Summer came and went, with fall on its way out.  Soon, winter would be falling upon the SM Philharmonic Orchestra once again.

The orchestra, unsurprisingly, had been doing poorly with the controversies and scandals that had been left in the wake of principal cellist Huang Zitao’s departure.

Although the reason for his departure had been a well-kept secret between the members of the orchestra, it was still bad publicity to have an empty chair in the forefront of the orchestra for their performances, and they all knew it. 

The empty chair haunted them, a constant reminder of the man that had once occupied it. 

However, none of the other cellists had been able to fill it – not only for their own fear of the cloud of bad luck that seemed to surround the chair, but also due to the violent way the conductor seemed to react whenever any of the cellists had attempted to audition for the spot.

So the chair remained empty in the months that had followed.  The chairs in the audience began to follow suit. 

Conductor Wu was distracted, disorganized, and angry all of the time.  He was now half the conductor he had once been, and most, if not all of their rehearsals since would end prematurely with screaming fits.

A murmur of discontent began to spread, and musicians began to look elsewhere for opportunities.

Some nights, Yifan would sit down with a bottle of wine and put a worn, homemade CD into his stereo.

The sounds of Zitao’s cello would fill the room and Yifan would spend hours replaying the CD over and over, until the wine was long gone and Yifan had fallen asleep staring at the dying embers of his fireplace with bloodshot eyes.

The very last person that Wu Yifan had ever wanted to see was staring at him at the opposite side of the table, hands folded neatly in front of him on his desk.

Those eyes that burned with barely hidden hatred stared at him through a friendly, professional façade.

Wu Yifan stared back at him, disorganized folder of music in one hand, shirt wrinkled, hair uncombed, eyes glazed over.

“Conductor Wu.  I've been expecting you.  Come, sit.”

Although it was pleasant enough, Yifan knew an order when he heard it.

Kim Joonmyun, although his power had briefly faltered within the orchestra’s inner network, was to their benefactors and patrons still the Executive Director.  Which meant that as much as Yifan hated it, he was forced to play puppet to Joonmyun’s directives. 

Wu Yifan had known this meeting was coming, but had been tried avoiding sitting down with the man for as long as he could remember.  He had received countless voicemail messages, emails, handwritten letters and notes asking, begging, ordering, but it wasn’t until the man had cornered him in his office one day and mentioned a potential notice of termination had the conductor felt inclined to take the executive director up on his request.

So when director gave a second, even more clipped, “Sit.”, Conductor Wu did as the director told him and slid down into the plush chair in front of the table.  That didn’t, however, stop him from purposefully pulling an inappropriate posture in front of the other man, sprawling back in the chair and bringing up one shoe to rest it on the chair’s plush seat.

The two stared at each other in silent contempt.

“It’s about time for you to stop avoiding the truth.”

Yifan laughed derisively.  “Shouldn’t you be telling yourself that?”

This time, Yifan leaned over Director Kim’s desk, plucking up a photo from the man’s desk, pretending to look at it intently.

“She’s very beautiful, your wife.  How did she react, when she heard the news?  I’m surprised she’s still Mrs. Kim, all things consi—.”

Director Kim interrupted Yifan, standing up to slam his hands on the desk.  Yifan was startled, leaning back to see the man with anger written over his face.   It took the director a few minutes for him to control himself, and Yifan watched with detached fascination the range of emotions that played out over the other man’s face as he struggled to calm himself down.

It was only after a minute that Director Kim finally closed his eyes, gritting his teeth and sitting down slowly.

“…How much do you really know about Tao?”

“Have you heard the cellist that plays music in the park every day?”

“Isn’t that a ghost story for children?”

“No, it’s true!  I’ve heard him and seen him myself when I was out jogging!  …Rumor has it - he used to be a world-class musician.”

“If he’s a world-class musician… how come he’s not a part of the orchestra here?”

“Like I said, it’s just a rumor.  Nobody’s actually talked to him to find out.”

