by Calia Read
Until then, I spent my days inside playing the piano, trying to give the notes my undivided attention. Yet my mind would only focus on Mathias. I could still feel his lips on my skin. The smell of him swarmed around me like a hive of bees. Often, I thought about how it would be when we were forced to be in the same room with one another.
Today my worries would be put to rest. This was our first practice. Well, second if you counted the first time I met him, but I tried not to think much of that horrific situation.
“I’m just your instructor … okay?” Mathias’ words echoed in my head, but they never fully took root.
When I entered my studio, I took a deep breath. Mathias was standing next to my Steinway, looking just as good as he did the first night I met him. A white dress shirt was tucked into a pair of jeans. The sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, revealing strong forearms and a river of veins that disappeared beneath the material.
Oh, God. How was I going to survive? I closed the door loudly behind me, making him jerk around.
“Hi.”
Mathias gave me a blunt nod.
Most days my studio was mine and mine alone. I came and went as I pleased. Multiple teachers had come before Mathias, but with him in the room, the space felt too tight and the air too little.
My lips drew into a thin line, and I felt like I was charging toward a battlefield. Mathias backed away as if I still had the plague.
I dropped my bag on the floor and opened the bench, as if this was something I did frequently. The reality was I hadn’t seen this sheet music in years. I just needed to keep myself busy.
After a tense moment of silence, I finally gave up and closed the bench. Mathias was still standing, staring at me with a strange expression. He didn’t look away like he usually did. I was on a carnival ride, slammed up against the wall, while everything spun around me.
He looked away, and I could breathe once again.
“I had a few pieces in mind that you could play for the festival.”
I said nothing.
“But I kept going back to Carmen Fantasy. I think that should be your performance piece.”
“Yet you thought I played it dryly.”
“And now you’ll play it with emotion.”
I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from saying that I do play with emotion. I didn’t want to start today on a bad note.
His eyes bore straight into mine. The heat in his eyes made goose bumps break out across my skin. “Are you okay with performing that?”
“Ja, ja.”
He held my gaze for a second longer before he abruptly turned away, taking along the memory of us. “Good. Warm-up.”
As I did a set of scales, I looked at him subtly as he sat down at the table. He had his own makeshift office; his laptop open with a note pad, pen and papers scattered around him.
I finished warming-up and sat there quietly.
He pulled his eyes away from the screen. “Start playing.” He turned his focus back to the laptop.
For a second I was taken off guard by his blunt tone. But I quickly gathered my wits. I played with the word ‘dry’ looming above me. I played it from start to finish, giving it everything I had.
I played damn good.
“That was uneven.”
My jaw dropped. My cheeks reddened with embarrassment. He was a liar. “No, it wasn’t!”
“Yeah, it was. You’re not pressing down with the same force throughout, and it makes the entire piece sound, like I said, uneven.”
All I could do was stare at him. There were no words.
“Try it again.”
I did. My back was so rigid that by the time I finished, I felt a knot forming between my shoulder blades.
That time wasn’t any better.
Neither was the next.
Or the next after that.
After an hour, he told me to take a break. Anxiously, I jumped up. I had to get out of the room. My patience and self-esteem were hanging by a string.
Before I left the room, I heard Mathias mutter underneath his breath, “We have a lot of work to do.”
I slammed the door.
K A T J A
In July, I learned just how picky Mathias could be.
He was a perfectionist, and if something wasn’t up to his standards he had no problem telling me to start over. He was one of those people that went above and beyond. I had a feeling that when he loved, he loved hard. And when he hated something, it completely consumed him. He was excessive and extreme and wouldn’t stop until it was just right. I would be more inclined to admire those traits if I didn’t see the brunt of all that intensity.
I was beginning to think that if Mathias had a past life, he was a dictator. All my other instructors paled in comparison to him. Whenever he got impatient of a certain piece¸ which was often, he simply said the last name of the composer, as if my brain was a Rolodex that had every composer and every song on file. That alone was mentally draining.
Sometimes I felt an inkling of jealousy directed at Mathias. I loved music. Lived for it. Problems and worries that circled around me became distant, almost forgotten the minute my fingers touched the keys. The melody vibrated through my body. It was intoxicating.
But Mathias felt it on a deeper level, as if he needed the notes to survive.
So many times I wanted to tell him to sit behind the piano and lead by example. I wanted to see if he was just as talented as I imagined.
I think he was.
To make matters worse, it was hot. So hot, that when you stepped outside at nine in the morning, sweat instantly started to form. The air was suffocating. Most houses had their blinds shut to keep the humidity out, and if you had air conditioning—which most Germans didn’t—then it was on the highest level possible. In my studio two fans were running, and if it was an especially hot day, we would turn off the lights and crack open the blinds to let a bit of sunlight pour in.
My clothes stuck to me like a second skin. My hair was pulled up in a ponytail, but stray strands still managed to stick to my neck. Every few minutes I would grimace and brush them away.
