Uncle Peter’s death remained vivid and depressing, a burden I could not easily unload. Sometimes, I would just stop doing my homework and start crying. Sometimes, I woke up in the middle of the night and pressed my face to my pillow to stifle the tears. My throat ached from holding down my grief. No matter how clear the day, how blue the sky, it looked gray and overcast to me. I spent my free time walking alone, my hands in the pockets of my jeans, my head down. It was even difficult to play the violin, because when I did, it made me think of him and I made mistakes. Mr. Wengrow abruptly ended my first lesson after Uncle Peter’s death and told me I was just not ready to return to my daily life. He was sympathetic and told me grief, especially grief over someone very dear to you, becomes a part of who and what you are and is not easily put aside.
“Give yourself a little more time,” he advised.
I didn’t want him to leave. I was caught between my great sorrow and great guilt, feeling I was letting down Uncle Peter and his memory. Both Daddy and Mommy were very concerned. They both knew that, except for when I had to eat with Grandad, I barely touched my food. Even the simplest of my farm chores became nearly impossible. Uncle Simon was everywhere, covering for me so that Grandad Forman wouldn’t complain. Many times I found my work had already been done before I arrived to do it. I knew it wasn’t fair. Uncle Simon had more to do than most people, even for someone as big and powerful as he was.
The few friends I had at school began to avoid me. I knew why. I knew I was too depressing to them, and there was just so much time they wanted to give my period of mourning. They wanted to talk about their flirtations, their music and television programs, and here I was staring at the lunch table in dark silence, not listening to what they were saying and not caring.
I didn’t watch television or listen to music and had no interest in going to the movies or on trips with anyone who asked, so they stopped asking. I felt like a balloon that had broken loose and was drifting in the wind aimlessly, carried in whatever direction the breeze was going, and slowly sinking into darkness.
Finally, one night when I had wandered off after dinner, Daddy came out to find me. I had gone down to the pond and sat on the small dock, my feet dangling only an inch or so from the inky water. Around me, the peepers were conducting a choral symphony, punctuated occasionally with a splash when a bullfrog leapt into the water. Because of the way the stars danced on the water and the solitude here, the pond was one of Uncle Peter’s and my favorite places.
“Hey,” I heard Daddy say, and turned in surprise to see him walking toward me. “Why aren’t you doing homework or practicing your violin?” he asked when he was beside me.
“I have it all done, Daddy. I did it in study session today.”
“Okay, but I’ve gotten used to hearing that violin,” he said.
I looked out at the dark water.
“Uncle Peter would be pretty upset, after all he did to get you started,” Daddy said softly. “I told you I was going to continue paying for your lessons.”
“I know.” I choked back my tears.
Daddy then did something he had never done before. He sat next to me on the dock, keeping his feet just above the water, too. For a long moment neither of us spoke. The silence seemed to engulf us like a warm blanket. I imagined his arm around my shoulders, just the way Uncle Peter would embrace me occasionally and laugh or try to cheer me up.
“I miss him a great deal, too,” Daddy said. “Every time I hear someone laugh, I turn to see if Peter is coming through a door or over the field toward me. I warned him about doing that crop dusting, but he was so carefree about everything in his life. He just refused to see danger or evil anywhere. He was too pure a spirit.”
“I know,” I said. A fugitive tear started to run down my left cheek. I flicked it off quickly, the way I might flick off a fly.
“However, the last thing Peter would want is for all of us to stop living, too, Honey. You know that, right?”
I nodded.
“It just hurts too much, Daddy. I can’t be anything like Grandad and I don’t want to be,” I said defiantly.
He was silent and then he nodded.
“No, I don’t want you to be like him, either,” he admitted.
“I don’t think he really loves any of us,” I continued.
“I guess he does in his own way, Honey.”
I shook my head.
“You don’t accept terrible things happening to people you love as easily as he does.”
“You don’t know how he mourns or when. He does, in his own way,” Daddy insisted. “It doesn’t do any good to dislike him. It doesn’t bring Peter back. Did you ever hear Peter speak against him?”
“Not in so many words,” I admitted. “But he didn’t approve of him,” I insisted.
“I think he felt sorry for him. That’s the last thing Grandad wants, however,” Daddy warned, “anyone feeling sorry for him.”
Why not? I wondered. What was so terrible about people showing you sympathy?
We were both quiet again. Then Daddy reached out and put his arm around my shoulders.
“I don’t want to see you so unhappy so long, and your mother is very worried about you, Honey,” he said.
“Did she send you out?”
“No, I’m here because I’m just as worried,” he told me.
I relaxed and let my head fall against his shoulder.
“What all this does, Daddy, is make me afraid of ever loving anyone else. It’s like what happened when we lost Kasey Lady.”
