Thread: Satie

draft of a short story

The wooden piano stool creaked beneath Ms. Wagner’s weight as she waited for her next student. She ran her red acrylic nails along the keys and listened to her foot work the bronze pedals. Wires and metal and wood all moved against each other, pushing and pulling and rising and falling with each shift of her hands and feet. Beneath her pale fingers she could feel it breathing in anticipation, waiting for her to set the tempo of its pulse.
Within her a string of memory vibrated a melody. It shivered in a frequency that resonated through each nerve and tendon that ran down her arms and into her fingers. In the silence of the small studio she curled her left hand into a chord and loosened her right fingers for the melody. She breathed and pushed down and felt the keys give beneath her pressure.
The room filled with an electric breathlessness as Ms. Wagner and the piano moved against each other. She dug her fingers down into each key, building the tension with a dissonance that grew beneath her until her hands felt the piano shiver. Her right fingers plucked out the tension only for a moment before her left picked up the tempo with rolling chords that filled the small room. She could feel the piano moan as she moved the pedal up and down, drawing out each note while keeping them from spilling into each other.
Her eyes watched her fingers command the piano, bending its will for her own. Everything fell from her mind as the studio filled with chords that painted the room with a resonating thunder that shivered each wall. Her hands galloped against the thin keys, strangling each resolved chord with a tension as she pushed the piano towards a crescendo. It trembled in fear as she smashed through the motifs that littered the last few moments.
Before she could let the final chord gasp beneath her fingers she heard a knock on her door. The string of concentration that wrapped her mind around each note snapped. Those last few seconds were just as important to her as any other moment during the song and now it was gone. Now there would be no time for her to slowly compose herself and she silently cursed her late student. She stood up and opened the door for her next appointment.
Standing in the doorway was a gasping young man holding a folder full of sheet music.
“Hello, Josef.”
“Hello, Ms. Wagner. How are you today?” He said between breaths.
“Come in.”
He entered the small studio and stood next to the piano, waiting for permission to sit down. She sat on a metal chair next to the stool and motioned him to sit down. He placed the folder on the piano and slowly sat down, enjoying the creaking it made beneath his weight. She could see the sweat shine on his face and hoped that he wouldn’t get her piano wet.
“I’m sorry that I’m late, Ms. Wagner. I was stuck in traffic and I couldn’t find a parking space.”
She opened the folder and searched for the piece they had practiced last time.
“I hope you’ve been practicing the Satie piece since last week.”
She knew that he didn’t and waited for him to lie to her. While she hated the fact that he rarely practiced she gained some enjoyment watching him give himself away through a lousy performance. She particularly enjoyed the sound of his teeth grinding as he missed the right notes. She wondered why he continued to pay for lessons when he rarely practiced.
“I have ma’am. To be honest, it was hard to find the time, with school and all, but I tried my best to practice.”
This wasn’t a lie. Josef had been practicing as much as he could but senior year of high school was slowly killing him. Advance placement classes and searching for college and partaking in clubs and volunteering: it was a miracle he found time to practice. But, despite the lack of time he dedicated to piano lessons, he continued because he was utterly and desperately in love with Ms. Wagner.
Josef fell in love as soon as he met her. He found her through the local performance art center when he decided to pick up piano again. As soon as he saw her he signed up for lessons. Of course, she was significantly older than him but that didn’t matter. Every time he sat at the piano he thought of her. He thought of the slight tan line on her finger that moved up and down as she demonstrated how a song should be played and he felt weak whenever she moved his fingers into the right position. He loved the sound of her acrylic nails clicking on the piano keys when she played and how it reminded him of typewriters. He shivered every time her grey green eyes pierced him whenever she asked if he practiced that week.
After finding the Satie piece she looked at him, waiting for him to start playing, to reveal his lies through his playing. He cleared his throat and nervously placed his fingers on the keys. She watched him fidget and move on the stool and she felt like laughing at him. He took a deep breath and begun the slow waltz of the song.
Playing this song was going to be damn near impossible when everything within Josef was trying to keep him from getting an erection. However, he somehow made it through the first few bars. His hands moved slowly across the keys as he resolved the dissonance with each bass note with a minor chord. Slow and steady, he thought to himself. He soon completed the first section of the song but his hands began to tremble as he started the second section.
This is where he will mess up, she thought. She could see it in his hands. His fingers shook uncertainly as he tried to read the score and play at the same time. He looked up and down but he made few mistakes. He even got the accidentals. His fingers shook less and he increased the tempo. She was disappointed.
If he could just make it through this song he could look at her again. He wanted to impress her with this song because she once remarked how much she enjoyed Satie. He searched for the easiest sounding song by him and asked her about it. He remembered his heart leaping in his chest when she looked impressed by his request to learn the song. All he had to do was finish the middle section and it would be clear sailing afterwards.
I wonder if he can make it through the climax of the song. Ms. Wagner thought to herself. She watched his hands began to tremble again as he tried to applied the right amount of force to the keys. To her growing surprise, he was making it through the crescendo of the piece. While his hands did shake he grew more confident with each chord until he was filling the room with a nervous energy that built the tension between them.
He finally pushed the major chord of the climax with such power and grace that he knew that he was surprising her. Perhaps she would congratulate him with a hug after this song. Perhaps they will look deeply into each other eyes and she would blush and he would look down at her hands and hold them before they both looked at each other and kiss and. His fingers slipped right after the climax, causing the whole tension of the song to stumble.
She smiled and watched him blush as he tried to regain control over the song but it was too late. This slip up destroyed the fragile confidence he had and now it was all over. His fingers began to tremble at such a frequency he could barely press down on the right keys. The song twisted into a terrible parody of itself when he tried playing the melody motif at the end of the song. He tried to hold down the last chord but the song was already ruined and she enjoyed watching his face as he shamefully turned to her.
“What happened?”
“I don’t know, ma’am. I’m sorry”
“It doesn’t seem like you practiced much over the week, did you Josef?”
He kept looking down at his hands.
“I tried practicing as much as I could, ma’am.”
Ms. Wagner smiled and asked him to try again, but slower this time. She enjoyed pointing out the mistakes he made and the things he could do to improve his method. The piano stool creaked as they switched chairs. She straightened her back and begun to play the piece in a slow tempo, showing him how his fingers should be. He watched and nodded whenever she looked at him but his mind was not on the music. Sitting on the small chair next to her he watched her red nails move slowly over the black and white keys, rising and falling like the melody he couldn’t quite get.

