Starry-Eyed (33 page)

“And . . . I wished you hadn't died at the end.”

Tamia narrows her eyes as if she's searching for a hidden meaning in
my comment. There's no hidden meaning, though—it's just as stupid as it sounds.

I flatten the music against the stand just for something to do. Then, so I won't have to say anything else, I begin to play.

The song opens with a piano introduction that sounds difficult but fits neatly under my fingers. Still, it's always a strange moment, the beginning of a collaboration. It's how I imagine a first date must be. Feeling each other out, trying to work out how much is too much, too fast, too soon.

“Faster,” she says.

I stop playing. I'd only reached the third measure. “What?”

“You need to go faster.”

I point to the music. “It says
mässig
. That's, like,
moderato
. A medium tempo, right?”

“We have a four-minute time limit. They'll cut us off if we go over.”

“Oh. So why are you singing this piece at all?”

“My teacher, Bethany, chose it. I like Schubert
lieder
, and she thinks this one will stretch me. You know, a challenge.” She produces air quotes for the last word.

It'll be a challenge to perform it in under four minutes
. But I keep that to myself.

I start again. My fingers dance across the keys, almost trip in their haste to move along. So much for the music making me sound good. I haven't practiced playing this fast. Now I'm a kid on a bicycle with no brakes, flying downhill, blocking out any thought of where I'll land or how messy it'll be.

It's a relief when Tamia finally joins in.

She's quiet at first, the German poem delivered in hushed, almost secretive tones: about sleeping in the shadow of a linden tree. But as she moves through the second stanza, her voice becomes more focused. When she sings about carving words of love into the trunk, there's a purity to her tone that fills the room even though she's not singing very loudly. She sounds relaxed and in control.

In the middle, the poem turns darker. The music shifts to a minor key.
Finally, things become frantic. She sings about icy winds, and the already too-quick tempo becomes faster still. We're not together anymore. Tamia sounds like she just wants to get the song over with, or worse, as though she doesn't know what the words mean.

We end the song with a reprise of the opening—different words, but same music. But that's not all that has changed. Her heart doesn't seem to be in it anymore.

A piano solo closes the song, but I don't bother playing it. I spend every evening practicing alone in a cavernous room where each chord echoes, and composing music that exists only in my own head. It suits me well, being alone. But now I have an audience, and I don't want Tamia to think I'm wasting her time.

She slides a water bottle from her knit purse. “Okay, then. Thoughts?”

“It was pretty good.”

She takes a swig. “And?”

“I'll need to work on keeping the tempo up. We don't want to get cut off.”

“Agreed.”

There's an awkward pause. “So what did
you
think?” I ask.

She wipes her sleeve across the piano. A cloud of dust rises up. “We weren't together in the middle. Or the beginning. Actually, the end wasn't much better either. You know?”

She looks disappointed. It was just one performance—not even a performance, a
rehearsal
—but Tamia acts like the problems are insurmountable. I don't know what to say to that.

“Okay, then,” she says, filling the silence. “I think we're going to have to watch our balance when we get to the ‘icy winds' bit.” Another pause. “I can't compete if you play that loud,” she says, spelling it out for me.

If she wants faster, I'll give her faster. If she wants quieter, I'll give her quieter. “Let's run it from the top,” I say.

I don't wait for her to reply, just launch into the opening. She has thirty seconds before she has to sing. That should be plenty of time, even
for a perfectionist like Tamia.

When she's about to come in, I look up and make eye contact. Tamia opens her mouth, and closes it again.

I stop after a couple measures. “I think you were supposed to come in there.”

“I know.” She won't look at me. “I'm sorry.”

“For what?”

“The stuff I said just now. I do that a lot. Fill the silences, you know? Mom always says, ‘If you never stop talking, you're bound to say the wrong thing sooner or later.'”

She hesitates and waits for a response. Only, I'm not used to shooting the breeze with girls like Tamia. Or any girls at all, come to think of it. I suspect her mom might be right.

Tamia leans against the piano. “You don't talk much, do you?”

I give a lopsided shrug. “You're the one with the vocal part.”

For a moment, she looks confused. Then her face opens up in a grin, toothy and unselfconscious. “That's actually pretty witty,” she says.

I didn't really mean to be witty, but I like the effect it has on her. She has a cute smile. “Thanks.”

“Okay, then. Now that we know you're witty and insightful, how about you tell me what
I'm
doing wrong?”

“Nothing,” I say.

“Nothing?” She narrows her eyes. “Seriously?”

I can't tell if she's disappointed that I have no criticisms to offer, or if she's disappointed that I'm unwilling to share them. Either way, saying nothing again will not impress her.

“Well,” I begin. “Except for the stuff you already know.”

“And what would that be?”

I swallow hard. “Your voice loses focus at the bottom of your range—it's why you want me to play quieter. In fact, the whole piece is too low for you. I'm guessing this has something to do with Bethany
challenging
you. Problem is, you're holding back. I can't even tell if you like the song—”

“I don't,” she says quickly. “I mean, it's beautiful . . . for other people. Just not me.” She lifts her water bottle but doesn't drink from it. “Bethany does this to me all the time—makes me sing stuff that doesn't sit well. She's really picky. Kind of intimidating too. She always says ‘comfort breeds complacency.'”

“No way! Comfort is what lets you inside a song. Lets you
own
it.”

