Unraveled

I didn’t mean to destroy the piano. 

I blamed most of it on the weather. It was a hot summer for New York. Heat made people angry. Of course, celebrations still raged. The war had just ended. Deaf in one ear from a riding accident, I had avoided the draft. But I wasn’t celebrating.

 I had one more exam before I graduated from Juilliard. One last exam. 

Not written. Not oral. 

Audible. 

The piece was Ravel. My last act, and for good reason. Ravel was hard. Hardest piece on earth. And though I did not lack talent, I doubted I had enough to meet standards.

So with the exam approaching and my fate resting on an impossible feat, I had locked myself in my apartment and banged away at my Steinway. I shut all windows, despite the heat. I didn’t want the cheers and whistles from the ticker tape parades interrupting my flow. 

But that was the problem. My flow wouldn’t actually…flow. My fingers kept slipping. My head felt fuzzy. I was aware of every pinch and pull, every bead of sweat dripping down my back. All of it. A sour taste invaded my mouth, and my tongue turned pasty. I had two days to perfect this. Two days. And I was nowhere near ready. 

A knock jerked me from my trance. 

“Charlie? Come on, Charlie, let me in!”

I bowed my head. Why was he here? I asked him not to disturb me.

Knock. “Charlie!” Knock. “Come on, Charlie!”

I opened the door. My neighbor, Patrick, was leaning against the frame, his smile wide and stained teeth crooked. Wrinkles covered his clothes, like he had just awoken, which wasn’t a far-fetched idea. His family was very wealthy. He could afford unemployment. 

“I brought you a present!” he shoved a large wooden box into my living room, grunting with effort.

“Patrick…I don’t want this,” I said.

“Of course you do!” he positioned the box against the wall, grunting, then paused and wiped his forehead. “Can you turn on a fan?”

“I don’t own fans.”

“Why not?”

“Because they’re…dangerous. The cords could…explode. Or the blades could cut me.”

“Not if you’re careful.”

I sat down on the piano bench. “They’re not practical.”

“That’s what makes it interesting,” Patrick said. “The future’s full of impracticalities, so you have to be impractical to enjoy them. 

He stepped back from the box. I raised an eyebrow. It was a piano. Smaller, with no strings or lid, and an odd iron grate above the keys.

“I already have a piano,” I said.

“But not like this!”

“What is…this?”

“The thing that will put you, my friend, out of business!” Patrick smacked the top of the piano, then flopped into a green armchair. He fixed his gaze on the Steinway. “Any luck so far?”

“No.”

“I can hear you through the walls.”

“I’d prefer if you didn’t listen.”

“Can’t help it. I don’t have the privilege of being deaf.”

I looked at the new piano. “So…what’s it do?”

“It plays music.”

“But there’s no-”

“It plays music without you touching it,” Patrick said. He rose and felt behind the piano.

“What are you doing?”

“Plugging it in.” 

I heard a click, and the piano began to play. The keys moved of their own accord, like a ghost. Beating. Pulsing. A heartbeat. Fluttering, like a hummingbird. And familiar. I knew this piece. This was my bane, my Everest, my deathbed goal. Ravel. Now this piano was playing it first try, without an operator, all on its own. 

Patrick sat back in the armchair, watching the new piano. “Doesn’t need practice. Costs little, gives much. It’s the perfect bargain.”

“Why did you buy me this?” I asked. 

Patrick shrugged. “You’ve been struggling. I thought you could play along, get the feel. It might help.”

I crossed my arms. “I don’t need help.”

“You’re sitting in the dark, it stinks like feet, and you’ve been locked in this room since Friday,” Patrick said. “You need help.”

He went to the door. “Try it out. Can’t hurt.”

He left, but I kept staring my new…gift. If I could even call it that. 

It wasn’t natural, a machine that could do what humans did, but better. It was the same reason I didn’t own fans. They were new. They were efficient. Threats. 

The piano finished Ravel and fell silent. I watched, tense, waiting for another sound. When none came, I relaxed a bit. It seemed harmless enough, the mahogany frame polished and sanded, the iron grate shiny, not a speck of rust visible. Pleasing to the eye, didn’t take up a lot of space, I could see the appeal. Very…efficient. 

Maybe Patrick was right. Could this help me perfect Ravel?

I bit my lip nodded to the empty room. It was worth a shot. Besides, what was there to lose?

