Petrify

15. The Pianist

The Pianist

For you.

I study the words scrawled on the page. A few more measures for the waltz, the left hand the same chords, though the melody begins to wilt into something melancholic.

It’s written in such a way that the left hand is heavy, while the right barely dances across the keys, lilting and tenuous.

Humming through these new lines, I’m mapping out the movements of my hands before I can even make it to the keyboard.

I don’t tell anybody. This, I keep to myself, my own little secret. This song, this piece of worn paper, mine. If I show someone, they might take it, and then I’ll never know how the song resolves.

He left it for me. He wrote this for me.

What is he trying to tell me?

My thoughts wander to him, to the song, even when I am occupied with Henri and our lessons. I want so badly to tell Henri to take a break, so I can have the piano to myself.

One more day passes, and I can play the waltz with my eyes closed. Becoming so familiar with a piece, the movements second nature, mindless, almost—I’m meant to do this. I’m meant to be this vessel for the music. It feels too good, like the song and I are slowly meshing together.

Of course the song he wrote is worming its way into my head.

Twice now he has revealed himself to me. No one thinks he’s real, but now I know better, though I’m not sure exactly what I’ve done to earn his music.

He’s hurting, I think. His heart. As much as a ghost’s heart can hurt.

He doesn’t know he’s dead.

I’m waiting for him, waiting for the next time he’ll show himself.

I catch myself wondering if he’s watching, sometimes feeling that he is.

Those eyes on me—it’s him, I know it. Ever since that first night, like some kind of guardian angel, always with me, and now I’ve come to expect it.

He’s always there. I imagine he follows me from room to room.

I’m such a freak.

Henri doesn’t seem to notice the strange attention lingering throughout our entire lesson. No one mentions the Ghost again, not Ms. Byrne, or Julia, or Em or Nathan. If they feel it too, they must be numb to it.

But my thoughts are of nothing but the song and its composer.

When I have free moments, I spend them with the waltz, even when my fatigue catches up to me and my eyes are too tired to focus on the thin drawn lines, the blots of ink translating his song into something tangible.

The melody echoes, layered over the ache that creeps into my skull most days.

I know I’m exhausted, and yet I can’t stop.

Sleep feels less important than getting this song right.

He needs to know he hasn’t wasted his music on me.

I’m no longer dozing when the clock in the hall announces the midnight hour, the soft, soothing chimes some distance away, yet ringing out like a death knell. My hands are already fisted in the sheets.

I’m not alone. I know it the moment I open my eyes.

When I push myself up, I see it—the shadow figure at the window, emerging from the dark like a wraith. The moon is bright tonight, and though my curtains are drawn shut, a soft blue glow illuminates the figure’s face.

That smooth, white face. Expressionless, blank.

Because it’s not his face.

It’s a mask.

Ghosts don’t wear masks, I think, somewhere in the back of my head. But it hardly registers, because I’m pushing myself against the headboard, as far as I can get from him, legs tangling in my sheets. “You—”

I don’t know what to call him. Nothing feels right. Certainly not Arnie.

Is this even Arnie, anymore? Or has he transformed into something else? He looks everything like a demon sent to haunt me.

His head cocks to the side.

“You—you’re—” Holding the blanket to my chest like it can protect me, for a moment I’m light headed. “You’ve been watching me,” is all I manage to stutter out.

I ignore the urge to pull the chain of the lamp, because every single time, he disappears the moment I look away. “Haven’t you?”

His hands remain at his sides. It’s too dark to make out any details, but I can see the edge of his figure against the midnight shadows of the room. I can see the planes of the mask. And the glint of his eyes hidden behind.

A dead man is standing at the foot of my bed.

He doesn’t know he’s dead.

I’m not sure that’s the truth. And I can’t stop the thought from forming: that I’m not sure this is the ghost of a dead man, either.

“You left me that music, didn’t you?” I start to ramble. “I thought you did. I—I played it a few times. It’s—beautiful.”

His response is a whisper, the sound barely louder than a breath: “Yes.”

And then he takes a step forward.

Yes, he left the music for me? Yes, he’s been watching me?

And he’s coming closer, my muscles screaming at me to do something, to move. “What is it you want?”

It’s then I remember I’m locked in this room—the chair is jammed under the door knob, sealing me inside. I can’t run. I could scream, but I don’t know if anyone would be able to hear me.

I am alone in this wing of the house, this wing which used to belong to him.

My tongue has gone dry, but I don’t let myself panic. I don’t look away either. Unable to blink. Unable to do anything but wait for his next move.

“I’m curious about you.” Voice low and gravelly as if he never speaks. “You’re more interesting than the others.”

“The others?”

“They’ve brought other tutors into the house.” A pause. “Yet you seem to care for him. And the music.”

“Of course I care.”

He doesn’t say anything else, those glinting eyes studying me through the dark. Can he see me?

Then he says, “We all run from something,” and my blood runs cold. “The past never really leaves us, does it? Tell me, Mallary Doyle, are you still running?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” It’s reflexive, the words out of my mouth before I can even think.

Deny, deny, deny.

He laughs. A rough sound that shoots straight through me. Raspy, deep, and male. “Yes, you do.”

My brain is scrambling to make sense of this.

There’s a masked man—a ghost—standing in my room.

But am I the one trespassing? Am I the one at fault?

Is this my fault?

The memory of the first time I went to Jason’s office plays in my head, his office hours after that first class, and it has my heart fluttering even quicker in my chest, a tight panicky feeling that doesn’t want to go away even when I take a handful of deep breaths.

