Tobe’s third-grade piano teacher had been the first to recognize his gifts. Now that he was in his early teens, it wouldn’t be a stretch to label him a wunderkind. A modern-day Beethoven, even. Sure, lots of kids his age can play an instrument, and play it well. But performing is a common talent. Composing, on the other hand—writing music as sophisticated as his semifinal sonata—put Tobe in a class all his own.
Or did it?
A mousy freshman named Genevieve wasn’t so sure, and she felt it was her moral obligation to set the record straight. So she stood in line, like everybody else, waiting for her chance to approach the young maestro. Now, in the interest of full disclosure, we should mention that Genevieve was also competing for the music scholarship. Although a gifted pianist in her own right, Genevieve had to concede she was not in the same musical league as Tobe. His talent was to be admired, and she had no interest in soiling his reputation. Still, she owed it to a friend to tell him what she knew. The sonata he’d taken credit for had actually been composed by someone else—someone who could no longer defend herself. We’ll see about that.
The sonata had been composed by a corpse.
Not at the time, of course. Mrs. Birch, the former music teacher at Buena Vista Middle School, had been very much alive when she wrote it. Genevieve had been there during its inception. Still, she would give Tobe the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he’d heard Mrs. Birch randomly playing it down in the school archives and when it came time to compose his own piece, bits of the sonata seeped in from his subconscious. That would be one explanation. It happens all the time in art. The problem was his piece wasn’t a little like Mrs. Birch’s. It was the exact same sonata, note for note, measure for measure. And Tobe had taken full credit for it, accepting all the accolades.
Just like he was about to accept the full scholarship.
So Genevieve waited her turn, a full thirty minutes in line, just to tell him: “That wasn’t your music.”
He peered down from the stage. His hair was wildly unkempt, and he wore thick-rimmed glasses he didn’t actually need. It was all part of a prefabricated look—the mad musical genius. He snapped his fingers, trying to come up with her name. “You are…?”
“Genevieve,” said Genevieve. “I sit behind you in chorus.”
“Not possible. I would have noticed those freckles.”
Genevieve blushed. “It’s possible. I’m not very noticeable.”
But she was that night. She had delivered the first blow innocently enough, but not out of meanness. There wasn’t a mean bone in her body. Scalpel, please. We’ll check. Still, Tobe had to figure out a way to stop her, to shut Genevieve down before she said another word. The people lining up behind her—Tobe’s fans—were already starting to gossip.
“Oh, wait!” He snapped his fingers again. “Now I remember. Didn’t I help you out once? The winter concert. You were really killing it on the triangle.”
She blushed a deeper shade, flattered that he remembered. “Yes, you were so very generous with your time.”
The longest two minutes of my life, thought Tobe. “You’re welcome.” He gently took her hand to shake. “If you ever need any more help, you know who to ask.” He tried to see past her, to the face of his next admirer, now on the approach. But Genevieve stayed where she was, and Tobe’s false smile evaporated. The mad musical genius simply looked mad…as in angry mad. “I have a lot of fans to get through. Let’s pick this up in chorus on Monday. Okeydoke?”
Genevieve nodded, turning to leave. But she couldn’t. For Mrs. Birch, she couldn’t let it pass. Tobe’s eyes narrowed under the fake glasses. “Still here?”
“The piece you played…” Genevieve swallowed whatever trepidation she had. “And, oh, you played it so well. Mrs. Birch would have been honored.”
Tobe could no longer mask his feelings, his anger overflowing. He whipped off the glasses. “Mrs. Birch? What are you talking about?”
Genevieve started blinking, which happened when she got upset. She needed to regroup. Stay strong. Stop blinking! If the fight had been hers, she would have already taken the dive. But she was fighting for a friend, one, as we noted, who could no longer defend herself. Genevieve took three deep breaths, like Mrs. Birch had said to do when she got nervous. “Your piece…” she began. “It’s really her piece. Maybe you didn’t realize it. It was probably an innocent mistake. But I was there when she composed it. I volunteer in the archives. And that piece you said you wrote—it was actually written by her.”
