Fantasia

XXII

Somehow, Eddy felt drained and exhausted after the phone call with his mother. It wasn't surprising, really. Almost every conversation with her left him feel worse about himself.

He was sure she didn't do it on purpose or out of any malicious intent. She wasn't a bad person and like Belle had said, she was their mother and Eddy knew deep down, that she loved and cared about him.

Just, the way she showed them, or him rather, wasn't exactly uplifting.

At least she might help him to contact his old friend.

Now, after Eddy had tried this route, he wasn't sure how to proceed with the search for the real Brett Yang. Would there be a violin shop or a luthier who knew him? But Eddy wasn't even sure where Brett lived. He could still be in Brisbane, but Eddy's gut told him, that Brett had moved on to some bigger, more sophisticated place. And calling every luthier in Australia was simply too massive of a task. Or maybe the conservatory knew something? Would they be eligible to give out information though?

Eddy sighed deeply, quickly set up an email for the Queensland con's admin and sent it before the part of him, which didn't want to cause any inconvenience for anyone ever, could hold him back.

After that, Eddy finally ran out of ideas how to further look for Brett, so he simply researched the pieces which Brett had played. Paganini 16, 20 and 24. He downloaded the scores from the ISMLP-site, printed them and took his out violin. It was still a bit early, but technically, he was allowed to play music after eight a.m., so Eddy placed his violin under his jaw, tuned carefully and glanced at the notes.
It looked difficult, but then again, this was Paganini, what did he expect? He had tried doing 9 when he had still been playing and it had been alright. He hadn't touched the others though, only listened to recordings occasionally or heard Brett play 24 when the other was practicing the piece for his entrance exam for the con. A bold and actually very high level piece for an entrance exam, but Brett had succeeded. Eddy might have chosen 24 too, if he would have had the chance to even try...

He quickly decided to try his luck with 16, since the semiquavers seemed more or less doable for a guy who hadn't touched his instrument in forever and started to slowly draw his bow over the strings. It went okay really and Eddy even picked up the tempo at some point.

This was fun! Even playing a more challenging piece he'd never practiced before was fun! What a bummer, that Eddy had forgotten how much joy it brought him to hear the notes he was able to bring to life, to phrase the music how he'd imagined it in his head if his technique allowed it and eventually, to bring this joy to other people listening to his music.

Eddy used to do all of that and had taken it for granted.

Yeah, what a bummer.

With a heavy heart, he went on to number 20. This one looked more challenging. There were double stops, complex chords and difficult, fast runs. Needless to say, Eddy's attempt sounded crunchy like hell, the chords were way too rough and the double stops out of tune.
And yet, it was still fun. Even when his left hand started to hurt, his fingertips burned and his bow arm got sore, Eddy had fun.

Paganini caprice 24 was the one Eddy still knew by ear, hearing Brett playing it countless times more than a decade ago. The main theme went smooth, the variations were something else though and as much as he wanted to try, Eddy had to admit defeat after struggling through the second variation and getting hand cramps while fighting with the octaves of the third. His admiration for his former best friend grew the more notes Eddy managed or didn't really manage to play from that piece. How had Brett been able to nail the pizz? That was some advanced technical shit! And Brett hadn't even been at the con yet when he had been playing it.

No wonder that guy had graduated with honours.

Eddy lowered his instrument and shook his left hand with a sad smile. What if he had followed Brett back then? What if he had followed his heart? Where would he be now?