Uncle Simon knew all the symbolism for all his flowers. How Grandad could have ever believed him to be ignorant was beyond my understanding. It was what he had expected because of the sin. I thought, but how unfair and how untrue.
"Thank you. Uncle Simon. I'll keep it close to me," I said. "I'll press it between the pages of my music."
He smiled and I stood on my toes to kiss him goodbye.
He seized my hand unexpectedly as I turned to leave. I looked back at him.
"When you make your music," he said, "think of my flowers. Think you're playing for them."
"I will. Oh. I will. Uncle Simon, Forever."
I ran to join Mommy and Daddy and soon after we drove to the airport.
All three of us were like children entering a toy store when we landed in New York and were driven into the city. It was dark by then and the lights were overwhelming. It was one thing to see it in movies and on television, but a far different and deeper experience to actually be there, to be gazing up at skyscrapers, to see the bridges lit, to hear and see the traffic and the endless stream of people.
Our hotel suite was comfortable-- and high enough up to give us a breathtaking view of Manhattan. We were all too excited to fall asleep and watched television almost until midnight. My appointment at the theater in which I was to audition wasn't until eleven. Daddy had planned it out so we would fly back on an early afternoon flight. I trembled, wondering if we would fly back with hope or defeat in our eyes.
We had breakfast and then the hotel doorman called us a taxi. None of us said very much. We sat and looked out the taxi windows. gaping at everything. Actually, I was looking through everything, not really seeing the people and the starts anymore. I was too nervous and afraid. My heart was pounding so hard. I was sure I wouldn't have the strength to lift the violin into position.
Mommy squeezed my hand and smiled confidence into me.
"You'll do your best. Honey," she said. "That's all you can do. After that, whatever is to be will be. When I came here as a young woman. I had to have faith in destiny. I had to believe that what was going to be was good. After you do all you can, there is nothing left but to watch and wait and accept. You must learn how to accept."
"To bend and not break," I repeated. It was one of Daddy's old sayings.
She nodded. "Exactly."
We arrived at the theater and entered with almost as much curiosity as trepidation. It was an empty theater. There was no one in the lobby to greet us. For a few moments, we stood around. Daddy checked his watch.
"They did say eleven. right?"
"It's on this letter." Mommy emphasized, holding it up. He had read it a number of times anyway.
Suddenly a door to our right burst open and a tall, thin, dark-haired woman emerged, her heels clicking on the tile floor of the small lobby.
"Hello," she said. "You're Honey Forman, I assume?" she asked. holding a paper in her right hand. She had large brown eyes and a sharp nose. Her lips were pencil-thin and curled a bit up in the corners after she spoke.
"Yes," I said.
"We're running a little late. Just proceed to the stage. There is a music stand on it for you. Start your pieces as quickly as possible," she added.
"I'm Honey's mother and this is her father." Mommy said pointedly. The tall woman widened her eyes and nodded.
"Yes," she said. "I'm Laura Fairchild, Madam Senetsky's personal assistant. Please," she added, moving to the door. She looked and acted more nervous than I was.
Mommv looked at me, shrugged as if the woman was beyond help, which brought a smile to my lips, and then nodded for us to go forward.
The theater was pitch dark except for the wide spotlight on the stage, which bathed the music stand in light. When our eyes got used to the dark seats. I could make out someone sitting in the rear. It was a woman with her hair pinned up, wearing something very dark and sitting so still. I wondered if she was real or a manikin.
Laura Fairchild gestured toward the stage. "Please," she said. "We must get started."
Daddy and Mommy took seats and I hurried to the stage. I opened my case and took out my violin and my music. First. I set the music on the stand. My hands were trembling so badly a sheet fell, and I watched it float to the stage floor. I knew I looked amateurish and awkward scooping it up and placing it on the stand. but I couldn't help it. -When I placed it there. I saw it had been the sheet over Uncle Simon's little white carnation. The sight of it had an amazing, calming effect on me. I felt myself relax, grow more confident.
After my warm-up. I took a deep breath, remembered all that Mr. Wengrow had emphasized about my posture and demeanor, and began. It was a slow start for me. I wasn't into it as well as I knew I could be. The setting, the rush-rush had chilled my enthusiasm. But suddenly. when I looked out at that dark theater. I envisioned Uncle Simon's flowers. The front row was filled with babies breath, birds of paradise sat beside pink and white carnations. Daisies looked over the heads of forget-me-nots, and on the aisles were blue, yellow, purple, and white irises. Jasmine was scattered throughout.
