Has the Maestro heard that? She needs to.
Half the guests are seated when they arrive before the monstrous piano. People still chat and mingle with glasses of champagne until a man with the physique of a bowling ball instructs all to find seats.
‘That is our host,’ Jan says quietly, ‘Audwin Denzel. He is a good friend of mine and in awe of our work.’
Our work. Jan is in for a headache of embarrassment when Beck pounds the piano keys. The audience blurs a little before Beck, lost in sweat and nerves. If he stares too hard at the piano, he can see his own petrified face.
The Maestro sits in the front row. Joey, smeared with chocolate and busily playing with her three empty wrappers, is sprawled on the floor beside her.
Jan approaches her and she rises, her face impassive.
‘Ida,’ Jan says. ‘I have met your son.’
How can he be so cheerful? How can he not flinch at the stone and ice in her eyes?
‘I need a word with him before you begin,’ the Maestro says.
Jan nods, ‘Ja. Of course. We will start when you are ready, Beck.’
He crouches to talk to Joey as the Maestro strides a few paces from them. Beck has nothing to do but follow. Behind him, Joey garbles, ‘I wuv chothlate,’ with a sticky mouthful.
In front of him, the Maestro whispers in ice.
‘You are to play first,’ she says, ‘and then next is your uncle and the true performance of this evening. I refuse to be embarrassed by you, Junge, do you hear me? I know this piece is inside you.’ She jabs a finger at his skull. ‘There will be consequences if you fail and you will pay. Whatever it takes. I will not be made a fool.’
Pay. Consequences.
Pain.
Beck says, ‘I’ll do my best.’
‘No.’ The Maestro wraps her useless fingers around his arm and draws him close, close, so the ice falls down his neck and his lungs fill with glaciers. ‘You will do better, or …’ Her voice hardens. ‘Or I will break your hands.’
Beck jerks away, the glacier splintering, stabbing his heart.
Would she? Is it a threat of desperation and fury?
Or
would
she?
Beck tucks his hands behind his back.
‘Go play.’ The Maestro gives a dismissive wave.
He takes himself to the piano. She would do it. She would.
How could he let her?
How could he stop her?
Beck stands beside Jan without realising he got there. The crowd hushes and several lights dim.
Jan raises a hand for silence and then, in the hush, he says, ‘Willkommen! Ladies and gentlemen, friends and associates and, of course, willkommen to the guests of honour – my dear sister, my niece and finally my nephew, who will play for us this evening.’
There’s a gentle wave of applause. They swim before him, like his icy insides are melting and he’s being forced to swim. His head is gone, gone, gone.
The clapping subsides and Jan continues. ‘My nephew, named after the famous Beethoven –’ his German accent caresses the well-known name ‘– will be performing two études for us this evening. Then I have a concerto to share with you, my friends. My nephew is a prodigy of the piano and considers returning to Germany to study from the greats.’
Applause again.
Beck didn’t know he was considering. He thought he was either being picked or dismissed. He wonders if, perhaps, the Maestro hasn’t been relaying what Jan says.
‘I do thank you,’ Jan says, ‘for honouring me with your presence on my brief Australian tour. Many thanks to our host, Audwin Denzel, for providing his home for this musical rendition.’ He leans towards Beck and whispers, ‘Would you like to announce your piece?’
Beck seems to have lost his wits. He’ll probably find them at some point. But right now, he’s blinking furiously as the crowd transforms into a sea of sharks with hungry eyes. He forces his brain to the Chopin. Remember it, remember it. The Maestro won’t let him live past a second bout of stage fright. He knows those études, the notes are burned to his bones.
He’ll do this, he can do it. He’s not going to fail. He takes a deep breath.
And then he sees her.
Why – what –
how is she here?
Her dress is a wispy green, her feet confusingly shod in silver high heels, and her hair is braided with silver ribbons. She looks comfortable, excited, sitting beside her parents, and her eyes are only for him.
August burns with admiration.
She can’t be here. This isn’t the place for her. She belongs in the stars with a turtle on her lap and Twice Burgundy in her ears. Not here. If she sees him, she’ll know.
She’ll know how much he hates music. How scared of it he is. How it controls his life.
Vaguely, he’s aware of Jan announcing the Chopin études in the wake of Beck’s silence, and then, with a gentle but firm push, he sends Beck towards the piano. August is gone from his vision. He only sees the rows of piano teeth and wonders if they’ll devour him.
Jan’s voice is in his ear. ‘Are you all right?’
He has to be. He has no choice.
He has to play perfectly.
As answer, he slips on to the cushioned stool and his fingers glide across the keys. How can something so terrifying be so beautiful?
How can his future depend on seven minutes on the piano?
Why couldn’t he be more than this?
He has to stop thinking of the Maestro’s threats. Think of something else. Think of – August. He imagines the hammock, the galaxies painted like glitter across the black sky above, her kiss that stole his heartbeat.
Beck’s fingers tremble into the keys for the first few bars – and then he plays the fire and wild dancing passion of Chopin.
He plays perfectly.
Except for one note.
For seven suffocating minutes, Beck plays those études. Notes tangle at a thousand kilometres an hour, complicated, exact, powerful. Those minutes crack his ribcage and pry music out of his soul like his life depends on it.
And then –
fumble.
He launches for the finale, for the chord that will linger across the room – but when his fingers land, it’s wrong.
Dissonant. One incorrect note and his world falls to ashes.
Beck snaps his hands away, panicked, hot with terror. Howcouldhedothat? He’s never made that mistake before. Does he replay the ending? Does he try again for the last chord? But he can’t – a professional musician ignores his mistakes.
But –
no.
His shoulders hunch.
He nearly doesn’t notice the cascade of applause behind him, and it takes him a second to remember to stand, to bow. His face is beetroot. How can they even clap for that? He looks for August, but the mass of faces blur and he feels dizzy with the effort of staying on earth.
But he can see the Maestro just fine.
Joey stands on a chair and claps furiously, pausing to whoop, which is as flattering as it is embarrassing.
And the Maestro? She doesn’t clap. For once her hands don’t even shake as she curls them into fists. Her eyes shine with furious tears.
How dare she cry.
Beck moves away from the piano. He feels like he just swam through a frozen river and each step is a sluggish effort. He wants to throw up. Or combust. He takes the seat beside Joey and waits for his heartbeat to calm, for his senses to return. He’s dimly aware of more music as Jan begins to play – light and cheeky at first, and then cascading down into a waterfall of swift, passionate notes. Beck can’t focus. He doesn’t even react when Joey whispers, far too loudly, in his ear, ‘You’re my bestest brother,’ and gives him a chocolate-smeared hug.
He just stares at his hands.
Even when it’s over, when Jan has finished his thirty-minute concerto and the crowd is milling once more, Beck is still rooted in his stupor. He smiles at blurred faces and repeats the name of his piece half a million times. He knows his palms are sweaty, his trousers ridiculously short, and his attention gone – but what they think no longer seems important. Not with the reality of the Maestro’s threats crushing his lungs.
He knows what is coming.