An admirer behind Genevieve gasped, and Tobe knew at once what he needed to do. He had to incite them, to sic his fans on the mousy girl making all those not-so-ridiculous allegations. He knew the mousy ones weren’t very good fighters. They didn’t have it in them. That was why they didn’t have fans. Oh, I might know one or two “Mouses” who do. All Tobe needed was the perfect mousetrap…along with the appropriate wedge of cheese. All right, enough with the mouse metaphor. It was time for Tobe to break out the bully tactics.
At once, he brought his voice down to a somewhat timid tone, matching it with an almost pitiable little-boy-lost look. His admirers had to lean in to listen. “You accused me of stealing. Of being a thief, a dirty cheat.”
Before Genevieve could reply, an overwhelming murmur swelled from the crowd. His crowd. Here’s the thing: The Buena Vista football team was zero and thirteen. Academically, the school was at the very bottom of an almost bottomless barrel. Tobe, their one ray of sunshine, was the only thing keeping it on any sort of map—flesh or otherwise. Attacking him was like attacking the school mascot. (Which happened to be a mouse. Go figure.) Even Principal Gribbons seemed out for blood as he swiftly approached the stage. “Is everything all right, Tobe? You look upset.”
“Is everything all right? I’ve just been accused of being a dirty cheat. Maybe I should drop out of the finals.” He looked pleadingly to the crowd. “What do you say?”
“Nooooooo!” they replied in perfect harmony. Without Tobe, there would be no TV cameras. No headlines, except for the humiliating football scores. No anything. Their angry eyes turned to his accuser, Genevieve. She put up her hands in mouse fashion and attempted to explain. “You don’t understand. No one admires Tobe more than I do. I never said he was a cheat.”
“Yes you did!” someone cried out from the crowd. “I heard it too!” shouted someone else. And then came the ensemble: “So did I!” “Me too!”
Followed by the personal attacks from the balcony: “She’s jealous! She’d do anything to win that scholarship!”
Followed by the chants: “Throw her out! Throw her out! Throw her out!” The sound was deafening. Genevieve couldn’t plead her case over the roar of the angry crowd. She looked to Principal Gribbons for support. He had implemented the district’s Zero Tolerance for Bullies policy, after all. How dispiriting, then, to see him leading the chant, conducting with his hands: “Throw her out! Throw her out! Throw her out!”
Genevieve ran from the stage, fearing for her life. Angry mobs can threaten that. Especially in horror stories. Tobe took center stage and, in a soothing voice, explained that it wasn’t Genevieve’s fault. She was merely using every means necessary to win the scholarship, even if it meant smearing the competition. This elicited even more support, the crowd affording Tobe a seven-minute ovation—shattering the old record! In the eyes of his admirers, Tobe was a true champion of the people.
He had silenced the competition, and no one would stand in his way. The only other soul to know the truth was dead. And the dead aren’t very noisy. Corpses by and large keep to themselves, snug in their graves. Every now and then, however, you come across a noisy one. The kind that rattle chains in your attic or go creaking about in closets. If you’re lucky, the noises stop on their own. If you’re not so lucky, the noises do what they did to Tobe.
The young maestro was about to hear from a noisy spirit, indeed. A spirit with a score to settle.
Mrs. Birch died in the music archives, where she had spent mos
t of her days. The cause of death had not been shared with the student body, but that didn’t stop anyone from guessing. Several theories slithered their way into lunchroom chitchat. For example: Mrs. B had died with her eyes wide open, which is fairly common, along with her mouth, as if she was in the middle of a song, which is less common.
Or had she died screaming?
Her fingers had still been touching the piano keys. Tickling the ivories, as it were. Putting these two things together, it would appear she had died doing what she loved. Singing at the piano. Phew! Sounds like a pleasant way to go, doing what you love, unless you love bullfighting; that would be painful…and messy.
Oh, and there was one other thing—a minor detail, but one you should hear. The police had kept it out of the news, but Mike Shea, whose mom worked as a dispatcher, had gotten the info straight from the corpse’s mouth. (Not literally.) It appeared Mrs. Birch had been discovered on her piano bench with her head turned completely around, facing backward.