I could feel the smile spread over my face and fill my heart with joy. I played on, soon flowing into my music, feeling myself soar with the melody.
When I was finished. I couldn't believe how exhausted I felt. The effort had drained me of all my energy, it seemed. For a moment, I couldn't breathe. "Thank you," I heard Laura Fairchild shout.
Immediately after that. I heard the doors to the theater open and close. Daddy was down at the foot of the stage to help me.
"That was wonderful. Honey." he said, "I never heard you play better."
"If she doesn't want you, she's a fool," Mommy declared before I could say a word of self-criticism.
I laughed to myself. How lucky I was to have parents like these, I thought.
Mommy was angry- about the way we were treated. She complained almost all the way home, bringing it up repeatedly.
'Why couldn't the woman introduce herself properly? Why couldn't someone say something encouraging or even something discouraging, for that matter? What sort of a school is this anyway? I want to speak to Mr. Wengow first chance I get," she said.
"Don't blame him for anything. He was only trying to help her," Daddy cautioned.
Mommy pressed her lips together and shook her head.
"New Yorkers," she muttered. "How rude. Maybe you shouldn't think of it anyway."
I understood she was simply trying to prepare me for a great disappointment. It was loving concern, like putting a bandage on before you even hurt yourself, but I didn't want to be one of those people who turned bitter and turned an their own dreams. I wouldn't be like the famous fox in the fox and the gapes fable, the one who couldn't reach the grapes and so declared them sour anyway.
There was nothing sour about having an opportunity in New York City. I would always dream of it, even if it was beyond my reach.
The days seemed to fall away quickly until graduation. All of my fellow students, including the ones who put on the biggest faces of bravado, bragging how far they were getting away from this "dull and boring place," suddenly started to look more like soldiers about to enter battle. Now their faces were full of anxiety, trepidation, and worry. The jokes, the songs, the pounding of the breast and defiance drifted out of our conversations.
The great clock was ticking. It would soon bong the hour when we would be cut away from the big boats that had protected and carried us so far. We would be out there, drifting on our own, making our own course, and either crashing on the rocks, into the obstacles, or sailing faster into the success that awaited us. Not knowing made cowards of us all, put the child back into our faces, the tension back into our eyes, lowered our voices, quickened our smiles, sped our tender hearts.
For Chandler and me, there was an added reality. Time wasn't just ticking on our childhood, it was ticking on our budding romance. He was scheduled to leave for an early orientation and had decided to start with some summer courses. Despite all of
our urgent and firm pronouncements of love for each other, we couldn't help but wonder and be anxious about the days of separation, the great distances between us, the direction our new lives would take. It shadowed our every move, every word, every phone call, every embrace and kiss.
On the Thursday before graduation ceremonies, the phone rang just before noon. Mommy answered and called me with a cry that at first frightened me. What new terrible event had occurred? My first thought ran to Chandler and his family. but Mommy wasn't looking gloomy when I bounced down the stairs and turned to her and the phone.
"It's Mr. Wengrow," she said breathlessly. "You've been accepted. He wants to congratulate. you."
She held the receiver toward me. For a moment I couldn't move. It was as if I was being handed the torch to carry for so many people, the torch to bring them out of the darkness and into the light Mommy had wished and prayed for so many times.
She shook it impatiently.
I lunged forward, took it, and brought it to my ear. "Mr. Wengrow?"
"Congratulations, Honey. You beat out some of the country's best. Madame Senetsky was very impressed with you. I hope you understand what a wonderful opportunity this is. Well more than ninety percent of her graduates go on to successful careers and those who don't, don't because of some personal failing, not because of her schooling. You'll be receiving a packet of information in an overnight delivery. I'm very proud of you and proud to have been part of your success. Don't forget me when you become rich and famous,' he kidded.
"Oh. I won't. Mr. Wengrow. Thank you. Thank you so much," I cried.
Tears were streaming down my face so hard. I could fill a dry well.
Mommy hugged me and then we went out and hurried to the west field to tell Daddy and Uncle Simon.
"We'll celebrate. All of us. We'll go to a fancy restaurant tonight!" Daddy cried. "We'll spend so much money, Grandad will spin in his grave. Twice!"
Uncle Simon laughed. They both hugged me and I hurried back to call Chandler. He came driving over soon afterward and we went to what had become our favorite place down by the pond.
"I'm very happy for you, Honey. I knew this would happen. I just knew it."
"I didn't. I thought I was not going to get it. They were so impersonal."
