Late Stories

Holding On

He’s almost sure he’s done this one before. Or one very much like it, but which definitely included Sibelius’s Fifth Symphony. He was driving a rented car in Maine. She was asleep in the front passenger seat. Last stretch of the trip from New York to the cottage they rented in Brooklin for two months. Route 175, he thinks it is, or 174. There was also 176 nearby, and 177 or 172 not too far from 174 or 175. They’d started out early that morning, alternated driving every hour and a half or so. She got tired at the wheel last time and had been sleeping for two hours with a towel across her chest and arms to keep the sun off her or because she was cold. He wanted to wake her to make sure he took the right road out of Blue Hill to get to Naskeag Point Road, where the cottage was, but thought it best to let her sleep. That way she’d have more energy to help him get the cats and the groceries and all their things into the cottage and clean and set up the place for the night. And he thought he knew how to get there from all the times they did it last year, their first summer together, when they rented the same cottage for two months. So it’s 1980. Second to last week in June. They always, even after they got married and had their first child, liked to get there and settle in before the renters and owners of vacation homes really started populating the area the first week of July. In the fall he’d start teaching in Baltimore and she’d finish up her postdoctorate at Columbia and continue teaching there another year. Two courses the first year, one on Dostoevsky. She had about ten of his books and a couple of biographies and several books of criticism of his works in a carton in the car’s trunk.

She woke up, looked at her watch and said “That was a good nap and a much needed one. I didn’t get much sleep last night, anxious about getting the car and setting off on time. Oh,” she said, looking around, “we’re almost there. You remembered the way. Did you notice any changes in Blue Hill?” and he said “It all seemed the same — restaurants, stores, galleries — from last year. Still no bookstore or simple sit-down lunch place like the one in Bucksport, which I was hoping for. I can’t stand fancy restaurants up here or ethnic ones. French, German, Thai — anything like that. They all seem out of place. Just give me a plain haddock burger, with lettuce and tomato, and not greasy, and made from today’s catch. Or a fresh crab roll and some crispy onion rings and the local cole slaw. And, of course, to share a slice of blueberry or raspberry pie with you.” “Well, Blue Hill caters to a fairly ritzy crowd, but give it time. Maybe the economy will flop and you’ll get your wish. Mind if I listen to the news? It’s almost five.” “Could I see what’s playing on the Bangor classical music station? I haven’t listened to anything for two hours. I didn’t want to wake you.” “You and music,” she said. She turned on the radio and went up and down the dial till she found something. “No, that’s the sister station in Portland, I said. It’s too faint to be the Bangor one. A little further up or down — I forget the exact numbers, but it’s still in the nineties, and it’ll be playing the same thing,” and she found it. Same music that was on the Portland station, but clearer. An orchestral piece, he thought, early twentieth century, he guessed, and one he didn’t think he’d heard before. “It’s lovely,” he said. “All right if we keep it to the end or until it starts getting too brassy or schmaltzy or loud? If it stays as good, I want to find out who it’s by and what orchestra and conductor.” “Anything,” she said. “The news isn’t going away, and they’ll just repeat it at five-thirty, if I remember from last year.” They let it play till the end. Sibelius’s Fifth. Lorin Maazel. Vienna Philharmonic. “That final movement was one of the most stirring and luscious things I’ve ever heard,” he said. “And that ending. Chord, silence, chord, silence, etcetera. Really unusual for a finish. Thanks.” “Now can we listen to the news?” “You didn’t like it? You were just putting up with it for my sake?” “I liked it, I liked it, but obviously not as much as you. I remembered I’d heard it before. But forgot who composed it and what number it was. When I finally realized it was by Sibelius, I was going to guess number seven. So I was off by two. I went to a concert where it was played. Bernstein. My favorite conductor. Same orchestra. In Vienna.” “You went alone?” “No. Going to hear Sibelius would never be my idea.” “The Russian poet, who I remember you said liked to ski in Austria?” “No. My boyfriend in Paris. We took a trip.” “Don’t tell me about it. And I’ve never heard it before. All the music I’ve heard and some pieces on the radio twenty, thirty times, and never that one? How can it be, a piece that great? I’m going to get it when we get back to New York.” “That’s a long time,” she said. “Think you’ll remember?” “Maybe there’s a record store in the Ellsworth Mall on High Street.” “There is, if it’s still there, in the rear of a paperback bookstore, but they don’t carry classical music. I’ve tried. When I had a working record player at the cottage, before we met.” “We should have brought mine up, with some records. Yeah, but that’s we said we’d do last summer, and look at us, we again forgot. We’re stuck with just a radio for good music. If you want, you can switch to the news now. It’s coming up.” “No, the announcer just said they’re going to play my favorite Bernstein piece: Symphonic Dances from West Side Story.” “What a coincidence,” he said. “You and Bernstein and the West Side.”

He bought a recording of Sibelius’s Fifth when they got back to New York, brought it to Baltimore with about fifty other LP’s and his old record player, and listened to it a couple of times. They got married a year and a half later, had a baby eight months after that, kept their apartment in New York but lived most of the time in a much larger apartment in Baltimore. The baby slept in a pram in their bedroom her first few months — four or five; six, maybe; he forgets how long. She awoke one night and started crying very loud and, unlike previous times, they couldn’t get her to stop. She didn’t need to be changed or fed, and he checked and both diaper pins were fully clasped. He thought maybe some music and the motion of the pram being wheeled about the apartment will get her back to sleep. Whenever she was in the car seat in the car and they drove off, she fell asleep almost immediately. He wheeled her into the living room, wanted to put on Rubenstein playing Chopin’s Nocturnes, but couldn’t find the record in the milk crate he thought it was in. Mahler’s Fifth Symphony was still on the turntable. He’d played it when he and his wife were having dinner that night. He put on the slow movement, turned off the lights and wheeled her around the apartment in the dark. She continued to cry. He took the Mahler off, put on the second side of Sibelius’s Fifth and pushed the pram around. The baby fell asleep in about ten minutes. He lifted the needle off the record, which he was going to do before those final chords came if she hadn’t fallen back to sleep by then, and wheeled her back to the bedroom. “Good job,” his wife whispered.

A week or so later the baby woke up around 2 a.m. and started crying loudly again without letup. He got out of bed and checked her and everything seemed all right: double diapers dry, safety pins closed, and his wife said she fed her just an hour ago while he was asleep. “We’ve got to do something,” he said. “The neighbors.” “Want me to handle it this time?” and he said “No, I like doing it, and you should sleep.” He wheeled the baby into the living room, put on side two of Sibelius’s Fifth Symphony, adjusted the volume till he could only faintly hear it, and pushed the pram around the room, staying pretty close to the speakers. She continued to cry. He picked her up, held her against his chest, her blanket still covering her, and walked around the room with her in the dark, kissing the top of her head every now and then. She fell asleep in a few minutes. He sat on the couch, still holding her close to his chest and kissing the top of her head and her fingers till the record was over and the needle returned to the holder automatically. The volume was set so low that the final chords didn’t disturb her. He put her in the pram, felt her diapers — they were dry — and wheeled her to the bedroom. “Everything okay?” his wife said, and he said “Fine, wonderful, couldn’t be better. What a doll we got,” and he got back into bed and held her from behind and soon fell asleep.