Virtuosity (19 page)

Jeremy,

I don’t hate you. But if I wanted to, I definitely wouldn’t need your permission.

His reply was quick.

Good to see your spunk is still intact.

He wanted banter. I couldn’t do banter.

Do you need something?

I paused before I pressed send. It was harsh, but he deserved it.

A second chance.

Unbelievable.

At what? You have to admit our situation makes being friends a little awkward.

He couldn’t honestly think we could be together.

So we’ve got a few complications to work around. So what?

Was he a complete idiot? Had he blocked everything that had happened out of his brain? The other possibility—that I was blowing things out of proportion—wasn’t something I was willing to consider.

Jeremy, I wish you the best of luck next week. I really do.

Did you believe that? Of course not. Me neither. That’s the problem here, or one of the problems. Neither of us can trust the other’s motives. I think we will both be happier with ourselves if we let our violins do the talking, meaning I don’t think we should see each other before the Guarneri. Focus on your music. I need to focus on mine. May the best violinist win, and maybe next week after the finals we can talk. Or whatever.

Pressing send should have felt better. But I was hollow. That pang of loneliness in my chest was too heavy to feel anything more than anger.

His reply didn’t make me feel any better.

I’m sorry. I really am. You’re obviously mad and you have every right to be. You’re right about the competition, so I’m not going to say another word to you about it.

But I do get to tell you that you’re wrong. About my motives, I mean. I didn’t do
anything or say anything that I didn’t feel.

I promise.

Jeremy

Every part of me wanted to reply. But I couldn’t. It wasn’t smart, and I had to start being smart if I was going to win.

I
was
going to win, but not for Yuri, and not for Diana. I was going to win for me.

Couldn’t exhaustion earn me a good night’s sleep? It seemed unfair. But insomnia, or at least
my
insomnia, didn’t even give a courtesy nod to what was fair.

That night I crawled into bed so tired my back and shoulders ached, but the music in my head wouldn’t stop. There was only one way to quiet it.

I slipped across the hall to where my violin was waiting, the orange wood shining like an exotic flower in the moonlight. I picked it up and played the first few notes of
Claire de Lune
. Moonlight. I walked over to the window while I played and stared up at the same moon. It seemed impossible that Claude Debussy had looked up into the night sky over a hundred years ago in France and heard this melody calling from that same glowing pearl in that same black sea.

Impossible but beautiful, like a fairy tale.

I stopped thinking and just let the notes sing. There was something pure about the melody, free from the tarnish of complications that I seemed so good at inflicting on music by daylight.

The same moon. If it had given Debussy
Claire de Lune
, maybe it would give me something too.

Chapter 15

T
he Guarneri was upon me.

That final week was a marathon of second-guessing and it all came back to that impossible-to-answer question: What was I most likely to screw up? What would I look back and wish I had spent just a few more minutes practicing? I didn’t know: fingered octaves? Just to be safe I had to drill them to death. Or what if I overshot that brutal shift at the end of the cadenza? I’d played it perfectly at least the last dozen times through, but that wouldn’t be any consolation if I missed it in performance. And it really could come down to something as painfully simple as that. One missed shift. So I did every
shifting exercise I’d ever learned about a thousand times, just in case.

My days were a sad mixture of practicing, eating, and googling illnesses that might put me safely in the hospital and out of the competition. I avoided Diana. Her ice queen act had thawed just enough to reveal paranoia in full flare. I couldn’t be around her. Seeing her vacillate between panic and distraction was just a reminder of her doubt, so I spent a lot of time in my room. She didn’t intrude. She was too terrified of unsettling my oh-so-delicate sanity to even punish me for lying to her.

Jeremy didn’t email or call, but that was good. The humiliation was still there, burning in my chest every time I thought about him, simmering under everything even when I wasn’t thinking about him. Fuel. It was fuel, and I had to feed it.

Anger at Diana had helped center me without the Inderal; humiliation over Jeremy might be my only hope at focusing on something outside of my own anxiety. It had to be, which was why I couldn’t forgive Jeremy. If I started to wonder if maybe he hadn’t been using me, I’d have nothing to anchor myself to when the panic set in. And then I might give in to the urge and take a pill.

