Neevah
“I needyou to go grab that C up top, Neevah.”
I swear. If Monk tells me to go “grab” one more damn note. We’ve been rehearsing for hours, and he more than lives up to his reputation as a perfectionist.
“Okay,” I say, shifting beside him on the piano bench in the hotel ballroom. Galaxy Studios bought a block of rooms for the cast and crew’s accommodations, and has also blocked off portions of the hotel for rehearsals and shooting.
“Walk Away,” the tune Monk wrote for the French Riviera scene, will be on repeat in my head long after we’re done. The opening strains float from the piano as we start the song again. It’s lush and heartbreaking and haunting. A song about a love betrayed, a lover abandoned. I close my eyes, blocking out the empty ballroom and Monk on the piano and every other distraction. I fall into the heartbreak of the lyrics—crack my heart open to let Dessi’s pain over losing Tilda flood in.
When I first started this movie, Dessi was some distant figure trapped in the pages of the past. She was history, but now I feel her present with me every day. I thought she was here to serve me, a means to the end of my big break. Now, I realize I’m here to serve her—to make sure a voice this rich and true, swallowed by the years and by injustice, is finally heard.
The closing notes hang in the air before evaporating into silence. I almost can’t bear to open my eyes, I’m so lost in the feeling this song perfectly conveys. I wipe the tears from my cheeks and force myself to look around, surprised to see several cast and crew members now gathered around the piano, some of them with wet cheeks and shiny eyes, too. Some of them snap their appreciation, some clap approvingly, and others offer smiles. I let my gaze lovingly drift over their faces. In only a few months, you can become pretty tight, and we have.
After the initial shock of Camille’s interview, no one has said anything snide to me or made me feel weird about my relationship with Canon. We’ve only been on location two days, and I’ve barely seen him, so there hasn’t been much opportunity for awkwardness, but I can already tell most of them are fine with it. A few of them even teased me, asking how I tamed the beast.
Of course, I haven’t.
“Now that’s a song,” Trey says, leaning his elbows on the top of the piano. “You wrote that specifically for the movie, Monk?”
“I did.” Monk’s fingers skate across the keys in a brighter-sounding flourish. “I used the script to write some of the original songs. I won’t score the film until after I see the final cut.”
“It’s a fantastic script,” Livvie says.
“Thank you.” That comes from the ballroom entrance where Verity stands, watching us all, but her eyes invariably returning to Monk. His eyes always invariably return to her.
“You know,” Monk says, “there was a song that was perfect for that scene when Dessi realizes Tilda was unfaithful. That she cheated and couldn’t be trusted.”
He looks directly at Verity, his fingers coaxing a few haunting notes from the instrument.
“It’s called ‘Don’t Explain,’” he continues, eyes still locked with Verity’s. “Billie Holiday wrote it when she discovered her husband’s infidelity. When she found out he wasn’t who she thought he was. Or maybe he was exactly who she thought he was, and she had lied to herself. Either way, he was a cheat.”
I glance at Verity. Several of us do, the discomfort filling the room the longer they stare each other down. Her lips tighten and her eyes slit with anger behind black-rimmed reading glasses.
“That would have been musically anachronistic, though, since this scene took place in 1939 and she didn’t write the song until 1946.” Monk presses his fingers into a dark extended note and then slams the piano lid down. “So too late.”
His harsh words seem to break a spell, and the people around me start laughing and talking, most of them about how long the day of rehearsal has been and how hungry they are. I concur, except I’ve been feeling a little nauseous. Even if I were hungry, I probably wouldn’t eat much. This sick feeling has persisted. Probably just nerves, but I’ve pushed it aside to get through today. We shoot this tomorrow, and I don’t want to be the reason things slow down.
I can’t be.
“I came to tell you guys dinner is ready and down on the beach tonight,” Verity says, looking pointedly away from Monk. “They’re doing a bonfire for us.”
“Oooh, fun,” Livvie says, gathering her bag and script, which we all seem to carry with all the new lines we’ve been getting.
“You sound amazing, Neevah,” Monk says, standing from the piano and walking with me toward the ballroom exit.
“Gosh, it feels like it took all day to get it right.”
“You weren’t that far off anyway. I’m just a demanding dude who’s hard to satisfy.”
“Between you and Canon, I don’t know how any of us survive.”
“So, you and our esteemed director, huh?” Monk asks, the smile he slants down to me teasing and kind.
My cheeks burn, but I don’t look away. “Guess everyone knows now.”
“I mean, I already knew.”
“He told you?”