Nearly everyone in the jazz band were fascinated with you; not that you were perfect or anything, but rather because you've got a willpower of steel, so sure of yourself that none of Fletcher's plentiful verbal abuse ever gets to you. You just brush it off and improve, your ability in your instrument increasing slowly but surely.

Notably, whenever Fletcher tries to get all up in your face about missing a beat or being distracted, you would just stare at him with a borderline disdainful expression until he delivered a final scathing blow (usually at your mother) and went back to the conductor's spot. Fletcher's pride prevented him from every backing down, but you just stood there and took the insults like it meant nothing to you, leaving him a little flabbergasted.

You were just clearing your sheet music, unclipping it from the stand, when a trombone player approached you, shyly complimenting your defiance to Fletcher's (abusive) teaching methods, and working up the courage to ask for your number.

Neiman happened to be packing up to leave as well, wrapping bandaids on his bleeding hands, when he overheard the trombone player's confession. For some reason, it ticked him off that other people had the audacity to approach you like that. You were above them, right?