I stared at the pile of dresses on my bed. Diana had already chosen one for me, but I was trying on everything in my closet anyway. The nos were on the floor,
the maybes were on the bed. The dress she’d picked was fine—flowing yellow fabric with a scoop neck and cap sleeves, falling just above the knee—and she’d decided on it weeks ago, back when we’d still been talking. “It’s perfect for spring, but not too fancy,” she’d said. “It’s only the semifinals. You don’t want to look like you think you’re performing for royalty.” She was right. But now I felt like an upside down daffodil in it. I wanted to wear something else. Something I picked.

I pulled the yellow one off the hanger on the back of my door and tossed it on the floor. Then I noticed a sea-green fabric poking out of the stack. I grabbed it and pulled it out. How had I forgotten about this dress? It had a satin sheen, a deep
V
in the center, and flared out at its floor-length hem. It was probably too fancy.

“Carmen?” Diana’s timid three-tap knock sounded on the door behind me.

“What?” I kept my voice was perfectly even—not angry, not penitent, not anything.

She stayed in the hall. “We need to talk about tomorrow,” she said. “About your medication.”

“No, we don’t.”

She paused. I’d confused her. “So you’ll take it?”

“No.”

She exhaled and shivered. “Car—”

“Please leave,” I interrupted.

Pleading filled her eyes. “What has happened to you?”

I didn’t answer. I wasn’t sure, but it
had
happened, and it wasn’t unhappening.

“Don’t do this,” she tried again.

“Good night,” I said, and closed the door.

The auditorium was nearly empty. Twenty-five, maybe thirty people sat in clusters scattered across the main floor. From my view through the stage right curtains, I recognized most of them—other competitors who had already played, their teachers, a few parents or friends. The stage was bare except for a single grand piano.

I knew it was impossible, that the judges were too far away, but I swore I could hear the scribble of their pencils, slashing their critiques through the last violinist’s performance. Almost my time. I couldn’t see Jeremy, but I wasn’t expecting him to be there. I pulled back from the break in the red velvet panels and closed my eyes.

In through the nose, out through the mouth, in through the nose, out through mouth.

In one of those middle-of-the-night internet searches that only make sense at the time, I’d looked up Lamaze breathing techniques. My thinking had been: childbirth, performing—they probably weren’t that different. Both were high stakes and hugely painful. Both went smoother
with drugs, or so I’d heard. Dr. Wright, the Inderal shrink, had given me some relaxation exercises, but I didn’t trust anything that came from him.

In through the nose, out through the mouth, in through the nose, out through mouth.

Again, it made more sense in the middle of the night. But I hadn’t thrown up yet, so maybe it was working.

I adjusted the bodice of my dress, tucking a wandering bra strap back under the satin. Diana usually loved playing supervisor to those details. Errant strands of hair, smudged eyeliner, loose threads—she usually had them tamed, corrected, or snipped before I even noticed them.

I glanced over at her. She was staring through the part in the curtains, right at the judges’ table. She hadn’t said anything about the dress change. When I’d come downstairs wearing the sea green gown she’d blinked and turned away, as if she’d never cared in the first place.

I turned back to the audience. The stage lights were only partially dimmed, which meant I could see my competitors’ faces. They revealed a little of everything: nervousness, relief, hostility, hope. I checked again to see if Jeremy had slipped in the back, but of course he hadn’t. He wasn’t playing until tomorrow.

The judges’ table sat wedged between the main block of seating and the exit doors, all three judges tucked into
it. I squinted, trying to make out their expressions and found myself drawn to just one.

On the far left sat Dr. Nanette Laroche, a cold-eyed French woman in her seventies. For decades she had been
the
teacher to study under at Juilliard. Now retired, she had been a career-maker, and according to legend, her methods made Yuri’s look gentle. Dozens of violinists had been squeezed and twisted into world-famous musicians by Dr. Laroche, but her appearance—frail frame, soft features, graying hair—was grandmotherly in every way. Except for those chilly eyes.

