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Stories posted in this category are works of fiction. Names, places, characters, events, and incidents are created by the authors' imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual persons (living or dead), organizations, companies, events, or locales are entirely coincidental.
Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you. 

Stronger Than Lions - 29. Rach-fuckin'-maninov

I sat through Mass, unable to pay attention.

I didn’t attend Communion, and slipped out during the recessional hymn.

The rain had stopped. The lanes of Newlands were quiet as I walked home. Water dripped from bare branches. The mountain was completely covered in fog.

As I turned into my street I saw The Thing parked outside my house.

Just as I tried to inch behind a tree, the headlights flashed. I heard him start the engine. The Jeep drove slowly towards me and stopped where I stood rooted next to a broken fire hydrant. He rolled down the window and leaned out.

‘Hey,’ he said, eyebrows arched.

I dug my hands into my pockets and walked slowly towards him. ’Hi.'

'At least the rain's finally stopped,' he ventured.

I nodded. 'How long have you been waiting outside my house?’

‘I dunno. Half an hour?’

‘I thought we said we'd chat in the afternoon.’

He squeezed his eyes tight for a moment, looking like a slapped puppy. ‘I’m sorry bru. I swear, I was driving to go to the sauna at gym but I just found myself taking the turn off to your house and like have been sitting here, psyching myself up to message you when you just, like appeared.’

‘It’s okay.’

‘Where’ve you just come from?’

‘I went to con— I went to Mass.’

He paused. ‘I thought you didn’t go any more.’

‘Ja, I haven’t been for a while.’

‘Do you want to get in? Perhaps we could go somewhere and… talk.’

I bit my lip. ‘Okay,’ I said, and walked over to the other side and got in. ‘Let’s go to the park around the corner.’

'Sure, bru.' He started driving.

If we were going to break up, I might as well hear the news somewhere quiet that felt safe. I’d spent many hours as a child running around the little park which abutted the bottommost reaches of the Newlands Forest. A small stream separated it from the woods. I used to imagine that there were sprites that lived in its waters.

He parked The Thing and we got out. We walked in silence to one of the benches underneath a silver oak and sat down on the driest one, startling a hadeda that flew off squawking loudly in disdain.

We stared ahead towards the stream, neither one of us making eye contact.

He spoke first. ‘I don’t know what to say, Cal, except that I'm sorry. I'm sure you hate me.’

‘No,’ I managed. ‘I don’t.’

‘You sure?' He tapped a foot against the ground, worrying free clods of dirt and stones and dead leaves. 'I know this sounds so lame, but we had all had so much beer, and it just like happened, and I know what it must have looked like to you, and I swear I wasn’t going to do anything more than…’

‘I slept with Veronica,’ I snapped.

‘Bru.’ He looked at me, eyes narrowed, head tilted. ‘What?’

I raised my voice. ‘I slept with Veronica, okay? I bumped into her last night and I overreacted and fucked up. I’m a worthless piece of shit. You should leave now before I hurt you more.’

His eyes were huge as blood pulsed in my ears.

‘Jesus.’ He stood up and picked up one of the loose stones and flung it at full force across the grass and into the stream.

‘It just happened,’ I sniffed, shivering. ‘I’m... really sorry. Not that it changes anything.’

He sat down again and put his hands over his face, shaking his head from side to side.

‘Chris,’ I said desperately. ‘Say something. Punch me. Anything. I deserve it.’

‘Fucking hell, Cal,’ he yelled, ‘fucking hell!’

I closed my eyes, hearing him take deep, terrifyingly slow breaths.

I waited for something to happen.

Nothing did.

‘Please…’ I said, opening my eyes again. ‘Please, Chris… I thought you’d left me and…’

He shot out a palm at me. 'Oh, God,' he said and looked down.

‘I think I should leave now,’ I muttered.

‘No.’ His voice was dead even. ‘You can shut the fuck up right now. But you’re not leaving.’

The silence was nauseating. Then I heard his voice go high.

At first I thought he was sobbing, but when I turned to look at him he was giggling.

‘Veronica!’ he said with a snort. ‘Veronica? This is… this is...fuckin' hilarious.’

He made a fist and raised it. I winced, thinking I was going to get decked. But it travelled slowly, well away from my face, and came to rest bumping me playfully on my shoulder.

He was flat-out laughing now.

‘What the fuck?’ I said, frozen.

‘Seven of Mine, you fuckin’ biscuit,’ he said between guffaws.

‘Why are you laughing?’

