Chapter 7: Nocturne

The ride back to my barn was quiet. Rebecca sat next to me, head on my shoulder. She was content for the moment, but the look in her eyes told me that she was already busy planning the next phase in her campaign to capture my soul. She already had my heart.

Had there been a nanny-cam in my truck, it would have recorded a stunned look of total disbelief and confusion on my face. I was surprised that the meeting with Rebecca's parents had gone so well. I was overwhelmed at the realization that in less than 48 hours I'd fallen in love with Rebecca, met her parents and had made a commitment to her with them as my witness. In a normal Universe, these things are supposed to take months or even years. After my recent period of anger and frustration, a time when I always seemed to take two steps forward and one step back, all of a sudden my life was going at light speed and in the right direction for a change. I should be happy. Right?

As we drove up my road, Rebecca turned to me.

"You know we're going to sleep together tonight?" She toyed with my chest hair.

"Yes, and other things too I hope." I wondered where she was going with this line of questioning.

"Duh! Yes, other things too, I already said that."

"OK, so what's your point?" Foolishly I thought maybe I could sidetrack whatever devious plan she was about to unveil.

"No point, just that it's early, and I thought that maybe we could fool around a little first."

"I thought you just said we were going to fool around." I was totally confused now.

"I meant fool around, like play some music. Maybe you could play for me, or we could play a few pieces together. It would be fun."

I thought about it for a heartbeat or two and then agreed. "OK, but you have to play for me too. Fair is fair." It would be fun.

When we turned on the lights in my studio, there on my piano bench was her violin and a portfolio full of her music. I didn't remember her leaving the violin there and I don't remember the music at all. Had she planned this before we left to meet her parents?

I did have a few surprises for her. After all, I'd been serious about music a lot longer than she had. In at least one aspect of our relationship I would be one step ahead of her. I led her to the back of the studio. On the back wall are my music cabinets. I have a lot of sheet music. The cabinets stretch almost the width of the room, and it's a big room. I've been collecting music since I can remember, and if there's a piece for piano, and if it's worth playing, chances are I have it. I even have a few autographs, originals in the composer's own handwriting. One cabinet is full of my own compositions. When Rebecca comprehended the scope of my music collection her eyes grew large. She went to the nearest cabinet and pulled open a drawer. By accident the drawer contained Bach pieces.

"Ooooh. You have all this Bach, we could do some Bach. No wait. That's no good. You know what Bach does to me. You'd try to molest me, and I wouldn't be able to resist." She was like a very naughty little girl in a candy store.

"We'll save the molesting for later. What else do you have? How about Beethoven? He doesn't get me quite as hot."

I pointed to the cabinet that held most of the Beethoven pieces.

"Spring, how about Spring? We could try the Spring sonata." She opened the cabinet started to dig through the folders. I stepped to her side to help her search, and she grabbed my arm and gave an excited squeeze.

She found the music and held the folder triumphantly aloft. "This will be perfect. I've worked on it before. It's Spring, get it? Just like us, just starting out." Her excitement was contagious.

"This will be so much fun. Even if I stink, you have to promise to carry me along."

"I'm sure you won't stink, and if you do, I'll stink too. We'll stink together." I couldn't believe those words were coming from my mouth. I'd always taken this kind of music so seriously. Always. The thought of just playing for the hell of it, just to have fun had never crossed my mind.

We laid out as much of the music as we could on the piano's music desk. She took her violin from its case and we did a little tune up. Then we began to play.

And we did stink. We got through maybe six measures before the first crash, and we crashed frequently thereafter. But it didn't matter. I was having the second most fun I'd ever had in my life. The first most was being in love with Rebecca. We'd play until one of us screwed up, then we'd stop and argue and then we'd kiss and tease, then we'd play some more.

We worked on the Spring sonata for almost two hours. We never did get all the kinks ironed out, but I could see that with a little effort we could. Rebecca was a talented musician and she played with beautifully defined emotion, not too syrupy sweet, and never dry and overly technical. Her playing was exquisitely controlled except when she was rubbing her hip against my back, trying to distract me from the music. My playing wasn't as clean as I'd wanted, but I noticed a sense of freedom creeping into my style that had never been there before.