horrible things about me.
I forced myself to look at him, still sitting at the piano, palms on his knees. He still looked like the Sam who’d pulled me from the lake, and the Sam who’d wrapped my hands after they’d been burned.
“What was that you played?” I edged closer. To the piano. To him.
Same wide-set eyes, same shaggy black hair. Same hesitant smile. “It’s yours,” he said. “It’s called whatever you want.”
I staggered back. So much for collecting myself. “Mine?”
He took my shoulder, stopping me from crashing into something. “Didn’t you hear?” he asked, searching me. “I used the notes you picked, things that remind me of you.”
My notes. Things that reminded him of me. Dossam thought of me, the nosoul.
He didn’t think I was a nosoul.
Oblivious to my thoughts, he went on. “It isn’t often I have the pleasure of performing for someone who hasn’t heard me play a thousand times. I think Armande and Stef are bored of it.”
“I can’t imagine ever getting bored of that. I could listen forever.” I bit my lip. Why couldn’t I say anything halfway smart? But he smiled. “You made that up? Just now?”
“Some of it. Some I’ve been thinking of for a while. I’ll have to start writing it down before I forget.” He offered a hand, which I just stared at because a minute ago, that hand had been on the piano making a melody
I had the best music.
“Are you all right?” He held me by the elbows, as if I’d been about to topple over from the weight of all my thoughts.
“Fine.” Overwhelmed. Dizzy. But I didn’t want him to realize I’d made more of his gift than he’d intended. I didn’t even know how to thank him.
“It’s late. Let’s clean up and rest. Does that sound okay?”
Dumbly, I nodded and let him lead me up the stairs, down a corridor, and into a bedroom decorated in shades of blue.
Lace hung over the shuttered window, covered the bed, and hid a closet alcove with hanging clothes. The walls were little more than sheets with hand-cut shelves pressed against both sides. Some cubbies held folded blankets and things, while others held books or small instruments carved from antelope horns. One wall had been made into a desk. Only the outside wall was stone, but he’d covered that with paintings of erupting geysers, snowy forests, and ancient ruins.
“Help yourself to anything that fits. I’m sure there’s something, even if it’s outdated.” He motioned at another door, made the same way as the walls. “There’s a washroom. Everything you need should be in there.”
“You have all this stuff in case a girl comes to stay awhile?”
Sam shifted his weight away from me. “Actually, it’s mine.”
I was imagining him in a dress before I remembered he’d been a girl in other lifetimes. He wasn’t the strange one.
“Right. Sorry.” It was a poor apology, but I couldn’t make myself come up with anything better. I was tired and sore, and echoes of his song — my song! — stayed in my head. My chest felt tight with need. “Sam, will you play your piano more?”
His expression softened. “And anything else you’d like to hear.”
Everything I’d felt downstairs, all my stupid childhood fantasies: They all returned, hitting me hard.
How could my insides be so taut and relaxed at once? After a lifetime of hoping to meet him, imagining what he might be like, he was not what I’d expected, mostly because he put up with me.
Chapter 9
Reprise
HE’D BEEN RIGHT about my needs being met.
In one of the cubbies, I found cozy shirts and trousers made of wool and synthetic silk. I laid them out for after I was clean. He had feminine underwear, too, but that was too weird; I left them.
After a quick shower to remove the worst of the road grime, I ran a hot bath to soak my poor muscles. When I turned the water off, strains of music floated upstairs. He was playing my song again. But just as I relaxed into it, the whole thing stopped in the middle of a phrase, then started again. He continued like that, sometimes only a few notes. Perhaps he was writing it down, like he said.
I closed my eyes and listened until the water grew cold, then dried and dressed and braided my hair.
When I peeked over the balcony, he hadn’t washed yet, just sat at the piano with a stack of lined papers and a pencil. He hummed as he made circles and dots across the bars, and tested the notes again with the keys.
I tried to be quiet down the stairs and to a wide chair, soft with pillows and a lace coverlet.
He didn’t acknowledge me, too engrossed in his work. I let my gaze drift over the parlor with all its instruments and echoing music. No silk walls down here. Fabric absorbed sound. I’d read that in one of his books.
Shelves sectioned off the kitchen, though few actually held books. They were filled with bone flutes, something made of osprey feathers and pronghorn antlers, and wooden boxes of various shapes. It was hard to tell in the wan light, but I thought I detected etchings of animals in the wood, like at the cabin.
There were few doors in the house — nothing between the parlor and kitchen — which probably meant that only bedrooms and washrooms were private. Sam probably never needed to worry about strangers wandering through his house.
Light had faded. I’d fallen asleep, and a heavier blanket was tucked up under my chin.
Sam wasn’t at his piano; the silence must have awakened me. Water gurgled through pipes, stopped. New silence, deeper like snow silence. In the dim parlor, I listened for his footfalls, creaks in the ceiling, but either this house was much sturdier than Purple Rose Cottage — that was very likely — or he wasn’t moving around upstairs. Perhaps he’d decided on a bath, as I had.
I blinked away imaginings of him reclining in the tub, long limbs stretched out, and water in his hair.
No, no, no. I pushed myself off the chair, muscles groaning, and tapped a lamp by the piano. Pearlescent light illuminated the ivory and ebony, and the thick paper with music written as dots and dashes and other indecipherable things. I settled on the bench, blanket tight around my shoulders, and studied the pages.
“Figure it out?” Apparently Sam wasn’t happy if he wasn’t sneaking up on me. How unfulfilling his hundred previous lives must have been.
“Maybe.” I scooted over to give him space, then pointed at the first sheet. “So far I’ve been thinking about the dots here.”
He nodded. “That’s a good start.”
“They’re the thing that seems consistent throughout, like the notes in the music. They go up and down like the music, too, so I was guessing they tell you which key to press.”
“And how long to hold it.” He laughed and shook his head, like he couldn’t believe I might be smarter than a squirrel who’d learned how to steal food without setting off the trap. “If I’d left you down here for an hour, you’d have been playing it yourself.”
I clenched my jaw and slid off the bench. Just when I’d thought we were getting along.
“What?” He had the nerve to sound confused.
“You keep patronizing me.” I faced away from him and crossed my arms. “You keep saying things like that, acting like I should appreciate your praise because you’re so much better than me. After all, you’re not new and trying to catch up to everyone else—”
“Ana.” His voice was so soft I almost didn’t hear. “That isn’t it. Not at all.”
“Then what?” My jaw hurt, along with my chest and head, and I was tired from the long trek, and tired from trying to guard myself.
“I wasn’t patronizing you. I meant everything I said.”
“You laughed at me.”