I gave Mathias a sidelong glance. While I looked like I got hit by a bus, Mathias was still … Mathias. Still a beautiful man.
The attraction I had for him was still alive, and brighter than ever.
Sweat formed on his neck, around his hairline. The sickest thing was that I wanted to lick it off. The sleeves of his polo were tight on his biceps, showing the ropes of muscle stretched beneath his skin. The blinds were cracked open. A streak of light came through, turning the hairs on his arm golden. On his left arm I saw a tattoo peeking out from beneath his sleeve. I wanted to see the full design. Was there a story behind it? Would it show me another layer of Mathias?
I was dying to know. I couldn’t help myself; for every level of frustration I had for Mathias Sloan, there was double the amount of fascination.
He sat at the table, pouring through sheets of music. Without lifting his head, he said: “Keep going.”
“I’m sweating so much my hands keep slipping on the keys!”
“Get a towel.”
“Give me a break,” I countered.
“Not going to happen,” he snapped.
Sometimes I wondered if Mathias was as adversarial to everyone or if he was only like this with me.
Did we bring out the worst in each other?
There were many more biting comments just waiting to spill from my mouth. I bit down on my lip and wiped my hands on the hem of my summer dress and continued to play. I gave Mathias another glance.
When my fingers slipped, yet again, Mathias leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and sighed with frustration. “Take a break.”
Before he could finish his sentence, I was up and out of my chair. I played in short fifteen-minute bursts, but sometimes it felt like I spent days behind the piano. I stretched and grabbed my water on the table. Mathias never lifted his head once.
I sat down across from him,
idly spinning the blue bottle cap. The whole time my gaze was riveted on his arm.
“What does your tattoo mean?” I asked abruptly.
His head snapped up. For a brief second, Mathias looked caught off guard. He glanced down at his arm and then shrugged. “It’s nothing.”
“You permanently marked your body, and there’s no meaning behind it?”
With a sigh of defeat, Mathias finally looked over at me. His gaze was purposely intense. I’m sure that most people would cower, look away, and change the subject.
But I couldn’t.
Finally, he jerked up his sleeve, and I saw wrapped around his bicep was a simple date: 2000.6.12. I glanced at his face and back to the tattoo. The date was in German format, which made me wonder what was so important about this date.
I rested my palms on my thighs as I peered carefully at his smooth skin. I reached out before I could think about the consequences. My fingers brushed across the black ink. His skin was smooth and hot. Mathias jumped. I jerked my hand back, realizing too late what I’d done. When we touched, it was never good. He was the match. I was the fire. We both went up in flames.
“Sorry,” I muttered as I took a step back.
Mathias looked at me beneath his lashes. “It’s fine,” he said gruffly.
I forced my eyes back up to his face. “What does the date stand for?”
With his eyes never leaving mine, he lowered his sleeve. “Just a date to remember.”
“Why won’t you tell me?”
“Because this isn’t story telling time on the carpet,” he snapped. “That’s why.”
I moved away from him, feeling more angry than hurt.
“Break time over,” Mathias mumbled quietly.
Stubbornly, I stayed put. “It’s barely been five minutes.”
“That’s plenty of time to take a break.”
I snorted. “No, it’s not.”
“Did your past instructors give you long breaks?” “More than what you give me, that’s for sure,” I tossed over my shoulder.
“Good,” he said. “That shows me that I’m doing something right.”
I stopped and turned around. “They did plenty of stuff right.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really.”
Mathias lifted a brow, waiting for me to continue, and all I could think about was that this was the longest we had gone without snapping at each other.
“They were strict. True, they weren’t like you…”
“What am I like?” Mathias cut in.
“I would tell you, but since break time is over…” I mimed my lips being sewn shut and tossing the key.
A devious grin graced his face, making our biting words slowly fade away. He looked at me and gestured toward my face. “What’s going on here?”
My hands instantly went to my cheeks. “What?” I said defensively.
“The black circles under your eyes. Not sleeping much?”
“What’s this thing you call sleep? It sounds familiar. Something I used to do before this psycho instructor came into my life and made me eat, sleep, and breathe music.”
He lifted his head, a small smiling playing at his lips. “Are you done?”
“Not even close to being done.” I brushed my fingers lightly underneath my eyes. I swore I put on enough makeup to cover them up. “Besides, you can’t see anything.”
“I can tell you’re too tired. Get more sleep, Schwartz.”
I frowned. “My name is Katja. Call me Katja.”
“It’s an American thing.”
“Well, the German thing is calling me by my first name.”
“You never call me by my first name.” His voice lost his teasing tone. The intensity in his eyes made goose bumps break out across my skin. I looked away.
“That’s because I don’t know what to call you,” I said quietly. “Should I say Mr. Sloan? Because I know there is no way you’d let me call you Mathias.”
I shot a look in his direction and found him still staring. He cleared his throat. “You can call me Mathias; Mr. Sloan is too uptight and professional. I don’t like it.”
“Mathias it is,” I said softly.
