“You’re so cute when you gargle,” I tell her.
She smiles. “Uh huh. Oh and, I’m skipping breakfast this morning, that’s why I brushed.”
“No you’re not,” I tell her. “You’re thin enough.”
“I feel like I overate a bit yesterday, so I’d rather not, if you’re okay with it,” she says.
I sigh. “All right. I can make an exception today, since it’s our last.”
She only seems to get sadder when I say that.
“Come with me,” I tell her, heading toward the door.
She pauses. “Really?”
“It’s only you and me today,” I tell her. “Well, and the grounds caretaker, but he’s not coming out of his apartment.”
“Should I put on some pants?” she asks.
I eye her legs hungrily. I want to say no, but I don’t want the lack of pants to be a deterrent to her running away. “Go ahead.”
She slips on some shorts from the laundry basket. I catch a glimpse of her butt—she’s wearing panties. Still, it turns me on.
I decide to wait for her outside in the hall, because I don’t want to have sex with her just yet.
When she emerges she asks: “So where to,capitano?”
I lead her downstairs to the main room. I pass by the patio door to make sure she sees it’s unlocked, then I halt beside the grand piano.
She’s staring at it with her mouth open. “Oh my God! You never told me you had a piano!” She jumps up and down and claps her hands. “Can I play it? Can I?”
She’s like a sweet little girl at Christmas, and I can’t help but smile. “That’s why I led you here.”
She sits down and immediately rests both thumbs on the central key, letting her other fingers stretch out to either side. She glances under the table at the pedals and experimentally presses each of them in turn.
She takes a deep breath, closes her eyes. When she opens them, she clumsily plays a basic tune. She hits several wrong notes, and her left and right hands seem to have trouble staying in sync.
She keeps starting over and gets slightly better each time. Still, I don’t recognize the song at all.
“I wish I had some sheet music,” she complains suddenly.
“Stand,” I tell her.
She obeys. I fold open the lid on the piano bench and grab one of the music books. I flip through it and stop when I reach Moonlight Sonata. Rosa likes to play that one now and then.
I set it on the music rack. “Here you go. This one is a bit complicated, though. I’m not sure you can handle it.”
“Oh, I know this one!” she says. She sits down eagerly and starts playing. She fumbles at first, making mistakes, but keeps getting better as she goes. I’m honestly quite surprised she can play at all, if it’s truly been years since she last touched a piano. I don’t know how she’s kept in practice.
She keeps getting better, so that by the time she’s halfway through the song she’s playing it almost flawlessly. She’s not just playing it mechanically now, she’s putting herself into it, leaning forward when she presses the keys softly, and backward when she hammers them.
I quickly find myself lost in the music, transported by the sheer emotion she imparts to the song. I imagine what our life would have been like if we had never parted eight years ago. I imagine walking down the street with her at my side, visiting restaurants, dancing, laughing, boating, making love. I imagine her playing in concert venues surrounded by thousands of people, and on random street pianos, busking to small crowds.
I live a lifetime while she plays that song, and when she’s finished, I’m left speechless, filled with regret over what we could have had.
The room seems so quiet now without the music.
She’s weeping softly. I’m not far from tears myself. But I bite them back.
