Iron Cast(23)

Ada slid the hair of her violin bow across a block of rosin, coating it to the right density. Then she systematically tuned her violin, tweaking the pegs until every note sang with perfect pitch. Once she was satisfied, she sat on the edge of the couch and sailed through the first few measures of “Amazing Grace.” It was one of the songs her father had taught her. When she was small, he’d bought her a cheap violin from a pawn shop. It had a seam down the back and a bridge that never seemed to stay in place, but none of that had mattered to Ada. She practiced every spare moment she had. Her father called her a natural, but that was generously ignoring the late nights she spent drilling herself over and over again, no doubt driving every resident of their run-down tenement insane.

The violin Johnny had given her was seamless, with superior sound and strings that were exquisitely responsive to her touch. Even away from her father’s tutelage, she had excelled, improving her technique and learning new ones from the violinists Johnny paid for shows. The first time she had played an emotion, it had been an accident. Johnny had explained the nature of hemopathy to her, of course, and she knew that somewhere inside her lurked the ability to make people feel anything she wanted them to feel. But it had still come as a surprise when a sonata she was playing made Danny start to cry, right in the middle of pouring a drink.

She’d started practicing emotions with the same vigor as she had practiced her father’s lessons, and soon Johnny was letting her play with the house band. The shows had been bigger back then, before the law. There were usually several bands in one night and performances four or five times a week. Ada had loved the unbridled thrill of it, the knowledge that she was giving people exactly what they wanted, what they paid for. Back then it had all been so simple.

Ada had played through nearly to the end of “Amazing Grace” without thinking about it when Corinne bounded down the stairs.

“There you are,” she said. She collapsed on the couch beside Ada in exaggerated relief. “Danny just made me help him mop the club, and it was terrible. Why don’t you ever have to help?”

“I help Danny all the time,” Ada said, lowering her violin. “You’re the one who’s always conveniently absent. Serves you right.”

Corinne rolled her eyes at her. “I can’t help that I’m better at being unproductive than you.” She twisted to face Ada, crossing her legs on the couch.

“Let’s play a few rounds. We haven’t in ages.”

“You may have forgotten, but I’ve been indisposed for the past couple of weeks.”

Corinne poked her on the knee. “That means you’re rusty. You need the practice.”

Ada wrinkled her nose in consideration but shook her head.

“I was going to straighten up our room and go to bed early tonight.”

“That is possibly the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.” Corinne grabbed her upper arm with both hands. “Please? I’m bored, Ada.”

She dragged Ada’s name into a whine, giving her best puppy eyes, which Ada never had the heart to tell her weren’t persuasive in the least.

“Fine,” Ada said. “One round, and only because you’re so pathetic.”

“I’ll take it,” Corinne replied, scooting back so that Ada had room to pull up her legs and mirror Corinne’s posture. They sat face-to-face, Ada still holding her violin.

“You start,” Ada said. “Someplace warm.”

Corinne nodded, her face screwed up in concentration. Then she began to speak in measured rhythm.

“I found you and I lost you,

All on a gleaming day.

The day was filled with sunshine,

And the land was full of May.”

Ada released a breath and let herself succumb to the illusion. It was less like opening her mind and more like jumping into a rushing current. The room began to change around her. The ratty armchairs and cluttered coffee table dissolved like burning paper, crumbling into nothing. Suddenly they were sitting on a beach. Ada could feel the coarse sand tickling her legs and taste the salt in the air. The sun was scorching overhead, raising a sweat on her arms. She looked out over the cerulean sea and watched the white-capped waves. She could hear their rise and fall, a steady pulse beneath the cawing birds.

When Corinne created illusions, she usually only gave the broadest strokes, letting her audience’s mind fill in the details. She had told Ada once it was easier that way, and she still had control over the illusion as a whole. But with more effort, Corinne could draw every detail from her own mind, shaping it with precision so that every aspect was her own design.

Corinne grinned at her, and Ada realized it was her turn. She raised her violin and let the bow hover over the strings for a few seconds while she racked her mind for the perfect melody. Then she started to play, letting the emotion carry through the whole room, since there was no one but Corinne to feel it. Corinne softened as she let it wash over her.

Ada began with simple joy, then built in layers around it. Love. Wistfulness. The tiniest hint of fear at the inevitability of such joy fading.

Ada couldn’t read people’s minds to know their memories, but she could harmonize emotions to call forth specific types of recollections. Usually she just knew whether the listener would be remembering their childhood or thinking of a past love or mourning a loss. With Corinne it was different, because she knew so many of her memories so well. Ada had tailored her song to evoke the Wellses’ summer vacations on Martha’s Vineyard when Corinne was a child.