Page 18 of Nantucket Longing

The night of the dinner, Madeline put on a long black dress and piled her hair into an elaborate updo that she then let shimmer to her shoulders.Sweeping through the residency kitchen dressed to the nines, she ran into a few of the other artists, all of whom had heard about Madeline’s piano inclinations and had spent the past few days begging her to show them.But Madeline was terrified to approach the piano again.What she’d felt, playing it for the first time in so long, had been staggeringly emotional—almost to the point of pain.It felt rational that it should be so painful.It touched all the delicate parts of her heart.

To the other residents now, she said, “One of these days,” and breezed past, shuffling through her bag for her phone.When she got outside, she dialed Henry, squeezing her free hand into a fist.Henry answered on the third ring and said, “Madeline!I was just thinking about you!”Madeline’s face burst into an enormous smile.She could picture him somewhere, drenched in the Los Angeles light, maybe on set with a walkie-talkie and an important-looking badge that called him “screenwriter.”

“How are you?How is everything?”she asked.

Henry laughed.“It’s a lot of boring meetings and talks with the director and ‘get into character’ sessions with the actors.No surprise that Sophia’s here all the time, wanting to insert herself into everything, making all of our jobs ten times harder.”

Madeline knew how complicated his relationship with Sophia was and winced.“I guess it is based on her life story,” she said.

“True!I don’t know how I would feel if my life was turned into a movie.Although I have a hunch nothing half as exciting as all that will happen to me,” Henry said.

“Don’t speak too soon,” Madeline said.“You’re still young.”

“They’re calling me The Kid around here,” Henry said.

“I guess compared to them, you are.”

Henry sighed.His tone darkened.“I just want to be taken seriously.”

“You are,” Madeline said, touching her hair.She wanted to wrap him in her arms.She wanted to dart back to the beginning of summer when things didn’t feel so complex.

A beat passed.A bird circled overhead.

“I miss you,” she said.

“I miss you, too,” Henry offered.“I’m sorry I left.”

“You shouldn’t be sorry.This is enormous for your career,” Madeline said.

“My grandma said things are heating up for you,” Henry said.“Dinner with someone tonight?Some guy from Paris?”

Madeline blushed.She hadn’t told him, but she should have known it would get back to him anyway.“I don’t know if it’ll come to anything.”

“Why not?My grandparents are really well-connected, and you’re good, Madeline.I still can’t believe you didn’t tell me you could play like that,” Henry said, a smile in his voice.

“I told you.I quit,” Madeline said.“And I’m too old to be a classical pianist now.I mean, I haven’t played in six years.And I started when I was three, so six years is like an impossible gap to fill.”She could never catch up to the people she’d once beat soundly, competition after competition.

“You started at three years old!Do you know what I was doing when I was three?”Henry asked.

Madeline wanted to hang on his every word.She closed her eyes.“I don’t know?What were you doing when you were three?”Inexplicably, she caught herself thinking about what their child might look like at the age of three.If their child was a piano prodigy, would she make him or her practice four, five, six hours a day at the age of five?Would she rob him or her of their childhood?

“Oh, Madeline, I gotta go,” Henry said suddenly, his tone formal.“I’ll call you later, okay?”

The line went dead.

But before Madeline could register his quick retreat, Greta and Bernard were outside, dressed immaculately and guiding her to Bernard’s BMW, which he’d bought recently with the money he’d earned from the sales of his latest book.

“Were you talking to Henry?”Greta asked, adjusting the strap of her beautiful black dress, then the pearl earring in her ear.

“I was!”

“He really needs to focus,” Greta said, sliding into the leather passenger seat.“I hope he isn’t calling too often?”

“He’s working himself to death, Greta,” Bernard said, sounding far more easygoing and playful.“He’s responsible!His girlfriend lives here!He’s allowed to talk on the phone every now and then.”

Greta clucked her tongue and turned around to look at Madeline in the back seat.“It’s terrible, isn’t it?I want so much for him.I’m willing to make him miserable, if only so he can look back and realize he accomplished everything he wanted to.”

Madeline laughed, thinking of her mother, of all her mother had sacrificed and all her mother had demanded that Madeline sacrifice in pursuit of music.“I know what you mean.”

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