She walked up and down callejones until her legs cramped. On the way back up the hill to her house she composed a mantra. You have to be safe, Tavelé. You have to be safe.
Twenty-Four
AS WAS HER CUSTOM, CALLIE COVERED THE BED and furniture with worn sheets, wrapped her hair with an old pillowcase, and then dusted the beams of her bedroom with a long-handled mop.
When she finished dusting, she hefted in an aluminum ladder that, when folded into an inverted V, reached ten feet high. Standing a few rungs down for safety, she began wiping a cloth sprayed with Pledge over the beams. It felt good to have nothing on her mind but caring for her beams. Making them shine.
Luxuriating in the sensation of cloth moving against wood, she laughed over stumbling at the mine shaft. Had she stumbled, as Pamela implied, because of Armando? She paused and reflected. Well, yes and no. Listening to him, she had become too anxious to be attentive. She began shining the beams again. But she hadn’t had to absorb his anxiety, had she? And yet she had. And then, as was usual with Armando, there had been nothing to worry about. And it wasn’t just Armando. She had also worried about how to stay on safe conversational ground with Pamela. But then that had gone as smoothly as her cloth moved across her lovely beams. She could credit herself, couldn’t she, with having dared to lean back into the car before Pamela drove off to ask her what question she had wanted to ask up there in the mountains, the one interrupted by Armando’s call.
Pamela had laughed. “Oh, I just wanted to know what kept you from playing the trumpet until now.” Then she had added that as a child she thought everyone would play the trumpet if they could, and so there had to be a reason, like her seventh grade band director, why they didn’t.
She climbed down, shoved the ladder a few feet, and then climbed back up. Lucky for her, Pamela had not asked why she took up the trumpet. And then, even better, after posing her question, Pamela drove off without waiting for an answer. She had called out after her: “You could write a self-help book: Find Your Inner Trumpeter.”
She moved to another section of beams. What if everyone had found their inner trumpeter? Flower vendors, baristas, delivery men, politicians, teachers, clerks, cooks, and cabbies. All would play the trumpet. She pictured trumpeters roaring from the rooftops, blaring across the balconies, crooning on the callejones, tooting through the tunnels.
Would playing shift their moods, the way it had shifted her father’s? Though not always. Not when someone had “dropped the ball,” as he put it. And, in his mind, someone was always dropping the ball. She rubbed hard against the beam. Paint store clerks. Waitresses. Other drivers. She rubbed harder, recalling him standing before her. “This time, young lady, you have dropped the ball, big time.”
He had spoken as if he had never dropped a ball in his life. She spit on the cloth. Sure, his hands had been quick. He could make a coin disappear and juggle half-a-dozen apples. But he had dropped the ball when it came to her. He had never even asked her if she wanted her baby. If she wanted to get married. “A hasty wedding for Alexander Quinn’s daughter. No. Not for my daughter.”
The ball he carried and carried well was the ball of blame. He blamed his temper on his mother’s death. He blamed his not having gone to college on the war. He blamed her and her mother for her “disgrace.” He had passed that big ball of blame on to her. She had tried to drop it, all right. Toss it. Kick it. Send it on its way. But it boomeranged back each time. Bouncing at her. You did it, you did it, you did it. And then when she lay down to sleep, it dribbled into her dreams.
Sometimes she felt relieved she had not kept her baby. She might have passed that blaming ball on. It would have been different if Noah had been with them. He would have tossed blame back to the rightful owner and taught his daughter to do the same. She sighed. But that could not be.
She climbed down from the ladder and lifted the dust cloth off her dresser, revealing the photo of her father dressed in his basketball uniform, his eyes shining with hope.
Aunt Ida had mentioned a photo of Callie and her father, the one when she was straddling the tree limb, her father smiling up at her. Her aunt said she was holding a book. Now she remembered something else. A ball. That was it. Her father had tossed a basketball, and she had caught it—without dropping the book—and then tossed it back. That’s why he had been smiling.
