Vibrato

by Tamara Mataya

  I hate the tension rolling from Dylan more, from the agitated tapping of his foot on the floor to his fist bumping on the arm of the chair. I did this to him, made him feel this terrible. I never meant to, but the damage is the same.

  The muscles in his jaw tense a few times as he grits his teeth over and over before finally speaking in a low, hoarse voice. “Explain.”

  I swallow hard, every word in my vocabulary deserting me and stare at the floor, shaking my head. My heart sinks with the enormity of what I’ve done to us both.

  Dylan’s hand roughly forces my chin up so my eyes meet his again and despite the situation, tingles rush through me at the contact. It could be Armageddon outside and I’d only be able to focus on this man and how very much I want him.

  But when I try to grab his wrist and press his palm to my cheek, he tears his hand away. “Rachel, what the fuck was that?”

  The loss of his touch devastates me all over again and I can barely focus on words. “It’s not what it looks like.”

  He barks out an angry laugh. “So, it wasn’t your fiancé announcing your engagement in front of everyone in there?”

  He’s focused on the wrong thing, but I can’t explain the circumstances behind it. I can’t change the engagement or the way Dylan found out, but he needs to know my feelings were real. “That’s not what I want to tell you.”

  His expression hardens. “Actions speak louder than words. In there?” He jerks his thumb toward the ballroom. “That spoke volumes.”

  This is all going so wrong. My stomach tenses. “No, it’s not like that. Please, Dylan, hear me out.”

  “Why? So you can lie to my face and tell me that I didn’t see what I just saw?”

  “It’s what you saw, but not what you think.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “I...” My mind spins, stuck in a rut of the truth. What can I say? I can’t tell him the truth. There’s no way I can explain anything without explaining everything, and I absolutely cannot do that. Right now I don’t even want to think about it; I want to run away from reality with Dylan. My teeth dig into my lower lip hard enough I taste blood. “We—”

  He leans closer. “Are you or are you not engaged to that man?”

  The tears don’t drip so much as pour down my cheeks. “I am. But I don’t—”

  “Then there’s nothing else to be said, is there?” His long, perfect body unfolds until he’s towering over me. “You made your choice before we even met.”

  But I don’t love Blaine! I spring up and follow. “Dylan—”

  He holds a hand up over his shoulder, a curt motion telling me to stop. I crumple into the chair he left and bury my face in my hands so I can’t see him leave for good.

  I’m such an idiot.

  What have I done? My chest squeezes like it’s being crushed, making every inhale a shallow battle in my efforts not to take a deep breath, because if I do, I’ll scream. I shouldn’t have ever gotten involved with Dylan. I’m not the girl who can separate sex and love.

  No, this is not me confusing sex for feelings. I genuinely care about Dylan. I should have never agreed to marry Blaine. That was my mistake, but I can’t take it back.

  Until Dylan, every romantic relationship had felt like a business interaction. Blaine’s proposition didn’t seem much more extreme—I didn’t know what I’d be missing out on—and it had seemed like I was getting everything I’d ever wanted.

  Angry footsteps, then slight pain as Dylan’s hands forcefully grab my biceps and he hauls me from the chair. “No, I do have a couple questions. When you left me, did you run to him right away or did you wash my cum off your body first? Did he know where you’d been all night? Did you think about me when he put his cock inside you or did it all just blur together for you?”

  I can’t defend myself without exposing secrets I’m not allowed to share. It’s better for us both if we part ways now. My future is set. My stomach heaves. “Don’t do this.”

  “Did you tell him what we did with his baton on the piano? Do you remember that? Does it get you off when he’s telling you what notes to play, knowing the things I did to you with that fucking baton? Do you get off on it? Does it make you wet when he’s there, holding it in his hand?” His eyes narrow. “Or maybe he’s in on it too. Maybe you both get off on how filthy it is. Does he keep you after rehearsals, bend you over and fuck you on the piano?”

  I shake my head.

