Chapter 9
NINE
“Sophie! You had me worried. You never miss a lesson,” Professor Grigoryan welcomed Sophie in with a relieved smile. “You look... different.”
Sophie smiled a broad, genuine smile. Instead of dashing nervously from her face, it stayed and spread to her eyes, glowing. “Thank you.”
He paused. “Well. How is the piece?”
Sophie got her cello out more slowly than usual.
She felt like a new woman, but the world was still the same.
Or was it? There was more to it than she could have imagined.
Maybe she fit into the parts of it she had never known about before.
“I think it’s good. I think it could be even better.
” She took a steadying breath as she sat, the cello between her knees, her leg muscles still a little sore.
“I want to try out for Spring Soloist.” She hadn’t been lying when she told Jesse she didn’t want to be a star.
She wanted to help others find their voices, but for now, before she became a teacher, she could shine on this little stage.
For a moment, her teacher-slash-conductor was silent.
Then, he whooped, his fist raised in triumph.
“Yes! Yes, you must try out! But, you must not try out with the Dvorak. It’s beautiful, but it is haunting.
I want you to shine, I want you to smile.
” His eyes lingered over her fingertips, flexing and poised on the strings over the long black fingerboard. “Haydn. In D Major.”
Sophie blinked. It was a great piece, but definitely “upbeat.” It was happy, even sprightly. “I never played that before.” She’d never felt drawn to it.
“You can learn it.” The older cellist dug in his drawers of sheet music, darting a glance at her. “You strike me as someone who has been haunted. Even hunted.”
Sophie’s eyes unexpectedly filled. Hunted.
Murdered. Driven out. Her family had been hunted.
Driven out of their native lands by war, persecution, and hardship.
That was not to speak of her birth parents.
Who knew what had happened to them? She had never much cared, figuring that they had abandoned her because of her unusual appearance.
Her own demons haunted her, self-hatred, and fear of virtually all others outside of her family.
“Shh, shh. Forgive a silly old man.”
“No. You’re not silly. You’re perceptive.” She hastily wiped her eyes as he continued to search.
When he turned back, he held out yellowed sheet music, a soft smile on his bearded face.
“The cello shows the soul. When you play, I see yours. A beautiful soul that loves her instrument because it can sing her songs.” He sat across from her, placing the music on her stand.
“It’s time to sing a happier tune, yes?”
“Yes,” Sophie agreed.
“Show them what you can do. Show them who you are.”
SOPHIE LOUNGED AGAINST the green-rusted statue of William Penn that dotted the middle of the campus. This is where she had started waiting for Jesse every afternoon.
“Sophie?”
Sophie turned her head. “Oh. Hey, Rick.” Halloween Rick. Freaked-out-leprosy-mentioning-Rick.
“Hi. I... I didn’t know where you —” he quailed under her stare. “Okay, I did know where you were, but I didn’t know what to say. I totally blew it on Halloween. I looked up some things on Albinism and—”
“I don’t have that, but I’m glad you looked it up,” Sophie found herself speaking casually, even smiling.
“You don’t— oh.”
“I don’t know why I’m so pale. I get that it’s going to be the first thing people notice about me, but it shouldn’t be the only thing.”
“Right! Right!” Rick nodded eagerly. “So. I wondered if you ever wanted to get a coffee sometime?”
“That’s sweet, but no thanks. No hard feelings?” She stuck out her hand.
He swallowed visibly and shook it. “Wow. Chilly fingers.”
“It’s thirty-five degrees out, Rick,” Sophie laughed.
It took a moment, but he laughed back, his face breaking into a wide grin. “You know who you remind me of?”
Sophie winced inside but kept her voice even. “Who?”
“There was a fairytale my nana used to read to me about a girl who lived in a land so far away, it was actually east of the sun itself. She married the Snow King and she was the Night Queen. They lived in a white castle made of ice and snow, with the moon hung between the battlements and the stars lighting their courtyard.”
Sophie stared, transfixed. “That’s a beautiful story, Rick. Wow. Th-thank you.”
“You’re welcome. It’s the least I can do. If I ever find the book, I’ll drop it off at Pettiford.”
“Or Ramsey. Jesse Smith’s room?”
“Oh. Ohhhh.” Rick nodded, his eyes full of realization. “Yeah. Or you can just Google it.”
“Probably easier. Do you know where the fairytale was from? What culture?”
“No, I don’t. I think maybe Russian or Siberian? Maybe Persian? I’m not a big help.”
