Chapter 5: Finished

The paper grocery bag gave off a cold, earthy smell where a damp potato had darkened its bottom. Ada Mercer stepped around it while Nora Bell held the door, then waited for Eli Finch to bring the tools through. They had taken the bus from their building after he came home from school. At the corner, she had checked the time and slowed her steps so they would not arrive before four.

“I haven’t put everything away,” Nora Bell said.

“We can get through.”

A dining chair stood beside the upright. The school photograph, the button bowl, and the folded receipt were still on top. Ada Mercer moved them to a low table, carrying the bowl with her palm over its mouth. She could feel the buttons shifting without hearing them.

Eli Finch set down the bag and took off his coat.

She opened the piano. The room was warm enough that she pushed her sleeves back before taking out the lever. Its handle came free of the cloth without catching. Beside it she laid the mutes, close enough to reach without looking.

Nora Bell said something from the doorway.

Ada Mercer turned, but caught only the end. There was the familiar moment in which she could make an answer from the shape of the sentence, offer a nod, and probably be right.

“I missed that.”

“Would you like the door shut? While I put things away.”

“Yes, please. I have trouble separating sounds now.”

Her hand stayed on the edge of the keyboard. Nora Bell looked at it, then back at her face.

“I’ll leave it shut until you call.”

She spoke at the same volume. Ada Mercer was grateful for that before she could prevent herself from being grateful. The latch settled into place, and the room became something she could attend to.

She played across the keyboard, then returned to the middle. There it was: a slight disturbance after the first clear strike, small enough to live beneath a tune. She let the key rise.

Eli Finch stood beside the chair, waiting.

“Sit where you can hear,” she said. “You can move if you need to.”

He shifted the chair a little and sat down.

She began with the neighboring notes. There were ordinary changes to attend to, the modest departures an instrument made while standing in a warm room. She worked through them without hurrying. Occasionally she stopped and let her shoulders drop before returning the lever to a pin. The boy watched the strings rather than her face.