by Rico, Lauren
“Hi,” I say with a shy smile.
“Julia, I missed last class. Is the test today?” he whispers.
I hope not. I think hard for a second to be sure.
“No, not till Wednesday. She wants to cover The Trout Quintet today and Monday.”
He’s visibly relieved.
“Thanks!” he says, sitting back in his chair.
I nod and face forward, but not before I catch a glimpse of Tom Carson, a cellist from my section, sitting next to Jeremy. The little creep sits just under Mila and, as Jeremy reminded me recently, he tried to stage a hostile takeover of the cello section while I was sick last semester.
“Hey, Mouse,” he says, twitching his nose as if he has whiskers.
Before Mila came along, Tom was my very jealous second chair and stand partner. One day, he noticed a birthday card sticking out of my music folder and snatched it up, reading it out loud against my protests.
“My dear, sweet little Mouse,” he recited in a mock old-lady voice. “It has been such a long time now since you first came to me, so shy, so afraid…”
This went on and on, my face beet red, tears stinging my eyes as Matthew managed to rip it from his hands, but by then, the damage had been done. From that day on, I was known as ‘The Mouse’ throughout McInnes. And not in the kind, affectionate way Miss Mavis had intended.
I hate confrontation and, normally I’d just ignore him and let it go. But I’m having a really crappy day, and I don’t need his nonsense on top of it. So, I give him my biggest, brightest smile.
“Oh! Hi there, Tom!” I say brightly.
His eyes narrow with suspicion.
“Say, I noticed in rehearsal today that you were out of tune in that soft section of the Strauss. Again. Just keep in mind, I’ll have to ask Maestro Hagen to move you back a row if you can’t get that worked out.”
I watch the snide look slide right off his face. He’s too stunned to give me even a smartass answer. As I turn back to face the front I can hear Jeremy chuckling behind me.
I smile to myself as I take out my notebook and pen.
10
“Dammit!” I yell out in frustration and kick the music stand in front of me. It goes flying across the tiny practice room, nearly missing the piano and sending my music flying to all corners.
I’ve been sitting in what feels like a claustrophobic, dimly lit jail cell working on the same five measures for hours, and I’m no closer to getting the sound right than I was when I started. Now, I’m exhausted and frustrated and, without Matthew around, I feel totally and utterly alone. Overwhelmed, I drop my head into my hands and start to cry; and not the pretty kind of crying either. The kind where you snort and hiccup and have to wipe your nose on the sleeve of your shirt.
My little pity party is interrupted by a knock so soft, that I’m not sure I’ve heard it at all. I lift my head to see a face peering in at me from the small square window in the door, but I can’t quite make out who it is.
“Hello?” I sniff.
The door opens slowly and a head full of chestnut brown hair pokes inside.
Oh, no. Oh, God! No, no. no! This. Is. Not. Happening.
But it is. And I’m certain that my blotchy, tear-stained face fully communicates the horror I feel at this very moment.
“Hi,” Jeremy says, his own face full of concern. “You okay in here?”
I quickly swipe at the tears and run my hand through what I’m sure is a tangle of hair on my head.
“Uh, yes, thanks,” I mutter, wishing the floor would suddenly collapse and send me plummeting to my death.
The rest of his body moves languidly around the corner of the doorway and joins me in the room, letting the door close heavily behind him.
“I couldn’t help but overhear– even through the soundproofing in here.”
“What? My temper tantrum or the nervous breakdown that followed?”
“No,” he laughs. “Well, both, actually, but before that the Rachmaninoff.”
“You know it?”
“A little,” he says, folding his arms across his chest. “What’s the problem?”
“The third movement. My cello professor is really unhappy with the way I’m playing it. He says I’m missing something.”
I stop talking and imagine how he must see me, unkempt, teary, and babbling.
“I’m sorry, you don’t need to hear my sob story.”
He puts up a hand and waves away my apology.
“Missing how?”
I clear my throat. I hate having to explain this to him.
“Emotionally, I guess. I’ve got all the notes down but he thinks it sounds… flat.”
“And you don’t hear what he’s talking about?”
I sigh and try to rub the stress from my temples.
“I do, and I don’t. I’m usually really good with this kind of thing. So I get that he wants something deeper but there’s just something about this piece… I’m having trouble connecting with it. You know what I mean?”
Of course he doesn’t. He’s not just stunningly handsome and charismatic; he’s a brilliant musician, too. I’d bet no one has ever told Jeremy Corrigan he’s lacking in anything.
“I think so. You want to play it for me?”
What? Now?
“Not really,” I mutter.
“Oh, come on. Don’t be embarrassed,” he says as he sets the music stand upright again, and gathers the pages I scattered a few minutes earlier.
When he has the piece setup in front of me, he moves around to the back of my chair so he can watch over my shoulder. It would seem, once again, that I don’t have a choice. Oh, what the hell, it can’t get much worse than this.
I pick up the bow and it’s all I can do to keep my hands from shaking as I play.
I only get through the first few notes before I stop in frustration.
“Still not right,” I say, dejectedly.
And then, there is his breath, warm and sweet against my cheek. He’s so close that our faces are almost touching.
