Just play and trust her to follow.
Initially, Shizuka had assumed this process was to compensate for a lack of training. Yet Shizuka quickly realized that, although it differed from her previous students, Katrina was far from untrained.
Her tonality had been honed by a lifetime of being concerned with her voice. Her fingerings were liquid, born of years of not wanting her hands to make ugly motions. And her ability to play to a crowd, project emotion, follow physical cues?
Katrina had trained in that most of all.
“Let’s start movement three and work our way around.”
“Yes, Miss Satomi.”
Katrina might do this. She might really be able to do this.
Shizuka would guide her, let her feel human, no matter how she might doubt. Let her feel old and broken. Let her feel childish and na?ve. There was no need to be perfectly beautiful, nor immortal, nor untouchable.
After all, none of that was needed to write a poem or to sing a song.
“Okay, let’s try that again.”
Katrina had been exhausted. Frustrated. This piece was far too difficult. All that brave talk earlier … What was she thinking?
Who was she, trying to play something her own teacher could not complete?
But then, Miss Satomi told Katrina about being in first grade, trying a new food called a burrito. About how throughout grade school, while she was practicing, other kids talked about Captain Kangaroo or the Mickey Mouse Club. In middle school, some of her classmates would go to the movies. She didn’t pay attention to the movies they saw, but she remembered hearing that they bought soda and popcorn. She imagined the movie theater like a big living room. Her parents had never let her eat in the living room.
She told Katrina how, one Halloween, people threw raw eggs at this very house. She said how her father screamed at her, because he found out that the eggs came from her school.
“He said I needed to make more friends. So I bought a parakeet named Pete. Pete couldn’t speak—but he sang a wonderful Magic Flute.”
Katrina had no idea why, but with Miss Satomi’s every word, Aubergine felt a little more agile, more certain, more alive.
“Maybe one day I might like a pet, too—I mean, if it’s okay with you.”
“As long as you take care of it,” Miss Satomi said. “This is your house, too.”
“Well, at least until your next student?” Katrina giggled.
Shizuka felt herself stutter. “W-well, I suppose.”
“Don’t worry, Miss Satomi. I’m not jealous. I know I’m yours for now.”
“Enough chitchat,” Shizuka said. “Let’s start again, from the third movement, all the way through and around again.”
“Yes, Miss Satomi.”
They played throughout the afternoon. After practice, Shizuka walked outside. Already, she could feel a chill.
Way to talk about eternity.
Hypocrite.
* * *
Since it was November, at the pond were not just the usual ducks, but also some Canada geese and even a heron. To her left, there was a golf course. Around her, people were playing basketball. The sun was setting, but of course it would rise again.
After all, the sun is a star, and stars do what they do, and planets and comets and various pieces of this and that may spin around them like moths around flame.
Somewhere, a group of beings like her were zipping around looking for things to kill. Somewhere, a group of beings like her were fighting over some sort of planet or another. Somewhere, a group of beings like her were running from a dying galaxy.
And in front of her, a group of beings like her were fighting over a two-day-old donut.
Lan tried to suppress her emotions. She had donuts to sell, a stargate to build, a family to protect. But she did not want to lose this person, this music she had just started listening to, and fallen in love with—not now, not so soon.
“Lan, are you okay?”
Lan said nothing.
“Lan?” Shizuka moved closer to her. Lan pushed away.
“So, Shizuka. February fifteenth.”
“Um, you mean Katrina’s competition? Actually, she’s improving extremely quickly. In fact, she might even—”
“Stop it! Just … stop it. You know what I mean.”
Shizuka turned to the west. The blood-gold sunset faded into dusk.
“How did you find out?”
“There’s a reason I’m the captain,” Lan said without irony.
Shizuka wrapped Lan’s arm around herself.
“I wish I could play music for you. But I can’t.”
“I know,” Lan said.