“We’ll talk about it in the car,” dad says.
“No,” I say. “I want to hear it from the doctor.”
“It’s possible you’ll never play as well again,” he says. He speaks very fast, the way air rushes out of a balloon when it’s been trapped in there. It takes an age for the words to permeate first my ears and then my brain.
“What?” I say. “That’s crazy. I’ll be fine.”
“You will be fine,” dad says. “Whatever happens, you’ll be fine.”
“See?” I tell the doctor. I have this overwhelming urge to stick my tongue out at him. I’ll show him. I’ll show everyone. I always do.
Thirty-Three
We’re having steak for dinner the next night, and Dad pours himself some wine. You can’t have steak without a glass of merlot once you’re over twenty-one, he always says, whenever we have steak. I don’t make the rules, that’s just the way it is. He’s about to pour some into Ebba’s glass when she covers it with her hand.
“I shouldn’t,” she says.
“Oh,” dad says, like he’s just remembered something. “Yes.” Then he takes her hand and kisses her palm, which seems an unnecessary reaction to someone not being able to drink wine.
I eat my steak, pink in the middle just the way I like it, tuning out the din around me as Juliette chatters and Rosie scrapes her plate with her silverware in that way that hurts my teeth and Harry asks for help cutting his dinner up. As I chew, appreciating the pepperiness, I chew on something else, too. Ebba’s always tired. She’s been wearing baggy t-shirts a lot. Case in point: today’s ratty old Yale Drama shirt. And now no wine? Oh, my gosh. She’s pregnant. She has to be, right? But also, she can’t be. Isn’t 43 too old? Or too old without fertility treatment? We’d know about it if she’d been having that, wouldn’t we? Isn’t dad done with sleepless nights and diapers? Aren’t we – aren’t the four of us – enough for him?
No. I must be wrong. Our lives can’t possibly be changing again. He wouldn’t do that to us. There has to be another explanation. Maybe she’s sick. There is tons of medication you can’t drink with. And who wants to wear anything other than yoga pants and baggy t-shirts when they’re sick? I don’t want her be, like, seriously sick. Not now that I finally like her a little. But that must be it, something she’ll get over when the antibiotics or whatever kick in. Because the other thing is unthinkable.
Thirty-Four
I’m not allowed to have my phone at the dinner table, but lately I’ve been putting in my denim shorts pocket and sneaking glances when dad isn’t looking. I don’t care too much if Ebba sees – she wouldn’t say anything; she’s too desperate for me to like her, and betrayal would definitely not help that cause.
With every moment that passes, it becomes more likely that I’ll hear from LACHSA. I spend a lot of time doing and redoing the math, first with a pencil and paper, and then over and over in my head, to try to figure out the probability of hearing from them at any given moment. Like, if I’m supposed to hear from them within a month of the video deadline, then on the first day I have a one in thirty chance of getting an email. On the second day it’s one in twenty-nine. And if I further subdivide each day into hours, minutes, seconds, even, I can basically spend all my time calculating and recalculating, and that somehow steadies my nerves. I tried to explain this to Katie when we went to the Cheesecake Factory last weekend and she looked at me like I was crazy.
“You know that in reality there’s basically a 99% chance they’ll contact you on the last possible day, right?”
That’s totally illogical, and I told her so.
“You’ll see,” she said, licking her spoon then smiling in that way she does when she thinks she’s right, though how she can possibly think this, when so few of her predictions are based on logic or have any basis in fact, I do not know. With every day that goes by it is, mathematically and therefore irrefutably, more probable that I’ll get the email than it was the day before. I’m not as excited as I could be – it’ll be an uphill struggle to get my arm back to fighting form in time for the audition. I’ll do it, of course I will, but I picked up my viola yesterday after PT and just holding it was hard. I know it’s going to hurt. But still: when I get that email, and it’s a yes, it’s going to feel incredible.
Today, there’s a one in three chance, and as it’s the end of the day and there aren’t many hours of it left, it’s actually a higher chance than that. Right now, it’s six thirty pm, so it’s actually an 11 out of 107 chance, or 10.3%. That’s high. So stuff dad and his stupid rules. I need to be within vibrating distance of my phone at all times.
