No Return: A Contemporary Phantom Tale (2 page)

I looked up, not wanting to meet my professor’s eyes. Dr. Green was watching me carefully, voice mild, expression calm, but those dark eyes of his were disappointed.

“Do you really think a performance like that is up to recital standard?”

Thank God this had been my one hour of private tutoring for the week. I would have been mortified if I’d sung like that in front of the other students in my senior class. As it was, I found it difficult to stop beating myself up mentally long enough to reply, “No, Dr. Green. It’s just that I had to work double shifts—”

He held up a hand, forestalling any further explanations. Most likely he viewed them only as excuses. “I know that most students these days need to work to make it through school. But if you allow a part-time job to take over your life, then you have no business being in this class—or pursuing a career in music.”

The words were cruel, but true, I knew. If I only had the discipline, I’d be practicing far into the night, after I returned home from work. But exhaustion usually drove me straight into bed after my shift was over. That familiar choking feeling rose in my throat, and I swallowed, hard. If I dissolved into tears in front of Dr. Green, I knew I might as well pack it in and give up on my dreams of singing forever.

“I’m sorry, Dr. Green,” I said at last, after I was reasonably sure that my voice wouldn’t betray me—at least any more than it already had. “I’ll tell them I can’t do more than twenty hours a week. I’ll be ready.”

He studied me for a moment, the worry lines between his brows seeming deeper than they had a few minutes ago. “Christine, I know this has all been difficult for you—”

“I’m fine, Dr. Green,” I said, knowing that the last thing I needed right now was words of sympathy. I admired Dr. Green greatly and knew that he was genuinely concerned about me, but sometimes compassion was harder to bear than cruelty.
 

“Mmm.” He hesitated, appearing to pick through the words he wanted to say and finding them all lacking. “I don’t say this to many students, Christine. You have one of the finest pure instruments I’ve heard. But talent isn’t enough. Without practice, dedication, hard work, all you have is potential. And that’s not what casting directors are looking for.”

There being no real reply to that, I said only, “I know, Dr. Green.”

Again he was quiet for a moment. Then he said, “I think that’s enough for today. Concentrate on the middle section, and we’ll see how you’re doing tomorrow.”

I took the dismissal as gracefully as I could and nodded, then retrieved my canvas satchel and shoved my score into it. “Thanks,” I said, and turned to the door without looking at him. I wasn’t particularly thankful, and I knew he knew it, but there didn’t seem to be anything else to say at that point.

A glance at my watch told me that I’d only used up half of the hour-long practice time I’d been allotted. Funny, it had felt much longer than that.
 

This was my last class of the day, so it was time for the murderous slog up the 110 Freeway through downtown L.A. back to Pasadena, and I wasn’t looking forward to getting into the crunch at five-thirty instead of six. Even a half-hour could make a huge difference in the chimerical beast that was the Los Angeles freeway system. At least it had cooled down somewhat over the past couple of days. Sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic in ninety-degree heat with no air conditioning would have been enough to push my already frayed nerves over the edge.
 

I had barely looked up from my watch before I almost collided with a man who stood outside the rehearsal studio. He was studying a small tabloid-size poster someone had tacked up to advertise the senior master class autumn recital. “Sorry,” I said automatically.

He looked at me swiftly, eyes sharp behind a pair of dark glasses, and I almost took a step back. That stare was far too penetrating, and as unexpected as it was unwelcome. Then it seemed as if a shutter closed down over his features, and he smiled. “No problem.”

“Well, as long as I didn’t smash your foot or anything…”
 

“All intact.” He continued to smile, but I was not reassured.

Eager to keep moving, I manufactured a smile of my own, gave a little nod of acknowledgement, and hurried off down the sidewalk, not wanting to look back.
 

The strength of my reaction surprised me a little. Sure, the guy “creeped me out,” to use one of Meg’s favorite phrases, but I couldn’t exactly say why. He did look a little out of place—I would have put his age at around forty, probably—but schools were full of “nontraditional” students these days, whatever that meant. He didn’t look like a student, though. His air was too polished, his clothes too good. Possibly a grad student, although they usually had an even worse air of poverty than the undergrads.

