Page 96 of Caught in a Storm
Billy wasn’t. He was depressed, he hadn’t been eating well, and he was slightly hungover. He’s self-employed, though, so he knows how to fake it. “Heck yeah, I am.”
LaVar asked if he could hang out and watch. Billy doesn’t usually go for that, but he didn’t have the energy to deliver his spiel about parent-induced anxiety. Plus, Jackson seemed cool with it. The kid sat at Billy’s bench, eyes wide. “Your piano’s awesome,” he said. “Dad, look at it.”
“I know, bud,” said LaVar. “Shiny, right?”
Billy settled into The Rocker. “First lessons are just an intro,” he said. “You get to meet me and hear about my philosophy. My philosophy is that music should be fun. I want this to be fun for you, Jackson. And I get to meet you and get a sense for where you’re at musically. Sound like a plan?”
Jackson didn’t look up from the Steinway, but he nodded.
“Well, when you’re ready. I’m all ears.”
Billy teared up ten seconds into “Für Elise,” and it had nothing to do with missing Margot. It was so perfect and so fluid and performed with such reverence that Billy was transported to a place where only the notes and Jackson’s skinny fingers mattered. When he was done with the song, Jackson set his hands in his lap and looked up at Billy, awaiting instruction.
LaVar was smiling. It was clear that he’d wanted to stay for the lesson so he could see the look on Billy’s face. “What’d I tell you, Piano Man?”
Billy took a deep breath and wiped his eyes. “Not bad, Jackson.”
* * *
—
Today’s lesson with Jackson is almost over now. LaVar is on Billy’s couch, enjoying the show. He won’t be here every time, he promised Billy earlier, what with offseason workouts starting soon for the Ravens and then the preseason ramping up. It’s fine, though, because Billy likes having him around. Caleb is here, too, hanging out in the kitchen with Lincoln, the Barber family’s pit bull.
Jackson is working through the Moonlight Sonata, and he’s killing it. By the time his lessons wind down, Billy, like LaVar, is pretty much just an observer. “Straighten that back,” he says. “Posture.”
Normally Billy doesn’t say things like that to his students, but he’s had to adjust for Jackson’s ability, so he basically spends an hour a week parroting the things his grandma used to call out to him when he was learning. Sit up tall. Round those fingers. Keep your hands steady. You should be able to balance a quarter on those things. Steady rhythm, now.
When he finishes the song, LaVar and Caleb clap, and Jackson smiles.
“Yeah, okay,” says LaVar. “You’re good on that one. Now show Mr. Perk what you were working on at home.”
“You mean Stevie?” Jackson asks.
“Yeah, I mean Stevie!”
Jackson starts playing “Superstition,” smiling the way Stevie Wonder himself would, and Billy remembers stumbling through the song with Margot after their first date while LaVar listened from the sidewalk.
He read somewhere once that sadness is the only inspiration that a musician needs. His electric guitar is right there on the floor, propped up against The Rocker, left over from Alice’s lesson earlier. He grabs it now, flips the amp back on, and sets his fingers on the five chord. “Let’s try it from the top,” he says.
Jackson starts over, and Billy goes five to seven, playing one of the funkiest guitar licks ever written, and he’s stunned by how fantastic it sounds.
“What?” shouts LaVar. “Piano Man? You’re a guitar man, too?” He gets up and dances, which upsets Lincoln. The dog tries to tackle him, but Billy and Jackson keep playing. “Get off me, you idiot!” LaVar yells at his dog. “I’m dancing here!”
Caleb doesn’t dance, because he’s far too tall and embarrassed, but he waves his arms in the air. Billy thinks of his grandma up in the cosmos somewhere watching him transition from Beethoven to Stevie Wonder. She’d scowl, probably. She’d shake her head and tsk. That would all be for show, though, because Billy knows that she’d love it.
* * *
—
“So, how much these pianos go for anyway?” asks LaVar. “These fancy Steinway things?”
Billy tells him a ballpark figure and LaVar whistles. “Damn, really? Shoot. Jackson, forget it. I’ll just buy you a Caddy instead, we’ll call it even.”
Jackson gathers his books and papers off the music stand. His homework assignments for the week are aggressive, but he keeps asking for more to do. New songs, theory work, listening exercises.
“You aren’t interested in selling this one, are you?” LaVar asks, touching the Steinway. “We already know it works, and the kid loves it.”
“Good luck,” says Caleb from the kitchen. “He’d sell me before he’d sell that thing.”
