Music From Standing Waves (8 page)

“Abby.”

“I’m here.” My stomach tightened as
Michelle’s cries echoed up the staircase.

“Abby,” said Justin again.

I shuffled across the mattress and held him
so my chest pressed against his back. Michelle’s footsteps rose
towards the bedroom. She opened the door and curled onto the bed,
pushing her head against Justin’s.

“They found him,” she coughed, her voice
husky. “He’s alive.”

Justin burst into a rush of grateful tears.
Michelle reached her arm over both of us.

“The boat was wrecked on the reef. But he’s
alive. He’s alive.” She repeated it over and over, her hair
clinging to her wet cheeks. I was going to say ‘I’m so glad’, but
it didn’t seem like enough. Instead, I just lay beside Justin and
felt our bare arms press together.

It was four in the morning when he walked me
back to the caravan park. Twisted palm branches lay across the
road. Bark had washed up from the gardens and thatched the bitumen.
Seas of bugs clapped their wings around the streetlights.

I stood on the doorstep and took Justin’s
hands. “I’m so happy your dad’s safe.”

He stared vacantly into his sneakers.
“Thanks,” he mumbled. “For staying tonight.”

I could hear the dull drizzle of the gutter
overflowing into the mud.

“Are you going to school tomorrow?” Justin
asked finally.

“I guess. Are you?”

“I guess.”

He held my glance. I shuffled backwards and
thumped into the door.

“I’d better go,” I said, fumbling for my
keys. “Thanks for walking me.”

Inside, the house smelled of wet towels. The
lounge was full of drenched campers, their clothes dangling from a
drying rack in the corner. A young woman sat up and turned over her
pillow. I climbed over the maze of sleeping bags and stopped at the
foot of the stairs. Nick was sprawled across the bottom three
steps, his head lolling against the wall like a rag doll. I knelt
down and rocked him gently.

“Nick…” He didn’t move. I took a blanket from
the linen cupboard and tossed it over his body. “Jesus Christ,” I
mocked. The blanket slipped off his shoulders. I sighed and pulled
it back up towards his neck, careful to cover the deep purple
bruises on the folds in his arms.

I opened my eyes the next morning to an
orange glow seeping through the matchstick blinds. The red numbers
of my clock radio glowed eleven-thirty. I rubbed my eyes; glad my
parents had let me sleep.

I turned onto my back and stretched. The rest
of the house was silent, but I could hear voices coming from the
park. I pushed aside the mosquito net and swung my legs out from
under the covers. My feet touched something hard. I looked down in
surprise. Beside my bed lay a long black instrument case. I knelt
down and opened the lid. Let out my breath. Inside lay an antique
violin, polished in a deep chocolate brown. Beside it, a bow and
new block of resin. I threw on my clothes and carried the violin to
school.

I swung open the music room door when
Andrew’s piano lessons had finished. I held the violin out to him.
“Here.”

“What’s this?”

“I already told you I can’t take your violin.
You know what my mum would say. Besides, if I take this, you’ll
have nothing to play on.”

He stood up. “What are you talking
about?”

“Someone left this at my house last night,” I
said. “And I have a feeling that someone was you.”

“Someone left a violin at your house? Are you
kidding? Maybe I’ll wake up tomorrow and find a Ferrari in my
driveway!”

“Don’t be stupid! Just take it back! You know
I can’t accept it.” I forced it into his hands.

“It’s not mine, Abby. My violin’s in my
basement. I’ll show you if you don’t believe me.”

I paused. “It wasn’t you?” I opened the case
and ran my fingers over the glossy wood. “Then who was it? Maybe I
have a guardian angel or something.”

“Maybe,” he laughed. “That’s a Pollastri. It
must be worth a fortune.”

I lifted it carefully out of the case and
bowed the bottom string. “It’s beautiful,” I agreed. “But I feel
bad just taking it.”

Andrew smiled. “How can you give it back when
you don’t know where it came from? Take it, Abby. It was obviously
meant for you. Just keep it out the way of your mum.”

I looked him in the eye. “You really had
nothing to do with it?”

He laughed a little. “You think I’d be brave
enough to come to your house and drop off a violin?”

