Marius
The concert ends as normal. I returned to the stage after a few songs, and just lost myself in the music.
One encore and we’re done, rushing off the stage.
“Where is she?” Jez asks as soon as we’re backstage.
“Mike said Hailey took her back to the hotel.”
He looks at me, then at the back entrance door and back at me. “Well, are you fucking coming or not?”
Anca
The dreams are dark. They are too real and make me wake up in a sweat.
I check the clock.
It’s close to midnight. They’ll all be back soon.
I don’t know if I can’t wait to see them to apologize, or if I should just take this time to pack and leave, be out of their lives for good.
I can hear chatter from the street through the open window.
And then there’s a knock on my door.
I should’ve known he’d come for me.
He who?
You know who.
I slide out of bed and pad over barefoot to the door.
He knocks once more before I open it.
“Anca, there you are,” he says, smiling and holding out a dahlia to me. “I’ve missed you.”
And that’s the last thing I remember.
Marius
We don’t say anything in the taxi back to the hotel. For some sick reason I can’t keep staring at the bruise spreading on his left cheek. Maybe because I’m wondering how it’s similar to mine, courtesy of his fist, and how it’s all come to this.
It’s a short drive and we jump out of the car as soon as it pulls up to the curb.
The elevator ride up the four floors feels interminable. We both jump from leg to leg, fidgety, like we’re starters in the 100 meter relay. The elevator bells dings and the door’s barely open before we push ourselves through the widening gap and run to Anca’s room down the hall.
It’s somewhat cartoonish, the way we come to a skidding stop outside her door and then glance at each other and then back at the door.
For a moment I consider pushing him away, but then it dawns, he has every right to be there that I do and I take a step back. The smallest flutter of confusion flashes across his face before he lifts his knuckles and raps on the door.
“Anca,” I say, once he’s done knocking. “Anca, it’s us. We just want to check to see how you are.”
We wait for a moment, listening for the sounds of her moving on the other side of the door. But there are none.
“Try again,” I say to Jez and he nods and knocks again, this time louder and for longer.
“Anca, it’s Jez. And Marius, just come so we can see you’re alright.”
But she doesn’t.
Because she isn’t.
Anca
I open my eyes, and it’s just as dark as it was before I opened them.
But there’s something about your other senses becoming more sensitive, because, just from the scents I can smell, the sounds I can hear, I know exactly where I am.
It’s the last place I want to be right now with the very last person I want to be with.
I try to stand, but something stops me, my hands are free, but my legs are tied down, my waist in some sort of restraint.
I don’t struggle. I know there’s no point.
I’m at the complete mercy of him.
Of the Maestro.
As if on cue, his voice creeps out of the darkness and crawls into my ears. “Anca. Don’t worry, I’m not going to hurt you. I could never hurt you.”
My hands instantly come up to cover the sides of my head. That voice. It’s so much worse than I remember. Even through the fogginess of my head right now, it cuts right through, like aural cyanide in my veins.
I feel my arms pulled away and held to my sides and his voice so much closer than it was before. “No, no. You need to hear me,” he rasps right by my ear, inside my brain. “You’ve been away from me so long, you’ve forgotten all the lessons I taught you.”
“You didn’t teach me anything.”
“Didn’t I? Didn’t I tell you… that you are not made to play in front of crowds… like a performing monkey? And what happened tonight?”
The thought that he was out there, witnessing my failure tonight makes my chest crumble. I can hardly breathe at the thought that everything he’s ever said about me has been true.
“Rubbish. Such rubbish you’re been playing. What a waste, what a waste of your talent, Anca!”
“What talent, you’re always telling me that people are only going to laugh at me!” I exclaim, throwing his own words back at him.
“Yes, Anca! Because they do not understand what true music is! And you… you go out there, pandering to their mediocrity. No, I had to come and remind you of what you’re really capable.”
He takes my hands in his and I struggle, trying to rip them away, his touch making every cell in my skin crawl, trying to shrink away from his clammy fingers.
He holds tight though, and pushes my hands forward, and I can feel smooth wood under my fingertips.
Oh. My harp. My old harp.
The years fade away, and I’m in his music studio all over again.
I run my fingers over the curve of the neck and the tears spring to my eyes. I lean forward and rest my head against it, its faint scent permeating my brain. Anyone who’s ever learned an instrument and loved their instrument know that it’s an extension of their self.
As much as it is a reminder of some of the darkest times in my life, the memories of all those hours I spent learning, creating, living and dying while playing this harp come rushing back.
“She missed you too, Anca. She missed your soul. It’s time to come back. Play, Anca, play. Play as you are meant to. Play as I taught you.”
Under the blindfold, I feel my eyes close and my fingers run down the length of the strings, muscle memory springing to life, the end of my fingertips twitching, aching to play.