In the late afternoon a distant bank of dark clouds gives us our first hint we're going to lose our good camping weather By early evening the sky is heavily overcast, the temperature is dropping rapidly, and we're feeling a few drops of rain. We eat dinner quickly, and I help Dad wrap the food bag in plastic and hoist it out of reach of animals.

Then, chilly and with nothing left to do, we all retreat to our sleeping bags.

I try to read but don't have enough light to see decently, and as soon as I put my book down, Amy says, "Tell me about Ben."

"You've got his picture, so you know what he looks like."

"But what's he like?"

"Well, he's my age. Really nice. Really talented. Really busy."

"He looks Chinese in his picture."

"Vietnamese, or half anyway. That's what his mom is."

Amy thinks about that. "Have you met her?"

"Just once, when Ben's folks traveled to New York to hear him play. They can't afford to live there and also pay for his school and music."

"Then who does Ben live with?"

"Officially he stays with a cousin, but he lives with some other guys."

Amy's eyes widen. "With nobody to be the boss of him?"

"Nobody." I throw her a sideways glance. "He's got just himself to see he gets his schoolwork and practicing done, plus laundry and cooking and rounding up paying gigs."

"Oh," Amy says, sounding more impressed and less envious. "I don't think I'd like that."

"Me, either" I tell her.

Then my face gets warm as I consider how my leaving New York the way I did might seem to someone who has to work so hard to be there. Probably Ben wouldn't think I'm ungrateful, but somebody else might.

Amy says, "Mom and I were on our own when she went back to school."

"Where was your dad?"

"He was gone and we didn't need him. Anyway, Bop says I'm his girl now."

Amy turns to face me, propping herself up on one elbow, and in a suddenly worried voice she asks, "Do you mind?"

"No," I answer realizing that I really don't.

"Good," she says, lying back down again. "We're pillow talking, aren't we?"

"I guess, if you can call rolled-up sweatshirts pillows."

"Like at a sleepover."

"I guess," I repeat. "I've never been to one."

"Why not?"

"There wasn't time Not with academic school on weekdays and music school on Saturdays and then home-work and practicing."

"Whoa!" Amy says. "You went to school on Saturday? You went to two schools? I wouldn't. Nobody could make me. It's probably against the law. Did you tell your mom that?"

"It's against the law not to go to school, not the other way around," I tell her.

"But..." Amy twists her fingers, crossing one over another "Didn't you ever have time for fun?"

"Maybe not the kind of fun you're thinking of; but, yes. A lot."

"I don't see how. Why didn't you just quit your violin? I mean, a long time ago?"

"Because I love playing it."

I want to explain more, but I doubt she'd understand.

Anyway, I wouldn't know how to tell her what it's like to wake up in the morning hardly able to wait to take your violin from its case because the few hours that you were sleeping were a long time not to have it in your hands.

And how could I explain about Saturdays and music school? About how included—almost embraced—you can feel in the moments before orchestra practice begins, when you're tuning and warming up, and all around you other musicians are doing the same thing.

Some days you hold your breath watching for the baton downstroke that will set a hundred instruments playing together You don't want to be an instant late plunging in; don't want to miss an instant of being carried along on sound that comes from every side and up from your violin, along your jawbone, to your ear.

When you go home at the dark end of a winter afternoon, after you've gone to music classes and ensemble and orchestra and maybe had a private lesson, you're so keyed-up weary you can hardly eat your dinner.

And then there's still more practicing to do. And tired as you are, you get on it, because maybe this night will be one of the special ones. A night when your violin comes to life in your hands and everything you play comes out better and better When the music flies and you fly with it, higher and better and faster until you're playing more beautifully than you ever have.

A night like that, you want to keep going forever.

That's what I want to explain to Amy. But her sputtering breath makes me think she's gone to sleep, and so I don't struggle to find words for what I could say more easily with my violin. Instead, I repeat to mysel£ "Because I love it."