This morning the relaxed moment of waking up in the arms of the boy he loved had only lasted a very short while, because the nerves had flooded in straight away and pretty soon he'd been so nervous he could barely eat.
In fact, he was so nervous he wondered if he'd be able to play properly at all, or whether his bow would resemble a coiled spring on top of a washing machine on its spin cycle.
They were in the back of the taxi now, Todd having taken the front seat again to allow Brett and him to sit squished together on the back seat again. And even though Eddy knew full well that they'd just spent the night side by side, so there was no way it was reasonable to complain about a few minutes apart, he was still so glad to have Brett right there, their hands furtively intertwined between their upper legs.
Brett gave his hand a small squeeze.
"You'll be fine, Eddy." he said softly, his voice so low that even the driver could probably not hear it.
Eddy sighed deeply. "Thanks. Do you reckon I'll ever get over this performance anxiety?"
Suddenly Todd laughed from the front seat and turned around to look at him.
"You too, hey? Well, I'm gonna go with 'no' on the getting over this shit front. I'm so nervous I could throw up."
"Well, if you want to do that you can do it outside, mate." Scruffy Suit unexpectedly added in his broad Aussie accent, and it was so out of character for him to speak that they all started laughing.
"Don't worry, mate." Todd drawled then. "I'm being metaphorical."
"Cool. No metaphorical puking either in my taxi, though."
Now they all roared with laughter, and Eddy had to admit he felt a little bit better for the driver's joke as they pulled up to the building and got out to pick up their instrument cases.
"Hello, group!" Mr. Davids said as they walked into the hall, the excitement clear in his voice. "I'll bet you've been wondering what surprise I've cooked up for you today."
They all nodded, and Eddy held his breath, waiting for the conductor to speak again.
"So, like I said I have asked some friends to work with you this morning, whom you will find in the rehearsal spaces upstairs. You can each work on your solo repertoire with them for an hour, and then you can have lunch. After lunch, you'll be spending the afternoon rehearsing with the Perth Symphony Orchestra on their new project, so you can have a taste of what it's like to play in a professional orchestra.
A professional orchestra.
The excitement blossomed hard in Eddy's chest, and if he wouldn't have been a sixteen-year-old guy he probably would have started jumping up and down in excitement right about now.
Seriously. He was going to rehearse with a pro orchestra? His heart thudded erratically in his chest at the thought.
"Right, you guys make your way up, Brett and Eddy in room one, Ian and Todd in room two, please. Enjoy!"
Mr. Davids gave them one more smile and then he started walking backstage before any of them had recovered enough to even thank him, surely to start his rehearsal with the youth orchestra.
The guys looked at each other, some disbelieving giggles escaping lips, and then they all spoke at once.
"A pro orchestra!"
"Perth Symphony is awesome, I've seen them in concert!"
"Do you know the concert master? He's fantastic!"
Then Todd took over.
"Guys. We've got to calm down, okay? This is a very cool thing and we need to make the most of it. So why don't we head upstairs and enter those rooms like sane people?"
They all nodded.
"You're right. Let's go!" Brett said, and the small group ran up the flights of stairs to the rehearsal rooms.
Eddy took a deep breath as he stood in front of the door a minute later. Who would be this mystery friend of Mr. Davids' on the other side of this door? He shot once last glance at Brett beside him and then he breathed deeply and steeled himself.
He slowly reached for the handle and opened the door.