  He sneers. “No, this is all you. You’re a musician, but you’re an even better actress. The supposed pure girl being into secrets and lies. All you wanted was another secret thrill to make your heart race more when you’re with him. How many others are you fucking?” He closes his eyes like he can’t bear to look at me.

  I deserve his condemnation. Being angry is better than the devastation that filled his eyes earlier, so I’ll bear these accusation, but the words scald my heart.

  “That douchebag with the ponytail at my concert. Did you suck him off in his car after I got you off?” His lips twitch into a hard line. “Maybe you let him fuck you before he dropped you off at my hotel. Did you let him come inside you? Was I getting his sloppy seconds that night?”

  I close my eyes against the way he’s trying to make what we did into something ugly and crass now he knows I was engaged to another man while we did them. He’s wrong about everything, but if it’s easier for him to hate me, maybe I should let him. Except, it hurts too much, I care too much and can’t take it. “Please, this is already so hard for me. I can’t—”

  “Hard for you? Right.” He scoffs. “Tell me something. Did you and I mean nothing?”

  You and I meant everything. But saying that will only make the situation worse. All I’m left with is the part of the truth I can share. “I’m sorry, Dylan.”

  He releases my arms and takes a step back. “Yeah. I am too. Congratufuckinglations. You two deserve each other.”

  This time, I can’t look away from his back, getting smaller and smaller as he leaves, taking a huge chunk of my heart with him.

  I know he didn’t take it all because I can still feel the ragged edges of the piece he left, aching in my chest, every throb raw agony.

  The door swishes shut, separating us through glass. He turns left and disappears from sight.

  The elevator doors roll open and closed with an expensive sliding sound.

  A phone rings at the front desk.

  Safely hidden in my little alcove, my knees hit the lobby floor, and tears flood my cheeks. My sobs are so deep they make no sound.

  I’ve forgotten how to breathe.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Alex forces a fresh tissue into my clawed fingers after removing the soggy, used one without flinching. I’ve gone through a box and a half since she got here an hour ago and moved my emotional breakdown from the couch to the bedroom where I can wallow in comfort and we can both stretch our legs.

  “Thanks for coming,” I snivel, scrubbing at my bloodshot eyes.

  “Shut up. Friends don’t need to say thank you,” she admonishes me.

  I’m the worst friend. I’ve kept so many secrets from her. Maybe Dylan’s right about me.

  I can only imagine how terrible I look, last night’s elegant up-do sagging like a ruined soufflé, still wearing my fancy dress. At least the tears and tissues have removed my raccoon eyes and makeup so I don’t look like the Joker. My eyes feel swollen and dry from crying; makeup disaster or not, they’re crimson and puffy, I’m sure of it. “Looks like I’m the one who should have taken the red eye.”

  Alex smiles at my pathetic attempt at a joke, stands and digs in my closet, and tosses a pair of sweats and a snuggly, chenille sweater at me. “Put these on. I’m going to go change.”

  I undress slowly. Somehow my body is sore too, to match my soul. I notice two bruises on my knees—probably from when I fell in the lobby. No one saw me; I escaped outside where I caught a cab home. Maybe it would have been better if someone had seen the whole thing. If every
thing was blown wide open—but that’s the overwrought nerves talking. Of course it’s better a secret.

  So many secrets jangling together inside me seeking escape, making me sick to hold them in.

  Taking off my push-up bra helps me feel a bit better, freer, and I shrug the soft sweater on, glad for the gentle texture against my skin, grateful Alex is here to help.

  She walks back into my room in a tank top and yoga pants and perches on the bed. “Comfy?”

  I nod and slip under the covers.

  “Good. Are you ready to tell me what the 911 was about?” As usual, she cuts through the bullshit right away.

  I bite my lip, thinking of where to begin. After the hotel, I’d found my way to a cab, and called Alex. It took a few minutes—I was crying so hard she initially thought I was being murdered, but I eventually made it clear I was begging her to come and she jumped on the next flight out to be with me without even knowing why, only that I needed her.

