He drew boats. Boats and ships, actually, all sorts of them, from ocean liners to little motor boats, though he had a particular fascination with the old-fashioned kind. Something about the grid of rope that made the rigging and the white, billowing sails intrigued him, pulling him in further than any of the others did. They appeared in his sketchbook by the hundreds: boats in fog, a boat on a sunny day, the remains of a ship, sadly rotting away on jagged rocks. Every species of boat in every imaginable situation made a pilgrimage to the pages of his sketchbook. He’d never seen a real ship in his life, but that didn't matter to him.
It began the day he met his father, when he finally got to visit that curious little house after a long, exhausting trip in the car. His mother had looked at Dad like she couldn’t trust him with anything so precious, but she went home eventually, promising her son that she’d come back at the end of that week. Looking back, those were the shortest seven days in his life, those lovely summer days spent running around the large property and exploring the bungalow, father following him with a smile on his face. He’d never noticed until then how happy that man had been, just seeing his son being the stupid kid he always was. It wasn’t the sort of thing he got to do on a regular basis; that probably made it more charming.
There was a model ship sitting on top of the piano, which was an object his father had revered. No matter what they had done that day, he always played a song that evening, carefully picking something out and contemplating it for a moment before allowing his agile fingers to touch the keys. He stared in awe at his father, amazed that the lines and squiggles covering those papers could be translated into music so full and vivid, that that nonsense could become pictures of ships and sea in his mind. His father’s green gooseberry eyes stayed in his memory forever, those eyes and the images he could conjure in his mind. He spent his entire life trying to replicate them, but no matter how beautiful his drawings became, he never succeeded.
--He sang about boats. Boys on boats, generally, but sometimes an ocean liner or a sail boat managed to squeeze its way into the music. There would be the rumbling of the sea or the rush of wind in the background to add some body to the words, which felt too lonely and empty on their own. Some didn’t like it, particularly when his hands became too enthusiastic, crashing down upon the keys, creating a horrible storm instead of a peaceful day on the water. They said it took attention from the pieces of his soul he was laying bare to the public, instead pulling people into the roaring, raging saltwater. He shrugged it off. He wasn't singing to tell a story, and besides, he loved banging away at that piano.
It began the day he met his son, when his ex-wife finally gave in and drove their boy to his house, starting one morning in July and arriving a day later with a million new concerns to rattle on about. She seemed to think he was incapable of taking care of a child, despite the fact that he had been the one up all night, comforting their restless baby. He had been labelled an incompetent father, but now was his chance to prove otherwise. That was his one chance to make his mark on the boy and for a while, he felt he’d botched it. A week wasn’t a very long time, and as much as he loved running around after that energetic five-year-old, he couldn’t help but feel like he had been just a part of the scenery.
This was until he looked at the boy’s face while playing a song. He’d never noticed that keen look, those green eyes fixed on his fingers while his mind wandered through mysterious landscapes. That was the last time he ever saw the boy. It was only later that he learned his son was an artist. A silly scrawl in marker was still stuck on his fridge, a full-colour doodle that contrasted sharply with the realistic, monochromatic works of art he made now. The Pianist was surprised to learn that he was the inspiration. Those drawings, unlike the music, did not live. The boy had learned only to record what he saw, not what he felt. For all his technical skill, he was no better than a photocopier. As beautiful as those imagined boats were, it was something like an insult.
--She ran from boats. It didn’t matter what kind, she didn’t like any of them. They reminded her too much of him, of everything she gave up for the sake of some meaningless little fling, of all the love she’d never get back no matter what she did. For ten years, she had been in and out of various relationships, always finding everything except what she wanted. There would never be another man like him, so she gave up searching completely. The idea of letting the past go never occurred to her; it was far too difficult to bother with, and her moody son wouldn’t accept anybody new, anyway.
It all began one morning in a café, with an exotic, dark-haired stranger, who promised to make up for all of her husband’s downfalls. Well, he had, for a while, and she thought this was the wonderful man she had been waiting for all her life. Then it all fell apart, and she was left with nobody but her boy, who would probably leave her for his father any day if she suggested it. He’d move out someday, anyway, into some ratty little dorm room where he had some illusion of independence, even though it’d be her paying for the expensive art school. One mistake, one stupid mistake, and she sent herself into perpetual loneliness. That man was so unforgiving.
Every couple would go through a rough patch some day, she knew that quite well. He, meanwhile, seemed to expect a bed of roses and smiling rainbows all the time, and backed out at the first sign of real difficulty. What he said before leaving wasn’t particularly creative, the delivery unconvincing. They could work it out. Everything would be fine, if only he had stuck around and worked at it instead of giving her a pile of excuses and assuring her that it was not meant to be in the first place. He’d backed out of it like a coward, trying to take away her boy too. Now she lived in fear of the water, of the sea where she had met that man and would find him again if she bothered to look.
