words together that he hoped sounded warmer, friendlier.
Dear Eddy,
It has been a real pleasure to have your company today. I hope you do not worry about the -
Again, Brett stopped, realising that perhaps he shouldn’t have started so early with the reassurances. He scrunched up that piece of parchment, chucking it aside and pulling out yet another sheet to begin again. He really shouldn’t, paper didn’t just appear on trees like fruit, but at this point the financial consideration didn’t stick for long in his head. He was concentrating solely on how to write to Eddy.
Dear Eddy,
Thank you very much for the pleasure of your company today. I hope that you found it enjoyable too, despite the difficulty that learning the violin may pose. I look forward to our next meeting and to a fruitful session then too. Enclosed in a separate sheet are my engagements for the next week, and you may choose a day that is suitable for you.
Pausing, Brett skimmed over what he wrote. The last sentence sounded very professional, but the offer that Eddy was free to choose should be inviting enough, right? He then continued:
Once again, I offer you my gratitude for this unique opportunity.
Pausing again, he wondered if he should include anything more. Bite the bullet and go for it, something in him urged him, to extend the overture.
You are a brilliant artist and I would be delighted to get to know you better as a friend. With my best wishes, for your good fortune, and happiness, until next week.
Brett Ziani.
He put down the quill and looked over his letter. It wasn’t perfect, but it got the point across, didn’t it? He wished he had paid more attention to his letter-writing classes, but it was too late to be regretting that. Quickly slotting it into the envelope and sealing it, he set the letter aside lest the temptation to scrutinise and rewrite it overcame him, and went to bed.