27. August

Chapter twenty-seven

August

“ W ith all due respect, Maestro, you’re making a mistake.”

I signed the final form and slid it across the desk to Dr. McCaine. “I respect your opinion, and I’m grateful for the opportunity you’ve given my daughter and me, but it’s time I get back to work. Is there anything else I need to sign?”

“With regard to the emergency contacts…” She indicated a part of the form I’d recently filled out. “You’ve listed yourself and Mr. Edwidge. I understand your wife—”

“Chloé is not and never has been my wife, nor is she to have any interaction with my daughter.” I removed a file from my briefcase and slid a photocopy across the desk. “This court order states I have full custody and rights to all decisions regarding Constance’s care. Under no circumstance is Chloé to visit or have access to my daughter. Is that understood?”

Lips firmly pressed together, Dr. McCaine skimmed the order and nodded.

“She’s permitted supervised visits only, and I will arrange them. Minor concerns can be brought to Mr. Edwidge. He agreed to that. Health concerns should be directed to the physician marked under her medical care forms. Emergencies or anything more pressing can be brought to my immediate attention. I left several numbers where I can be contacted.”

“We’re sad to lose you, Maestro.”

“You never had me, Dr. McCaine. My services were never meant to be permanent.”

“Still, it’s a shame to see you go. You’ve been a gem in the music department. Incomparable.”

I bristled. “May I speak freely?”

“By all means.”

“You’ve had an incredibly talented man running your music department for years, and you don’t give him near the credit he deserves. At the end of the day, honorifics attached to the end of a name mean little. What counts is the heart and soul a person puts into their job. Before coming here, my daughter was tutored by several classical music instructors. The best money could buy. I’ve declined to rehire them because she will learn more from Niles Edwidge than any overeducated chump the conservatory is spitting out these days. If your parents are complaining, maybe it’s time to stick up for your staff and stop nurturing their negativity. After sixteen years, Niles deserves to stop living in fear of being replaced. Shame on you for perpetuating a ridiculous stigma and making him feel like he isn’t worthy of being part of your staff.

“Now, if there’s nothing else for me to sign, I have a daughter who needs to move her belongings into the dormitories.”

***

The residual irritation from my meeting with Dr. McCaine lingered as Constance sat among a dozen packed boxes in her new dorm, arms crossed with perpetual teenage indignance. I’d pulled her from class early to help organize the room, but ten seconds in her presence, and I regretted my decision. She was as moody as ever.

“What’s the problem? You expressed a desire to live among your fellow students. You didn’t want to be in the cottage with me. Now that it’s happening, you seem upset.”

She signed something, and I glared with a quizzically raised brow.

Rolling her eyes, she typed a message on her phone and all but threw the device at me. I had to scramble to catch it before it hit the ground.

“Was that necessary?”

She motioned for me to read.

Why are you leaving?

“Because I have to return to work. You knew that. It’s why I enrolled you here. I promised your mother I would ensure you were comfortable first, and I have.”

She launched off the bed, tore the phone from my hand, and typed again, nose wrinkled and with a murderous glare altering her once fine features. Again, with vitriol, she slammed the phone against my chest and waved for me to read what she’d typed.

It’s not about me! OMG. What is your problem? How are you this stupid?

“I don’t understand.” I pinched the bridge of my nose, staving off the headache from too little sleep and the stress of sending Niles off to work that morning, knowing I wouldn’t see him again for a long time, knowing he would be upset when he learned of my absence.

Constance fisted her hands, and I thought she would punch a wall, then she signed something definitive with jerky and distinct motions I was likely meant to understand but didn’t.

I shook my head. “Constance, you know I—”

She stamped a foot and signed the same series of gestures again, slower and with more emphasis, as though punctuating her feelings on my stupidity.

“Stop it. I don’t understand what you’re signing. If you would—”

She all but screamed with her body language and used her phone to type her meaning instead. For the third time, she handed off the device with unnecessary violence.

N I L E S!!!

I frowned. “Niles?” How had we gone from discussing her comfort level in a new dorm to Niles? “I talked to him last night. He knows I’m leaving.”

