Sam and Ilsa's Last Hurrah by David Levithan

Author:David Levithan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Allen & Unwin
Published: 2018-02-10T05:00:00+00:00

twelve

SAM

I am not against drinking. But I can’t say I enjoy it very much when my friends drink excessively.

I’m trying to stay at the piano. Because if I keep playing, no one’s going to ask me why I’m not getting plastered. I’m trying to keep it jaunty—some Gershwin, some ragtime.

I don’t think anyone’s listening.

They are raiding Czarina’s liquor cabinet, which, if we’re honest, is more of a closet than a cabinet. Ilsa’s dispensing its contents to everyone like she’s the Florence Nightingale of gale-force nights.

I am not going to be the guy who tells everyone else what they shouldn’t be doing. I am sick of being that guy.

I want someone else to be that guy.

I want someone else to step in.

Nobody else is stepping in.

Johan’s letting Ilsa mix him a G & T. Jason’s swilling whiskey like its post-marathon Gatorade. I am not looking in KK’s general direction because I don’t want to know what’s happening there. Parker has lined up seven beers on the windowsill. Li doesn’t seem to be drinking. Neither is Ilsa, but I’m thinking she’ll start once everyone else has been given their pillage.

I wish Johan were still playing beside me. That felt good, to be harmonizing without having to open my mouth. His strings. My strings. Vibrations overlapping in the air.

But now he’s laughing at something Ilsa’s said.

I want to play louder. Drown everything else out.

Impossible.

Maybe that’s why I gave this up. Playing with other people around. It wasn’t making anything better.

I forgot that.

But that’s not really the reason. No, the reason is that audition. That failed audition. I’d wanted to go to Juilliard for years. It’s the best music school in the city, which to a New Yorker means it’s the best music school in the country. My rehearsals were flawless, my preparations impeccable. But as I waited there for my name to be called, I started to drown within the importance of what I was about to do. I got flustered, and when they asked me to come in, I didn’t even hear them at first. When I finally did hear them, when I finally was given the chance to shine, I sputtered. My thoughts were too loud. I couldn’t hear the music. I made mistakes. Probably not that many, but enough to throw me. I was fine—but the audition required me to be great.

When I got home, I couldn’t keep it hidden. I told Ilsa everything.

Her response? She told me, “If you can’t stand the pressure, then don’t put yourself under the pressure.”

I think this was her way of being supportive. But it also kicked away the last of the beams that were holding me up.

“Can I make a request?”

It’s Jason at my shoulder. Jason, whose breath is proof enough of how far gone he is.

“Sure,” I say.

“How about ‘How Can You Mend a Broken Heart?’ ”

I shake my head. “I don’t know that one.”

“ ‘Guess I’ll Hang My Tears Out to Dry’?”

I’m sensing a theme. I say, “Jason. Stop.”

He slaps his hand down on the side of the piano.

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