Short Story // Requiem for a Girl (2012)

By M. Wobrak

Originally published in AEONS Literary Magazine, Norwin High School (2012)

❋ ꧁✺꧂ ❋

The air in the dimly lit drawing room tasted of death. The stench was thinly masked by the clusters of burning scented candles placed on every flat, dusty surface in the room. But it clung. It made its presence known. In the farthest corner of the infinitesimal space, disorderly piles of worn musical scores overflowed from their wicker basket and cluttered the floor beside the pristine Steinway piano, illuminated by a small candelabrum placed carefully on the dust-covered dresser nearby.

A young man, hair wild from unrest, eyes wide from that fifth cup of tar black coffee, sat on the piano bench, smoking a cigarette. He stared at the blank page of sheet music in front of him. His long fingers caressed the ivory, hesitantly at first, a sad, mournful melody flowing from them. Simple, beautiful. These things were absolutely true, yet there was something not yet perfect about the sound. It was too simple. She was a complex girl. A realist draped in a jacket made from the sky. You could love her for a lifetime and still find new, captivating things to learn about her every single day. She couldn’t be described in a single word or a paragraph or a page. It would take an entire novel to describe her, one that would take one’s whole life to write. It would never truly be finished. This one paltry little melody wasn’t enough.

As he sat, he thought; he recalled every small detail of her face. He remembered her impish smile, the way her lips twisted up into something beautiful and the scowl she wore when she became frustrated, if only for a moment. Her wide, brown eyes were the shade of a walnut. Whenever he thought of her, his mind immediately wandered to the mornings when they would have breakfast in the university café after a long night of talking and studying. Those mornings came often. He would order orange juice and a bagel, while she asked for a cup of coffee, no milk. That was her usual. It reminded her of her life, she always said. Its taste was strong and bitter, yet one small additive could turn it sweet and warm and inviting. It could easily be altered. So it could, he supposed. But he drank the coffee for inspiration. In truth, he hated the stuff.

His mind wandered to another particular time that protruded from the depths of his memory: the first time he had played for her. She was just a freshman, a mathematics major with a budding interest in photography. They had met in the conservatory one December day when everyone else was home for break, while he was practicing a concerto for an upcoming performance in one of the spacious practice rooms. She knocked lightly on his door, asking if she could take his photo for a photography class she was taking. He cheerfully obliged, and she snapped a photo of him leaning on the top of the upright piano. He had complimented her smile. It was the first thing he had noticed about her, physically. Her face flushed, and she complimented his playing, saying she played a little, but not nearly as well as he did. He offered her lessons, mostly as an excuse to see her again. He knew from first glance she was a girl he wanted to see again. Every Tuesday thereafter, they met in the conservatory for lessons. Memories of that first day always found their way into his mind.

I have to get this perfect, he thought to himself. His jaw pressed in a hard line, holding back the tears he could feel forming. He cradled his head in his hands, lost inside himself for a long moment. Thinking honestly caused him pain at times, the memories of this girl, this fantastic girl, each a scar etched deep into his mind. A broken heart is no light thing. I’ll see her one day, though. I can play it for her. It’ll be soon.

One more cup of coffee. A glass of something stronger. Another cigarette. Another glass. One more attempt to get it just right.

No, he thought. That’s not right either. It was too diminished. He couldn’t let that happen to the memories. He pounded his hands once on keys, creating a cacophony of noise. He let the dissonance ring for a moment until he was engulfed by silence.

The sound of a door opening somewhere in the flat startled him. The sound of heels on the wooden floor clicked down the hallway, echoing in the small space. The sound stopped. He looked up from the scrawled upon page questioningly, his eyes holding a melancholy gaze. It was her closest friend, a pretty girl from photography class, standing in the doorway wearing a vintage-looking black lace dress. Her black tights had a patch on the knee, simultaneously hiding and highlighting their well-worn quality. She held an overflowing arrangement of dull, pastel flowers in her arms. She came this early to check on him, he thought. The young man returned within himself, thinking he would have bought her the most beautiful, brightly colored flowers he could find, had he had the chance. Blue roses. Golden daffodils. Beautiful red poppies. Anything but those half-dead things.

