by Amy Poeppel
“I’m not teetering off my perch just yet, as I tried to tell you before you insisted on dragging me here. No bones are broken. I’ll likely have a small bruise on my hip. There was no cause to waste the hospital’s scarce resources.” He turned to the nurse. “I apologize for my daughters,” he said. “They convinced themselves I was only moments from taking my last breath. They were so confident I was expiring, they began surveying my property for the perfect site for a funeral pyre.”
Both Bridget and Gwen began to protest as the nurse said, “You’re lucky you fell in a good way. You coulda hit your head or broken a hip.”
“I’m fond of my head, so I protect it at all costs,” he said. “Head and hands. The rest I could do without.”
“You’re a hoot,” said the nurse. She presented him with a cup of water, pointing the straw at his mouth.
He sipped. “Very refreshing. Thank you.”
“Do you remember what happened,” Bridget asked, “as in why you fell?”
“How on earth should I know?” Edward said. His tone suggested that Bridget had asked him something ridiculously hard, like the square root of a square root of a decimal. “But I do recall a tufted ottoman playing the hero; it broke my fall.”
“I just thought you might be able to remember,” Bridget said. “Did you trip on something? Or did you get dizzy?”
“What a useless line of inquiry,” he said. “Why are you so focused on events of the past?”
“Are you dizzy now?” the nurse asked.
“Not in the least,” Edward said. “I feel perfectly fit.” He turned to Bridget and Gwen. “This tireless nurse, Stella, a.k.a. Thelma, a.k.a. Florence Nightingale, who should be sitting with her feet up under the bright, fluorescent lighting of the staff break room, is working herself to the bone over my frivolous case, while I, who should be sitting at my desk working on an exciting project, which I’ll share with you if I’m ever released from this asylum, am lying here like a ne’er-do-well manatee.” He turned back to Stella. “May I go home?”
“Soon,” she said. “The doctor’ll be in to release you when she can.” She checked the IV to make sure it was dripping, and then said, “It was nice to meet you.”
Edward nodded his head solemnly at her as she left the room and closed the curtain behind her.
“We were worried,” Bridget said, feeling defensive, “because you couldn’t seem to get up off the floor.”
“Like a turtle on its back,” said Gwen.
“I could get up,” he said. “I just couldn’t organize my legs to do as they were told. Now, as to your obsession over why I fell, I will speculate that Lady Marge left a dustpan in the middle of the room.”
Gwen was leafing through a People magazine. “I was there,” she said, “and I didn’t see any dustpan.”
“That’s probably because Marge hid it during the melee that followed. Now listen up, daughters, in spite of your complete lack of faith in my organ systems and brain function, I have no intention of dying today, or tomorrow either. In fact, I may live to be a hundred and twenty-six years old. Conductors’ longevity is scientifically proven. All that waving our arms around and working up a sweat, it’s very aerobic. There’s not a thing in the world wrong with me.”
Bridget sat on the edge of the bed. “I’m sorry you’re spending your day here,” she said, “but we had to be sure you were okay. What can we get you? Tea? Juice? A magazine?”
“Nothing,” he said. “Stop nudging me.”
Bridget felt the old pang of hurt feelings and stood up.
Edward patted the side of the bed. “I didn’t say you had to go anywhere.”
She sat back down.
He used the remote to sit himself up even straighter. “It occurs to me that I have you as a captive audience,” he said.
“I think you’re the captive audience,” Gwen said.
“We’re stuck here together, though, aren’t we?” he asked. “And I have a matter of importance to discuss. In spite of appearances”—and he used his arms to indicate his current state of affairs—“I’m about to launch into something very invigorating.”
“Are you starting a new composition?” Bridget asked, remembering the score she’d seen on his desk.
“No.”
“Are you writing your autobiography?” Gwen asked.
“Good grief, no. Mine is a more meaningful endeavor than a self-indulgent rehashing of my life story. And besides that venture has already been undertaken by a Dr. Nicholas Donahue.”
