The Distance Between Us (13 page)

There’s a long pause. The metal legs on his chair creak as he shifts his weight. “How do you mean?”

I keep my back towards him. “He was gentle, and thoughtful. Just like you. And ever so much kinder than he is now.”

I lean toward the window and expel a “hah” of hot air to steam it up. I write my name in the resulting fog, and my finger makes soft squeaking noises on the moist glass.

Alex stirs behind me, and when he speaks, his voice is strangely subdued. “Do you still love him?”

I freeze for a moment, and the silence in the air between us vibrates like a piano string.

“No.” I bite my lip. “Isn’t that awful?” I turn away from the window and find that my drink has been refilled. “God knows Paul needs the love, but he’ll have to find it elsewhere, I’m afraid. I’m fresh out.”

The marijuana is making me sluggish. My hand swims through the air and latches with effort onto my brandy. “Oh, well. Down the hatch.”

He drains his glass, too. “That’s kind of sad, isn’t it?”

“I suppose.” I make a face. “But how in the world am I still supposed to care for that man?”

His pale blue eyes are troubled behind his spectacles. “But you’re his mom.”

“True enough. Yet the older he gets the less that means to me.”

His expression bothers me, and I roll my eyes. “Oh, stop looking at me like that. It’s perfectly natural to despise your children. Animals devour their young all the time, and no one makes a fuss about
that,
do they?”

He shakes his head. “You’re being weird. Maybe you shouldn’t smoke pot anymore.”

I smile at him. “On the contrary. I’m feeling extraordinarily clearheaded. Perhaps I should become a dealer so I can buy my marijuana in bulk.” I glance over his shoulder at the far wall and Paul’s high school picture is staring back at me. I feel my smile evaporate.

I settle my gaze on Alex. “I’m sorry to break this to you, darling, but the unconditional love that’s supposed to exist in families is a childish fantasy. A mother’s affection can be revoked at the drop of a hat. And the people in the world who need love the most—like my vile, turgid son, Paul—are the ones who will never get it, because they no longer deserve it.”

He doesn’t answer me, and he seems upset. I almost ask him what’s bothering him, but before I can he excuses himself to use the bathroom.

He’s far too sensitive for his own good.

I
n the eyes of the world, Hester Parker should have, long ago, been “put out to pasture.”

Just ask anybody.

She is a relic from a forgotten era, a dotard, and a cracked antique in society’s attic. She is a poster child for every sorry old has-been who clings like a leech to bygone glory, refusing to retire with dignity and make room for the next generation.

I even heard through the grapevine last year that I’d died.

The dean’s secretary, Marla Sorenson, scurried up to me in the hallway at school one morning with the news; she told me her phone had been ringing off the hook. It seems somebody, somewhere, had seen an obituary for a retired composer/pianist from Illinois named Hester
Parkinson,
and was confused by the similarity between our names and ages. Several of my colleagues on the East Coast swallowed the report without question; many called Arthur to offer their condolences, and the piano faculty at Juilliard went so far as to send a lovely bouquet of flowers in care of Carson Conservatory, for use during my memorial service.

On one level it was all very amusing and touching, but on another it illustrated—with grisly clarity—just how far from the limelight I’ve fallen.

When Vladimir Horowitz died, he was eulogized by every major newspaper and magazine in the country. Radio stations from Los Angeles to New York rebroadcast his most popular recitals, ad infinitum,
and every time you flipped on the public television channel there was Vladimir again, hamming it up at his final performance in Carnegie Hall.

By way of contrast, no one of stature in the vulturous press even bothered to inquire about the possibility of poor old Hester Parker’s demise. It’s not that they didn’t hear about it, mind you—but no reporter outside of Bolton could be enticed to follow up on a story that simply wasn’t considered newsworthy.

The first of my colleagues who phoned Arthur to console him told me later that all Arthur said to debunk the rumor was, “Hester dead? Don’t be ridiculous. The only way to kill Hester is to cut off her head and stuff her mouth full of garlic.”

She thought Arthur was joking, hence the reason she chose to share that little tidbit with me.

“Oh, yes,” I agreed. “Arthur is very witty.”

