Going Solo

by Cynthia Baxter

  “I’m sorry, Madame,” she said, nervously biting her lip. She felt so guilty about having been caught sneaking peeks at the clock every few minutes that she actually cringed. There was something about Madame Oretsky—her elegance, her stately manner, her exotic foreign accent—that made everyone who came in contact with her want to please her. And even on a day like today, when perfecting a Mendelssohn concerto was the last thing Allegra felt like doing, she couldn’t help wanting to live up to what she knew was the old woman’s image of her.

  “Is there something more important you would prefer to be doing right now, other than working on the fingering in the cadenza?” Madame Oretsky demanded. She seemed offended, as well as surprised, that Allegra was giving her music lesson anything less than her total concentration. Allegra was, after all, one of her most disciplined violin students, as well as one of her most talented.

  “No, of course not,” Allegra was quick to reply. She hated lying, especially to Madame, whose time, she knew well, was so precious that she only took on four or five students at a time. Just to have been invited to study with her was an honor, one that Allegra knew better than to take lightly. “It’s just that...”

  She glanced around the apartment, looking for some excuse—and a way to get out of there. Today’s lesson was already running late, the result of Madame’s four-o’clock student having canceled his lesson for today, a fact that Madame had informed her of the moment Allegra had arrived at the studio for her lesson at three.

  And despite her enthusiastic denial, there was indeed something else she wanted to be doing at this moment. In fact, seventy blocks away, downtown, in New York City’s artsy SoHo district, three people were expecting her to show up at four-thirty on the dot. If she didn’t come up with a good way to escape from here soon, she was going to let them all down.

  “It’s just that... I, um ...” Suddenly she had an idea. “Madame Oretsky, would you excuse me for a minute? I’d like to get a glass of water in the kitchen. My throat is kind of scratchy. Maybe I’m coming down with a cold.”

  Madame Oretsky drew her lips into a thin, straight line. She didn’t take kindly to interruptions. “All right, Allegra. If you must.”

  “Thank you. I’ll—I’ll only be a minute. It’s just this ... sore throat.” Allegra put her violin down gently, then hurried into the kitchen, flashing an apologetic smile.

  The reflection in the glass doors of the kitchen cabinets was truly that of a serious violin student. Allegra’s thick mane of black hair was tied back neatly and fastened with a tortoiseshell barrette. She was wearing a navy blue sweater over a tailored white blouse along with a blue-and-white plaid skirt, the uniform for Miss Tabbitt’s School for Girls.

  She looked like any other sixteen-year-old girl who attended a prestigious private school in New York City. So much so, in fact, that no one looking at her would ever have guessed the little secret she was hiding from her parents, most of her friends, and certainly Madame Oretsky.

  But there was no time for thinking about that now. She only had a few seconds to carry out her plan, so she had to act fast. While the cold-water tap was running, Allegra quickly grabbed the pepper shaker off the counter and shook it into her skirt pocket. Then she hurried back into the other room.

  “There. My throat feels a lot better now.” With a nod, she picked up her violin and began to position it under her chin. “Now, where should I pick it up?”

  “Let’s take it from right after the fermata,” said Madame Oretsky. “Now think about your phrasing as you ...”

  “Ah-choo!” As Allegra had lifted the violin up to her chin, she had carefully snuck one hand into her pocket, taken a pinch of the pepper, and held it right up to her nose. “Ah-choo! I’m so sorry, Madame, I... Ah-choo! Oh, my goodness. It must be this cold that’s coming on. Ah ... ah ...”

  “Allegra, my dear, you do sound ill.”

  “I think maybe ... ah-choo!”

  Madame Oretsky sighed. “Well, then, perhaps we had better stop for today. Get yourself home and into bed. And drink plenty of hot tea.”

  “Oh, I will,” Allegra assured her. Already she was laying her violin carefully in its case. She only hoped the flush on her cheeks would be mistaken for feverishness by her music teacher.

  As she rode down in the elevator a minute or two later, away from Madame Oretsky’s apartment and toward the streets of New York City, Allegra carried out a quick-change act, her heart pounding the whole time. Even before the elevator doors had closed, she had reached into her oversize carryall and unfolded the pair of acid-washed jeans that was tucked inside. Once she was alone in the elevator she pulled on the jeans and then wriggled out of her plaid skirt. Before tucking that into her bag, she pulled off her sweater and blouse, exposing a lime-green-and-pink-striped T-shirt. As the elevator doors opened into the lobby of the apartment building, she was pulling the barrette out of her wavy black hair, setting loose a wild, unruly mane that tumbled down past her shoulders.

  “See you next week!” she called to the doorman as she strode out of the building.

  Tossing her head and breaking into a huge grin, she stepped out onto the sidewalk. She suddenly experienced a delicious sense of freedom mixed with anticipation of what the rest of the afternoon would hold. This Allegra, the one who almost skipped down the street toward the subway, was an entirely different person from the intense, studious one that Madame Oretsky knew. This Allegra was one who was alive, energized, and very, very happy.

  * * * *

  “Sorry I’m late, guys,” Allegra said breezily as she stepped into the large, bright loft that the rock band called Never Too Young had recently begun using for their rehearsals.

