Have I already told you that I call my parents the weekend hippies? It always makes them laugh; I think it’s a label they’re quite proud of. They’re very easygoing and probably overindulgent where I’m concerned, but they work hard during the week at jobs that call for a lot of discipline, so they make it a rule for us all to let our hair down at weekends. I’m not allowed to be at most of their parties, it’s all too grown-up for me, they say, but I’m usually in the house so I know what’s going on. They smoke a lot of weed and trip out on acid, and everyone seems happy and in love so they take off their clothes and have orgies.
They are surprised and thrilled when I tell them I want to learn the piano. I haven’t shown any interest in it before, but that doesn’t matter; all that does is the satisfaction of knowing I’m happy at school and focused on doing well even in subjects I’ve shown little aptitude for in the past. They are keen for me to explore every avenue that’s open to me, and aren’t at all judgmental or disappointed when things don’t turn out so well. We know already that I’m never going to be an athlete, or a scientist; I probably won’t make much of a pianist either, but they consider it a wonderful skill to have even if I’m not going to be the next Clara Schumann. Everyone agrees with that—it was discussed among their guests during the weekend I broached the subject—and before I returned to school on the Sunday evening many piano recitals were played on the new stereomaster that Daddy bought for Mummy’s birthday. It looks like a small sideboard and has taken the place of Grandma’s old writing desk in the niche to one side of the marble fireplace.
The question of who is to teach me was never in doubt. My parents have met Sir on visits to the school and were as charmed by him as they are by anyone who has kind things to say about their daughter. (I don’t think Sir ever utters a bad word about anyone, it’s not in his nature, but his praise for me is fulsome enough for my parents to feel certain he’ll do a magnificent job of bringing out any hidden talent I might have.)
“Have you got a crush on him?” Mummy asked when she came into my room to help me pack for the return to school. She’s lovely and willowy, eyes deep, dark pools of dreaminess, wide lips always slanting toward a smile. “I know I would have if I were you,” she confides with a laugh that seems to float on her perfumed breath.
I tell her I might have if he weren’t so old and she laughs again. “He can’t even be thirty yet,” she gently scolds. I don’t tell her he’s twenty-five because I see no reason to. She comes to clasp my face between her delicate hands and gazes into my eyes. Her own aren’t fully focused, which tells me she’s stoned, but I’m used to her being that way and usually love her even more when she is. “Do you think we should invite him to one of our weekend parties?” she whispers mischievously. “Would you like that?”
Knowing I’d rather keep him to myself than share him with my parents’ promiscuous friends, I say, “The taxi should be here any minute.”
She laughs and hugs me close. “You’re a beautiful girl, my darling, probably more beautiful than you know, but you will soon and when you do you’ll begin to understand how powerful you are. Don’t squander that power; use it wisely and you’ll make all your dreams come true.”
During the journey back to school I sit staring at the passing countryside, thinking over her words, and trying to understand what they really mean. Was there something tucked away in between them that I’m not clever enough to catch? We’ve had plenty of chats about intimate things; in fact, thanks to their parties, I know quite a lot about sex without ever having experienced it. I’ve even been invited to join in on occasion, but Daddy is having none of that.
“This is for the grown-ups,” he tells me, sending me back to bed, “and you’re not there yet, my angel.”
“Your first time,” Mummy sometimes says when we’re lying together on her bed chilling out to Cream or Hendrix or the Doors, “has to be special and with someone who matters to you and cares about the way he takes your most precious gift.”
“Did Daddy take yours?” I ask.
She smiles and stretches like a cat. “Yes, my darling, he did and we both treasure that truth, that memory almost as much as we treasure you.”
There’s so much to think about on my return journey, much of which I don’t really understand even though I think I do.
Now here I am in the music room with Sir having my first private lesson. School has finished for the day so everyone else is either in the dorms or at their own after-hours activity leaving this wing of the main block quite quiet. Sir is sitting beside me at the piano showing me how to find middle C and explaining its importance. His voice is soft and low, and I wonder if he knows the real reason I’ve asked for these lessons.