But I digress.

My anonymous status notwithstanding, I still manage to pack in a crowd whenever I’m required to give a master class in the concert hall at Carson, and today is no exception. The national media may never again pay any attention to me, but locally, at least, I am yet considered to have a smidgeon of entertainment value (not unlike the bearded lady in a traveling freak show). And while there is precious little comfort in such limited notoriety, at this juncture I’ll take what I can get.

Though to be honest, it’s a mystery why anybody would want to see me teach one of these things, has-been or not.

There are musicians who never feel alive unless a student is present. For them, nothing measures up to the thrill of helping a raw talent evolve into something resembling a mature artist. Such people live for the moment of revelation in a protégé's eyes, that instant of connection when they say a magic word, and the student’s brain opens wide to receive it. Mentors such as these may be fine players in their own right—although they are rarely first-rate—but their passion is not about playing. All they truly care about is passing on the “sacred flame.” More often than not, they are zealots and/or tyrants, and they are gifted amateur psychologists, and once in an aeon they may even be saints. But they are not performers.

They are teachers.

And while there are numerous examples of musicians who have been equally terrific at teaching
and
performing (Leonard Bernstein and Isaac Stern, to name two), if you got them in private, they would tell you their hearts belonged, mostly, to one discipline or the other. Both fields of study require commitment and enormous patience; both call for talent and sacrifice and heartache. But no honest musician is as invested in one facet of the art as much as the other—unless he or she is schizophrenic.

You are either a teacher, or you are a performer.

And I am a performer.

Which is why I’m always flabbergasted when the unwashed multitudes flock to these once-a-semester classes, as they have this afternoon. Especially since I am no longer able to do much playing myself, which implies that the audience, in defiance of all logic, must be coming primarily to observe my questionable prowess as a teacher.

Granted, the spectator sport aspect of a master class also has something to do with the heavy attendance. I’ve long believed most people show up for these things for the same reason the Romans packed the Colosseum whenever the lions were lunching on Christians. They’re hoping the open lesson format of the class will turn into an emotional bloodbath—say, for instance, an ugly clash of egos between a young virtuoso and the more experienced musician leading the session, or, even better, a painful public dismemberment of said virtuoso if he finds he is unable to do what is asked of him.

It’s most unsavory, and thus irresistible.

As I walk onstage to begin the session, a hush spreads through the auditorium. Since this is not a concert per se, the houselights have not been dimmed and I can clearly see who’s here. I scan the crowd for familiar faces and am shocked to find my daughter Caitlin staring back at me from the back of the room, sitting off in a corner by herself. She’s wearing a bright green dress and her best glower, and when my eyes lock with hers, she sniffs and looks away.

Dear God. What on earth is
she
doing here?

I haven’t seen her since….

I rip my attention away from her. My heart is beating rapidly but I keep my face expressionless and continue my sweep of the audience. A moment later I get another unpleasant jolt when I find Arthur planted—a portly, angry weed—in a row of Conservatory faculty members. He’s a head taller (and half a foot wider) than anyone near him, but I pretend not to notice him. He frowns and says something to Ben Hessling, the viola teacher, and both of them smirk.

So. Arthur has turned Ben against me, too. That stings, but I’m not surprised. Ben doesn’t have a single opinion that somebody with more of a backbone hasn’t spoon-fed to him.

I square my shoulders and turn away from them. It’s time to begin the class. Arthur and Caitlin be damned. I have a job to do, and I will not let their presence rattle me. I suppose I should count my blessings that Paul isn’t here as well.

I take a deep breath to calm my nerves. I can smell the fresh wax on the floor at my feet, mixing with the scent of mildew coming from the heavy, red cloth curtains tied back at the corners of the stage. Dust and stale human sweat hangs in the air, only slightly diluted by the odor of old leather and wool pouring from the seats behind me. The familiar stench is a comfort; I’ve been on a thousand stages in a thousand concert halls, and they all smell the same.

