Reflection (42 page)

Gram stood up. “I should have let you go back to Texas,” she said.

Rachel's eyes stung as she watched her grandmother start for the door. Gram stopped, resting her hand on Rachel's shoulder. “I'm sorry,” she said. “I didn't mean that. This is all just very disturbing to me.”

THEY DIDN'T SPEAK FOR
the rest of the night, and Rachel kept the folder with her, looking at the handwritten music inside it every once in a while. It was almost midnight and Gram was in bed by the time she heard the two cars pull into the driveway. She met Michael and Chris on the porch.

“How did it go?” she asked, turning on the porch light. She could tell by Michael's expression that he wasn't happy.

“The people don't want the development,” Chris said. “Michael told everyone who was against it to stand and practically the whole room stood up, but it doesn't seem to matter.”

“He's right.” Michael sat down on the porch swing with a sigh and Rachel sat next to him, the folder on her lap. “The board seems to have its mind made up. They really don't care what the little guys think, I'm afraid.”

“It was so cool, though, Mom.” Chris sat down on the top step. “I mean, I met so many people. So many Amish. They were really nice, but you could tell they weren't used to that kind of meeting—not that I was, either.” He grinned.

“The place was packed to the rafters,” Michael said. “People stood out in the hall.”

“And there was no air-conditioning,” Chris added.

“Oh, no.” She thought of her hour in the heat of the attic.

“There were lots of reporters, lots of cameras,” Michael said. “NPR was there, and the
Wall Street Journal
. One thing we got was good coverage. I don't think it's going to make a difference, though.” His gaze fell to the folder on her lap, and she saw his expression change as he made out the typed word on the label. “What the…?”

It was her turn to grin. She handed the folder to him. “You won't believe this,” she said. She described finding the music and Gram's reaction.

“That's it?” Chris asked. “That's
Reflections?
“

Rachel nodded.

“Can I see it?” Chris asked, and Michael handed the folder over to him. Chris set the music on the floor of the porch so that the light hit it, then began leafing through it with concentration, head bobbing slightly, one hand keeping time on his thigh.

“I'll talk to Helen,” Michael said. “Maybe she just doesn't understand how this can save us. What do you think the problem is?”

“I have no idea.” Rachel shrugged. “Maybe she wants to hold on to this piece herself as her last remembrance of her husband. Although she did say she should have burned it.”

Michael shook his head. “Weird.”

“Can I play it?” Chris asked. “Can I use the piano?”

Rachel was longing to hear the music, but she shook her head. “We'd better wait until you ask Gram, since she's being so strange about it. And I don't want to wake her up with the piano.”

Chris returned his attention to the music, clearly mesmerized.

Michael got to his feet. “I'm going to go,” he said.

She wished he would stay, but she wasn't certain how Chris would react. She knew that was Michael's reason for leaving.

“Can I take this to my room with me?” Chris asked. “I want to finish it.”

“All right.” Rachel stood up herself.

“Good night, Chris,” Michael said. “I enjoyed your company tonight.”

“Yeah, me too,” Chris said. “See you tomorrow?”

“Sure.” Michael gave Rachel a quick hug, and she reluctantly let him go.

She was in bed when she was startled by the knock on her window. At the second knock, she laughed out loud.

Naked, she got up and opened the window for him. “You used to throw stones,” she whispered as she unfastened the screen.

“Well, you slept upstairs back then,” he said, climbing over the sill. She and Luke and Michael would wake one another that way. They'd sneak out of their houses and go exploring in the middle of the night. Their mothers would compare notes the following day on how lazy and tired their kids were all the time.

“And you slept in your jammies back then.” Michael stepped into the room and pulled her into his arms for a kiss. His clothes felt cool and soft against her bare skin. “I've missed touching you,” he said.

She began unbuttoning his shirt, and in minutes she had him undressed and stretched out beneath her on the bed. He let her make love to him as he had to her a few nights before—slowly, dragging it out, as if making up for all the years of lovemaking that had been lost to them. They lay naked together afterward, the moonlight on their bodies. Despite the air-conditioning, it was too hot for the covers.