"That's the theater. That's the world you're going to be in. It's better if you don't make too much of an emotional investment in your every opportunity. Get used to disappointment, rejection, defeat, and turn your back on it so you can go on."
"You sound so wise sometimes. Chandler."
"I'm just used to disappointments in a different sort of way," he said. "I hope you'll find what you want out there. Chandler."
"I will," he said. "I've already found it in you."
We kissed and held each other and looked out over the pond. Every once in a while a fish popped up or a frog splashed. The clouds in the distance spread themselves thinner and thinner, revealing more and more blue skies, more and more promise.
"You'll come to New York, won't you?"
"Sure," he said. "When you want me to come."
"I'll always want you to come to see me. Chandler." He smiled.
"I hope so."
We walked back to the house, holding hands. Mommy invited him to dinner, but he said he had to go to some dinner with his parents. He thanked her.
"Sometimes. I feel so sorry for him," Mommy said afterward. "I hope he'll be happier.'
"He will."
"Of course he will," Mommy assured me. "Remember," she whispered. "have faith in the future. Some people are so pessimistic, they miss the wonderful opportunities. They become blinded by their hardships, so blinded they miss their blessings."
"You never did, Mommy."
"The day you were born. I knew I never would," she said.
Epilogue
There was a different light on Graduation Day now. Gone was the sense of an end. It was replaced with a wonderful sense of a new beginning.
Uncle Simon brought a truckload of flowers over to decorate the stage, and the people who attended said it was the most beautifully adorned graduation they had ever seen at our high school.
The band teacher asked me to play a solo piece as part of the program. but I asked if I could do a duet with Chandler instead.
"If he'll do it." he said. He had long ago given up on Chandler doing anything at school
performances. However. Chandler ageed, and we performed a Beethoven sonata. The applause was deafening.
When the principal handed us our diplomas, he announced what our future plans were to be. I saw how impressed everyone was when they learned I was going to a prestigious school of performing arts in New York City.
"We'll hear about this girl soon enough," he declared.
Mommy's eves were drowning in happy tears. and Daddy and Uncle Simon looked like twins with their matching smiles of pride.
There were a number of parties afterward, one of the biggest and most elegant at Chandler's home. He and I made an appearance there and then left under the excuse of having to attend a few others. His parents didn't seem to mind. They were enjoying their friends. His mother soaked up her role as hostess.
"I thought I was going to suffocate in there." Chandler declared.
We laughed and drove off, but instead of going to another party, we returned to our favorite place on my farm. Chandler had brought a blanket along and we spread it out and lay beside each other, gazing up at the splash of stars.
"I always found it fascinating that people in the same hemisphere, thousands and thousands of miles apart from each other, could look up at the same stars." Chandler said. "You see that group twinkling there. the Seven Sisters?"
"Yes."
"Let's declare them ours tonight, and every time we can see them let's think of each other, forever and ever, no matter where you are or where I am."
"Okay."
"You're going to be a famous person someday, Honey. You're going to do wonderful things."
"What about you? You're just as talented, if not more so. Chandler."
"I don't know. I don't burn with it the way you do when you play. Not yet at least."
"You will."
"Maybe," he said smiling. He kissed me. "I do love you," he said. "I can't imagine falling in love with anyone else as deeply."
"I hope not," I said. "I didn't think you would want to love me. I thought you would become impatient and angry with me because I wanted to wait until... to wait before we..."
"I can't help loving you."
"I know it's different for boys. They don't want to be teased. disappointed."
"I'm not feeling teased. but I'm not saying I'm not anxious about it."
He smiled and ran his fingers down my neck and over my breast, bringing his lips to mine.
"There aren't many girls your age who would stop, who would want it to be so special," he whispered.
"Maybe it's because of the way I was brought up. Maybe I've got to break free of so many things first. Maybe I've got to stop seeing Grandad in the darkness, making me feel guilty. I can't help being afraid-- not of going to hell, but of becoming like him, spending my life hurting people so I would feel less guilty about myself. Does that make any sense?"
"Yes," he said. "Tomorrow, you will start to leave it all behind. I believe in you. Honey, more than I believe in myself.'"
He put his arm around me so I could cradle my head against his shoulder and we looked up at the stars again. A cloud drifted along, blocking the Seven Sisters.
"Get off there," Chandler cried. "Go on with you." The cloud moved away.
And we laughed and held each other and filled our hearts with the faith that we could always do that, always blow away the clouds that threatened our stars.
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