A Violin

Word count 1512, used for Friday, Monday, and Tuesday.

During the day Anthony DiNardo was the very image of a scared little boy. No matter that he was twenty-six; he looked like a child hopelessly trapped in a man’s body. Anthony had long thin hands, perfect for the violin, which was his one and only passion, the one true love he could ever conceive. When he played, the shy man child was transformed, playing with speed and dexterity and passion and grace, his hands flying across the instrument, his eyes closed, his body still and statuesque, a man possessed. The notes he pulled from the string were unbelievable, incredible, and impossible. He was a genius. A genius in music, seeing and playing what no one else could see, what no one else could play. But a painfully shy boy, he never could play in front of anyone, other than a few professors and his mother. All hoped he could move past that phase, and into the places they imagined him, glittering concert halls, champagne drenched receptions, spotlighted stages. A bright and glorious future for a most exceptional and talented young mind. Through his life, Anthony never would grow out of that awkward and painful second adolescence, try as he might. He lived in a small one-bedroom apartment, which he maintained with his meager salary as an employ at Barnes and Noble, where he never really talked to anyone. He was quiet and polite, and always distant and always the introvert. He often felt embarrassed at his social ineptness and felt great anger when he blushed his trademark pink blush. Everyone he knew and those few he let into his limited circle of friends tried to urge him out of his shell, but to no avail. He’d just quietly travel to and from his job, living in a world of contradictions, silent, but full of music, quiet, but full of words. Anthony’s pain might have been in his inability to leave his hermetically sealed world, but his greatest torture was in forever being out of reach. Out of reach of the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes on, the woman of his dreams, Kayla Friedrich. She was a coworker of his, and he’d watch her as he shelved books, always glancing out of the corner of his eyes, and falling deeply in love with a woman, a goddess, he could never touch, never have. But in his dreams, and sometimes right after waking, Anthony was a different man. In his dreams, he would be standing at the opening of a cave, under a full moon. The forest glowing with the light and life of it, filling the air with the rhythms of cicadas and hooves, the ferns swaying in the breeze, the scent of it woody and damp, like freshly turned earth, the dark rich kind. After a few lungfuls of the thick generous air, Anthony would walk into the cave, which would seem to go on forever, and branch out into to tunnels, of which he always knew which one to take, going left right, right, left, left, middle, left, right, and on and on, and yet forgetting his route, knowing the place was a maze-like ecosystem where one could be lost and never found. On his way, he would hear bats and hear rats and moles and swallows going around in circles and patterns, all mindful only of their own lives and not disturbing others. There was a peace between species there that flooded Anthony, serenity. His footsteps gradually became quicker until he was practically running into a large cavern. The cavern was a perfect sphere, not made by the hand of man, or of nature. The rock which it was built out of was smooth and gray, but still strong. It felt like glass to the touch and seemed to pulse softly. Anthony would take his place in the very center of the chamber, and lift his violin, which he’d realize he’d been holding all along. Directly above where he stood was a perfect circle, that yet some how seemed pointed at its ends, and it let in the moonlight from above. When Anthony took his place, the moon seemed to move exactly above him and the light would transform the cave from mysterious and somewhat gloomy to a beautiful and yet sad place. Once the moon was in position, one could see that the walls were filled with ledges and niches and that all these spaces were filled with plants, most of them with closed buds where they would soon flower. There were also ferns, big and small with curled tips and moss covering edges of ridges. Anthony would stand and pull the bow delicately against the string once, which pulled from it a prolonged mournful sound that split the air and added a sense of anticipation. The buds would open and in the place of flowers, though still surrounded by petals, were eyes. The ferns uncurled to reveal green and yellow eyes and moss seemed to perk up to listen. An audience for a genius that could play for no audience of mere mortal men. He began to play, somewhat slow at first, like the first rolling tears of a widow or the first hiccoughy laughs of a newborn. Pollen would fill the air, glowing like drops of silver in the moonlight, bringing and eerie and breathtaking effect to the dark edges of the caves, sifting and swirling around, bringing more light to the audience, as they were not beneath the sliver of moonbeam. The air would fill with expectations and then Anthony the gifted would begin. The notes were both fast and slow, coming from everywhere and nowhere at once, gliding and crashing against each other, seeming to leave the bow two at a time, or not really be there at all. The music was skin crawling, eerie, beautiful, maddening, ghostly, unearthly, supernatural, perfect, angelic, delicate, radiant, flawless, and sublime. Maddeningly exquisite music that would have driven mere men to tears and laughter and insanity. Music to perfect for a human ear, the master to masterly. He knew then that his shyness was a divine caution, for if he reached full potential before mere mortals, they could not stand the radiance and crumble to ash. The melody, the harmony, the notes the tune and vibrations then seemed to come even more alive and take life of their own, pulsing with the walls, then vibrating fast and slower. Anthony would open his eyes then, and expectantly turn them to a spot on the far wall, what seemed to him the far wall anyway, and notice that there were less plants there, and a shadow on the surface, somewhat ragged, and yet a perfect arched portal. Out of that darkness she stepped, and the music quieted for that one perfect moment. Kayla Friedrich, the goddess, and in that realm, his. The music rose higher then, to pitches known not to humans, and they would dance, floating and not, with the grace and skill and ability of the notes themselves, free and chained only to each other, spinning and dancing, with the ability of gods, the freeness of spirits, the grace of sea dwellers. Another power moved them, a power greater and more terrible than any other, even love and magic. The music would move faster, hurtling at incredible paces to the crescendo, the climax, with a force and a horror and terror and beauty and elegance and then began its descent. Kayla slipped away, like a sigh, a puff of breath, like a wave on the sand. Anthony seemed to slide back to his place, in the perfect center, and retake the violin, rein in all the notes and restore order. The audience watched him avidly and silently, their eyes unblinking and excited, delighted, shocked, and awed. The pollen still floated around, with less force and more melancholy, like a mother lamenting the pass of her children’s years. Anthony then, drew the incredible concert to a close, with one long sad pull of the bow across the strings. Opening his eyes he’d see the flowers closing up upon themselves, wilting, their lives ambition complete. He’d heave a sigh and look up. The pollen would fade and the moon would rapidly disappear under the trees. The sun light would begin to creep in the circle, first pinkish then stronger and stronger, at a rapid pace, until the light would rush in thunder quick above his head and bathe everything in its heat. Then Anthony would smile a secret smile and make breakfast and head to work. When he woke his hands would be red and strained and sore, as if he’d really played all night, though his violin would be firmly and safely locked in its case. Sheets of music would be filled, but his hands had no ink stains. And for one glorious second, Anthony DiNardo would fully understand his purpose and message in life. Then it was gone and he’d go back to prepping for a day as a foot soldier in the corporate work force.