Chapter 2

It took three lessons for Christine to work up the courage to ask the voice what his name was. But finally as she was leaving one night she said "Goodbye." Paused and said "It seems strange not to have anything to call you."

"Why should you call me anything? Do you speak of me to others?"

"I-no." Christine frowned. All she had told Meg was that her new teacher was strict but talented, and she thought lessons were going well. No one else in her life would care. "I just think it's weird, to not even have a name to say bye to."

"You may call me Maestro, if you must." He rolled the "r" and Christine felt even less sure about where his accent originated.

"Allright, Maestro." She felt a little dumb saying it. "Goodnight, then."

"Goodnight, Christine." It was said slowly and carefully, as though he was not in the habit of exchanging pleasantries. She shook her head as she stepped out into the crisp autumn air. Her curiosity about her teacher was reaching unbearable proportions. He was always severe with her, stopping just short of mean in his chilly politeness. But the way he sang. The way her voice was transforming already, after less than a week. It was exhilarating.

It also made her job seem duller by comparison. She spent even more of her time watching the big stars record and imagining how she would sing their songs, and sighing to herself when they went off key. One morning her coworker Jamie hissed "Ooh, bad luck. You got Carlotta duty today."

"Is it that bad?" She asked. She'd heard enough tirades from Meg, but her roommate did tend to exaggerate. Jamie made a pitying face.

"There's a reason everyone trades shifts not to get her. You've been lucky so far, but you'll see." Christine felt her face fall.

"Oh. Well, it will be exciting to meet her, I guess." The other girl gave her a pitying look before hurrying off. Christine went to consult the sacred coffee chart, a color-coded document tacked up in the assistants' break room that listed the Starbucks order of every client and higher up employee at Garnier. Christine had perfected the art of the coffee run, and only minutes later she arrived at her assigned booth with a venti triple shot and a determination to inform Carlotta that she had sung back up for her, because if there was one cliché about the business that was already ground into her, it was that it was all about who you know. The only problem was Carlotta was not there. Andre, Christine and Carlotta's manager Seth stood around the studio smiling uncomfortably at each other and remarking about the weather for almost an hour before the singer burst into the studio. Her signature midriff was tan and bare, her hair was huge and glossy and her voice was loud.

"Andre darling how are you?" She purred, kissing Andre on both cheeks and holding a hand out for her coffee at the same time. She sipped it, grimaced, tossed it in a trashcan and rounded on her agent. "Don't look at me like that Seth, I know I'm late. But you can't rush perfection." She winked, and turned to Christine, looking her up and down with a critical eye.

"Hi, I'm Christine." She said. "I actually sang back up on one of your songs, Dance For Love I think it was called?"

"Hmm." Carlotta raised a perfectly shaped eyebrow, then addressed Andre. "I didn't know we were letting coffee girls sing my songs, dear."

"It was an emergency situation, and Christine has always expressed a passion for singing." Carlotta looked unimpressed. "We can re record it if you'd like, of course."

"Yes I'd like." She rolled her eyes. "Why doesn't anyone understand, there's a difference between professional singers and amateurs. Even for the small parts you can't just assign someone random."

"You're right, I should have thought. Next time I'll-" Carlotta waved a dismissive hand, cutting Andre off.

"Dio can I just get in the booth already? All this talking is giving me wrinkles. It's your job Seth not mine."

"I'll work it out, Carlotta." Seth said with an oily smile. She was already walking towards the booth as he talked, hips swinging and heeled boots clicking, and as she opened the door she spared one more glance at Christine to say

"And that coffee was cold. If I could get something decent sometime today that would be fabulous." Christine nodded, even managed to force a tight smile onto her face, and practically fled back to Starbucks. It was going to be a very long day.

And of course it wasn't over, when she got home. She would have to leave in a few hours for the terrifying and thrilling prospect of a lesson with Maestro. She groaned, collapsing onto the sofa and burying her head under a pillow. Carlotta had not improved on Christine's return to the studio, and she wasn't sure if she could be berated anymore that day without breaking down in tears. Meg found her like that and said

"What happened to you?"

"Carlotta." Chrstine said, refusing to take the pillow off her head.

"Oh honey." She tutted, leaving the room for a moment and returning with the emergency pint of ice cream they always kept in the freezer. "Isn't she the worst?"

"She's terrible!" Christine agreed, sitting up and feeling better already. They spent a good while criticizing Carlotta and by the time she returned to Garnier the whole thing seemed to Christine funny rather than infuriating. She warmed up on her own as she'd been instructed, waiting for Maestro's voice to make itself known.

"So you had the dubious privilege of listening to one of the most popular artists in your country record today. How did you like it?" She jumped, even though she had vowed not to tonight. He always did this, interjected a non sequitur seemingly out of nowhere rather than greeting her with a simple hello.

"You were there?" She hadn't thought of that, even though he had discovered her by listening in during the day. Was he always lurking at Garnier, hiding out wherever he was now? Could he see her as she went about her daily routine? The thought had her flushed and confused.

"Yes." She waited, but it seemed she wouldn't be getting any more information on that front. "How did you find her?"