At this point it’s only fair to interject: lunchroom chitchat is traditionally prone to exaggeration. Gross exaggeration. But as it applies to lunchroom cuisine, chitchat can also provide a reasonable distraction from the cardboard squares being pawned off as pizza. The reality was no one really knew how Mrs. Birch had died. Well, except for Mrs. Birch and, of course, the night janitor, who had discovered her remains, and he wasn’t talking. Lunchroom chitchat said that he went insane, that he currently mopped the floors of the crazy house…out of habit.
One thing was certain, confirmed during a double-period assembly in the main auditorium: Mrs. Birch had died in the archives, and the door had been sealed with an industrial-strength lock and a heavy chain.
Unusual security measures, wouldn’t you say? Were they worried about someone getting in? Or something getting out?
Genevieve would be the first to tell you there was absolutely nothing to be afraid of. And I have 998 spirited acquaintances who’d insist she was wrong. Dead wrong. She knew Mrs. Birch about as well as she knew herself. They’d spent an exceptional amount of time together since Genevieve’s parents’ divorce. Mrs. Birch had taken on Gennie as her protégé. Gennie was what she called her. They’d spent an entire summer in the stifling non-air-conditioned music archives, cataloging sheet music and archiving videos of the school concerts. And if you think sitting through one school concert is tough, try sitting through 138 of them! It’s enough to make you tear your own ears off. Oh, such lovely images.
On certain days, when Genevieve’s mom worked a second shift, Gennie and Mrs. Birch even ate dinner together. Always by the piano. They would sing and converse. They’d talk about french fries and butterflies and the things that mattered most, which often sounded like the things that mattered least. They seemed to laugh as much as they sang. And on one very special day, they cried. It was the day Mrs. Birch shared the details of her own divorce and of the child of her own she could never have, due to a prolonged illness.
After Genevieve went home, Mrs. Birch remained in the archives. She stayed all night, composing a sonata.
Yes, that sonata.
The next day, when Genevieve returned, Mrs. Birch played the completed piece, and together they wept. Through song, Mrs. Birch had summed up their special bond. It was funny and sad and sometimes silly. And like all true friendships, it transcended words. It was music.
She called it Gennie’s Friend.
During the school week, Tobe’s smear campaign continued in earnest. Genevieve, he had decided, wasn’t a mouse at all. She was a snake. A jealous viper, and all the more dangerous for it.
Genevieve felt eyes glaring at her the moment she stepped onto her bus. The students were bad enough, but no, not Wes! Yes, Tobe’s smear campaign had reached Wes, the bus driver, too. By the time she got to homeroom, Genevieve felt like an outsider in her own skin. And the online comments were even worse. How dare she question the integrity of the school superstar?
But the final nail in the piano came during rehearsals. By then, Genevieve was too upset to play, her eyes blinking out of control. Tobe had a hard time keeping the grin off his face. Her performance seemed like one giant mistake. Oh yes, the scholarship was a lock. Just one more turn of the screw for insurance purposes. That ought to do it.
It happened before lunch. Genevieve was called to the principal’s office and told, in no uncertain terms, to stop bullying the young maestro. “Me? I’m not doing anything! Tobe stole Mrs. Birch’s music. And now he’s bullying me!”
Mr. Gribbons gave her a condescending double pat on the knee. “We don’t make accusations we can’t back up with proof.”
“But I can. I can back it up!”
“So you have the proof? The original sheet music, perhaps? With Mrs. Birch’s name on it?”
Genevieve lowered her head. “No, I’ve never seen it. But…it’s in the archives!”
“The archives are sealed.”
“So let’s open them,” she logically suggested.
“Not until the police complete their investigation.” Mr. Gribbons opened the door leading to the hall. “There’s really nothing left to discuss, Gennie.”
“It’s Genevieve. I’d rather you didn’t call me Gennie.”
“Very well…Genevieve. Good luck with the competition. I don’t know if you’ve heard…Channel 12 News is coming. Bless that Tobe.”