She ran her fingers along the top of the picture’s frame. Had she been unfair to him? She crossed her forearms on the bureau and stared into those shining eyes. He would have been around seventeen, her age when she met Noah. She lifted a hand to the picture and moved a finger across her father’s cheek. Then she recalled how quickly that lopsided smile would become a curled lip of scorn. She lowered her hand and leaned in closer. “No. I am not unfair. When it came down to it, when it mattered most, you were not on my side. It was about your dishonor. Your broken dreams. Always, always, always about you.” She rested her forehead on her crossed forearms and closed her eyes. How was she supposed to let go of that?
Twenty-Five
CALLIE HAD JUST FINISHED BREAKFAST THE NEXT day when Pamela called. “Hey, I forgot to ask you something.”
She coughed. What could that be?
“Would you like a lesson before I go? You know, like you said, to release the inner trumpeter.”
She pictured herself in that line of triumphant trumpeters stretched across Guanajuato’s rooftops and laughed.
“That is, unless you’re too busy,” Pamela said. “Ami Mai thought you might be. You are still working, after all. But I’ve got time now, if you do.”
Another lesson so soon. What would Armando think? She looked over toward the jaguar. He wouldn’t mind her going to Pamela’s, if she were searching for Tavelé. The jaguar appeared to raise an eyebrow. But then she had no reason to think Tavelé was there. He had run away from Pamela, too. That’s why she had bought a leash. In case he turned up again. “Armando really should keep him on a leash, you know,” Pamela had said. Oh, boy, did she. And you think so, too, she thought, staring down the jaguar.
“Callie?”
She continued directing her thoughts to the jaguar. If they did find Tavelé, Pamela could be the one to take him to Armando. They would surely become friends then. So, really, there was no reason to stop seeing Pamela on Armando’s account. The jaguar’s expression was hard to read. She leaned toward him.
“Are you still there?” Pamela asked.
“Oh … yeah … ah.”
“I’d like to get you playing, and not just on the mouthpiece, so if you would like a lesson, bring along your horn. What do you say?”
She looked over at the trumpet case. It seemed a pity not to take a lesson when she had a perfectly good trumpet. “Okay. Sure. I’ll be right down.”
“SO,” Pamela said when they were seated together at a music stand, each with a trumpet on its bell by her side. “What are your goals?”
“Goals?” She caught herself glancing to the photograph of Pamela at her high school.
“For this baby,” Pamela said, gesturing to Callie’s trumpet.
“Oh, well.” There was, wasn’t there something about the trumpet? And then it came to her again, how her father would come up from the basement after playing. A changed man. And so she told Pamela about that. And about how she thought, as a child, that there was something magical about the trumpet.
“So that’s your goal? To discover the magic in the trumpet?”
She laughed. “I guess so.”
“Okay, I can work with that. Do you read music?”
“I know the notes.”
“And you sing?”
“A little.”
“Play any instruments?”
“None.”
“Singing is good. Can you harmonize?”
“I sang alto in the church choir.” Her father had said she had to join in on something at church, and, given the anonymity of singing in a group, the choir seemed an easy way to save herself some grief.
Pamela picked up her trumpet. She played a note and asked Callie to sing “ta” to the note she played.
“Okay, let’s go up the scale.”
Callie sang along.
“Okay.” Pamela said, “Now I’ll play C. Sing along, and then hold the C while I switch to E and G.”
They started, and she tried to sing out, remembering how her father would say, “Sing up,” like he would say, “speak up.” Funny. “Sing up, Callie,” he would say, “I can’t hear you.”
“All right,” Pamela said when they finished. “You stayed right on the C. Brava.”
She smiled. Her mother had a soprano voice, light and always in key. “That’s where you got your ear,” her father would tell her. “Not from me. Or I would be on Ed Sullivan instead of up a ladder.”
