Symphony of Sound.

Jack is jittery and nervous on the morning of his Grade Six Cello exam. He’s pacing around the school parking lot, waiting for one of the teachers to show up and take him away to his exam hall, which is somewhere across the city.

“Relax –you’re freaking out, I can tell.” Alex comments from the bench a few feet away. “You’ll do fine, I promise.”

Jack turns and glares at the older boy, who is slumped back against the wood, wearing an annoyingly smug expression and his jeans and some old band tee that Jack’s pretty sure he stole from Zack.

Jack, on the other hand, is in full formal school uniform, because he’s ‘representing the school in the community’ or some other rubbish along those lines.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Alex laughs, making grabby hands towards the younger boy, who reluctantly walks over to him and sits in his lap.

“I’ll look at you however I want.” Jack snaps, giving the older boy a stern look. Alex looks genuinely scared for a moment, honey eyes widening considerably before the younger lets out a rough sigh and tangles his slim fingers in his messy dark brown hair.

“I... Sorry. I guess I’m just nervous, that’s all. Sorry I kind of took it out on you.”

“That’s okay.” Alex says, hugging Jack a little despite the odd arrangement of limbs. “If I was in your position, I guess I’d be nervous too.”

“Thanks for that, Alex. You’re supposed to be making me feel better about this, not making me more reluctant.”

“Sorry. But, Jack, you really have nothing to worry about. Promise.”

Jack is about to make a witty response, but Miss Clarke, one of the other music teachers, arrives in her too expensive, school loaned Mercedes, ready to whisk Jack away to downtown Augusta for his exam.

Alex hugs him tight in goodbye and good luck, before burying his hands into the deep pockets of his hoodie and heading back to the junior block, not stopping to watch Jack’s car drive away.

He holes himself up in his dorm room for the rest of the day, calls various members of his family and watches a few box sets of Lost on his laptop, forces himself to practice a little for Orchestra and Music class, as much as he dislikes the idea.

He’s more irritated by the fact that he has to work with Nick than he lets on –not only is he incredibly annoying about eighty percent of the time, but he’s also a brass player.

For some reason, Alex has had a hatred of brass players for as long as he can remember. It’s probably incredibly unjust and wrong, but it’s kind of tradition now for Alex to sit and glare at the brass section during orchestra.

There’s nothing wrong with them, really, Alex just dislikes them for reasons he doesn’t honestly remember.

But, besides, he’s ended up stuck working with Nick for this unit, and he still doesn’t quite understand how any song can be covered using just a double bass and trumpet and still sound half acceptable.

Alex presumes this is why they’ve chosen (see: Nick’s chosen) a Rammstein song with a trumpet fanfare for an introduction.

He’s still somewhat unsure about it, but he practices anyway, simply because he doesn’t want an angry Nick Santino on his case.

He gets bored of it quickly, though, and returns to playing around on his laptop until Zack knocks on his door half an hour later.

“You awake?” His voice says through the door, and when Alex grunts in response, the younger pushes the door open.

“They’re putting a movie on in the common room, if you want to come watch it.” Zack suggests, sticking his head around the door. “Hey, is that my shirt? I’ve been looking for it for at least a week.”

“It might be,” Alex says with a smirk as he closes his laptop, setting it down on his bed before standing and moving over to the door.

“God, nothing is sacred in this place, is it? Can’t leave anything unattended for more than two seconds before a thieving British git comes and steals it from you.” Zack says with a laugh, taking hold of Alex’s wrist and dragging him out of his room and down the corridor, into the common room.

“Hey, guys.” Greta says with a smile as the two of them enter the common room and take a place on the floor beside the fire. “It’s good to see you.”

“We’re watching Coraline.” Paul, a flautist they both know from Orchestra, leans back and tells them.

There’s not many of them there –Greta, Nick, Paul, David, Christofer, Austin and, of course, Alex and Zack.

Rian is out somewhere with Cassadee, and when he told Zack, the younger boy had just completely zoned out at the mention of the younger girl.