Bridget thought of Nicholas’s content face, deep voice, and gray socks from her dad’s library. “He’s writing a book about you?”
“Don’t get me off topic.” He took a deep breath. “When I was a young man,” he said, “as you may know, I was invited to a retreat.”
Bridget and Gwen looked at each other. “A yoga retreat?” Gwen asked him with a serious expression.
“A Buddhist retreat?” asked Bridget.
“A nudist retreat,” said Gwen.
“Are these attempts at humor?” asked Edward, growing impatient, “because I’m telling you something significant that will impact us all, and you’re making jokes.”
“Sorry, Dad,” said Bridget, dropping her smile.
“You were saying?” said Gwen. “A retreat?”
He smoothed the hospital blanket over his legs. “It was a summer residency program, highly selective. I sailed from England, my first trip to America, and made my way to a secluded boarding school campus in upstate New York. When I arrived, I quickly ascertained that there would be no distractions; we lived like monks. The dorms were bleak and simple, the schedule was grueling, the town had nothing of interest. Each day began with a swim in a cold lake at six in the morning, lights were out at ten p.m. The food was bland and meager. They served watery oatmeal for breakfast and watery soup for dinner. I’ve never been so homesick in my life.”
Bridget had heard this story many times before. The food got worse with every retelling.
“But we were productive. We were a small group, all composition students, and we were accountable to each other. That’s where I met Johannes Lang, along with six other composers I’ve stayed in touch with my whole life. We had two professors, both dead now, of course, who taught theory and reviewed our work. I wrote Synchronicity that summer, the first truly ambitious piece of my career, a nod to Henry Purcell and my love of baroque music written for English country dance. That retreat was so meaningful to me that once I reached a certain level of achievement as a musician, I made my commitment to mentor composers every August, this summer being no exception.”
The image that came into Bridget’s mind whenever she heard the word “synchronicity” was of synchronized swimming, women with nose plugs and caps on their heads pulling together in a circle, pushing apart simultaneously.
“Didn’t you meet Mom there?” Gwen asked. She had closed the magazine.
He held up a finger. “I’m getting there. At the end of the summer, they bused us all to New York City, hired professional musicians to play our work, and invited important people who were in positions to commission pieces.”
“At Carnegie Hall,” said Bridget. She loved this part. “Mom was sitting with a group of her friends from Barnard, and she spotted you through her opera glasses.”
“You’re ruining my story,” he said, and then raised his eyebrows at her in mock warning. “There was a terrible storm that day with wind and torrential rains, and our bus nearly skidded off the road. It continued raining well into the evening, so many people decided not to come to the concert at all.”
“There was a storm?” said Bridget. She didn’t remember anything about bad weather.
“Our pieces were being performed in the small recital hall at Carnegie,” her dad said, “which is now Weill Hall, and your mother came in spite of the storm and even though there were plenty of seats closer to the stage, she chose to sit in the back. She didn’t need opera glasses because it’s an intimate spa
ce, but she was using them anyway, and while my piece was being played, she trained her lorgnette on me and watched as I watched the musicians.” He closed his eyes for a brief moment, as if he were picturing the scene. “I met her after the program, and she said, ‘Well?’ ‘Well what?’ I asked. ‘Were you satisfied with how the musicians played your piece?’ I was not, not at all actually, but I smiled and said I thought they did a fine job. She leaned over and whispered, ‘I don’t believe you.’ ‘Why is that?’ I asked, thinking she was being presumptuous. ‘I could tell by your expression that it was all you could do not to jump out of your seat and play all the parts yourself.’ She was right, of course. That was precisely what I had wanted to do.”
“And you took her out for ice cream,” said Gwen with a sigh.
“Coffee,” said Edward.
They sat quietly, as Bridget remembered sitting with her mother eating raspberry sorbet. Pink lipstick. A ’70s key chain with a bright yellow smiley face.
“Now,” said Edward, “why am I telling you this story when you’ve likely heard it countless times before?”
“Because it’s meaningful,” said Bridget, wistfully, “and you want us to remember it.”