  Tommy, the lead guitarist, glanced up from the copy of Rolling Stone magazine he was reading and grinned. “Lucky for you you’ve got a voice worth waiting for,” he teased.

  “Tommy’s right,” said Roy, the band’s founder and unofficial leader, as well as its drummer. “If anybody else dared to show up half an hour late, we’d have to give ‘em the ax. But you, lady, you’re the one with the rainbow in her voice.’’

  Allegra blushed, just as she did almost every time she looked at Roy. “Cut it out, you guys. Look, I said I was sorry. Give me a break, will you?”

  “Better be careful,’’ Larry joked, moving over to his bass guitar. “The girl is armed. What do you think she’s really got in that violin case?”

  Allegra laughed as she set down her violin case and her tote bag on the floor. “Believe me, my violin teacher would be the first to agree that I’m carrying a weapon around in here. I got a little tied up, but I’m here now. So let’s make some real music!”

  With that, Roy began pounding out a steady, electrifying beat. Tommy and Larry quickly joined in, launching into the opening bars of the song the band had been concentrating on for the past few weeks. It was an original, written by Roy himself—with Allegra in mind, as everyone knew. It was also the song the group planned to open their act with, if and when they ever got a gig.

  Allegra skipped over to the microphone that was set up in front and clutched it with both hands. As she stood in the huge, nearly empty loft with Roy, Tommy, and Larry behind her, all of them playing their hearts out, she felt as if she were suddenly springing to a higher plane, as if then and only then she was everything she ever could be. She closed her eyes and moved with the music, letting it blend in with herself so that she could no longer tell where the music ended and she began.

  And then, at the familiar sound of her cue, she began to sing, experiencing that same thrill she felt every time she heard her own voice, clear and sweet and distinctively, magically, wonderfully her own, filling the room.

  “Loving you ... wanting you ... knowing I’m your Rainbow Girl ...”

  It had been only eight months since Never Too Young had been formed and only two months since Roy’s cousin had volunteered this space for their practice sessions. The band was good—or at least it was going to be good, once the
y had a chance to polish themselves up as much as they needed to. All that was missing now was the chance to start performing, to get some real experience, to show the world what they could do. And that would be happening soon enough, probably by the end of June. By the summer they expected to spend their days practicing and auditioning and, hopefully, at least some of their nights performing in small clubs around the city.

  Being the lead singer for Never Too Young was the most important thing in Allegra’s life these days. It was the fulfillment of a dream she had had ever since she was a little girl. She used to spend hours in her bedroom, pretending to listen to recordings of the piano concerto her older brother was studying or the opera her mother was going to be performing at the Met the following week. Instead she listened to the records of the female vocalists she loved, going even as far back as Janis Joplin and Grace Slick.

  By the tune she was sixteen, Allegra had already resigned herself to the fact that this dream of hers would never become anything more than just that. Rather than singing the songs she loved for an enraptured audience she would have to channel all her musical talent into the violin. The fact that her mother was one of the world’s foremost opera singers, her father a well-known orchestra conductor, and her older brother a piano student at the Juilliard School of Music stacked the odds against her even more.

  Allegra herself had been studying the violin ever since she was seven. She felt some passion for the instrument, and she did have a natural aptitude for it. That combined with her ingrained sense of discipline, a Ferrante family trait, helped turn her into a fine violinist with great promise for a future musical career.

  And she did have to admit that she enjoyed playing the violin. She loved the feeling of mastering a seemingly simple concoction of wood, strings, and horsehair. She appreciated the rewards of manipulating four strings so that they recreated the beautiful music of Beethoven and Mozart. She relished the thrill of performing a concerto or being part of a powerful orchestra. Besides, classical music offered an exciting contrast to her tedious days at Miss Tabbitt’s, one of New York City’s stuffiest private schools, as far as Allegra was concerned.

  And so, for a long time, studying the violin was good enough. That is, until she met Roy at a party given by one of her classmates.

  It was one of the usual boring get-togethers—the same guests, the same music, even the same refreshments. Allegra had wandered around the living room, wondering how long she should stay before making an excuse and getting out of there. And then she heard someone playing the piano. She went over and asked him to play one of the songs she liked. Just for the heck of it she burst into song, quickly forgetting all about the silly party as she got lost in her love of singing.

  When she finished, there was no reaction, no applause, barely an acknowledgment of what she had just done. The other girls from Miss Tabbitt’s and their boyfriends just didn’t seem very interested. Only one person seemed to care, and that was Roy.

  “Tell me,” he had said, sauntering over to her casually, acting as if he had known her all his life even though she had never even set eyes on him before, “have you ever considered singing with a group?”

  At first she’d thought he was teasing her. “I’m not that bad, am I?” she countered, assuming that his question was intended to be sarcastic.

  “Are you kidding?’’ he had replied, sounding very matter-of-fact. “You’re great.”

  After that night, everything changed. Suddenly there were new people to meet, new songs to learn—and the ongoing challenge of how to steal time out of her busy schedule, one that was already filled with school, homework, practicing, violin lessons, and orchestra rehearsals. It was no easy matter finding the time to get together with Larry, Tommy, and, of course, Roy in order to turn their mutual dream of Never Too Young into a reality.

