Jacob scowls. ‘I was in a band. That was my job.’ He throws his words at Maestro like they’re knives. ‘I’ve been kinda getting over five deaths, if that’s okay with you.’
Maestro swallows and scrutinises the ceiling. When he regards Jacob again, he stands taller. ‘Do you want this, Jacob?’
‘Want what?’
‘A life in the world of music. For me to coach you. To work at the career you’ve begun. Because you could become huge, son. If you want it.’
Jacob considers me, expression loaded with mayhem. ‘I guess,’ he says. He traces a finger down the scar on his calf. ‘Seeing as I’m not dead. Yet. A second chance. Or third. Fourth.’
‘Okay. We need some new rules though.’ Maestro strides over to the music system and switches off the rap music. ‘First. We’re going to hold our lessons here, you and me, but it has to be tidy and clean or the lesson is cancelled. Second. No more drinking at all. Show me you have self-discipline. Prove you want this. This is your job. Turn up for it every day, ready to work. Third. Astrid is off limits. If I ever see what I saw when I came in here, our contract is terminated.’
‘No way.’ Jacob’s straight arm strikes the wall beside him. ‘Astrid’s old enough to decide for herself. What’s whether we get together got to do with anything?’
I blush. Maestro’s never mentioned boyfriends, and now he’s banning them? I fall back onto the arm of the sofa, shocked Jacob objects to that rule over the no-drinking rule, or having to tidy up.
‘Because she doesn’t need you as a distraction from her career.’
‘What career?’ I say, louder than I mean to. But Maestro ignores me.
‘Already you’ve got her writing chart music,’ he growls. ‘And she argues with me – just like you do.’ Maestro turns to me now. ‘Astrid. You can go home now.’ He deposits his glare on me, waits for me to move. Here’s the version of him I dread.
I consider him, then Jacob, each of us a point in a triangle. The room fills with unspoken words.
‘I heard you in the hospital, Dr Doc,’ says Jacob from the floor, surrounded by broken glass. ‘I’ve only now figured out what you meant when you said you’d been trying to keep us apart.’
My whole body clenches.
Maestro sputters over his words as though they’re coming to him too fast, then says, ‘What are you talking about? I did not say that.’
‘You thought I was asleep. I’m starting to see through your mask,’ says Jacob. ‘On the outside you’re the supportive father, the wise voice coach, but you control everything and everyone, even whether Astrid chooses to be an opera singer or not. She can sing and have a boyfriend.’
Maestro scrubs a hand over his reddening skin. ‘This is the drink talking.’
‘And I thought you were such a cool dude to convince my parents to let me audition for the music school in London. To take time out of your schedule. But you didn’t care which school I went to, did you? If I stayed in England, then you could keep Astrid and me apart. Isn’t that true?’
‘Maestro?’ I want to obliterate Jacob’s words from the charged air. Except I’ll still have heard them.
‘I said to go home, Astrid. Do as you are told. I will discuss this with you at home.’
I step toward him, stall. ‘But –’
‘Now!’ Maestro roars. His face distorts. I hardly recognise him. He’s let whatever demon he’s fighting take over, and my old father has vanished. I trip forward, casting around for my car keys and patting each of my pockets.
Behind me Jacob hoot-snorts. ‘You’re more frigging cuckoo than a clock.’
‘Jacob. I’m on your side,’ shouts Maestro. ‘And those are my rules. If you choose to accept them, call me. I’ll come over tomorrow. Ten am.’ He pauses to take a deep breath. ‘But I have my doubts about this. Can I trust you to keep to my rules? All of them.’
‘What about me being able to trust you? What about your own daughter being able to trust you? When are you going to stop lying to her?’
For a moment the world stops with only the light of the music player winking on pause.
‘What are you talking about?’ demands Maestro.
‘Start telling the truth.’ Jacob hauls himself to his feet, crosses his arms. ‘About Veronika Bell. How she didn’t die after Astrid was born.’