“Because Mom always knew what you were thinking,” said Gwen, “just by looking at you.”
“Because that summer was life-changing. That retreat turned out to be the most pivotal experience I ever had, professionally and personally, setting off a series of events that shaped the course of my life, brought me to my wonderful wife, and eventually led to you girls. Consider that I wrote a piece called Synchronicity, and your mother and I, as if in sync, appeared at the same concert, on the same night, in spite of a storm. Which is all to say—and I know this may come as a surprise—I’m getting married.”
The clock on the wall ticked the seconds along as if nothing unusual had been said. Bridget was stunned, noticing all at once the healthy pink of her father’s cheeks, the brightness of his eyes, the happy thrumming of his fingers on the white waffle-knit hospital blanket.
“Married?” said Gwen. The magazine slid off her lap and onto the floor. “You’re getting married?”
“Who is she?” Bridget asked.
“She is, in fact, someone you know quite well. She’s smart, entertaining. Fabulous company. We have everything in the world in common.”
“Who?” said Gwen.
He paused, smiled, and said proudly, “Lottie.”
“Lottie?” Bridget asked, startled. “As in Charlotte? Johannes’s wife?”
“Widow,” he corrected.
“Right, widow,” said Bridget, getting up from the hospital bed. Bridget had last seen Lottie and Johannes in Munich at a winter chamber music festival, but she couldn’t remember how long ago. Ten years maybe? They’d invited her, Jacques, and Will to their house for an overly formal dinner of venison stew and a lot of red wine. Bridget was touched at the end of the evening when they’d stood on the doorstep together, waving good-bye in matching fur hats, holding gloved hands.
“Doesn’t she live in Germany?” Gwen asked. “How did you… reconnect?”
“I saw her at Johannes’s funeral last fall, and we’ve been emailing ever since.”
“Emailing?” asked Gwen. “Just emailing?”
“And texting. Jackie set me up on something called WhatsApp, and it’s marvelous. Did you know you can make an overseas call and pay nothing for it?”
“But you’ve visited in person,” said Gwen, flashing Bridget a WTF? look. “You’ve seen her?”
“Her lovely face lighting up my iPad, yes. The wedding will be at my house at the end of summer, and we’ll all toast to our happiness.”
“That’s so soon, Dad,” said Gwen. “Shouldn’t you give it some more time? Take it from me, you should do a lot of thinking before you decide to tie the knot.”
“I’m almost ninety years old,” said Edward. “Why in God’s name would I wait another minute?”
“When is she coming?” Bridget asked, shocked her father hadn’t shared his feelings along the way before coming to such a momentous decision. “And where will you live? Is she moving to New York?”
“In the words of Tennyson, ‘’Tis not too late to seek a newer world.’ ”
“Huh?” asked Gwen.
“Meaning…?” Bridget said.
The doctor came in, and Edward abruptly shifted gears, turning his full attention to the visitor in the white coat. She was the spitting image, he said, of Jessye Norman.
8
Will pushed his shopping cart out into the bright parking lot and was loading his paper bags of groceries into the back of Bridget’s Volvo when his phone rang. He glanced at the screen and answered right away with an overly enthusiastic “Hello, Caroline!”
“Will Harris?”
“Speaking.”
“It’s Caroline Lee.”
Yes, I know. “I’m so glad you called.” He leaned on the car and put a hand over his ear so he could hear her better.
“I’m looking forward to our collaboration,” she said formally.
“So are we. We’re thrilled to have you join the trio.”
There was an uncomfortable pause.
“Is everything okay?” he said.
“Yes, but I’m calling to let you know,” she said, “the dates you proposed for rehearsals aren’t going to work. I’m incredibly busy.”
Will’s heart sank. “All right, of course. I’ll check with Bridget, and I’ll get back to you with some other options. Could we try for August? We won’t have much time before the Frick.”
“It’s just that I’m so busy,” she said again.
“I know,” Will said. “We’re quite tied up as well, but I’m sure we can find—”
“And we need to resolve a few matters first,” she said. “Have you agreed to everything?”
