Crescendo

Chapter 5

A poor excuse for a novel summary waited in the drafts section of my email account. The list trailed down from mistake messages to forgotten love letters that would never be sent.

My fingers hovered over the laptop's touchpad; one quick movement and Tessa would be satisfied with my effort.

Maybe.

I pulled my hand away and gnawed on a polished nail. My mother said pretty designs would deter the pesky habit; she was wrong. My nails would be chewed down to nubs by the end of the week if I didn't reel myself in.

The classroom whispered as Daniel wrote on the board.

Once word spread that a famed musician was teaching at our humble university, the lecture hall filled to capacity.

I sighed, frustrated by the lack of available seats and courses to transfer into. Even though I sat in the back, as far as possible from Daniel and his doting fans, I found our eyes often meeting during class.

I had been busy pretending that it meant nothing.

He never said anything to the contrary.

At the beginning of each class period, he wrote a list of book terms and definitions in front of us. By the end, he passed out "flash" quizzes over the material.

The routine became more aggravating with each class.

When the scattered conversations trailed off, I used the sudden silence as an excuse to close the email tab.

Tessa would have to wait one more day.

"Good news," Daniel turned on his heel, grabbed a stack of papers out of his bag, and smiled, "I have graded all your essays. Most of you did great, others need to step it up a notch. Saying that Beethoven was a cool guy isn't going to cut it, no matter how amusing it may be."

I glanced at the boy two rows in front of me. The greek letters on the back of his t-shirt, hat, and water bottle made it hard not to stereotype him as the culprit.

Daniel set the pile onto the desk beside him, snapping me out of my thoughts. "You may pick up your copy after class," he said before his gaze drifted to me, lingering for half a second. Then, he began a lengthy lecture on Gustav Holst's The Planets.

I frowned, wondering what I had done to warrant such an honor.

****

After thirty minutes, amateur doodles covered the white space in my notebook. Soft sketches of sunsets and alien invaders crowded my scribbled notes.

Daniel rambled by the podium, launching into a lesson about leitmotifs.

I enjoyed music as much as the next person but the man could really go on about a topic.

As much as I wanted to zone out, ignore my due dates and Daniel's lively lecture, I knew it would only bite me in the ass later.

I set my pen down, giving up the easy distraction, and leaned on my hand.

Tessa would beat down my door if I didn't send her a summary, a mood board–hell, a playlist, by the end of the night. I had been making promises for weeks.

Her patience was unmatched, truly.

But after months of brainstorming, all I had conjured up was a half-assed pirate love story. I rubbed my forehead,

Maybe I shouldn't have watched that Pirates of the Caribbean marathon.

I shook away the thought and watched Daniel flit around as if the room was his stage. His energy infected the front row of the class, making half-dead college students invested in the musical theory behind Star Wars.

I rolled my eyes but a smile crept passed my facial security.

The awe of seeing him from only a few feet away, instead of a couple hundred, had worn off but this, his passion for music, continued to surprise me.

And the intrigue didn't end there.

I had tried to forget about our encounter at the party, but a few questions lingered, doomed to be left unanswered.

If we hadn't run into each other, would I be one of the many fans hounding him for a selfie or an autograph? Would he still glance at me, the girl in the back of the room?

I wasn't sure it mattered. I had already resigned myself to passive enthusiasm for his class, his music, and him.

"Don't forget," Daniel raised his voice, attempting to speak over the roaring clatter of the class packing their bags, "Grab your essays on the way out. I have plenty to carry as it is."

A few coeds giggled as they passed him, whispering something I didn't want to know.

Instead of watching Daniel be flattered by his groupies, I checked my watch, eager to pick up my afternoon coffee.

Finally, when the path cleared, I descended from my lofty seat. I followed the lead of the boy who sat to my right and waited for an opening at the desk.

By the time I made it to the front, the papers were no longer in the neat pile Daniel left them in but instead, strewn across the scratched surface.

I sifted through the remaining essays until I uncovered mine from underneath the mess. Bold, red ink was etched into the margins, footers, and line breaks.

Who the fuck scribbles in the line breaks?

I flipped to the last page, where 69 was written in large, unapologetic letters.

Fuck.

I twisted the paper so no one could see over my shoulder and backed out of the crowd before scanning the bright red, accusative notes.

Daniel tore my report apart, despite being the one assigning impossible prompts.

I sucked in a breath like my mother would tell me to.

She would stay calm.

She would be polite.

She wouldn't march up to the podium and stir up trouble with the Daniel Kane but, I did it anyway.

Daniel was busy packing his bag, paying little attention to the last few student stragglers.

My grip tightened around my paper as the scuffed heels of my boots announced my arrival.

Daniel looked up, his eyes meeting mine, "Can I help you?"

I paused, barely stalled, then held up the essay and tapped the red ink in the bottom right corner, "You gave me a sixty-nine."

"What about it?"

"Well," I leafed through the pages and pointed out his harsh scribbles, "You dissected an Intro to Music paper like it was for a professional writing course."

The clasp on Daniel's briefcase clicked as it shut.

"Are you admitting that you didn't try as hard for this class?" he asked, amused by my visible agitation.

Maybe but, "That's not what I said."

Daniel sighed, "I dissected your paper because I expected more."

I silenced the sarcastic, ugly comments forming in my head before they could get me into trouble.

"I mean," Daniel took a long sip from the mug resting on the podium, "It's not every day that you have a national bestselling author in your class, is it?"

"About as common as having a world-renowned musician as a professor," I said, growing more bitter by the second.

He chuckled, taking the matter lightly and not as the potential GPA bomb that it was. "Revise the paper and turn it in by midnight. I'll regrade it with more adjusted expectations."

"Thank you," I forced the words out, knowing at the very least my mother could be proud of that.

I turned, leaving him alone in the classroom, and marched down the busy hallway, wondering how I could prove my writing prowess to the world when I couldn't even convince him.