“That’s okay. Google will fill in the blanks. Oh. There’s Jesse.”
Rick stared at the man who moved toward them, clad in denim. The dark-haired figure moved like a rangy wolf, just enough slouch in his shoulders and length in his steps to make every stride a deliberately predatory gesture. “Oh. That’s the Snow King, isn’t it?”
Sophie looked at her boyfriend. More than her boyfriend.
She didn’t know the word for this relationship when it was about love and acceptance and strangeness.
He was not her everything, but he was close.
Hm. King might be okay. “My King” was actually a Nigerian term of love her mother often used toward her husband.
“Yes. That’s the Snow King,” Sophie murmured, a small smile dancing across her lips.
“And there is my Night Queen,” Jesse announced, eyes only for her.
Rick left while they were still kissing, leaning against the frozen metal statue, neither one seeming to mind the cold.
“IT’S A ROMANIAN TALE.” Sophie was perched in Jesse’s bed, sitting in a nest of sweatshirts and pillows.
Jesse made a thoughtful noise. “A king who lives beyond the sun and is always cold. A queen who rules the night and joins him in his icy palace. Babe, this tale is totally about vampires.”
“Really?”
“Pretty sure a lot of ‘fairy tales’ are more real than anyone believes. Then again, they don’t know about people like us, do they?”
Sophie closed her laptop. Jesse’s offhand use of the words “people like us” didn’t annoy her, but it wouldn’t leave her mind.
“What is it?” he asked, shutting his own computer.
Sophie smiled at him. They had added another step to their routine.
Jesse really was a business consultant and he spent several hours every morning making calls to London or writing emails to clients in California, and talking to people everywhere in between.
She joined him in his work when she had time, taking care of the duties of her new part-time job.
It was a job no one else had wanted, but that she regarded as perfection.
She was the music department’s student assistant.
She was in charge of making photocopies for the orchestra and band, organizing materials for faculty, requisitioning materials from other libraries in the state system, and many other little jobs.
She could do many of them from her computer, but not if she couldn’t focus.
“You said ‘people like us.’ I’m not a vampire.”
“I know, Beautiful, I’m sor—”
“I want to know what I am. Do you think... do you think anyone in Pine Ridge could help me?”
“I bet. Mr. Minegold knows a lot and I know he’d be really happy to meet you. Um. You know, your parents could be a big help, too.”
“My parents don’t...” Sophie stopped. She’d been about to brush off the idea.
Her parents didn’t know anything about supernatural things.
Only they did. They were both deeply spiritual people, and although they’d left some of their ancestral practices and beliefs behind, the religious and ritualistic aspects of Nigerian and Armenian culture were still very important to them.
They meant a lot to her, too, albeit to a lesser degree.
“Maybe over Christmas Break,” Sophie twisted her fingers, “we could spend some time alone with our families, and then we could be together. With our families?”
Jesse moved next to her on the bed. “Is that too soon for you?”
“No. I’ve waited a long time to have someone to bring home. Even a friend.”
He kissed her hair. “I know what you mean. Geez, I can’t believe break starts this weekend.”
Sophie pushed the computer from her lap. “That’s three days away. We’d better not waste it.”
Jesse laughed and prowled up her body, hands skimming up her bare legs until they found her panties.
“That’s right. I’m betting I have to be on good behavior for your parents?
No sneaking into your room at night to wake you up.
.. with a kiss?” His lips parted her thighs, lids lowering seductively as he suckled on each slim white limb, then the deep pink rose between them.
“Daddy’ll kill you if you try. What about your mother?” she teased, rolling his shirt off over his shoulders.
For a moment, the sensual, playful air between them changed.
Jesse scooted up, resting his cheek on her stomach.
“My father was very influential. He convinced my mother that any relationship I formed would lead to discovery and put me at risk. He knew I was unhappy, but he believed I’d be even worse if I tried to find a woman to share my life with.
After all,” Jesse looked away, “she’ll die and I won’t.
I’ll always have to say goodbye. For a long time, I believed he was right. ”
Sophie stroked his hair in silence for a moment. “What changed?”
“You. You said goodbye to me. And I knew that it would be worth my whole life if I could have another day with you,” his smile trembled for a second. “I know one day we’ll have to part, but... so do all people. I’ll take what I get. I got one more day.”
“Lots more days, Baby.”
She pulled him underneath herself in one lithe glide, caressing his face as she brought them together.