--He dreamed about boats, among other things. There were memories he tried to suppress and others he wished he could relive, but he never chased them or wasted too much time dwelling on should-haves and could-haves. Life was too short to sit around all day long, rewriting one’s past and losing out on the present. Those boats reminded him of a love that had never died and a person who had somehow faded away, though he was still alive, living normally, unaware that somebody was thinking about him at that moment. Locking the front door, he put the key in his pocket and made his way to the car. He had no idea whether he’d die the next month or decades later, but he wasn’t going to wait until it was too late.
It all began on a hot September afternoon, when they were still fresh from the laziness of the summer holidays. They sat together in French class, and the Pianist’s eyes were a lot easier to fall into than tedious lessons involving verb conjugation. Nobody ever noticed their hands intertwined beneath the desk, or the hundred other clues that would give them away. The Dreamer didn’t know what his mother would have said had she known, but his lover’s father was clear on his views: no, never, unacceptable, wrong. He was a violent man, always drunk out of his mind when he was at home. If he were to realise, then the Pianist would be facing much more than just his disapproval. Of course, they didn’t plan on keeping it a secret forever—it was just until they were far away, when the old man would have no power over them.
As blissful as it was, he couldn’t say he was surprised when the romance ended. This man wasn’t used to being the one everybody blamed and hated, the one nobody understood. He wanted a simple life, which was far from what the Dreamer would bring him. There was no denying it. He understood this, so as he watched the ceremony, he managed to bring an honest smile to his face. The other woman would bring him just what he wanted. Maybe he did spend the rest of the day curled up in a ball in the middle of his bed, but the Pianist would never see it. They wouldn’t talk about it when they met again. There was no point wasting words on the past when he could enjoy the present in silence, listening to the smooth, chocolaty warmth of his voice.
--The Artist left his car parked in the street and walked up the winding path to the bungalow sitting on top of the hill. The house was slightly more dilapidated and the sky was clouded over, but little else had changed since his last visit, thirteen years ago. He could smell rain in the air, but rather than a nuisance, it was a welcome change to the heat and dryness he had become accustomed to. Maybe there would be some thunder. The sky's own song, he thought, with its harsh, sudden snaps and gentle, low rumbles. Music impossible to reproduce, even with the best instruments.
A cool wind pressed against his back like a hand, ordering him to pick up speed. He obeyed, dropping his thoughts as if they would weigh him down. This was a sign. Hurry, before— before what?
--She had asked him to call her when he got there, and tell her how his father was doing. He’d agreed, probably because it was so little to do for a woman who had given him so much. Even if he hated her, even if that man had brainwashed him into thinking her a monster, he still owed her too much for him to ever pay her back. This was nothing unexpected. In fact, that was exactly what was written in that invisible contract she had signed when she first found out she was pregnant. Now, eighteen years later, she sat beside the phone, waiting, hoping for something she didn’t really understand. She drummed her fingers on the side table, wishing that tapping rhythms on mahogany could make time faster. When was it going to ring?
--The two men stared at each other almost as if they were lifelong enemies. The older one made his deductions quickly, but the Artist was still perplexed at his presence. It wasn’t that surprising that two people came to visit the same man at the same time, yet something was telling him that this was different. They had both come for similar reasons and now they would be battling for his father’s attention.
He reached out to ring the doorbell, but the Dreamer got there first. A minute went by… two… five… ten… no answer. Once again, they turned their glances upon one another, the questioning looks in their eyes making speech inane.
Without a word, the Dreamer stepped off the porch and made his way down the hill again. After what seemed to be an hour, he returned, a wry smile on his face that seemed to soundlessly proclaim, ‘I should have known!’ He took a moment to stretch his back, joints cracking audibly, then finally said, “Just left a couple of minutes ago.”
“What do we do?”
The Artist ran a hand through his long hair, sliding it back over his head. Just like the Pianist would have done, the old friend thought, amused at this similarity. It was one of those habits that he’d found easy to ridicule when they were younger. Now, he couldn’t really say what he’d do if he saw the man and his many little movements again. Time had converted the silly to the endearing.
“I don’t know about you,” he said, scratching the side of his nose and starting to descend, “but I’m not giving up. He’s here somewhere, and I’m going to see him again, even if it means digging him up.”
“I wonder if I'll ever see him. I wanted to hear the music again,” the boy said blankly. He had a feeling, a heavy, leaden feeling in the bottom of his stomach. "I wanted to see the ships in the ocean. I want to draw them as they are in my head, alive, pulsating with vitality. I wanted to see the—”
“Boats,” the man interrupted softly. “He left the taste of sea in one’s mouth, didn’t he?”
--A string of clear, delicate music filled his mind, nearly overpowered by crashing waves. The Pianist had tried to write a note, but the words wouldn’t come to him, not at his home or on the cliff that overlooked his end. Now, hundreds of notes of a different type covered the papers. He smiled, satisfied, and set the sheets on the ground with a rock to weigh them down. Two men, one quite young and the other as old as he was, were beginning to run towards him.
“Stop!”
To his mind, there was only one thing to stop, and it was a life. He jumped.
--Her hands shook, the plastic of the phone banging against her silver earring. He wasn't weak. It made sense, in a way. He could never be sure of what she'd think if she knew the truth, so he let her weave a story to fill in the gaps. An apology, mingled with the mysterious scent of salt, was in the air. At last, peace.