I melted back into my seat as the orchestra started its last tuning, disparate rivers of sound converging into one clear A.

“Congratulations,” Jules whispered. “You are officially a badass.”

Liz leaned forward to shoot me a nod. “Brava,” she said, while beside her, Reinhardt coughed to cover his wild giggles.

I relaxed, finally, and all of me crumpled, arms and legs shaking, teeth chattering, in physical shock at what I’d had the guts to do. But I no longer cared how I looked, even to my apparently approving seatmates.

My part was played, that final hell no delivered, the lights were dimming to nothing, and the great Oscar Bell was finally taking the stage.

43.

oscar’s arrival induced an instant standing ovation, the kind given to living titans, even though he was as of this moment an unknown entity, a human question mark.

He stood before the podium, hands pressed in thanks as he took a bow, gestured to the audience. Then he faced the orchestra—and froze.

No. He was locking up. Taking too long to get going. Losing his momentum at exactly the wrong time.

I racked my brain for a way I could communicate to him what this was, not a wave of pressure, but one of support. The glass wall was there, yes—the patrons in full regalia, here to gawk—but cracks were spreading all over it, and not just because of my speech. This room, filled as it was by some of the toughest, most sophisticated music aficionados in the city, felt warm as a family gathering as we stood applauding what he was about to do. A seventeen-year-old kid. It really was amazing.

I willed him to turn—look at me—but then my eyes drifted to the students in the orchestra, the choir. They were grinning up at Oscar with sparks in their eyes, primed and ready, and I started to laugh. I’d thought I was infallible, that I knew what he was feeling, but I was wrong, completely wrong. He wasn’t losing his mojo. He was sharing it.

He turned, finally, and the last of my fears evaporated. There was his foppish posture, his grin, his charm, his stately elegance, the maestro fully merged with himself.

His eyes scanned the front row and found me—and at his tiny wink, my hands laced themselves together and dropped.

He waved for the audience to sit, but didn’t turn back to the orchestra. First, he had something to say. Even I wasn’t sure what it would be.

I clutched the velvet of my seat while Oscar beamed at the crowd.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I know your program advises everyone here to turn off their cell phones during the performance.” He gestured to a woman in the crowd holding one such program. “But . . . I’m going to ask you to do something different.”