Searching for Sylvie Lee (20 page)

I nodded.

“Now, take out your hand and flick the droplets off. As you do that, imagine all of your tension falling away with the water. Very good.” Then he gently dried my hand with a small cloth, massaging every digit, and placed the bow in between my loosened fingers. “Hold it lightly, do not tense up. Now you are ready.”

And when I began, for the first few moments I could hear the difference, but then I started to stiffen. I was learning that this was my natural state: stressed. His spine was rigid, bracing him against the sounds I made, though his expression remained neutral. Outside, lightning flashed as the rain turned into a downpour, splattering against the sundeck.

I winced and laid down the bow. I could not do this to him any longer. “This must be torture for you. I should stop.”

He came and knelt before me on one knee so we were face-to-face, his eyes intent. He laid a hand on my arm. “Oh no. You have only just begun, Sylvie. That is why it is called an instrument. It is a tool for you to express whatever you want, good or bad.”

“I must be filled with badness, then,” I muttered, smiling a little. I leaned toward him. I had a sudden wild desire to lay my cheek against his. Here was a man who understood heartbreak. Here was a man who also knew what it meant to be devastated, and who somehow kept it all contained. I pulled myself back and searched for a reason to keep him talking. “Is your daughter musical too?”

He glanced over at their photo together. “Oh no. Zoë’s passion is competitive alpine skiing, which happens to be a very expensive sport. My ex-wife is a musician as well and between the two of us, we can barely manage to afford it.” He stood. I blinked back my disappointment. “Our time is almost up. Why do you not take the cello home so you can practice and not torment me so much next time?”

“You would lend me your cello?”

He shrugged and pulled out a hard cello case from a sliding cabinet beneath the window. “This is a cheaper one that I rent out to students sometimes. You cannot improve if you do not practice.”

As he flipped open the lid of the case, I eyed the huge instrument. I was not substantially taller than it. “I do not have a car here.”

He bent down to place the cello and bow inside. The case was mostly black, with streaks of dark blue running through it like a river. Two padded straps on the back allowed it to be carried like a backpack. “No problem. I take mine on my bicycle all the time.”

I waved a hand at his long legs, the muscled arms. “But you are Dutch.” People carted Christmas trees on their bicycles here, balanced on the steering bar.

“So are you.” He stood and set the case upright. “You rest that on your baggage rack on the back of your bike and you will be all set.” The doorbell rang. Filip handed the cello to me. “Your chauffeur is here.”

I staggered a bit to get the cello through the tiny hallway and into the entryway. The whole thing was heavier than I thought. Filip had the door open and Lukas stood there drenched, dripping onto the tile floor. Droplets rolled off his hair and traced the line of his jaw. Behind him, a torrent of rain fell as thunder boomed.

I asked Filip, “When should I come back? I am only here a few weeks at most.” Now that our lesson was over, I was like someone who had smoked opium for the first time. I did not
want
to see him again; it was a
need
. I felt lighter, looser, and something about him or our lesson had done that for me.

Filip glanced at Lukas, then bent and gave me three deliberate, lingering kisses on my cheeks. The charming playboy had returned. “As often as you like,” he drawled. “Come every day.”

Lukas took the case from me and scowled. “Do I need to hit this guy with my camera for you?”

“It would be easier to use the cello.” I gave Filip a slow wink to show I was sophisticated and unaffected by him. “But it is not necessary. When he flirts, it is nothing personal.”

I was unprepared for the flash of pain on Filip’s face or the way Lukas flushed dark red to the roots of his hair. Had there been some other woman between them in the past? Someone they truly loved?

Lukas swung the case over one shoulder and turned on his heel to leave. “Yes, that has been my experience.”

W
ith the cello strapped to my back, the Vespa scooter caught so much wind that, at times, it seemed like we would take flight. The Dutch called this dog weather. Above us, the heavens opened while hard gusts of rain sent rivulets of cold water down my back. The shifting air currents caught the broad instrument at an angle and Lukas swerved to avoid a sudden bicyclist. Blinded by strands of my hair in the whipping wind, I was barely able to stay seated, clinging to Lukas with all my might. My shoulders ached from the weight. When we finally arrived at the house, I dismounted and tried to race inside to get out of the storm. But even though I was fairly tall, the cello still hit me at mid-calf, so I could only take tiny, mincing steps.

