Page 5 of Petrify

“Yes.” Mariane’s smile doesn’t falter. “Did they not add this into your contract? We are terribly busy and he must be looked after until dinner. He is getting to that age. Trouble seems to findhim. Toys amuse him less and less every year.” She laughs, too. “Is this a problem?”

“No, of course not.” Though it’s not what I signed up for, sayingyesisn’t an option. In a few months, I’ll be able to say I worked forTheBeauchenes. With this alone I could be principal pianist next season. I’ll get my own features, maybe my own shows. “When can I meet him?”

Leo looks at his wrist watch. “Now.”

Henri Beauchene has the same curly blonde hair as his mother, emerald eyes, and a small bruise on his chin, and the moment he steps into the room, he is the smallest eight year old I’ve ever met. He clasps his hands together like it’s a practiced gesture, and his lips remain sealed shut.

“I’m Mallary.” I offer a hand.

He stares at it for a moment, shuffling on his feet. Glancing away.

“Henri, behave.” A hissed command from his mother. “You’ll be with Miss Mallary until lunch, remember?”

They don’t kiss his head, or hug him before saying goodbye. They don’t say goodbye at all. They just leave him with me, a stranger, and I have to feel for him.

The boy doesn’t move, frozen in his shyness. He’s dressed in a knit sweater and slacks that my mother would’ve insisted was wasted on a child, what with how they’d be ruined by the end of the day.

“Well,” I say into the silence. “Let’s see where your last tutor left off.” The nostalgia of the songbooks hits me like a wave. Only, I didn’t have someone to teach me these scales, or these quick one-minute tunes. I didn’t have the luxury of a tutor to push me to practice. I flip through the worn books, the last tutor’s notes—Nocturne no 9, E minor, at 45 bpm Sept 22?—

“Was that you playing earlier?” His voice is small and rough, scratched through his throat like they were his first words of the day.

“No, I just tapped the keys.” I frown, turning to him. “What did you hear?”

“I don’t know.” He shrinks into himself even more.

“Did you hear music?”

He only looks at me, green eyes widening. I know this look.

“It’s alright.” I smile again. “Why don’t we warm up? You can show me which book you’ve been using, and then we can?—”

He glances at the Steinway. “Can… you play something for me?”

Not two seconds ago, his parents insisted we get right to it. There’s no time to waste, apparently. But Henri’s green eyes are big and shining, and I haven’t played for days, too preoccupied preparing for this last-minute gig.

“Any requests?”

He shakes his head and watches me with the pull of rapt concentration at his brows as he tracks the movements of my hands at the keys—left to right and back, as though the song is simply hiding inside of the piano and I am its exorcist. I play the Nocturne, by Chopin, at the correct tempo. It’s the easily-impressed fascination of children. The song is there, I tell him, suspended in the air. The chords, the harmonies, they’re already mingling, already dancing together. Our fingers, this instrument, is what gives the music breath.

Maybe I understood this when I began playing by myself, even if I couldn’t put it into words. The reason certain songs take me over, overwhelming to the point of tears.

When I turn to him again, the last note ringing, his cheeks flush.

“You know of Chopin’s Mazurkas?” I ask.

He nods. “We talked about them.”

“Have you tried one?”

He shakes his head.

“What songs do you know?”

After a moment of silence, I consider that maybe he doesn’t know the names. Then he shrugs.

“Hey,” I say. “Why don’tyouplay something for me?”

Maybe, just maybe, he starts to ease into a smile. “What song?”