I make a pot of coffee in my room and boot my laptop up, and in the morning light from my open window I find the agent’s email and read it again.
Dear Ms. Laurent,
I want to congratulate you and the rest of the Royal London Symphony Youth Orchestra on a wonderful performance last night. I was particularly captured by your playing of The Swan.
I represent United Kingdom-based soloists and work comprehensively with musical directors across Europe and beyond. If you are considering representation at this time I would love to hear your audition tape…
I stop reading and sit back and look out across Bangkok. It’s been three years since this woman—Paloma Sanchez, her name is—sent me this email. She’s long given up on me and probably even forgotten who I am.
I consider again what I want from my career. If this email arrived in my inbox today, what would be my first impulse? Well, to panic, because I’ve never recorded an audition tape. But putting that aside, would I be excited to be offered the possibility of representation as a soloist?
Yes.
My heart beats a little faster and I reach for my phone to text Laszlo. Then I stop myself. I need to think first, about a lot of things, and the space he’s given me within his embrace is as special as his embrace itself. I can feel the ghost of his body against mine and it makes me braver. I want to figure this out on my own, but knowing Laszlo’s there if I need him is everything. I glance toward my cello standing expectantly next to my bed. I have all day before I need to be at the concert hall for tonight’s performance. I need to think and I’m going to do it with my cello in my hands.
I have a quick shower and put on fresh clothes and then take out my cello and start to play. But I stop almost immediately, wincing. The notes sound terrible in this tiny, carpeted space. I pick up my instrument and head down to the lobby where I speak to the concierge at the front desk. He’s helpful and understanding and points me to the mezzanine level. I go up and find a large, wooden floored conference hall standing empty and silent. There’s a stage at the far end and I take a folding chair and my cello and walk up the stairs.
The acoustics aren’t wonderful but I have space and peace. I play from memory, and I really listen to myself. I play the way I want to play, not in any the styles I’ve been taught or the way that people expect. I play The Swan, and I pour all my grief over my mother and father into the notes, but also all the love I have in my heart. There’s so much love. I feel it radiating through me as the strings tremble beneath my bow. I play Bach, Elgar and Brahms. I play all my favorite pieces like I used to do, experimenting with the sounds, inflecting them with my emotions.
And as I play I think. This is really why I went to the Mayhew five weeks ago, to face the three most difficult things in my life: losing Laszlo, being stuck with my music, and my grief over what might have been with my parents. They’re all connected, and if I want something real with Laszlo that means being real myself and facing the things I’ve done, stretching back to that day thirteen years ago.
As the music swells around me I let everything rise up. I remember the first time I saw Laszlo, the kindness on his face as he hunkered down before me and showed me that newspaper article. That’s me, Isabeau. I have an orchestra filled with musicians like you. Only the very best people, and I think one day you might be one of those people. I looked at the page and I looked at him for, what? Three seconds? I wanted what he was offering so much. A strained note enters my playing. I left my home, my life and my father, for a complete stranger and the jewel-box offer of a life of music. I was a child, and I don’t think I knew what forever meant, or what my father must have felt losing me. But I feel it now, the pain I must have inflicted.
I don’t know if a child can be held responsible for making thoughtless decisions. I don’t know if I can—or should—regret what I did.
Regret what Laszlo did.
I don’t want you to have any regrets, Laszlo. Promise me.
When I finish I put my bow aside and open my eyes, breathing hard through my nose, in and out, defiant tears in my eyes. This is what I want people to hear when I play. I don’t know if it’s good enough and I don’t know if it’s what people will want. But it’s all I have. People might think I’m strange or uninteresting or just plain wrong. I might make people angry with what I do. It’s scary, the thought that everything I have might still not be enough. But what if just one person wants to hear it? Really needs to hear it? That will be enough. I may not become the great soloist that I dreamt of but I won’t exhaust myself trying to be something I’m not, only to be left in the end with the ashes of my misguided efforts.