I smiled.

“Come round tonight and have a play. We can
go over the Elgar.”

Until I was fifteen, there were two
certainties in my life. One was that I would eventually escape
Acacia Beach to perform in the concert halls. The second was that
Justin and I would one day be together. Both seemed inevitable.

We walked home from school together in
awkward, not-sure-if-we’re-boyfriend-and-girlfriend-yet
silence.

“Did you watch
The Simpsons
last
night?”

“No.”

“Me neither...”

I could hear the bubbles popping in Justin’s
Sprite can.

“You going to Simon’s party?” he asked.

“Dunno. You?”

“Dunno.”

I missed the days when we could talk crap for
hours.

I started to play my pieces in my head. I
floated away from Justin, out of Acacia Beach, to the world I had
only ever imagined. I stepped on stage to play for a packed
theatre; three thousand people holding their breath, waiting for my
first note. The music rose into the domed concert hall ceiling,
while outside, snow fell; the same sparkling white I had imagined
in my Antarctica.

Justin elbowed me. “Hey. I’m talking to you.
You ignoring me?”

“Huh?” We were at my front gate. “I have to
go.”

“You going to practise?”

I chewed my lip. “Yeah.”

“Can I come?”

“What?”

“Can I come? You’re always on your violin.
And you never tell me about it. I just want to see what you’re up
to all the time.”

My heart fluttered at the thought of him
hearing me play; the thought of no longer having to hide my passion
from my best friend. I tried to act blasé. “If you want.”

He followed me into the van and sat on the
bed while I set up my music stand. I decided to play him the Elgar.
Surely, I thought, he would understand my obsession when he heard
the sweeping lyricism of the
E Minor
.

Music engulfed the tiny caravan. I blocked
out the voices from the park and the sound of birds scratching on
the roof. Blocked out the heat blazing through the plastic windows.
Even without the piano part, the sonata churned dramatically; each
note so full of emotion, so full of my dreams, of my desire for
success and escape. I felt Justin’s eyes on me and suddenly I was
the soloist on stage, sharing my music with the world. Half way
through the second movement, he shifted on the bed and it creaked
loudly.

“That’s great, Abby,” he said. “Really
impressive.”

“I wasn’t finished.”

Justin stood up. “Let’s go to the beach or
something. It’s not going to matter if you miss one day of
practice.”

I paused, not convinced. He took the bow out
of my hand and squeezed my fingers.

“Fine,” I sighed.

We walked to the water hand in hand,
teetering on the edge of discomfort. Justin sat on the sand and
tugged me down beside him. My heart sped. He was going to try
something, I just knew it. Not that I didn’t want him to… But what
if after all this time, all this build up, he thought I was a bad
kisser? What if I did something embarrassing like smash noses with
him? How were you supposed to avoid smashing noses? My mind was
tripping over its own feet. Why hadn’t I checked these things with
Hayley first?

For a while, we just sat, watching the boats
slide across the water. Then I buried my feet and began to get
impatient. If Justin was going to try something, I wished he’d just
do it so I could get back to my sonata.

“What are we doing here?” I asked, twisting
the buttons on my school dress.

Justin shrugged. “Just hanging. You want to
go to the rock pool?”

“I should go back and finish practising,” I
said.

He frowned. “Is that all you ever think
about?”

I didn’t reply. It wasn’t that far from the
truth. Violin really had begun to consume my thoughts. Not just the
violin, but all it represented: an escape, a future, a new
life.

“Do you ever think about getting out of
here?” I asked. “Leaving this place?”

He paused. “Not really.”

I turned away with the sudden realisation.
Where was Justin in this exciting new life I’d imagined?

“Never?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know, Abby. I never
thought about it. I guess not.”

Silence fell between us again. It was
deafening. I wanted to scream, just so there would be sound.

Finally, Justin spoke up. “You’re going to
Melbourne aren’t you? For that music thing?”

I swallowed heavily.

His voice was croaky. “When?”