“Sex,” he whispers in my ear.
“Excuse me?” I croak.
“This piece is all about sex. When you play, think of the piano as trying to seduce the cello.”
“I don’t… I’m not sure how to convey that…”
Out of nowhere I feel his large hand resting on my shoulder.
“No, wait. I’m sorry to cut you off Julia, but what I just said isn’t quite right. It’s not sex. It’s more than just the physicality of it. It’s making love.”
Oh. My. God.
“Look, I’ll show you.”
He reaches around me to pluck the accompanying piano part off the music stand. Before I can ask him what he’s going to do with it, he has left my side and is pulling the bench out from under the piano. But he doesn’t play piano. Does he?
“Third movement!” he says, getting himself situated quickly. “In three… two…”
“Wait!” I protest but it’s too late.
“One!” Jeremy starts to play the solo piano opening.
I’ll be damned, he does play the piano. And well, too.
Under his fingers, the opening is a nostalgic reverie. I’m hearing things that I missed before. Romance with just a hint of something darker. Not sinister so much as… broken. No, fragile. Bereft? That’s it. Bereft. The mood he creates is so hypnotic that I nearly miss my entrance.
“You’re coming up here…” he calls out over his shoulder.
There’s no time to think, so I just play. This time, as I pull the bow across the strings and allow my fingers to stretch across the fingerboard, I imagine the sound of the cello as a voice, professing its love– a sentiment echoed lovingly by the piano. It goes back and forth, this romantic dialogue. They are separate. They are together. And suddenly the two voices are so intertwined that it’s hard to tell where one starts and the other ends.
In an instant, it’s clear to me what I’ve been missing all this time. Jeremy is absolutely righ
t. This is the sound of lovers, clinging to one another. I’m so drawn-in that I can feel my own pulse quicken as the intensity mounts. It crests and slowly dissolves into the quietest, most intimate of utterances. When the last note is played I can only sit there, staring at the music, bow hanging from my hand. He has turned around and I can feel his eyes fixed on me, gauging my reaction to what has just happened.
“Wow,” I say when I can finally meet his gaze. It comes out as barely a whisper. “That was… amazing.”
He smiles at me and, in an instant, he is on his feet. Still reeling from the emotional performance, I watch in stunned silence as he takes the cello from me and lays it gently on its side. He squats down so that we are at eye level, and presses his lips to mine. It is delicate and firm, confident and tentative all at once. After a long moment, he extricates himself from me and walks over to the door.
“Now do you understand?” he asks softly.
I can only nod dumbly.
Jeremy smiles, nods and slips back out into the hallway, letting the soundproof door shut tight between us.
11
Spending time in the stacks at Childress Music is like wading into an archaeological dig. It’s hard work, and you get dirty, but the historical discoveries that you can make are absolutely worth the effort. Broad wooden filing cabinets take up nearly every square inch of floor space, most of them topped by solid oak bookshelves that touch the ceiling. They’re all stuffed to capacity with sheet music, scores and etude books. This is where the most rare of editions can be found lurking among reams of mass-produced Mozart, Beethoven and Bach.
Surprisingly few musicians that I know bother with this place. Why come all the way downtown to crawl, climb and root around the narrow, dusty aisles for something they can just as easily find online in a fresh clean copy? Not me. I don’t even come here with a specific piece in mind. I relish the hunt, the thrill of standing on a shelf, knocking over a pile of concertos and having a rare sonata fall on my head. It’s happened! And I love it.
Right now, I’m sitting on the floor of the cello aisle, examining a musty-smelling edition of the Dvorak Cello Concerto. When I hear footsteps approaching, I lean forward without looking up, ensuring that whoever it is doesn't have to step over me to get past. But the shoes don’t pass. They stop right next to me. I glance over and find myself inches from a pair of white Chuck Taylor’s. Really? Tell me there isn’t another cellist who wants to be right where I’m siting right at this instant.
Chuck Taylor coughs and I look up, following long, jean-clad legs up to a t-shirt and button down-shirted torso and, finally, the finely chiseled face. I’m stunned to find that Chuck is none other than Jeremy Corrigan. I’ve been working hard to avoid him since that day in the practice room. The day that he kissed me. I suppose there’s no avoiding him now.
“Well, look who else is digging for buried treasure!” he says, smiling down on me.
“Uh, Jeremy, hi,” I mumble up at him. I’m going to break my neck if I have to keep this up, so I tuck the Dvorak under my arm and start to pull myself back onto my feet. And then his hand is there, on my arm, helping me up.
“What’d you find?” he asks, nodding toward the music I’m holding.
I start to slap the dust off of my backside and thighs.
“Oh, it’s a really old edition of the Dvorak Cello Concerto. I’ve never seen it before.”
“Now that’s what I love about this place,” he says with a wide sweeping gesture around the store. “You have to get a little dirty, but you never know what’s going to turn up! I mean, look what I found hidden in the bottom drawer over there, under a heap of Mozart Horn Concertos!”
He’s brandishing a yellowed, fragile looking piece of music.
