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‘Why so sad?’
He hadn’t noticed her behind him, standing in the doorway which led from the kitchen. He stopped playing abruptly, aware that the music had given away much more than he had ever intended. ‘It’s a slow piece of music.’
A slight frown of disbelief. It seemed that he could lie to the rest of the world, but Charlotte caught him out every time.
‘I recognise it. You’ve played it before.’
When he’d played it before it had been just a dalliance with the keys. Now it was a full-blown, passionate love affair, full of all the conflicting emotions in his heart. ‘It’s a work in progress. It changes every time.’
She nodded. Walked over to him. ‘Will you play it again?’
‘No.’ She couldn’t lure him in like that. If the music insisted on betraying him, then he’d stick to other people’s compositions. ‘I mean...I need to think about it a bit more.’
She nodded and he beckoned her over. This time she sat down next to him on the piano stool as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
‘Would you like something else?’
‘If you want.’ She smiled. ‘Whatever you want.’
‘Your turn to choose.’
She grinned. ‘What was it you were playing the other night?’ She hummed a few chords, her voice clear and tuneful.
‘You’ve got a good ear. Most people don’t get that bit right.’ He reproduced the chords she’d sung and she smiled, singing along with the music.
He’d played this song thousands of times before. Kathy had liked this one, too, but it had never felt like this. Never as if he was caressing someone with the music. Never so head-swimmingly erotic.
He hadn’t thought about Kathy in years. If asked, he would have said that he’d forgotten her, but it seemed that she’d just lain dormant in his memory, waiting to emerge and reprimand him for having ignored the lesson she’d taught him.
‘What’s the matter?’
Charlotte was closer now, and Edward realised that he’d stopped playing.
He shrugged. ‘This song reminds me of...someone I used to know.’
‘Should I be sorry?’
He shook his head. ‘I don’t think so. It was a long time ago. When I was at university.’
‘Which time?’
‘The second. Kathy was a medical student.’
She nodded. ‘First love?’
He shrugged. ‘I suppose so.’
It had been more like a first friendship, really. Kathy had been quiet, studious, so like him that everyone had reckoned they were made for each other and it was just a matter of time before they got married.
When she’d left him, citing a lack of emotional commitment on Edward’s part as her reason, it had been proof positive to all their friends that Edward was the cold fish they’d always marked him down as being.
She nodded. ‘My first love was Isaac’s father. That didn’t work out too well.’
‘But you loved him once...’ The words almost choked Edward.
‘You know they say that love is blind?’ She looked up at him and he nodded. ‘Well, I don’t think so. I think that real love sees everything.’
‘Do you think you can really ever see everything about someone?’