I was referring to our beautiful golden retriever, who had eaten some rat poison Grandad set out for rodents in the henhouse.
“Mm,” Daddy said. He loved that dog, too.
“After we buried her, Mommy told you she never wanted to have another animal. She couldn’t take the pain of loss.”
“She’ll change her mind one of these days, or the first time she sets eyes on another cute puppy.
“People lose people all the time, Honey. You can’t stop it and you can’t stop yourself from loving someone. It isn’t like turning the lights on and off. It has its own life, its own power, and sweeps over you.”
“Is that what happened to you, Daddy? Is that why you and Mommy got married?” I asked.
He was quiet and then he laughed.
“No,” he said. “Hardly.”
“What do you mean?”
“Our situation was somewhat reversed. We got married first and then fell in love,” he revealed.
I pulled back and looked up at him.
“I don’t understand. How do you do that?”
“Well, after your grandmother Jennie had died, Grandad Forman decided we needed a woman on the farm. He wasn’t going to remarry. He said he was too old and God didn’t mean for him to have a wife, but I wasn’t exactly burning up the world with my romantic skills. Matter of fact, I hadn’t had a girlfriend since the tenth grade, and she got married to someone else a day after graduation.
“Oh, I had a date here and there, or what you would roughly call a date, I guess, meeting someone at a dance or at the movies, but nothing ever became anything. Peter was seeing lots of women, but he was too free a soul to give any woman the sense she’d be important enough to be his wife forever and ever. He liked what he called ‘playing the field.’
“There were many nights when he and Grandad went at it, Grandad ridiculing and criticizing Peter’s lifestyle, even calling him sinful and warning him that God would not look kindly on him.”
“I’m sure he believes Uncle Peter’s death was because of that, doesn’t he?” I asked quickly.
Daddy looked away.
“Maybe.”
After a moment, he turned back to me.
“Anyway, it was clear that the obligation to bring a woman into our lives fell on my shoulders.”
He paused and tossed a pebble into the lake.
“You know your mother came here when she was only just nineteen.”
“With her aunt, yes,” I said.
“Well, Grandad was impatient with my failure to just go out and find a wife, so he contacted Mommy’s aunt Ethel, who brought your mother to America to marry me.”
“What are you saying, Daddy? You mean, she knew she was coming here to marry you, even though she had never seen you before?”
He nodded.
“And Grandad arranged it?”
“Yes.”
“But why would Mommy do that?”
“Things were hard for her where she lived in Russia, and this was an opportunity to escape it.”
He laughed.
“I’ll never forget the way we were introduced. Your grandad said, ‘Here’s your wife. The wedding will be tomorrow.’”
“But why did you do it? I mean, I know Mommy is very pretty and all, but she was still a stranger. How can you marry someone without knowing anything about her?”
“When I first saw your mother that day, I actually felt sorrier for her than I had been feeling for myself. No one looked more helpless, more lost, more terrified of tomorrow. I couldn’t even utter the word no.
“And then I looked into her eyes, past the fear, past the terror, and I saw something that warmed my heart. I don’t know if that qualifies as love at first sight, but I thought I could make her feel good, and I hoped she could do the same for me.
“In time, we grew closer and closer. Maybe we didn’t have the sort of romantic start people see in movies and read in books, but what we have is strong. We’ve become tied to each other in deep ways. I don’t think she could stop herself from loving me any more than I could stop myself from loving her.
“If that could happen to me, it will surely happen to you, Honey. Don’t worry about it. Love will find its way into your heart, and it will be more comfortable there because of what your uncle Peter gave you and taught you.”
“I hope so, Daddy.”
“I know so,” he said. He smiled at me and stood up. “How about you come home and practice that violin?”
“Okay, Daddy,” I said, and rose. He reached for my hand.
“Look at you,” he said, “with calluses on your palms from your farm chores. I bet that alone scares away most of the boys today. You’re too tough for them.”
I laughed.
“I haven’t held hands with any lately,” I said.
“Never mind, you will,” he said.
I couldn’t remember the two of us having a more warm and wonderful conversation. It did help me regain my composure, and that night, I played the violin better than I had for weeks. When I looked out the window, I saw Uncle Simon had come to his. I couldn’t see the expression on his face, only his big body was silhouetted in the frame, but I knew that he was wearing a smile. I could feel it even across the yard.
I never stopped mourning the death of Uncle Peter, but in the days that followed my quiet conversation with Daddy at the pond, I felt myself emerging from the darkness and looking forward to the light. I began to talk more at school, cared more about my appearance, and practiced my violin with greater determination. Mr. Wengrow was very pleased with my progress and told me so.
One day he made a surprising proposal.
