[Fiction] Composer

I wrote this. Very out-of-genre for me. Light CW for self-harm, alcohol abuse.

***

Rebecca says she doesn't write music.

First thing she's said since I got home. One of her moods.

I say, Rebecca, if you don't write music, then what's that you're writing now onto that staff paper?

Rebecca shakes her head. She says it's not new music. She's transcribing. She does not stop writing.

I ask her, from what.

She says, from memory.

So, what, I ask, you just came up with this on the bus, or in line at Ollie's, or -

She shakes her head. She doesn't come up with the tunes. She doesn't come up with any of it, she says. Her voice wobbles. She does not stop writing.

I stop ironing and ask her what she's talking about.

This isn't her music, she says. She does not devise. She remembers.

I walk over to the desk, stand behind Rebecca, peer over her weary shoulder at the paper. Just the one part this time, solo piano. It's a scrawl, as always. Rebecca's music is... dense. Slippery. I suppose it's jazz-adjacent in structure, but I've never known much about music theory. She likes that about me. Says she gave up on dating musicians.

Still, the sight-reading my clarinet teacher drilled into me never really left my head. I hum the first few notes, a weird, heavy melody. Rebecca holds up her left hand and makes a small, uncomfortable noise, and I shut up, startled.

You'll make me lose the memory, she says. Her hand grows shakier, the stems dancing at odd angles on the staff. Is she crying?

She does not stop writing.

I linger for a few moments more, and decide I should leave her to it. But when I turn to leave,

Tammy, she says, what's wrong with me?

I put a hand on her shoulder - hard, knotted - and tell her, there's nothing wrong with you, Rebecca, this is just the way you work.

But it's not me working, she says. I'm just an arm and a hand and a pen and a tune. She slams the desk with her left hand, knocks over the coffee I brought her a few minutes ago. It sears her skin red-raw and her breaths become little yelps of pain. She does not stop writing.

I pull out my phone and start dialling, but I'm only two 9s deep when she grunts, don't call the hospital. I need to finish this.

Fuck that, I say, look at your hand! I dial the third 9.

Tammy, she says, if I have to leave now, I'll lose the tune. She talks about it like losing a limb, or a friend, or worse. Her burnt left hand shakes and slaps the desktop, trying to displace one pain with another.

I should ignore her. My thumb hovers over the green dial icon. But I don't press it.

I want a bowl of iced water, she says. And the Smirnoff. I want to stop feeling like this.

Wordless, I bring her both. She sticks her hand in the water, whimpering, splashing the page. Then she grabs the vodka - with the shiny red tangle of pain her left hand has become - and gulps it like an energy drink.

I sit back down on the sofa, drink my tea, and sink my attention into Reddit. I can't look at Rebecca. I should have called an ambulance. I should have broken up with her, when she was like this a couple of weeks back, writing that piece that made my head hurt when I looked at it.

I hear a thud. Rebecca's head has hit the desk, mouth hanging open. The bottle is empty.

She does not stop writing.