"Carlotta?" She frowned. "She was," she paused and looked at her feet. It was one thing to complain about Carlotta to Meg in the safety of their apartment, but the woman sold out worldwide tours. Who was she to judge her, especially to someone like Maestro who clearly knew so much more about music than Christine did? But he had asked, and she didn't have any more false niceties left in her today. "She sucked. I mean, I don't know, her voice is good, I think. It's strong and clear and everything. But it's not…pleasant I guess? Like even if I liked her style of music, I don't think I would enjoy listening to her sing it."

"I would agree with you on those points. Did you notice anything else?" Christine felt a stupid little grin form at that. It was the closest to praising her he'd ever come.

"Well, her range wasn't great, I don't think. She thinned out, on some notes that weren't that high, especially from what you said of where my range could go."

"Correct again. You need not be so hesitant to express an opinion, Christine."

"But she's so famous, it's not like my opinion of her matters. And besides, I don't want to be rude."

"After the way she treated you, I should say you have every right to be rude." For a moment he almost sounded angry. He seemed to be a man of few and formal words, perhaps Carlotta's constant, loud chatter had irked him. She laughed a little.

"If I treated every celebrity the way they treat me, I wouldn't have a job."

"Strange, isn't it, that you and the rest of this society is expected to worship her, when your background vocals are the best music she will ever put out." Christine could feel herself turn an undignified shade of pink at that, but then she remembered with disappointment

"She won't put them out, though. She asked Andre to re record, without even listening to it."

"That remains to be seen." Something in his voice chilled her, and for the thousandth time she wanted to ask why he cared, why he was so invested in the career of a random hopeful, but as usual she was too scared of the answer. "At any rate your piece is on the stand, under your warm ups. You may begin." His tone was now the calm and collected one she'd become accustomed to, and everything seemed to come easily that night. The warmth she felt from Maestro's compliments seemed to seep into her voice and make the simple song she was working on sound better than it ever had before, and she left with a smile on her face. The next two lessons were on the weekend, so there was no troublesome talk of work to interfere. There was only pure, soaring, beautiful music, and nothing mattered for a couple of hours, not Carlotta's rudeness or her rent due the next week or even the constant loneliness that sometimes felt like it was eating her from the inside out. On Sunday afternoon she took out her song writing notebook and her second hand guitar, which had both been gathering dust for a while, and found that she didn't hate what she was writing. Christine knew she was not an extremely skilled or groundbreaking composer, but it felt wonderful to be producing her own music again, even if most likely no one would ever hear it.

On Monday morning she was actually in a good mood for once, chatting with Jamie in the break room when Andre sought her out with a strange, nervous look. "Christine." He said gravely, his eyes flicking between something on his phone and her face. "I just wanted to let you know that Carlotta will be using your backup vocals, when she releases that single."

"Oh, she changed her mind?" Christine was surprised, to say the least. Carlotta had seemed very firm in her conviction that Christine would only ever be a coffee girl. "That's great."

"She has, well, that is to say, it's all a bit complicated and technical, but anyway the important thing is you understand it will be your voice on that track, and no one else's. Besides Carlotta's of course." Andre, who always kept himself so neat and well groomed, was visibly sweating, and Christine couldn't help but think she was missing something.

"That's great to hear." Christine said slowly. "Thanks for uh, letting me know."

"No problem, no problem at all." He nodded before hastily departing. Christine turned back to Jamie.

"That was weird, right?" The other girl nodded.

"Definitely weird, even for Andre."

"Maybe you got ghosted." Joe Buquet suggested around a mouthful of donut, wiggling his fingers. Christine laughed half-heartedly and Jamie rolled her eyes. Legends of a ghost at Garnier seemed to be as old as the building itself, and it was blamed for everything from broken equipment to questionable decisions the managers made. It was a favorite subject of Joe's in particular, and he would even invoke its name as he was cursing his typical thirsty Thursday hangover. "Just wait, itt'l whisper in Rich's ear give Christine a raaaise." He continued.

"I wouldn't complain." She muttered. Despite Joe's teasing, Christine couldn't shake the feeling that Andre's strange behavior had some significance she didn't understand. Suddenly she wondered if Maestro was listening, and what he would make of the whole affair. She caught herself wandering down side hallways and peeking into empty rooms whenever she had free time that day, as though she would happen upon her music teacher without even knowing what he looked like. Garnier was an old building, a bit bigger than it needed to be for its modern day purposes, and when the lights got dim or dust swirled around old record players that hadn't been touched in decades, it wasn't so hard to imagine a ghost here. In fact as she examined all the framed awards and black and white pictures of artists so legendary they took her breath away, it was harder to think that she belonged here in any creative capacity. She almost laughed when she saw a Grammy tucked away in the corner of a shelf, as though it was nothing more than an old paperweight. She couldn't resist holding it for a moment, though she was almost sure she wasn't supposed to. It had to be the product of an overactive imagination, when she heard a voice whisper "soon Christine" right in her ear. But she still replaced the Grammy and hurried back to more populated parts of the building, resolved not to mention the incident to anyone, especially not Joe Buquet.