“Well, if he’s that good, why doesn’t he come out to give a performance every now then?  I’m on the entertainment committee board for the Christmas festival that’s coming up in a few months…”

“You could try, but I don’t think he likes audiences.  He only plays very late at night and very early in the morning, and only in a very isolated part of the park.  Besides, he never looks up when he hears people passing by.  Not that we haven’t tried though – he’s built up quite the fanclub with us local girls.”

“Really?  Is he quite handsome?”

“Very.  But..."

"But...?"

"He always… looks… sad…”

Director Kim picked up the only other picture frame that had been on his desk, and set it down in front of Yifan.

Yifan looked at it, at first with boredom, and then again, with narrowed eyes. 

Two little boys, hands laced tightly together.

He had seen this picture somewhere before.

He wracked his brain, picking the frame up to closely examine each boy’s face.

The older boy was clearly a much younger director Kim, sharing the director’s same gentle smile and friendly, loving expression.

The other though… the other was…

Yifan’s eyes widened, trailing a finger across the face that he had come to know so well.

“Who is this?”  Yifan had asked, on the one odd night that they had chosen to stay over at Zitao’s cramped apartment.  Zitao’s roommate was over at his boyfriend Lu Han’s house, and the two of them were sitting alone on Zitao’s bed, curled around each other tightly.

“Oh, this?”  Zitao picked up the picture frame from his bedside.

“This—“

“—Is my half-brother, Huang Zitao.”

Yifan’s hand shook, and he dropped the picture back down onto the desk with a loud clatter. 

When Kibum had managed to be stay hidden and quiet enough to hear a piece in its entirety, he knew with absolute certainty that he had to get the cellist to play for them.

However, “No.”, was the mysterious cellist’s first and only response to Kim Kibum the first day he managed to corner the solitary figure in the park. 

So Kibum watched him leave, the crimson scarf trailing behind him as he disappeared between the red and yellow trees.

Jieun was right, though. 

He was beautiful.  And so very sad.

“But—you two don’t even share a last name!”

Director Kim shook his head.  “I use my mother’s last name.  Zitao uses our father’s last name.”

“You mean—that day—“

“That day, we were having dinner.  In fact, if I recall, he had just been telling me about how happy in love he was with 'someone' in the orchestra.”

Director Kim looked up with a gaze that pierced straight through Yifan.

“That someone… was you, wasn’t it?”

Yifan sat back in his chair, and for the first time in months, let the tears that he had been holding back trail numbly down his face.

The next time they met, it was Zitao who had found Kibum. 

“Coffee, black, please.”  He murmured, leaning onto the bar as he looked around the small café.

“Please, just give me a few more days, Jonghyun.”

Zitao lifted his head at the light, distinctive voice, and the cellist turned to find Kibum sitting at a table in the corner, engaged in a conversation with another man. 

The intimate way the two were sitting reminded Zitao all too painfully of Yifan. He turned away to grab his coffee and pay, wanting to leave before they could serve any more reminders of the conductor he loved. 

“Key, I hardly see you anymore.  Why can’t you get someone else to take over festival duties?”

Zitao paused by the door.

“I can’t, Jonghyun.  You don’t understand – the entire committee is full of people who think we should be setting up …kissing booths and – and dunking games.  I won’t stand to see our town turned into a third-rate laughing stock.  I just need one more act, Jonghyun.  I want – I need to make this perfect.”

Perfect.

Who else did he know that had only wanted perfection in his life?

“…if that’s the way it is, don’t bother coming home.  I’m sick and tired of waiting for you to come back and falling asleep in an empty bed with an empty heart.”

Zitao quickly backed away into a corner as Jonghyun stood up, put on his hat and walked out the door.

Kibum sat quietly at the table, looking down at his hands.

Zitao bit his lip.

“I’ll do it.”

Kibum looked up in surprise to see the cellist sitting down in the chair in front of him.  He was so shocked that his response was poorly constructed.

“…wha— huh?”

“I’ll play at the festival.”

Kibum’s eyes lit up at the other’s response.

“Really?!  That means—“

“On my own terms.”  The cellist finished.

