Page 47 of The Sins of Noelle

Noelle DeVille was a pianist first and foremost. In fact, that was the only good thing anyone could say about her, and always qualifying it against her negatively perceived traits.

She might be odd, and a little difficult, but she was a masterful pianist.

She might be rude and impetuous, but at least she had a great talent at the piano.

She might be asocial, but she was a musical genius.

Noelle had been told the exact same things her entire life, not only by her teachers and all other adults who'd met her, but by her own family, too.

And just like them, she could not name any other quality about herself.

She'd been told so many times what peoplethoughtshe was, that she'd started believing it herself.

Now, she only saw herself asodd.

Music mattered. The piano mattered. Her fingers which touched the piano mattered.

The rest of her? Not so much.

Music was theonlything she could offer to the world. So she would do it properly.

If before Noelle had, at times, taken her talent for granted, this time she was ready to give it her all.

The entire week was a succession of rehearsals until she wasmostlysatisfied with herself. Everyone else was, too. But ever the perfectionist, Noelle still felt something was missing.

Cisco and Yuyu attended one of the rehearsals, as promised, praising Noelle for her newest compositions and assuring her they had full confidence in her and her abilities.

But soon the time came for them to depart again, leaving Noelle alone once more to face Elena's biting words.

"One of my friends is going to be at the performance. She works for a newspaper and she said she will do a piece on you," Elena told her in passing a few days before the contest.

The meaning was clear.

Noelle must win so that her mother's friend could pen a glowing article about her.

Yet all those words of encouragement only made Noelle doubt herself more, especially since she was still hung up on the final part of her second piece. Though she had finished it, Noelle thought it far from perfect.

The more people praised her and declared that no one was more likely to win the contest than her, the more Noelle froze up, the expectations placed upon her making her falter under that massive weight.

As the days passed, the day of the contest getting closer and closer, Noelle found herself under such immense stress that she could barely sleep at night.

Even her beloved shows failed to help her. Her attention span was lacking, her anxiety spiking through the roof.

She felt herself on the verge of giving up, though she'd long decided those words could not be part of her vocabulary.

Yet it all came crashing down the night before the contest.

It was a little over ten, and though Noelle knew she should try to get some rest before the big day, she could not calm her rattled nerves.

Thinking a chamomile tea could help her, she went down the stairs to the kitchen to prepare herself a cup.

Everyone was already asleep, the house eerily quiet. Elena always retired at eight, and did not like anyone to bother her—with the exception of Cisco. Her oldest son was always welcome, despite the fact that he'd long distanced himself from her because of her treatment of Yuyu.

Noelle placed the teabag in a mug, adding some hot water over it before taking a seat at the kitchen table, waiting for the tea to cool down. Wrapping her hands around the warm mug, she released a deep breath in an attempt to calm herself.

She was still trembling.

On and off, she'd been trembling the entire week.

---