By Means of the Piano

It was pulling teeth for us to say nice things about each other. I was constantly watching my step, silently lifting my foot and sincerely not knowing what I would come down on. He never said anything cause he loved the aftermath of a breakdown.

But I fixed that with the piano.

He would completely shut up when I scooted along the piano bench and got settled to hover over the keys.  As if in a trance, he would insist on standing over my shoulder to grasp the melody and my fingers.

Moonlight Sonata was the clincher and he would need it repeated over and over again.

Maybe it was the fact that my back was turned to him and he couldn’t see my restless eyes searching for reassurance, or trying to pillow doubt. Maybe it was because when I played I didn’t open my mouth  and stupid stuff for him to roll his eyes at, even if what I had to say meant the world to me. There was only one way for him to break free from his perceptional personality:

The piano.

We went to a wedding in Wyoming, about six hours away from Denver. I already knew that I loved him, but I had no clue what was behind his smile. I was nervous, giddy. We would be together for thirty-six hours straight, and I would be introduced as the flavor of the week to him friends.

We bickered. Harmless stuff I had already heard so I knew how to fight it. Then this girl, who sat and watched us finish each other’s sentences with words of resentment and punch-packed pain, dared us to say one nice thing about each other.  I know that he turned towards me, I met his gaze…the hesitation solidified what everyone was thinking: We were horrible together.

We got drunk at the wedding, left early and stopped to get something to eat before going back to our room.  We didn’t say much, again.  I was way too smart to speak up cause I knew it would fuel the fire, and he didn’t say anything at all…either fueling his own fire or trying to extinguish mine.

Harshly and abruptly, he stood up, took my hand and headed out to the car, saying nothing. He drove back to the church where the ceremony was in and led me through the front doors. I was struggling to keep up with him and his dead set vision, but he wasn’t even paying attention. When we got up to the front of the sanctuary, he pulled me up the four stairs that led to the stage and in the direction of a big, beautiful baby grand piano.

I played for two hours.

When I was at school, studying music, he came to visit me for a chunk of time, which meant we had to share a car. He would drive me to school for my practice sessions in these little tiny rooms. I practiced and banged at the keys with every anger filled ounce I had in me and he would take my car and do whatever it was that he wanted to do.

I didn’t find out until three years later that he never left the building but sat outside the practice room door.

A good hour into the reception of my wedding, I looked around, trying to see everyone, and noticed that he wasn’t around. My heart skipped a beat thinking he had left, without a good bye, without goodwill, and just anger that it wasn’t him up there. The party in my mother’s back yard was beautiful with tea lights, flowers, cake, laughs, but not him. I picked up the hem of my dress, walked into the empty house and heard something.

Something from the direction of my piano. One key, one at a time. Just a series of lonesome, solitary notes.  I climbed the stairs to the loft where that piano had been all my life, to see him.  His right hand pressing the keys, left arm stretched out in front of him, with his head of curly, perfect hair falling over his left arm, face turned away.

His tears caused mine to begin tracks of their own.

Ever after, I would play over the phone for him. He would be on the other end of the call, sitting at a piano that happened to be around and ask me to tell him how to play. He didn’t care about technique, which fingers to go where or here, he just wanted that tone…and I obliged.

I used the piano to fix things, even those that aren’t completely broken.