Kibum straightened up, nodding quickly, wanting to do anything that the cellist wanted as long as it ensured his presence at the upcoming festival.

“Sure – anything.”

“One – I will provide my own pieces.  Two – No questions.  You will not ask about my progress, or pry about my past, or my identity.  Three – I will play alone, in an enclosed room.  You can set up speakers throughout the festival to broadcast my performance, but I refuse to play on an open stage.”

Kibum’s mouth flopped open and closed like a fish as he struggled to understand why.  But as he opened his mouth to question the cellist, he realized that in doing so, he’d already be violating the second rule.  So Kibum swallowed his questions and gave a simple nod.

“...Okay.”

The response seemed to satisfy the cellist, as he stuck his hand out to the other. 

“Edison Huang.”

Kibum took Edison’s hand and shook it warmly. 

“A pleasure to work with you, Edison.”

Director Kim stared as the man in front of him broke down in tears that the director would have never anticipated from the Conductor Wu that he knew from before.  The normally cold man was sobbing, face in his hands, hands shaking and fists clenched. 

He should hate the man in front of him, and he did, for all the reasons that he knew he had.

Yet at the same time, a part of him really pitied Wu Yifan for all that he had lost.  The grief that the other was finally showing was so raw, so real that Director Kim knew that whatever his brother had felt for Wu Yifan, the man had returned with an equal intensity.

“…One week.  I’ll give you one week.”

The conductor looked up at him from between his hands.

Director Kim pulled out the two train tickets he had bought in advance, throwing them onto the table.

Yifan picked it up with fingers wet with tears.

One round trip, and one one-way ticket.

Yifan looked up questioningly.

Director Kim stood up, walking to the window with his arms folded behind his back.  “I’m going to give you a week’s time, and a round trip ticket, to travel to our hometown, find Zitao, and bring him back home.”

Yifan stood up on unsteady legs, tickets clenched tightly to his chest.

“I—but I can’t leave, for that long – the orchestra –“

Director Kim shook his head.  “Don’t worry, I’ll find a temporary replacement for now.  Just be warned - If you don’t come back with my brother… don't bother coming back here.  We both know that without him, this orchestra cannot survive with you as the conductor.”

Yifan hesitated, opening his mouth.  Director Kim whirled around, staring at Yifan with anger swirling in his eyes.

“I’ve given you what you need, now GO!” 

Conductor Wu flew out the door and Director Kim was left by himself again. 

The young director slowly sat back down his chair, suddenly feeling older than his thirty years.

He picked up the picture of Zitao and him from where it had fallen face-down on the desk, wiping the dust off of it with a tender finger.

“...Tao.  I hope this is what you want.”

Zitao lived in small town in which the only practical entrance and exit was by train.

So when Yifan finally arrived at his destination, with nothing but the tickets in one hand and his heart on his sleeve, he was surprised to see the number of people who had arrived with him.

Hundreds of people, all visiting the same place at the same time.

Just in time for the Christmas Festival.

He realized, noting the tinsel that decorated each streetlight, the banners that were hung everywhere promoting the event.

As the crowd around him swelled and grew, Yifan was suddenly hit with a wave of worry.

How will I find him now?

“Do you think they’ll have a kissing booth this year?”

“No, silly.  They have that classical musician playing, instead.  Whoever they are, they’re really good.”

“Classical music?  How boring.”

Yifan lifted his head, grabbing the arm of the passing girls.  They shrieked in surprise, looking over in disgust and annoyance before, upon seeing Yifan, their facial expressions quickly changed to ones of starstruck love.

“You – you mentioned something about a classical musician playing.  Where?”

The girls pointed toward the town square in silence and Yifan left without another word, weaving through the crowd.

“Are you sure you’ll be alright here on your own, Edison?”

Edison nodded quietly to Kibum, turning his head to regard the man with a small smile.

“I’ll be alright.  You go have a good time with Jonghyun.  You deserve it.”

Kibum nodded, turning on the sound equipment before closing the door behind him with a soft click.

