Once a Rebel... by Nikki Logan Read Free Book Online

noisefrom the mounting audience surged and washed over them.
    ‘Are you coming or staying?’
    It wasn’t too late to scalp the tickets out front for a profit.
    She let the smile loose, finally. Smug and a little bit too appealing. ‘And forgo the chance to make you have to get your Spartacus on?’ She pushed past him and spoke into the crowd. ‘Not on your life.’
    Shirley shuffled in her seat as the applause for the conductor finally died down. She had no idea who he was but every other person there clearly did, judging by the adulation. The white-haired man turned his back on the audience and sorted his music in the descended hush. The perfect acoustics of the venue meant that everyone heard it. Even the shuffling of music sheets sounded good.
    Of course
, her mother would have chided.
Beethoven wrote it.
    It was hard, as it always was, not to regret her mother’s absence. How she would have appreciated this special moment. Then again, if she’d been alive, would any of them have thought of doing it? She’d barely gone to the movies in all of Shirley’s childhood, let alone anywhere this special.
    That was the awful irony about bucket lists.
    ‘Ready?’ Hayden leaned in and whispered. His shoulder brushed hers and the heat pumping off him surged.
    The final murmurs from the rows of seating behindand above them stopped and, though nothing in particular was said, the orchestra locked their eyes on the white-haired man in front of them the moment he raised both arms and held them there.
    Shirley’s breath held, too.
    And then they came … The first distinctive notes of Beethoven’s Fifth symphony.
    Da da da dum …
    Da da da dummmmm.
    This close, the music was virtually a physical impact. Its volume. Its presence. The hairs curling around her face blew and tickled in the breeze generated only by the synchronised speed of the string section as they commenced their furious playing.
    She still hadn’t breathed.
    Hayden glanced sideways at her as the galloping, excitable violins grew in pitch and strength and she sat up straighter. It wasn’t until the trombone had its momentary solo that she heaved in her first breath.
    And still he looked.
    Amazing, this close, this live. The passion of the performers poured off the stage and washed over her. The drama of the conductor’s jerky directions, the rolling synergy of their notes.
    Her eyes fell shut.
    The music fluttered against her face as it entered the gentle, lyrical interlude which grew and grew.
    This was what Beethoven must have experienced when he could no longer hear his music.
    And then it came. The discordant counterpoint.
    Her eyes opened and she glanced to her right. Hayden was still looking at her. She took a deep breath and returned her full attention to the hammering orchestra. Minutes passed, planets orbited, the poles melted. The music softened for a momentary reprieve. The poignant, forlorn aria of a lone oboe—she wondered how she’d never noticed it before when her mother cranked up her
Best of Beethoven.
    And then the tumbling notes, the controlled descent before returning to the power of the full orchestra for the climax which ended so very like it had begun. Her chest heaved, her heart beat in synch with the strokes of the musical genius. Her body flinched with the explosive closing notes, and she pressed her lips together to stop from crying out.
    And then … nothing.
    Silence.
    The conductor lowered his baton. The orchestra breathed out as one—long, slow and silent.
    Shirley turned, breathless, to Hayden. She couldn’t clap because no one else was. She couldn’t leap up and shout for more, though it seemed ludicrous that music like that wasn’t supposed to be celebrated loudly. She could only look at him and hope that her excitement and appreciation were written in her eyes. Her fingers curled around his, hard, as though she could press her thoughts straight through his skin.
    His return gaze was complex. Curious. As though she were