  The time between then and her knocking on my door is a dark abyss filled with bitter tears and sending emails and texts to Dylan that have gone unanswered. I glare at my silent phone, willing it to ring. It stays silent. “It’s a long story. I should have told you ages ago.”

  “Start talking, then. No matter what it is, I’m here and we’ll get through this.” She takes my hand and squeezes. “Are you pregnant?”

  I bark out a laugh. “I’d be happy if my problem was that prosaic.” My heart throbs and I blow my nose and begin. “No. I didn’t get the job with the symphony purely because of my playing.”

  Alex sighs. “Rachel, yes you did. You’re so talented—”

  I squeeze her hand before letting go. “No.”

  She frowns. “Did your dad meddle and use some contacts to get you in? Because even if he did that, if you weren’t incredibly talented on your own merit, it wouldn’t have mattered. You can’t let that make you doubt how good you are, because—”

  “No, he had nothing to do with it. I got the position because I agreed to marry the Maestro—the new director, Blaine.” I pause and blow my nose again, wincing at the rub of tissue against the raw flesh, laughing when I look up at Alex, who’s been stunned silent. I’ve never seen her speechless before. “Your face looks about the same as mine felt when Blaine asked me during my audition. He was so casual about it, like I’d already agreed. He’s young, but wants the family man persona. He believes it will give him more power and flexibility with the symphony board—make them take him more seriously, see him as a peer.”

  “That’s stupid.”

  I shrug. “Not really. They’d been dragging their feet hiring a new director for ages, and Blaine thought his age was already a big strike against him. In that world, conservative is the norm. Families and legacies are all that counts. Appearances. Because of my family, education, appearance—and of course, my skill—I was the perfect candidate to be Mrs. Sanderson.”

  “And he just came right out and asked you to marry him?” Alex’s voice is flat with disbelief. She’s taking this way better than I would, if our positions were reversed.

  I nod. “He let me audition, said I was good, but if I wanted to guarantee a position he had a proposal for me. Of course, at first I thought it was a, you know, a sex thing. That I’d have to get on my knees and open wide for a place on the symphony. But that’s not part of it. It’s not about sex at all. He’s serious enough about the symphony that he’s willing to live in a sexless marriage for the rest of his life for it. Maybe discreet affairs. He’s willing to let our transaction evolve over time if we come to care for each other...So I’d thought it was kinky, but—”

  “Instead, he wanted to put a ring on it.”

  I smile weakly. “Ironic, hey?”

  “It’s bullshit, Rachel. It’s extortion, or blackmail, or...something I can’t remember the name for right now. It’s wrong!”

  “I made the choice freely, and it really does make sense.”

  Alex shifts her legs into a cross-legged position and faces me head on. “No, and I don’t know why you felt like you had to trap yourself like that. I can’t imagine anyone more driven to succeed than you. And you’re talented and would have gotten a seat sometime on your own merit, even if it was with another symphony. You’d never have failed, period. This decision feels nothing like you. It’s so impulsive, so final. If you’d have hung on—”

  “Someday wasn’t good enough for me. I couldn’t stand being a disgrace any longer.”

  “A disgrace? The only person who thinks that way is your asshole father and you have nothing to prove to him.”

  I shred the edges of a tissue with my fingertips. “He’s finally proud of me. He sent me an email last night. One of his Floridian golf buddies was at the event—his wife is a patron.”

  My phone had dinged with an email alert, and I’d jumped, heart lifting, hoping it was Dylan, irrationally furious when it was a glowing email from Father instead. “She sponsors a chair already, worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. She wants to sponsor my chair too and I don’t even remember her! I walked around schmoozing patrons and hoping for the best. But he’s finally said he’s proud of me. You should have seen the email, Alex. I can show you.”

  “That’s not a reason to marry someone, and no, I don’t want to see the email. He should be proud of who you are, not who he wants you to be.”

  She’s said it a hundred times, but today it has a poignant edge. Because I think I lost someone who actually may have loved me for who I am.

