“Do you think it’s finished?” I asked, feeling a twinge of anxiety that these pieces wouldn’t be perfect. There was always something that needed work.
“It’s all a process,” he said, shrugging. “You’ll go on to play them. Even better than you play them tomorrow.”
“You don’t think I’m ready?”
“You know them by heart?”
“Yes.”
“And you understand something of the piece.” A thing that, I was only beginning to learn, meant to him that I understood why it worked the way it did. Something of its essence. The calculations that had been made to bring it to life. “Just have fun,” he said at last. “Didn’t you do well at the previous one? You shouldn’t have any trouble with this one.”
“It just matters more now.”
He cracked a smile. “Picture everyone in their underwear.”
“Does that really work?”
“Well, it’s distracting, you know, choosing the right color for the right person in the audience. This one has olive-green boxers with crescent moons.” He winked. “That one in a tropical motif. You know.”
It was a bit of warmth that made the fear recede, but this morning I found my fear had rooted, stolen over my heart in my sleep, and it’s making me act weird, move weird, stare at my mom like a deer in headlights.
“Where’s your coat?” she asks.
“I forgot it.”
Another exasperated sigh.
“Are you sure you want to do this? We don’t have to, you know.”
It’s because I want to — so badly — that I feel so miserable. I leave the Tupperware on the floor and open the car door.
The reception area is large, like a library without books in it, painted in doctor’s office teal and peach. My mother points at a round little girl, her glittering silver tutu skirt rustling as she walks. “It’s like prom in here. Or First Communion,” she whispers. I can’t help noticing that most of the people around me are Asian, though no one as brown as me. It’s just like the first competition I went to. I feel as if we stick out.
The girl waiting in line in front of us lets out a high-pitched squeal when she catches sight of someone across the room. They rush to meet and hug dramatically, like they haven’t seen each other in a while. I wonder how long they’ve known each other. How long they’ve been going to these things. It occurs to me that the girl before me at my lessons might be here, but I haven’t seen her yet.
“Claire . . . Alalay,” the woman at the table says. “Oh! One of Paul Avon’s students. Lovely. Welcome.”
I brighten with the recognition. Finally, I feel a little thrill of excitement. She knows my teacher. I belong. She tells me where I can find a piano to warm up and where I’ll be playing and when. It will be hours before I perform.
We blend into the parade of dresses and stockings and heels, eventually settling into two overstuffed chairs, loudly upholstered, in the air-conditioned lobby. I take my history book out, Mom a Vogue. I soak in dead presidents, internment camps, rations. She stews in asymmetrical hems; beautiful, fearful eyes; honey sunny hair.
Some kids look miserable; others have hard-set eyes that mirror their mothers’. Utterly stoic. Others are actually laughing. What I wouldn’t give to be one of them.
“I think the Apassionata, Dad. No, definitely the Apassionata,” I overhear.
“Seems a bit overplayed.”
“But it’s so dynamic!” The man’s glance lingers over my mother, who isn’t paying any attention.
“I just think your piece should stand out.”
“Are you cold?” my mother asks. Her face has gone pale. Whatever cheerfulness she’d felt before is gone. Somehow, at some point, she switched into fear mode without my noticing. Her resting state. “We should have brought a blanket.”
I shake my head no. She’s visibly relieved, and even more so when I pull out the sandwich.
“Hey! You’re the lesson after me.” I look up. It’s the girl from Paul’s. Hair up, lips like a bow. Her long cheeks and light-blue eyes make her look a little feline. “I thought I’d see you at one of these shindigs.”
Her way of playing always makes me want to like her — quick and clever, always on the attack. Even when the music smooths out into a rolling legato, there’s an urgency. So annoying that she’s pretty, too. When she smiles, her eyes melt and light up at the same time. I can’t help looking at her dress — gray-blue and long with tiny greenish-blue polka dots — and bemoaning mine, which I’d bought simply because it was the right kind of thing — black, a simple A-line that fit me. I’d wanted it in blue, but it somehow looked cheaper. I give her my hand. Is that what I’m supposed to do? She shakes it.
“Julia,” she says. “Have you gone yet?”
“No, soon, I hope.”
“Well, go fast. Don’t keep us waiting. I want to go home.” I laugh. “I feel like I’ve been here forever.” She points to the bathroom behind us. “Gotta run. Good luck.” I wonder if she means it.
“You too.” A sleeper wave of nausea washes over me as I watch her leave. There’s no way I can beat her. No way.
“She’s a classmate of yours?” my mom asks.
“At Paul’s.”
“She’s wearing leg warmers. That’s smart,” she says.
An hour goes by. “Are you sure you want to do this?” my mother says for the second time, looking up from her laptop. She’s been binge-watching K-dramas.
Her eyes plead, and I suddenly understand that she’s doubting, too. There are so many things she leaves for me to try to understand on my own, so many things she doesn’t say. Parents don’t have to explain themselves. They aren’t necessarily straightforward about their feelings.
I think I know why she doubts me. I wonder if she’s been replaying every slip of my fingers in the last few days, every missed note, panicking as badly as I’ve been. I wonder if, secretly, she doesn’t think I can do this. Or if maybe she doesn’t want to see me crack.
It’s true, she’s never seen me fail. Not really, not in front of masses of people. For a moment, I wonder if that’s why she thinks I’m so pretty. So smart. So artistic. She’s been protecting herself from really finding out. Willingly blinding herself out of love.
A burst of applause pulsates through the walls.
“No. I definitely, absolutely want to do this.” I give her a confident smile, suddenly determined to perform well, if only to keep her from thinking ill of me, to keep her from falling apart.
It’s time. We join the others shuffling in the hallway. A burst of applause pours in when a door opens. She whispers in my ear, “You’re so brave.”
We part ways in the auditorium as I look for the right place to sit — there are chairs marked near the front of the stage. I sit down and try a small smile on the girl sitting next to me. Chipmunk cheeks, a strawberry-red dress. She pulls a hand out from where she’d been sitting on it, waves. My mother has chosen a seat near the back, in the corner. There is a sense of expectation, like before the choir sings at church. My heart wants this so badly, there is nothing left to do but play. The girl beside me chews gum in my ear, the rhythm of her quiet smacks slowing when names are called out, speeding back up during the applause, and stopping completely if the player on the stage catches her interest. She seems so relaxed, it makes me realize how spun up I am. I look at my mother — she’s too far away for me to read her expression — but just seeing her reassures me as I walk onstage to the piano.