Accidental Notes: A Novel

Chapter 6

More than the Notes

Not sure what this story is? The synopsis is available here.

Catch up on chapter 5 here.

As whispers wind their way from the atrium to the fellowship hall, I slip around a corner, not ready to face them. I need to call my mom first. It’s her — not Dad — I want to talk to about whoever Brennan is. She knows me. I know how to talk to her. But she doesn’t answer my texts. Then she doesn’t answer my call. Breathe, I tell myself, but it’s easier to say than it is to do.

Mom has changed recently. She’s been impossible to argue with, impossible to confide in. Her mind used to hold so much space for me, but these days it radiates in a million different directions. Finally, she calls me back. It’s been less than three minutes, but that’s a long time to hold your breath. “Adaya? Is everything okay? I thought the funeral was now.”

“It is, Mom. And people keep talking about my brother, but I don’t — ”

“I’m in the middle of something. Can we talk later? You’re okay? You’ll be okay?”

“I’m fine, Mom.” It’s a lie, but apparently that’s okay now. “We’ll talk later.”

I wonder if the second sentence is as much of a lie as the first. I hope it isn’t. Then she’s gone with a quick, “We will. Love you, Daya,” and my hope is barely a flicker.

When Dad makes his way to the fellowship hall, he collects me from the corner without saying anything. His eyes are red-rimmed and shallow. I can’t prod him, either. He’s not even here. Strangers come by and give me well-wishes. Talkative ones launch into stories about my grandmother’s life, but I can’t listen while I wonder if these mourners know about the brother I might have. Grayson sits across the hall from me with his family, pointedly not looking at me. No matter how many times I check.

We go home. I lose the evening regretting how I talked to Grayson and playing back memory after memory from my childhood, looking for the ghost of a sibling, for a hint that Pastor Clark was right. I try to sit at the piano and play “Sunset Boulevard.” The math is all there, but my hands are too slow. I wear my fingers to soreness making mistake after mistake.

In the morning, I wake up to an eerie quiet. With the funeral over, this house feels emptier, less Grandma’s already. We’ll be packing it up soon, getting ready for an estate sale after Christmas, Dad said. Nothing is in boxes yet, but it all feels static now. In a holding pattern, waiting to move on. I eat breakfast alone at the kitchen table, waiting for Dad to wake up so I can practice. Every tick of the bird clock hanging on the yellow-papered wall reminds me how soon my audition is. But my body is still sluggish, stuck in the moment when Pastor Clark said I look like my brother. Stuck half an hour later when I couldn’t even finish the song.

Dad comes downstairs and turns on the TV, sitting in his pajamas and slippers.

“I set out some cereal for you, Dad,” I say from the doorway.

He shrugs. “Not hungry yet.”

“Can I make you some coffee?” Mom taught me how ages ago, and Dad’s half-sentence must mean he needs some. But he just grunts and changes the channel. He seems awake enough, though, so I move to the piano. Play the notes, Adaya. It’s just math. Everything you need is right there.

Minute after minute I try. Minute after minute I fail. Then I need to give up so I can get myself ready for the audition. I want to look my best, so I brush and pull my hair into a single braid down my back, put on the dress pants I wore yesterday and a chunky red sweater that feels like Christmas. It’s never cold enough to wear it in California.

Then I set up my iPad on a stand near the piano and rest my hands on my lap, where I hope Mr. Gutierrez won’t see them shaking.

I never thought about where Mr. Gutierrez would be while I auditioned. I guess I assumed he’d be at school. It’s the only place I’ve seen him since he started teaching there, but it’s winter break. The background that pops up behind him is this giant Christmas tree in a cozy corner of a house, two stockings on the mantle. He’s wearing a purple button-up shirt he’s worn to school before, and smiles genuinely when he sees me. Dad didn’t smile like that at the airport.

“Hey, Mr. Gutierrez.”

“Adaya! I hope you’re all settled in Bend. How did playing for the funeral go?”

My whole body tenses. “I’d rather focus on the piece I have to play today, if you don’t mind.”

For half a second, his eyes dart off screen. I clinch my jaw. I don’t want to have more of an audience than I need right now. I don’t even trust myself to play this right when it’s just us — and Dad in the other room — and I’ve known Mr. G since I moved to California.

“Sorry about the disruption. It’s just us now. What piece have you chosen?”

“The title track from Sunset Boulevard,” I say, then bow slightly as I move to the piano bench and sit down. I’m still shaking. I haven’t been able to play anything right since I saw Pastor Clark.