Her friend asked how he was holding up, awkwardly putting a hand on his shoulder, a clear attempt at compassion. She clearly felt uncomfortable though, as they had maybe met once before, at a party. The one thing they had in common was their grief. The young man offered no response. She inquired as to if he had gotten any sleep, trying desperately to get him to talk. Still no response. Exasperated, she threw her hands up and said, “We have to leave soon, sorry… I’m upset, too, you know. You weren’t the only one who was hurt by this. We shouldn’t be late. For her.”

The young man spun around on the bench, his eyes suddenly dark, intense. “I need to finish this.” His eyes grew sad again, a look of desperation clear upon his face. “Look, I’m sorry, but I can’t leave without finishing….”

Somehow, she understood, nodding her head slowly. She gestured toward to the cuckoo clock on the wall, the bird popping in and out of the little door on its façade, letting him know they needed to leave in about three hours. Six o’clock. The young man nodded and turned again. She stood in the doorway for a few minutes more before clicking back down the hallway in her loud heels. She waited in the kitchen, watching an old movie on the small television set on the counter.

For two more hours, the young man poured himself over that piano. He drained his soul onto the keys, sewed his heart to the paper, drowned the rests in his tears, spilled his memories into each and every black note that he scribbled. He began to feel almost unwell, repeating and rewriting, composing and erasing, scratching the page and tugging on the ends of his hair.

By five, the melody was very much similar to the way it was before, but there was still something minute, almost undetectable that caused it to take on some different, unexpected quality. It was simultaneously sweet as milk chocolate and bitter as a broken heart. So fantastically, absolutely, her. The girl he loved, the girl he missed, the girl he couldn’t live without.

The low drone coming from the kitchen ceased. The sound of heels on the wood echoed again. At the doorway, her friend stood, asking if he had finished, because he needed to change out of his pajamas before they left the apartment.

“Ah, right. I did finish. Give me a minute to compose myself.” He half-smiled at no one in particular.

After getting ready, the young man and the girl’s friend slipped into his old 1980s Honda Civic and drove ten miles in complete silence. Tension and uncomfortable stillness made the air in the small cabin go stale. Soon enough, they pulled into the cobblestone parking lot of Watson & Holcomb Funeral Home and slipped inside, relatively quiet. Everyone was standing around in black, talking amongst the colorless flower arrangements. It made for a sober scene. It took his every might not to give in and cry. A few people, mostly acquaintances from the university, approached him, giving him their condolences, telling him what a lovely girl she was, like he didn’t already know that and they did. Her friend leaned over and whispered to him, asking if these people even knew her at all. It was exactly what was on his mind.

After the milling around died down, everyone sat down in the padded folding chairs placed before her closed casket. A priest got up and began speaking about how God would welcome her into His Kingdom soon and how she’d be happy there. He thought about how she never went to church or prayed. Her parents got up, and that was the worst. Her mother was a slight woman, with eyes as wide as her daughter’s and her smile hidden smeared away by the grief. Her father, normally tall and overwhelming, looked nearly as meek as his wife. Losing a child changes a person. Try as he might, the young man could barely pay attention. His mind kept wandering back to the days and nights they had spent in each other’s company. They spoke softly, almost apologizing for asking her to come home for Christmas when they knew there was a terrible snowstorm on the way. It was painfully clear they blamed themselves for what happened. It hurt the young man to listen. He knew how she had had her mind set months beforehand that she would visit over Christmas after having not seen them for months. Even if they had asked her not to come, she wouldn’t have listened.

After they had finished their tearful speech, her mother motioned a small, frail hand towards him, an indicator that it was his turn to speak. Before rising from his chair, the girl’s friend placed a hand on his shoulder for a moment. She smiled, encouragingly. He returned it half-heartedly.

Slowly, the young man made his way to the piano bench at the front of the room. He did not stop at the podium to say anything. No explanation would be necessary. He placed his coffee cup on the piano’s top, taking great care not to spill it on the instrument. It wasn’t anything like his Steinway; it was really nothing special. She never sat with him on this bench and listened to him play for her. She never leaned over and kissed him on the mouth here. She never placed her hand on his and traced the lines of his knuckles on this bench. It held no sentimental value to him, but it would have to do. He pushed the torrent of memories from his mind and squeezed his eyes shut, opening them a moment later.

He lowered himself onto the seat before straightening his suit and tentatively stroking the ivory keys, playing before his love one last time.