But this was uncharted territory. I had no bloody idea what I was doing. I’d never cared for anything deeply except survival, and when things got rough, I turned to jokes and laughs. To fix whatever was broken before it got uncomfortable.
She doesn’t want that. She wants real.
And honest. And I was a cheating bastard who’d just turned in a proposal for the NoSci, with help from my father’s envelope. My theory was that the right blend of polymers could bond to ions in asphalt and make potholes close on their own. It was only a theory, and if by some miracle it passed round one, I’d still have to do all the work. Butself-adhering potholeswas not what prestigious awards were made of.
Father can’t say I didn’t try.
“What do you have going on today?” Harper asked, pulling me from my guilty thoughts.
“First lesson with Wolfe after school, right before crew practice.”
Our first regatta was the next day (the school took a holiday on Tuesday for it) and the entire Academy was hyped the way most schools prepped for football. AmericanandEuropean football.
Harper eyed me up and down. “You seem nervous. Regatta or Wolfe?”
“Wolfe. He’s going to rip out my guts via my fingers.” I leaned in. “Despite the covert status of our relationship, are you coming to the regatta?”
“Wouldn’t miss it,” she said. “And I was thinking—”
Langford blew in the door, muttering apologies, and immediately began the day’s lesson.
“You were saying?” I whispered.
Harper blushed again, looking uncharacteristically bashful. Shy, even. “Nothing.”
***
“I don’t have a lot of time,” I said, joining Professor Wolfe in the empty auditorium where Advanced Piano was held. “I have crew practice in forty-five minutes.”
“Ah, yes, the infamous Castle Hill regattas,” Wolfe said, rolling ther. “I’ll keep our inaugural lesson brief.”
Today he wore a long black coat, black pants, and shirt. He had no detectable odor of liquor hanging around him, and his eyes were clear blue lasers, scanning me up and down.
“First things first,” he said, indicating I should sit at the baby grand. He then laid a piece of music on the rack in front of me. “Can you read this?”
I scoffed, even as my insides twisted. “Of course.”
“Play.”
I obliged, because my brain—for whatever reason—decoded notes with ease. I took a mental picture of the page, set my fingers on the keys, and did as Wolfe commanded.
The piece started with a fast, repetitive series of three notes with my right hand—the music had me envisioning sunlit water rippling along a creek bed. Eventually my left hand joined with a harmony, but Wolfe snatched the sheet music off the rack.
“Stop, stop, stop. What did you just play?”
I shrugged. “Didn’t catch the name.”
“Ravel’s Gaspard de la Nuit.”
“Okay.”
“How would you describe what your right hand was doing?”
I frowned. “Repeating notes: A, C sharp, and F sharp.”
“Rapid triadic ostinatos,” Wolfe said. “Do you know what that means?”
“Not really,” I said, my neck heating. “I told you, notation isn’tmy thing.”