Jack is still not back from his exam by the time the movie is done and Paul is crawling across the floor to take out the disc and place School Of Rock inside.

Of course, with Alex’s mind being as treacherous as it is, it’s telling him that something bad has happened to Jack and he’s in trouble or something of the sort.

He’s thinking of disaster theory number seven when the door of the common room swings open and Jack stumbles inside, eyes lidded with sleep and a yawn stretching his lips.

“Hey,” Alex says, jumping to his feet and making a half asleep Zack jolt awake, “I missed you.”

Jack makes a tired noise of approval and blinks a few times, picking up his cello again and heading for the stairs.

Alex takes it from him before he reaches the stairs, deciding that the younger boy is too tired to be carrying anything other than his own body weight right now.

Jack makes a soft noise that Alex takes to mean ‘thank you’ and he almost falls through the door of his dorm after he’s unlocked it. Alex catches him before he completely passes out and manages to direct him onto his bed rather than the floor.

Alex tries to make a move to leave, but finds he can’t, because Jack has twisted his fingers into the front of his shirt and it refusing to let go in his sleep ridden state.

Jack makes another noise of content and buries his face against Alex’s chest. The older boy sighs, resigning himself to the fact that Jack isn’t about to let go any time soon, so he may as well just sleep here tonight.

He absently wraps his arms around the younger boy’s tiny waist and exhales gently, smiling against Jack’s hair as he drifts off.

“So,” Zack asks as he takes a seat opposite Rian at the breakfast table, “how was your date?”

He asks more out of courtesy than curiosity, because he honestly couldn’t care less about how Rian’s date with Cassadee went –he’s taken more of a dislike to her over the past few days than ever before.

Rian shrugs, continuing to shovel cereal into his mouth at an alarmingly fast pace.

“It was alright, I guess. Kind of boring movie though –girly films always are.”

“Your definition of a ‘girly film’ is anything that has Zac Efron in it.” Zack replies, rolling his eyes.

It’s Sunday, so everyone has shown up to breakfast in basically whatever they slept in, so Zack is sitting there in red sweatpants and a gray hoodie, while Rian’s wearing a two sizes too big Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles tee and green shorts.

Jack and Alex appear a few moments later, and nothing could ever mentally prepare Zack and Rian for the sight that lies before them.

They fell asleep fully clothed, so one can only assume they woke and changed at some point during the night. That’s the only liable reason for Alex to be wearing a pale blue onesie with a hood, and Jack to be clothed in what appears to be his brother’s Megadeth tee and his underwear, and fluffy pink slippers.

“Remind me again why we associate with them?” Rian says with a laugh, rolling his eyes as the other two come over to sit with them.

“I really think I should, Jack.” Alex says, peeling the skin from the banana that he lifts from his tray. “It can’t hurt, right?”

“Alex, I don’t know if it’s such a good idea.” Jack replies with a frown. “You’re not due to take Grade Five for another six months, at least.”

“I know that.” Alex snaps. “I just feel as if I’m falling behind. You’re all so far ahead of me. I mean, Zack will be Grade Eight sooner or later, you’re going to be Grade Six in about two weeks, and Rian’s not going to be at Grade Six forever.”

Rian and Zack realize that they’re discussing (read: arguing about) Alex’s double bass grade. He’s only at Grade Four, and while Zack can see why it’s bothering him, it’s nothing to worry about.

“Relax, Alex.” Zack says with a weak smile. “You have to remember that we have all been playing for longer than you anyway –Rian and I both started properly at eight, Jack started at eleven and you only started at thirteen. It’s great that you’ve come this far in three years, you don’t need to push yourself.”

Alex makes an annoyed sound from the back of his throat –he knows that the younger boy is right, but he’s not about to admit that to anyone but himself.

“I’m still going to talk to Mr. Smith about taking it early, though.” He says, taking a bite and chewing entirely too violently on the banana he’s passing off as breakfast. “I’m at the same skill level as freshmen, guys. That’s not good, and you know it.”

Rian shrugs, pushing his empty bowl away from him.

“Whatever, do what you want. Your decision, not ours.”