  It was all made even more difficult by the fact that her parents were anything but approving.

  “Rock music?” her father had exploded the first time she had dared to mention her interest in joining the newly formed band. His Italian accent grew heavier, just as it always did when he was angry. “For this we have spent almost ten years training you in violin and music theory? To sing nonsense over a microphone to crowds of children who have nothing better to do than sit there and watch?’’

  “Those songs, they are not real music,” Allegra’s mother had chimed in. Her tone was softer and more sympathetic, but the sentiments behind it were the same. “The songs of Verdi, Mahler, the arias, the duets, those are real songs.” And then, without even realizing it, she began humming the beautiful aria from Madame Butterfly that had first made this French soprano famous twenty-five years earlier.

  At least Allegra’s brother Pierre was sympathetic.

  “Trading Beethoven for something a little more current, are you?’’ he quipped, giving her a gentle punch in the arm after she had excitedly told him about Roy and Never Too Young and all the big plans the group was making. “Well, good luck. In a household like this one, you’re going to need it.”

  Pierre did more for her than just wish her well. He snuck home tapes and CDs of the newest rock albums, more than she could ever afford on her allowance. For her sixteenth birthday, he got her tickets to a concert given by her favorite female vocalist. And most important, he helped her cover up her mysterious absences, backing her up when she told her parents mat she had been at a friend’s house or at an orchestra rehearsal that had run late. Both Pierre and Allegra knew full well what their parents’ reaction would be if they ever found out that where she really was, was in a poorly heated loft on Prince Street, singing “Rainbow Girl” twenty-six times in a row.

  She managed, somehow. She was late for everything, almost always exhausted.... But she had never been happier. Before long, Never Too Young began to turn into something. To her it was everything.

  “That was fantastic, Allegra,” Roy said after they had finished running through “Rainbow Girl.” “You know, even when I was writing that song, even when I was hearing it in my head, I never dreamed it could sound that good.”

  Allegra could feel her cheeks turning beet red, not because Roy was paying her a compliment as much as because the sense of satisfaction she was feeling practically made her glow. She was relieved when, as usual, Tommy responded to Roy’s comment by making a joke.

  “Sure, Roy,” he said. “That’s what you always say right before you make us go back to the beginning and do the whole stupid song all over again.”

  Everyone laughed. Allegra turned around to face Roy.

  “You want another run-through? You’ve got it. One, two; one, two, three, four!”

  And they were off. Once again Allegra was transported from being just another earthly being to becoming Allegra, the girl with the rainbow in her voice, the Rainbow Girl herself.

  * * * *

  It was just past seven o’clock as Allegra paused outside the door to the Ferrantes’ apartment. She was making sure that her hair was neatly pulled back into its barrette once again, her skirt was in place, and the blouse underneath her navy blue sweater was tucked in before she used her key to let herself in. She poked her head inside and glanced around before entering.

  “Don’t look so guilty,” a friendly voice called. “You’re only ten minutes late.”

  “Oh, hi, Pierre.” Allegra was relieved to find that her brother was the only one waiting for her. He was sitting at the grand piano that graced one corner of the large living room.

  “So how did it go?” he asked.

  “I had a fairly good lesson today. The Mendelssohn needs more ...”

  “No, no, not the lesson, for heaven’s sake. Hey, it’s me you’re talking to, remember? Your brother, Pierre? Your greatest fan?”

  Allegra laughed. “You’re just saying that because you expect me to be rich and famous one day.’’

  “That’s right, I do.” Pierre played a flourish on the piano. “And I expect that you’ll buy me my very own Steinway grand piano when
you are.”

  “I’ll buy you Carnegie Hall, if you like.” Allegra sank into one of the butter-soft lemon-colored leather chairs in the room. “But that’s not why I’m doing this, you know.”

  “I know that. You’re doing it for the same reason that I go to Juilliard every day just to be tortured, to get shot down, to have my confidence destroyed. Simply for the pure love of it.” He launched into a fiery passage from a Mahler concerto, his face drawn into an angry scowl.

  “If you’re playing that well these days, I don’t see what Juilliard has to complain about,” Allegra observed. “By the way, do you know when we’re having dinner? I’m starving.”

  “Why, hello, dear. I thought I heard you come in.” Catherine Lafarge, Allegra’s mother, came sailing into the room. Even though this evening she was dressed in nothing more elegant than beige pants and a pale blue sweater, the world-renowned diva still was a commanding presence. “How was your lesson with Madame?”

  “It was all right, Maman,” Allegra replied. “I need to work on the Mendelssohn this week. I’m afraid it didn’t sound very good.’’

  Allegra’s mother frowned. “Perhaps that was because of this cold you seem to be coming down with.”

  “Cold?” Allegra blinked in confusion.

  “Why, yes. Madame called me over an hour ago to ask how you were feeling. She wanted to make sure I put you right to bed and gave you plenty of hot tea.” Leaning forward, she studied her daughter. “You look perfectly fine to me.”