I can’t stop blinking. It’s as though I’m watching Maestro’s bulging eyes and dropped jaw as a series of flash cards. Palms up and backing away, my throat throbs. ‘She’s not dead? You lied?’
Maestro has put on a mask I’ve never seen. His skin is grey and slack, the creases in his face deeper. Mouth quivering, he says, ‘I can explain.’
21
Jacob
‘I can’t even look at you.’ Astrid turns away from her father and runs from the studio.
‘Astrid. Stop!’ The doc launches himself after her, but stumbles down the brick stairs outside. He’s on the grass, clutching his knee. There’s a rip in his trousers and a bit of blood. ‘Please, Jacob. Stop her. Don’t let her drive.’ He points to Astrid, his face coming apart.
Memories stack on top of each other: the Harley, the van, the car accident. I chase Astrid up the lawn, out the gate, and snag her elbow before she climbs into her car. She’s crying and keeps her head turned away. ‘No way am I letting you drive when you’re this upset.’
‘He lied. He lied. She’s not dead.’
Jeez, I’ve stuffed up. ‘No, that’s not right. She is dead. But there’s more to it.’
She blinks, processing this, and then glares at me, furious.
I’ve never seen Astrid truly angry.
‘Spit it out,’ says Astrid. ‘Whatever you think you know.’
I crack my neck nervously, and then plunge in. ‘So I was bored. And I was thinking about you this morning. And I got to thinking about how you want to find out about your mum. So I searched for her death certificate online – to find the cause of death.’
‘You found it? I couldn’t find it when I did a search.’
‘It can be tricky. But I’ve done it for –’ It sounds insane that I researched the death certificates of my friends. Cause of death: stupidity. ‘Anyhow. I remember you said she died soon after you were born, and you thought it was childbirth, or maybe post-natal stuff. But the death certificate is dated twelve years after your birth.’
Her head snaps round. ‘Are you sure? Maybe it’s a different Veronika Bell?’
‘I cross-referenced her birth certificate and marriage certificate. The death certificate was in the name of Veronika Miller – she must have changed it back. It was her.’
‘Twelve years! Twelve. Years.’ Fist clenched, Astrid bangs the car roof. ‘Why would he lie?’ Her tone could explode lightbulbs right now. ‘How did she die?’
‘It was lung cancer.’
The look Astrid gives me buries me ten feet deep – but it’s not her anger that kills me, it’s the headlong, breaking-apart loss that’s muddling her features, as if her mum only just died today. She’s going to have to mourn her all over again.
A sob jags her throat and she slumps against the car. I reach to touch her, but she jerks away. When I heard about Purple Daze I felt sure I would drown in a grief so deep I’d never climb out of it; I didn’t want to eat, breathe, talk, kiss, love, laugh, sing again. And I believed I was completely alone. I want to hold Astrid, and comfort her, but I remember how I hadn’t wanted to be touched – back then touching felt too real. Physical contact poked a hole in the box of emotions I was fighting to contain. Touching’s the last thing she needs.
A mess of emotions clutters Astrid’s face now. The doc planned to detonate this bomb when she turned eighteen, in a careful, well-thought-through way. And here’s me blurting it out. I’m an a-hole.
She slices multiple straight lines in the dirt of the car roof with an index finger
. Then her lips move into a wary smirk.
‘What?’ I ask.
‘You. After everything. The accident. Your parents not being here today. You stood up to Maestro. You’re amazing.’
It’s a beautiful realisation – I amaze someone.
It’s all I can do not to kiss her.
She leans her back against the car, the small smile suddenly blotted out.
Apart from not wanting to be touched, I remember wanting quiet – space in my head. I keep my lips sealed.
‘Lung cancer,’ she says. ‘She was always smoking cigarettes in the press photos . . .’
Odd for an opera singer to smoke. I think it, but don’t say it.
‘Maestro will have to tell me everything now.’ Astrid claps a palm to her mouth, talks through her fingers. ‘Whoa. Mum was alive when Savannah died. How could she not come to the funeral? Such a big part of my life is now not a part of me. My memories are all false.’