She and Pamela did some breathing exercises, and then Pamela showed her how to buzz her lips. “There are various schools of thought about lip buzzing, as there are on every aspect of learning the trumpet,” Pamela said. “I’m one who finds lip buzzing useful—even for a beginner, if you take it easy.”
“Okay,” she said when they finished buzzing a few notes. “And now for buzzing the mouthpiece.” She showed Callie how to hold it with the thumb and first two fingers. “Let’s go.”
The mouthpiece felt cool against her lips, but not uncomfortable. She tried to vibrate her lips, but nothing happened.
“Just relax,” Pamela said. “And try again.”
Eventually she made a sound. A nice quiet sound. A friendly little buzz. She smiled.
Pamela buzzed several notes, and Callie tried to match her. Then Pamela took her mouthpiece away from her lips. She leaned over and picked up her trumpet and put the mouthpiece in. “Let’s go!” She nodded toward Callie’s trumpet. “It’s easier than buzzing. You’ll see.”
Callie reached for her trumpet. Then she looked toward the open front door. It was one thing to sing or buzz with the door open, but play the trumpet? What if someone heard her? And, besides, her lips were tingling from the buzzing, so that’s what she told Pamela.
Pamela laughed. “That happens at first. Okay then, this is as good a time as any for my little lecture.”
Pamela leaned back in her chair. “My father came home late for dinner one fine fall day, and when we asked what happened, he said the car had ‘wandered.’” She laughed. “But he found his way back—and with apples from a stand that he would not have passed, if his car hadn’t ‘wandered.’”
She leaned toward Callie and raised her hand, with her index finger up. “So, too, the trumpet may wander. You want to be aware when it veers off course. But treat each departure as an opportunity for exploration.”
She lowered her hand. “Leave frustration by the wayside, if you can. And if you can’t, take a break. Once you’re relaxed again, pick up the trumpet. Your goal is to feel good about playing. However it sounds.”
Callie thought of the blasts of the mariachis. “Even if it hurts your ears?”
Pamela laughed. “Okay, you have permission to cringe at damaging decibels. But otherwise, no. Got it?”
She caught herself looking at the door again and turned back to Pamela. “Got it,” she said, trying to sound convinced.
“It’s all about practicing awareness. Of how the trumpet feels, how your lips feel, how your breath feels, how your sounds relate to those of the musicians around you.
“It’s not easy to stay aware. Our minds are on the alert for danger. That saved our ancestors from being too attentive to the fragrance of ripening fruit to notice the hiss of a snake.
“But fear distracts you from playing your best. That’s why it’s important how we conceptualize unintended sounds. Not as snakes about to strike, but as wanderings offering wonder.” She smiled. “You never know when you’ll run across an apple stand.”
It all sounded good, but didn’t seem to stop her heart from racing when she glanced again at the open door.
“Quite a lecture, no?” Pamela raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t lose you somewhere along the way, did I?”
Callie laughed. “Maybe a little. But I do know what you mean about that feeling of wonder. I have it when translating, strange as that may sound.” She looked at the open door again. “But I’m not sure about being present playing the trumpet. I’m not used to being loud.”
“Well, how about giving it a try?” She smiled. “Let the trumpet work its magic.”
Callie took in a breath and reached for the trumpet, but she found herself looking out the door again.
“Are you expecting someone?” Pamela lowered her trumpet. “You keep looking out the door.”
Caught. What could she do but confess? “Like I said, I’m not used to being loud.”
“You were listening to my lecture, weren’t you? About accepting the sounds your trumpet makes?”
“Well, yes, but it’s one thing for me to accept the sounds, it’s another thing to subject someone else to them.”
Pamela laughed. “Okay, I’ll shut the door.” She got up. “This time.” She shut the door and sat back down. “Ready now?”
“Ready,” she said, and before Pamela gave her another direction, she blew a note that sounded so loud she jumped.
Pamela laughed. “Way to go!”
Callie laughed, too, and then turned the trumpet to look inside the bell.
“Something in there?”
“That’s what I’d like to know.”