We’re eating lasagna tonight, my Saturday night favorite. (Dad goes heavy on the garlic and fennel and I love both.) Henry is telling us all a very elaborate story about a plot of some movie he’s probably invented and dad and Ebba are nodding between bites and asking questions like they’re interested. Rosie and Juliette are low-key fighting about the pink sweater that Juliette is wearing and Rosie says is hers. They’re both punctuating what seems like every word with a scrape of their forks on their plates.
“Why would I borrow any of your clothes? Your clothes are boring,” Juliette says.
“I’m not saying you borrowed it. I’m saying you stole it.”
“We live in the same house. You can take it back anytime.”
“So you’re admitting you stole it?”
“Borrowed it,” Juliette says, dropping her fork, which lands off her plate and splatters sauce everywhere.
“Without permission.”
“You’d never give me permission.”
“Stole it, then.”
I look down and, under the table, slide my phone out of my pocket just a little. Just enough to see that I have no notifications. It’s important that I don’t press on the home button and unlock the screen, because sometimes when you do that you end up missing notifications before the phone goes back to sleep. I like it when they line up neatly on the screen. I can see right away if Madison has tagged me in an Instagram post, or if I have, say, a Snap from Katie or a text from Libby. Or an email from LACHSA. I have them set to VIP, so I’ll know the instant the email arrives in my inbox.
But right now, there’s nothing. Again.
“That sweater’s too small for you, anyway,” I tell Rosie.
She gives me a look that could cut through ice.
“Dad,” she says, still looking at me. But dad is still pretending to be deeply immersed in whatever it is that Harry is holding forth on. “Dad,” she says again, more loudly.
“Just a minute, sweetie,” Dad says.
“Fine,” Rosie says, huffing a little. She gives me another look, like, just you wait. And not in an inspiring Hamiltonian kind of way.
“What is it, sweet pea?” Ebba asks her. For a second, Rosie looks a bit annoyed. That’s how I know for sure that she meant to rat me out. She knows it will have less of an impact if she tells Ebba than it would if she tells dad.
“Clara keeps looking at her phone.” She sounds defeated, like she already knows she’s lost.
I look at Ebba and wait for her verdict.
“I think we can let her off the hook this week,” Ebba says. Because of course she does. Pander, pander. “She’s waiting for an important email.”
I turn, so Ebba doesn’t see, and give Rosie my ha! look.
“But that’s what she always says about having her phone at the table,” Rosie whines. “I’m waiting for something important!”
“Well,” I say. “I usually am. This no-phone rule is BS, anyway.”
My dad clears his throat. Getting his attention is easiest to do when you threaten to swear.
“It’s true,” I say. “It is.”
He sighs. Harry is still talking, apparently oblivious to the fact that nobody is listening.
“We’ve been through this,” dad says. “At least at dinner we are going to communicate face to face, like civilized human beings.”
“The family
that eats together with no screen time stays together,” I offer. I admit it’s not all that catchy.
“Exactly,” he says. He doesn’t grasp the irony. It’s a bit late for our family staying together. “I like to hear your voice and see your face. Is that so much to ask?”
“Honey,” Ebba says to him, quietly. I know what she’s communicating with that one word. I know she’s taking my side (which sounds noble, but it’s really just for her own benefit, because if I like her, it makes things easier for her and dad). I know she’s basically saying, let’s go easy on her this week, okay? She puts her hand on his. He looks at her like a lovesick puppy. Gross. But also, I’m off the hook for now. I know she didn’t ultimately do it for me, but I’m still grateful. Attention successfully deflected.
And then my phone buzzes.
Thirty-Five
“I have to go the bathroom,” I say.
Dad raises an eyebrow. “Half-way through dinner?”
I consider all kinds of responses. I could tell him I have my period. I’ve noticed it tends to shut guys up when you say that, because they have no clue what to say in response. I don’t blame them for being kicked out – it is icky, let’s face it – or even for not really getting it, because I get it but I don’t get it, your body destroying itself every month because there’s no egg implanted in there? Okay. Rosie’s always asking me about it. I think she thought she’d get it before her twelfth birthday, like I did. I gave her my old copy of Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret and she left me alone for a while after that. Even I liked that book, and I don’t like books. Maybe I should make dad read it. If you ask me, that book should be on every middle school curriculum, because we all need to know this stuff, not just girls. Maybe if guys knew us better they wouldn’t be so scared of us and they’d stop making ridiculous laws trying to control us and, for the love of everything, maybe they’d be okay with voting for a super-qualified woman for President instead of an orange sack of human excrement. Maybe Judy Blume will save us all. Maybe she should be President.
