Entropy (17 page)

I remember how people in my company kept coming up to you, expressing their admiration at your courage. I kept blushing when you looked over at me that way you did when you knew that no one else was looking. No one would ever see the things in you that I did: the way you spoke to me; the sound you made with your heart and mind when you used to play; and the irresistible way you turned into a shy adolescent when I asked you to make love to me. You always tried to hide your shyness, but your hand always started to shake as soon as I lit a candle and came into our bedroom. After all this time you were still nervous around me, like the very first time we were together.

But I digress …

I remember that there was a lot of alcohol being consumed at that event - not that drunkenness could ever be an excuse for what she said. You told me that you had left the party for some air and was sitting on a rock watching the tide, when a few people in the company who I disliked came up to you. You know I would have fought across vast deserts to keep anyone from hurting you.

And yet, I wasn't there for you.

I heard that someone started off by making a comment about your arm and your body. Those fiends were trying to topple the strength I was trying to help you rebuild with their insinuations and their jealousy. One man even asked you if you were sick. You told them you weren't. The conversation went silent so you stood up to leave. I was proud that you never wavered in your attitude and your demeanor. You had such integrity and pride. It was always there, even though you could never see it.

Then that woman asked you that question.

We drove home in the middle of the night. I didn't care that I missed the performance the next day. I wasn't going to subject you to that kind of abuse again. I kept reaching over to push the hair out of your face while you slept as I drove the 100 miles back home. You know home could be anywhere for me, provided that I am with you …

I am not really sure what triggered it, but I thought a lot about the pianist from your quartet last night. Maybe it was caused by my recent rehearsals for my upcoming recital. Yesterday was the first time that we could actually get someone to come and play in the studio in over a month. The pianist turned out to be so young that I knew he would not play any of your compositions. I wasn't even sure that he would have ever heard of you. And I was glad. I didn't really want to hear anyone else play your music. In my eyes, no one had that right.

The pianist was the member of your quartet who died, wasn't he? You didn't say anything to me about him until a few weeks after it happened. I knew that you had held out hope that you would all play together again. Is that why you held on for so long before telling me about him? Did his passing cause an emotionally crippling realization that you would never play in the quartet again? There is no shame in admitting that. He was so supportive of you after the accident, even though you told me not to show you any of the letters that he sent. I still do not understand why you never wanted to read them. Was it because you had been forgotten by so many people that it was easier for you to just push away those people who still cared? Did you prefer to think that your life wasn't important to anyone else?

He honestly cared about you in those letters, even more so after he heard about all of the details of exactly what had happened. The night he found out he called the house. You were still in a weakened condition, and being constantly questioned by the authorities exhausted you. I couldn't tell him why you had done it because I didn't know; just that you were going to need years of therapy and rehabilitation. I wasn't going to tell him all the details of what happened, but he already knew ...

“It is so tragic,” he said ...

He didn't come right out and say it, but he seemed to suggest that the dissolution of the quartet had affected you more than anyone realized it would. He said that although you were the most intense out of all of them, he felt that at times, it prevented your music blossoming. I told him that you never blamed him for wanting to go back to school and to study abroad. You knew that Europe was the greatest field for a young musician to develop himself. He never asked if I needed anything. But it didn't matter. All I have ever needed was you, and you were still with me.

“People go in different directions.”

To him, it was that simple. You said that it was unfair for him to consider you in his decisions when at the time I said he was being selfish.

You sobbed most of the night when you finally told me that his plane had crashed over the waters near Ireland. We were supposed to go to dinner that night and then go to counseling together. You always told me that I didn't have to go, that I didn't need to see all of your deformities at once; what you felt made you unlovable and deformed. You saw yourself as a monster. I married you because I wanted to experience all of you, and that included your pain as well. I wanted so much to be a part of your healing, so you knew that I would always stand by you.

I stayed up with you that night. I remember how you suddenly stood up after not moving for hours, and sat down at the bench of the piano that I used when I rehearsed at home. I knew that you had taken lessons a while back, but had never seen you try to play. God, I wished you could understand how talented and rare you are. People spend years, decades learning to play an instrument, and you learned how to master its technique in months. It was as if you were a wild animal tamer. You were able to look into the eye of a beast without fear, without discourse. I just never realized that you couldn't do the same when you had to confront the beast that haunted you.

You pulled out the bench from underneath of the piano and sat down. I knew that composers had written pieces for musicians with one hand, but I had never heard any of them. Apparently, you had researched them and downloaded a few pieces. At first, your fingertips moved across the ivory keys, disjointed and clumsily, as if they were too big for your hand. You pulled your hand back and set it on your lap. I came around and stood in front of you. Your eyes were closed. When they opened you took in such a deep breath and slapped your fingers down, punishing the instrument.

It was as if you hated it.

Tears welled up in my eyes as you composed yourself and played again. The small, personal recital lasted a little more than four minutes. I was never moved more than I was during those beautiful truncated moments. When you finished, you stood up and pushed the bench back underneath the piano and came closer to me. You said that you would try to learn to speak without music, and to love without silence. You asked me to help you, to reconstruct you. I put my hand on your chest and felt your heart trying to tear through your rib cage …

The rain fell harder and it seemed as if it was the only sound in the world. It had grown darker, so at least now it was harder to see inside the bus.

I still didn't know how to end this.

I had completely convinced myself that nothing would change if I turned myself in. I would still struggle to find my balance and to rid myself of my feelings of self-loathing and recrimination. It couldn't go on. I closed my eyes. Killing him would have been the only time I would have had courage. I wanted to get to him so much.