“Well, here’s where I think it is,” Pamela said pointing to Callie’s heart. “The trumpet at its best—and with your willing participation—magnifies what’s there.”
“So that’s the magic?”
“I leave that to you—and this baby,” she said gesturing to Callie’s trumpet. “I’ll teach you some exercises to play when I’m gone. I’ve made a tape for you to play along with, and I’ll loan you my tape of Clora Bryant’s “Gal with a Horn” to listen to. You can tell me what you’ve discovered when I get back. How’s that?”
Pamela paused before opening the door for Callie to leave. “I forgot to ask you the other day. Are you comfortable around babies? Not everyone is. I’m not sure I am, to be honest.” She rushed on, “Oh, I know I’ll love the little squirt. It’s just that I’ve never spent time around babies.”
She recalled her newborn warm against her chest, the smell of her scalp. “Once you have your baby in your arms …” She felt a lump form in her throat, and when she tried to swallow, she began to choke. She covered her mouth and turned away, coughing. She couldn’t cry. Not now.
Pamela put her hand on Callie’s shoulder. “Callie, are you okay? Can I get you some water?”
She turned back, tried to smile, and nodded. She had tears in her eyes, but that was all right, she told herself. Pamela would think they were from the coughing.
By the time Pamela got back with a glass of water Callie had stopped coughing. She took a sip of water. “I just wanted to say ‘you’ll be okay.’”
“That’s what my mother says. But, you know, she won’t be here. At least not most of the time. We don’t know for sure yet when Ami Mai will be here. And I don’t even know how to change a diaper.”
Callie was surprised at how anxious Pamela sounded. It couldn’t be hormones. She wasn’t even pregnant yet. “You have plenty of time to learn that. And, as for your mother and Ami Mai not being here, don’t worry, there’s help right here in the neighborhood.” She put her arm around Pamela’s shoulder. “Doña Petra knows everything there is to know about babies.”
“Juanito’s grandmother? I met her the other day with him.”
“You can depend on her.”
“She seems nice, but I thought …”
“She can use the extra hours.”
“That’s an idea,” she said, opening the door for Callie to leave. But Callie realized when the door shut behind her that Pamela had sounded almost forlorn.
Twenty-Six
BUT, OF COURSE PAMELA HAD NOT FELT GOOD about Doña Petra, Callie th
ought, as she headed to the center after her lesson to buy a new cell before her daily search for Tavelé. Pamela wasn’t fluent in Spanish, nor Doña Petra in English. But she, herself, could help with translation. And there must be other things she could do, too, like make casseroles and yogurt for Pamela and purees for the baby when it was time for solid food.
She called Pamela as soon as she got home with her ideas.
“Well, that clinches it,” Pamela said, sounding relieved. “Be sure to practice every day while I’m gone. Breathing, too. A month of practice.”
Practice, yes. But where? She looked around her kitchen and dining area. Not there. Too many windows for sound to escape through. Some nice, enclosed space … Ah, the laundry room. With only one small window and that one facing away from the callejón. A socket for the tape player. A hook for hanging the trumpet. A basin for washing it. As Armando would say, Perfect. Parfait. Perfecto.
AND so early the next morning, she began a new routine, showering and dressing, breathing under the avocado tree, then practicing a few minutes. Not more than fifteen minutes at a time, Pamela had advised, and even then she was to pause for as long as each note she blew.
Even so, buzzing left her lips tingly. It wasn’t unpleasant, just new. Actually, she kind of liked it. And to think she could have gone through her whole life without having had that particular sensation. How many others had she missed?
There was another new sensation, now that she thought about it, the peaceful feeling that came over her when breathing. She had thought that perhaps the breathing had calmed her father. He had always said breathing was key to playing. But the feeling after playing was still another new sensation. It was peaceful, but there was more. The resonance of the trumpet’s tube and bell added warmth and fullness to the vibrations from her lips.
The Trumpet Lesson Page 14