A Note of Madness (3 page)

Harry always seemed so at ease around everyone, even girls. Especially girls. He was good-looking, but in an unusual sort of way, with the slow gait of a gentle giant. Yet he had a sophistication, a maturity in his demeanour that commanded a certain respect. He was Flynn’s closest friend. Yet sometimes he hated him. Around Jennah, he made Flynn feel like a tongue-tied fool.

‘Are you going to practise?’ Harry’s voice made him jump.

‘No, I did enough this morning.’ He stretched out his legs. ‘Think I’ll go to bed.’

He got as far as the doorway when Harry’s voice stopped him. ‘You OK?’

Flynn half turned, coffee cup still full in his hand.

Harry was regarding him placidly, his face still eerily glowing.

‘Yeah, why?’

‘You were kind of quiet again this evening.’

Flynn resented the ‘again’. Just because Harry talked for England didn’t mean that everyone found it so easy. He gave a small shrug. ‘Just tired.’

‘Sleep well then.’

‘You too. Don’t work too late.’

WHEN HIS ALARM
went off at seven the next morning, Flynn thought it had to be a cruel joke. Every morning for the last week he had been getting up and going for a run in the park before lectures. Some days – yesterday, for example – even managing a run after class. Today, the very thought of it was horrifying. He felt as if he had only just gone to bed and a crushing torpor seemed to have taken hold of his limbs. Even reaching out to turn off the alarm before it woke Harry didn’t seem worth the effort. With great difficulty, he opened his eyes and blinked dully at the pale morning light filtering in through the curtains. The thought of lectures this morning sickened him.

‘I can’t believe you skipped Historical Studies again.’ Sick of canteen mush, Harry had returned home to gaze into the empty fridge. ‘What’s the matter with you? Are you ill?’

Still in the T-shirt and jogging bottoms which served as pyjamas, Flynn surveyed him from his usual place among the crumbs on the kitchen counter. ‘No.’

‘I knew last night you were going to go all monosyllabic again,’ Harry said matter-of-factly, buttering two slices of bread for a sandwich. ‘Want half?’

‘No.’

‘Have you got Kaiser this afternoon?’

‘Of course.’

‘Oh well, cheer up. At least you’re not me with two essays to do in as many days! Jen’s given me hers, by the way – what a star.’

‘Good for you.’

Harry shrugged good-naturedly. ‘What else are friends for, hey? Are you ready?’

‘No.’

‘Well get dressed and let’s go. It’s nearly one already.’

The Royal College was one of those places where you just weren’t allowed to feel tired. From the moment you stepped off the Kensington street, through the heavy doors and into the grand entrance hall with its marble floor and huge, sweeping staircase, you were enveloped by an aura of purpose, of hard graft, of dedication. Sometimes, if the orchestra was rehearsing, the corridors would be deserted and music would explode from the double doors at the end of the hall. Occasionally there would be a concert on and students and professors alike would be hurrying from one place to another, carrying sheet music, stands and instruments, a palpable feeling of urgency in the air. Or it would just be lunch time, with the faint strains of
practice coming from the music rooms, and the few students who actually believed in stopping for lunch standing around and chatting, or drifting in small groups towards the canteen with tempered, controlled enthusiasm. It was an impeccably well-oiled establishment, in which there was always something you should be doing and always a feeling you hadn’t done quite enough.

‘What is the matter?’ Professor Kaiser greeted him. ‘Have you not slept?’

Jesus Christ! What was it with everyone today? ‘I’m OK.’

‘You don’t look “OK”,’ Professor Kaiser said in his clipped German accent. ‘You look like someone who has not had so much sleep. I warned you, did I not, about going out during the week?’

‘We went to Professor Miguel’s concert,’ Flynn said to shut him up.

‘I see.’ There was a pause. ‘Well that should not have kept you up so very late. But you must make sure to get enough sleep. Remember the other week we wasted much time.’

Flynn had a dim recollection of feeling almost equally crap a couple of weeks ago. Three painfully dismal lessons had ensued, resulting in Professor Kaiser giving him two days off to ‘get some rest’. Ironic, really, when at the time he had been sleeping twelve and thirteen hours a night. Perhaps if he played badly
enough today, Professor Kaiser might do the same again.

As it was, he didn’t even have to try.

‘Put some effort into it, Flynn!’ Professor Kaiser was pacing the room, running a hand over his balding head. Never a good sign.

