But the door was not locked. It swung inwards with a faint creak that might have been a cracked, whispering voice, saying, ‘Come inside, you are expected…’
Still, all I had to do was step inside, deposit the letter somewhere where it could not be missed, and beat it back to the newsroom.
After the sultry radiance of the setting sun, the interior of the warehouse was so dark that it was confusing, and I stood in the doorway waiting for my vision to adjust. I had the impression again of massive shapes grouped everywhere, some of them swaying slightly, as if the slight ingress of air from my entrance had disturbed them. There was something wrong about them – they were in the wrong place and I could not work out why.
But there was one thing that was not confusing and that was the smell. It came at me like something solid, and I gasped then flinched.
The darkness was not quite so thick now, and I could see that the shapes seemed wrong because they were suspended a couple of feet above the ground … They were hanging from massive iron hooks driven into the rafters overhead … Pallid shapes, but streaked with dark, livid red … mottled … Here and there globules of yellow fat clung to their surfaces…
A dreadful comprehension started to unfold and my stomach lifted with nausea.
Because if you’ve ever smelled meat that’s recently been slaughtered – if you’ve ever walked into a butcher’s shop when they’re re-stocking the freezers – if you’ve ever entered an abattoir…
Incredibly, in this bomb-torn, shelled-out city, where the inhabitants were living on scraps and charity, this warehouse was filled with the unmistakable scents of raw meat – not all of it fresh.
Behind me the door which I had left open was slammed shut, and there was the sound of a key turning. I spun round, but it was already too late. A man stood there, barring the way. He wore an overall, darkly stained, and in one hand he held a long knife. In the other was a saw.
He said, ‘You have brought me a letter, I think?’
A letter … ‘Yes.’ My voice seemed to be coming from a long way away.
‘If you read it, you will understand.’
The single sheet of paper slid from the envelope easily enough.
On it were written the words, ‘This is the only one I could send you today.’
The Prodigy
Shawn Reilly Simmons
Gary always knew he would go places. Mother had told him so for as long as he could remember.
‘Eat your oatmeal before it gets cold,’ she’d tell him every morning at breakfast. ‘You need your strength for practice.’
‘Practice,’ Father grumbled from behind the newspaper. ‘Boys his age should be practising ball, not messing around in a room by himself.’ He pulled the paper taut, his meaty fists straining the edges.
Mother would swat the towel over her shoulder and go back to the sink, clanging the dishes a little too hard against the porcelain as she washed them.
Gary is going places now, no doubt about that. He shrinks closer to the window and hugs his violin case to his chest as the large man comes down the centre aisle of the bus, glancing from left to right at the available seats. He lowers himself into the spot next to Gary, who keeps his eyes on the glass as the bus pulls out of the depot and lurches onto the dark highway.
Gary’s favourite place at Kalamazoo Middle School had always been the music room, tucked away at the end of the second floor apart from the other classes. The walls were lined with construction paper cutouts of clef symbols and music notes, taped over a five-lined staff in a repeating ascending scale. The music room was his favourite because it was either the quietest place at school, or it vibrated with music from his violin.
Gary spent fifth period every day in the music room by himself, practising his scales. The rest of his class was at gym, but Mother had told the principal that Gary couldn’t risk injuring his fingers, or hands or anything else roughhousing with the other children. Gary sat outside the principal’s office on a hard plastic chair, swinging his legs in perfect 3/4 time, quietly humming Bach’s Minuet No. 2. The principal’s secretary glanced at the door when Mother’s voice grew louder, then slid her eyes towards Gary, tapping the cap of her fountain pen against her bottom lip. Gary pretended not to see her.
After school Gary would stand in the middle of his bedroom, practising his lessons in a spotlight of sun until the shadows moved to the edge of the carpet. Then the garage door would rumble up and Father would be home from work again.
Gary liked it when all of the calluses on his fingers were uniform, thick and hard like little yellow tortoise shells. But his favourite was when he bled after practising. He’d suck on his fingers until the bleeding stopped, then bandage the tips before heading downstairs to dinner.
