“Do you know the piece well enough to be angry and still keep tempo?”
Naomi stared.
“Yes.”
Lucia smiled.
“Then welcome to performance.”
Naomi placed her fingers on the strings.
The first chord was quiet.
Too quiet.
She tried again.
Better.
Lucia listened.
The Saint-Saëns section was familiar.
Controlled.
Clean.
Naomi had played it hundreds of times.
The new commission was different.
Written specifically for youth harp and chamber ensemble by composer Adrienne Cole, it was titled Harbor Lights.
Seven minutes.
Technically difficult without being theatrical.
It required harmonics, pedal changes, fast rolled chords, muted effects near the soundboard, and one exposed section in which the harp played almost alone beneath a violin harmonic.
Naomi loved that section.
She also feared it.
Lucia waited.
Naomi reached measure thirty-two.
Missed a pedal.
Winced.
Stopped.
“Again.”
Lucia said.
Naomi restarted.
This time correct.
At measure forty-seven she rushed.
Lucia tapped a pencil against her folder.
“Train.”
Naomi groaned.
“You always say train.”
“Because you speed up like one.”
“This isn’t a train piece.”
“Your problem is.”
Naomi laughed.
Good.
Anger loosened.
That mattered more than perfection.
At eleven twenty, Naomi’s mother arrived.
Danielle Carter entered through the side doors still wearing navy hospital scrubs beneath a long black coat.
She had worked an overnight shift as a respiratory therapist and looked as though coffee alone was keeping her vertical.
Naomi saw her.
“Mom.”
Danielle smiled.
“There she is.”
Lucia looked toward the clock.
“You worked all night?”
Danielle nodded.
“Seven to seven.”
“And you came straight here?”
“I showered at work.”
Naomi wrinkled her nose.
“Good.”
Danielle laughed.
Then saw Karen on the far side of the stage.
Karen looked toward them.
Her face changed again.
Danielle noticed.
Mothers notice.
“What happened?”
Naomi immediately said:
“Nothing.”
Lucia said:
“Something.”
Naomi stared.
“Traitor.”
Lucia smiled.
“Accurate.”
Danielle looked between them.
Naomi sighed.
“A teacher told me not to touch the harp because she thought I was waiting for another group.”
Danielle became still.
“Which teacher?”
“Mom.”
“Which?”
Lucia answered carefully.
“Karen Wallace.”
Danielle knew the name.
Everyone connected to the regional youth music circuit did.
Karen taught strings at Ashby Preparatory Academy, one of the most expensive private schools in the county. She also volunteered on the festival education committee.
Danielle looked toward Karen.
Then back.
“What exactly did she say?”
Naomi explained.
Not dramatically.
That helped.
She said Karen stopped her hand, said the harp was not a classroom instrument, asked whether she belonged to chorus or strings, and told her to wait away from it because the soloist would arrive.
Danielle’s expression hardened.
“Did she know you were a performer?”
“No.”
“Were you wearing your badge?”
Naomi touched her cardigan.
Her credential was clipped inside.
“No.”
Danielle took a breath.
That fact mattered.
Not as excuse.
As fact.
“Did you tell her?”
“I said I had checked in.”
“Did she ask your name?”
“No.”
Danielle looked toward Lucia.
Lucia said:
“She apologized after I identified Naomi.”
Danielle nodded.
Then looked at her daughter.
“What do you want?”