The Orchestra - Sinfónia Lifsins - 38. Vác Steals the Show

If there was anything good in the media’s attempt to slaughter Dmitri’s reputation, it was that the saying there’s no such thing as bad publicity turned out to be true after all. The ISO was featured so much in the newspapers that our ticket sales suddenly sky-rocketed. On Thursday, the concert hall was crowded with shallow patrons who wanted nothing more than to see if Dmitri dared show his face in public again.

Surprise, surprise: Dmitri not only showed up, but we made a point of demonstrating how much we wanted him there.

We walked onto the stage as usual. Took our places. Did a bit of a public warming up. Only Dmitri and the replacement stayed behind the stage doors. People clapped when the replacement came in, most of them finally assured of their suspicion that Dmitri had fallen victim of his systematic persecution. We could see it in their eyes. The audience stared as one at the empty Principal Oboe’s chair like their life and pride depended on it staying that way.

The replacement stood with his violin ready to tune and turned to face Dmitri’s empty seat. He did a good job at hiding his usual blushing. Must have been some miracle of extra make-up. The replacement waited for the tuning note that never came. We waited with him.

It was as clear a message as we could make it without breaking too many protocols: Dmitri tuned the orchestra. Without him, we would not play.

The silence lasted until people in the audience started to turn to one another wondering what was going on. The buzzing sound of their whispered conversations filled the concert hall. Not laughing at their confusion turned out more difficult that it should have been.

The stage doors burst open and Dmitri finally walked onto the stage. I stood up and the whole orchestra followed. Dmitri found his place amidst an enthusiastic ovation from all his colleagues. The woodwinds sections even patted him on the back as he passed by them. Dmitri sat down and we followed his lead. The concert could finally begin.

(...)

“Well played, everyone. Well played!” Arnar joined us backstage at the interval. Pats on the back, hugs, and even some kisses were exchanged as our one true leader showed his most social self. “Your display of unity made some of us quite emotional.”

“By ‘some of us’ you really mean yourself, right?” Karen asked. Arnar lifted his arms in surrender.

“Yes, I do. I cried like a baby.”

Laughter. Everyone was amused at the thought of Arnar in tears.

But only because they had not seen him cry in pain.

“Aw, thanks a lot, everybody!” Dmitri bowed. “What you did there means a lot to me. I’m really lucky to work with such wonderful people!” Some tried to take the nicety back. They said it was nothing and, really, just part of their job. Somewhere there must be a book on good manners that says it is polite to refuse compliments. It made me almost glad I had never been properly socialised. And apparently Dmitri had not been properly socialised either. “Yes, I really mean that. And to prove my point, drinks tonight are all on me!”

The bastard led the procession of loud drunkards-to-be towards the bar. Almost everyone fancied a free drink, or at least the company of people who fancied free drinks. Only three of us remained in the warm-up room: one was me (with alcohol being such a poison to my body that even the smell made me sick), one was the kid (who was not even old enough to drink), and the other was someone who wanted to talk to the kid and me at the same time (and thus had a death wish).

“Gunni, Siggi, can I ask you something?” Vác, the clarinettist with a past acting career, approached quietly. It was not his style to be noisy (most likely why he was avoiding the free drinks party).

“Sure, what is it?” the replacement answered. At least it meant I did not have to.

“Seeing as I’ll be leaving on Monday to shoot the History Walkers special episode, I thought I should invite some of my friends to a weekend-long screening marathon of the movie and the TV series. I know neither of you have seen it yet, so if you want to give it a shot… I think it would be good to get in the mood for when we record the episode’s soundtrack.”

“Yes, I would love to! Thank you!” For some reason the replacement decided this situation required extensive blushing. All situations seemed to require extensive blushing when he was involved.

“You’re welcome. I’m going to invite more people too, but I thought it would be easier to start when there aren’t that many of you around.” Vác blushed too. I really expected more of him. All that blushing must be a celebrity thing.

“It’s definitely easier to get your voice heard that way.” Vác and the replacement looked at me and they blushed even more. How much more red blood cells could their faces stand?

“Do you want to come, Siggi?”

“Whether I want to come or not doesn’t really matter. You’ll invite Dmitri and he’ll drag me along under promises of wild kinky sex afterwards.” Their faces turned into neon tomatoes. Kind of amusing. “Count me in.”

“Oh… ok.”

