The Protégé

by Brianna Hale

  I told Hayley that I don’t want a physical relationship with Laszlo. I’m such a liar. I want him so much it aches, and I drive another finger into myself, curling my fingers over and over, trying to ease the burning desire for him. I need something thicker than my fingers. I need him.

  Isabeau, what the fuck are you doing?

  Laszlo’s voice, cold and angry. My eyes fly open and I yank my hand out of my pants. He’d be furious if he knew I was doing this. He can’t possibly know but that’s not the point. I need the security of him more than I need to get off and that means not cheating the little things. I trust him and he should be able to trust me.

  I turn over in bed, wrapping the blankets tightly around myself. I won’t masturbate over Laszlo. I’m keeping to our arrangement. I’m a good protégé. A horny, unsatisfied, but good protégé.

  Now all I have to do is keep this up for the whole five-week tour.

  Chapter Nine

  Laszlo

  Then

  Warm air indolent with the scent of late-summer roses is drifting into the lounge and Isabeau and I are sprawled at either ends of the sofa. I keep one eye on the score spread out in my lap and one eye on her, waiting for her to look up from the copy of Fahrenheit 451 she’s reading for English class.

  I liked having her in my orchestra for her debut last week and it’s given me an idea. Finally she places a bookmark between the pages and I say to her, “Isabeau. How do you like your youth orchestra?”

  She looks up in surprise at my question. “It’s fine. I mean, good,” she amends quickly, as if anxious not to seem disloyal. So, she’s not overly attached to it.

  “How do you like your conductor?”

  Isabeau hesitates, and then says with a wrinkle of her nose, “He’s all right. Not as good as you. Not as patient as you, either.”

  No loyalty for him? I have to hide a pleased smile. Even better. “How would you like me to be your conductor?”

  She sits up, excited. “But you’ve already got eight cellists and I’m only fourteen. Or do you mean you’re going to take over the youth orchestra? Please say yes.”

  “No. I want to start my own, from scratch, and I’d like you to be the very first member.” The thought came to me yesterday as I looked around the empty Mayhew stage at three in the afternoon, around the time that schools were getting out. Why should the space go to waste so many afternoons a week when there are promising young musicians who could be playing there? I have the time. What’s more I have Isabeau, and why should she be playing for some second-rate conductor when she could be with me? I want more of her music in my life. She does so much of her playing without me and I feel like I’m missing out on something precious.

  Her eyes grow wide. “Really? You mean that? Yes please, Laszlo. Will we play at the Mayhew? Will it be a proper big orchestra that performs symphonies? Can we do Scheherazade? I love Scheherazade.”

  I feel my heart glow golden at the excited expression on her face. “Yes, at the Mayhew. And we can play Scheherazade and all sorts of other pieces.”

  Isabeau squeals and comes over to hug me, knocking the score out of my lap and onto the floor. “I’m so happy you’re going to be my conductor!”

  I hug her back fiercely, feeling very happy about that, too.

  Auditions for the new Royal London Symphony Youth Orchestra begin the very next week but it takes nearly a month to put a full ensemble together. The amount of young talent that I hear is heartening. Every now and then there are rumblings in the classical music world that young people are all learning the guitar rather than the flute and violin, but my worries are put to rest by the dozens of talented musicians I hear.

  I want to make Isabeau first cello because she’s the most talented, but she’s also the youngest and I worry that the sixteen- and seventeen-year-old cellists will make things hard for her or tell her that she’s only first because she’s my favorite. It wouldn’t be a stretch because she damn well is my favorite but there are orchestra politics to be mindful of. In a year or two I’ll move her up to first or second, but for now she’s fourth, and delighted with her place.

  For our very first concert, just before Christmas, we perform The Carnival of the Animals and Peter and the Wolf back-to-back, and it’s a massive hit. All the parents and friends of the orchestra give them a riotous standing ovation, but most important of all is that my orchestra is incandescently happy. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Isabeau smile as much as she does when she takes her bows with the rest of the orchestra. The next morning there’s a small, amused piece about the performance in the Arts section of the newspaper and I find the journalist’s tone both irritating and pleasing: my little orchestra that did so well.

