Page 43 of The Second Ending
“Good God, Ashleigh, what’s happened?”
Did she look that dreadful? She caught a glimpse of herself in the glass on the door to the storage room. Oh, heavens. Yes, she did.
Gordon was at her side in a moment. “Are you alright? You look like someone died. Do you want to talk? We’ve got nearly half an hour before rehearsal starts. Look, let’s go into the storage room. It’s going to get noisy in here pretty soon.”
Without waiting for her response, he led her into the small space, lined with folding chairs and mats and other equipmentfor a variety of programs. He opened up two of the chairs and they both sat.
“Now, what’s wrong? I promise not to tell if you don’t want me to, but you look like you need to get something off your mind. I’m an excellent listener.”
She shook her head to refuse, but then a word escaped, and another, and before she could stop herself, she was pouring her heart out to his sympathetic ears. She sobbed out the whole sad story about Sebastian, her father’s vindictiveness, the land deal, and about being used by Marcus to complete the sale. She didn’t talk about her dashed dreams, the cruel trick her parents played in ruining her life eight years ago, and her broken heart, but she suspected he understood.
With the words came tears that she struggled to contain, and which he answered with a pile of tissues he drew from some mysterious pocket and a gentle hug.
“I’ll explain to Randall that you’re not up to rehearsal tonight,” he offered when she’d mopped up her face. “He’ll understand. I don’t have to give him details.”
She shook her head. “No. I need to sing. I can’t let them crush me any more than they’ve already done. We need to be ready for when Mrs Berg comes next week to hear us. I’ll be okay.”
She was lying, to herself as much as to him, but she needed to push through.
“Okay. Let me know if you need to talk more. You’ve got my number.” He gave her a final shoulder hug and slipped out the room, letting her follow a moment later.
By now, most of the choir had arrived and were starting to fill their chairs. Emma caught her eye from across the room, and Ashleigh tried to stand tall as the other soprano gave her an assessing stare. By the look on Emma’s face, she was clearly found wanting.
“Ash, are you okay?” Elise walked up from somewhere. “You look a bit rough.”
“Yeah, I’m—”
Her words were cut off as Randall cleared his throat and the rest of the singers moved to their seats. In a moment, Gordon played the first chord for the choir’s warm-up exercises, and the rehearsal had begun. Ashleigh tried to lose herself in the familiar rhythm of it all. A simple arpeggio, up and down, do-mi-sol-mi-do. Then up a semitone, and then another. Then some octave leaps, some lip buzzes, and enunciation exercises.
“Reach for that top note, good, now, pay attention to where you’re placing the consonant when you change pitch. Keep the vowels the same. Aaaaahhh…” and so it went for a few minutes until Randall invited them all to turn to the first piece. It was good. The notes were there. Ashleigh could do this.
But she couldn’t. For every note she sang, a hundred awful thoughts and memories screamed at her. She made it through the first half, her voice thick and unhappy with unshed tears, ignoring the sidelong glances from her fellow singers.
She struggled through the opera choruses after break, and tried to be bright and charming in the Gilbert and Sullivan. Lord, she felt anything but. Now there remained just a few more of the trickier passages to rehearse, including the folk song with the unusual harmonies and the difficult entrances.
God, she could hardly hear herself. How could she find the right notes? The only sound in her head was the din of voices: Sebastian’s arrogant claims, her father’s sneers, Marcus’ exhortations.
“Wrong note,” Emma hissed, breaking into her thoughts.
Oh. Right. She’d pay more attention next time. Now for the syncopated entrances. Listen to the tenors, find the beat, count… wait, was that beat three or four? Where were the altos?
Oh shit! She’d sung the right note, but at the completely wrong time, filling a moment of silence with her ill-pitched voice. “Oh, God, I’m sorry.”
“Let’s try that again,” Randall said, his voice even. “Remember to subdivide the beat coming up to that passage. From rehearsal number 2, Gordon?”
Pay attention, Ashleigh. Count, listen… good. That worked. Thank heavens.But there was another passage coming up, similar, but just different enough that…
She got the timing right, but on the wrong note. Tears burned at the corners of her eyes. This was not like her at all, this inability to focus, this mess of very obvious mistakes. “I’m so—” She began to apologise again, but Emma’s strident voice filled the room instead.
“When you’ve finished demonstrating to us all exactly hownotto do it, perhaps you would care to step aside and listen to the rest of us, so we can show you how it should be done.”
“Emma…” Randall warned, and Ashleigh wanted to fall through the floor. How could this be happening?
The soprano ignored him. “Well, it’s true. We’ve all been working our tails off, and she’s going to ruin it for me— For us. For everyone. It’s not fair.”
“Emma…” Gordon added his warning to the mix. Yes, he was chastising Emma, but Ashleigh knew all eyes were on her, and they were not approving. Oh, God, could she just melt away into nothing? This was her worst nightmare.
More words emerged from Emma’s perfectly lined lips, but Ashleigh couldn’t make sense of the sounds. The universe roared around her, sounds and sights and thoughts all jumbling together into an incomprehensible cacophony, and it was all she could do not to collapse in her place.
