L = chapter twelve

The Piano Teacher

by
Kim West

chapter 12

The morning of Saturday 9th September arrived with the air of a funeral
in her heart. She had not been allowed a chance to make her farewell.
She had cruelly missed the ceremony of passing afforded by the actual
funeral of her much-loved piano teacher. She still felt loaded with all
sorts of unresolved feelings. A year on, these now descended out of the
blue, slowly filling her with their waves of terrible restless
malevolence. This was the closest that she would come to thinking about
the details of his murder. His vile murderess was now of course,
securely incarcerated and Denise sometimes felt that she would never be
capable of facing the details, but intuitions of a horrible reality
hovered around her on the dull morning of the party.
Breakfast was as usual a quiet affair, but despite her own anxiety, she
could sense her parents were bursting to chatter. The mismatch between
their perception of things and her reality was never clearer to her
than now. They enjoyed enormous vicarious pleasure in this damned party
invitation. They perceived it as a recognition of the achievements of
their child. To keep it all in perspective she kept whispering,

"Thirty one and still a home girl," like a mantra.

Benevolently, she opened up the subject of the day for them and asked
her father if he would drive her there and collect her at nine
o'clock.

"Of course," declared her father. "But, if you do want to stay longer,
just call us."

"I'm sure that I won't, unless I get drunk," she added wickedly, easing
up for once. Her mother blushed.

"Denise," she chided, tapping her naughty daughter's hand.

"Who will be there then?" Started up her father. It was the hundredth
time he'd asked this. Each time mother had a new list.

"I expect there will be his family. What does the husband do now
Denise? Lawyer? Well there might be some people from his work. Then
there's relatives from Mr. Stenton's side. That'll be interesting won't
it? You must try and meet some. I'm sure they'll know all about
you."

"Steph sounds really nice Denise. She'd make a good friend for you.
You want to arrange to see her again."

Mother seemed to assume that these more affluent families were always a
close and interesting network of Aunties and Uncles with tales to tell.
It was her fantasy, borne of regular emotional servicing through the
Soap Opera Factory. The enchantments of her selection of viewed
"Operas" filled her with a whole belief system about such peoples'
lives. For instance; all problems are solvable if your friends help and
most folk basically are "good at heart", apart from the very few
"wicked ones" who would eventually be seen off by the local hero. This
was accompanied by a wonderful all-encompassing resource of community
spirit to drag folk screaming through the hard times. Of course none of
this applied to her and Denise's father, because they were not of that
class. Their needs were measured more simply and more privately,
perceiving themselves to be of much more humble stock.

Denise sighed with the strain of it.
"The world away
and this one.
Two kites flying,"
she thought.

Later that day, she struggled to like her new outfit. In order not to
feign illness and back out there and then, she had to remember that
there would be lots tales to tell her parents when she came home. She
stared at herself in the mirror. She didn't often play the piano now.
It was too painful and had lost its point for her. She stretched her
hands out in front of her and studied them. The stubby neat nails
needed varnish to sophisticate her look. She turned her hands over and
traced the rivulets and tributaries in her palm and then down to her
wrist where the tiny blue root system of her veins came near to the
surface. When she had first heard of Edward's death, she had stroked
these veins with her under-arm razor, praying for the strength to join
him. She had taken fifteen paracetomal that night and slept for
forty-eight hours under her parents' guard. No one knew of her
overdose. She had severe stomach cramps for weeks, but claiming bad
period pains, she nursed them and the accompanying sense of vagueness
like treasure with her grief.

Edward's hands had been narrow and long. His palm so secret. His nails
were immaculate, despite gardening. His skin rippled, as veins
slithered back and forth like snakes across a myriad of powerful
tendons when he flexed his hands to perform. Edward's hand in hers felt
like a source of immense strength. It was something like those people
that she had read about who would hug a tree to feel its history and
contact the vast natural force field of Mother Nature.

Was it today that she would have to say good-bye to him? She prayed
not. because she did not want to say good-bye to him ever.

In the pale blue shower, she scrubbed her body, hoping thus to
expurgate the grime of her humble status. She applied an exfoliator to
her face in preparation for her make over.

"All I need now is colonic irrigation," she muttered in the broad
Dublin brogue she slipped into occasionally, to cheer herself up. She
stepped into the new, cream, a-little-less-sensible underwear that
mother had appeared with at teatime the day before.

"Thanks mum. Did you get me suspenders?" she had chirped shocking even
herself and causing her mother to blush again. Mother knew about that
sort of thing from her Soap viewing, but would not have expected to
actually be exposed to them. That page in her Freeman's catalogue lay
unopened.
Denise sighed. She pulled out her green two piece, from between her
blue two-piece and her grey two-piece.

"At least this one a colour Edward would like," she thought, as she
hooked it onto her wardrobe door.

Three-quarters of an hour later, as the clock relentlessly ticked on
towards half past six and she was finally satisfied that she could
achieve no more with tasteful makeup and pink nails, she dressed. She
was shocked to find that the outfit she had purchased was a good deal
more stylish than she had imagined. There was a long slash in the
skirt, which she had not noticed, and it seemed that she was expected
to wear this to the side. This revealed much of her leg to the
mid-thigh as she walked. She tried sitting on the bed and the skirt
fell open. She grabbed the saucy edge and tucked it in between her
crossed legs. The top was a close and perfect fit, but had a scooping
neckline, which only just did not reveal her new bra. She looked in the
dressing table mirror and found that she was blushing like her mother.
This outfit was quite unexpectedly flattering. She had to admit that
she actually liked herself in it. It filled her with tingling nerves,
but also with some pleasure, for Edward could be proud of her at his
niece's party. Briefly she winced at the memory of that Green and Pink
Chiffon Creation she might have fallen prey to had she not burst into
tears in the dress shop.

Mother stood by the door, as though seeing her daughter off to
university and neighbours twitched at their curtains, catching their
breath to see the girl next door transformed into this sleek
socialite.

Father drove slowly, out of respect. In a sudden moment of warmth,
Denise kissed him as she left the car. She had not kissed her father
since she was a child at bedtime.