  Exactly. Lost. Focus on the future. “It’s what I want to do.” Even to myself, it’s unconvincing.

  She raises an eyebrow. “Is it?”

  I can’t answer, because it isn’t—not anymore.

  “That’s what I thought. Hon, you’ve got to get out of this. You’re worth more than a fake marriage.”

  I pull the pins out of my now sloppy bun, relishing the tiny tugs that skitter across my scalp when they snag on locks of hair, stalling for time, unsure what to say. Really, I suddenly need to work off the nervous feeling coming over me at Alex’s words. “Maybe, but I already said yes. And when he announced our engagement, the board made a little announcement of their own. He’s Director now too, which validates that he was right.”

  “It was a coincidence. The board hadn’t had a little meeting in the bathroom after Blaine announced your engagement. The decision had been made before. You need to get out of this. It’s not too late to change your mind.”

  “I signed a contract.”

  She bites her lip and smacks the bed but from frustration, not anger. “I can’t believe you never told me about this.”

  “I almost did a hundred times, but I didn’t want you to worry.” Or try to talk me out of it. “Besides, the contract has a non-disclosure clause. I could be sued for telling you all this.”

  She shakes her head. “I’m sure that kind of contract can’t hold up in a court of law. He doesn’t own you, no matter what you signed. We will find a way out of it.”

  “Even if I wanted to, then what? What would my future be? Moving again, spending every penny of savings I have running around the country auditioning for chairs, hoping for the best until I find a situation that would never be as good as this—marriage notwithstanding. I’d be giving up so much.” I already gave up the best thing when I let Dylan walk away over a contractual obligation. I deserve this misery. I chose my bed and now have to lie in it, even if it means sobbing myself to sleep every night.

  I swallow hard. “And if I broke the contract now, the embarrassment would kill my family, socially. Maybe it won’t be so bad. The contract is only for five years. I’ll still be young when this finishes.”

  “Five years? That’s not a small chunk of your life to give away. What the hell is in this for him if it’s not about sex? And don’t say it’s about his image. Being married isn’t going to change much.”

  I slide down and pull the covers up to my chin. “It’s not just about the image. You’re right. It
’s about a legacy.”

  I can literally see the second the light goes off for Alex. Her nostrils flare and her eyes widen dramatically. “Oh, no. You didn’t agree to...You’re going to have a baby for the man?”

  The look on my face must say it all. A fake marriage is one thing—a real baby is another. It’s the one thing that makes me spend most of my time not thinking about the arrangement.

  Alex sits ramrod straight, cheeks darkening. “How the fuck is that supposed to happen? I mean, you’re not actually going to sleep with this man, are you?”

  “Artificial insemination.” It’s the first time I’ve said the words out loud. They’re alien and don’t sit well with me. “I don’t have to sleep with him.” My voice cracks over the last word. “Blaine chose me because music is everything to him, and I have skills he’s hoping our child will possess.”

  Alex scowls. “That’s not how it works, there’s no guarantee!”

  “But wait, there’s more...” I sniffle. “There’s someone else...”

  Alex’s expression softens. “What’s his name?”

  “Dylan St. John.” The four syllables take a herculean effort to get past my tongue. My dirty, perfect little secret.

  “Dylan...” Her jaw drops. “The rock star?”

  I nod. My heart wobbles and I lean in, laying my head on her lap, fresh sobs overtaking me again. If I’d been able to articulate things better, jumped in and said he meant everything to me...but it was for the best he left, really.

  How long is it going to take for my heart to buy that?

  Alex makes soothing noises, stroking my hair and shoulder for a moment until I can breathe again, handing me a new tissue when my sniffles get really bad. She pulls an errant pin from my hair and sets it on the nightstand. “Where the hell did you bump into him again? He’s next level famous and you don’t exactly run in the same circles. Is he into classical music? You are so full of secrets, such a little dark horse.” Her hand stills before she flicks my ear. “This is fabulous.”

  “No, it isn’t.” I sit up. “It changes nothing.”