The Piano

Eloise played the piano. There was a time when she thought she was getting quite good. Not that she planned to go on the concert stage. When she wanted an audience, she played for her family. Mostly she played for herself. She loved Bach and had been learning “The Well Tempered Clavier.” And like her idol, Glenn Gould she hummed, almost moaned when she played.

She and her family live in a rambling house on the shore of a small lake just outside the city. Her father is a lawyer by profession and was recently appointed a judge. Her mother teaches art history at the university.

She first learned to play at her mother’s side, but soon surpassed her mother’s ability. She had successive teachers over the years until she couldn’t stand it any more. When she turned fifteen she succumbed to adolescent juices and closed her practice book. She did not play a note for the next six years and only approached the piano to dust it.

After high school she went on to university. In her senior year she met a third year medical student. She was certain that this was “It”, not entirely convinced what “It” was. They were married and after one year divorced. “It” did not stand. This was when she returned to the rambling house by the lake with its hard wood floors and French doors which opened to the long lawn stretching down to the water. Her parents were gone all day so she was left to herself. “Eloise, oh Eloise what am I to do now?”

She swam, sun bathed, and even considered fishing. She would sleep late and read trashy novels. One day out of sheer boredom she took to sliding on the polished wood floors in her green knee socks. Her mother had taken pride in those floors. A woman came once a month to wax them.

It started with a small slide, a slip really, when she was rushing to answer to phone. Then occasionally on the way back from the kitchen through the hall way, slip, slide, glide. Then it developed into the most interesting part of her day. She would roll up the Afghan carpet, get a running start, hit the bare floor with both feet and the broadest grin that she had in years. She could reach three quarters of the way across the room. Then one day she tried for the record. It was the day after the lady waxed it to perfection. It was like glare ice. She started her run from out on the patio through the French doors. By the time she reached the floor she was going at top speed. Within four feet she lost it, landed on her back side and slid a few more feet. There was a thud when she was stopped by the leg of the piano. She lay there in pain under the piano listening to the fading chord of her crash. Crawling out she sat down at the key board and for the first time since she was fifteen started to play.