But that doesn’t matter. I’m going to have to play no matter what I’m feeling if I make the pit orchestra, so I prepare my hands, close my eyes, take a steadying breath, and begin the song.

At first, everything goes according to plan. This song, a haunting, intricate piece, starts to haunt me. Feelings are contagious when the math works. It’s technically challenging, but within my range to play well without thinking too hard. The movement changes to something with even more tension and I tense as well. But my fingers remember the notes. Muscle memory is doing what I can’t intentionally right now. I’m fine. I’m doing fine.

Until the moment I’m not. My hand lands one note down from where it should, and all four parts in the chord are wrong now, some even in the wrong key. The sound is like nails on a chalkboard. All my thoughts are stuck in the echo that resounds inside of me: I could have sworn it was your brother. You look just like him. I push through, but I have to press the right chord before I can continue, or the next part won’t play in my head. It takes half a measure for me to regain my bearings.

There, better, perfect. It was a blip, half a second. I didn’t freeze like I did at the funeral. Soon I’m playing the last note. One full breath later, I grab the iPad and flip the camera. I immediately wish I hadn’t.

Mr. Gutierrez is studying me, a wrinkle between his eyebrows that isn’t usually there. I don’t know how to interpret that look. All I know for sure is it isn’t pleasure. It isn’t satisfaction.

I’m not good enough. I push my glasses up the bridge of my nose.

“Thank you for your time, Ms. Finley,” he says. Then his eyes stop meeting mine. He shakes his head barely enough to notice. The dismissal is nauseatingly clear.

I knew it would be difficult to get in as a freshman, but I worked so hard for this. I can’t let it go this easily. I need to know what I did wrong so I can fix it — for next year if not for now. With a deep breath, I put on Mom’s lawyer voice. “I appreciate you giving me the chance to audition remotely with everything happening in my family. I know that wasn’t good enough and I want to get better. How can I get better?”

Mr. Gutierrez takes too long to answer, his eyes wandering away from the screen so he doesn’t have to answer me. Then he must take pity on me because of my grandma. “You’re a great pianist, Adaya. You’ve clearly been working hard.”

He pauses long enough I have to fill that silence. “But.”

“There’s more I’m looking for in my musicians than the ability to play the right notes.”

I cringe. I didn’t even do that right and now he’s saying I screwed up more than just the notes.

“I don’t think the pit for Legally Blonde is the best place to showcase you.” He smiles “But the school choir has a showcase at the end of April. It’s smaller, but I’m looking for a student accompanist. The choral work is more like what you learned in private lessons. Rehearsals start in January, but we can audition you after Christmas if you’d like.”

“I’d need a new piece of music, I assume.” Legally Blonde and a choral performance call for such different things.

“You would,” he says. “Choose wisely, and remember, it’s about more than the notes you play. Have a merry Christmas, Adaya,” he says.

“Thanks, Mr. G. You, too.”

His smile touches his eyes and the familiarity breaks me to pieces when the call ends.

I text Mom, but can’t manage many words.

Adaya: I didn’t get in. New audition for a smaller thing after Christmas. Yay.

Mom: You did the best you could have.

Mom: I’m sure.

Mom: I hope you try for the new audition, too.

I don’t respond. I can’t let myself hope for anything else. I don’t even leave the piano bench, replaying every second of that audition piece, trying to figure out what else I did wrong. If playing the right notes isn’t enough, I don’t understand what could be.

Riley texts me in a chain half an hour later, remaining her annoyingly optimistic self.

Riley: Well??? How did it go?

Riley: Are you ready to spend all our time in rehearsals together when you get back?

Adaya: You got in?

Riley: Second trumpet! [happy_dance.gif].

Riley: And???

Adaya: Congratulations, Ri.

Riley: …you didn’t make it? How could he not choose you?

Adaya: Mr. G said something about how playing the right notes isn’t good enough

Riley: omg. I never pictured I would be there without you.

Adaya: well, you will be. Have fun.

Riley: It won’t be the same, you know. You deserve this.

Adaya: Doesn’t matter if I deserve it if I don’t get it.

She’s typing something else, but I don’t care. I want her to be happy, and she won’t be happy if she’s stuck watching me wallow, and for as long as I don’t understand why I’m not good enough, I’m going to be wallowing.

So I leave my phone in the family room and find Dad. “Didn’t you buy a gingerbread house?”

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