The Facts and Fictions of Minna Pratt (11 page)

They smile at each other and do it for Porch then, as a final gift, their eyes clamped shut, Minna grinning.

Porch teaches them how to stand and bow from the waist together. He conducts them like a symphony.

“You play well together. You must take your final bow well together.”

He beams.

One day
.

“
I
will miss them,” says Minna's mother about the frogs. “Especially these two.”

“They like music,” says Minna's father.

“They
love
my stories,” says her mother wistfully.

Lucas smiles.

“It's time they went into the pond, where they'll be happy. They're growing up.”

Minna's mother lifts her eyebrows at him.

Lucas has this day freed most of the frogs. Minna counts nine remaining, counting Morose and Sly, her mother's favorites. Minna, Lucas, and Willie have driven with Twig to park ponds around the city, Willie refusing to sit in front.

“Slow down here, Twig,” he calls out from the backseat. “For heaven's sake!”

“My mother says Twig drives in a brisk manner,” says Lucas.

“Hush up, the two of you, or drive yourself,” answers Twig, having it out with a taxi driver who suddenly looks over, brakes, and grins at her.

Three park ponds in all they've visited, Lucas gently pushing the frogs to the edges. He does not seem sad, not even angry at his parents.

“They're going to give us a reception backstage after the competition,” he says. “Win or lose, they say. That's a bit of a fuss, don't you think? For them.”

Minna nods.

“Lucas?” she says, staring at the water. She can see their reflections there. “You wanted them to find the frogs. Didn't you?”

There was a pause.

“Maybe,” says Lucas finally. “I knew they would someday.” He pushes a frog to the edge of the grass. “Go on. Into the pond, you alien creature.”

The frog jumps in, making a small splash. Their reflections turn wavery.

“Only one alien creature left in your house now,” says Minna, her arms around her knees.

“Who?” asks Lucas.

“You,” says Minna.

Lucas smiles and takes the last two frogs out of their glass aquarium. Morose and Sly.

“Not so,” says Lucas. “My father and mother yelled at each other this morning.” Lucas looks pleased. “My father threw a book in the living room. My mother said the frogs had heard me play more than they had.” Lucas puts Morose and Sly on the grass by the water.

“They said I could keep these two,” he says after a moment.

Minna looks up, surprised.

“But it is time to let them go,” says Lucas, turning to look at Minna. “
My
choice,” he adds.

Lucas smiles and in the silence, one after the other, the last of his frogs slip into the water and away.

The day
. Minna has wished for sunlight, but the day is not sunny. It is not even nice. Minna wakes to sheets of rain against her window. Wind whips the small trees outside. She can barely see across the street. Minna slips out of bed, padding barefoot down the hall to her mother's writing room. The room, clean after the frogs' departure, is beginning to look cluttered again. Minna sees a laundry basket with an array of socks inside. She bends down to look more closely. She smiles. All the socks are white. No stripes. There is a strange comfort in that, and in the beginnings of another mess.

“Minna?” Her mother comes into the room. “Dad's driving you early. Nervous?”

Minna shakes her head.

They look at the shelves where the frogs have been. Then Minna looks at her mother's sign:
FACT AND FICTION ARE DIFFERENT TRUTHS.
There is something here I almost know, thinks Minna. I am beginning to remember.

“Minna,” says her mother softly, holding out a folded paper. “Read what came in the mail today.”

Minna unfolds the letter and reads:

Minna smiles.

“What did you answer?” asks Minna after a moment.

“Dear Robert,” begins her mother, “some of them are and some of them are not. But they are
all
true.”

Minna nods. She looks at her mother's typewriter for a long time. She reaches out to touch the keys.

“How did you know?” she asks after a moment.

“A crooked
r
,” says her mother. “I know my typewriter very well. I also,” she adds, putting her arm around Minna, “know you and your truths very well. Whatever name you use.”

There is more comfort in the kitchen. Minna's father has lost his glasses. He searches through the rubble of the kitchen counter, in the drawers among the silverware, as Minna's mother bangs into breakfast.