For the first time in months, a comfortable silence wrapped around us. Mathias grabbed a chair and pulled it up next to him. “Sit down.”
I frowned. This was different, but I needed a mix-up in my day-to- day, so I sat.
I leaned in as multiple videos of the Carmen Fantasy uploaded.
“We’re gonna watch a few videos.” He tapped the screen, right where the female pianist was frozen in place. I knew who she was. Evgenia Elstina —a talented pianist from Russia that put me to shame.
“Watch her hands and really listen to how she plays.”
I nodded, for once acting like the good student I should be. The video started to play, and soon I was sucked into a music vortex. I leaned in closer, rapt with attention.
With complete ease, the pianist’s hands glided across so smooth and fast they almost looked like they were floating.
When the song ended, Mathias pressed pause. We sat there in silence.
“It’s so beautiful,” I said softly, afraid to break the peaceful moment.
Mathias glanced over at me. “It is.”
Our eyes locked, and I felt myself being plucked from the music world and dropped back into reality. He was so close we were now breathing in the same air. Well, I was trying to breathe, but my lungs wouldn’t expand. My eyes were fixated on him. It didn’t matter how many times I told myself to look away—I couldn’t. Light poured in from the window, staining the left side of his face in a golden hue. I could see the light stubble on his cheek. I restrained myself from reaching out and touching his cheek.
Mathias emitted this energy that always stirred something in me. It never failed. He’d be close to me, and even if it was for a second, my mind shut down and my body took over, encouraging me to do things I had no business doing.
“Do you understand what I meant about uneven?”
His voice was so deep. Every time he talked, it felt as though his words made my skin vibrate.
I swallowed. “Ja.”
“Carmen Fantasy,” he said slowly, as if he had to pull the words from deep inside him. “From the beginning.”
Reluctantly, I made my way back to the piano.
Mathias didn’t look at me the rest of the day.
K A T J A
By August, I was nothing but a big ball of tension. I closed the front door and loudly slumped against it. Today was my third practice with him, but it didn’t seem like it.
The more we tried to pretend that there was no lust between us, the heavier the tension became around us. Soon, it was going to be too much. I just knew it.
“Fun day?” Simone said from the living room.
I dropped my bag to the ground, when what I really wanted to do was throw it at the wall.
“I can’t keep doing this.”
“Still want to jump his bones?”
“Like you wouldn’t believe.”
Simone smiled.
“And you know the worst thing?”
“What?”
“He still manages to drive me absolutely crazy.”
“So basically he’s acting like a typical man.”
That made me smile just for a second, and then I glanced down at my bag and today’s practice came back to me. I pulled out a handful of sheet music and thrust it in her face. “You know what this is?”
She pointed to my fingers. “Multiple paper cuts?”
I waved the papers.
Simone lifted her hands. “I don’t know. What are they?” “Music. Scores and scores of music. That he wants me to study. Study. Last month it was watching how pianists played and really listen to the notes, which I was perfectly okay with. But this? I hate reading music.”
“You just need to calm down and relax.”
Sitting down, I dropped my face into my waiting palms and took a deep breath.
/>
“Did you expect something different? This is exactly what I-”
“-Knew would happen. Yes, yes. You’ve told me your thoughts before.”
Simone shrugged.
“I expected the first few practices to be…”
“Tense?”
I snapped my fingers and pointed at her. “Yes! But this is beyond anything I could’ve ever imagined. If I don’t play a piece to his standards he makes me start over, from the very beginning, until it’s just right. He wants ‘feeling’ and ‘emotion’.”
“Good thing you didn’t have sex with him. Could you imagine? You’d have to restart, over and over and over until it was just right.”
“You’re not helping,” I said dryly.
“I could’ve told you he was going to be this way. When I walked into the apartment he was practically devouring you whole. Clearly he’s a thorough teacher in everything he does.”
I groaned miserably. The sexual tension. His cold demeanor. My inability to play the piano correctly … all of it was building up inside of me and I was ready to snap.
“You know what’s strange?”
“What?”
“I’ve never seen him play. He never even touches the keys. Show me one pianist that wouldn’t want to touch those ivory keys!”
“I can’t.”
“Exactly my point.”
I fell into the chair in the corner and stared up at the ceiling. “I mean, am I being punished for something I did? I swear this is retribution from some past mistake.”
“Yes. This is your punishment for not listening to me when I told you he was dangerous.”
I lifted my head. A retort was hot on my tongue, but then I took in all the clothes neatly piled around Simone and the suitcase in front of her.
Shit.
She was packing.
Next week she was leaving to go back to Munich and I had completely forgotten. I wasn’t ready to say good-bye to her. I was going to miss having her to talk to.
“God, I’m sorry, Simone. I’m over here complaining and I totally forgot that you were-”
Simone waved off my words. “Forget it. I like hearing you rant about Mathias.”
I snorted.
She stopped packing and looked over me. “I know we’re having a small good-bye dinner next week, but you know what would make me really happy?”
