Page 94 of Sunrise By the Sea

He deftly spread the white stuff – sour cream – on the thinly sliced toast, snipped off a few ends of the fresh chives, then dolloped a large amount of the tiny black marbles in the middle of it. Then he proffered it to her.

‘Um,’ said Marisa.

‘Is very, very good with Champagne.’

Marisa took a swallow of her drink. The Champagne was so delicious. Alexei was watching her and she found herself giggling and unable to steel herself to eat.

He held up his hands.

‘Ah, no. I have got it wrong for Marisa. Always I get it wrong for Marisa.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I play too loud, I shout, I do not say good morning, I get cross with you.’ He looked at the floor. ‘I do not always haff words for you, Marisa.’

His voice had gone very low.

‘And the language I speak you do not hear.’

He glanced at his piano.

‘And the language you speak we do not share.’

With this he looked at the food. Then he looked back at her sadly.

‘I wish I knew how to talk to you, Marisa.’

Marisa was suddenly flaming-red, embarrassed and confused and completely at a loss. This wasn’t in the CBT handbook. Nothing like this. Nobody had ever spoken to her like this before, ever.

In utter confusion, she popped the toast straight into her mouth before she could think of another thing.

The saltiness of the fish contrasted with the sharp creaminess of the sour cream, the fresh shock of the chives – and of course the bread was Polly’s from the bakery, so even the toast was absolutely perfect. Her eyes shot open.

‘Well,’ she said, looking completely shocked.

Alexei had been staring at the floor after his long speech but now he looked up at her.

She swallowed, covered her hand with her mouth, went to take another bite.

‘This is . . . this is amazing,’ she said.

His face cracked into the broadest grin and he immediately started spreading more sour cream on the toast, and heaving big lumps of caviar with the tiny, delicate mother-of-pearl spoon.

‘Yes!’ he said, pouring her more Champagne. ‘It is wonderful!’

‘Oh, that was good,’ she said, after half the caviar tin had been devoured, and Alexei had looked at it regretfully and Marisa had said, yes, but think how happy you will be tomorrow that you left some and he listened to that and nodded at the sense of it, and they refilled their glasses, and she sat back quietly on the sofa, her shoes off, her feet tucked underneath her.

His eyes were thoughtful, watching her. ‘You are always so quiet.’

‘I am so quiet because all the voices in my head were shouting at me at once all the time, any time I tried to do anything. I didn’t have room to make my own noise.’

The Champagne had loosened her tongue. But it was also that way of his again; the easy slow way he had of tilting his head, of listening and weighing and measuring every word he heard. Perhaps that was being a musician, she thought; having very strong listening skills so that you heard not just the words but the spaces between the words.

‘I was trying to hide from the voices that were so loud . . . that told me every day about everything I couldn’t do and every way in which I was failing and no good and . . .’

She looked into the glass.

‘Well, it never worked. And I am so sorry I was so cruel about your music. It felt like something else shouting at me. Even though I know it wasn’t.’

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