‘You got shit-faced and hopped into the sack with the hottest girl in school for a rebound fuck because you thought your idiot goon of a boyfriend was cheating on you.’

‘I don’t... I don't understand,’ I stammered, ‘I just slept with someone else and you’re not mad?’

‘Of course I’m mad, bru. I’m fuckin’ furious. But I definitely don’t hate you.’

I must have been doing the slapped puppy look at this point. ‘You don’t?’

He shook his head. ’I fuckin’ love you. And I’m...I'm sorry I behaved like such a dickhead to make you react like that. Come here, please, come here.’

He pulled me towards him and I didn’t resist.

When he rested his head on top of mine I lost it and burst into tears.

‘Oh babe,’ he said, tightening his grip. ‘We’ve both been fuckin’ idiots. You thought I’d left you?’

I nodded, pulling away and trying to compose myself and failing. ‘I didn’t plan it… we met by total accident and… and we went to her house and there was wine and it just… it just happened and…’

He took my hand. ‘If I hadn’t said yes to that lap dance with, ugh, Tricia…God, I’m such a tool.’

‘But—but I went...further. How come you’re still here? Being nice?’

He was quiet for a few seconds. ‘I fucked up first. Also, you’ve never been with a girl before. I have. It’s not how I'd have planned things but… I’m kind of glad it happened.'

'Why?'

'It’s happened and we are still here.’

It felt like each word was dripping slowly into my brain. ‘Can you…' I said, 'can we forgive each other?’

He gave a little smile. ‘I think we have to? We were both drunk as fuck.’ He squeezed my hand a little tighter. ’You know, I really wanted to leave straight after the game.’

I blinked. ‘And then you went… straight… after the game.’

'Ow.' He knit his brow and then grasped his chest in mock pain. ‘Ooh. What a burn.’

I tried to deadpan but was now laughing myself.

‘I deserved that,’ he said. ‘And I can see this scares you. Me, and girls. You’ve mentioned it before.’

I tried not to flinch. ’I think you understand that fear now, because, um, hello, Veronica…’

He nodded a few times. ‘Fuck. I do. All too well, man. We just have to...'

'Can we talk about it, later, maybe? Right now I just want to congratulate my boyfriend on scoring the winning try.'

'Aw, man.' He looked at me, blushing. 'Just, believe me when I say I didn’t want to be anywhere else but with you when we won. Felt fuckin’ amazing getting that try and knowing you watched me… I wanted to kiss you in front of the whole school and for there to be a fuckin’ soundtrack and credits rolling and shit. Epic, stuff bru. Epic.’

I beamed. ’Hans Zimmer or John Williams for the soundtrack?’

He cocked his head to the side. ‘For you? Hmmm. It'd have to be next level. Someone you play, someone...oh shit, yeah, baby.'

'Chris?'

'Rach-fuckin’-maninov, bru. I'd need a time machine, but, I'd ask that guy to write you your own personalised… symphony. Did I choose right? Did he write those things?’

‘He wrote three,’ I said, grinning. ‘Or five, if you’re being technical. And stop sweeping me off my feet already, the end of his Second Symphony is like one of my favourite things ever, like Williams and Zimmer combined and squared.’

He let out a sigh. ‘Oh thank fuck. I was totally guessing, but, shit, now I have to hear this.’

‘You could, and… I…’ I stoped, sniffed and shook my head. ‘Sorry, it’s all…so much.’

‘Bru…’

‘I miss my mom.’

He pressed his forehead against mine. ‘Oh babe. Tell me what you need.’

‘I need for us to stop talking. Take me home and maybe we can sit and listen to the Second Symphony. We have it.’

‘Can I hold you while we do so?’

‘I won’t say no, Number One.’

‘I will comply, Seven of Mine.’

We listened to the whole hour of it. Not to a CD, but to my father’s LP of a 1973 recording with André Previn conducting the London Symphony Orchestra, as we lay on the lounge floor under a frayed woollen blanket.

Chris was fidgety in the first movement, grabbing and letting go of my hand haphazardly. He started tapping his feet in the second. When the clarinet solo started in the third movement, he froze, and when the great climax of the Adagio hit he looked for all the world as if he had been injected with morphine. The final movement whirled around us in glorious, ecstatic ribbons of noise. I thought of hadedas and water sprites and as the great beast broadened and tumbled towards its cosmic closing bars we finally kissed, messily, hungrily, smeared with each other’s tears and sweat.

The speakers hissed with white noise as our embrace slackened, the kiss dying along with the ocean of sound that had retreated as suddenly as it had arrived.