‘Astrid.’
We turn to see a shrunken Maestro limping toward us. Up until now I’ve seen him as a kind of fictional hero – wise, focused, talented, self-assured. But today that image slips away and he’s simply human.
‘Come home.’ His words are monotone; his body stooped. ‘It’s time.’
Astrid’s fists clench and unclench. She pivots to me. The rage has drained from her features, and what’s left behind is fear. I pull her keys free of my pocket. She yanks open the car door and closes it behind her. Before Maestro moves to follow her, he pans back to me and mouths, ‘Thank you.’
22
Astrid
I was six years old before I learnt to tie my shoelaces because I wouldn’t let my dad teach me before then. ‘Mum will teach me,’ I declared early in the process, stamping my foot on the floorboards in the entry hall.
‘And how will she teach you?’ Maestro asked, although I called him Dad back then. He remained calm as he knelt next to me on the floor. But I couldn’t tell him that I planned to jump off the high wall in the playground and in a few hours I’d float up to heaven with Mum and Savannah. Instead, I replied, ‘In my dreams.’
Maestro gave a considered nod, as if in approval, and reached for my shoes with the buckles. ‘Why don’t we wear these today then, so we’re not late.’ It was a reasonable request, but if I wore those to school, when I went to heaven at break time, I wouldn’t be wearing the black patent lace-ups and Mum would never teach me how to tie them.
So I ran out to the car, the laces clacking on the wooden floorboards, and of course tripped down the front steps. I expected Maestro to get angry – I deserved it. But Maestro raced to my side and brushed me down. He dabbed a hanky at the blood trickling down my shins. I saw my shoes and began to howl not because my knees hurt but because my shiny shoes were scuffed and Mum wouldn’t think them pretty anymore. I told Maestro this and his response stayed with me, guiding and comforting me throughout every day of my life.
‘A mother’s love is strong enough that even though she’s in heaven she is everywhere around you, too. When you hear the wind rustle in the trees, it’s her singing to you. When you feel the sun on your face, that’s her hand stroking you. When you see the light glinting off the ocean, it’s her waving. When it rains, those are her tears from heaven, because she’s so sad not to be with you. Therefore, she already saw the shoes when they were new and shiny.’
‘And when I fall down the stairs that’s her saying, “Let your dad teach you to tie your laces”?’ I replied, thinking I was getting this ‘mum’ stuff.
Maestro shrugged. ‘Maybe. Mums move in mysterious ways.’
But every word had been a lie. Every time the sun warmed my cheek and I laid my hand on what I believed was hers, she wasn’t there at all. She sang and waved and laughed and cried somewhere else in the world, living her life without me.
She didn’t love us. She didn’t want us. She never saw my new black patent shoes.
By the time I reach the third set of traffic lights Maestro’s BMW pulls up behind me. I watch him through the rear-view mirror. Sitting behind the wheel, he seems smaller.
When we pull into the driveway I don’t wait and shoot indoors to place myself in the dining room. I don’t want to do this in the music room. I need a table between us. I don’t want to be touched, cajoled, comforted. I want the truth.
I study the candy-striped wallpaper – Mum’s choice. As was every bit of furniture in this room, this house. And her choices helped me piece together what sort of person she was. She liked antique furniture, so she had sophisticated taste. Maestro always said we should keep the house neat and tidy because Mum would’ve approved, therefore she must’ve been an organised and calm person. She loved real fires and the ocean view across the treetops, so she loved nature. All these little details helped me imagine her, along with her dresses and Savannah’s and Maestro’s stories about her.
Now I wonder if any of it’s true.
When Maestro walks in he resembles the ragged teddy bear on my bed, the one Mum gave to Savannah before Maestro passed it on to me. Everything about him sags, as if the stuffing’s fallen out of him. He sits down opposite me.
‘Is it true? Jacob says she died when I was twelve. Five years ago.’
‘She left, Astrid. She left us.’ His words come out in a breathless flurry. They echo and vibrate in the air like each word is a gong being bashed one at a time, their meaning cruel, certified, undeniable.