“Your son is terrific.” Michael stroked the backs of his fingers along her side.

“You were so good with him,” she said. “Thanks for asking him to go with you tonight.”

“He was a big help.”

She could see Chris's face at the kitchen table, the hope in his eyes as he listened to the stories about his father. “I love him too much,” she said.

“Impossible.”

“I do,” she said. “It makes me so afraid of losing him. I've lost too many people. Two husbands, my parents. I lost you, in a different way.”

He hesitated. “Are you afraid of losing me again?”

“Yes.”

He pulled her closer, but she knew he could offer her no reassurance that that wouldn't happen. She clutched him tightly, pressing her face against his chest to breathe in his scent.

“It's understandable that you'd fear losing Chris, but it's unfounded,” he said. “Really.”

“He's so much like Luke, though,” she said.

“Yes. I couldn't stop looking at him tonight. He's Luke, through and through.”

Rachel felt the lump form in her throat. “He's like the Luke you were describing tonight. Beautiful and kind and loving. But he's getting to that age where Luke changed.”

“It won't happen.”

She began weeping, and for the first time she realized the fear had been inside her all along. “He wants to quit school. He wants to play full time in his band.”

“He has a passion. Let him follow it.”

She sat up. “But I'm afraid it will be the beginning of the end,” she said. “He'll change. Maybe the mental illness is there, beneath the surface, just waiting for something to trigger it.”

Michael reached up to touch her cheek. “There's no Vietnam right now, Rache. And Chris is not Luke.”

She studied his face for a moment. His expression was serious. There was love in his eyes, and she lay down again, pulling close to him. She wouldn't think about Chris any longer tonight. She wouldn't think about all she had to lose.

HELEN LAY IN HER
bed staring at the ceiling as she had been for the past couple of hours. She knew Michael was in the house. She'd heard him at Rachel's window, and it warmed her heart to know they were together.

She had not felt this sort of love for other human beings in so very long. She would look at her granddaughter and her beautiful great-grandson and be filled with an almost foreign sense of joy and caring. But that joy was tinged with sorrow, because she knew she was a disappointment to them. They thought she was being selfish and unreasonable, and there was no way she could make them understand. Rachel and Chris were both too young to know that integrity and love and sacrifice could be more important than a simple piece of land.

She thought of Peter often these days. She'd known him better than anyone, known his kind heart and his compassion. And she'd known all too well the core of self-doubt that had festered inside him.

She rolled onto her side and closed her eyes. The land would be developed or not, she thought. And Rachel and Chris would either love her or loathe her. She would do nothing to change either outcome—not because she couldn't, but because she knew in her heart that the path she had chosen was the honorable one.

RACHEL WAS READING ABOUT
Rwanda in the two-day-old issue of the Sunday
Times
when Chris walked into the kitchen.

“Is Gram up yet?” he asked as he sat down across the table from her. He plucked a bran muffin from the open tin and took a bite.

“Not yet.” She knew he was anxious to get his great-grandmother's permission to play
Reflections
on the piano.

“I was up practically all night,” Chris said, “but I didn't get to look through that box of pictures and stuff yet.”

He'd been up all night studying the music, she thought. She watched his face as he chewed his muffin. He looked like a perfectly happy, healthy twenty-year-old. Her fears of the night before seemed silly in the light of day.

“Well,” Chris said casually, eyes on his muffin, “was Michael sneaking around last night for my sake or Gram's?” A small smile played at the corners of his mouth.

Rachel caught her breath, let it out. “Yours,” she said.

“Tell him he doesn't need to do that. It's okay. As a matter of fact, I think it's cool you two are together.”

Rachel felt the color in her cheeks. “Thank you,” she said. “It's very difficult, though, Chris. He and I don't feel as though we're doing anything wrong, but the rest of the world might. His congregation definitely would. It's not a very good situation.”