  When she’s fifteen I move Isabeau up to second cello and the orchestra learns and performs Scheherazade. The piece has a difficult first violin solo throughout but a sixteen-year-old called Hayley Chiswell is more than up to performing it. I notice that she and Isabeau have become good friends and I’m glad of this because I want Isabeau to have more music friends her own age. That was one of the reasons I set the orchestra up. But not the main reason. The main reason is looking toward the string section and seeing Isabeau looking back at me, smiling. That year she wins all the cello competitions she enters and I’m there for every single performance.

  I find that working with the youth orchestra is as rewarding as working with my main orchestra, and sometimes more so. I don’t have to be so formal as they’re good kids who are happy to be there. I like leaving the suit and tie at home and rehearsing in my shirtsleeves, without a baton, and when we perform I tell them they can wear whatever they like as long as it’s black and doesn’t clutter up the stage. One season a trumpet player arrives at three performances dressed as Neo from The Matrix. It’s the Mayhew, but they’re kids. They’ve got the rest of their lives to be serious about classical music. Isabeau wears black jeans and sneakers or long black dresses, whichever she’s in the mood for. Sometimes the sneakers go with the dresses and she wears winged eyeliner as well. She’s finding herself and I love watching it happen. I have Isabeau close to me and I get to hear her play and watch her pretty, studious face. Conducting and orchestras are my life and it’s wonderful to share it with her. She cares as deeply about the orchestra as I do. I think about having her in my symphony orchestra in a few years’ time. I want that very much. But then, she won’t have time if she’s a soloist and I want that for her as well. I think it’s what she wants most of all, too. That’s a long way in the future, though. For now she’s here, and I couldn’t ask for more.

  But one day, when she’s sixteen, I don’t have such a wonderful time at rehearsal.

  When Isabeau and I arrive it’s the same as any other day at the Mayhew. The ensemble is making excellent progress with Holst’s The Planets which they’ll be performing at the Winter Concert. Isabeau is happy because she’s just received top marks in her Grade Eight cello exams and I’m always in a good humor when Isabeau is smiling.

  As the rehearsal progresses my mood takes a nosedive. I don’t know what’s got into everyone tonight but the ensemble is restless, talking in between pieces, getting up and down, slumping in their chairs. I don’t expect them to be as respectful and professional as my orchestra because they’re not professionals, they’re a bunch of teenagers and this is supposed to be fun, not work, but tonight they’re really testing my patience.

  Something’s off in the woodwind section. I keep listening for a badly tuned instrument or sloppy playing but everything sounds as it should. One of the clarinet players is talking a lot, and in the middle of a discussion I’m having with the section about their part in the third movement he yawns conspicuously without covering his mouth, and I’ve had enough.

  “Mr. Reese. If I’m keeping you up you’re welcome to leave.”

  His mouth closes with a snap and he sits up straight. “Yes, Mr. Valmary.”

  A ripple goes through the orchestra as everyone adjusts the way they’re sitting
. I look around slowly, driving the point home that I’m not feeling as tolerant as I usually am and they shouldn’t press their luck. Everyone is silent and still. Good. Perhaps that’s the end of it.

  I finish what I was saying and we keep playing, and twenty minutes later the rehearsal is over. I start packing up and out of habit glance at Isabeau, just to check on her, and notice that a flautist called Ryan Taylor has left the woodwind section and is standing next to her while she puts away her cello. Thinking back I realize that he was looking at her throughout the whole rehearsal. It wasn’t Kieran Reese getting to me all this time. It was Ryan.

  He’s standing by her chair while he takes apart and cleans his flute. I try to follow their conversation by their body language. He seems to be asking her a question and she’s hesitating, not wanting to answer. Finally, she glances at me and then gets up and comes over, her fingers running through the end of her ponytail.

  She purses her lips and looks up at me with hesitant eyes. “Laszlo…”

  I smile at her, wanting to put her at her ease. However I’m feeling tonight it’s not her I’m irritated with. “What is it, sweetheart?”

  “Laszlo, Ryan has asked if I can go with him to a concert on Monday night.”

