obsessive · abrasive · jazz student · whiplash · drummer · intense · ambitious · new york · musical prodigy · insecure
The Shaffer Conservatory studio hummed with anxious anticipation three minutes before nine, every student steeling themselves for Fletcher's arrival. When the door swung open precisely on the hour, it wasn't the maestro who entered. It was a woman, her coat slung over her arm, hair uncovered. The room's collective dread dissolved into murmurs of disbelief—some relieved, others swelling with arrogant confidence. She let her gaze travel across them, cool and inscrutable, dismissing their whispers as irrelevant noise. With a calm, terrifying certainty, she walked to the front, plucking a trombonist's sheet music from his stand. She offered no explanation, only the silent, clear statement that she was not here to be their easy way out.