I hugged my knees. “I don’t know. Not for a
while, I guess. Not til I’m eighteen… ” I squeezed my eyes closed
against my knees. I thought back to the caravan where my violin lay
across the bed. I felt sick. Suddenly, the thought of the city
loomed dark and frightening. I shuffled closer to Justin and
pressed my head against his shoulder. He smelled of Lynx and
lemonade.

“And even then,” I coughed. “Maybe I won’t.
Maybe I won’t even get in. Maybe I’ll just stay here. Like
you…”

There were two certainties in my life. I had
just never realised that one cancelled out the other.

I went to Andrew’s anyway the following
night, to rehearse my Kreisler study. For the first time, I didn’t
care about perfection. What difference did it make how I played my
scherzo if I was going to stay in Acacia Beach with Justin? My
violin squeaked and skidded over the semiquavers like I was a
ship’s fiddler hyped up on rum.

“Steady,” said Andrew. “You’re slowing down…
Watch your pitch… Faster…
Listen,
Abby, you’re way too
sharp!”

I threw down my bow. “Stop being such a
hard-arse!”

“Well if you want to play out of tune, go for
it…”

I flung myself onto the piano seat.

“Why are you cracking it?”

I let out an enormous sigh. “You wouldn’t
understand,” I opened my mouth to say, then stopped. Andrew was the
only
person that would understand. He had been forced to
make the same decision I was facing. A life as a performer or a
life with Hayley. And hadn’t he found everything he wanted right
here in Acacia Beach, away from the Conservatorium and the concert
halls? Had he agonised over the decision, I wondered, or did he
just
know
? Why didn’t I just know?

“Am I doing the right thing?” I asked.
“Making this my life?”

He smiled sympathetically. “You know I can’t
answer that for you, Abs. That has to be your decision.”

I huffed. My decision, but I needed someone
to help me make it. Needed some assurance that I wasn’t heading
blindly into chaos. I dropped my violin into its case.

“Where’s Hayley?”

Hayley was no more willing to help me than
Andrew was.

“You’re way too young to think about things
like that,” she said. “Just enjoy yourself.” She gave me a cuddle
and sent me on my way, no doubt happy I’d freed up her husband for
the evening.

I took my violin home, then stood for what
seemed forever outside Justin’s front gate. I sucked in my courage
and knocked on the door. I was asking a lot of Justin. Asking him
to compete with the love of my life. Asking him to steal me away
from it. Footsteps echoed down the hallway. Was Hayley right? Could
I just enjoy myself with Justin and push my looming decision to the
back of my mind? Or was I dragging us both into a relationship with
an expiry date?

I turned and sprinted away from his house.
The front gate clicked open. I heard him calling after me, but I
kept running. Maybe if I just kept sprinting away, past the
mansion, past the caravan park, out into the street, I could run my
way out of all the mess. Justin caught up with me somewhere between
my parents’ house and the beach.

“Geez Abby,” he panted. “What the hell?’

I turned away from him. I tried to gulp down
air, but the humidity stuck in my throat like cotton wool. I
crumpled into a heap in the middle of the road. Justin sat beside
me.

“What the hell?” he said again.

I hugged my knees.

“So you’re running away from me? That’s how
you’re going to solve this?”

“I don’t know how to solve this,” I said
finally, my voice tiny between gasps for air.

“Come on, Ab. I like you. You like me. Why
does this have to be so fucked up?”

We were spotlit suddenly by the headlights of
a banged up white Ute. I turned away so Justin couldn’t see my
face. The driver honked loudly and drove around us, making a cloud
of dust as the wheels skidded through the gravel.

This was the main road through town; the one
that passed the caravan park, continued down to the beach and
looped around the shops. A pot-holed circle of a road. I could stay
on it forever and never see anything new.

“I’m going to the city,” I said. “Soon. I
have to get out. I can’t stay here.”

I could feel Justin’s eyes on me. His breath,
still fast and gulpy, was right next to my ear. I couldn’t look at
him.

“You’re still on about all that,” he said.
“Escaping and shit… You’ve been dreaming your life away since you
were twelve.”

“I’m not spending my life in this dump!” I
hissed. “It might be enough for you, but it’s not for me. Having
this dream is the only way I can survive here!”

“Your real life’s that shit then, is it? That
you can’t forget about leaving for two seconds?”