I wound up the player piano, then returned to the Steinway. Ravel began to play. I did my best to keep up, but my technique was sloppy. The player piano hit every note. Perfectly. I tried not to get angry. That wouldn’t help. I just needed to focus. 

But the more I focused, the more my muscles tensed, my eyes narrowed, my nostrils flared. How could a machine beat me at my profession? My passion?

The tempo increased. I hunched over the keys, fingers flying. Faster. Faster. Sharp. Flat. Accidental. Piano behind, piano in front. Strings vibrating. Electricity crackling. My neck tingled. My gut twisted. Tempo increased. Minor. Dark. Sharp. Flat. Trying to breath, to feel, to flow. To live the music.

Then it unraveled. I forgot the rhythm. My hand banged a C major, not an F#. Melody crashed. Harmony deflated. And behind me, singing like a god, the player piano finished the piece. Without a single hiccup. A single mistake. I looked at the Steinway, hate for the awful god-machine eating at my soul. Hate for my own ability.

I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t finish. This was the terrible truth...the realization that I could play anything in the world…except Ravel. That I was bested by a metal mind.

A tear slipped down my cheeks and my throat tightened. With a shuddering breath, I tapped the highest key – a C – and sustained it. The shrill note echoed across the room. It was haunting, solemn, a note that signified an ending. A subtle finish. My finish. The damn machine. 

What was the point of continuing? This was the beginning, I knew. This piano could lead to new things…other, more unnatural devices. Humans yearned for control, but so did machines. They were efficient, but sinister. Mindful, not mindless.

I balled my fists and whirled around. The piano sat, shadowed and silent, gleaming in the late afternoon sun. It was god-like. A heavenly instrument. The attribute that first drew me. The ethereal aura that emanated from the wood, from every screw and panel and key, from the brass pedals to the velvet dust covers. It was a beast. A great, beautiful beast. 

A lion. And I, the circus-master. I thought I had tamed it. A grave mistake…

I slammed my foot into the side panel. War. Smash! Machines. Bam! Unravel. Crack! Unravel. Twang! Unravel, unravel, unravel…

I don’t quite remember the details. My vision went black. My body felt giddy, drunken, and my arms surged with unnatural strength. A feeling terrible and powerful, all at the same time. 

I opened my eyes and took in the living room. Blood dripped down my knuckles. Bruises covered my hands. Panels and keys and brass pedals were strewn across the floor. And the piano…

It was gone. Destroyed. Only the disfigured hull remained. A creepy moan emitted from it, out of tune and key. I raised my chin at my defeated opponent and surveyed the wreckage. Then, like a candle snuffed out, I sunk into the armchair. 

My perfect, immaculate Steinway. A destroyed, evil machine. But weren’t both machines? Music still was made by use of steel and wood. I was just a mediator. A metaphor for human incompetence. A pawn. 

I stumbled to my feet and opened the window. It was too hot. Too hot. Sweat beaded on my brow, dripping down my nose and seeping into my lips. Inevitable. It was inevitable. The coming age, the coming takeover. My mind was limited compared to the piano. Limited compared to the cars. Just last week the papers had told of a hit-and-run. It was man against machine. Defeat. Inevitable. 

***

I went to Patrick’s later that night. He asked me about my hands. I only shook my head and pointed to my room. I stayed behind in his apartment, rinsing the blood off my hands. I kept blinking, even though there were no tears in my eyes. It was reflexive, a stress-reliever. Stress owned me right now. I let it. 

Patrick eventually came back, shock on his face, and sunk onto the couch. I sat next to him. The silence was awkward, tense.

Finally Patrick spoke. “Why...”

“It...it was an accident,” I said, my gaze fixed on my shoes.

Patrick sighed, clapping his hands together softly. “Must’ve been some...accident.”

We listened to the radio for an hour and the newscaster’s shrill voice blared stock updates, then Patrick went to bed. I stayed up, listening to the sounds of traffic. I wasn’t sleeping. Not tonight.

The next day, two men came and cleared the wreckage. I didn’t watch. When they were gone, I went back to the Steinway. The ivory keys felt good against my fingers. Rough. Textured. Controlled. Real.

I couldn’t play Ravel. Yet. Maybe soon, I’d figure it out. But at least for now, though the Steinway was steel and wood, it was still mine to command. I was still its master.