Jonghyun was waiting for him outside of the small booth’s door, reaching out a hand to his lover which Kibum took.

As they walked away, Jonghyun huffed.

“I’ve never heard of a classical musician that only plays in a room by himself.”  He muttered.  He had been jealous of the man ever since he had found out how excited Kibum had been upon learning that the man had agreed to play for the festival. 

“Don’t be resentful, Jonghyun.  There’s more to him than I think either of us know.  I don’t think he trusts people very much.”

“Why do you think that is?”  Jonghyun said in a off-handed way that showed how much he really (didn’t) care. 

Kibum sighed, looking back at the booth.

“…I wish I knew.”

In a small, dirty and dark booth, Zitao stared at the concrete wall in front of him for several seconds before blinking once, twice and then looking down to his case.

Zitao slowly and methodically pulled his cello out of the case, drawing the endpin out before screwing it tight.  He took out his bow, running a loving hand across the wood before drawing rosin across the fine hairs.

He sat down on the flimsy plastic chair that had been set out for him, using the tip of his bow to tap the play button on a recorder that lay nearby. 

It was strange, different to play with a pre-recorded orchestra track in an empty room.  Yet this is what former principal cellist Huang Zitao had been reduced to. 

It was with an odd air of finality that Zitao carefully placed his fingers on the cello, lifted his bow, and poured all of his disappointment, hatred and grief into the very first, powerful chord.

Edward Elgar’s Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85.

Yifan knew it was him the moment he heard the first note.  His heart stopped.

The most aching, unforgettable music was playing, and he watched as for full, long minutes, the music that had haunted his dreams once again captured the hearts and minds of the audience that listened. 

He watched as the crowd around him paused in their laughter, steps slowing down as they all looked up through the snow at the loudspeakers surrounding the plaza.

Zitao. 

Through everyone’s reactions, he knew that it was undoubtedly Zitao.

Yifan was flying through the snow through the now un-moving crowds, desperately searching for the origin of the sound.

Try as he might, he couldn’t find any stage, any sign of the cellist, only the lingering, haunting sounds that played through the speakers that were set all through the park, driving Yifan mad.

“No, no, no, no!”  Yifan gasped through heaving breaths as he realized the piece was slowly coming to an end.  His chance – his chance was slipping away through his fingers and he realized he couldn’t do anything to stop it.

When silence settled into his ears, it was with a sick, crawling feeling. 

He was running now, with eyes bleary with unshed tears.  It was in this manner that Yifan ran into two people who, like the rest, had stopped to listen to the music, sending the trio crashing to the floor.

As Jonghyun pulled him off the floor with a groan, Kibum looked down at the man who had run into them at full speed.

“What the hell is your problem?  Watch where you’re—“

Kibum’s sentence quickly died as he stared down at the man before them, still on his hands and knees on the snow-covered pavement.

Kibum could have recognized that man anywhere. 

“Oh my G—Jonghyun, this is Asia’s most famous conductor, Wu Yifan!”

Kibum reached out with trembling hands to help the conductor off the floor.  Jonghyun helped, although with less starstruck awe, pulling the man up until he was on his feet and patting the snow off the conductor's back.

The entire time though, the conductor remained quiet.  When Kibum looked into Yifan’s eyes he realized something was wrong.

The conductor was staring up at the loudspeakers, eyes wide, and shining with an emotion that Kibum had only ever seen in one other person in his life.

“…You’re looking for Edison Huang, aren’t you?”

“…Edison?”  Was the first, gruff word that came out of the conductor’s mouth, suddenly looking at Kibum.

“…the cellist who I hired to play tonight.”

Kibum found himself taken aback when the conductor suddenly grabbed his shoulders, leaning in close. 

“You know him?!  Where is he?!”

When the smaller, slight man pointed in the direction of the booth, Yifan took off, running toward it with the desperation and speed of a madman.

Jonghyun picked his lover off the ground, holding him close as the two of them watched the conductor take off in silent confusion.

Zitao packed his cello for the very last time.  He had already put away his bow, tucked away his endpin, and stuffed his rockstop into its pouch.

