I waited as the janitor mopped the entire corridor from end to end and I lifted my feet from the floor when he neared me so he could pass his mop under my chair. Eventually, new nurses came in to replace those ending their shifts, and that’s when I caught sight of Mr. Trellis walking down the corridor in my direction. He sat beside me. “They haven’t found any bleeding, which is very good news. They’re going to watch him for a few days, but it looks like he’s going to be okay.”
“Thank God,” I said while clasping my hands together.
“Which reminds me,” he continued, looking straight ahead. “I was wondering if you’d do me favor.”
“Of course.”
He glanced at me and then away. “Tell your God that I’m going to seriously consider his request.”
“I’ll let him know,” I replied.
I was allowed to see Teddy a short while later, and he appeared so much like himself that it brought tears to my eyes. “Nana,” he said frowning, “they cut up my lucky shirt.” He pointed toward a pile of clothes on the chair. I held the shirt up and saw that it had been neatly cut right down the middle, separating “Super” and “man.”
I folded up the shirt and tucked it in my purse. “Don’t worry, I’ll fix it for you.”
Teddy gave me a dubious look. “How can you fix that, Nana?”
“You’ll see,” I said, giving his nose a little squeeze.
Adam and Lillian had left the room momentarily, and when they returned Lillian made her way to her son’s bedside. “Sweetheart, Mommy is exhausted and my feet are killing me. I’m going to have to leave and soak them in a hot tub, but I’ll be back first thing tomorrow.”
“That’s okay,” Teddy replied brightly and he gave his mother a kiss and a smile, but the moment she left he turned to me and his smile dropped. “You’re not going too, are you, Nana?” he asked.
“Don’t worry, Teddy. I’ll be right here.”
Teddy came home from the hospital a couple of days later and Jessie hovered nearby with wide, curious eyes, staring at her brother as though he’d just returned from another planet. She was unusually considerate and brought him several of her favorite toys to play with. Normally, Teddy would’ve rejected these girlish toys, but he appreciated her kindness and made an effort to respectfully consider each one she offered. It was only when she left the room that he asked me to place her dolls on the chair away from him.
One evening a week or so later, when the children were asleep and all was quiet throughout the house, I moved my chair closer to the reading lamp beside my bed and threaded a sewing needle. I placed a thimble on my right middle finger as my mother had taught me and I began to mend Teddy’s Superman shirt.
For years I believed that if I took up a needle and thread, I’d feel my mother’s absence more acutely, but I was wrong. I felt her presence in the room as I worked, guiding my hand and watching me, speaking when she thought my stitch wasn’t quite right or massaging my hands if they grew stiff. “You must be patient, mija. Mending a garment requires focus, and you can’t rush it. In this way, the threads are able to find each other, and the fabric heals itself in your hands.”
It was nearly midnight by the time I finished, but when I surveyed my work I was pleased. The stitching was not as refined and precise as my mother’s, but it was quite good. And I thought the mended line running down the center of the shirt was interesting, like a scar that Superman had sustained in a cosmic battle. I could only hope that Teddy would see it the same way.
When I went to bed and turned out the light, I drifted back to swaying in my hammock. “Let’s imagine, mija. Let’s imagine that beautiful music is raining down from the heavens and flowing over us and everything we see, washing away all our fears and doubts. Do you hear it?”
“Yes, I hear it, Mama.”
And as I slept, the melody drifted and swirled all around me, as though plucked from an angel’s harp, and it carried me through much of the night. Although I’d gone to bed later than usual, the next morning I awoke feeling very rested. After checking on Teddy and Jessie, who were still sleeping soundly, I went to the kitchen for some coffee, but Millie was already waiting for me, her eyes bright. “Did you hear the music last night?” she whispered excitedly.
“Yes,” I replied, amazed that she’d heard it too, when I was certain that I’d been dreaming.
Millie’s cheeks quivered with emotion. “To hear him playing again after so many years”—she clasped her hands together—“it took my breath away.”
At that moment, Ms. Lillian entered the kitchen dressed in her yoga clothes. “What are you two whispering so mysteriously about?” she asked as she poured herself a cup of coffee.
“Didn’t you hear the music last night, Ms. Lillian?” I asked.
She froze with the rim of her coffee cup poised on her lips. “What music?”
Millie glanced at me warily. “Ana and I are certain that we heard piano music last night. I can only assume that it was Adam.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said with a toss of her head. “You know as well as I do that Adam hasn’t played in years. In fact, I have a good mind to sell that piano or give it away.” She gulped her coffee and stuffed a banana into her tote bag. “I’d say you were both dreaming. Or maybe,” she said, her eyes round with imaginary fear, “it was a ghost.”
After Ms. Lillian left, Millie and I went directly to the music room.
The furniture was scattered about in disarray as usual, but when we approached the piano, we saw that the cover over the keys that was always kept closed had been lifted. And the felt strip of fabric that lay over the keys had been neatly folded and placed on the floor next to the piano bench.
“Well, well, well,” Millie said, crossing her arms. “It appears that we’re being haunted by a musical ghost who forgets to put things back where he found them. And,” she continued, nodding toward the mug on the table, “our ghost seems to have a taste for coffee.”