Tamia sighs. I'm preaching to the choir here.

“What if I transpose it for you?” It would take me a couple hours, but it's easy work, and it's not like I've got a million other things going on besides schoolwork and piano practice. “Put it in a higher key, you know?”

“No. I appreciate it, but you're already doing so much.”

I can tell she means it, but there's something else too. And I think I know what it is. “I get it. You don't want to sing this one in front of all your friends. And you
really
don't want to lose this contest. But you're afraid of annoying Bethany, and auditions for Eastman are coming up soon and you don't want her to give you a bad reference and—”

“Whoa.” She's almost laughing, but not in a nasty way. “Anything positive you can share?”

“Well, your top range is . . . extraordinary.”

The words come easily, teased out by her openness. But once I've said them, we're silent again. It's the right word, but I don't know how she'll react.
Resonant
is a musical term. Even
clear
and
warm
and
rich
are terms we can throw about meaningfully, but not
extraordinary
. It sounds reverential. I'm afraid I've just revealed as much about me as I have her voice.

“You need a song to showcase that range,” I tell her, trying to salvage the situation.

“Right. One with lots of sustained high notes so I can really open up. And maybe a
pianissimo
top A, just to show off.”

“Exactly. You want to win, right? You want people to be floored.”

Belatedly, it occurs to me that maybe she wasn't being serious—doesn't believe such a song can possibly exist. She's wrong about that. Anything is possible in music.

Even though she's dubious, the corner of her mouth twists upward. I've found her weakness, this needs to be the best. “I don't know about winning,” she says. “I just want to beat Kendra Nielson.”

I've noticed Kendra onstage too—petite blonde with an incongruous powerful
mezzo
voice—but I don't mention that. “Your nemesis?”

“Moriarty to my Holmes.” She steps around the piano and stands beside me. Runs a finger soundlessly across the highest keys. “So I suppose you know a piece like that, do you? A song so perfect that it might as well have been written for me? One that even my teacher doesn't know about?” There's a teasing challenge in her voice, like she wants to believe it. Wants to be impressed by me.

“Yeah, I do,” I tell her. And even though it's a white lie, I know that with enough time, I'll make it true.

. . . . .

I peer through the large glass panel in her front door and watch Tamia skip toward me. Literally
skip
. She kicks something to the side—it looks like a giant sausage—which gives me time to admire today's ensemble: denim skirt over black tights, a fluffy cream sweater topped off with a red scarf. Very festive. Very Christmas-y.

That's what happens when we get snow in November.

She opens the door and practically drags me inside. Closes it quickly and shoves the sausage-thing in place. “Keeps the draft out,” she explains. “House is almost a hundred years old, you know?”

“It's a problem.”

“Sure is.”

I take off my jacket and gloves, and she drapes them over a radiator. “So,” she says, “I got the music you sent. Now I can't decide whether to thank you or apologize.”

“Why apologize?”

She shrugs. “I meant it when I said I like Schubert, but I never really
believed there'd be a song that's so
perfect
for me. It must've taken you hours to find.”

It did take hours actually, but I don't want to talk about that.

“That
pianissimo
top A near the end. . . just sublime.”

My cheeks flush. I never imagined she'd be so impressed. “I'm glad you like it.”

“I can't believe Bethany hasn't given it to me before.”

I'm not used to gushy, and I don't think I can get any redder. “Schubert wrote about six hundred songs, right? It's a lot to get through.”

“Well, thanks for finding the one-in-six-hundred song, then.”

“It was my pleasure.”

She opens her eyes comically wide. “Your
pleasure
, huh? Well, then, I match your pleasure with my undying gratitude.” She gives what I think is a curtsy. “Living room's this way.”

She leads me along a narrow hall that splits the one-story house in half. The kitchen is ahead—someone's cooking—and there are closed doors to either side. I wonder which of them is her bedroom.

“That one,” she says, catching me looking.

A woman—her mother, I presume—appears in the kitchen doorway. She's shorter than Tamia, but the resemblance is uncanny. “You must be Cooper.”

“Hi.” I go to shake hands, but she's holding a spatula and bowl. “It's nice to meet you.”

“Likewise. Tamia's been telling me all about you.”

“She has?”

Tamia's mother looks amused. “Yes, Cooper,” she says slowly. “She has.”

Tamia grabs my sleeve and pulls me into the living room. Three boys are fighting over the controls for a video game, but she strides over and turns it off. “Rehearsal time,” she tells them. “So sorry.”

They take the disappointment well—at least until they're out of the room. Then the sound of fighting echoes along the corridor.

I give her a sympathetic look. “Must be pretty tough to have three
brothers, huh?”

“Not really. Means I get my own room.”

Tamia closes the door and shepherds me over to the piano. It's an old Baldwin, probably a family heirloom. The wooden legs are chipped where the boys have banged toys against them. The ivory keys are worn and discolored. I know without pressing a key that it'll be out of tune.

“My grandfather's,” she says, watching me. “He used to accompany us.”

“Us?”

“Mom and Dad and me. We used to sing hymns, chorales, folk songs, that sort of thing. I'd sing soprano, Mom on alto, Dad on bass. Grandpa would fill in the tenor and play the accompaniment.” There's a hint of sadness in her voice.

“Not anymore, though, huh?”

“No. He died, and my brothers aren't big on music.” She brightens again. “It's okay, really. Dad always sang flat, anyway.”