“What’s everything?”
“Randy talked to you?”
Randy? She called Randall “Randy”?
“Like, on all the advertisements, posters, emails? My name should appear first. And in a larger font, okay?—so that my name stands out.”
Will cringed. This was exactly the kind of diva bullshit he hated. The sort of Gavin Glantz–style egotism that made his blood boil. “Well, Caroline, maybe Randall should—”
“And we need professional photographs taken of the three of us for promotional materials—”
“Okay, but—”
“—with me standing in the front.”
“Seriously?” He realized he’d accidentally said that out loud, so he quickly added, “We’re only three people. How far in front of me and Bridget do you need to be?” He wanted to embarrass her by posing a specific question (one foot? two feet?), but he stopped himself.
“I’m bringing something important to the trio,” she said with an edge to her voice, “so it’s reasonable to expect that fact to be acknowledged.”
There might have been some truth to that, but it was in terrible taste for her to spell it out. Her youth and her success were not a good combination, and Will did not like the implication that he and Bridget were somehow riding on this child’s coattails.
“I have a photographer I want to use,” she said. “I’ll send you her information?”
The expenses were stacking up, and although he wanted to divide everything evenly with Bridget, he simply couldn’t afford to.
“We should set up a photo shoot for July. He’ll need a deposit to hold a date.”
“I thought you said you’re busy,” Will said.
“I can make time for that,” she said as though it were obvious.
“Anything else?” Will tried to keep the annoyance out of his voice.
“No. Yes, actually—I know you guys are good, okay? And it would be nice to join an ensemble.”
Why was she using conditional tense? “But…?”
“Well,” she said, “when I searched ‘Forsyth’ on the internet, I had a hard time even finding you.” She pronounced their
name foresight, which Will found annoying. “The Forsyth Grill in… Where was it? Kansas City or something comes up first, and then Forsyth Lighting Warehouse. You have, like, no web presence at all. You need a platform. We’re not amateurs, right? You’ll deal with it?”
Will felt an urge to throw his phone across the parking lot and into the brick wall of the grocery store. Instead he said, “We’re hiring a publicity firm Randall recommended, and we’re redoing our website, and soon we’ll be on all the… Across the social media landscape. Twitter, Instagram, and all that. We’re going to get a whole new…” He struggled to find a word that was fitting. “…to-do.”
“Good,” Caroline said. “Otherwise, it’s just embarrassing.”
Asshole.
“We have to be much more visible. So how soon?” she asked.
The contract for the PR firm was sitting unsigned in Will’s backpack in the loft. They were requesting a payment of $32,000, money he certainly didn’t have. He had hoped to be able to pay some of his share before giving Bridget the bill.
“Soon,” Will said.
“I hope so,” Caroline said. “Did Randy discuss my travel?”
“No.”
“Nothing unusual, just what I need when we’re on tour. The kind of hotel rooms I require, although I’m sure you stay at nice places. And I obviously don’t fly economy,” she added, “ever.”
Fuck this, thought Will. He wanted out. He wanted to replace this brat with someone nice, a team player.
“Okay, Will? Are we cool?”
“Yeah,” said Will flatly. And then, “Actually no. We’re not ‘cool’ at all. I need to talk to Bridget.” But as he ran that conversation through his mind, he already knew exactly what Bridget would say (We need her! She’s the answer to our prayers!), so he swallowed hard and said, “Never mind, yes, it’s fine. We’re cool.”
“You aren’t sure,” she said. It wasn’t a question.
“I’m entirely sure. One hundred percent.”
“Hmm. Good-bye, Will.” And she hung up in such an abrupt way that it reminded Will of the olden days when one could still slam a phone down onto a receiver.
What the hell, he wondered, was her problem? And why hadn’t she had Randall call to discuss these logistical matters? The only thing he wanted to talk to her about was what music they wanted to play together and what times were good to rehearse. Now it was awkward, and Will didn’t even know what she’d meant by “Hmm.”