(Music geekery ahead, you have been warned.)
Some have called Sergei Rachmaninov's Symphony No. 2 in E minor (1907) the last great symphonic statement of the Romantic era. Although it was a massive success at its premiere, it soon fell into obscurity and out of the repertoire as more modern and avant-garde composers became fashionable. After successive reappraisals, it is now considered one of the greatest symphonies ever written and is now tremendously popular.
The composer exerted a deep and lasting influence on film music—for me this is very clear when you listen to John Williams's scores for Star Wars.
Previn's 1972 recording was a landmark one that helped re-established its home in the standard symphonic canon, but I have appended here an extract from my own favourite live performance, which would not yet have been available to Cal and Chris in the mid 2000s.
Here are the closing minutes of the symphony referenced in the chapter (end of the fourth movement), timestamped from the slow but steady build-up to one of the most triumphant endings in all of classical music (it erupts into full force at around 57:00). The most famous bit is however the (almost unbearably) lovely third movement, which in itself contains one of the greatest climaxes ever written for orchestra. I do encourage you to listen to the whole thing as the boys have.
 
 
2013, 2023 Sean J Halford
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Thank you for reading! I would love to hear your thoughts and comments and greatly appreciate honest feedback from readers.
If you are enjoying this story, feel free to recommend it and/or post a review. 
Stories posted in this category are works of fiction. Names, places, characters, events, and incidents are created by the authors' imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to actual persons (living or dead), organizations, companies, events, or locales are entirely coincidental.
Note: While authors are asked to place warnings on their stories for some moderated content, everyone has different thresholds, and it is your responsibility as a reader to avoid stories or stop reading if something bothers you. 

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Chapter Comments

1 hour ago, Petey said:

While Cal wishes to stay in “the pit (depths)of guilt” as my late Mother called it and Calvinists love to stay, Chris would not allow it. 
The boys sure complement each other. They both can support each other when the need arises. 
Music, the great healer ❤️

Quite right. Also, when you’re at the bottom of the pit it kind of feels morbidly safe, but what a gloomy existence. I had an uncle who had severe depression throughout his life and refused treatment, instead he clung to the doctrine of predestination that this was foreordained and refused to budge from his Calvinism. A gentle kind man whose spiritual addiction to piety robbed him of a happy (or at least happier) life. 

If I’m going to be scientifically cute… you could say Cal carries some sort of amplified genetic memory of guilt and that Chris’s influence is dampening this down… or at least, I’ve written Cal as being too head up in the clouds, taking in too many big thoughts, and Chris is helping him see the ground beneath his feet—conversely Chris has been gaslit by society and his father to think he is only good if he embraces a rigidly stoic view of the world and Cal is helping him look up at the sky and see the big picture. :) 

  • Love 5
1 hour ago, Petey said:

While Cal wishes to stay in “the pit (depths)of guilt” as my late Mother called it and Calvinists love to stay, Chris would not allow it. 
The boys sure complement each other. They both can support each other when the need arises. 
Music, the great healer ❤️

Quite right. Also, when you’re at the bottom of the pit it kind of feels morbidly safe, but what a gloomy existence. I had an uncle who had severe depression throughout his life and refused treatment, instead he clung to the doctrine of predestination that this was foreordained and refused to budge from his Calvinism. A gentle kind man whose spiritual addiction to piety robbed him of a happy (or at least happier) life. 

If I’m going to be scientifically cute… you could say Cal carries some sort of amplified genetic memory of guilt and that Chris’s influence is dampening this down.

I’ve envisaged Cal as being too head up in the clouds, taking in too many big thoughts, and Chris is helping him see the ground beneath his feet and live in the present. Conversely Chris has been gaslit by society and his father to think he is only good if he embraces a rigidly stoic and empirical view of the world. Cal is helping him look up at the sky and see the big picture. Which might lead some people to think I basically wrote a love story about statistical regression to the mean 😂😂

  • Love 3

Like Chapter headings - the music adds another layer to the story - if only all such misunderstandings were so easily resolved?

Chris appears very attuned to Caleb - that he would like Rachmaninov - and I think the flow of this piece is Caleb swimming back up out of ocean depths?

The third movement performed by the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Andre Previn is on YouTube - 

 

But what would Caleb compose for Chris to celebrate a winning goal? Music for the lows and highs of a football game?

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1 hour ago, dbonarz said:

Like Chapter headings - the music adds another layer to the story - if only all such misunderstandings were so easily resolved?

