Lost Melody (5 page)

Doreen’s eyebrows rose. “That’s a big step. Do you think you’re ready for that?”

Jill turned the doctor’s trick around on her. “Do
you
think I’m ready for that?”

The woman smiled an acknowledgement of Jill’s use of her own technique. “If you do, then so do I.” She sobered. “Here’s an even more important question for you. Do you want to marry Greg? Do you love him?”

Finally, a question she could answer with certainty. She met the doctor’s gaze straight on. “I love him more than anything. Yes, I want to marry him.”

Doreen dipped her head in a nod. “If you want my opinion, I’d say last night was a big night for you. You got engaged, and you made a decision that you know will place you in a painful situation — back in front of a piano.” She caught Jill’s gaze and held it. “You’re not broken, Jill. You’ve been wounded, but you’re healing. Just keep the lines of communication open with Greg. Make sure he knows what you’re feeling, what you’re going through.” She glanced at her watch and stood. “Perhaps you should try a different prescription to help you sleep.”

Jill shook her head as she, too, stood. “No, thank you. No
more sleeping pills for me.” She leaned over and scooped up her purse. “I’d rather not risk another disaster dream like last night.”

“Well, if you change your mind, call me.” Doreen replaced the pen in the holder and rounded her desk, a sign that the session was truly over. “I’ll see you next week. Oh, and congratulations on the engagement.”

“Thank you.”

Jill left the room and nodded a silent farewell toward the receptionist in the small outer office. She felt better, her perspective restored. She did love Greg, and he loved her. It’s not like she was trading her dream of being a world-class pianist in order to marry him. She’d envisioned herself married to Greg for years, and pictured their marriage as an overlay to her career, another layer in a satisfying life. The career may be gone, but that just left her with an altered version of the original picture. Their life together would be wonderful. And who knew? Maybe helping him with his campaign would be just what she needed to force herself out of the apartment and back into public view.

As for last night’s terrible dream, no doubt the counselor was right. Yesterday had been a big day for her. A good day, but it was normal to experience some anxiety after making two life-changing decisions within a few hours of each other. No matter how much she loved Greg, marriage was a huge step and hers was going to happen in one month. That in itself was enough to send most brides cowering in a corner for a session of thumb sucking.

In some ways, the other decision felt bigger, more alarming. A custom-designed stress dispenser. Was she really ready to sit down in front of a piano again, even if it was only to teach? It felt like progress, a step in the right direction, and progress never came without a cost, right? Not that she had to jump into anything quickly. The end of June might be a good time to start,
when school let out for the summer. She could take her time, work herself up to being ready to take on a student. No rush. After all, she really hadn’t made a firm decision until the words tumbled out of her mouth while talking to Nana last night. Of course she’d feel anxious about it. Anyone would in her shoes.

So the dream had been merely a symptom of her subconscious stress over two major decisions. That, and a sleeping pill with side effects. Nothing more. Since the decisions were all made, and she wasn’t going to take the pills anymore, she wouldn’t have to worry about having any more weird dreams.

Then why couldn’t she shake the unsettling feeling that the dream was only the beginning, and that the real nightmare was about to start?

J
ILL’S HAND HAD BARELY TURNED
the knob at home when the front door was jerked out of her grasp. Nana stood in the entry hall, her shiny red lips stretched into an exasperated grimace.

“There
you are. Where have you been? Your appointment ended two hours ago, and you didn’t answer your cell phone.”

She reached outside to grasp Jill’s coat sleeve, and in the next moment Jill found herself snatched over the threshold with a suddenness that nearly threw her off balance. The door shut behind her with a firm
thump.

“I must have forgotten to turn my phone back on after my appointment, and then I went by Centerside to see Mom.”

Jill had barely unfastened the last button of her coat when the garment was whisked off her shoulders and tossed haphazardly over an already-full coatrack.

“We’ve been waiting for an hour.” Nana placed a hand on Jill’s back and propelled her toward the living room.

Jill almost stumbled over the threshold. “We?”

The small room was filled to capacity with elderly ladies. Chairs from the kitchen table had been brought in and placed between the existing furniture to form a circle around the perimeter of the room. Every available seat was occupied, and
somehow five ladies had managed to wedge themselves into the depths of the sofa. A mishmash of brightly colored clothing and various shades of gray hair blurred together in Jill’s vision, while an alarming clash of perfumes threatened to send her nose into sensory overload. She barely had time to identify the mob as Nana’s knitting group when a communal squeal arose from a dozen throats. In the next moment, they swarmed.

