Laurence sat at the keyboard, laying down the first and second violin parts for an orchestral score he was writing. Valerie sat in his study in the green wing chair, picking cashews out of a bowl. A short glass of rye and soda sweated beside her on the end table. She'd placed it on a cork coaster.

"I'll need your help with the bowings," he said. He deferred to her on anything technical that had to do with the playing of the violin because she was a violinist.

For the timpani part he asked Valerie to put her hands over the strings in the piano and kill the ring. She did her job, sat back down and took a drink. For the double-bass line he kept the pedal down. This is how he recorded the music on his ancient multi-track Sony - bottom first as he worked his way toward the top of the page. When he got through he'd want to know what Valerie thought as long as she liked what he'd written. This was the game Lydia's parents played: that her mother had opinions she didn't have to keep to herself.

That afternoon listening to the new piece, her mother looked like she wanted to cry but she wouldn't. Laurence thought visceral reactions were tawdry, that goosebumps were fine for Beatles songs, but serious music was sublime, religious; it nourished your soul not your nerve endings, but for Lydia, hearing his music was like seeing him naked. She stood outside the door and listened. A lump was in her throat, but she'd trained the tears not to go past that checkpoint. Her father couldn't handle how much she loved him. He'd be ashamed. She tried to push the pleasure out of her body and up into her head.

Outside the crape myrtles shook in the wind. A blizzard of pink petals filled the driveway. The pretty mess stuck on your shoes and last spring the white wool rug in the hall had been stained. Lydia went outside to sweep before her mother asked