  My hands still on my sheet music. As she’s sixteen I suppose I should have expected this. Over the years she’s grown taller, more slender in places, filled out in others. There’s still a coltish uncertainty about her limbs and the way she holds herself sometimes but even that will disappear in a year or so. Her childhood prettiness has turned into loveliness. My ward is beautiful, and I know I’m not the only one who sees it.

  I’m going to have to starting dealing with Isabeau dating. My irritation expands. I don’t want dozens of spotted youths calling at the house to take Isabeau out and worrying every minute that she’s gone. I swallow down the outright refusal that’s clamoring to get out of my mouth, and think, What concert? Mentally running through next week’s performances and soirees I can’t come up with a single event that would be worth Isabeau’s time. Besides, Monday nights have always been our night. Usually neither of us have to perform. I cook. She does her homework at the kitchen bench and after we’ve eaten we play something together. I like it. I look forward to it.

  “There aren’t any concerts on Monday night.”

  Isabeau smiles and tugs on her ponytail. “Not that sort of concert, silly. A band. Electro pop or something.”

  She’s expecting me to tweak her nose and tell her not to be cheeky as I usually do when she teases me, but I’m not in the mood. A band. A dark venue. Dancing. Ryan’s arms around her to protect her from the press of sweaty bodies, but really so he can feel her up. A thick, ugly sensation spreads through my chest. She’s too young for that. She’s too…mine.

  She’s too young for that, I correct myself quickly. I’m just being protective. It’s what I do. But I feel the same angry, resentful sensation that I get when I catch men looking at her in the street. That they’re coveting what’s mine. If anyone’s going to put his arms around Isabeau to protect her it’s going to be me. Knowing that I can’t and shouldn’t want to doesn’t seem to change that. If I was actually her father it wouldn’t be so complicated. I wouldn’t feel like men were encroaching on my territory and I could just let her go.

  But I don’t want to let her go, and certainly not to a dark, sweaty pop concert with fucking Ryan or anyone else.

  I clear my throat, sorting through the sheet music as if I’m looking for something. “I see. Do you think you have time for dates, what with orchestra rehearsals, practice and schoolwork?”

  “No.”

  I look up at her in surprise. I was expecting an argument, pleading, but she’s regarding me with perfect calmness.

  “You’re right, Laszlo. I’ll tell him that I’m too busy.”

  She turns away but I reach out and grasp her hand, tugging her back. I smile at her, puzzled and pleased at the same time. “You don’t want to go?”

  She squeezes my hand and leans close to whisper, “Not really, Laszlo. I’ve already told Ryan no three times saying that you wouldn’t agree, but he insisted I ask you. Now I can just tell him you don’t want me to go and he won’t dare ask me again. Please keep being so strict and scary. Then I won’t have to date anyone at all.”

  Her cool fingers slip from mine and I watch her go back to Ryan and tell him that her strict, scary guardian has told her she can’t go. The boy’s face flushes with annoyance and I make sure I’m busy with my music case when he glances in my direction. It’s petty and it’s beneath me but I’m fiercely pleased by the whole exchange. Isabeau doesn’t want to go on a date with Ryan. Isabeau doesn’t want to date anyone at all.

  She picks up her cello case and comes toward me, leaving a disappointed Ryan in her wake. I take her instrument from her, feeling in a better mood than I have all night. As we walk through Leicester Square on our way to the Tube I watch the faces of the men we pass, seeing how their covetous eyes roam over Isabeau. When their gaze falls on me and the hostile expression in my eyes they look quickly away. She has no idea, talking to me of the evening’s practice. I smile down at her, liking her where she is. Liking her close to me, being able to keep her safe even as I feel a creeping sense of guilt that I shouldn’t like it quite so much.

  But Isabeau’s only sixteen. She’s asked me to be strict and scary so men with leave her alone and I’m more than happy to do that for her. More than happy.

  Chapter Ten

  Laszlo

  Now

  I wake in the morning with a sense of completeness like I haven’t felt in three years. The orchestra is whole again and everything is just about in place for the tour. But it’s not that making me feel so full up with happiness. It’s Isabeau. I always wanted her in my orchestra and now I have her.