“You’re getting married!”

“So happy for you.”

“I remember your eighth birthday party like it was yesterday.”

She was swept into a hug, then passed from one set of arms to another before being nearly squeezed breathless by Mrs. Montgomery, an enthusiastic eighty-year-old with the bosom of a stripper and the strength of a wrestler.

A clap of hands behind her cut through the excited babble. “All right, girls, we’ve got work to do.”

At Nana’s commanding voice, the chatter ceased and the ladies returned to their seats. Mrs. Montgomery gave Jill’s arm a final pat before settling into one of the armchairs and picking up the cup and saucer from the floor beside it.

Jill turned to Nana. “Are you having a tea party?”

“No, dear. We don’t have time for that. They’re here to help us with the wedding.”

Nods of assent around the room. Jill managed an awkward smile, then grabbed Nana’s arm and pulled her toward the kitchen.

“But we told you last night we’re having a private ceremony,” she whispered. “Small. Just family. We don’t plan to invite anyone from town.”

“Oh, we don’t expect to come, hon.” Mrs. Tolliver twisted around on the sofa to give Jill an earnest glance. “We’ll just help
you work out the details beforehand. Then we’ll watch the video at the reception.”

“Video?” Jill widened her eyes. “Reception?”

Mrs. Fontaine spoke up from her chair near the fireplace. “We were thinking it would be nice to have a reception afterward, maybe in late January. You know, a celebration with your friends and church family.”

“Now, Alice, we haven’t made any decisions about the reception yet.” Nana blinked blue-shadowed eyelids in a display of mild rebuke. “We have enough to handle with planning a decent wedding in exactly a month. And on Christmas, too.”

“Oh, yes. Quite enough. I don’t know how we’ll manage to pull it all together in time.” Mrs. Montgomery’s eyes gleamed, obviously not the least bit intimidated by the daunting task.

Obviously, preparations for her own wedding had been plucked out of Jill’s hands. She made one last attempt to wrest control from the tenacious troop of geriatric wedding planners.

“Nana, Greg and I really don’t want an elaborate ceremony. Just a quiet exchange of vows in front of the Christmas tree. Maybe a few snapshots we can put into a photo album, but nothing extravagant, like a video.”

“Extravagant? Nonsense.” Mrs. Tolliver set her cup in the saucer with a determined
clink.
“You won’t even know my nephew is in the room. He’s an excellent videographer.” She lifted her eyebrows and spoke to her neighbor on the sofa with obvious pride. “He used to work for a cruise ship doing vacation videos. People paid a lot of money for those videos.”

Was she kidding? Take a man away from his family on Christmas to record a private wedding ceremony on an apple orchard ninety minutes away? Jill opened her mouth to voice
another protest, but Nana grabbed her in a firm grip and turned her toward the bedroom.

“Let’s get you into the dress. We need to get started on the alterations. You’ve a slimmer waist than Lorna when she married, and I’m sure we’ll need to let out the bust.”

They left the women scurrying for their sewing boxes. Judging by their energetic expressions, the alterations would be finished by the end of the day.

Her mother’s wedding dress lay across Nana’s bed. Jill stopped when she caught sight of it, and then inched slowly into the room. She’d forgotten how lovely the dress was. Creamy white satin fell in graceful folds from an empire waist, the bodice covered with subtle but elegant beadwork. She reached for the short train and caressed the silky fabric between her fingers. An image arose in her mind of the framed photograph on the dresser in Mom’s room at Centerside. She’d been stunning in this dress, the smile on her youthful face radiant. Happy. So happy.

Would Jill be that happy on her own wedding day? If she could ever be truly happy again, surely it would be that day.

“Hurry up, now. Slip off those clothes.” Nana flipped the dress over and began unfastening the pearl-shaped buttons. “Oh, before I forget to tell you, Eloise Cramer’s granddaughter will be here tomorrow at ten, and then Alice’s granddaughter at eleven.”

Jill paused in the act of lifting her sweater over her shoulders. “Why?”

Nana blinked. “For their piano lessons.”