Once inside, Lukas stifled a guffaw at my half-drowned appearance. Water drizzled from us both onto Helena’s marble tiles. He took the case off my shoulders, then removed my jacket and hung it over the radiator to dry. I propped one arm against the wall and bent to pull off my soaked shoes. When I straightened, locks of my wet hair were plastered to my face.

Lukas reached over and gently cradled my jaw and cheekbones in his large warm hands. He tucked each lock of hair behind my ears with his thumbs. My eyelids fluttered closed. He bent down and pressed a tender kiss to my forehead.

When I opened my eyes again, he had already turned away. “I will take your cello upstairs for you,” he mumbled, leaving me staring at his retreating back.

L
ater that evening, after I had changed into dry clothing, I heard the door downstairs click closed. Lukas was back. All of a sudden, it seemed more attractive to practice in the living room rather than the lonely attic.

“Hey, Lukas, is that you?” I called.

“Come down and join me,” he said.

I tried to walk downstairs with the cello case on my back, but it kept hitting the stair directly behind me, causing me to lurch forward. I made it down one flight and saw Lukas standing at the base of the other staircase, waiting for me, chuckling at my predicament. I was three-quarters of the way when the cello slammed into the stair behind me again and I started to tumble.

“Whoa!” He spanned my waist with his hands and swung me, cello and all, off the stairs. He carefully set me down on the floor.

Once I caught my breath, we both doubled over with laughter.

“Are you all right? How many times a week are you taking lessons again?” Lukas gasped.

“Every weekday,” I said, giggling. “Unless this thing kills me first.”

“I could bring you.”

“Yeah, right.” I snorted, thinking of our wild ride home. Our soaked jackets still hung from the radiator, though the floor tiles were dry. Lukas must have mopped after I went upstairs. “Filip said I could bicycle with that monster. He made it sound very simple.”

“I hate that guy. You need to rent a car.”

“I need to rent a car,” I repeated. Luckily, my credit card still worked. Jim was probably paying our bills. I sobered as I thought of him. Had he been back to our apartment? Was he with her? I pictured her, waiting outside his office for him. They saw each other every day. I chewed on my inner cheek. There was an ache in the back of my throat and it was difficult to swallow. How could I hate him and still wish he were mine? The last time we spoke, he’d been so angry with me, as if I were the one who had done something wrong. I had never paid attention to his ugly side before, despite that horrible drunken night at Princeton. My eyes had been firmly closed to it, idiot that I was.

“Sylvie?” Lukas touched me on my forearm. “You seem far away.”

“It is nothing.” I placed my hand over his fingers and gave them an affectionate squeeze. “I am glad you suggested this. I think these lessons with Filip are truly going to help.”

F
ive days later, the weather was warm and clear, perfect for a burglary. It had drizzled in the night as I lay in my bed, staring at the ceiling for hours, worrying that Isa would decide not to take Grandma for her daily walk. However, I knew the Dutch. No amount of rain, sleet, or snow stopped them.

We had planned it carefully. Early that morning, before Isa arrived, Grandma pulled me toward her by the sleeve so she could whisper, “When you ride a tiger, you must not try to get off halfway.”

It was still dark outside and the fear of a downpour made me extra prickly. I rolled my eyes. “I know, Grandma. Why do you two think I cannot be a good thief?” They needed Lukas to help Grandma navigate the stairs safely, so I had to play the burglar.

Lukas, standing by Grandma’s bed with his arms crossed, switched into Dutch so Grandma could not understand him. “When it comes to being naughty, you are a floppy dick in rosewater. Let me do it.”

I raised my voice. “No, I do not want Grandma to fall. I can stand strong in my shoes.”

“Sssst! My parents will hear.” He blew out a noisy breath. “Isa took her out alone before I came home.”

“Grandma was stronger then,” I hissed.