The eagerness to do well, to please. To stand out.

I think about the last time I was cornered, and how well that ended.

“What does it matter? I am here to do a job. I’m here for the music. That’s all.”

“Music?” The word is smooth, the whisper velvet-soft. “What does that word mean to you?”

My eyes narrow. “Is this an interrogation?”

I can feel his sneer. “It is now.”

“Because I don’t remember anyone saying that I had to answer to you.”

He hums, a low, amused sound that resonates in his chest. “Are you sure about that?”

This ghost, this man, is as real as I am. I have no doubt if I were to reach for him, my hand would meet a solid chest.

And if he’s real, then there is a man in my room. My locked room.

He hasn’t made a move to rush me. He stays put a few feet away. If he wanted to hurt me, he would have already. At least, this is what I tell myself.

“I’ve made music my everything,” I say, answering his question. “Without it, I…”

I don’t want to admit what I’d do, where I’d be, if I hadn’t decided to throw myself into learning everything I could about my instrument.

It was a distinct decision, too. I remember it well.

I wasn’t a prodigy, or even remotely talented, but one day I’d had enough of the hand I was dealt and if nothing else, the music became a distraction.

Something to do to stay out of my mother’s way. Something to fill the time.

“Then we’re the same.”

Though he hasn’t moved an inch closer, I swear I feel breath on my neck, a heat closing in around me. His attention is piercing, his presence in the room drawing all the shadows closer.

“The same?”

The white mask slowly nods once. “I hear everything. Every moment you’ve sat at that piano and played. I’ve heard you play my music.”

“And you’ve been watching me.”

“Yes.”

I’m aflame with the memory of him standing by the tub. Opening my eyes, limbs buzzing with pleasure, just to see his dark form. The thrill of being so vulnerable. A heady mix of pleasure and peril that I know can be so quickly addictive.

I should be angrier.

I only stare back at his solid white mask, trembling in my bed, thinking maybe I’m too familiar with the way my heart pounds.

“What do you want, Mallary Doyle?” He steps forward, saying my name again like a taunt, like he knows just how he’ll get under my skin. “What has been promised to you? Which of your dreams are for sale?”

The scowl sours my face before I can stop it. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“Favorite in your class. The shoe-in for the residency. A spot in the city orchestra with your name on it. Principal pianist. But you didn’t get the residency. The orchestra didn’t take you in as anything but an understudy. Why is that? When you play so beautifully?”

Shame heats my face.

He’s too close to the truth, probing at my failures.

“Maybe I decided to take some time off.”

His head tilts. “No.”

I open my mouth to bite back again, but he cuts me off.

“All of that can be yours again. That, and more.”

“That’s why I’m here,” I bite out.

There’s a tense pause.

Then, “How badly do you want it?” Something deep and sensuous and wholly alluring seeps from his voice and straight into my blood.

He doesn’t—He doesn’t mean—

My face heats. Stupid, to read into something like that.

“No, don’t fight it.” Somehow, in the space of a few moments, he’s rounded the bed, so that he is just out of arm’s length. He could grab me. Pin me to the bed. Do so, so many things to me.

And no one would know until it’s too late.

What did Ms. Byrne say, that I was put in this wing for peace and quiet?

Nausea settles into my stomach, every swallow thick, every breath just too thin.

This ghost—their son—they know he is in this house. They have to.

They know he is in this house and they put me in his old room.

“Think of how good it could be,” he says, creeping closer. “Take what I am offering to you.”

“How could you help me? How could you possibly help me?”

“I wrote that music, didn't I?”

“That doesn’t mean anything.”

He’s growing impatient. A hand flexes at his side. Does he want to touch me? “Do you truly think that anyone else gets it, like I do? That anyone would understand the pull it has on you?”

Somehow I know he means it. That he feels music’s sway, too.

“Sure you wrote that song. But you can’t promise… all of that.”

“I’m promising more.” He’s too close now. “I’m promising everything.”

My breath catches. I’m too weak to not give in, to not fall for the future hinted at in his syrupy-sweet words.

“You’re unsure. Let’s make a bargain, then.”

He really is a devil.

“I will write you music. I will help you. Just keep playing for me.”

I blink. “That’s all?”

In the few silent seconds lingering between us, I want to know so badly what he’s thinking. His eyes glimmer, I’m not sure he blinks, and I can’t look away, pinned under his stare. “Do we have a deal?”

“Yes.” Said too quickly, spilling off my tongue before I can think any better of it. But could I say no? Would I say no to him?

“Good.”

I almost expect him to close the space between us. But what reason would he have to touch me? The blank white face betrays no emotion, and it’s too dark for me to really make out his eyes.

“You must practice,” he says. “As often as you can. Every night. I’ll be there.”

Before I can think better of it, I’m shoving the covers off, my legs sliding over the side of the bed.

He jerks back a step. “Don’t.”

Already I’m fucking this up. Too eager. Unable to read him or the situation.

My mouth falls open but no excuse comes out, the single word a flaming hot rejection spearing through my chest. “Sorry, I—”

I’m going to ruin this before it even starts.

“I will find you when it’s time.” He recovers quickly, a new air of caution. “Tomorrow night.”

I think he wants to say more, the silence hanging thick, but he moves away, giving me a single nod as he fades into the shadows like a true specter.

The words are soft, muffled by his mask. “Goodnight, Mallary.”