Nocturne (26 page)

If there were to be sides.

If this ever got out of hand.

It’s going to be fine
, I told myself. After all,
he
told me he loved me and
he
was the one who desperately kissed me on that sidewalk. We were adults in love.
We can work through this hiccup
, I thought.

I thought.

Gregory

“—And a student that you’ve already dodged rumors about already, at that. Damn it, Gregory, what the hell?” James held his arms out, his face red with anger as we stood on the stairs in front of my house.

He’d met me on the stairs as I returned from chasing Savannah down.

Fuck.
 

Now James was making me answer for it.

“For God’s sake, James, would you calm down? You’re making a scene.”

“I think you made enough of a scene for both of us, Greg.” He clenched his jaw, and I started to panic just slightly. I’d never seen James so erratic before.

Looking side to side, I lowered my voice to an almost-whisper. “Back up a little for me. Who saw what, exactly?”

“A student of Madeline’s who called her right away …”

As James gave the details about this girl who reported what she thought she saw to Madeline, my mind shifted to Savannah, and the desperation I felt as she fled my house.

Desperation causes people to make mistakes. To fail. There was no room in my life for failure.

“Okay, okay,” I cut him off, waving my hand impatiently. “What do I do to fix this?”

“You cut off all contact with Savannah Marshall. Starting right this second.”

The idea was preposterous. I was helping her with one of her recital pieces. We’d become close on a musicianship level, learning from each other as we practiced our piece together. All of that was secondary, evidenced by the fear rising through my chest. I loved her. I couldn’t simply cut her off.

“That’s irrational, James. I’m helping her with one of her recital pieces.”

“She can find another cellist, James. I know you’d like to think you’re the only one, but you’re not,” James scoffed.

“Won’t that just work to confirm whatever rumors are floating about?” My pulse raced at the thought of never seeing Savannah again.

“It won’t confirm them any more than making out with her in front of the school, Gregory. You’ve worked too hard for too long to let something like a fling with a student ruin everything for you. You could lose your job at the university and cause scandal for the orchestra. Not something either place, or you, need right now.”

I had no other cards to play. No tricks left up my sleeve. Except one.

“I love her.”

“Ha!” James let out a full-throated laugh. “Come on, Greg. You don’t have to lie to me. You don’t love anything but music, and you don’t love anyone but yourself. You’re a good guy, but we both know that relationships have never been a priority for you. Now is not the time to make them one. Especially not one with a student. You need to cut the shit. You’re not in love with her. You’re excited by her. Who wouldn’t be? She’s gorgeous. They’re all gorgeous, and they’re all talented. That’s where it ends.
This
is where it ends. You need to stop seeing Savannah, starting immediately.”

“I’m a goddamn adult, James. I’ve been in control of my own life for as long as I can remember, and I don’t intend to have you standing on my stairs changing that now.” Panic struck like lightning through my body at the thought of having to
end
things with Savannah. Whatever it was … it couldn’t end.

James stepped up one stair so we were level. He spoke low and slow into my ear. “You’ll lose everything. Your position at the conservatory, for sure. While you’ll stay in the orchestra, your reputation certainly won’t. Think about it. Is she really worth all of that?”

She is.

“It’s not as simple as that, James.”

“Yes, it is, Gregory—”

“I love her!” My yell scattered a group of pigeons from the sidewalk in front of us.

“If you love her,” James spoke carefully, “then release her from this. Think of how she’ll be seen. Her senior year, as she’s auditioning for symphonies, and she’s fooling around with the principal cellist for the BSO? Come on, Greg, you don’t want that stamp on her head as she starts off, do you?”

I set my hands on my hips and looked down. “Damn it …”

“You’ll both be better off in the long run if you cut this off at the pass. But, you’re already established in the community and she’s not—”

“
I get it, James,”
I snapped. After a few seconds, I cleared my throat and nodded. “Okay. I’ll end things with her. Today.”

I had no choice. He was right.

“Just like that, huh?” Out of nowhere, Savannah’s voice forced the full weight of what I’d just said onto my shoulders.

Shifting my gaze to the sidewalk, I found Savannah standing wide-eyed with her arms hanging loosely at her sides. Staring at me. The space between us was filled with words designed to protect both of us from what everyone
else
would think.

“James,” I asked, never breaking Savannah’s stare, “can you give us a moment?”

“Uh …” James looked back and forth between me and Savannah, mouth hanging open.

Savannah addressed him, looking at me the entire time. “That won’t be necessary, James.” Her face was like stone; the only evidence of life coming from her was in the trembling of her voice.

“Savannah.” I jogged down the stairs to meet her.

She took a deliberate step back and held up her hand. “Stay away from me.”

At that she turned slowly away and marched with a stone-like cadence down the sidewalk, away from me.

I stood there, waiting for her to come back. Waiting for her to change her mind.

She never did.

Savannah

T
he soft strains of Antonio Vivaldi
played in the background. Men and women spilled out onto the lawn in their gowns and tuxedos, as the wait staff hurried here and there delivering champagne and caviar. I held a glass of Riesling in my left hand as my eyes scanned the crowd.