Anyway. My other option for getting excused from the table so I can go read the email from LACHSA in peace is to point out that Harry is always getting up halfway through dinner and nobody says anything to him, but there’s a valid argument to be made in response: he’s a six-year-old boy. And I don’t have time for any of these conversations. I need to check my phone immediately. So instead I look at dad and answer his question, half-way through dinner? with a simple yes. My chair scrapes along the wooden floor as I get up as calmly as I can, which isn’t very. I don’t sprint to the bathroom, exactly, but I don’t amble, either. I click the door closed and locked, sit on the cold porcelain edge of the bath, and take out my phone. There is it, the notification: an email from [email protected]. The subject line: your LACSHA application. And then the first few words of the message: Dear Clara, thank you for your application. We –
I close my eyes. I can’t bring myself to look. I press my phone’s home button and leave it down for several seconds, which Siri takes as her call to action. I consider asking her, Siri, should I read this email? What if it’s we get many applications every year and after careful consideration we have decided to offer your place to someone who plays a more popular instrument? What if it’s we regret to inform you that... But what if it’s We don’t even need to audition you, on the strength of your tape alone we would be delighted to offer you a place? Given the current state of my wrist, that would be super helpful. It’s not protocol, but you never know. I’m worth making an exception for.
That’s terrifying, too. My whole life is about to change. LACHSA, Juilliard, the Symphony: the beginning of the Rest Of My Life. Screw getting my period—this is when I really become a woman. Now that an audition might be in the cards and I am letting myself think about it, it’s stomach-clenchingly terrifying. I always throw up before exams and auditions, it’s as much a part of the process for me at this point as warming up with scales. And my stomach is clenching right now. Okay. Deep breath. I screw my eyes shot, then open one, then the other. I tap on my email app. I have to really concentrate to focus on the email: the letters have gone all blurry. Dear Clara, it says. Thank you for your application. We reviewed your audition tape and, after reviewing it carefully, we are pleased to invite you for an in-person audition on 17th February 2017. Please prepare –
I can’t read the rest. I throw my phone into the empty sink, lean over the toilet, and throw up my lasagna, pieces of undigested carrot and all. Even as I’m leaning over, heaving my guts out, I’m thinking, I hope this doesn’t put me off lasagna forever. But it might. I guess it depends how this all ends. I take my phone out of the sink, swirl water from the faucet in my mouth and then mouthwash, spit and brush my teeth, wash my hands. I’m so focused on my body’s reaction to the email that my brain hasn’t had a chance to react yet. I haven’t jumped up and down or texted Katie or Madison or Libby. Wow, I say to myself. Wow.
So now what? I guess I go back to the table and make a Big Announcement. Someone knocks on the bathroom door.
“Clara?” It’s Rosie. “Dad sent me to check you’re okay.”
“Tell him I have my period,” I say though the door, a kind of in-joke with myself.
“Do you?” I imagine Rosie opening her eyes all wide and desperate for details. I crack the door open and forget to be mean to her. Instead, I have this weird impulse to hug her. But that would freak us both out, so I refrain.
“No,” I say. “And I’m fine. Never been better, actually.”
I must be grinning, I know I’m grinning, I can feel my cheeks aching with it.
“You got the email?”
I nod. Rosie’s eyes widen.
“Girls,” dad calls. “You’re missing dessert.”
She looks excited for me, which is sweet. All this time I thought she only cared about characters in books. And about Ebba, of course. Perfect, wonderful Ebba. Rosie wants to be in on the secret, but she also wants to be the one to tell the world.
“Clara got the email from LACHSA,” she announces, when we’re back at the table. I wanted to play it cooler than that, to have the news come out more slowly, to make the rest of the family guess at it and wait for it, but I’m too dazed and too happy to be mad.
Dad looks like he might throw up, too.