Genevieve swallowed her vomit, leaving the principal’s office in a blinking hurry. Several students had been waiting for her in the hall. From their paint-spattered clothes, she guessed they were from the Art Honor Society. Also, it said Art Honor Society on their hoodies. They chuckled with their hands over their mouths and parted to reveal their latest masterpiece. Taped to the wall was a painting of Genevieve, sitting at a piano, with her head turned completely around, facing backward. The art teacher heard the commotion and emerged from her room, then tore down the painting. Too little, too late. The damage was done.
Genevieve hit the exit running. She ran and she ran, never looking back. As Tobe watched her from the chorus room window, he basked in the glory, his victory complete. Now there was no one alive to stop him.
Poor Tobe, always concerned with the living when it’s the dead he should be worried about.
He first heard it during homeroom. As usual, Tobe strutted in a few minutes late, the rest of the class assuming that was what geniuses did. The opening announcements had already begun, and Principal Gribbons’s voice was booming over the PA. After the pledge, Principal Gribbons spoke about the next Friday’s competition and how their entire town would be watching. Every student was to be on their best behavior. All heads turned toward Tobe as the resident musical genius made his way to his desk. The morning announcements were all about him; they usually were. But there was nothing usual about them that day. For just as Principal Gribbons was about to conclude, Tobe heard it—the opening notes of the sonata. The soft piano chords of the haunting melody lilted through his head and washed over him like a dream. Tobe sat up at full attention and looked around to see if anyone else had heard it. Was it being broadcast over the PA, or was Tobe just hearing things?
“Did you—did you hear that?” Tobe asked of the girl next to him.
“Yeah,” she responded. “We all have to wear black and white for the competition.”
Tobe stared at her, then realized that she hadn’t heard it. It was all in his head. The music was gone in an instant, so Tobe thought nothing of it. Oh, but he should have.
It was later, during third-period math, when he heard the sonata’s exposition once again. And once again, he assumed it was all in his head, since he had played the piece so many times. But this time, it sounded different. Like more of an echo. A sound shadow. Tobe closed his eyes and listened harder, giving it his full attention. And that was when he realized that someone—somewhere—was playing Gennie’s Friend.
He opened his eyes and studied the faces of his fellow classmates. Most of them were struggling with Mrs. Dee’s triweekly ma
th quiz. Well, except for Craig Craft. He was struggling for boogers, but that’s a whole other story. And Mrs. Dee herself, she was at her desk, scrolling through her phone. But the music was pretty loud. Why weren’t they reacting?
Tobe got up from his desk and slowly walked toward the sound of the sonata. “Excuse me? Tobe?” It was Mrs. Dee. “We’re in the middle of a quiz. Where do you think you’re going?”
He didn’t respond. Her voice no longer had a place inside his head. Tobe was entranced by the piano and the power of the sonata. It had overtaken his brain, gnawing away at his gray matter like a symphonic saprophyte.
“Tobe, are you still with us?”
It grew louder still. The haunting sonata was rising from an uncovered vent in the floor. Tobe got down on his knees and placed his ear against the metal grate. That’s it! It’s coming from the basement. Of course. The archives!
A petite hand tapped his shoulder, and Tobe turned with a start. Mrs. Dee was staring down at him, her look moderately stern. One couldn’t get too upset. After all, it was Tobe. “Would you mind returning to your desk?”
“Don’t you hear it?” Tobe asked. No, make that demanded. “The piano. The sonata!” But almost as soon as the words left his mouth, the music ceased, as if the sonata was in on the joke.
Mrs. Dee gave one of those condescending poor baby head tilts. “Are we feeling okay? Do we need to see the nurse?”
His classmates chortled. It was the first time Tobe had ever been laughed at. For the record, it didn’t feel very good.
“We are feeling fine!” hollered Tobe. “But you need to get your ears checked, because you must be deaf if you didn’t hear that!”
Mrs. Dee turned to her class for confirmation. “Did anyone hear a piano?”
“No, Mrs. Deeeeeeeeee!” the class answered in unison.
She turned back to Tobe. “Maybe you need to get your ears checked.”
“My ears are twenty-twenty, Mrs. Dee. I know what I heard!”
“This is math, not music. And we’re in the middle of a quiz. Won’t you join us?”
Tales from the Haunted Mansion, Volume 3 Page 3