Chris appears very attuned to Caleb - that he would like Rachmaninov - and I think the flow of this piece is Caleb swimming back up out of ocean depths?

The third movement performed by the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Andre Previn is on YouTube - 

 

But what would Caleb compose for Chris to celebrate a winning goal? Music for the lows and highs of a football game?

Ooh thanks for finding it. The bit that starts at around 6:52 (in your clip, not the one below) and explodes at 7:45 always makes my hair stand on end, and in a concert hall the effect is overwhelming.Rach suffered from lifelong mood issues and this symphony (along with the 2nd Piano Concerto) marked a triumphant return to composition after a severe bout of depression. He must absolutely be telling the story of overcoming the darkness here, given how the first movement starts extremely somber and gloomy and then very slowly it starts crawling out of the depths. 

I chose the final movement for the chapter because it's pure festival and fireworks... if you compare the opening of the 1st and 4th movements side by side they are complete opposites in mood. As to what Caleb might compose? He's more a performer / pianist, so it would be a piano piece, like Rachmaninov's 6th Moment Musical, it is just so unbelievably triumphant. Here's Nikolai Luganksy, one of the best Rach interpreters.

 

Edited by Sean J Halford
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While I can't disagree with the classical musical choices that give rise to the empathy both boys seek in each other, for us peons, the great unwashed heathens , who only get to sit in the last rows (if we were so lucky), of the nose-bleed seats for concerts such as the wonder of  Rach-fuckin’-maninov. Most likely our seats would be on the hard cobbled seats, barely up from the gutter.

But I digress, both boys have inner strength that is allowing both to break the bounds of instilled/installed dogma, and see the possibility of life outside the narrowness of their upbringing.

If I were to ascribe to a musical standard, chosen from the cheapest of seats, I would choose the following. Here where I live in Boston Ma., we have a tradition of July 4th concerts, celebrating our founding, the creation of something new. I feel our two star-crossed lovers are worthy of another choice, this the last played as the fireworks go off and as sappy as it may be I give you...

 

 

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22 hours ago, drsawzall said:

While I can't disagree with the classical musical choices that give rise to the empathy both boys seek in each other, for us peons, the great unwashed heathens , who only get to sit in the last rows (if we were so lucky), of the nose-bleed seats for concerts such as the wonder of  Rach-fuckin’-maninov. Most likely our seats would be on the hard cobbled seats, barely up from the gutter.

But I digress, both boys have inner strength that is allowing both to break the bounds of instilled/installed dogma, and see the possibility of life outside the narrowness of their upbringing.

If I were to ascribe to a musical standard, chosen from the cheapest of seats, I would choose the following. Here where I live in Boston Ma., we have a tradition of July 4th concerts, celebrating our founding, the creation of something new. I feel our two star-crossed lovers are worthy of another choice, this the last played as the fireworks go off and as sappy as it may be I give you...

 

 

I have been to the Jazz under the Stars at Sydney Festival in the Domain (part of the Royal Botanical Gardens) the closing of the Jazz evening is the 1812 Overture, which is a fantastic night

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On 7/1/2023 at 2:52 AM, drsawzall said:

While I can't disagree with the classical musical choices that give rise to the empathy both boys seek in each other, for us peons, the great unwashed heathens , who only get to sit in the last rows (if we were so lucky), of the nose-bleed seats for concerts such as the wonder of  Rach-fuckin’-maninov. Most likely our seats would be on the hard cobbled seats, barely up from the gutter.

But I digress, both boys have inner strength that is allowing both to break the bounds of instilled/installed dogma, and see the possibility of life outside the narrowness of their upbringing.

If I were to ascribe to a musical standard, chosen from the cheapest of seats, I would choose the following. Here where I live in Boston Ma., we have a tradition of July 4th concerts, celebrating our founding, the creation of something new. I feel our two star-crossed lovers are worthy of another choice, this the last played as the fireworks go off and as sappy as it may be I give you...

 

 

Hey, I love the Boston Pops and so did my dad who was a classical musician. 1812 overture is always a showstopper. In the mid-2000s, as it is now, Cape Town has one chronically underfunded, but highly talented symphony orchestra and it has a loyal (but small) following... and tickets are cheap. It is one of the few remaining professional classical orchestras on the African continent.

So Cal and Chris could probably have gotten affordable seats especially as students, or, more likely, would likely be getting their musical kicks from records and CDs. 

www.cpo.org.za

 

Edited by Sean J Halford
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