McGrew hums at the table as he eats his cereal. On his lap, out of sight of his parents, is a newspaper with the headline:
HOUSEWIFE CAN'T STOP EATING CATERPILLARS
.

The phone rings. McGrew answers.

“What?” he says, folding his newspaper into his literature book.

“It's Emily Parmalee,” he says to them. “She wonders if she can wear cleats to the concert. They're new,” he adds.

“No,” says Minna's father, joyfully rescuing his glasses from the dish drainer. “Tell her plain old shoes will be fine.”

“No,” sings McGrew into the telephone and hangs up.

Breakfast is scorched scrambled eggs and orange juice with frozen lumps that haven't dissolved. Minna smiles all through it.

There are rumblings of thunder and lightning as Minna dresses for the concert. Minna bends down to give her cello a pat before she zips it into its canvas case. She hoists it on her hip and goes to meet her father.

Downstairs Emily Parmalee is wearing a blue dress to which she has sewn sequins in odd places. She wears old shoes and the largest diamond stud earrings that Minna has ever seen. Minna peers closely at them.

“Fake,” says Emily. She hands Minna a sealed envelope. “McGrew and I have a special message in this envelope that you should read just before you play.”

Minna smiles at both of them and puts it in her skirt pocket.

“Remember,” sings McGrew.

“I'll remember.”

“Ready?” asks her father. He takes her cello and picks up an umbrella.

“Ready,” says Minna.

And they race outside into the storm.

Backstage is filled with noise and instruments and musicians wandering nervously with music in their hands. Mrs. Willoughby-Fiske is not smiling, though Porch is. He herds Minna over to Imelda, who is peering over someone's shoulder at the music.

“Oh my dear,” says Imelda. “Haydn's Opus 20. Four flats!”

Lucas comes wearing a suit with the sleeves a bit short. He looks at Minna.

“Well?”

“No,” says Minna. “No vibrato.”

Orson appears with his hair sleeked and shiny like a bowling ball. Minna can see the shape of his head for the very first time.

The big windows of the waiting room rattle in the wind, and the lights dim for a moment, then are bright again. Everyone quiets.

Mrs. Willoughby-Fiske arrives with their numbers, a long tumble of pearls falling over her chest like a mountain climber's rope.

“You are number ten,” she says, looking intently at each of them. She holds up two hands, ten fingers, then disappears to hold up other numbers to other quartets.

“Last,” says Porch happily as he tunes Imelda's violin. “Good position. Memorable. Make sure that last chord is in tune!” He finishes with Imelda's violin and reaches for Minna's cello. “This weather is not terrific for tuning,” he mutters to her. “I'll tune you now, but I'll be out front. You'll have to make sure that you stay tuned.”

A rush of wind and rain hits the windows and they all look up. Someone laughs nervously. Another in the corner bursts into tears. She has lost her music. There is a flurry of talk. Someone rushes out.

“Good-bye, good luck,” says Porch, and before they can say anything he is gone.

“Number one,” intones Mrs. Willoughby-Fiske and the room quiets. She holds up one finger.

It is time.

The room is eerily silent except for the wind and rain and the crashes of thunder with lightning afterward. The lights flicker.

“There was lightning and thunder just as Beethoven died,” says Imelda as they all walk to the window. “It is said that he arose from his deathbed, shaking his fist at it, then he fell back dead.”

“Thank you for that,” says Orson, and they laugh.

Slowly, one after another, the quartets leave and return with bursts of talk.

“You were flat,” says a violinist.

“I know,” moans the cellist. “My end pin slipped. I nearly fell over my cello into the audience.” Laughter.

“Lucas?” says Minna. They are leaning against the wall by the window, Minna's cello lying at her feet.

“What?” Lucas turns to look at her. His face is close to hers, so close that she can feel his breath on her cheek.

“Why are we doing this?”

Lightning flashes. The lights dim again. Lucas grins at her.

“Because we love it,” he says simply.