He said slowly, enunciating each word as if I were feebleminded, “You have to make it real.”

Grandma said sweetly in her melodious Chinese, “When the sandpiper and the clam oppose each other, it is the fisherman who benefits.”

As one, Lukas and I protested, “We are not fighting.”

“Fart!” she said. Great, now even Grandma called me on my bullshit.

After Helena and Willem left for the restaurant, I pretended to go to my daily cello lesson, then parked the rental car on another street and returned via the back door, which I had left ajar. However, this door was normally locked and required a key—concealed in the kitchen drawer—to open it, so we decided to make it seem as if the burglar had entered and exited from the front door, which often did not close properly anyway without a hard push. Since we did not want to get Isa in trouble, Lukas made sure he was the one to leave the front door unlocked. The neighbors were always watching. Last Monday, Helena hadn’t opened the drapes early in the morning and the woman across the street rang us. “It was so strange, I wanted to make sure you were all okay.” So I stayed hidden inside the house, my heart leaping in my throat as if I were a real criminal, until I heard the slow, creaky sounds of Lukas, Grandma, and Isa leaving.

Then I climbed the stairs with gloves on, like a thief from a movie. I felt completely ridiculous, as out of place as a cat in a dog kennel. My prints were all over the room anyway, not that they would bother to fingerprint for such a petty crime. Staying out of sight of the windows, I rummaged through Grandma’s things and pulled everything out of the closet. We had taken the jewelry a few days ago. Before I left her room, I quickly bowed to the altar to Kuan Yin and apologized for the mess.

But she who says A must also say B, so I went into the bedroom of Helena and Willem and examined it with the eyes of a hoodlum. This was my chance to wreak some revenge. I could hurt Helena for a change. What would a petty thief take? What did I want? I scanned the scattered evidence of their relationship, accumulated year after year like the bulky rings of a tree. If there was a map to their hearts, it would be here in their bedroom. I remembered how Willem and Helena would sometimes go for bike rides together on their free days: “just like the Dutch,” Helena liked to say. She loved him, I was sure of it. And Willem? He certainly needed her and her family’s money—perhaps need casts even stronger chains than love.

How could I possibly understand Willem and Helena when I had no grip on the relationship between my own ma and pa? They had nothing personal in their tiny bedroom back in New York. They never went to dinner together, never cuddled in front of the television. Those horrible fights they’d had when we were little, when Pa would get drunk and call Ma a whore and a liar. But still, there was tenderness when they looked at each other, though it was quickly hidden away again. Ma stayed up late mending Pa’s work gloves. Pa put the choicest pieces of abalone in Ma’s rice bowl. An ocean of love, guilt, and duty surged back and forth between them, stroking both their hearts even as it kept them apart.

There were no photos or books in Helena and Willem’s bedroom either. Instead, a vase of fake flowers, Helena’s jewelry case, a collection of expensive ties in the closet. A few of Lukas’s childish drawings hung in cheap frames. A shelf filled with complex modular origami figures made from tiny bits of folded paper. I stepped over to examine the designs more closely: a green-and-white peacock with its magnificent tail unfurled, a dragon boat, an orange-and-white model of Couscous. What did it mean? A mug that read
WORLD’S BEST MAMA
. Had I not saved my pocket money and bought that for Helena, all those years ago? Why had she kept it? A woman’s Rolex watch. Bought for herself? A gift from Willem? The more I saw, the less I understood.

I went to their dresser to steal her jewelry case and my eyes were captured by my own image in the mirror instead. For a moment, I was little again, creeping into their bed after a nightmare. Sometimes they let me stay there, snuggled up to their warmth. More often I was sent away.
You must not disturb Grandma in the night. You are trouble enough for her all day long.
I would then sneak up to Lukas’s room and fall asleep curled on the floor beside his bed, holding his hand in mine. I leaned closer to the mirror and the reflection of the woman in her expensive clothing faded away. There was my weak eye, already pulling to the outside with the stress of the burglary, the strain in my lips, the fake tooth that was a bit lighter than all the others, the desperation etched on my face.
Who are you, Sylvie Lee?
I whispered to myself.