I shook my head.
Jumping at shadows again
.
Like you don’t have enough to worry about already.
 

George, my boss, was going to flip out when I told him I could only work twenty hours a week. And how I was going to make expenses on that amount of money, I had no idea. I had a small, tightly guarded hoard of money in a savings account, all that was left from the sale of my grandmother’s house, but it probably wasn’t enough to get me through the rest of the school year. I’d thought about getting a roommate, but my place was so small I didn’t even have room for a cat, much less an actual person.

“Christine! Hey!”

I turned. Randall again. This was starting to get awkward.

“You still haven’t scheduled that practice time with me,” he continued, planting himself in my path so I had no choice but to stop.

“Well…” I hedged. Things were complicated enough already. Even though I might admit to myself—deep down—that he interested me, I knew a relationship should be the last thing on my mind right now.

Randall was a graduate student who sometimes worked as an accompanist for the senior master class. He was also, as Meg liked to put it, a “hottie.” I wanted to pretend I was immune to the charm of his hazel eyes and ready smile, but I knew better than that.

While I tried to play it cool, he made no secret of his interest in me, much to the disappointment of several other girls in the master class. And although I thought for sure my hard-to-get act would wear after time, he showed no signs of calling a halt to his pursuit. It would have been a lot easier if he’d been someone who didn’t interest me at all.

He smiled, that easy grin which probably could have melted harder hearts than mine. “The recital’s only two weeks off—”

“I know that!” I snapped, my tone sharper than I had intended it to be. I was still smarting from that painful session with Dr. Green.

Randall seemed unfazed. “So why would you turn down hours and hours of free practice time?”

“I’ve been working a lot of shifts at the restaurant.”

His eyebrows lifted. “Uh-huh.”

Despite myself, I had to smile. “Okay, so now you’ve succeeded in making me sound like an idiot.”

“Never that.” He fixed me with those hazel eyes of his. “So what are you doing right now?”

I was caught. This was my one night off from the restaurant, so truthfully all I had planned to do was go home and slog through that paper. I still had the weekend, though. And while the music history class was important, my marks in the senior master class would actually determine whether I’d get accepted into the master’s program. How I’d ever be able to afford it was a worry for another day.

I smiled back at him, surrendering finally. “Looks like I’m practicing.”

“Good answer.”

I let him take my satchel as he directed me to follow him to the staff parking lot—being a T.A. had at least a few perks, it seemed—so we could drive to his place. Apparently the practice studios on campus were all booked up, he explained ingenuously, and I had to keep from laughing. He was probably right, but his enthusiasm about my having to go practice at his home was all too transparent. Well, if he thought I planned to do anything more than practice, he was going to be sorely disappointed.
 

His home turned out to be a well-appointed Spanish-style duplex in the mid-Wilshire area, about fifteen minutes from campus. Although it appeared to have been well decorated in the not-too-distant past—the velvet slipcovered couch and curtains were straight out of the Pottery Barn catalog—right now most of the casually bohemian chic was buried under music scores, empty pizza boxes, and copies of
L.A. Weekly
.

“Sorry about the mess,” he said, grabbing a couple of pizza boxes with one hand as he dumped my satchel on the floor next to the piano. “I haven’t been here all that much lately.”

“Just long enough to order pizza,” I said, and he grinned.

“Well, it’s fast and easy. My microwave’s on the blink.”

“And God forbid you’d have to cook something—”

“Like on a stove?” He gave a mock shudder. “You’re kidding, right?”

I thought of my lone toaster oven and tiny apartment-sized stove, and decided not to mention the fact that I’d had to get along without a microwave for the past two years after mine self-destructed while nuking a bag of popcorn.

“Right.” I waited in the living room while he disposed of the boxes and rustled around in the kitchen, doing who knows what.
 

