Vanilla 23, chocolate 20, strawberry 22: Stage Fright
Title: Stage Fright
Main Story: In the Heart
Flavors and Toppings: Vanilla 23 (music/dancing/singing), chocolate 20 (caution), strawberry 22 (flowers), cherry on top (present tense and some stylistic things).
Word Count: 468
Rating: G
Summary: Olivia cannot believe Jake is talking her into this.
Notes: Concrit always welcome if you have it! Also, there is some Lars in this. Not a lot, but some. I know some of you folks were looking forward to more of him. :)
EDIT: Ahem. My apologies for the html fail. Nobody saw nuffin'.
Olivia cannot believe Jake is talking her into this.
Okay, so, Lars is helping. It's her song, he says, written just for her, and it's only right that she be in the video. Besides, she should be used to performing for an audience; doesn't she play piano for anyone who will pay her?
Well, yeah, but in churches, and at weddings, and at parties. No one's exactly paying attention to the pianist at swanky parties. They've got better things to do, so Olivia can play in blessed peace.
Besides, Lars doesn't want her to play in his video, though he does want Jake to play the cello, apparently (she didn't even know Jake played the cello). He wants her to dance. She hasn't danced since...
...well, for a long time.
At least not for an audience.
There won't be an audience, Jake tells her. There will only be Ivy and Aaron, and maybe Gina, making the cameras and the sound do what they need them to. She knows Ivy and Aaron, and Gina's seen her dancing around their shared dorm room, going up en pointe briefly before dropping back down. It won't be like dancing for strangers.
But it is, she wants to say. It is like dancing for strangers because it's not like cameras are sympathetic. If the others were watching it would be different, but Ivy and Aaron won't be watching her, because Aaron will be too busy fiddling with the sound and Ivy too busy swearing at the cameras. Gina... Gina will do as she pleases, always has, but Olivia suspects she'll be watching Ivy, keeping her from applying percussive maintenance and accidentally breaking a recalcitrant camera.
So the only thing watching her will be the cold glass eye of the video camera, framing her face and body, splitting them apart, making her separate and bare before the thousands upon thousands of people who might see this through other glass eyes: monitor screens, laptops, even television if Lars gets really lucky. She won't have a chance to explain herself to the camera. It will not be watching her benevolently, with a loving eye always ready to forgive errors. It will not be waiting after her recital with a bouquet of daffodils, 'sunny flowers for my sunny little girl.'
She has not danced since she left her father's house. She's not sure she's ready to do it again.
She wants to tell all this to Jake, and she could; he knows about her father, her mother, the day her childhood ended, and he understands, he lost his family too. But explaining all of it would take too long and maybe sound selfish; after all, he's going to be playing cello again, isn't he, reclaiming something he lost.
So instead she says, if I dance you're dancing with me.
A tiny smile crosses Jake's face--relief? Amusement? Affection?--and he says, sure, just tell me what to do.
Main Story: In the Heart
Flavors and Toppings: Vanilla 23 (music/dancing/singing), chocolate 20 (caution), strawberry 22 (flowers), cherry on top (present tense and some stylistic things).
Word Count: 468
Rating: G
Summary: Olivia cannot believe Jake is talking her into this.
Notes: Concrit always welcome if you have it! Also, there is some Lars in this. Not a lot, but some. I know some of you folks were looking forward to more of him. :)
EDIT: Ahem. My apologies for the html fail. Nobody saw nuffin'.
Olivia cannot believe Jake is talking her into this.
Okay, so, Lars is helping. It's her song, he says, written just for her, and it's only right that she be in the video. Besides, she should be used to performing for an audience; doesn't she play piano for anyone who will pay her?
Well, yeah, but in churches, and at weddings, and at parties. No one's exactly paying attention to the pianist at swanky parties. They've got better things to do, so Olivia can play in blessed peace.
Besides, Lars doesn't want her to play in his video, though he does want Jake to play the cello, apparently (she didn't even know Jake played the cello). He wants her to dance. She hasn't danced since...
...well, for a long time.
At least not for an audience.
There won't be an audience, Jake tells her. There will only be Ivy and Aaron, and maybe Gina, making the cameras and the sound do what they need them to. She knows Ivy and Aaron, and Gina's seen her dancing around their shared dorm room, going up en pointe briefly before dropping back down. It won't be like dancing for strangers.
But it is, she wants to say. It is like dancing for strangers because it's not like cameras are sympathetic. If the others were watching it would be different, but Ivy and Aaron won't be watching her, because Aaron will be too busy fiddling with the sound and Ivy too busy swearing at the cameras. Gina... Gina will do as she pleases, always has, but Olivia suspects she'll be watching Ivy, keeping her from applying percussive maintenance and accidentally breaking a recalcitrant camera.
So the only thing watching her will be the cold glass eye of the video camera, framing her face and body, splitting them apart, making her separate and bare before the thousands upon thousands of people who might see this through other glass eyes: monitor screens, laptops, even television if Lars gets really lucky. She won't have a chance to explain herself to the camera. It will not be watching her benevolently, with a loving eye always ready to forgive errors. It will not be waiting after her recital with a bouquet of daffodils, 'sunny flowers for my sunny little girl.'
She has not danced since she left her father's house. She's not sure she's ready to do it again.
She wants to tell all this to Jake, and she could; he knows about her father, her mother, the day her childhood ended, and he understands, he lost his family too. But explaining all of it would take too long and maybe sound selfish; after all, he's going to be playing cello again, isn't he, reclaiming something he lost.
So instead she says, if I dance you're dancing with me.
A tiny smile crosses Jake's face--relief? Amusement? Affection?--and he says, sure, just tell me what to do.