“I can explain,” I say, pulling the papers out of her hand and moving closer to her.
“There’s no need,” she says, taking the papers back. “I know Professor MacAfee is looking for these.”
“I know, and I was trying to return them.”
“How long have you had them?” she asks.
“Months. The long and short of it is that we’re trying to help Charlie graduate and he needs to pass this class.”
“You’ve broken the law.” Lock crosses her arms, effectively hiding the papers under her arm. The only way I can get them back from her is to reach around or tackle her. Personally, I’d love to tackle her so that we’re wrestling around a little, but I have a feeling she’ll frown upon that move.
“I haven’t,” I tell her, defending myself. “I didn’t take the test. I was only trying to return it.”
“I know. I saw you.” Lock covers her mouth, clearly taken aback by her slip of the tongue.
“You were watching me?” The thought actually excites and validates my odd stalking habits when it comes to her. I can’t help but smile, letting her know that her admission is sitting very well with me.
“I’m investigating and have said far too much. I must go.”
“No, wait.” I grab her arm as she stands. She can’t leave with the test. It’s my responsibility to return it, sight unseen. “You can’t leave. Well, you can, but not with the test. I need to return it.”
“That’s what I’m going to do. Professor MacAfee will pay me for its return.”
Well, crap, it’s not like I can compete with money. That’s liquid gold to a college kid.
“How much? I’ll double it,” I tell her without really thinking about the ramifications of emptying my wallet or savings account.
Lock looks at me, perplexed, pulling her cheek in between her teeth. Either I’ve outsmarted her or…well, I don’t know, because she seems pretty damn intuitive and observant about things.
“I don’t know. She never said.”
Bingo!
I stand and place my hands on her shoulders and look her in the eye. “Lock, I think you’re beautiful and have thought that since I saw you on the first day of school. However, your beauty aside, I cannot let you return that to MacAfee. I will treat you to a month’s worth of dinners off campus if you allow me to put that back in her drawer.”
“Where’s the thumb drive?”
“The what?”
“There was a thumb drive too. It’s been stolen as well.”
My hands drop as I shrug. “I didn’t steal the test, and no, I’m not telling you who did. I was only tasked with returning it. I don’t know anything about a thumb drive.”
Lock studies me, no doubt watching my facial expressions to see if I’m lying. I have a feeling she’s good at reading people and that thought sort of scares me.
“I could use some food,” she says, catching me off guard. The smile that accompanies her comment is enough to make any man weak in the knees. I know mine are about to buckle. “But we need to return the test first.”
“How do you propose we do that?”
“Simple—we’ll go back to the ag building and wait until the time is right.”
My mind can’t find any plausible reason to disagree with her, making me believe that a life of crime is in our future.
• • •
Lock Holmes
Today I’ve committed a series of “Lock never does this” type of things. I’ve agreed to a date with a complete stranger, followed him to his house, and willingly walked up a flight of stairs to his bedroom all in the name of an investigation, while wondering what it’d be like to hold his hand. Today is a day of new experiences; why not test them all out? Because that’s not who I am, that’s why. I’m the one who pays close attention to my surroundings, notices mundane things like the comforter on John’s bed has been sewn, which I can tell because the corners aren’t square, or the fact that the house he lives in is slowly slipping off its foundation. He’ll never know, but the sliver of light coming through his closed door is a pure indication of structural issues.
I had never felt pure elation before until my fingers touched the papers on his bed. My gut instinct told me earlier that John had what I was seeking. It’s common for students to be in buildings that aren’t related to their area of study; what I found odd was how he was acting. Slinking down the hall and looking over his back as if he were waiting for someone. It was right for me to follow him. Except now that I know he has the test and have heard his explanation, I don’t want to turn him in, making me a less-than-stellar investigator. I should be strong enough to put looks and personality aside. He’s a criminal and should be treated as such. But when he brushed against me while we were walking, he sent shivers over my skin, something I’ve never felt before.
The near kiss almost sent me into overdrive. I had to act quickly for fear he’d realize I’ve never been kissed before. Boys tend to make a mockery of a situation like this, so I did what any self-respecting future crime solver would do—I reached for the evidence. What I didn’t expect was his reasons for having the test and the pleading that came with it—or my willingness to help him continue the cover-up.
“I need a piece of paper,” I say to John, who immediately pulls his notebook out of his backpack, tears out a sheet, and hands it to me. The deep impression of his pen allows me to read the words he had previously written. It’s medical jargon and something I tell myself I should learn. You can never have too much knowledge. I pick up one of his pencils off his bed and start sketching the ag building from what I remember of it. As soon as I’m done, I hand it to John.
“Okay, what do we do with this?”
I don’t know? Think fast, Lock. All I’ve drawn is the inside of the building, which doesn’t do much for us. What we need are the blueprints showing us how to tunnel through the heating system and into Professor MacAfee’s office.
“Professor MacAfee trusts you, right?” John asks.
I nod halfheartedly because trust is such a deep word. I’m not sure if I trust anyone but my parents.
“So she wouldn’t suspect anything if you’re in her office, right?”
