Chapter 20 - The First Song Was Hers
A year after Victoria shoved Lily across a marble floor, I stood outside a neighborhood music studio with my daughter holding one hand and her rabbit holding the other.
She was four now, tall enough to reach the pedals of a child's practice piano only if she stretched. Her hair was in two uneven braids because she'd insisted on helping me do them herself.
Ethan waited near the door in an ordinary gray sweater. He'd spent the year answering questions from investigators, accepting the consequences of his business decisions and learning that parenting wasn't a title someone could hand him. He asked Lily whether she wanted him to come inside.
"You can listen," she said. "But don't sing louder than me."
He promised. I almost smiled.
The legal process had continued on its own schedule. Victoria accepted responsibility in court for her actions and was ordered to stay away from us. Arthur faced trial over the company fraud and the effort to silence witnesses. The investigation into Malcolm's death had brought charges against the men prosecutors said were responsible. Not every hearing was finished. Truth, I'd learned, could be established piece by piece without pretending every wound had closed.
I was back in classes, working toward the scientific career I'd once abandoned. Dr. Bell had given formal testimony and retired from her research leadership position. Grace had left the mansion for a job managing a community arts center. Each of us was living with choices we'd made, good and bad.
As for Ethan and me, we weren't suddenly the couple we'd been at twenty-three. He didn't have a key to my apartment. We were building a respectful way to raise our daughter, and whether anything more was possible would take time. I no longer mistook grand gestures for trust.
Inside the studio, Lily sat at the piano and touched a single white key. A bright, uncertain note rose into the room. She looked back at me.
"Mommy, is this one okay?"
I knelt beside her. I remembered the mansion, the marble, the way she'd apologized for wanting to hear music. I remembered how small she'd felt in my arms.
"Every key is okay, sweetheart," I said. "This is your song."
She pressed another key, then another, laughing at the sounds they made together. Ethan wiped his eyes without interrupting her. I sat close enough for Lily to reach me whenever she wanted.
For the first time in years, I wasn't listening for footsteps in a hallway or waiting for someone powerful to decide what happened next.
May you like
I was listening to my daughter make music.
And nobody was going to take the piano away from her again.