The meaning of Nana’s words sank in. She had two piano students coming in the morning. Anger flickered at the edges of her mind. Nana had arranged it without consulting her.

Jill let the sweater fall back in place. “Why did you do that?”

Her grandmother looked up from her work on the dress,
surprise widening her eyes. “Alice has been bragging about her granddaughter’s talent for a long time, so I knew she’d jump at the chance for the girl to learn from you.” She scowled. “I don’t know a thing about Eloise’s granddaughter, but she wasn’t about to let Alice get away with saying
her
granddaughter was taking lessons from Jillian King.” Concern replaced the scowl as Nana peered up at her. “You did say you wanted to give lessons, didn’t you?”

Jill set her teeth together against the battling emotions that raged inside. Yes, she did say that, but there was a giant chasm between saying something and doing it, between making a decision and acting on it. She needed a few months to get used to the idea.

On the other hand, Jill knew Nana meant well. She wanted to be supportive, to help. Which was the reason she’d organized the planning posse in the living room. She didn’t mean to meddle, really. Or if she did, it was only what she considered helpful meddling.

Jill swallowed a gulp of resentment. “Yes, I did say that, but I didn’t intend to start tomorrow. I would prefer to arrange things on my own, that’s all.”

“I’m sorry, dear. I understand.” Worry lines appeared in Nana’s forehead. “You know I would never do anything to upset you. Alice and Eloise are both in the other room. I’ll go right in there and tell them I spoke out of turn.”

With an effort, Jill forced the knotted muscles in her shoulders to relax. “No, that’s okay. It’s done now. I — I appreciate your help.”

Maybe this development was for the best. A kick in the pants by her well-meaning grandmother might be exactly what she needed. Now she’d be forced to cross the invisible barrier she’d erected around her piano.

With a forced smile to assure Nana she wasn’t upset, she
allowed herself to be dressed. As the silky fabric slid down to settle against her hips, she realized she was hoping the fitting would take a long time — hours and hours. The longer she spent downstairs with the ladies, the less time she’d have upstairs where the piano waited for her, but that was merely a delay tactic that would ultimately serve no purpose at all. Before ten o’clock in the morning, she’d have to overcome her reluctance to touch the ivory keys.

Tonight, she’d have to play.

J
ILL STOOD IN THE DOORWAY
between her kitchen and front room, her hand hovering over the wall switch. In the corner of the living room, the dark, winged shape of the piano waited. For nearly a year she’d managed to avoid approaching it — no easy task, since it dominated the room. If she allowed her imagination to run unfettered, she could feel the instrument’s resentment as it hovered beneath the quilted cover.

Ridiculous. It’s an object. It doesn’t have feelings.

But all her life, the piano had been Jill’s best friend. Oh, she had school friends, but why confide in another girl when she could pour her emotions out through the keyboard? The piano accepted. The piano understood. The piano responded with mournful canon when she felt sad, or joyous sonata when she felt glad. To her, the piano was the most
feeling
instrument ever created.

She hadn’t touched it in a year. It was time.

At a flip of the light switch, the tract lighting she’d installed in the ceiling illuminated that corner of the room. From where she stood, Jill could see a thin layer of dust on the quilted cover. A twinge of guilt pricked her conscience. A Schimmel Konzert was an intricately crafted instrument, a work of art manufactured in
Germany, and far too expensive to be allowed to become a dust collector. At least she’d had the tuner here twice in the past year, so even though she had neglected it, the piano would be in good repair. And the cover had done its job in protecting the instrument.

For a moment, her feet refused to move. They felt heavy, stuck, as if she’d happened across a patch of sticky flypaper in the doorway. With an effort, she pried them up and dragged herself across the room.

Heart pounding against her ribs, she stood beside the hulking object and rested her right hand on the quilted cover. There. She’d touched it. She waited, giving her heartbeat time to return to normal.

I’m being silly. It’s a
piano,
for heaven’s sake. It won’t bite me.

But no matter how much her mind understood that, her body reacted with a visceral tensing of every muscle, from her toes on up. For a full five minutes, Jill merely stood with her hand on the cover.

She heard Doreen’s voice in her head.
Describe your feelings, Jill.

