Sara Alexander - The Last Concerto

A towel landed on Alba’s face. She looked across at Raffaele, who was grinning, performing on her behalf. A wan smile threatened her lips. Marcellino took the helm in Bruno’s newly acquired British jeep, delivered from England by one of his cousin’s foreign husbands. The teenagers crammed into the back, some on the metal benches that lined the sides, others on the space between them. Mario’s sister sat on his lap, Alba sat cross-legged on the metal floor by Raffaele. Lucia, clutching her protruding belly, yelled at Marcellino as he bombed down the white roads oblivious to the bumps and his wife’s discomfort. After passing the scant smattering of shops, edging open for the season, onwards through the pineta , they arrived at the beach at last. Tall white dunes rose into view as the party negotiated the steep incline and skidded down towards the coast. As always, the wind whipped, and the fine sand prickled Alba’s calves as it flew across the beach. The other people on the beach had long since given up on their umbrellas and laid them down, closed, beside themselves as they worshipped the glaring sun above. Nothing about this section of the coast was an alluring invite. The others in the group yelled in the water now, dashing towards the edge and diving into the deep. Lucia planted herself onto the sand, propping herself up on her elbows.

‘I’m surprised your mother let you out for once, Alba.’

She looked down at Lucia beneath her huge sunglasses. Two miniature concave Albas reflected back to her on the glass.

‘Enjoy your freedom while you can, no? Soon you’ll be making babies like me and then all this jumping around will feel like a story your grandma would tell you at bedtime.’

A blank space formed where the image of a kind grandmother ought to materialize. Alba nodded, to close the start of a conversation she could not relate to, if nothing else. The older women in Alba’s family shared whispered gossip, dabbled in magic and superstition in equal measure. They did not weave soporific fairy tales.

‘For heaven’s sake, Alba, go and have a swim. You stand there like the world’s ending already. I’d do anything to have just graduated from school again!’

And with that Lucia let out a breathy laugh and eased herself down onto the warm sand beneath her towel.

Alba peeled off her T-shirt and shorts and let them fall to the ground. She slipped out of her flip-flops and felt the grainy heat under her soles. The white sand slid away underfoot till she reached the water, waves rushing up to her, white foam curling into clear. She dived in, feeling the cool envelop her, head racing to the bottom, desperate to drown the noise around her. Her body rushed to the surface for air and then her arms beat through the surface without pause. Three strokes, one breath, repeat. The turquoise rose into view for a snatched intake of air, then down into the sloshing blue, pounding a beat in her ears. Her arms wouldn’t stop. All these weeks without her music had built up an avalanche of physical frustration, more than she could bear. Her hand cupped like the shape of a pianist’s diving into the water, pulling it away from her. The repetition was the closest way to reach her scales, to sense the symmetry of those exercises in her muscles, to feel the pulse that had greeted her every morning and now lay buried in a not so distant past.

She may have heard voices, which she chose to ignore; the shouts of her brothers, their cousins, Raffaele, Mario, all unnecessary interruptions. The ache for the solitude and complicit dance of music burned. With each stroke, each tension and relaxation of her muscles, her body fought to drive the feeling out further like a tide. She reached the first curve of rocks and pulled herself up onto them, the sun pounding down, drying her salty skin. Raffaele swam over to join her.

‘Need company?’ he said, hauling his dripping body beside her. ‘Well, you don’t have the choice right now, sorry. I’ve had just about as much as I can take of your cousin’s ball throwing. Mario’s swum out to catch squid so at least I don’t have to listen to him for a bit.’

Raffaele stopped mid-flow. ‘Alba?’ he murmured, watching her fat tears roll down her face. ‘Have I bored you to tears already? I’ve got to stop doing that. I think it’s becoming a habit.’

Alba snorted a laugh.

‘OK, a glimmer of hope in the dark, no?’

He reached his arms around her wet shoulders.

‘You can tell me. Right? Of all the people here today, you can talk to me. If I actually shut up, that is.’

He smiled at her second laugh. Her sobs ebbed.

‘They’re killing me,’ she whispered.

Raffaele held the silence. It caught Alba off guard. She took a deeper breath.

‘Mamma. Papà. This insane wedding talk.’

Raffaele interlinked his fingers in hers. ‘Only until we get to do what we want with our lives. We don’t have to stay here, do we? We get to be who we really are if we’re together.’

He lifted her chin with a gentle finger of his other hand.

‘I love you, Alba. I don’t want you to be that wife in the kitchen. We know that. Our marriage is a refuge. From all the things they’ll force on us if we don’t stick together.’

‘I don’t want to be a wife. I want to be a pianist.’

Alba withdrew her fingers from inside his hand.

Her words splatted out in starts, competing with tears. ‘Signora Elias taught me more than I can describe. She passed on magic, in secret. Mamma and Babbo found out after the Accademia di Santa Cecilia’s in Rome offered me a full scholarship. They burned the letter. I’m still not out of their sight for a minute. I’ve started full-time at the officina , but you knew that already. I haven’t played for weeks.’

Raffaele held her. Alba caught the slosh of turquoise water rise up towards their feet upon the ochre rock.

‘I feel like I’m disappearing,’ she said, shuddering.

‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’

‘It was my hidden life. I’m dead without it. Can you understand that?’

His smile was a silver streak of grief.

‘The only person who can help me now is you, Raffaele.’

‘How?’

‘Help me get to Rome.’

Raffaele’s face was struck with disbelief.

‘I need to buy a ticket for the boat. Once I’m there I’ll be OK.’

‘You want me to help you escape?’

‘This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance, Raffaele. We can’t stay here and wither away. Is that what you really want? For yourself? For me? I love you, Raffaele. I don’t want to destroy your life with a fake marriage. I want you to be free. I want us to set me free too.’

Raffaele dropped his head onto his hands. Alba’s chest creased with spidering panic and the intoxicating liberation of unburdening her secret.

Mario’s head appeared around the rocks. He pulled his snorkel mask up to the top of his head, his eyes reflecting the glint of the sun-kissed water. He pedalled water and reached his full net of squirming squid overhead.

‘Full catch!’ he yelled, triumphant.

Alba watched him register the tears drying on her face, Raffaele ashen.

‘Don’t look so sad! They didn’t feel a thing, si? ’

Raffaele offered a half-hearted laugh, to make Mario go away if nothing else.

‘Your ma’s going to be happy, no?’ Mario asked, flicking his mask back onto his face and racing back to the shore to show off his hunt.

Raffaele and Alba waited for him to be out of earshot.

‘Your parents are one of the wealthiest families in Ozieri, Alba. You’ve been working for Signora Elias for years – you can’t find the money?’

‘Mamma took everything. There’s no way she’ll give me a single lira towards this. You’re crazy to even suggest me asking them.’