She felt the current of emotion stir, every time she lifted the horn to her mouth and blew. It was a good current. Quickly muddied when she heard the words.

“Oh, how gifted she is!”

Hours, every day. The hard work. Given up opportunities. All for the French Horn.

When she began to play, no one could have picked her out from any of the other students. It took months of her own rigorous training regiment, the schedule she had chosen when the music took her, before her abilities began to rise above those around her.

She had spent so much time on this.

Gifted? Gifted were the people who were immediately good. Good for them. For every gifted individual, for every genius, the hard workers fell a little harder. She fell a little faster. She had given up so much for this. She would do it again.

However, she didn’t have the words for this. She did, however, have the music. She played even better, if just to spite them.

The spite didn’t carry through the sound. She loved the music too much.