Devastation marred her face, and her eyes, so much like her mother’s, glistened with fresh tears. She ripped the phone from my hand and proceeded to type furiously.

“This conversation would go a lot faster if you opened your goddamn mouth and spoke for once.”

The room’s temperature plummeted ten degrees with her icy glare.

If she could have told me to go to hell, I had no doubt Constance would have unleashed a fury like I’d never known, but my nonverbal daughter didn’t have that means of expelling her frustrations.

Instead, she whipped her phone against the drywall, hard enough to leave a dent, and threw herself on the bed, burying her face in her arms. Her shoulders shook with silent tears, and I stood helplessly to the side, unsure what to do and unclear where I’d gone wrong. Why did everything have to be difficult between us?

“Is this how you’re saying goodbye?”

Blindly grabbing for a discarded shoe on the floor, she threw it at me, missing by a mile. The second one nearly caught me in the head, but I dodged its assault.

“Christ, child. What is your problem?”

I didn’t need words typed on a phone or sign language to understand she wanted me to go.

I picked up her phone and examined it, noting the long crack across the screen. When I pushed the button, it lit up, requesting a password. At least it worked. I would order a replacement and have it sent to her once I was settled in Chicago.

I set the device on the empty bedside table and peered down at my distraught, sobbing daughter. “I’m sorry, Constance. I don’t know what you want from me. I’m not good at this.” At being a father, at knowing how to fix your anger, at loving you. I said none of it. She would probably yell and throw more things.

“Call me if you need me. I mean it.”

No response.

I waited a few more minutes, wanting to reach out, wanting to draw her into my arms until her tears stopped, but she would deny me affection, and the rejection would hurt too much to bear. Watching her cry was already killing me. Reluctantly, unsure how to fix us, convinced it wasn’t possible, I left.

At the rental, I stared at the historic building housing Timber Creek’s finest and considered one last time if I was doing the right thing. Deep in the center of my being, a lonely heart thrummed with a prolific symphony. I closed my eyes and hummed my favorite parts, drawing on the image of the man who’d shared my bed the previous night. He was the soul of every note. Two intertwined loves. One existed because of the other, and I would do justice for both.

“Wait for me.” The cool spring breeze swept my words away. I imagined them riding the wind and finding their way to the man for whom they were spoken. “I’ll prove myself true. I swear it.”

I wasn’t brave enough to grace the music room and say goodbye. I’d explained all I could the previous night. After making love, when he’d asked how soon until I departed, I’d never responded.

I wasn’t good at goodbyes, and witnessing heartbreak on his face might have been enough to change my mind.

***

I arrived in Chicago at seven in the evening. The stale air in the one-bedroom condo—it had been closed up for nearly six months—tickled my throat. Despite the outdoor temperature, I opened a few windows, letting the breeze through. A thin layer of dust covered the furniture. If I’d thought ahead, I could have hired a cleaning service to tidy the place, but everything happened quickly.

The available dorm.

Dr. McCaine’s offer.

The dawning realization that I’d somehow fallen in love.

Knowing I couldn’t remain in the secluded—safe—confines of a winter dream and needed to find a way to meet the world head-on.

Three messages awaited when I landed. Two from my agent and one pointed text from Niles. Niles’s was brief and direct. You asshole.

Collapsing on the couch, I stared at the two words for a long time, debating how to respond. I had a hunch he didn’t want to hear from me, at least not right away. I texted my daughter, asking how she was doing, but received no response.

I called my agent instead and made arrangements for the coming weeks. The quicker I could get things organized, the faster I could return to Niles. As we talked, I stripped the bed, tossed the sheets and blankets in the washer, and opened the empty fridge, finding nothing but condiments. I made a list of groceries.

When I hung up, I retrieved the symphony from my bag and deposited myself at the piano. Carefully, I laid several pages on the rack. I didn’t need the score any longer. The music was imprinted on my mind. Over and over, I played. This section and that. Blending. Harmonizing. Feeling every note in my soul. It was the only way I could be close to Niles. I needed to keep the music alive. It could not go silent. Not now. Without it, I would be lost.