When Gary fumbled his fork and it clanged loudly against his plate, Father would sit stonily quiet and stare at Gary’s bandages as he shovelled mashed potatoes and peas into his mouth.
One night Gary was awakened by a thumping sound and his parents’ raised voices coming from the bedroom next to his.
‘You’ve turned him that way,’ Father shouted.
‘You don’t understand,’ Mother wailed. ‘He’s a prodigy!’
Gary lay still in his bed as he listened to Father’s heavy footsteps go down the stairs.
‘Where’s Father?’ Gary asked the next morning at breakfast. Father’s chair was empty, the bundled newspaper lying damp in the driveway.
Mother put his oatmeal down in front of him and smiled weakly as he gazed into her puffy red eyes. She placed a cool hand on his cheek then went back to the sink, washing the dishes carefully, rinsing each plate and cup under the tap, turning each one over several times in her hands before gently propping it in the drying rack.
‘Mother, what’s a prodigy?’ Gary asked. He watched Mother’s shoulders fall, then shake with sobs. Gary ate his oatmeal before it could get cold.
When Gary received his invitation to audition for a seat at the Nottinger Institute of Music in Chicago, Mother cried again, but those tears were filtered through a red gash of a smile. Her mouth moved but no words came out as she read the letter. Dark streams of mascara cut through the white powder on her face then pooled under her puffy chin. Mother had gotten a job at the make-up counter at the mall in downtown Kalamazoo.
Mother bought Gary a bus ticket for the three-hour trip to Chicago. They didn’t have a car and Mother had never learned to drive. She depended on rides from friends or walked four blocks over to catch the city bus to her job at the mall. The morning Gary left home, she’d sprung for a taxi, a bright-yellow one that waited for them at the end of the driveway.
At the bus depot, Mother held Gary’s face in her hands, her palms warm against his cheeks, and kissed his forehead. She told her boss at the department store she’d work through her lunch break if he’d allow her to take a personal call from her son when he arrived in Chicago. Gary fingered the change in his pocket and promised he would call the minute he arrived.
Gary hadn’t bothered to tell Father about auditioning for music school in Chicago. He’d only seen him once since he’d left that morning several years before. It was one late-spring day in Gary’s junior year. Father was standing in front of Kalamazoo High School, waiting for him to come out after dismissal. When Gary saw Father standing there, he stuttered to a stop on the sidewalk, then thought about hiding his violin case behind his long, thin legs.
Father bought him a scoop of chocolate ice cream. They sat on a bench in Bronson Park and stared at the fountain in front of them.
‘I’m remarried, you know,’ Father said.
Gary looked at him cautiously.
‘We have a son, just born. Christopher’s his name.’ Father’s tone was matter-of-fact, conversational. ‘We’re leaving Kalamazoo,’ he said. ‘A fresh start for the family. I got a good job lined up in Indianapolis. I came to say goodbye.’
Father clasped Gary awkwardly on his bony shoulder. The cool chocolate taste in Gary’s mouth t
urned to copper. His shoulder sagged under the weight of Father’s hand.
‘I have this,’ Father said, as an afterthought. He pulled a Swiss Army knife from his pocket and handed it to Gary. ‘It was my dad’s. During the war. Thought you might want it.’
Father continued to mumble words but Gary just stared at the scratched red tool and his callused fingertips, not hearing him. At some point Father must have left. Gary watched the sun set behind the falling water of the fountain.
When the bus to Chicago pulled into the station, Gary stepped onto the asphalt, clutching his violin case in one hand and his mother’s frayed tweed satchel in the other. He passed by a bank of payphones and stopped to study a faded map of downtown Chicago encased in thick, scratched plastic. He took two trains to Nottinger then stood for a moment across the street to admire the school’s redbrick walls and sturdy white columns.
