When Papa is home. Like tonight. Eve and I give recitals in the living room. After our hike I sit at the piano and look at the sheet music while Mama Eve and Papa sit on the couch in front of me. I always play first because if I play second Eve’s song gets all mixed up with my song and I forget the notes altogether. There is nothing worse than hearing Papa’s frustrated sighs as I try to recover by picking and testing different keys with my fingers. “Just read the music.” He’ll nudge. “The music is right in front of you.” But that’s the thing. Notes on the page look like some foreign alphabet to me. Instead of reading them I like to close my eyes and imagine the song as a movie or a shape or sometimes a dance. This helps me and my hands shimmy over the keys as if they’ve known the steps all along.
Tonight I am playing the Moonlight Sonata. Eve will play Für Elise. Papa leaves at the end of the week for his international tour with the symphony. He’ll be gone all of June July and some of August and it really will be “just us girls.” I’ve been practicing for weeks to learn the whole piece perfectly. Every Wednesday morning Mrs. Umanski has been drilling us on scales arpeggios and music theory before letting us practice our new pieces. I pay extra attention to the notes at my lesson as well. If Mrs. Umanski suspects I’m playing the song by ear she raps my knuckles lightly while barking: “Start over and this time keep your eyes up!”
But the Moonlight Sonata is my favorite. I know the notes by heart now. I’ve been waiting weeks for this. To feel Papa nodding his head in rhythm with me and only me. I close my eyes and get into position. The keys feel like the cool marble of a museum floor. Then softly. With eyes still closed. I start. The whole room swells. And I do not open my eyes. Not once. My fingers fly. Just fly. Mimicking each note perfectly like little brown thrashers gossiping in the trees.