After dropping the children off at school, I arrived home to find Millie hard at work in the music room. She’d thoroughly dusted the piano so that every inch of it shone, and rearranged the furniture so that it faced the piano as it would during a recital. That evening when Mr. Trellis came home from work he found us gathered around it. Teddy had settled himself on the piano bench and was pounding away at the keys while Jessie sat below him, pressing the pedals with her hands, fascinated by its mystical effect on Teddy’s notes. When we saw Mr. Trellis standing in the doorway watching us, Millie and I held our breath. Even Teddy and Jessie were silent. Finally Teddy asked, “Do you want me to play a song for you, Daddy? Millie and Nana think it’s very good.”
Mr. Trellis took a moment to consider his son’s offer. Then he shook his head, obviously disappointed. “Before you place your hands on the keys, you have to learn how to sit properly on the bench. Look at how you’re slouching, son. Sit up, lift your chin,” he commanded.
“But then I can’t see the keys,” Teddy complained.
“That will come later,” he said, and in three strides he was sitting next to Teddy and demonstrating appropriate posture and hand positioning.
“Millie says you used to play really good. Will you play for me, Daddy?” Teddy asked.
“Me too!” Jessie chimed in. “Play for me too!”
He flashed Millie and me a look that was not altogether sour, then he placed his fingers on the keys and closed his eyes. The notes he played were tentative at first, as though he were searching for his music through a storm of broken memories. But once he found what he was looking for, he created a sound so lovely that I was transported to a realm I’d never experienced before. As I listened, it felt as though my spirit were flying beyond this time and place into an eternity I couldn’t comprehend. And as he swayed to the sound of his music, I was able to see into the deepest recesses of his soul, and the beauty I saw there brought tears to my eyes.
When he finished, we were silent, overwhelmed by the mastery of what we�
��d just heard. And then Ms. Lillian, who unbeknownst to us had come into the room while he was playing, began to applaud and exclaimed, “Darling, that was spectacular! I insist that you play for the guild event I’m planning next month. The theme is ‘An Evening in Salzburg,’ and you would be perfect!”
Ms. Lillian was relentless. Whenever I saw her with her husband she was talking about “An Evening in Salzburg,” and the fact that she’d already told the gala committee he would perform, and how important it was that he play, and how it would elevate her status at the guild, and on and on. Despite her enthusiasm, Mr. Trellis remained stoic and uncommitted.
“I don’t understand it, Ana,” Ms. Lillian complained one afternoon as I folded the children’s clothing in the kitchen. “Adam has been blessed with an extraordinary talent and he’s positively stingy with it.”
When she pressed me for an opinion, I simply said, “I agree that it would be nice for him to share his talent with others, but perhaps it’s too soon. I think you should be more patient with him.”
“Ana, I’ve been waiting for years to hear him play,” Lillian fumed. “How much more patient can I possibly be?”
Mr. Trellis preferred to play late at night after everyone had gone to bed. I made a habit of leaving my bedroom window open so I could hear the music more clearly as it drifted through the courtyard. One particular night, I was so mesmerized by the beauty of his playing that I found it difficult to sleep. I heard the melancholy strain of his notes, how they lingered as though drifting and searching for hope. Sometimes it sounded as though he were weeping inconsolably through his music, at other times that he was soaring with unrestrained joy.
One Saturday morning I was on hands and knees collecting some toys that Teddy and Jessie had left in the foyer when Mr. Trellis strode up and announced, “I’ve decided not to play at the guild. I just told Lillian and I wanted you to know as well.” In response to my baffled expression he added, “Lillian told me that you thought I was being selfish.”
“I’m sure she misunderstood,” I replied, flustered.
He folded his arms across his chest and set his chin firmly. “Perhaps I am being selfish, but I…I don’t feel comfortable displaying myself in such a manner. When I was a boy, I did as I was told, but I’m no longer a boy,” he said with defensive bluster that I found endearing. “And if I don’t enjoy performing for strangers like I’m some kind of trained monkey, then that should be explanation enough.”
“Of course,” I replied, “and Ms. Lillian will eventually understand.”
“How about you? Do you understand?”
“Mr. Trellis I…I have no idea how it must be to play as you do, but when I listen to you it’s like…it’s how you described it when you saw your father perform heart surgery for the first time.”
“All I remember saying was that it smelled very bad. Are you saying that my playing stinks?” he asked with a teasing smile.
“Oh no, of course not,” I replied. “But you said something else too, don’t you remember? You said that it was like life struggling with its own mortality. And that’s what I hear whenever you play. So as far as I’m concerned, it’s up to you when and how and to whom you choose to reveal it.”
He was thoughtful for a moment and then he knelt down before me so we were at eye level, and while gazing at me, he gently touched my cheek with his fingertips. Then, as though suddenly remembering who he was and where he was, he stood up and left me to my task without another word. But I was hardly able to see what I was doing for the tears in my eyes and the pounding in my ears that his touch had provoked. I looked up just as he entered his study, his head hanging and his broad shoulders stooped as though burdened by an enormous weight. And then I came to fully accept what I’d been denying for years.
