Violence and Violins

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Memories floated through his head when he looked at the cello resting in the corner of the suspect's bedroom. The feel of the sheet music in his hand had brought the good and the bad ones back to the forefront of his mind and he had smiled at all of them. He had enjoyed the stunned look on his partner's face when he had mentioned he grew up playing the violin and she hadn't pressed him for details, but that didn't stop the memories.

On the day he'd first carried his violin to school his friends completely deserted him. He had just started fourth grade and the music teacher had discovered that he played the violin and his mother had signed him up for orchestra. He had liked playing it when no one knew about it, but now he was doomed. His mother had told him no one at school would laugh at him, but he knew she didn't know what she was talking about.

She had always been proud to show him off to visiting friends, embarrassing him by making him play for them when they came to dinner, and he had done it for her because not too much made her happy anymore. So he would play "Barcarole" by Chopin and a couple of Irish lullabies she loved and then she would let him go. He enjoyed it, if his dad wasn't drinking. But that was getting rarer and when he was, his dad always made fun of him for playing what he thought of as a "sissy" instrument, as he called it. His dad had busted up one of his first violins, hitting him with it when his early attempts to practice had irritated him and had led to yelling and finally violence.

He wasn't very good, but he continued because it made his mom happy. The neighbors were another story. He was pretty sure he could hear cussing coming from the house next door when his dad forced him to practice out in the yard. Not that he blamed him. The first couple of years he sounded pretty awful and of all the instruments, a badly played violin will scare the hell out of all the pets in the neighborhood, so anyone with a hangover must have been in pure agony.

But taking it to school was another thing all together. He got into fights over his violin almost every time he had to take it to school for orchestra practice. In his neighborhood, most of the kids he hung around with had never even seen a violin before, so of course, they laughed at him. He learned to joke about it with friends and he learned to fight all the others if they tried to take it away from him. His mother had no idea what was going on and he didn't tell her.

He did get to travel around to different schools in Los Angeles with the orchestra every once in a while and that was interesting. After one crosstown school orchestra concert, one of the kids from the big ritzy schools they were visiting, told him that they were all afraid of the kids from his school because of where they came from. The kid confided that there had been a rumor going around that he was carrying a knife inside his violin case. He had laughed so hard he fell off his chair.

Yep, he had learned to fight really well because of that violin, and he had learned not to practice if his dad was drunk, but he never regretted playing it. He only had to remember how his mom's face lit up when he played for her to know all the shit he took because of it was worth it. If it made her happy, then he was happy. So, the memories were all good.

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