Vác and the replacement did not try to start a conversation after that. The drunken cohort of the ISO returned five minutes before the second half of the concert was due to start. They somehow managed to look sober enough to play through Dvořák’s New World Symphony without noticeably messing it up.

(...)

“I know that smile. You want me to go with you to Vác’s party, don’t you?”

“Yeah, it would be nice to have you around.” The bastard had conveniently waited until I was securely handcuffed to the bedpost to give me his ‘Siggi-I-want-you-to-do-me-a-big-favour’ face. His plan was made even more obvious by the fact that he was already holding his most expensive flogger on one hand and our largest butt plug on the other.

“But you’re giving me the wild kinky sex on a Friday evening. I don’t see how that translates to bargaining material to get me to go with you on Saturday.”

Dmitri hit the mattress with the flogger. “Oh, that’s because what I’m about to do to you is just a light preview.” The grin reached its widest proportion. “If you enjoy the next hour, I’ll give you twice that on Monday. Deal?”

“Hit me.”

“As you wish.”

(...)

“Am I supposed to explain to everybody exactly how you made me come?”

“Depends. If you mean ‘come’ in the sense of that awesome sexy orgasm you had after I spent half an hour spanking your ass while you were tied to the bed, and then proceeded to hammer my cock inside you for the other half hour, it’s really up to you. But if you do, don’t forget to mention how Karen barged in demanding you use a gag because your screams were getting in the way of her favourite TV show. And you could also say something about that monster butt plug that was in your ass until we switched to my cock.” The bastard was still grinning. It would not surprise me if his lips had been glued in place since last night. “But if you mean ‘come’ in its most boring meaning, then you’ll have to explain the details of our deal, and tell them everything about how all the stuff I just said is going to happen double on Monday.”

“You’re just so proud of yourself, aren’t you?”

“Nah, I’m just really happy for you, Siggi!” One arm over my shoulder, forcing me to walk side by side with him. “I mean, you are coming with me to Vác’s party, so it must mean you really liked all of it and you want more.”

“If you must know, yes, I want more.” The bastard’s lips overextended. He must have found a way to turn them into rubber. “I mean, what better way to get back at the people who call you an unfaithful whore than going for an all-out BDSM scene with your very willing roommate? Who is, by the way, not paying you?”

The bastard laughed. “The papers would have a field day if they knew…”

“And your boyfriend would have a heart attack.”

“Please don’t tell Gunni any of this has ever happened.” Suddenly, a serious face.

“Shouldn’t he know about the stuff you’re into? For future reference and all that.”

“Gunni doesn’t need to know details yet.” Arms crossed over his chest. We were no longer walking. “And besides, I’m not even that much into causing pain. I only do it with you because you like it so much.”

“You like the tying up part.”

“That doesn’t mean I necessarily have to enjoy spanking people who are tied up. But anyway…” Dmitri tried to smile again, and we resumed our walk. “Yesterday was good for me too. It’s about time I get over that last time I put you in hospital.”

“I was trying to kill myself. It wasn’t you who put me there.”

“Exactly! I just have to keep remembering that, and we’ll be back to normal in the blink of an eye!” Dmitri’s smile was not very convincing this time around.

“Don’t push it too hard. I won’t go crazy horny if you take a little bit longer to feel like consensually hurting me again.” If Dmitri took as much time to heal from this particular trauma as I was taking to come to terms with Arnar’s retirement, it would probably be a couple of years at least.

“Fine, but Monday night is still on. I’ll make your ass very happy to compensate for having to put up with social people for the whole weekend.”

“I can live with that.”

We wore matching grins by the time we arrived at Vác’s.

(...)

Vác did not live far from us. The house of the once-famous TV star was one of those modern buildings with huge windows everywhere that let in as much sunlight as possible while keeping a decent level of insulation and privacy. Also for the sake of privacy, the whole property was surrounded by a tall living fence. Vác was lucky if this was enough to keep the paparazzi away. That fence had to be really efficient, because all of Vác’s living room could be seen as soon as one entered the garden, thanks to a giant window that covered most of the front wall of the house. In fact, there was no wall. It was just one huge glass pane that allowed anyone to see the cosy interior décor and the massive size of that one single room.

“Dmitri, Siggi, welcome!” Vác opened the door for us. “Aren’t Karen and Gísli coming with you?”