“Have we always known that?” whispers Minna.

“Number ten,” announces Mrs. Willoughby-Fiske.

They follow Mrs. Willoughby-Fiske out into the hall and through a dark hallway until they come to a door with a tiny window.

“Wait here,” she says, “until I call you.”

She opens the door and for a moment they hear the sound of music onstage. It is Haydn.

“Too slow,” says Orson in a low voice. “At least we play to tempo.”

Minna puts her hand in her skirt pocket and there, forgotten until now, is the envelope.

“Hold this,” Minna whispers to Lucas, handing him her cello. “It's a note from Emily Parmalee and McGrew. They told me to open it just before we play.”

Carefully, Minna opens the envelope. There is a folded sheet of paper inside. She holds it up to the exit light.

“What does it say?” asks Lucas.

“It says . . .” She grins suddenly. “It says . . .”

The door opens. Four silent musicians file out after Mrs. Willoughby-Fiske.

“Come now,” she says to them.

“It says,” repeats Minna, “the opera's not over 'til the fat lady sings.”

They walk onstage smiling.

N
o one has prepared Minna for the applause. The noise surrounds her as she stands and bows with the others. Imelda and Orson look startled, too. Only Lucas stands calmly in the din, smiling slightly as if he awakens each day with it. They sit to the rustlings of the audience, the coughs, the sneezes. Minna sees her mother and father, Porch just in front, Emily Parmalee and McGrew smiling at her. Willie and Twig are on the aisle next to Mr. and Mrs. Ellerby. McGrew points down the row of seats and Minna looks. It is Lewis, the bus driver, wearing round glasses and a suit, studying his program.

Minna finds a crack in the wooden floor for her end pin. They tune softly, Lucas stopping to turn a peg. The lights dim, then brighten. The audience quiets. Imelda lifts her bow. There is a tiny beading of sweat on her upper lip. She nods. And they begin.

It is a bit like dying, Minna thinks, or so she's heard. All the things she must remember, all the things she has learned pass by in her mind's eye: the fortes, the pianissimos, the difficult bowing parts she has checked in pencil on her music, the fingering. She nearly forgets the first repeat, somehow. Lucas, next to her, looks at her and smiles because he knows it. The allegro ends, and someone in the balcony applauds and is quickly hushed by a sister, a brother, a wife. Imelda smiles. Orson tunes. Minna takes a breath.
The andante
. Minna waits through her measures of rests, looking out to find Porch. But she can't see him in the dark. Minna smiles at this; places her bow on the strings. Begins. Strangely, Minna thinks about it later, the andante seems to come from her fingers for the very first time, not from her head. Her fingers stretch without her telling them to stretch. They have learned the music. They know Mozart. Some hairs come loose from Orson's bow, and they trail like threads of silver in the light as he plays. She remembers to repeat. And then, two measures from the end of the coda, where Minna feels nearly safe, the lights go out.

There is a gasp from the audience, a bustle from backstage, a loud noise as something falls to the floor. A flashlight. The audience murmurs become louder as they finish the last chord of the coda.

No one says it. Not one of them asks what to do. They know.
Play no matter what
.

“Ready?” asks Imelda.

“Yes,” says Orson.

A small light suddenly appears in the wings.

“Yes,” says Lucas.

“Min?”

“Ready.”

“Play,” says Imelda.

They do not start together, but no one else knows. Three measures into the presto the audience quiets. Minna grins in the darkness.
You can play the presto with your eyes closed, I bet
. And they can. Lucas laughs once beside her, and at the last crescendo Minna thinks about the final two chords.
Play them in tune
. They do.

The applause comes at the same moment, surprising them all again. The lights come on—
too late or maybe not
—and they rise clumsily by their chairs. And it is over. The audience is on its feet, applauding and shouting. The house lights go on and at last Minna sees Porch, standing, too.

Lucas leans over close to Minna.

“Was that a small vibrato at the very end of the andante?” he asks, his voice loud over the noise of the applause.