“Yes! Why didn’t I think about that? I have access to her office. I mean, I can call and she or her aide will open it for me. You’re brilliant,” I say, as I spring from my spot on his bed and wrap my arms around him. He holds me to him, not letting me go. The appropriate time for a friendly hug has passed, but neither of us seems to want to let go. That is, until I feel his right hand move from the center of my back to my side. The unfamiliar feelings have me pulling away and avoiding any type of eye contact.
I stand, moving away from John and his bed, and pull out my cell phone. “I’ll text MacAfee now and let her know that I’ll need access immediately. Hopefully by the time we get there, the door will be open and we can slip the test back in, unsuspected.”
“Sounds good,” John says, stepping behind me. I try not to let his closeness affect me, but I’d be a liar if I said I wasn’t feeling something. I just wish I knew what it was. I look at him over my shoulder and fight the smile that is pushing its way out. His backpack is slung over his shoulder and without saying anything John and I trek across campus, keeping a healthy distance between us. Every time he steps closer I change my pace, only to find myself gravitating toward him. When we enter the ag building, it’s fairly quiet, most of the classes having concluded for the day. John leads the way to MacAfee’s office. At the last moment, I cut in front of him. If MacAfee is to have her room dusted for fingerprints, I don’t want his to show up. It’s best that I be the one who turns the doorknob.
I leave the light off and close the door after him, locking it so we can put the test back unseen. I pull out my penlight, a gift from my parents last Christmas, and light up the room enough for us to see.
“That’s the coolest light ever,” John whispers as he puts his arm around me. I don’t shrug him off because I like the way it
feels there. MacAfee’s office isn’t big, but her desk sits back in the corner, set kitty-corner. It’s an odd configuration, but it must work for her.
“She said bottom drawer,” I say, as I tug at it. It takes what little strength I have to pull the drawer open. John catches me as I fall backward and it doesn’t escape me that his lips have brushed against my cheek. I should move, but I don’t. I sort of like the way he’s holding me.
John hands me the test and I set it in the drawer, right next to a thumb drive. I pick up the drive, holding it between my fingers.
“Do you have your laptop?”
“Yes, why?” he asks, slipping his bag off his shoulder and pulling his laptop out. He lifts the lid and types in his passcode. I show him the thumb drive and hate that I can’t see his expression.
“MacAfee said the thumb drive was stolen as well, yet it’s in her drawer. Let’s see what’s on it.”
John doesn’t hesitate, taking the thumb drive out of my hand and plugging it in. A video pops up with Professor MacAfee smiling at us.
“What is this?”
“I don’t know,” he says, pressing play.
“Hello, Lock and John. My plan couldn’t have worked out better. John, weeks ago your brothers came to me asking for help. They thought I’d be the best person to help, since I have neither of you as students. Your brothers have grown tired of watching you fawn over Lock Holmes and asked me to intervene.
“I came up with the idea that my final would come up missing after contacting my friend Ron, at the police station. He is well versed in all things Lock and said I would need an investigation if I wanted her attention.” She winks at the camera as if any of this is funny.
“The final for my class isn’t missing, in case you’re wondering. I changed Charlie’s grades in the computer system knowing you, Lock, would look there first, hoping you’d think he’d be your suspect.
“John had a specific time to try and return the test and Lock being there played perfectly into the plan. I’m hoping I can say everything else has worked out. The reason you’re in my office is because John likes you, Lock. I’m hoping that someday you’ll like him in return. Thank you both for being willing participants in Delta Phi’s plot to bring their brother some happiness.”
The video goes blank and John and I are left cloaked in the darkness of MacAfee’s office.
“I’m sorry, Lock. My brothers are…well, there are just no words.”
“Is it true?” I ask, turning around, relishing the way his hands feel as I move in them. I shine my penlight on him, as if he’s under investigation.
“Very true. I like you, a lot.”
My body warms at the sound of his words. I’ve never known someone who wanted to be with me before, and maybe I want to try to be with him. I drop my penlight and lean in, brushing my trembling lips against his. John pulls me close, deepening the kiss, until I pull away. I realize for the first time, I’m experiencing a stirring in my belly, which has to be the love butterflies, and John is reason for them.
“That was nice. I think I’d like to try that again.” And he does, pressing his lips against mine once more and hopefully not for the last time.
Beethoven’s Baton
BY
Austin Farmer
Oh friends, not these sounds!
Let us instead strike up more pleasing
and more joyful ones!
—Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller, “Ode to Joy”
Performed in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony
Sherlock strummed the last note of the symphony and exhaled sharply. The power required to produce those incessant fortissimos—the sheer amplitude of the piece—was nearly too much for any instrumentalist to play, let alone a violinist. One of the strings on Sherlock’s violin unwound itself, sprang up into the air in a wild corkscrew, and nearly stabbed his eye out. He bit his tongue and swallowed his frustration, careful not to upset his vehement conductor.
Luckily, his conductor was a little hard of hearing as of late and had not noticed. Sure, Ludwig van Beethoven was a creative genius, but his demand was much too high; how could one be expected to learn his Ninth Symphony in less than two weeks’ rehearsal? If it were not for the sheer beauty of their performance hall, the Kärntnertortheater, throbbing in the heart of Vienna, Sherlock would have dropped his violin in the middle of the movement and moved to Berlin the next day, leaving everyone, even his roommate, to ponder his exit strategy as an unsolvable mystery—something only he alone could solve.