Flynn stopped, mid-bar. ‘What, again?’ he asked testily.

‘
Ja, ja
, again! Again from the beginning. You play as if you are in a – how do you say? – a
coma
! Where is the melody? It, I cannot hear. You need to make it sing. Sing! Rise above the chords—’ He hummed a few bars. ‘Yes?’

Flynn nodded wearily. His fingers felt like lead against the keys and his whole body ached with tiredness. The clock on the piano read quarter past two. He couldn’t believe that only fifteen minutes had passed. Gritting his teeth, he returned to the first bar.

‘
Nein, nein!
’ Professor Kaiser cried. And so the torture went on.

He was not in the mood for Jennah when she caught up with him in the hall. Bouncy, sparky Jennah who always had a smile for everyone and a lot to say.

‘Are you coming to the pub after class?’ she asked.

‘No, I’m going home. Anyway, you know I’m broke.’

‘Me too. So? Harry will buy us drinks. Oh, please come with us, Flynn. It’ll be fun.’

‘I’m going home,’ Flynn repeated between clenched teeth.

‘Are you OK?’ She put her hand on his arm.

‘I’m fine.’ He had pushed her hand away without even realizing it.

Jennah stepped back quickly, her face registering hurt and embarrassment. ‘OK, well if – if you change your mind—’

Flynn turned away before she had the chance to say anything else. He couldn’t even trust himself to be civil.

There was a four-pack in the fridge. Harry must have been shopping. Flynn took it to his room and turned his stereo up loud.
Don Giovanni
on full volume. Tough luck, Boney downstairs – if you don’t like it you can go to hell. He drank the beers quickly, staring out of the window at the late-afternoon sun. The branches on the trees looked like claws.

He awoke with a pounding head. The luminous numbers on his alarm read 10:13. Gritting his teeth against the pain, he stumbled out of bed and headed for the bathroom. No pills in the bathroom cabinet. He had climbed up on a stool and knocked half the contents of the kitchen cupboard onto the counter when Harry came in and switched on the light.

‘Bloody hell.’ Flynn sat down heavily on the edge of the sink, squinting against the painful light.

‘What are you doing?’ Harry looked at him in disbelief.

Flynn groggily rubbed the back of his hand over his eyes. ‘Painkillers,’ he mumbled.

Harry started collecting up the strewn contents of the cupboard. ‘Aspirin?’

‘Yeah.’

He handed Flynn two tablets. ‘God, you stink! Have you been drinking?’

‘Bit.’ Flynn downed the tablets with a mouthful of tap water.

‘You should have come to the pub with us!’

Flynn groaned, splashed his face with water and sank heavily to the floor, leaning against the fridge. He looked up dizzily as his eyes grew accustomed to the light.

‘Coffee?’ Harry offered, putting the kettle on.

Flynn nodded gratefully. There was an interminable silence as Harry waited for the water to boil, stretching further still as he proceeded to methodically fill the mugs. Flynn rubbed his face. His eyes throbbed with an aching pulse.

Harry handed Flynn his coffee and sat on a stool on the other side of the room. ‘You know, I’m beginning to worry about you.’ His voice was even.

Flynn couldn’t tell if he was serious or not. So he said nothing.

‘Hardly talking, sleeping all the time. It’s not healthy, you know!’ Harry gave a brief smile.

‘So?’

‘Jennah was wondering whether it was André’s concert that upset you.’

‘Don’t be absurd.’

‘Well, I could see her point. Last month you went underground for about a week when someone mentioned his name at lunch.’

‘It had nothing to do with that.’

‘Well then, what is it?’ The intensity of his own voice seemed to surprise Harry a little, and he gave a quick, false laugh. ‘Why aren’t you speaking to anyone? Why are you getting drunk on your own?’ Another strained laugh.

‘Who cares?’ Flynn put his hands over his face, wishing he could yell at the top of his voice to drown out the sound of Harry’s infuriating voice. Why did that guy have to talk and talk?

‘Have you thought of going to see one of those counsellors at the university?’ Harry suddenly suggested.

‘Please tell me you’re joking.’

‘Shall I give Rami a call then?’

Flynn lowered his hands from his face and looked up in horror.

‘Well, I just thought—’ Harry began quickly, then stopped.

‘This has got nothing to do with my brother!’

‘OK, sure. I just thought . . . since he’s a doctor . . . he might have been able to . . .’ Harry tailed off awkwardly.

