Katrina might do this. She might really be able to do this.

Shizuka would guide her, let her feel human, no matter how she might doubt. Let her feel old and broken. Let her feel childish and naïve. There was no need to be perfectly beautiful, nor immortal, nor untouchable.

After all, none of that was needed to write a poem or to sing a song.

“Okay, let’s try that again.”

Katrina had been exhausted. Frustrated. This piece was far too difficult. All that brave talk earlier … What was she thinking?

Who was she, trying to play something her own teacher could not complete?

But then, Miss Satomi told Katrina about being in first grade, trying a new food called a burrito. About how throughout grade school, while she was practicing, other kids talked about Captain Kangaroo or the Mickey Mouse Club. In middle school, some of her classmates would go to the movies. She didn’t pay attention to the movies they saw, but she remembered hearing that they bought soda and popcorn. She imagined the movie theater like a big living room. Her parents had never let her eat in the living room.

She told Katrina how, one Halloween, people threw raw eggs at this very house. She said how her father screamed at her, because he found out that the eggs came from her school.

“He said I needed to make more friends. So I bought a parakeet named Pete. Pete couldn’t speak—but he sang a wonderful Magic Flute.”

Katrina had no idea why, but with Miss Satomi’s every word, Aubergine felt a little more agile, more certain, more alive.

“Maybe one day I might like a pet, too—I mean, if it’s okay with you.”

“As long as you take care of it,” Miss Satomi said. “This is your house, too.”

“Well, at least until your next student?” Katrina giggled.

Shizuka felt herself stutter. “W-well, I suppose.”

“Don’t worry, Miss Satomi. I’m not jealous. I know I’m yours for now.”

“Enough chitchat,” Shizuka said. “Let’s start again, from the third movement, all the way through and around again.”

“Yes, Miss Satomi.”

They played throughout the afternoon. After practice, Shizuka walked outside. Already, she could feel a chill.

Way to talk about eternity.

Hypocrite.

Since it was November, at the pond were not just the usual ducks, but also some Canada geese and even a heron. To her left, there was a golf course. Around her, people were playing basketball. The sun was setting, but of course it would rise again.

After all, the sun is a star, and stars do what they do, and planets and comets and various pieces of this and that may spin around them like moths around flame.