‘Gary Graham Smith,’ the woman in the admissions office muttered. ‘Your mother has left several messages for you.’ She leafed through a few folders on her desk. ‘Yes, here you are. You’re in Building C, Room 219.’
Gary took the packet and set of keys she handed him. The folder was embossed with the school’s seal. He ran a finger over the shiny upraised letters as he said, ‘May I use your phone to call her back? I’m out of change.’
The secretary sighed and handed him the receiver from her desk phone, dialling the number he gave her. Gary slipped his hand into the pocket of his trousers as he spoke into the receiver, gripping the coins tightly in his fist.
As he grew older, Gary practised less in the afternoons in his room at home. As his arms and legs grew longer, his fingers did too, and they seemed to know where to go on the neck of the violin without him having to think about it. He found himself increasingly bored with practising scales, or playing concertos he knew he’d performed perfectly dozens of times before. Gary spent more and more time lying in bed, tracing his eyes over the drawings of female characters in his comic books. He memorised the curve of a breast, the fullness of a thigh, painted lips curled into a sneer. Gary thought about the times he’d seen Mother through the crack in the door while she got dressed, squeezing her soft body into her girdle, grunting and cursing under her breath.
He felt no shame afterwards, only temporary relief from the tension.
Building C was in the back of the main conservatory, the farthest student dormitory on campus. He passed by Buildings A and B, which were reserved for upperclassmen who had earned their seat for another year at Nottinger. Desks at the school were competitive, only the best student musicians got a chance to try out. And only the best of the best were granted desks and a scholarship, which included room and board.
Room 219 was halfway down on the right side of the narrow hall. Gary could hear muffled conversations and laughter, and a mingling of notes from different instruments seeping from behind the brown wooden doors he passed.
He turned the key the woman from the office gave him and the door swung open. The first time Gary laid eyes on Travis he was sitting on the window ledge carved into the cinder-block wall, exhaling a stream of smoke outside, a hand-rolled cigarette pinched in his fingers. A wispy girl with white-blonde hair lounged on the mattress at Travis’s feet, her head propped on her thin arm.
‘Shut the door,’ the boy in the window hissed, waving Gary into the room and flicking the cigarette through the window.
Gary stood still and studied their faces, his violin case and satchel pulling down his shoulders. He debated going back to the office and demanding his own room.
The boy in the window hopped down and hurried to close the door.
Gary dropped his gaze, training his eyes on a cracked tile on the floor.
‘I’m Travis. Looks like we’re roommates.’ He stuck out a hand for Gary to shake. Gary stared at it, then shuffled his violin case to his other hand, looping his fingers through the handle. He wiped his palm on his pants and shook Travis’s hand.
‘Gary Graham Smith.’
‘This is Layla, second chair flautist.’
“Former second chair soon, hopefully,’ Layla said dreamily. ‘I plan on moving up after auditions.’
Gary remembered the first solo concert he ever gave at Kalamazoo Elementary. He stood on stage in front of the assembly, a warm spotlight trained on him from above. A music stand next to him held the sheet music for Tchaikovsky’s Sixth Symphony, but Gary didn’t need it. He’d memorised the piece, which he performed for his classmates and teachers, the student expressions ranging from mild interest to dejected boredom.
Mother stood and led the other adults in a round of applause when he finished, clapping wildly from her seat in the front row. Eventually everyone joined in as Gary stepped to the front of the stage and took a stiff bow.
Gary was invited to perform in the Honours Youth Orchestra, which offered spots to the best musicians from each of Kalamazoo’s schools. The conductor appointed Gary first violin, second desk.
Gary sat behind Tiffany Hart, a gifted violinist and junior at Kalamazoo High, who was occupying first chair, first desk for her third year in a row. Gary stared at the back of her neck concert after concert, studying her starched white collar and dark-red tendrils of hair curling with sweat under her ponytail, which bobbed and swayed along with the music.