I wasn’t seeking out anyone in particular. It was actually just the opposite. Until that morning in the cathedral, it had been more than five years since I’d seen Gregory Fitzgerald. Five years I’d spent mostly in Europe, living a life marked by travel and performances instead of a home and stability. A life much like my mother had, a life that sometimes felt amazing and sometimes felt desolate.

A few days ago, I’d left Moscow. The season was over for the Bolshoi Ballet, and I was unsure of my plans to return. I thought maybe I could finish my final year of college and find a job teaching music somewhere, maybe in a high school near Philadelphia.

But who was I kidding? The lure of my musical career pulled me back every time I tried to walk away.

So here I was in Boston attending the wedding of my mentor Madeline, and James, Gregory’s best friend. It was a beautiful ceremony, in Boston’s largest Catholic cathedral, and
of course
Gregory was there, standing at the front of the wedding party as best man to his long time colleague and friend. At one point Gregory’s eyes swept the congregation, and against my will I shrunk down in my seat a little, ducking my head behind a large man who sat in the pew in front of me. I didn’t think he saw me. I didn’t particularly want him to.

I shook my head, scoffing a little at myself. After all, while Gregory hurt me, badly, it had been more than five years. Five years was plenty of time to get over the rejection I felt as he effortlessly dismissed his feelings for me.

Five years was plenty of time to get over what was nothing more than infatuation in the first place. After all, Gregory was a selfish ass. The issue wasn’t that he hadn’t loved me. The issue was that he hadn’t loved me enough to fight for me. Or to even really admit his feelings for me to James, who pushed him to cut off contact with me.

“Excuse me … you’re Savannah Marshall, right?”

I blinked in surprise. I’d been lost in my thoughts as I stood there thinking of Gregory and hadn’t noticed the woman approach. Cynthia Dillinger. Clarinet, and in my year at the conservatory. We hadn’t been close, but it was nice to see a familiar face.

“Yes … Cynthia, right?”

Cynthia smiled. A fake smile, plastered on just like her makeup. “Oh, you remember me! I’m so pleased.”

“Of course I remember you.” I sipped my wine and returned the smile.

She turned her head away from me, scanning the crowd, then glanced back at me, and her tone of voice wasn’t precisely unfriendly, but it wasn’t all that warm either. “I wasn’t so sure you would, I was never part of the
conservatory elect
.”

I raised an eyebrow. “I don’t know what you mean.”

She looked at me skeptically. “Of course you do. You ... Nathan ... Yon Park ... the professors fluttered around you and your
talent.
The rest of us were rabble in comparison.”

I could have tried to deny what she was saying, but there was nothing I could offer. I’d seen it happen in the years that led to me entering the conservatory, and it was no different when I was there. While I didn’t notice the extra attention while I was a student, the second I stepped away I could see that I was being groomed for one of the Big Five, and no one bothered to ask if that was what I’d wanted.

Uncomfortable with the direction of the conversation, I shifted the subject. “What ever happened to Yon?”

“London Symphony.” Her eye roll highlighted five years of resentment over her perceived place on the conservatory totem pole.

     “Oh ... I see. I’ve lost touch with a lot of people.”

She gave me a speculative look and said, “I heard you went off to Europe right after you quit school.”

I nodded. “I took about a year studying folk music in Eastern Europe, and I’ve mostly been touring since.” I was understating it. I hadn’t gone and studied folk music in Eastern Europe. I’d wandered, mostly by bus and train, from town to town. Meeting local musicians and learning their music. Busking in subway stations in Prague. I’d learned more about music in just a few months wandering around than I did in ten years of formal classes and lessons. I learned more about myself, too.

I hadn’t left because of the sex, the kissing, or because of Gregory’s stark rejection. Not even because of my mother, or my confusion about my goals in life. None of those things, or maybe all of them. It took several months of me trying to tease out my motivations for leaving the place I’d dreamed about since I was a girl, to realize that sometimes life just takes you in a certain direction. Motivations or not.

Cynthia smirked a little and said, “I will say, it made our senior year super interesting. There were rumors that you and Fitzgerald snuck off together.”

“I can’t imagine why,” I said, running my hand over my navy eyelet dress.

“He disappeared the same day you did. Although he turned up with the BSO a week later.”

I tilted my head and said, “What, did he take leave or something? What do you mean
disappeared?
”

She gave me a stare. “He stopped teaching. Surely you knew that.”

I took a sharp breath, surprised. But maybe not. He hated teaching anyway. Though I wondered how he managed to pay for that giant monument to his ego ... the one-of-a-kind cello he toted around as if it held the secrets to his soul.

It probably did.

“Savannah!”

The shout startled me, and immediately a smile spread across my face.

Nathan! 

“Excuse me,” I said, and walked away from Cynthia without another word.

A moment later I was laughing as Nathan wrapped me into a warm hug. We squeezed each other tightly, and unexpectedly I began to choke up, tears flooding my eyes. I hadn’t seen Nathan in years. We’d talked on the phone, emailed, and chatted online, of course. But I missed looking into his eyes and watching his dimples. I missed being hugged.

“Christ,” he whispered. “I missed you so much.”

I leaned back and looked up into his eyes. “Where were you earlier? I looked for you at the ceremony.”