“Yeah, I know, but you told me once to do what feels right to me and not worry about what the rest of the world thinks. You should do the same.”

Had she actually said that to him? She didn't recall.

Chris stood up, wolfing down the last of his muffin as he grabbed another. “There's something really weird about that music,” he said as he headed toward the living room.

“What do you mean, ‘weird'?”

He shrugged. “I don't know. Not sure. But I can't wait to play it. Call me when Gram gets up, okay?”

“I will,” she said.

She returned her attention to the paper after Chris left the room, forcing herself to face the new pictures from the refugee camps. The cholera-stricken children looked dazed and flat, lifeless versions of the children she'd taught. At least she was finally doing something to help—not much, but it was better than nothing.

“Good morning.” Helen walked into the room.

“Hi.” Rachel folded the paper and carried her teacup to the sink. “Can I get you something for breakfast?” she asked.

“No, this will be fine,” Gram said as she sat down at the table and pulled a bran muffin from the tin. Rachel took the jar of marmalade from the refrigerator and handed it to her.

“I'm sorry we fought last night, Rachel,” Gram said. “I love you very much. But I ask you to please respect my wishes regarding the music.”

Rachel sat down. “I want to, Gram, but it's hard when I don't understand the position you've taken. Especially when the stakes are so high.” She picked up a crumb from the table with the tip of her finger and dropped it onto a napkin. “I told Michael I found the music. I know he wants to talk with you about it.”

“He can talk to me until his lips are blistered, I'm not going to bend.”

“If you could tell me why, Gram.” She leaned toward her grandmother. “The bulldozers are set to roll as soon as the board casts its vote, and everyone knows the vote is nothing more than a formality at this point. Everyone—”

“Gram?” Chris appeared at the door to the kitchen. “May I play
Reflections
on the piano? Please?”

Gram studied his face as if she might find her answer there, and Rachel saw the love in the older woman's eyes. Gram wouldn't be able to resist her great-grandson's request.

“When I'm done with my breakfast and out the door, you may,” Gram said. She looked at Rachel as Chris disappeared from the doorway. “I'm going into town this morning,” she said. “I need to return those library books and get some more.”

“Do you want me to take you?”

“No, thank you. I feel up to the drive, and I'd just as soon be by myself today.” She narrowed her eyes at her granddaughter. “I trust you'll keep that music in the house?” she asked.

“I won't do anything with it without your okay,” Rachel answered.

Chris was at the piano the instant Gram left the house. Rachel sat in the chair by the window, sipping a cup of tea, listening. He played smoothly, humming the orchestral parts, playing the piece as if he'd performed it many times before. Most likely he had, in his head, throughout the night. Already there was emotion in the playing, passion, and she tightened her hands around her cup. It had been a while since she'd heard him play anything classical. Chris had inherited something powerful from his great-grandfather, no doubt about it.

It was a long piece, with very few places that gave Chris pause. It was only near the end of the second movement that Rachel realized she would not have recognized the composition as a Huber. There was something different about it. And the middle of the third movement was, as Chris had said, weird. The notes spilled on top of one another without harmony. She thought of those artists who threw paint on a canvas with no method to their madness.

When he finished playing, Chris turned to face her. She could see the glistening of perspiration on his forehead. He was smiling.

“Nice, isn't it?” he asked.

She nodded. “You play beautifully.”

He picked up a sheet of the music and looked at it. “It's different, though. Different from his other stuff.”

“I thought so, too. Though I really couldn't say in what way.”

“This third movement is downright bizarre.”

“It was a little…cacophonous there for a while.”

“Good word, Mom!” He looked impressed, then began leafing through the music again. “I don't think I could ever memorize that passage,” he said. “This climax”—he played a few notes—”leads to a fortissimo unison on the B-A-C-H theme. Then he starts this weird six-page cadenza with a statement of the main theme in the bass, F major. But after that, he goes right into new material. It's like someone else wrote these few pages.”