At the end of Gary’s first season, the youth orchestra was invited to perform at the summer opener at Kalamazoo’s concert hall to a sold out crowd. The conductor asked them to gather in the orchestra room before they made the trip downtown for one final run-through of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring. Large jugs of lemonade and water sweated on the back table next to a tray of cookies, the conductor’s gift to the students for their hard work, and for being invited to perform in front of Kalamazoo’s elite, including the mayor.
Gary stood by the snack table and attempted to read Tiffany’s lips as she talked with a couple of the clarinet players across the room. She glanced Gary’s way and smiled, then walked over to him. Gary picked up a cup from the table and filled it with lemonade, then handed it to Tiffany.
‘Thanks,’ she said gratefully. ‘Excited about tonight?’
Gary mumbled, ‘Sure am,’ and chewed on a cookie as he gazed into her blue-green eyes.
Tiffany selected a cookie for herself and downed the rest of her lemonade.
‘Watch your pace during the second movement,’ she said, placing a hand on his shoulder. Gary focused on the pressure of her slender fingers. ‘You’re getting better,’ she continued. ‘Keep it up and you’ll get my chair when I graduate.’
The concert hall was standing room only by the time the orchestra took their seats. Gary stared at the back of Tiffany’s neck and the darkening ring of sweat around her wilting shirt collar. As they began to play Gary followed her movements, matching the strokes of his bow to hers, keeping his eyes on her thin elbow. Tiffany’s hair grew damp and her arm shimmered wetly, drops of sweat falling on the floor around her. Tiffany’s elbow shuddered then became rigid as she dragged it across her violin one last time before she slid from her chair and collapsed onto the floor.
A jarring note escaped from her violin as Tiffany crumpled to the ground. The string section paused, followed in a ripple by the rest of the orchestra. Audible gasps came from the audience and, for one long moment, there was only silence in the overcrowded hall.
‘She’s having a seizure. Someone call an ambulance!’ shouted the conductor.
He jumped from his podium and rushed to Tiffany’s side. Her face was pale and her eyes half open and glazed as she visibly shook on the floor. The audience leaped to their feet and several men rushed to the stage, one of them shouting that he was a doctor.
Tiffany was carried away, mumbling incoherently, her clothes damp with sweat.
Gary slipped his hand into his pocket and fondled the now-empty pill capsules he’d swiped from Mother’s medicine cabinet that morning. The bottle said take one daily for weight loss. Now he knew what taking ten of them togethe
r could do.
Tryouts at Nottinger were that morning. Gary was the first one in the conservatory, up before dawn practising his audition piece. He hadn’t slept much, spending most of the night staring at the ceiling in the dark, listening to the fluttering snores from Travis’s side of the room.
The studio door opened and a few other students filed in, Travis among them.
‘I didn’t even hear you leave this morning,’ Travis said as Gary placed his violin in its case and released the tension on his bow.
Gary smiled at him and shrugged. ‘Wanted an early start.’
‘Good luck today,’ Travis said, clapping Gary on the shoulder, his own case dangling in his fingers.
‘You too,’ Gary said, glancing at the hand on his shoulder.
Nottinger’s head dean called the students into the studio one at a time. Gary closed his eyes and leaned against the wall in the hallway, waiting his turn. He and Travis were the last two to go, and the only violinists auditioning that morning. The students stood silently, straining to hear the others through the door.
Heading in last, Gary chose to play a piece he knew he’d perform flawlessly, Vivaldi’s Sinfonia in C Major. He watched the faces of the instructors on the judging panel as he worked through. They sat completely still as they listened, studying his form, searching for any mistakes or missed notes. When Gary finished playing he knew it had been perfect. He nodded and bowed to the panel sharply, then left without a word.
Gary holds his violin case tighter to his chest and shrinks closer to the window and away from the man who has fallen asleep next to him on the bus. The man’s heavy shoulder sags closer to Gary with each passing mile. Gary sighs and sets the case down on the floor between his feet, closing his knees around it and crossing his arms.
Mystery Tour Page 25
