It’s the silence between the songs; that’s the agonizing part. After the bows have lowered and the audience has applauded — in those two minutes when the conductor readies his sheet music and the spit valves are emptied — that’s when Mark Loverbaum really feels his night slowly ticking away. He feels his slick hair greying, and any chance of browsing stock trading websites on the internet late into the night disappearing in the ether…

Loverbaum is seated in section B, row 9 with his family. The mezzanine. His teenage son plays tuba in the Markeell Junior High marching band, something he and his wife do their best to promote every way they can. When they got a flyer in the mail for the upcoming fall concert series, they jumped at the opportunity to showcase their support. His wife picked the night, and Mark bought the tickets. The minute he clicked the little PURCHASE button, his fate was sealed. It would be no ones fault but his own. He had no idea what he had in store for him.

My God, how boring! Twenty-two obscure hits from the seventeenth century, all of them sounding the smae, compiled by an esteemed creative director that no one has ever heard of, played perfectly by sixty-six musicians no one has ever heard of, with the strained, unexcited expressions on their faces that the audience has. So rehearsed, so soulless, so fucking long…

Mark glances at his playbill in the inbetween spaces. He takes his glasses off and rubs his temples. The next piece I’d by someone named…

Russian Folk Piece?! Oh, for fuck’s sake! It’s like these guys pride themselves on digging up old bullshit that time forgot, but they don’t get that time forgot it because it was meant to be forgotten! Let old shit stay buried, maestro! Mark wants to climb out of his seat, out of his suit, out of his skin, but he can’t because he wants to show his son and wife how much he appreciates this: the arts. Even though right now he’d do anything for a quick hit by the Moody Blues. Or maybe something by Steppenwolf.

The conductor raises his arms. The philoharmonic readies. The audience inhales. The music begins. Mark’s eyes go glassy. He’s about to retreat into the back of his mind – that place that one goes when faced with unescapable boredom.

Wait a second… He knows this song… It’s Tetris! Yeah! It has to be! He’d recognize that song anywhere! Mark leans forward in his seat and looks at his son with a goofy smile on his face. His son seems to only half understand, but totally game for the excitement.

The experience is magical. For six minutes, Mark can practically see the blocks descending from behind the upper velvet curtain and settling atop the heads of the brass section. A box appears to the right of the stage, beyond the percussion on the raised platform. It visualizes the next shape in the series. A block, a zag, a zag, a line. A tally appears in the gilded ceiling of the concert hall, rocketing upward as a Tetris clears the horn section.

He’s filled with memories from his pot-fueled teens in the murky basement of the corner arcade, his greasy pizza hands throttling the joystick. He’s transported to the night when he got the seventh highest score on the chart in front of Elizabeth Dulane, who kissed him on the cold concrete by the jacuzzi at two in the morning. He’s surrounded by long-haired friends on the roof of Shortall’s Bar the night before the first winter blizzard.

Then, as quickly as it began, Korobeiniki ends. The audience applauds, the conductor bows, and Mark Loverbaum instinctively stuffs his hand in his pocket to pull out another quarter.