Chapter Eleven
TWELVE YEARS AGO
BY THE TIME the concert is over, I’m sticky with old sweat.
My black dress clings to my skin as I set my mallets on the marimba and start gathering up my sheet music.
The stage lights are hot, and there’s no doubt in my mind that my curly hair now consists primarily of frizz.
The audience’s applause flowing over the stage makes it all worth it—even if it’s just our families and friends.
Disheveled appearance aside, the night couldn’t have gone better.
It was my first performance with the Juilliard orchestra after playing with the Lab all year, which is where most first years get their bearings.
Myself and two other percussionists—a junior named Aaron and a senior named Bo—ran the pit.
After rehearsing all semester, we played beautifully together, weaving around each other through pieces by Berlioz, Shostakovich, and Stravinsky. The last one is my favorite.
Aaron, Bo, and I congratulate each other on a job well done and set to work packing up our instruments.
The other students start filtering off the stage to retrieve their cases.
I’m eager to get everything wrapped up and find my family.
It’s the first time they’ve ever seen me play with the Juilliard orchestra, since my holiday concerts were a much smaller group, and I can’t wait to talk to them about it.
Some thirty minutes later, I’m inching through the throngs of people in the halls outside of the Sharp Theater.
I get pulled in different directions by my friends—Celia, come meet my mom!
and Oh, Celia, this is my big brother I was telling you about!
—coming from every which way. I smile and wave and shake hands and give hugs to people I’ve heard about all year.
The entire time, I scan the crowd for the four faces I really want to see.
Finally, I spill out of the masses and into the main lobby of the building.
Standing off to the side near the glass walls that overlook the exterior grounds are my dad, mom, and both sisters.
I head straight for them but get hijacked by Anthony and his parents, who pepper me with polite questions about how I found myself at Juilliard.
I manage to extract myself after a few minutes and turn to see my family waving at me.
They’re dressed in what my mom always called church clothes, even though we aren’t religious outside of the major holidays.
Their nice shirts and pants are ironed. My mom has her dark hair swept back in an elegant twist. Every single one of them is beaming.
“Hija!” Dad exclaims as I rush over to them. “That was magnificent.”
My mom smooths my hair and cups my cheeks before I swat her hands away. “Madre, please,” I whisper, too proud to let my friends see me being doted on.
“Sorry,” she replies. “I’m just so proud.”
“Honestly, that was cool as hell,” Rosa says, hands on her hips.
“Language,” my dad cautions with flattened brows.
Amanda bumps her shoulder against mine. “Yeah, I knew you were good, Celia, but not, like, that good. That was next level.”
“Thanks.” I’m smiling so hard my cheeks are starting to hurt. “Kind of amazing that everyone up there is still a student, right?”
My dad shakes his head. “Barely even adults and you’re all up there sounding like pros.”
“Are you sure that guy on the piano is a student?” Rosa asks. “He was really going for it out there.”
Amanda nods. “Way better than anyone else I’ve ever seen play at any of the thousand concerts we’ve been to.” My mom tuts, so Amanda adds, “Sorry. Your students are good, but you saw him up there. That was, like, something else.”
Out of the corner of my eye, a figure hovers in my periphery. I turn slightly to see Oliver standing by himself. His eyes are on the crowds still milling around in the halls. He must be waiting for someone.
“Yeah, actually. That piano player is right there,” I reply, then lower my voice to a whisper, forcing my family to lean in so they can hear me. “His dad is, like, famous in our world. Some people say he got the solo tonight because of that, but… I don’t know. You saw him play.”
“Famous?” Rosa asks with both eyebrows raised. “Would I know who he is?”
“No,” Amanda answers for me, and I can’t help but snort. We both know that Rosa’s knowledge is more general pop culture and less niche classical music world.
“Is he a friend of yours?” my mom asks as her eyes slide to the boy in question.
“No,” I scoff. “He’s not anyone’s friend, really.”
“Hija,” my mom chides, and I already know what’s coming based on her scolding tone. “Don’t be so rude. That’s your classmate. You should introduce us. Be nice to him.”
I want nothing more than to argue with her, to tell her that Oliver is a snob who thinks he’s better than the rest of us, but I know from the way she has her hands on her hips that there’s no point in trying.
If I don’t call him over, she’ll march right over to him on her own.
María García has been an elementary teacher my entire life; no one is going to be excluded or forgotten, not on her watch.
With a heavy sigh, I turn and call out, “Hey, Oliver!”
His attention snaps to me. I wave at him to tell him to come over here.
His eyes go wide, like he’s a deer in the headlights.
I wave again, this time with a little more passion.
Slowly he starts to make his way over to where I’m standing with the rest of the Garcías.
He stops just outside of the semicircle my family formed and gives me a quizzical look.
“Oliver, this is my family,” I say as brightly as I can, extending my hands out toward the people who look just like me. “My dad, José, my mom, María, and my sisters, Amanda and Rosa. Everyone, this is Oliver. He played the piano tonight.”
“Nice to meet you,” my mom says as she smiles at him.
“Great job up there,” my dad adds.
“Yeah, you were great.” This from Amanda.
“Are you really only in Celia’s grade?” Rosa asks. “Like, you’re eighteen or nineteen or whatever?”
Oliver says nothing. He just stands there in his all-black suit, blinks several times, and swallows hard enough that I can see his throat work. An uncomfortable, tense quiet settles over our group while everyone waits for him to respond. I knew this wasn’t going to go well.
I have no choice but to break the silence myself. “Yeah, Oliver is in my year. It’s the first time they’ve ever had a freshman pianist play the Firebird at the end-of-year performance.”
My dad nods encouragingly at Oliver as he says, “Well, it’s obvious why. You’ve got a real talent.”
Oliver looks at all of us, one at a time, his brown eyes closed off and cold.
Finally, he mumbles something that might be a “thank you” or something else, but I can’t tell.
With that, he darts away from me, from my family, and disappears out the exterior doors and into the gathering night.
Humiliated, I stare after him for several long, stunned seconds.
Oliver really is that rude.
My cheeks heat as I turn to look at the confused faces of my family.
Next to me, Rosa giggles, which causes Amanda to laugh, which then forces my mom to pinch both their arms with a frown on her face.
Reckoning with the sting of another Oliver dismissal—of my whole family this time—is something I never want to experience again.
“I tried to warn you,” I mutter finally.
My dad shrugs. “Can’t win them all. What do you say we go get some food, huh?”
All four women give a resounding yes. Together, the five of us step out onto the streets of New York City and wander down the block. We eat, laugh, and talk at an Italian restaurant until they kick us out some four hours later. That night, my dad coins the term Professor Pendejo.
FROM: Chris Ross
TO: Celia Garcia , Oliver Barlowe
DATE: Sunday, August 23 at 2:12 AM
SUBJECT: music?
got anything for me to chew on? a theme? even just a lick of something?
c
FROM: Oliver Barlowe
TO: Chris Ross
CC: Celia García
DATE: Sunday, August 23 at 2:27 AM
SUBJECT: RE: music?
Hi Chris—not yet. Expect something this week.
Oliver