I listen closely to what he’s telling me, catching the words in a web of understanding that is uncomplicated and complex at the same time. I ask questions such as “Is middle C always played with the right thumb,” and “Why does the scale begin with C and not A?”
He smiles at that and says, “I’ve never tried to find out the reasoning behind the keyboard being set up the way it is, but I can tell you it was invented by an Italian, Bartolomeo Cristofori in the sixteen hundreds.”
“Bartolomeo Cristofori,” I echo in a whispery attempt at an accent, and as my eyes go to his a smile remains on his lips even though he blushes and looks away.
I’m not sure why he blushes, but I think I do too.
He puts a sheet of music on the stand in front of me and points out middle C so that I can see how it appears between the five lines. I look at his hand, his long fingers and short, clean nails. I follow it as he reaches across me to begin playing a scale, his hand cupping as though, he explains, he is holding a ball. I can feel his chest close to my arm, his breath on my hair. My heart is beating hard, and I wonder if he can hear it over the notes he’s playing. On E he tucks his thumb under his fingers to reach F, and on the way he back he crosses his middle finger over his thumb at the same place to end smoothly back on C. It’s simple and almost tuneless, and yet this is the foundation, the start of everything he is going to teach me.
He encourages me to play the scale myself, and a hint of humor comes into his voice as he tells me to relax my thumb. I press the keys awkwardly at first, but then experience a childlike pleasure as I travel steadily through the eight notes and back again.
I hope he’s pleased by my dexterity. As I look at him to check the door opens and Mrs. Green, the new English teacher, comes in. She asks if she can have a word with him out in the corridor, so he tells me to practice the scale again until he comes back.
I’m not worried that there might be something going on between them because Mrs. Green is at least as old as my grandma and has a hairy wart on her chin. And she’s married, although that probably wouldn’t count for anything if she were young and attractive.
I think about asking Sir if he’s married, but I know I won’t. Mandy Gibbons is sure he has a girlfriend, but I think she’s making it up, because how would she know?
I play the C major scale again, slowly at first, bringing flexibility into my fingers and thumb, then I go faster and faster making my fingers fly over the keys like a practiced musician. When I stop abruptly the notes take a moment to fade into silence, which isn’t silence at all, because many sounds are drifting in through the open windows. A netball game in the distance, a car driving away, girls laughing, footsteps, a radio playing “Hurdy Gurdy Man.” I can smell the grass, fresh and sweet, and feel the penetrating gaze of classical composers watching me from the walls of the room. Mozart appearing pleased with himself; Beethoven looking slightly mad; Vivaldi a bit female; Debussy handsome and not unlike Sir.
I wonder what’s taking so long, but then the door opens and he comes back apologizing and making a joke that I don’t really understand, but I laugh because he does.
He returns to the chair that’s next to my stool and I play the scale again, quickly and fluidly as though I’ve known it all along.
“You’re a natural,” he tells me and we laugh again.
I want to touch him, and at the same time I’m terrified that he might touch me. If he does I shall start to shake and the sensations throbbing like bass notes at the join of my thighs will explode.
“Will you play?” I ask him.
He looks surprised.
“I don’t mean scales, I mean something by one of them.” I wave toward the long-dead men in the posters.
“But how are you going to learn if I do the playing?” he asks lightly.
I can’t tell him that I want to watch his hands moving over the keys, his body swaying and his eyes closing as the music transports him to a place of pleasure. I don’t even know how to put it into words, but it’s what I want.
When I look at him he seems confused, but there’s more. I catch the slight tremble of his lower lip as he traps it between his teeth. A kind of energy flows between us like music, gentle chords and scales that only we can feel or hear. I think he’s reading my mind, I can sense the thoughts going to him, reaching him like a song.
He knows why I’ve asked for this private tuition. We both do.
His eyes drop to my mouth and I think he’s going to kiss me.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” he asks quietly.
I know he could mean the lessons, but he doesn’t.
My voice catches like a quaver on a whisper as I say, “Yes.”