“I have another student I tutor. He’s a pianist, and I think it might be of great benefit to you both if you practiced some music together. I don’t know if it’s possible, but I would suggest you come to my home to do so. I have a piano there. What do you think of the idea?
“Actually,” he said before I could respond, “the two of you are my most exciting and promising students. I would want to give you both extra help and not charge you for it. I wouldn’t be in this work if I didn’t have a passion for it and I didn’t get great satisfaction out of finding students like yourself and Chandler,” he added.
“Chandler? You don’t mean Chandler Maxwell?” I asked.
Chandler Maxwell was a very wealthy boy in my class whom everyone considered to be the poster boy for being stuck-up. Except for some geeky younger boys who seemed to idolize him, he had no friends whatsoever. He came to school in a shirt and tie, with his hair trimmed almost military style and his slacks perfectly creased. There wasn’t a single school activity that appeared to interest him. He didn’t belong to any team, any group, any club. Everyone had the feeling he was looking down on their efforts, and everyone wondered why he didn’t attend some expensive private school anyway.
Apparently, his father, who was president of one of the local banks, didn’t believe in sending him to a private school. He had succeeded with a public school education and his son should do the same was the philosophy he preached to anyone who asked.
Most of us knew Chandler played piano. There were times when he played it at school, and the choral teacher and the band instructor both tried to get him to participate in their concerts, but he steadfastly refused, simply shaking his head with a smirk that suggested he thought their suggestion was ridiculous.
Naturally, the other boys mocked him, teased him, even tried to get him to fight, but he never did. If I could say anything on his behalf it was that he had remarkable self-control and the ability to ignore anyone and anything that displeased him.
He was not bad-looking, either. There were occasions when I stared at him and his eyes met mine, but he always made me feel guilty, made me feel as if I had stolen a look at a forbidden subject. I know I turned crimson and shifted my eyes away guiltily, and then chastised myself for being so interested, even for an instant. I wanted to hate him and despise him as much as all my friends did, but something kept me from doing that, something kept me stealing glances.
“Yes,” Mr. Wengrow said. “Chandler Maxwell. I’ve already discussed the possibility with him and he is willing, especially after I described your talent.”
“Maybe he won’t think I’m so talented once he hears me play,” I said.
“Chandler respects my opinion on such matters, Honey. He wouldn’t be working with me otherwise, believe me. He’s a very opinionated and an extraordinarily self-confident young man. Personally, I think he has musical genius.”
I raised my eyebrows. I knew Chandler was a good student, but not within the top ten students in my class. He was in all of my classes—including my language class, even though I suspected he didn’t have any interest in taking Spanish. He always looked so bored, but took it because there was a language requirement. Whenever he was asked to pronounce or recite something, he did it so softly Mrs. Howard had to ask him to repeat it, and eventually would give up on him.
“I don’t know,” I said.
The idea was intriguing, but at the same time frightening. What if he made fun of me? I knew how sarcastic he could be. Most of the boys who jeered him didn’t even understand his comebacks and how degrading and nasty they were. When that happened, I could see the self-satisfaction in his eyes. If he caught me looking at him, he tightened his lips and narrowed his eyes with suspicion, as if he was afraid I might expose him.
“Well, would you like me to speak to your mother about it?” Mr. Wengrow asked. “Because of her background, she has a real appreciation for good music.”
“I don’t know,” I repeated.
“Well, let me mention it and then you and your family can discuss it. I suppose there would be some consideration about getting you to my home and back.”
“I have my license,” I said quickly. “I’ve been driving since I was ten, actually. On the farm, I mean. I’m sure I could use my daddy’s pickup.”
I realized I was solving problems enthusiastically. I did want to do this.
“Fine. We’ll talk about it in more detail next time I come,” he said.
Before he left, he did talk to Mommy and Daddy. Grandad was present, but made no comments, unless we counted his grunt.
“It sounds like a good opportunity,” Mommy told me later that night. “Mr. Wengrow’s so excited about it, he says he won’t charge for the added time. What do you think, Honey?”
“I guess I could try to see how it goes,” I offered.
Daddy looked pleased and nodded.
They were both so nervous about my moods and emotions these days that anything that promised to bring me some pleasure was desirable.
“Then we’ll tell him it’s fine with us,” Mommy said.
“I’ll need the pickup, I think,” I told Daddy. “I wouldn’t want you to have to drive me.”
“You can use the pickup, but you had better clean it up before you get in it,” Mommy said. “You don’t want to walk into someone’s home smelling like a farm girl.”
“What’s wrong with that?” we heard Grandad call from the living room. He was listening through the walls.
“Nothing a good shampoo and bath won’t cure,” Mommy retorted.
Daddy actually laughed loud enough for Grandad to hear.
It brought a smile to my face.
Uncle Peter wouldn’t have laughed much louder, I thought. He’s still with us.