  I let my mind wander over the memory of her the day before yesterday in her black skirt with her slender legs in tights, asking nervously but determinedly to be my protégé again. Last night she called me Mr. Valmary without any prompting, and soon I’ll tell her to call me sir in private. I imagine her saying it. Yes, sir. It will sound so good from her pretty pink mouth as she looks up at me with supplication in her eyes. I feel my cock twitch and realize I have a raging hard-on. I’m thinking about Isabeau and I’m hard.

  This tour and various other commitments have kept me busy and I haven’t had sex in weeks. I reach for my phone to text a singer I know to set something up for later tonight, but my desire for her or any of the other women I enjoy taking to bed has evaporated, and I put my phone down. I just want to lay here in the dim morning light thinking about Isabeau with an expectant expression on her heart-shaped face. How I loved seeing her looking at me just that like while she was in the youth orchestra. She was always so well-behaved and attentive, not like the other unruly teenagers in the ensemble. Always my sweet Isabeau. In a few short hours she’ll be sitting just a few feet from me in the string section of my professional orchestra with just that look on her face. Playing exquisitely, her very best, for me. Watching my hands, watching my face, listening to my voice, the only things on her mind me and the music.

  It’s sexual, Laszlo. Your voice, your words, the way you talk to me. Especially the way you are with me when you’re conducting or we’re playing together.

  The way I am with her makes her happy. Probably makes her wet, too. Jesus Christ. Do I make her wet? I groan and roll over, trying to put such delicious thoughts out of my head. Being a conductor imparts a great deal of control. A hundred people look to me day after day, night after night for instruction and employment, people who have to do as I say or else. Unlike some conductors I’m careful not to abuse this power but I feel a thrum of dark satisfaction that Isabeau finds the way I am when I’m working and guiding her arousing. Yes, sir in private. Yes, Mr. Valmary in front of the rest of the ensemble. Yes, maestro during rehearsals and on stage.

  Yes, daddy when I unbutton her blouse and pull down the lacy cups of he
r bra to stroke my thumb over her nipples.

  I realize my hand has strayed to my cock and I stroke myself, imagining licking the dusky pink tips of her breasts. Making her kneel before me and pushing two fingers into her mouth. Feeling her suck them while she plays with her clit, her hand inside her underwear, white cotton briefs of the sort I used to pull out of the dryer and try not to look at. Or has she moved on to little lacy things and G-strings now? I hope not. I like the school-girlish white cotton, wedged tight into her ass for a spanking or pulled temptingly aside so I can lick her, and then ease her tight pussy down onto my cock. Powerful arousal surges through me. Fuck, I’m going to come in a minute.

  I let go of myself with a groan. This isn’t very mentorly. In fact it’s exactly what I shouldn’t be doing. If I give myself free rein to think about Isabeau sexually it will be too tempting to act on those desires and she’s told me she doesn’t want that. Besides, I’ve never thought about Isabeau while jacking off and I’m not about to start now.

  Almost never thought about her while jacking off.

  I throw back the blankets and stalk to the shower. While I wait for the water to heat up I wonder how long I’ll be able to keep this up. The whole tour? While I’m close to her every day, being strict with her, seeing her be obedient and respectful to me and oh so sweet and good? Christ. I’ll go mad.

  Whatever I have to deal with it’s my problem, not Isabeau’s. I’ll just have to be as disciplined with myself as I’ve promised to be for her. As she wants me to be with her, because she responds sexually to my control.

  Fuck.

  My hard-on surges anew and I switch the taps to cold and thrust my body under the freezing deluge. The icy needles of water do nothing to drive thoughts of Isabeau out of my mind.

  Two hours later I’m showered and suited at the Mayhew. When I come onto the stage I shake Marcus’ hand and talk to him for a moment while the last of the orchestra takes their places. I’m focused squarely on my concertmaster but I can see Isabeau in my peripheral vision, tuning her mother’s cello and straightening her sheet music. Neat and pretty in black with a black velvet bow holding up her half-ponytail.