It was really a lovely place. Los Angeles still has some amazing architecture, despite the developers who seem determined to raze anything more than twenty years old. Randall’s duplex, probably built in the 1920s, had charming arched doorways, art niches, hardwood floors, and a fireplace that looked as if it actually still worked. And it had been furnished intelligently, which led me to believe the decor was probably the work of an ex-girlfriend.

The living room was dominated by the grand piano, a gorgeous carved behemoth in walnut, not the standard black Yamaha or Steinway I had come to expect. At least this room was big enough to accommodate the thing; at my bungalow I had been hard-pressed to squeeze in my grandmother’s tiny spinet.

I stepped around the curve of the piano to look at the name emblazoned in gold leaf above the keys, which, believe it or not, were apparently the original ivory. “‘Baye,’” I read aloud.

“Never heard of them, right?”

I shook my head. “I’m not an authority, but—”

“No, that’s a really obscure reference.” Randall came back into the living room, a glass of red wine in each hand. I opened my mouth to protest, but he just handed the wine glass to me, smiling, daring me to say something, and I took it meekly. He sipped some his wine, waited until I had followed suit, then continued, “Baye was actually the company that made the guts—you know, the sounding board, the strings, all that good stuff—for Steinway back in the 1920s. Then they decided to strike out on their own and start their own company, but their timing was lousy; the Great Depression hit about a year later, and the company folded. But they made some amazing pianos before they went bust.”

The wine was good. Probably a cabernet, but past that my uneducated palate couldn’t distinguish much except that I liked it. I hadn’t allowed myself to indulge for a long time—couldn’t afford it—and I took another sip. “That’s too bad.”

He nodded. “It happens. I’m just glad my grandfather actually bought one. Probably because it had the sound of a Steinway without the price tag.”

“Was he careful with his money?”

At that Randall laughed, but he didn’t seem all that amused. “Christine, he made Ebenezer Scrooge look like a party animal.”

“Well, Scrooge was a party animal by the end of the story,” I replied.

“
Touché
. But not Grandpa. Still, he did have the good sense to pick up property all over L.A., hold on to it, and then leave it to his grandkids.”

I lifted my wine glass in a gesture meant to encompass the living room. “And so you’re here?”

“Did you really think I could afford this place on a T.A.’s salary?”

I’d secretly been wondering about that but wasn’t going to admit it. “Well, even a T.A.’s salary looks pretty good from where I stand.”

His smile faded. “I’m sorry about that, Christine—”

I cut him off. “Why should you be? As if any of it’s your fault!” I bent and picked up my satchel and pulled the sheet music from it. I handed the photocopied pages to Randall. “We did come over here to practice, right?”

His eyes met mine for a moment, and I sucked in my breath. Under the easy smile and the friendly demeanor I suddenly got a glimpse of the desire underneath, and I felt a tremor go through my body. This could be dangerous, then, probably more so than I had guessed. After all, I’d never really had a serious relationship or experience with anything more than a few awkward dates.

He took the score from my hand, and the moment passed as he seated himself in front of the keyboard. His fingers brushed mine as he took the music, but the touch was so fleeting I wasn’t sure whether it was by accident or intention.

Then there was no time for worries about his intentions or my reactions to them, because Randall launched into the opening notes of the aria, and the music stole me away with the first trill.

“
Ah, je rit, de me vois si belle en ce miroir
,” and I felt the rush, the warmth of the music flowing over me and welling up from somewhere deep inside, the notes coming out pure and strong, my voice clear, unmarked this time by worry or doubt or fear.

I didn’t know whether it was Randall’s presence, the half a glass of wine I’d just consumed, or a desire to prove Professor Green wrong, but whatever the case, I had never felt in truer voice. And I could tell, as the last few notes of the aria died away, that Randall felt the same.

After a moment he finally lifted his hands from the keyboard and looked over at me. “You blow them all away. You really do.”

I made some sound of demurral, but inside me was a tiny,
 
fierce triumph, because I knew at some level he was right.

Randall kept his gaze locked on mine, and I could see a sudden shift, just the slightest twinkle in his hazel eyes before the corner of his mouth twitched. “But that doesn’t mean we can’t try to improve perfection, does it? From the top, then—”