El Violoncello - The Cello

Lucy heard the deep, warm tones of the cello coming from the dining room and quickly turned off her small transistor radio. Not much could tear her away from the seductive rhythms of Mary Wells, Marvin Gaye, The Supremes or her favorite, Smoky. But when her older brother practiced the cello she was transported to distant places that looked nothing like the confined, chipped-painted walls of their home. She didn't know much about classical instruments or any music besides motown and her parents rancheras, but for some reason those low melodic notes made her think of places she saw only on television. She imagined great concert halls bigger than her school auditorium even, where fancy ladies in the audience sparkle with jewels and the musicians wear expensive-looking suits.

Her brother, Sal, played on, oblivious to the world around him. She was careful not to let him see her. In the last few months he had grown more irritable, snapping insults at anyone who interrupted his concentration. Crouched against her mother's heavy china cabinet she watched the back of Sal's head, gently tilted toward the fingerboard, and tried to picture him on the stage of one of those great concert halls. She didn't know where he'd get a nice suit but she was sure he would look quite dapper in one. The whole family could make a special trip to see him play. They might be asked to sit in the very first row because they are related to him. She could ask her older sister, Connie, to sew a new dress for her - maybe borrow one of her pill-box hats!

The music stopped. Jolted out of her daydream, Lucy heard the rustling of sheet music and watched Sal readjust himself in his seat. Facing the sun-drenched window, he sat upright and began a piece she recognized as one of Johann Sebastian Bach's creations. Sal played it more than any other. It was her favorite. Lucy soaked in the melancholy melody and forgot all about the lingering smell of two-day old beans abandoned on the stove and the chill of the hardwood floor underneath her bare legs. Instead, she lost herself beyond the dining room window. Sal's somber notes seemed to serenade the gray clouds as they lumbered past the sun. A blanketing feeling of love and sorrow wrapped around her. Love for her mysterious older brother who made such beautiful music. Sadness that she could not explain.

There was no way she could know. It was too early to foresee. It'd be at least another year before he'd see a doctor. Two more years before he'd be properly diagnosed. She would bear witness to his paranoid fits, hallucinations, and disorganized thoughts. She would visit him in eery institutions and hear bizarre accounts of electro-shock therapy. She would routinely rescue him from the streets when he'd wander aimlessly. She would hurry in the night to be by his side when he would pass in his sleep. And she would always remember the transportive magic of his cello.