“Melt my face off?”
“Yup.”
“That’s disturbing.”
“And never made it onto an album,” he confirmed. But then he took the tune he’d been playing and morphed it into the chorus of one of his more famous rock anthems. I could hear how he’d developed it, grown it, and changed it into the hit it became. We both belted out the famous lyrics that did not in any way reference melting faces.
“Much better,” I told him as he hit the closing notes.
“Now you.” He looked up at me, taking his hands off the keys. “Play me something you love.”
“It might be classical,” I warned him. I still found it strange how many people said they loved music, but never listened to classical. To me, pop, rock, jazz, hiphop, classical, they were all pieces of the same glorious puzzle. But I’d had enough conversations with enough people to realize I was a bit of an anomaly.
“Give it to me.” Ash settled back on the piano bench, his arms folded against his chest.
My fingers tickled their way along the keys as my mind roamed among songs, solos I’d memorized for auditions, pieces I’d absorbed over the years because my parents had played them so many times. Then it came to me, the Rachmaninoff concerto.
From the opening chords, it commanded great swells of emotion, rumbling along the keys, evoking dark, fraught trouble but moving, slowly, effortlessly through the piece into lighter, swirling moments of sweetness. I’d always been in awe of this concerto, how subtly it changed between emotions, how fully it ranged across the keyboard from bright, prancing, showy notes ripening into full, deep tones. It blended, creating an entirely otherworldly mood, another space in time. I could hear the piano together with the sweeping strings, woodwinds and brass of a full orchestra, swelling and accentuating and bringing it all to life. As my fingers came off the final, triumphant notes, I opened my eyes and wondered, what did Ash think of all that?
He watched me, mesmerized, as if he hadn’t taken a breath the whole time I’d been playing.
“What was that?” he asked, as if he’d just seen a UFO.
“Rachmaninoff.”
“Rach what now?”
I laughed. “He’s a Russian composer.”
“Holy shit!”
“I know, right?” He’d felt it, too, the power of it all.
“Here I was thought I was making music all this time!” He brought a hand to his hair. “Holy shit, Ana. You’re amazing!”
“Thanks.” Shyly, I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “Not amazing enough to make a career out of it. But…”
“Why do you put yourself down like that?” He brought a hand around my waist. And I realized that the blanket had slipped completely down around my waist while I’d played. I’d performed it all topless.
“Whoops.” I brought the blanket up around my shoulders again, folding it demurely over my torso.
“I have to admit, that added to my enjoyment,” Ash teased me. “But, seriously, do you know how talented you are?”
I shrugged. It was complicated. And hard to explain it to a musician so famous he had the world eating out of the palm of his hand. “The thing is, going into music isn’t exactly an easy way to make a living.”
“You could do it,” he insisted.
“Ash.” I shook my head. “It’s not that simple. My parents groomed me be a classical pianist, but my heart wasn’t really in it. And you have to love it like nothing else if you’re going to do that for a living.”
“OK, so you don’t want to be a classical pianist. What do you want to be?”
“I’m a children’s librarian.” I deliberately didn’t answer his question about future potential, choosing to ground myself in reality.
“I know what you are. But what do you want to be?”
I let out a frustrated breath. “It’s easy for you to ask me that, Ash. You’re a famous rock star. You’re living the dream.”
“No, I’m not, Ana. Half the time I’m so sick of the shit around me I want to scream.”
“Why don’t you?”
Now he sighed in frustration. “There’s a whole machinery around me, Ana. Tons of people making a living off of me, my band, the promotions, the touring, the merchandizing. I can’t just walk away from it all.”
“Why not? If it’s making you miserable?”
We looked at each other, tense. Until, suddenly, we weren’t anymore. He smiled at me and brought a finger to my chin and I melted into his touch, his sweet kiss on my lips.
“You make a lot of sense, Anika.” We sat together, touching foreheads. “But you still haven’t told me what you want to be when you grow up.”
With a laugh, I reminded him that I was already 24.
“And you think it’s all over, then? 24 and done?”
“All right.” I held my hands up in surrender. “You want to know what I really want to do? But don’t get me wrong, I really do like being a librarian.”
“I know,” he assured me. “I saw you in action. You’re very stern.” I glared at him. “And helpful with the kids,” he added.
“What I’d really love to do is compose. I love writing songs. There, I said it.” I realized I was shaking. Why had that been so hard to admit? I guessed there was the fact that my parents had told m
e time and again there was no way to earn a living doing songwriting. Why pursue a dream that made no sense?
“Cool!” Ash clapped his hands together. “You’re so good at it.”
“What do you mean?”
“You figured out the perfect way to end that song I’ve been working on for months. I couldn’t get it. Then you jumped in, finished it off and made the whole thing so much better.”
“Really?” That was cool.
“Yeah.” He turned to the keyboard again and began playing that song, the one we’d done together so many times. When I’d first heard him playing it in that stadium in Santa Clara, it had stayed with me, haunting me, calling to me. And he was right, I had heard the ending. It had flowed straight out of my heart and together now we played it beautifully.
“This song’s about you.” He turned to me almost shyly as he played.
“It is?”
“I don’t know how, yet. I’m still figuring out the lyrics.”
“Nothing about melting faces,” I cautioned him.
“Got it.” He nodded.
Outside the window, the view caught my attention. “It’s stopped!” I exclaimed, clutching the blanked around me as I stood up and walked over to the glass. “It’s not snowing anymore.”
In the late afternoon light, the snowscape looked both gorgeous and eerie. Crystal white, icicles hung from the rooftop. I couldn’t make out any distinct shapes in the yard, only mounds, drifts and swells of white. No paths, roads, or other houses, only huge pine trees weighted down by pounds of white snow still stood tall, bearing their heavy load.
“The storm’s over.” Ash came and stood next to me, sounding somewhat regretful.
“It’s so quiet all of a sudden.” No wind raging, no limbs snapping off of trees or heavy whumps of snow falling off roofs. Just us inside, and the silent frozen expanse outside. Soon, snow plows would have it cleared. Soon, we’d have to leave. My heart sunk. There it was, reality. I’d never wanted it to come back.
“You know what that means? Now that the snow’s stopped?” Ash took my hand and squeezed it in his own. The tone of his voice sounded way more upbeat than I felt. “Hot tub!” he exclaimed, pulling me along with him.