“It’s this really rare Schubert song for soprano, horn and piano. I had no idea the damn thing even existed! All I can think about is how great it’s going to sound on my graduate recital!”
His bright, white smile opens his entire face, and I can’t help but be drawn into his excitement.
“Look,” he says, opening the pages and beckoning me closer.
The score itself is a work of art. The cover is printed with intricate scrollwork and calligraphy. Inside, the notes themselves almost seem to have been hand written.
“Oh, Jeremy, this is so beautiful,” I say, gently running my index finger along the imprint of the melody line.
“Hey, are you done here?” he asks, “I was going to grab a slice down the street before I head back to Brooklyn. Feel like coming?”
Hmm…. Dust mites and Mozart, or pizza with Jeremy? Tough call.
“Yeah, sure,” I agree, and we pay for our purchases at the front counter. While we’re there, I hand the cashier the little pink claim ticket for the bag I checked when I came in. The man hands me a large shopping bag in exchange.
“What’ve you got in there?” Jeremy asks, eying the bulky box inside the bag as we leave the store.
“Boots.”
“Boots? What, like snow boots?”
“No, silly! Fall boots. The tall leather kind with a long zipper on the side.”
“Oh! That kind of boots. I like those boots.”
“You do?” I ask, scrunching my face in surprise as we walk toward the pizza parlor. “Why’s that?”
He glances at me sideways and I catch sight of a very naughty looking smile.
“Because it seems like they usually go with short skirts.”
I laugh and shake my head.
“What?”
“Nothing!” I assure him. “It’s just that you’re right. I wouldn’t have expected a guy to notice that kind of thing, but I guess when you put it in the ‘short skirt’ context… well... that makes sense.”
“Are you planning to wear yours with a short skirt?” he asks, with one eyebrow cocked.
“I don’t own a short skirt,” I say with an exaggeratedly sad smile.
“Maybe you should go and buy one! I could help you pick it out,” he suggests, a little too helpfully.
“Yeah… I’ll keep that in mind…” I grin.
We each get a cheese slice and eat, sitting on stools at a high countertop that looks out onto the busy city street.
“So,” he begins between bites, “Isn’t boot shopping one of those things you girls do in a pack?”
“A pack?” I laugh.
“You know what I mean,” he groans. “Seems like shopping is a team sport. What are you doing down here by yourself?”
I shrug and poke at a golden brown dough bubble on my crust.
“I don’t know. I guess I don’t really have anyone that I can ask to come with me. Matthew’s a pain in the neck; he likes to hover over me when I’m browsing. I always feel rushed, so I just leave him at home now.”
“What about Mila?”
“What about her?”
“I’ll bet she’d go boot shopping with you.”
God forbid!
“She might….” I start thoughtfully, “but, then I’d have to listen to her go on and on and on for hours; about the boots, about the cute guy selling the boots, about the cute guy’s cute manager, about the manager’s boots…”
He holds up his hands in mock surrender.
“Alright, already! I get the idea. And, you’re right. That would suck.”
“That would totally suck,” I agree.
“What’s up with her lately, anyway?” he asks.
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know… I have a good view of the cello section from back where I sit, and it seems like for the last few weeks, her body language is a little bitchier than usual. I thought maybe she’s pissed about something and giving you the cold shoulder.”
I stifle a laugh. Bitchy body language? I’m not even going to ask.
“Yeah, well, that’s more about you than me.”
“What?” he says in surprise and puts his pizza down. “What did I ever do to her?”
“Nothing,” I reply. “That’s the probl
em.”
His dark eyebrows scrunch together, and he shakes his head.
“What are you talking about?”
“I mean that she… she likes you. A lot. And she doesn’t like that you and I have been… talking so much.”
“Seriously? Well, I have zero interest in her.”
“I’m sure this isn’t the first time a McInnes girl’s had a crush on you,” I say with a smile.
“Maybe once or twice,” he says sheepishly.
“Uh-huh,” I nod knowingly.
He rolls his eyes and sighs in resignation.
“Okay, maybe more than once or twice. There was Katie the bassoonist; she never said a word to me. Not one. But she followed me around all the time. The harpist, Shania, she was actually pretty cute, and we went out a few times. Let’s see…” he appears to be thinking hard. “Oh! And the timpanist.”
“Timpanist? I don't remember any girls who played the timpani…”
“That’s because it wasn’t a girl,” he says.
“Oh?” I say, needing a second to work that one out. “Oh!”
Jeremy pokes me in the ribs with his elbow.
“Boy, can’t get anything past you!” he teases.
I chuckle and take a sip through my straw.
“So, does that mean you’re between girlfriends?” I ask, and immediately wish I could stuff the words back into my mouth.
“Why, you interested?” he asks with a sly grin.
Oh, I have got to get off this topic. And, this is as good a time as any to bring up the other topic on my mind. The one that really needs addressing before it grows up to be a giant elephant in the room.
“Hey, thanks again… for the Rachmaninoff,” I say softly. “I can’t tell you how helpful that was.”
“Happy to do what I can,” he says, starting to gather his now-empty paper plate and cup. It takes him a few seconds to meet my eyes again. “I, uh, hope you didn’t mind the…”