What I didn’t know then, didn’t know for years, because they kept it from me, was that initially one of the city’s newspapers had tried to make something of the fact that I happened to be in the bank at the same time my father put down the briefcase. And how could I know, they asked, that it contained a bomb. This was back in a time before the media worked in concert and chewed people up and spit them out largely for the fun of it; therefore, the assault wasn’t unanimous.
When journalists at the other two major newspapers sought more details from police, they learned that my father had abandoned us and divorced my mother, that for a long while, our family and a friend of the family had been suspicious of his activities and of the people with whom he consorted. Among police officials participating in a press conference, Detective Nakama Otani declared that without the help of the Bledsoe family—my mother had reverted to her maiden name—they would at this point have not a clue to the identity of those who had perpetrated the First National horror. He also said that if I hadn’t been there, if I hadn’t glimpsed my father, those in the bank would have had no chance to flee or to take shelter, resulting in a much higher death count. “The boy could have run and saved himself, but he tried to save others,” Detective Otani said. “And for his bravery, he will never walk again.” After that, even the offending newspaper joined with the others to declare me a hero.
My mother and grandfather had impressed upon everyone from the nurses to all of our friends that were I to learn I’d been declared a villain and then a hero, the knowledge would do me no good and might cause emotional and psychological harm. We were but a family of musicians, entertainers, and we wanted applause not for doing the right thing in a moment of stress, which anyone might have done, but for hitting the right notes in the right order and with a dash of style.
Mom and Grandpa Teddy were so wise. Considering my guilt and sorrow, I might have taken refuge in the label HERO, and worse than refuge—satisfaction. I know myself well enough to realize that such a choice was within my character to make. Such high self-regard at an early age would have warped my life perhaps no less than did paraplegia.
That Thursday when I came home, the piano remained in the front room, though a new bench had been constructed. The seat of it matched the dimensions of the previous bench; however, a padded back had been added. As I eventually discovered, I would need years to be a hundred percent confident of my balance when sitting forward on an armless chair, let alone on a bench without either a back or arms. Happily, having grown in the past two years, I didn’t need to resort to my butt-slide technique to increase my keyboard reach, because that would no longer be a trick I could perform.
My grandfather had modified his beloved Steinway to an extent that uglified it a little, which made my heart sink. With admirable cleverness, he had devised a way for me to use the damper, una corda, and sostenuto pedals even now that my feet were useless to me. He had taken off the fallboard, leaving the keys permanently exposed, and he had drilled into the casing behind it to install three controls similar to the draw knobs—or stops—on an organ. Each one controlled a wire strung tautly through two pulleys behind the lyre and down to the pedal, which he had extended through the back of the lyre base. Pulling on a knob engaged the pedal function; pushing it released the pedal. Not elegant, not ideal, but workable, he assured me. Even if I wanted to play something as formal as Mozart, I would have to do so with some degree of improvisation, to allow a free hand to quickly push or pull the draw knob when needed.
Or otherwise, perhaps I could use the extensions to the knobs, which he had put to one side until then. With some nervousness, his voice as solemn as his face, he showed them to me. The extensions brought the grab knobs over the keyboard and about ten inches above it. They were sheathed in rubber, so that by craning my neck just a little as I played, I could pull a knob with my teeth, push it in with my chin.
“It works, it really does,” Grandpa said with sober conviction. “Oh, sure, you’ll need to get the hang of it, you’ll be frustrated for a while. But I’ve practiced with them, developed a technique. I think I can teach it to you pretty quickly. It’s not elegant, it’s not ideal—”
When I chimed in, “—but it’s workable,” he looked uncertain for a moment, saw that I was not despairing, and smiled broadly.