Mozart’s home was also a museum, so while my father stood outside to talk to his new guy, I wandered around the halls of what had once been Mozart’s home, thinking about how cool it was to literally be walking in the footsteps of one of the greatest musicians and famous people in the history of the world.
At one point I glanced out the window to see the man my father was speaking to. I had to admit, the new guy was pretty hot. My friend Landen would have called him “GQ as fuck!” He was tall, dark hair, a rugged face. He was in a black pea coat, dark slacks, his hair slicked back. He was debonair and didn’t look like an attorney. I’d pictured a doughy man with glasses and a brief case when I thought attorney. This man could have been a model. He was also incredibly intense. He was listening to my father speak, his gaze laser focused on whatever he was saying. I would have guessed he was probably about thirty. Maybe younger, maybe older. It was hard for me to guess men’s ages. Besides, I only paid attention to guys my own age.
But this one was hard not to look at. Or imagine certain scenarios with…
I turned away from the window and wandered around some more. I had stopped to look at Mozart’s childhood violin when my father joined me, finally. They’d been speaking for over half an hour.
“Sorry, sweetheart,” he wrapped his arm around my shoulder and kissed my head. “Took a little longer than I thought it would.”
“Is all okay?” I asked.
“Oh yes. All is well,” he said, smiling. But there was something in his eyes that told me different.
“Handsome guy, your new guy,” I said as we walked toward the next exhibit. “Sorry, I had to take a peek.”
My father laughed, “Oh Lord, Camilla. You sounded so grown up just now. Don’t grow up on me too fast.”
We walked around some more but I was growing bored, and my father seemed distracted by something.
“So why bring me here?” I finally asked him. “I know there’s a lesson in everything we do.”
Dad nodded, “Yes. Very true. Well, I’m a big fan of Wolfgang. You know, he was born to a musician. His father, Leopold. From the time Mozart existed, his destiny was laid out before him. Yes, he was a genius, but to be immersed in something is to make it anything but a choice. Mozart was composing at 4 years old. He went on tours by 6 years old. His genius is undeniable, but it’s always made me sad in a way, how he was never given a chance to pursue anything else.” My father’s face grew sad for a moment.
“Dad,” I said. “He’s Mozart. One of the great geniuses of our time. I don’t think he minded. Like you said, if something is your destiny, it’s going to happen either way. There’s no other choice.”
“Maybe so,” Dad replied. “You know, his rival, Salieri, used to say Mozart was in direct contact with God. Because he could compose so quickly and beautifully, like God Himself was dictating the notes to Mozart. He was definitely touched by something. Every time I come here, I think of that. Of destiny, of whether everything is predetermined.”
It was an odd conversation to be having with him. There were layers to it that I couldn’t see. What we were talking about wasn’t really what we were talking about.
“I don’t think so,” I said. “Nothing is predetermined. We get to choose. I plan on choosing what I want to do with my life. I haven’t figured it out yet, but I know when I do, it won’t be because of anything but my own volition.”
My father looked at me, surprised. As if he was seeing me for the first time.
“Camilla, that makes me proud to hear you say that,” he said. “Yes. Choose your life. Make it what you want it to be. It’s a lesson I wish I had learned earlier. That I had choices. That I didn’t have to do what was asked of me or expected.”
“What do you mean?” I asked. We were on the edge of a breakthrough. I could feel it.
My father paused for a long moment. I could tell he was mulling over something.
“Another time,” he finally said. “We will talk about that further down the road. Just know I am proud of you, Camilla. And I always will be.”
Four
I was thinking about that trip to Austria as I flew on a private plane for the second time in my life, across the country to Tahoe. Everything Nolan Weston told me had worked out smoothly. I’d packed, been picked up in a black SUV, and been taken to the small private airport in Charlottesville where a Gulfstream jet awaited me.
And now I was trying not to cry thinking about talking to my father about Mozart when I was sixteen years old. And how we’d never gone back to the topic of destiny or how my father had been talked into his own, long before I even existed. And we never would. It broke my heart.