Page 19 of Nantucket Longing

They met Bernard’s friend, the jazz saxophonist David, at a swanky French-fusion restaurant on the outskirts of the Nantucket Historic District.They were seated on the rooftop overlooking the gorgeous harbor, where Madeline could just-barely make out the sailboat she and Henry had spent all summer on.She didn’t feel comfortable going by herself and wondered if her sailing days were over just as soon as they’d begun.

David was a slightly overweight fifty-something American man with salt-and-pepper hair who’d spent too long in Paris and was happy to pretend he’d forgotten American customs.He wore a pair of sunglasses far past nightfall and ordered the most expensive glasses of wine off the menu, frequently saying that American wines couldn’t hold a candle to French ones.But despite all that, Madeline found him just as charming as Bernard and Greta did.She loved his fabulous stories of playing music all around the world.She loved his talk about his children, his French wife, the arrondissements that smelled of fresh bread and hot chocolate.

Of course, it soon came out that Greta and Bernard knew David because he’d been a resident at The Copperfield House thirty years ago.Madeline wasn’t surprised.

“I didn’t know anything back then!”David said with a laugh.“I’d just dropped out of Juilliard, for crying out loud, and I didn’t know what to do with myself or my musical talents.I was pretty sure I was garbage because all of my Juilliard professors had told me I wasn’t any good and that my career was over, just like that.”

“But you got into Juilliard,” Madeline heard herself whisper.“That means you’re great.”

“Sure.Maybe at one time I was okay,” David said.“But I didn’t have it in me to be a classical musician.There are too many rules and regulations.You have to wear too many tight-fitting suits, and you can’t get away with not practicing ten to fourteen hours a day, not at that level.”He laughed and poured more wine for everyone.“Tell me, Madeline.What’s your background?”

“She’ll hardly tell us anything,” Bernard said, his eyes glowing.“We were hoping she’d open up to someone like you.Someone with a similar music background.A prodigy.”

“I’m no prodigy.Only my mother calls me that, and I don’t even think she believes it,” David said with a laugh.“But come on, Madeline.You have to tell us something.We’re all friends here.”

Madeline winced, and with her thumb, she traced a line down her thigh.“I, um, I started playing when I was three.”

David nodded and propped his elbows on the table, which was something Madeline thought rich people would never do.

“My mother did everything to keep me in lessons,” Madeline said.“We didn’t have a lot of money, and I know it was hard for her.”

Madeline went on to explain that she’d won everything from the Midwest Piano Contest to the Manhattan Junior Piano Competition to the Kansas Little Pianists before going “junior professional,” as it was called.She’d cut an album at the age of thirteen.She’d dropped out of school to pursue contests and practicing as much as she could.She’d changed piano teachers five times before landing on Mrs.Everett, who’d taken her “all the way, or very near it.”As she spoke, Bernard, Greta, and David were rapt.

But when it came time for Madeline to explain what had happened at Juilliard, she simply couldn’t.Her tongue felt numb.

So she said, “I was going to audition for Juilliard, but I didn’t.”She sipped her wine and raised her shoulders.“I quit after that and moved to LA.”

David gaped at her.“You quit?Just like that?”

Madeline nodded.

“Your mother let you?”David asked.

Madeline felt a stab of sorrow.She raised her shoulders again.She couldn’t talk about her mother, not here, not anywhere.

“Didn’t you miss it?”David asked.

Madeline answered honestly, for a change, “I missed it every single day.I still do.”

“That piano’s been downstairs, waiting for you,” Greta breathed.

“But you couldn’t touch it till you were ready,” Bernard countered.It sounded like he really understood.

David looked terribly excited.He adjusted his sunglasses and said, “Play with me.Please.I want to know what kind of musician you are.”

“But you’re a jazz musician,” Madeline said.“I was only ever a classical musician, and now, I’m nothing.”

“Nonsense.Greta and Bernard haven’t stopped singing your praises.”

“I’m sure they’re overdoing it,” Madeline said.“I only played ‘Claire de Lune’ for them.It’s one of the easier pieces I’ve ever done.”

“It’s not one of the easiest pieces to play beautifully, and you know that,” David pointed out.

Madeline’s heart thudded.She knew that was true: that plenty of pianists could play and even memorize “Claire de Lune,” but that most of them played it clunkily, without the poetry that the piece required.She looked away from his penetrating gaze.

“I’ve hardly ever improvised,” she said then, hoping to get out of it.She knew that if David wanted her to play jazz with him, she would have to make something up as they went along.It required a level of creativity and skill that was beyond the classical music level.It scared her because there was no perfection involved.She couldn’t practice it over and over again for ten, twelve hours a day.

“Come on.Just try it once,” David begged.“If you hate it, I’ll never ask anything of you again.”

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