Cover

Dedication

In memory of Edward Kraeder

1.

a stranger was playing my piano. My piano, untouched for months, purring under his fingers like a stray cat. More than purring . . . singing, leaping, laughing, dying, all in the time it took me to stumble-run downstairs.

I stared into the dusty living room from the bottom step, not trusting my eyes—my ears even less. But there he was, half standing while he played, one knee on the bench, like this was a quick errand he’d needed to run.

A boy. Tall, lean, angular, skin rich brown, hair a supernova of spirals backlit by afternoon sun.

I couldn’t see his fingers, but I could feel them skipping over the keys, tiny pings in my chest, arms, spine. So many notes. It was contrapuntal, insanely complex, cogs and gears—which piece? I couldn’t pick out the key, let alone the composer, but here he was, commanding my piano, smiling at some private joke. He wasn’t even looking at the keyboard as he played.

He was staring at me.

“Do you like it?” he called.

Was this a hallucination? A musical one?

“You play really well,” I got out.

Nobody was supposed to touch my piano. Not me, not anybody. Not anymore.

Not a stranger in my house.

He was still going—softly now, relentless, the key shifting. “But the piece?”

My eyes darted to our tall many-paned windows, the big oak doors—open to the stoop. How had he gotten in? “I—I’m trying to figure out what it is. I know it’s Bach, but . . .”

He hopped with delight, not missing a single note. “Not Bach. But oh my God, that you thought so . . .”

He grinned, so relaxed and weirdly familiar that everything seemed to readjust like it does in a dream, making me wonder if he lived here and I was visiting. He had a single dimple, an easy smile—what was happening?

Chatter from West Seventy-first Street filtered into the living room and away. I took a step closer. A better look.

My age—seventeen, eighteen?—dressed like an August issue of GQ. Short-sleeved striped button-down, royal-blue bow tie, neatly pressed chinos, a canvas belt. He was definitely real. Hyperreal.

This couldn’t be an intervention. Nobody could have been tone-deaf enough to send a brilliant pianist here to tempt me to change my mind. Could he be some stalker fan of Dad’s or Mom’s, or Win’s or—was it pure coincidence? Had I just . . . left the door open behind me and he’d seen the piano? Or, or, or . . .

My staring must finally have gotten to him, because he bobbled the first note in twelve thousand. He took his hands off the keyboard, a magician before the reveal.

“Want another try?” His bright eyes locked on mine.