I stood and waited for the negotiator to call.

The beautiful woman was leaning against the bus window gently sobbing. I moved near her so that I could see outside through a window more clearly. So many people had gathered there in the rain. Even if Augustina was out there, she could never convince all of those people that I never meant to hurt anyone.

I glanced at the open catalogue resting in the hands of the beautiful woman. It contained pictures of paintings. The man behind her, who appeared to be in his late thirties to early forties, told me to let her go. I said
no
. It would all be over soon. I stopped and clutched the gun tighter. I turned my wrist over and struck him above the eye with the butt of the gun. Blood rushed out from a cut that the blow had caused above his eye. It dripped onto the floor beneath his seat.

I told him that just because a man failed it didn't make him a coward.

I sat down again, watching the rain streak across the glass of the windows. The objects outside were getting more indistinct. I replaced my earpiece and pressed play on the recorder, before lifting the gun onto my lap. Slowly, I moved it up against my sternum then let it settle into the notch in my throat. I put my index finger over the curve of the trigger, and slid my finger back and forth across the thin steel.

I had a dream the other night but I'm not sure how you would respond to it if I told you. The bassist in your quartet was here with his two daughters, the children he had adopted with his wife after he quit the group. We were sitting back in deck chairs, listening to the water trickle from the pond he had helped you install. I had never lost our child, but instead we had a son, who was running through the yard with the twin girls, laughing and grinning, the way we used to as children. You had held my hand so tightly in that dream, with such passion and love, that when I awoke I looked at my wrist, expecting to find marks from where your fingertips had been.

I know that you love children. When we used to walk around the neighborhood and saw other couples with strollers, or setting up lemonade stands, you would try to hide it, but your eyes would light up whenever you saw children, giving you away. Perhaps it was the innocence involved in being a child, the lack of responsibility, or the lack of self-awareness and self-consciousness. Please don't misunderstand what I am saying. You were the most responsible man I have ever known, and your accident did not change that, no matter what you or anyone else thought.

I was listening to some music the other day. It was a collection of songs that will forever echo in my memory. You bought the CD for me right before your accident. After hearing the music for the first time, I expressed such a desire to go to see the soloist in concert that you said that you would take me. But we didn't go the next time they were performing locally. It was one of the first times that I was actually mad at you. We were struggling for money at that time, and you thought that it was an unnecessary extravagance. You were right, but I took it out on you anyway. You would have had every right to be angry with me, but you never were. I wished more people possessed your nobility. I left that morning while you were out and wrote you a note saying that I was going to spend the night at a friend's house. I was pouting like a spoiled child, but I didn't want to make matters worse by saying something that I would later regret. I tried calling you that night, but I only let the phone ring once before I hung up. I didn't have the courage to talk to you.

It was late, almost sunset the next day, when you pulled up in my friend's driveway and started knocking at the front door. Cars had been going past the house all afternoon. Each time I had hoped that it was you, coming for me because you couldn't go another hour without seeing me. But each time when a car drove on by and I realized that it wasn't you, I got upset. I was expecting you to run barefoot to my friend's place, and to drag me back home with you. We all want to be chased. I felt stupid though, like a teenager, who was upset because there was no note in her locker from that boy she liked. I remember that you had a flower in your hand when I opened the door. You then took me by the wrist and lead me back home.

Even now, I still cannot believe what you did next.

While I had been gone, our house seemed to have changed. Although the front lights were off, I could still see a basket of flowers sitting on the porch. I bent over to smell them. It reminded me of running through the fields as a child, the dandelion seeds and pollen clinging to my dress. I wanted to have known you back then. I got upset for a few moments, knowing that there were things like this that I hadn't yet shared with you. I wanted to know all the little things about you, just in case we never had a chance to share them in the future. Stupid things, like your first cut, the first time you spoke, the first time you saw a woman and felt something tingle behind your chest …

You raised my eyes towards yours and told me to go inside.

Most of the lights in the house were dimmed or switched off, so I let you lead me. I was temporarily blind to all but your wishes. You were my custodian. We moved through the living room and when we reached the French doors that led to the rear of the property, you told me to close my eyes. I stepped through the door with your guidance but lost my balance. I singed the side of my ankle on what I thought was a candle. I soon opened my eyes and couldn't believe what I witnessed.

Lining the edges of the stone patio and walkway were small candles floating in clear, oval bowls of water. The piano from our living room had been moved outside, and was surrounded by plants and flowers. A large portion of the lawn, which was once unkempt and cluttered, had been cleared. Across that open space was a large blanket. A beautiful outdoor table was set up for an elegant dinner, complete with candlelight. In a bucket full of ice was two bottles of wine. You asked me to sit down. I shouldn't have been surprised when you pulled out the chair for me. It was then that a man who I didn't recognize stepped out from the house dressed exquisitely in a tuxedo. He unfolded a small table next to us from which he served dinner. I wasn't sure who made it, but the food was amazing. I never saw that man again for the rest of the night. You never told me who he was. Everything was so beautiful.

We were alone, and I felt so blessed with our life. You kept smiling at me during dinner. It was so quiet in the neighborhood, as if you had asked everyone to stay away, so as to leave us to swim alone in that momentary of tranquility in our lives. That peace was broken when someone began to play the piano behind me. However, I didn't turn around until I heard that voice. It was so recognizable to me. For the first time I understood how you must have felt when the music that you had composed was played.