Okay, use the tools she’d learned. What was she feeling? She closed her eyes and performed an inventory. Sadness. Anxiety.
Fear.
Yes, the overriding emotion was fear. Standing here beside the instrument that used to mean more to her than anything else reminded her of all she once hoped to attain. She flexed open her left hand, which hung at her side, until she felt the stretching pain she’d come to accept as normal in recent months. Those goals had been lost to her. Even though she could compensate for the smaller reach, the pain would impede her movements. She would never again play like she once did. She’d come to accept that.

But how much had she lost? That was the question that lay
at the base of her fear. What if she couldn’t play at all? Could she live with never playing the piano again?

She opened her eyes. There was only one thing worse than never playing again, and that was living in fear. It had been almost a year since the accident. It was time to heal, to move on.

With slow, careful movements, she pulled back the quilted cover and exposed the graceful curves of the Schimmel. The glossy ebony finish gleamed in the soft tract lighting. She raised the lid and stepped back to admire the symmetry, the beauty of the instrument. This wasn’t the same piano she’d used as a child. Nana could never have afforded a Schimmel. They’d owned an inexpensive upright until Jill started performing on the concert circuit during college. Then she had invested in this one.

Sitting on the padded piano bench felt like sliding into a favorite summer blouse after a long winter of heavy sweaters. She lifted the music rack and ran a finger across the smooth top edge. Her sheet music had all been stored in the attic, but she didn’t need it. The notes from hundreds of pieces came into focus whenever she closed her eyes, and the intricate harmonies created by masters like Chopin, Beethoven, and of course Liszt, vibrated deep in her soul.

She rested her right hand on the keyboard. The ivory caressed her fingertips, smooth as the softest silk yet firm as marble. Her eyelids shut almost of their own accord as her thumb stroked middle C. The note rang out to fill the silent room with a pure, sweet tone that raced up Jill’s arm, vibrated over her collarbone, spread through her ribs and, finally, crept into her heart with agonizing sweetness. A tear slipped between her eyelids and traced a path down her cheek. She ran up the scale, C to C, and her fingers flew over the keys as though they’d danced this dance only yesterday. They raced back down to middle C, then back
up again, faster and faster, moving with joyful abandon through the familiar exercise that was seared into muscle memory from years of repetition.

Without conscious thought, she switched to a one-handed version of a simple tune she’d learned long ago. The chords of Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” flowed from fingertips that skipped across the keyboard’s upper registers like a child on a sidewalk. The harmonies weren’t complete, though. They needed the lower octaves. She raised her left hand.

In the moment before she touched the keys, she caught sight of the scar, red and vivid and ugly. Both hands jerked back as though the keyboard had grown thorns. The last notes she’d played hung heavy in the air.

I can’t.

Tears clogged her throat as she slid off the bench and backed away from the piano. A harsh truth pummeled her brain. She couldn’t risk knowing if she could play. Not yet.

Tomorrow’s lessons were introductory sessions. She could spend the time getting to know her new students and introducing them to the basic keys and finger exercises. No need to play anything.

She rushed to the wall and flipped off the lights. The piano settled quietly into the darkness.

Flames, voracious and vicious, roared in the cold air, whipped into a fury by a morning breeze that drew its strength from the icy Atlantic. Screams joined with the fire in a deafening dissonance of sound. People dying. Suffering. Burning flesh, followed by freezing cold and a horrible squeezing of lungs.

No air. Can’t breathe.

Jill sat up in bed, gasping. The roar of the fire deafened her. She covered her ears, pressing with her palms to block out the screams.

No. The room was silent. She was at home, in her own bed, her own quiet bedroom. No sound at all except her pulse pounding like an aboriginal war drum.

It’s not real. I’m safe. I’m safe. I’m safe.

She repeated the mantra over and over, willing herself to believe it. But her thudding heart refused to take heed.

The people of Seaside Cove must be warned.

The idea again seeped into her consciousness as though from an outside source. It went deeper than thought, more like intuition, something that bypassed logic and resonated in her soul with a sense of urgency impossible to ignore.

“It’s just a dream.” She spoke aloud to drown out the tumult in her mind. “A stupid dream that happened because I tried to play the piano and couldn’t. That’s all it is.”

But why was it the same dream as the night before? And why had it returned when she hadn’t taken any sleeping pills?

And why couldn’t she dismiss the thought — no, the insane notion
—
that she had to warn people about a coming disaster?