INTERLUDE // Tubbo X Reader

22

You were the first to arrive in piano lab - as you almost always were, of course. The room was empty when you walked in, and you took your regular seat near the back of the room setting your stuff down as you eagerly waited for Toby to arrive. 

Would it be weird if you asked him right away? Was he even going to address what had happened on the catwalk? He had to... there was no way that you would be able to even look at him without thinking about the way he had kissed your breathless last night. And that he had kissed you first - he was bound to say something, you were sure of it. 

You spun back and forth in your chair as you waited for Toby to appear in the doorway. It seemed longer than usual, but that might have just been that you were anxious to see him. Nerves always made the time pass by slower, but when another girl in your class walked in before Toby did, you started to get worried. 

Maybe she was just abnormally early though. If Toby did want to talk about last night (and you really hoped he did), you had been banking on having the classroom to yourselves at least for a little while. There was usually a good almost ten minutes before anyone else showed up, but-

Someone else that wasn't Toby walked into the room, and you could feel your spirits begin to fall. He should be here by now. 

You watched as the rest of the class filed into the room, chattering amongst themselves as they took their seats, your hopes dying each time another person walked into the room. You kept glancing towards the door every time you saw a flash of brown hair, only to be disappointed that it wasn't Toby. Any hopes you had had of seeing him today died completely when Mrs. Mears walked into the room and class started. 

"Good morning everyone!" Mrs. Mears chirped, one hand clasped around a mug of tea as the other closed the classroom door. "Today's easy, we're going to be doing critiques of the acts from last night's exhibition!"

Maybe he was just late - something had held him up getting to school, and he would be rushing into the classroom at any second now, apologizing as he took his seat next to you. You would smile, and he would grab your hand under the piano and tell you to find him at lunch. You would sneak off somewhere quiet - maybe that almost abandoned stairwell - and talk about what happened and you would ask him out and then you would kiss him again. 

Mrs. Mears ruffled through the papers on her desk until she found the stack she was looking for, trading her mug in favor of the worksheets. "We're just going to be watching the recording of last night's performance." She said, starting down the center aisle as she passed out papers. "All you guys have to do is fill out a box with at least one critique for every act, and nothing vague like 'it sounded bad' - real critiques."

She stopped when she got to your row, glancing at Toby's empty seat before she looked up at you. "No Toby today?"

You shook your head, taking the paper she handed to you.

Mrs. Mears clicked her tongue. "Too bad. You guys did amazing last night, I just wanted to say. Everyone was really impressed when I told them you had written the piece yourselves." She smiled, and some of the disappointment you were feeling since Toby hadn't shown up alleviated - your favorite teacher was proud of you.

Mrs. Mears finished passing out her papers before she headed back up to the front of the room, pulling down her projector screen and flicking off the lights. She pulled up the recording on her desktop computer and the film began to roll, the camera focusing on the stage from where it stood somewhere in the center of the crowd. 

You watched the head of the school come out and give a greeting to the gathered parents and students before the first act went on - the school's band, sounding squeaky and flat. You jotted down a few notes as the song dragged on, and your eyes dragged up to the top of the screen. Just above where the camera's frame was would be the catwalk. But at this stage in the night you wouldn't be up there yet.

You would still be hanging out in the wings, nervous about going on to preform, and Toby would be rubbing circles into the palms of your hands to get you to loosen up your fingers. Maya would be making jokes about how terrible the band was, and you would be agreeing, laughing along because you needed something else to think about besides how close Toby was standing to you.

The band finished (thank god) and the next act went on - a quartet of strings. It would be another three acts before Maya went on, and then another two before you would see yourself and Toby take to the stage. You were a little anxious to know how you sounded - obviously, you'd done well for Mrs. Mears to compliment you, but you wanted to hear it for yourself. 

It would probably be easiest to write a critique on yourself too - you knew for a fact that you had almost messed up the timing at one bit near the end.

You turned slightly to make that joke to Toby before remembering that the seat next to you was empty. You were immediately dampened again, turning back to the paper in front of you and jotting something halfhearted about the next act down in one of the boxes. You curled your fingers into the palm of your hand - it felt empty. 

You had been so looking forward to his shy little smile, and you had really wanted to grab his hand under the  pianos again.