The Memory Book(48)

We ducked into the lobby of the Dartmouth performance hall. The last time we were near here, we were making out on the field behind it. Our footsteps echoed on the shining, checkered tile. I’d never been inside.

“What time is it?” Stuart asked.

“It’s two thirty,” I said. I had been checking my phone every chance I got, in case Mom came home and found me gone, or in case Coop was heading back early.

Through the row of closed, arched wooden doors, the sounds of an orchestra floated out, muffled.

Stuart knocked on the box office door.

Suddenly, a balding man opened the door. When he saw Stuart, he smiled a little.

“Glen, can we pop inside for a second?”

“Eh.” Glen glanced toward the doors. “Fine. Go through the side door, though.”

I mouthed what? You know him? as Glen led us down the hallway.

Stuart whispered, “My parents are on the board.”

I raised my eyebrows and resisted whispering back, fancy.

We entered the performance hall without anyone looking up. The orchestra was in plainclothes, practicing. It was unearthly beautiful. We found seats near the back, in the dark.

“So your parents…” I began.

“They give as much as they can to keep this going—these are tough times for orchestras.”

“I can imagine,” I said, watching the violinists chop the air in sync with their bows.

“My parents used to be musicians themselves. They always tell me they were never that great, and they met because they were both third chairs.” Stuart laughed a little. “They realized at the same time that they weren’t going to go anywhere. It’s sort of bittersweet for them, but they loved music all their lives—Sorry. I’m talking too much.”

“No, no,” I said, taking his hand. “I didn’t know your parents were musicians.” I closed my eyes. “It sounds like a fairy tale.”

“This sounds like childhood,” Stuart whispered, leaning close to me.

I thought of his house full of books and music, of every day being like this. I sighed. “I can’t help wishing I had a childhood like yours.”

“What do you mean?”

I almost said rich, but it was not about the money. “Where books and music and philosophy brought me closer to my parents, not further away.”

I thought of the one bookshelf we had at home, in the living room next to the TV, a mix of Dad’s mystery novels, Mom’s garbage magazines, and mostly kids’ books that Mom and Dad had read to us over the years. All my own books I just stacked on the floor in my room.

And I’d never heard a professional orchestra before. It wasn’t as if an orchestra wasn’t something my parents would like, I’m sure they would, but it was so far off their radar, it might as well have not existed. The closest they got to a musical ritual was playing Johnny Cash while they sorted the bills. I smiled to myself at the image.

Stuart whispered, “Trust me, it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. I wish I was closer to my parents, too. I mean, they support me in whatever I do, but I feel like they know too much about books, and music, and writers. They know way more than me about good writing.” He let out a little defeated laugh. “Like, how are you supposed to impress people like that?”

I was surprised. “I imagined you all sitting around at happy family dinners, drinking wine and talking about Kierkegaard.”

“Ha! More like sitting around an empty table, in an empty house, because everyone’s in different cities.”

That’s right, I remembered. Stuart’s family owned houses here, in New York, and in India. The orchestra started over.

Stuart put his arm around me. “My favorite parts are actually parts like these, when the orchestra messes up, when they’re out of tune, when they play the same note over and over.”

I turned to face him. “Why?”

“I don’t like too much perfection. It scares me.”

“It doesn’t scare me,” I said immediately.

“Why?” Stuart echoed.

I thought of all my plans, now ruined, and pushed down the sadness that was coming up in my throat. I would tell him soon. “Because I know it doesn’t exist.”

The orchestra swelled. Stuart looked at me. “This is pretty close,” he said, and our mouths met long and slow. I didn’t know how to respond to that, because soon, I would be so far from perfect, I’d be unrecognizable.

Stuart has his own world to juggle, and a book to write, and he doesn’t need another person to add to all the questions he has about his life, let alone a person who might slowly lose herself before he even gets a chance to know her better. I was too tired to tell him right then everything that was inside me.

After Coop dropped me off at home, I wrote Stuart an email telling him about NPC. And that I will not be in New York next year. And that it’s probably for the best that we don’t see each other. I wish we had gotten to be in New York together, at least. It’s hard for me to even type that. I want him to stay with me until the end of the summer but I will try to be brave and try not to picture him riding the Q and N trains he loves so much with his arms wrapped around another girl, hurtling through the city.

I’ll also say this: I don’t know much about boyfriends and dating, and now I won’t know much about love. But as last dates go, Future Sam, I’d say that one was pretty great.