“Have to make sure I remember this theme,” Watson said. He laid the violin on his lap and dog-eared a page of his score. “I have never heard anything so sweet.”
“After how loud that was,” Sherlock said, “surely I will never be able to hear anything ever again.”
There was a yell from the podium, and Sherlock covered his ears just in time before it turned into a roar. Beethoven was screaming at Fabian Rainer for not turning the pages of Marcos Pierre’s score quickly enough. Since Fabian had been demoted from first-chair to second-chair cellist, Fabian was required to turn the pages of their score, but he had been falling behind. There was something in Fabian’s demeanor—his sagged shoulders, his pallid skin, the constant nervous flitters of his eyes—that made Sherlock uneasy. With only one day until their performance, the orchestra needed to be focused on the task at hand.
“If you are not paying attention, then perhaps I should not pay you at all.” Beethoven spoke in a deep legato, his words nearly incoherent mumbles. He threw his hands in the air and shook his head furiously. “Do you not know who our guest is tomorrow, or are you all ignorant? Leopold Hobrecht, the royal representative of Berlin, will sit right there in that box seat. And if you do not turn pages quickly enough, Fabian, I ensure you will never play a note in the heavenly gardens of Vienna ever again.”
Beethoven chewed the tip of his baton and wrote a note on his score. Fabian seemed to cower into his chair, and Marcos smiled sardonically.
“Look at his nervous twitch, chewing his baton like that,” Watson said. “Just listen to those hideous ultimatums. And his infallible rage—I believe that he might finally be losing it.”
“My dear Watson,” Sherlock said, “surely he has lost it long ago. Have you not seen him walking around town like a vagabond, wandering through darkness on many midnight’s new moons, humming? It is a gradual breakdown of the mind. For when an artist born with sight can no longer see his own painting, he suffers a gradual breakdown; likewise, when a composer can hardly hear his song, the brain begins to hum dark phantom melodies in the mind.”
“Whatever phantom tune his muse whispers into his ear, it is straight from Apollo’s lips,” Watson said. “His melodies are the anthems of Olympus. He truly understands what the world wants to hear.”
“And how the world should sound. He is desultory and delusional, but ingenious at that. I just wish he were not marching to the beat of his own drummer.”
“Careful. He can still read lips.”
Beethoven glared at Sherlock. He ran his hands through his steely-gray hair and stormed out of the room. Sherlock nodded and mouthed a pleasant hello; Beethoven quickly walked by without giving him another glance and hissed a sharp “Auf wiedersehen.”
“Harsh,” Sherlock said.
Sherlock felt something brush up against his ankle. He leaned over, and there on the floor was one of Fabian’s pages. He picked it up and stared at it incredulously, as if he were deciphering some foreign language. The room was empty now, and Sherlock could hear Watson sighing, eager to join the rest of the orchestra and chorus for a well-deserved break.
“What is it?” Watson reached for the score, but Sherlock pulled it back. “Another one of your treasonous conspiracy theories?”
“Take out your violin.”
“But I do not want to practice any longer. You promised me a wine at Café Dejaun after our last case, remember?”
“Stay just a moment longer, and I will double my offer
. Take it or leave it.”
“The price of friendship is costly, and yet in such instances I must remind myself the payback is greater.” Watson walked over to the piano and opened the cover. “Two glasses of wine it is, yes?”
Sherlock nodded and set the score on the piano. “Play me the first theme.”
“It has been a while since I have even touched the keys, but how is this?” Watson played a few notes, and to Sherlock it sounded as if a child were taking his first lesson on the piano. The grand concertmasters of Vienna—Haydn, Mozart, and Schubert—would wince at the amateur fingers dancing across the keys. Surely, Sherlock concluded, Bach was rolling over in his grave.
“Now play me this.” Sherlock turned over the score. Scribbled at the top of the page was a new staff with mere inkblots as quarter notes. Underneath was a scrawl of an almost illegible date: May 7, 1824.
“I have never seen this before. Beethoven is not surprising us with a new theme tomorrow, is he?”
“That is because Beethoven did not write it. It is not even in the proper key.”
“And to whom does this belong?”
“Fabian.”
“Then perhaps Fabian was attempting to start his own opus and nonchalantly wrote a tune.” There was a tone of annoyance in Watson’s voice that surprised Sherlock. “It was his own personal diary. I do not see the point of this. Now let us go. I am hungry and in desperate need of a drink or three.”
“If your eyes do not fail you, the date written is tomorrow. How can one write a journal entry for the future? Unless our friend is a time traveler, of course. Go on, play it for me.”
Watson sighed and conceded; he played the tune a little more fluently. “There, are you happy? It is not even good. This melody belongs at the bottom of a pigsty.”
Sherlock stood at the far end of the piano and played the notes flawlessly. “Do you not see it?”
Thirteen Authors With New Takes on Sherlock Holmes Page 19