Page 50 of Serenade Me

Chapter Seventeen

Anca

I was never supposed to excel at harp.

I wanted to draw things and write things and paint them in all the colors of the rainbow from my imagination.

Even as a child I’d see girls with their sketch books and journals sitting against tree trunks, losing time as they found themselves in the lines they drew on paper, words or doodles, something that flowed from mind to hands to create tangible art. I craved the day I could live such a romantic, bohemian lifestyle.

But as I progressed in music, those earlier dreams were forgotten, and I realized that my art did flow from my fingers, it stimulated the ears and penetrated the soul that way.

I spent hours in my room, reading music like it was Austen, Steinbeck. Those little notes were like words, rising and falling. Drama and pain, beauty and joy, they were all contained in those little black lines on paper. It was just my job to read them aloud with my hands on my harp. To tell the story how I interpreted it.

When I realized there was freedom in my gift, I thought my life was set.

And then everything changed.

And everything I believed about my talent was gone.

Because of one person.

Not the Mae- Maestro.

I can’t even blame it on him.

Because I let myself believe what he was telling me.

No, the only person to blame, was me.

When Jez called me that night, to offer me the position of playing with his band, my instant answer was no. No, not just no, but no no no no no no no. Not a soft serve cone’s chance in the seventh circle of hell was I going to perform.

He’d pleaded, he’d begged. And I’d never been able to refuse my brother before.

So I came.

And I listened to them. And for the first time in years, I yearned to be on stage.

With them.

And with him. Marius.

That need to be a part of the music he was creating trumped my crippling panic and fear, and it wasn’t until I was on that stage, a crowd of fifteen thousand waiting, hungry for what I was supposed to give them, that I felt I couldn’t do it.

But I should’ve known, I should’ve had no doubt that when I needed the help, needed someone to understand, someone to hold my hand and tell me I could do it, and how to do it, it would be him.

It was always meant to be him. I’ve known it from the moment I saw him when I was just a girl, too young to know about love.

It was always meant to be him.

Always.

But I know that he feels that his relationship with Jez takes priority, and I know that he feels that allegiance to my brother so strongly because I feel it too.

I watch him, as he looks at me, with a longing that feels like a sharp pain in the pit of my stomach, then he pushes open the carriage door and walks away. And I wonder if there is anyone left in the world who can see me like he does.

***

It feels like everyone on the train is crammed into this one carriage. And I don’t blame them. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else in the world either.