My face flinches, as though he cuffed me. ‘She left right after I was born?’
His glare stabs the table top. ‘That’s why I couldn’t tell you. I knew you’d blame yourself. I didn’t want you growing up hating yourself. I didn’t want Savannah to blame you either.’ He gets to his feet, paces toward the music room and back.
‘But I thought it was my fault anyway. I thought it was my birth – I thought I killed her.’ Fury blooms in my chest. I jump to my feet. ‘You should have told me. I have blamed myself for her death every day of my life. I spent my life amazed that you didn’t blame me. And now I know why. How could you let me think that?’
He swings to me. ‘I didn’t know you thought that. Why would you think that?’
‘Because if she’d been murdered or something awful like that, the media would’ve been all over it. Because why else did you make it such a big secret? Even Savannah believed that.’
He scrunches his face, drawing all his features inwards as though he wants to obliterate them. ‘No. No. It had nothing to do with you. I’m so terribly sorry.’
‘Why did she leave then?’
‘It’s complicated.’
‘The truth.’ I bang my fists on the table. The ornamental vase in the middle jumps and rattles.
He lugs in a huge breath, holds it in, then lets it go. ‘Yes. The truth.’ Maestro’s lips distort. ‘Veronika had been suffering from a hoarse voice after performances. I begged her to visit a specialist.’ He gulps down a sob that becomes a low squeal. ‘She didn’t go. Instead she took a break.’ He stares over my head into space, slowly forming the words like they hurt to speak. ‘Savannah was almost four when she left us for six months. She had run off before: three or four times a year, she’d disappear. She never told me where she went. Sometimes her suitcase came back with labels from places like Morocco or Venice. But usually it was just for a week or two, not six months.’ He lets his breath trickle out.
My legs as weak as wet paper, I sit down again.
‘And when she got home we had two problems. One, she hadn’t visited the voice specialist. And when I finally convinced her, it was too late. She had vocal nodules – calluses on the vocal folds. The damage was permanent.’ His gaze searches my face. ‘And it meant she had to stop performing. To someone like her, the doctor may as well have told her to stop breathing.’
Maestro plods from the table to the music room entrance and back again.
&nb
sp; ‘What did that have to do with her leaving us?’
Maestro stops pacing, rubs the back of his hand across his forehead. ‘It wasn’t you girls. I promise. It was her. Some people aren’t cut out to be parents. She struggled with the responsibility. I’m afraid she wasn’t as perfect as I may have painted her to be. Savannah’s puppy? Veronika didn’t accidentally let it escape: she hated how it piddled on the rugs and yapped all night so she gave it to someone in the staff at the Opera House and bought Savannah a teddy instead. And there were more tears than cookie baking. The one time she did try baking, Savannah burnt her fingers on the cookie tray. It was the second visit to the hospital in a month because Savannah had slipped getting out of the bath and knocked herself out – your mother had been on the phone longer than she realised even though I’d lectured her many times about watching Savannah. And while she was away from home performing and travelling, she coped with the occasional responsibility. But the prospect of living in one place, being a mum every single day, and never performing – she couldn’t do it. She said parenting made her feel trapped and inadequate. But the truth is, she was too self-absorbed, always seeking pleasure and fun and avoiding – well, real life.’
Her words on the flowery notepaper. People shouldn’t try to be what they are not.
‘But what about you?’ I remember Maestro’s story of how they met on the steps of the Viennese Opera House, how they fell in love by the next day.
‘I wasn’t enough to fill that hole in her life. In fact, I became a reminder of the life she could no longer have. As were her dresses. I stopped her cutting them up. She got into a terrible rage. She called her life a living death. She couldn’t stay.’
‘And that’s why she left behind her opera dresses. She’d never need them again.’
‘They haunted me day and night. The lingering smell of her . . .’
Therefore, he dry-cleaned them and stored each item in the guest room cupboard to give us memories to touch with our fingers.
The Astrid Notes Page 14