Flynn shook his head slowly in disbelief. Harry and Rami had sort of hit it off when Rami had been helping Flynn move in. But God forbid that Harry should actually call him. There was a long silence.

‘Well at least it’s the weekend tomorrow,’ Harry said with false cheer.

There was nothing to be said to that.

Flynn woke the next day at two in the afternoon. Harry was in orchestra rehearsals, thank goodness. He ate some dry cereal from the packet and drank Coke from the bottle and tried to go back to sleep. It didn’t happen. He tried to read. Tried to watch TV. Even tried to practise. No activity was tolerable for more than a couple of minutes. After going through each of them repeatedly in a sort of crazy triangle, he collapsed on his bed, exhausted and suddenly close to tears.

He tried to think back to the first part of that week. The part when he had been full of energy and was continuously looking for ways to burn it off, when no task had seemed too arduous and no mountain too hard to climb. It will come back, he kept telling himself. It will, it will. You’re just feeling shitty because, because . . . It was impossible to find a logical explanation. Because the world is crap, was all he wanted to say. But the world hadn’t been crap a few days ago. So what had changed? He thought of André, thought of Harry and Jennah’s playful flirting on the bridge and wanted to cry. So maybe Harry had been right. Maybe the concert had upset him after all. How pathetic.

‘Do you have to keep humming that godforsaken tune?’

Several days had passed and the greyness of the
previous week was just a distant memory. Flynn’s eyes were on fast-forward, his body radiated energy and this morning even the college canteen seemed to glow.

Flynn gave the ketchup bottle a violent shake and raised his eyebrows at Harry. ‘The Rach Three? A godforsaken tune?’

‘It wasn’t meant to be hummed! And how can you eat a hot dog first thing in the morning?’ Harry was tired and essay-grumpy.

Jennah glanced up from under her curtain of hair and gave Flynn a sympathetic grin. The three of them were sitting at a table in the empty canteen, amidst piles of papers and books, finishing off some last-minute coursework.

Flynn returned to the ketchup bottle and started humming again. First movement of Rachmaninov’s Third Piano Concerto. Such an innocuous start – a series of slow, simple notes. A deceptive, pragmatic beginning to a piece so fraught with madness that by the end it left pianist and listener alike in a state of drained mental exhaustion.

He had started running again. Rachmaninov playing on his iPod. The dew still fresh on the grass, the pink orb of the dawn sun just visible over the trees. At that deserted hour, the park had seemed to hold secrets and promises that made him fizz with excitement. At such a time, anything was possible.

Harry put down his pen and glared at Flynn. ‘Would you
stop
?’

Flynn ignored him and bit into his hot dog.

‘OK, I’m done,’ Jennah said. ‘If I have to read through this drivel one more time, I think I’m going to scream.’

‘Oh God,’ Harry moaned. ‘I haven’t nearly finished. I don’t even understand the last question. What the hell is ars antiqua, anyway?’

‘Who cares?’ Flynn replied.

‘I think it’s a type of thirteenth-century French music, but I’m not sure,’ Jennah said.

Harry reached for the heavy tome of
Grove’s Dictionary of Music
and began flicking crossly through the pages. ‘I bet it’s not even in here—’

‘Come on, come on, give it to me.’ Impatiently, Flynn grabbed the dictionary from Harry and ran his finger down the page. ‘Here we go –
ars antiqua
: when rehearsals go on for so long, your arse goes numb and feels like it has turned to stone.’

Jennah snorted and, when Harry scowled, quickly covered her mouth with her hand.

‘Very funny,’ Harry snapped, holding out his hand for the dictionary. ‘Give it back.’

Flynn leaped out of the way. ‘Hold on, hold on, what else have we got in A?
Accidentals
: when a music student is so drunk he can no longer control his bodily functions. Or how about
arco
: a musical term employed when one uses the bow in a sweeping motion to knock off the head of the person in front? Or what about
attacca
?’ Flynn went on. ‘When a cellist decides he can
take no more and gores the conductor with his spike!’

Jennah made a choking noise and brought her other hand to her mouth.

‘Oh, for God’s sake don’t encourage him!’ Harry turned on her.

‘Sorry, Harry, sorry,’ Jennah said, bursting into laughter. ‘We will help you, we will. Where are you up to?’

‘Next word!’ Flynn announced. ‘
D.C.
What does
D.C.
stand for, Harry? And no, it’s not the capital of America.’