“Well?” Ebba says. She’s smiling already. She knows. I’m trying to be deadpan about it, for the element of suspense, but my eyes are probably giving it away.
I let the clock tick a couple of times, let the anticipation in the room mount. Even Harry has stopped talking and is looking at me wide-eyed. I kind of want this moment to go on forever.
“I got the audition,” I say, leaning against the fridge nonchalantly, as if this couldn’t matter less, as if I’ve been expecting this all along, which, of course, I have. Maybe. And then I say it again because the words feel so good in my mouth and sound so good out in the world. “I got the audition!”
Since I’m still standing it makes it easy for everyone to pile onto me in a family group hug. There’s the scraping of chairs and then more and more bodies attached to me, saying things like so proud and congratulations and do we get to eat dessert now. And after a while everyone calms down and we do eat dessert. It’s crème brûlée, which I also love. Dad has this little torch thing to crisp up the top of them on special occasions. It’s like this whole evening was planned just for me. I tap the sugary top of mine with the back of my spoon, watching it crack. I love that moment.
“I still have to get through the audition,” I say, reminding everyone to be calm even though I don’t want them to be calm, and even though the email is like that first crack in the crème brûlée topping. A good thing is coming, coming, it’s inevitable, you have just to dig your spoon in.
Thirty-Six
I’m in bed, but I don’t know how I’m meant to sleep tonight, after just getting that email.
On the one hand, phew! Total relief. I’ve gotten past the stage I stal
led at last year. I can stop running my thumb down my phone screen to refresh my email every fifteen seconds. (Any chance the new kind of pain in my wrist is from that and not from the viola playing? Any chance at all? Okay, never mind.) At least now I’m The Girl Who Got To Audition At LACHSA. I did a thing that has zero to do with who my dad is. Yay.
On the other hand, this is not over. For the next couple of weeks, I have to work harder than I’ve ever worked in my life. Take it easy, the PT said. Yeah, right. Like that’s an option. My wrist will just have to co-operate. No choice. Women give birth, don’t they? I’ve heard that’s pretty bad. They push through the pain. Not to mention Liesl and the broken ankle. I’ve got this.
I start to figure out how many hours a day I can fit in. I can get up half an hour earlier than I usually do, at 5.30. I can play in short bursts and rest between them if I really have to. I can go right to my room after school and put my phone right in my desk drawer so I don’t spend half an hour scrolling through Instagram before I get to work. I’ll have to skimp on homework, figure out a rotation so that each subject takes a slightly knock, but nothing too drastic. Maybe for a while I can be the one who copies someone else’s answers in the Spanish vocab tests. I should probably warn Ashley, who sits behind me, that she might need to actually learn the words once in a while. Or maybe I’ll copy Isabella in front of me and Ashley can still copy me, telephone style. I’ll have to ask Ashley to ask Isabella to write bigger and angle her body just right so I can see okay. No point in me asking, because she could easily look me up and down, pretend not to recognize me, and say, I’m sorry, who are you again, and she wouldn’t be completely unjustified, since I don’t think we’ve exchanged more than a couple of sentences all year so far.
The idea of cheating makes my pulse race. I’m a rule-follower and a hard worker. Maybe I won’t cheat in Spanish. Maybe I’ll find other places to cut corners. Social studies, maybe. But that’s already my worst subject, already threatening to tarnish my otherwise perfect GPA. Not that my GPA matters, no-one asks about a star violist’s GPA, they’re too wowed by the Juilliard thing but, wait, what GPA do I need for Juilliard? For LACSHA it’s 2.0, so I’m obviously way, way in the clear on that. But what if there are two equally good violists applying to Juilliard in 2020, and only one of them has a 4.0 GPA? I’d damn well better be sure that violist is me and not the other one. So no skimping, not even in Social Studies class. And math, well, I’m way ahead in math, headed for an AP class in fact (do they have AP classes at LACHSA? Probably not, right? But when I’m there will I stop caring about anything except the viola anyway?). I could afford to cut a few corners in math class, except I don’t want to, because I love math, and I love being way ahead, and I love the way the teacher looks at me, like I’m a prodigy or something. Fine. I’ll just have to sleep less. It’s only for a few weeks. I’ve totally got this.
Girl, Unstrung Page 11