I got into this piece right away. It was easy to start reading and intriguing from the start. I got a little distracted in the third paragraph describing her playing the piano, I think maybe you could trim this down a bit. But I loved the description of how she interacted with the piano as she played it, the push and pull of it was great. You have a lot of wonderful descriptive language here.

After Josef shows up I noticed a lot of word repetition. Spots like:

He entered the small studio and stood next to the piano, waiting for permission to sit down. She sat on a metal chair next to the stool and motioned him to sit down. He placed the folder on the piano and slowly sat down, enjoying the creaking it made beneath his weight. She could see the sweat shine on his face and hoped that he wouldn’t get her piano wet.

permission to sit down, motioned him to sit down, slowly sat down. It took me out of the piece. Just finding alternate phrasing would help a lot. Irrelivant, but the image of him sweating enough to make the piano wet was sort of an absurd one.

I'm going to nit pick a bit with the word repetition, I guess it's a pet peeve. The word practice could use some changing up.

If he could just make it through this song he could look at her again. He wanted to impress her with this song because she once remarked how much she enjoyed Satie. He searched for the easiest sounding song by him and asked her about it. He remembered his heart leaping in his chest when she looked impressed by his request to learn the song.

Moving on, the reference to his potential erection felt a bit out of place. All the other references to his love are fairly chaste, which isn't to say that there isn't lust there, only that lust wasn't coming across in the descriptions of his feelings.

I love the sensory reference of the clicking of her acrylic nails. I can hear it in my head when you describe it and I love that noise. There are several great sensory descriptions that bring the story right off the page.

I think Josef is a great character with good motivation and struggles. I feel sympathy for him, and a little pity. I can picture him in my head very well.

I understand Mrs. Wagner because I've had piano teachers that truly appeared to be sadists, but as far as her development as a character is concerned, I struggle with her motivation. Why does she delight in watching Josef fail so much? Why is she excited to catch him in a lie? I guess if we could get even a couple sentences in the beginning about her being bitter about something or years of piano teaching with ungrateful students wearing her down, or whatever the motivation is, it would really help her become a three dimensional person.

I think it's a great idea and has a good structure. You write very well with great imagery and humor. If you spice up the language a bit so it's not so repetitive and develop Mrs. Wagner as a character a bit more I think this could be a really wonderful piece. Great work!

This is quite good. I like how you describe - so poetically- the relationship between Ms. wagner and the music. Your prose has this romanticness to it; I mean I can really feel the connection, feel the love Ms. Wagner has for the piano in just the first paragraph.

Beneath her pale fingers she could feel it breathing in anticipation, waiting for her to set the tempo of its pulse. (!)

That's deep^^^^^. The eloquence of your prose in regards to the minutiae of piano playing, of Ms. Wagner's craft, is...well it's like music in itself which in a piece centering around music is for lack of better word astounding.

Don't take this as an insult but I was more enticed by the relationship between Ms. Wagner and the piano then Josef's budding crush on her.

Overall, it's quite good...not great. The end lacks the pull that the beginning had that's my only problem with it and might I add that that is a very slight problem. Good Job.