It was with tender arms that he held his cello close to him, slowly laying it into the case and a hand over the beautiful, red wood.

He gave it one last, long look before closing the case, and locking it.

He wouldn’t be opening it again.

He already had a potential buyer set up for him, and now it was time for Zitao to catch the train to meet him.

The cellist wheeled the case behind him, looking around him before closing the lights, and opening the door.

When Zitao opened the door, he found himself face to face with the man who he had once loved.

Yifan was running, body heaving in exertion as he struggled to catch up with the trailing red scarf that flitted through the crowd.

“Zitao!  Zitao, please wait!”

But the cellist didn’t wait, and Yifan was stunned by how fast the man ran with the full cello tugged behind him. 

The crowds parted for Zitao and closed on Yifan, and Yifan watched in desperate frustration as the gap between them slowly widened.

Somehow, Yifan eventually found himself on the opposite side of the train station as Zitao, watching as the cellist panted and heaved on the other side, separated by a pair of tracks, each going in opposite directions.

“ZITAO!”

Yifan didn’t care that everyone else could hear him, didn’t care that men, women and children alike were turning to stare at him.

He only cared that Zitao’s head rose, tilting his head to the side.  He had the cellist’s attention, if only for a few seconds.  He panted, struggling to think of what to say -

I’m sorry –

I never meant to hurt you –

I still love you –

I need you –

But Zitao was losing interest, and was moving away, so Yifan stopped thinking.

“Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major!”

Zitao’s breath caught.

“Camille Saint-Saëns’s Le Cygne!  Gabriel Fauré’s Élégie, Op. 24 – Debussy’s Claire de Lune!”

Yifan was gasping, voice cracking but he didn’t care.

“…Edward Elgar’s Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85.”

“Do you remember?   Because I do.  Every single movement of every single piece that you’ve played.”

“I fell in love with every note, with every .”

Yifan was pounding his chest now, eyes red and wet with tears.

“Even when I can’t see you – I hear you!  I still hear you!  You haunt my dreams, you exist in my every waking moment – everything that I see reminds me of you and I – I can’t live this life without you, Huang Zitao!”

Zitao turned around slowly, revealing eyes that were just as wet as Yifan’s. 

“Your brother – your brother told me everything.”

“I – I was so lost in finding perfection that I didn’t realize what should have been obvious from the very start.  I’d apologize, but words can’t express – how deeply sorry – I really am.  So please, Tao – come back.”

The conductor dropped to his knees, pleading the other man.

“Please!”

Yifan stared deeply into the cellist’s eyes from the other side of the tracks.  There was emotion swimming in them, and Yifan watched as those eyes filled with tears, and –

The train on Zitao’s side finally arrived, separating the two and cutting off the line of contact that Yifan had.

When the train finally left, five minutes later, the conductor realized that Zitao was no longer there.

The conductor’s breath hitched, and he struggled to breathe, clutching at his chest as he stared at the empty space in front of him with disbelief and heart break.

He was only able to break his eyes off of the sight in front of him when, from the corner of his eye, from right beside him, he saw a flicker of red.

As had been the case from the very first day they had met, he heard Zitao before he even saw him. 

“…Okay, Yifan.  Take me home.”

Zitao arrived late, having endured both bad traffic and a starstruck cab driver who had taken far too long in pulling out Zitao’s antique, full-size cello from the backseat.

Only able to leave after the man had shaken his hand a dozen times, Zitao entered the grand hall five minutes later, making his way down the long hall in a leisurely pace, lugging his cello behind him.

When he finally entered the rehearsal hall, Zitao was immediately met with a hundred familiar faces, all smiling to greet him. 

One by one, the entire orchestra stood for him, and Zitao made his way through the rows of musicians who remained still as he passed by, heads turning to follow his path.

As he drew closer, Conductor Wu turned to face him with a brilliant smile, stretching out a hand toward the empty seat that had always been Zitao’s.

It was with tears in his eyes that Zitao slowly sank down in the first chair of the cello section.