I begged God to forgive me as I realized how I truly felt about this awkward, brilliant, and remarkable man. I loved the children, there was no doubt about that, and I’d developed a deep affection for Millie and Ms. Lillian too. But the real reason I hadn’t returned to the convent, or gone to New Mexico to work with Sister Josepha, was that I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving him.
I was hopelessly in love with Adam Trellis.
Eleven
ANA’S REVERIE WAS INTERRUPTED by the sound of footsteps, and she looked up to see Millie walking briskly across the courtyard toward her. It lifted Ana’s spirits to see her smiling face and twinkling eyes. Although her hair had gone from gray to white, it suited her and she seemed more youthful somehow.
“Jessie told me I’d find you here,” she said as they embraced. Her sharp eyes took in Ana’s thin face and pale complexion, but she said nothing about it.
“How is he?” she asked.
“He seems weaker today,” Ana replied, knowing that it was useless to slide into her wishful platitudes with Millie. She looked about to see if Jessie were anywhere in sight. “Dr. Farrell came by early this morning. He doesn’t think there’s anything more he can do, but I think we still have some time left.”
Millie nodded soberly, and then her face screwed up with sadness and a touch of anger. “Whatever time is left, it isn’t fair.”
“I’m grateful for every second—”
“It isn’t fair,” Millie said, shaking her head resolutely. “All the gratitude in the world doesn’t change that, Ana.”
The two women entered the house and climbed the stairs side by side.
Before entering Adam’s room, Ana hesitated outside his door. “I’m sure that he’ll ask you about Teddy.”
Millie nodded and squared her shoulders. “What should I say?”
“Tell him that you’re certain he’ll come,” she replied without hesitation.
Millie frowned. “Are you sure? Last time we spoke you said nothing had changed, and that was only yesterday.”
Ana closed her eyes. She felt suddenly faint and reached out to the wall for support. “For goodness sake!” Millie cried, helping her to one of the chairs in the corridor. “You told me you were taking care of yourself, but look at you, you’re a walking cadaver. How much weight have you lost?”
“I don’t know,” Ana muttered.
“You don’t know?” Millie replied, her eyes bugging out. “Well, if you continue this way, we’ll have to bury you next.”
Ana stared wide-eyed at Millie, shocked to hear her say such a thing, but Millie didn’t back down. “You wouldn’t mind, would you? It would be just fine with you if we buried you and Adam together side by side.”
Ana brought her hands to her face, and Millie sat down next to her as she wept. “That’s okay,” she said, circling her arm around Ana’s thin shoulders. “You go right ahead and cry your eyes out until there’s nothing left. And when you think you’re all done, you won’t be. You still have a lot of crying left to do.”
“Oh, Millie,” Ana said once she was able to catch her breath. “I’m dying with him. I know I am.”
“Of course you’re not,” she said. “You’ve lost a bit of weight, that’s all.”
Ana shook her head. “It’s more than that. I read somewhere that when someone you love dearly is seriously ill and dying, you’re at risk of getting ill yourself, and I can feel it inside of me. You’re the first person I’ve told, but I don’t mind telling you that I’m glad I’m sick because I can’t live without him.”
“Now, now,” Millie said, taking hold of Ana’s hand. “I’ve been where you are now, and I know that when your heart is breaking it can feel like you’re dying inside. Only time can ease the pain and make it better. You have to be patient.”
“Yes,” Ana said, hastily wiping her eyes. “Time is all I have left.”
Once Ana felt more composed, she and Millie entered the sickroom. Adam’s eyes fluttered open and he smiled when he saw them. “Millie,” he whispered.
She sat next to him and took his hand. “I can see that Ana’s taking good care of you.”
“Always,” he replied.
Millie chatted about her retire
ment and how busy she’d been, sounding so cheerful and casual that it was possible to forget that she was talking to a dying man. Ana was grateful that for a moment or two she could pretend that all was well, and she took several steps away toward the window. She spotted Sister Josepha sitting on the ledge of the fountain, enjoying the breeze and the sound of the water. It seemed to be singing to her, and when Ana closed her eyes, she could hear it too.
Now that he had brought music back into his life, Mr. Trellis was less angry than before. He smiled more easily and, although more than ten years had gone by, he appeared younger than he did on the first day I met him. He began keeping normal hours, and the best time of day for the children and me was at around six o’clock in the evening when we heard the crunching of his tires on the gravel in the driveway. We usually waited for him at the front door, Jessie with one of her art projects in hand to show him and Teddy with his favorite board game tucked under his arm. Now that Teddy had started junior high, his father had taken to playing a game with him after dinner as a reward for having completed his homework, and Teddy liked to give him a preview of what it would be as soon as he walked in the door.
The joy in Mr. Trellis’s eyes when confronted by such a welcoming committee was a beautiful sight to behold, and I’d gaze at him spellbound, always standing at a respectful distance, yet ready to lend a hand should the children hang on him for too long as he made his way to the study.
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