I fix him with a skeptical glare. “Oh, sure. That’s all you want. Weren’t you just bragging about how you were going to demolish me in the rankings?”
“Why not both?”
He still has his hand resting on the small of my back. Hasn’t pulled it away yet, even though we’re in public, where anyone could see. For a moment, I find myself imagining what it might be like when we go back to Parker—and how the rumor mill is going to positively combust when it hears that the music department’s most notorious enemies are now sitting together in the caf and giving good-luck kisses in the stage wings.
Maybe this is what would have happened three years ago if we hadn’t ruined it for ourselves. Maybe today, here in Stockholm, we’d be old hands at comforting each other, so used to being in each other’s orbit that distance chafes and aches, unusual.
I offer to buy him lunch, but I know even as I ask what the answer is going to be—he has to practice. So I let Celia treat me to sandwiches instead, and afterward, I sneak backstage again to Jamie’s practice room. I can hear him playing through the door, so I wait until he finishes a movement, then knock quietly.
“Come in,” he says.
He’s alone. The top of the piano is littered with sheet music, half of it balled up like he got halfway through reading his notes, then got frustrated. At one point, he clearly got anxious enough to throw the paper across the room, judging from the small pile accumulating in one corner.
“You…good?” I ask. He is the same sickly color my asparagus fern started to turn when I forgot to water it for three weeks straight.
“Yeah. Yeah, totally. Doing great. Crushing it. Why do you ask?” He laughs, the sound bizarre and too tight as it rips itself from his throat.
“I can leave, if you want to practice in peace.”
He shakes his head. “No. No, it’s fine. But. I’m going to puke, so you might need to step aside for a second so I can leave the room.”
I do, and hope it’s not too apparent on my face how worried I am about him. Stage fright is one thing, but I’ve never known Jamie to get performance anxietythisbad—and trust me, I was always paying attention, always furious that he seemed so unbothered by things like major performances and competitions considering the panic attacks I usually have leading up to them. I would tell myself that he just kept all of that behind closed doors, but I’ve been living with him for the past week of this particular competition, and he’s been a very normal and expected level of nervous the whole time.
When he returns, still wan and shaky but slightly less green, I’ve cleared off a seat by one of the score-laden tables and stolen a water bottle from the bulk supply I found shoved into a corner next to a filing cabinet.
“You’re going to be fine,” I say, because he clearly needs to hear someone say it.
“I know. I know. Worst-case scenario, I make a fool of myself on an international stage, right?” His answering laugh is unnatural, manic.
“That won’t happen. You’ve never made a fool of yourself on any kind of stage before, and that isn’t going to change now.” I scooch my chair closer to the piano bench so I can reach over and touch his knee when he sits, squeezing lightly. “The actualworst-case scenario is that you don’t place. But you’re still in the top twelve, Jamie. The toptwelvein theworld.”
“Top twelve contestants in this competition, anyway.”
“Stop splitting hairs. It’s a good thing. You’ve already won.”
His gaze narrows slightly. “Is that how you’re gonna look at it, ifyoudon’t place?”
“I’ll try, yeah.”
He sighs like he doesn’t believe me, his gaze sliding back over to the piano, narrow-eyed, like it’s an enemy he has to confront.
I wish I could end this for him. Just take out a pair of scissors and snap the cord of this horriblewhateverhe’s feeling and set him free. At least the clock is ticking; he goes onstage in less than half an hour, which means in an hour—max—it’ll all be over. For better or for worse.
I just have to hope that getting the performance over with improves things. But it feels like too much to hope that he gets through this, overcomes whatever psychological block he has about this competition, and cuts himself a break. Is it selfish to hope he quits, at least for a little while?
I can’t keep watching him torture himself like this, chasing accolades, like that will prove he deserved to live when his brother didn’t.
The rest of that half hour drags by. Jamie makes a few more abortive attempts at practice, but his focus isn’t there. “I kicked Celia out,” he admits when I finally ask what happened to his actual instructor. “Can’t handle the pressure right now. I just need to…” He blows out a breath, scraping his hand through his hair. “Fuck.”
“Here,” I say, getting up and gesturing for him to lean over so that I can gently comb his now-mussed hair back into something resembling order. “It’s almost over. Do you want to just…sit, for a little bit? We can play backgammon.”
“We can playbackgammon?”
“Yeah. I have the app downloaded on my phone.”
“Of course you do.” But at least the exasperated sigh resembles the Jamie I actually remember.
When someone finally shows up to get him, I reach out and grab his hand before he can disappear, pulling him back for another quick kiss. “I’ll be right there,” I tell him. “Right backstage. I’ll watch the whole time.”