The recital hall at Carson seats five hundred (three hundred in the orchestra section, and a hundred each in the mezzanine and top balcony). The upper levels are closed today, forcing an intimacy between the watchers and the watched. The stage itself is large and rounded, with a polished wooden floor, and a Baldwin grand piano has been rolled out to the center, its lid raised high for full volume. Four alcoves surround the stage, each sheltering a white marble bust of one of the “biggies”—Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms—perched on stout, black Roman pillars, like demigods.

I’m scheduled to work with three pianists today. One of them is a student from Carson, and another is a young lady from Northwestern University who drove down from Evanston. Both are proficient players, but the star of the day is already seated at the piano,
waiting for me. He’s a special guest from Russia, in town this week as part of an exchange program our development director set up with her counterpart at the Moscow Conservatory.

I walk up to him and he rises from the bench to shake my hand, introducing himself in a thick Slavic accent as Viktor Katavasov.

“It is a great honor to meet you, Ms. Parker,” he tells me, gripping my fingers. He’s a handsome, black-haired boy in his late teens, with long arms and legs, and a huge nose, rubbed raw and red from an apparent head cold. He lowers his voice so the audience can’t hear him. “Thank you so much for agreeing to teach me today. I’m very nervous to play for you.”

His English is good, even with the accent.

I nod at him and whisper back. “There’s no need to be nervous. I’m largely tone-deaf, and heavily medicated.”

His smile brightens. “Ah, yes. Dr. Pavlovskaya warned me about your sense of humor.”

His teacher in Moscow is Olga Pavlovskaya, an old friend and professional rival from my touring and competition days.

I smile back at him. “That’s too bad. It’s more fun when people think I’m serious.” I press his hand warmly. “You can relax, dear. Olga has been singing your praises for months in her e-mails, and she never exaggerates. How is she doing, by the way?”

He beams. “She is very well, thank you. She told me to give you all her love, and she misses you terribly.”

I feel a sudden constriction in my throat and have to fight back tears. I give his hand another squeeze and look away. I’m being a mawkish old fool, but my daughter and husband have me feeling singularly vulnerable right now, and any affection at all, even from the other side of the world, is almost more than I can bear.

I take hold of myself again and gesture for Viktor to sit, then I face the audience.

“Good afternoon.” I’m relieved to hear my voice come out strong and controlled. “My, this is quite a throng. Should I be flattered, or was there nothing but reruns of
Cops
on television?”

Chuckles. I let my glance pass over Arthur and he rolls his eyes. He used to chide me for what he called “working the crowd.” He once told me I was a pianist, not a comedienne, and that I cheapened
myself with what he considered “feeble attempts at stand-up routines.”

I told him jealousy was not an attractive quality in a man.

“As you’re no doubt aware,” I continue, “this brave soul sitting at the piano behind me is visiting from Russia.” I turn to acknowledge Victor and he sniffles and wipes his nose on the sleeve of his thick gray sweater. Olga’s students have always had zero stage presence, so I decide to let this breach of performance etiquette slide. “I understand Viktor will be playing a Chopin
Polonaise
for us.” I tilt my head at him. “Is that right, dear?”

He shakes his head. “No, I’m sorry, Ms. Parker, but Dr. Pavlovskaya suggested that I perform instead one of the
Nocturnes.”

I close my eyes for an instant. Oh, no. Please.

This can’t be happening. Olga, you treacherous old fool. What have you done?

I glare at him. “Let me guess.
Number 1 in C minor?”

He blinks. “How did you know?”

There’s no escape from this now. I have no choice but to make the best of it.

I wave a hand. “No matter. That will be fine, Viktor. You may proceed whenever you’re ready.”

He cracks his knuckles and takes a deep breath, and I move gingerly to the chair provided for me next to the piano bench, where I can see his hands. I sit and try to seem unaffected, but after a pause my gaze returns against my will to Arthur, then to Caitlin.

They’re the only ones here who know what this is going to do to me.

God. I can’t bear it. Arthur is actually waiting for me to look at him, and there’s open compassion on his face. I don’t dare show any reaction, and a moment later he turns away. Caitlin is staring at her lap.

Viktor’s long fingers sink into the keyboard and I jerk a little in my chair as the wistful, elegiac first notes crawl out of the open lid of the piano and limp across the stage. I close my eyes again and nearly moan aloud.