Page 68 of Divine Oaths

Grief that does not speak

AFTER SARAH AND I PARTED ways, my head was buzzing, but I left for my Piano I class to take everything in. The lecture was in progress, and I took a seat at the back of class. One by one, the professor called students to perform pieces that showcased the concepts we’d learned over the past few weeks.

I zoned out for most of it.

Everything I’d encountered since coming to Westfield weighed heavy on me. All of these revelations and setbacks were overwhelming, and by the time class finally ended, I had a migraine from thinking so deeply about Sarah’s words.

I shoved my notebook in my bag, juggling the rest of my books and hurrying to leave, only to be stopped by the professor at the classroom door.

Professor Enlex was in her early forties, spoke with a slight lisp, and looked like all of the instructors in old Hollywood musicals. She had a shoulder-length bob, straight hair with grays weaving through it, and huge glasses parked on the bridge of her nose. She held her hand out to stop me from exiting, moving it aside only as other students rushed past.

“Sianna,” she said. “Come with me for just a moment.”

When finally the music room was empty, Professor Enlex gestured to one of the keyboards in the center of the room and directed me to take a seat behind it. She took my piano assignment notebook from me and flipped through it until she reached the section where we were supposed to record our practice sessions for the semester.

“Where are your daily practice logs?” she said. “Have you done any of the scales we’ve discussed? What about the different types of intervals we’ve been working on?”

“I haven’t gotten to it yet.”

“You haven’t gotten to it yet?” she repeated. “We’re a month into the semester, and you haven’t done any of the assignments?”

“No, I mean, I’ve done them, I just haven’t logged anything. Yet.”

Professor Enlex frowned.

“Show me, then.”

I stared at her. “Now?”

“I can wait.”

I sighed and sat behind the keyboard, resting my fingers above the keys. We were practicing Bach’s Italian Concerto, which Enlex wanted us to spend the first half of the semester learning to refine our skills. But I’d mastered the piece by age ten. Not with sheet music or anything like that. From memory. From the whimsical, upbeat allegro to the softer, gentle moments of the melody’s minor movements. I closed my eyes, the echo of the song humming in the back of my mind. I let myself sink into the sensation, let my mind wander to that safe place I always went to when it was just me, a piano, and nothing else.

On instinct, my fingers moved along the strokes of the keys, slowly at first and picking up the pace as the melody of the song came to life. Brushing the keys sparked visions in my mind, but I quickened my pace, not letting the touch linger enough to be sucked into the past. I knew most of the song from memory, but there were a few keys I missed when I’d shifted to the major scale.

“Now do Beethoven’s Sonata No. 14 in C-sharp Minor.”

“That’s not in the syllabus.”

“Just do it,” she snapped.

I turned back to the keyboard and tried to recall what I knew of the sonata from memory.

“‘Clair de lune,’” Professor Enlex demanded next.

Again, I acquiesced, barely finishing the last notes of the piece before she named another.

“Chopin, 24 Preludes.

“Pachelbel’s Canon.”

I gave her a look of confusion, and she clarified: “Canon in D.”

Over and over again, she named a piece, and I performed it from memory.

When I finished, I turned back to Professor Enlex, who stared at me stone-faced, as if she couldn’t believe what she was witnessing.

“You have perfect form, perfect tempo,” she said. “And yet you spend all of my classes staring out the window and daydreaming?”