The other two judges were less interesting to me. There was Dr. Daniel Schmidt, musical director of the Zurich Symphony, and Dr. Yuan Chang, a professor of music theory at the Curtis Institute. Both seemed too far removed from actual violin performance to be holding all this power.

Beside the main judging table, the competition proctor sat at a little table of her own. It was her job to see that things ran smoothly, which meant ringing the bell for the next competitor, stopping performers if they went over their allotted time, and shushing anyone who got too loud. Tweed jacket, horn-rimmed glasses, excellent posture, face-lifting bun—she looked like she was auditioning for the part of a librarian. Any second now she would ring the bell and it would be my turn.

I took inventory of myself. I hadn’t taken Inderal in over a week, but the feelings churning through me were just as bad as that first performance without it.

I felt nauseous, and my hands couldn’t get colder, not even if I’d plunged them into a bucket of ice and held them there. My legs were shaky, but I could walk.

I gave the audience one last glance, and this time I saw Clark and Yuri in the far left corner. I’d been too busy looking for Jeremy and missed them before. Yuri sat slumped in his chair, his head nestled into the mountain of his hunchback, his hands folded patiently in his lap. His presence was calming. After my last lesson, I wasn’t sure he would come at all. Everything had felt so final when I’d left.

Win it for myself. That was what he’d told me. I was trying.

I’d spent the last week unraveling. Layer after layer peeled off, was still peeling off, and underneath … I didn’t really know what was underneath.

The metallic ding of the proctor’s bell jerked me out of my thoughts. It was time. I took a deep breath and stepped onto the stage. One foot at a time, slowly, evenly, I made my way to the center, barely aware of my accompanist behind me.

I’m okay. Awful but okay.
The realization hit just in time. My knees were shaky, but not buckling. My hands were still cold, but I could move them.

The proctor announced me, articulating each syllable. “Car-men Bi-an-chi.”

I glanced at the judges’ table, put my violin on my shoulder and began to play. Tentative at first, the music began to flow, and then rush, and then soar. I was free, and everything else melted away. And as I lifted my bow from the strings after the final note, I knew it was enough.

Silence, then a thin ripple of applause sounded across auditorium.

“Thank you,” said the proctor.

Out of breath, I took one last look at the judges’ table. All three were busy writing, heads down, hands scribbling furiously. Weren’t any of them going to look at me? As if reading my mind, Dr. Laroche lifted her silver head and nodded.

Ding.
The bell was my cue to exit the stage, but I didn’t want to pull away from those cold gray eyes.

Ding.
“Thank you,” the proctor repeated, this time louder with a hint of annoyance.

I nodded back and left the stage.

That night I checked my email over and over, but it stayed empty. When something did come in at 10:37 it was an ad for a male enhancement product, then an H&M sale notice popped up ten minutes later.

Nothing from Jeremy, probably because I’d told him
to leave me alone, and because he was practicing for his semifinal tomorrow. I was dying to send him an email and tell him how well I’d played. He deserved to know. He deserved to be scared.

Finally, I turned off my computer and stretched out across my bed. I missed him. That didn’t make any sense, considering how mad I was at him and how hurt I still felt. But that didn’t make me miss him less.

I pulled up onto my elbows and grabbed the dog-eared competition schedule off my nightstand. Jeremy played at five p.m. Only one person followed him, then the judges took an hour to deliberate before they announced the three finalists at seven o’clock sharp. Part of me wanted to go early and hear Jeremy play again, but the rational side nixed that idea. I needed to do exactly what I’d told him to do: focus on my own music. I’d show up just before seven.

My head suddenly felt heavy, too heavy to hold up. My performance had been … perfect? No. Nothing was ever perfect. But it had been close, nerves and all. I smiled and stretched my arms over my head. The memory of it made everything else unimportant. Or at least less important. I let go of the schedule, letting it fall to the floor and slide under my bed. My head dropped to my pillow and my thoughts glided halfway into dreams, through the different pieces of music I’d
been practicing, and then strange music I didn’t even recognize. The sound of my violin was beautiful, but it echoed in an empty concert hall and finished to no applause at all.