“They’re coming in the car because they wanted to bring some stuff with them. Karen has a whole load of History Walkers paraphernalia she wants to brag about in front of you. They should be here soon.” Dmitri took charge of the formal pleasantries. It was no secret I sucked at those.

“I see. Well then, come in and make yourselves comfortable. Sarah and the twins are already here. I’m setting up the projector so we can watch everything on a proper big screen.”

Once in the house, Dmitri turned into an annoying social butterfly and kept Sarah and the Japanese violist twins entertained until the other guests started to arrive. I was allowed to have my moments of peace and quiet until the time came to watch History Walkers the Movie. Karen and Gísli cluttered the living room with their complete collection of plush dolls of the movie characters (Vác’s blushing upon seeing himself in doll form was somewhat entertaining), and the fifteen people and one kid huddled together to watch our colleague’s rise to fame. Most sat on comfortable-looking couches and armchairs, but I was given a pile of cushions on the floor. Nothing personal, just the unfortunate detail that the couches were made of leather and I did not fancy skin rashes and potential anaphylaxis for the sake of a social event I was not all that keen to attend to begin with.

History Walkers the Movie was one of those sci-fi adventure movies full of special effects and attempts at humour even during highly explosive battles. The plot was simple: time travel becomes a reality, villain tries to mess with the space-time continuum and alter history, and good guys try to stop him by becoming a kind of time police. Nothing new. Nothing too exciting. And since the movie was ten years old, even the special effects were not that great.

The only thing that was almost interesting in this whole situation was that the sixteen-year-old Vác of the movie looked almost exactly like modern-day twenty-five-year-old Vác. Somehow, the man did not age a single wrinkle. I was not the only one who noticed this.

“So, what’s your secret, Vác?” Karen asked him at the end of the movie. “If you told me you filmed this thing yesterday, I would’ve believed you. What happened to you during the last ten years? Or rather… what didn’t happen?”

To his credit, Vác smiled and got perfectly in character to answer. “Well, you see, our natural ageing process does get a little weird when you spend so much time crossing space-time barriers…”

After we were done watching the movie, we spent another six hours in front of the giant projector watching the whole first season of History Walkers the TV series. There were toilet breaks and food breaks, but obviously there was nothing I could eat apart from a baked potato and some salad leaves. At least the series ended with a gay couple’s first kiss. It would have been cute or romantic if it did not happen after one of them killed half the world in a berserk rampage he remembered nothing about.

Everyone seemed to think it was perfectly romantic, though. The kiss was followed by many ‘ooh’s and ‘aw’s and ‘squee’ from our little audience, and the rest of the night was declared a pyjama party. Suddenly, enough mattresses to accommodate sixteen people sprung from out of nowhere, complete with pillows, duvets, and bed sheets. And the bathroom magically became the site of a long queue because everyone wanted to change into their pyjamas at the same time. Only the bastard decided he was too good to queue.

“Ok, I’m not going to wait!” he shouted in the middle of the room. “If you don’t want to see my private parts, look away now!” Out of the fifteen people still in the living room, only two looked away (his kid boyfriend and our host, both with faces in identical shades of red). Not that the bastard cared. He most likely enjoyed the attention. Gísli followed his lead, and so did Karen. And Emil. And Sarah. And the twins. One by one, most of the remaining guests stripped out of their daily clothes and into their horribly cute nightwear right in the middle of the living room. With the lights on. In front of a wall made of glass.

Smart move, everyone.

“I think I should point out that stripping in my living room is by no means mandatory.”

“That’s good to know, now that there’s only three people still not wearing pyjamas…” Ugla tried hard not to laugh. Our Principal Bassoon had been the first to run to the bathroom to get changed, and thus missed the whole spectacle of mass momentary nudity. Knowing her, she probably regretted it.

“I think I’ll go to the bathroom…” The replacement ran out of the room with the first excuse he got. It was not unrealistic to imagine that his whole body had become the same colour as his face by now.

“I’m going to get changed in my bedroom. Feel free to do whatever you want, Siggi.”

“I’ll wait for the bathroom. Public nudity is not my thing.”

“Ok, then. See you later.”

The pyjama party seemed to last even longer than the TV series, though logically speaking it could not be true. It was three in the morning when everyone finally calmed down enough to collapse on the floor of mattresses. It was barely nine o’clock when Vác’s alarm told us to get ready for part two of his History Walkers marathon. Two seasons to go, twelve hours of footage, plus all the extras.

If time travel was real, I would fast forward to Monday already.