A fly balanced on the edge of the blade, its wings tucked in.
How did it do that?
If he turned the ax and brought it down on the chopping block, he’d cleave the insect in two. If it stayed there, of course. But they never did, those flies. They didn’t stay in one place. Not like he did. Sitting at the piano every day, his father standing behind him, holding a stick that he’d been given by a conductor who was more famous than he was. The stick stung the boy’s fingers.
I make mistakes when I play because I don’t have the music in my fingers like he does, thought the boy.
He liked reading the musical scores. They conjured up pictures and figures, secrets written in a language that he only partially understood. He never let his father watch when he read the scores. That would encourage his father’s dreams, give him hope and make him even more cruel.
His fingers. The ax. The fly.
He blew at it, and it took off buzzing toward the rafters. Then he turned the ax. If he spread his fingers he could see the cuts that had been made in the chopping block. His right hand lay on the uneven surface. He was left-handed and didn’t want to lose any fingers he might need. So he aimed for the little finger and ring finger on his right hand. They were the two least important. It was essential to strike in the right place, not too far up, not too far down. If he chopped off only a little stump, that wouldn’t be enough. He mustered all of his attention.
The ax whistled through the air and struck just under the middle joint of the two fingers. The sound reached his brain before the pain did. Crunching, like the sound of his mother slicing carrots. Then a silent movie began rolling. Two fingers shot up in separate arcs from the chopping block and landed on the damp garage floor. They were like rubber, bouncing away before coming to a halt. Only when they stopped moving did he notice the burning heat in his hand.
Then he heard his father outside.
“If you quit fooling around and really try to play this time, you can come back inside.”
The garage door opened.
His father stood there, motionless, staring at him. At first his face was flat and stiff, like a marble bust. Then he screamed.
His father understood what he’d done.
In the silence after the scream, the big man collapsed. But the boy remained standing there quite calmly, listening to the blood dripping onto the floor. Rhythmically, as if striking the keys of a piano. Music was finally pouring from his fingers.
The fingers. The drops of blood. The floor.
At last those terrible hours at the piano were over.