Esme pushed the scraper along the side of the piano cabinet, watching the old finish collect onto the flat edge of the metal and crumble by her feet. The powder it created was black. At the moment, it felt just as volatile as any substance that had ever been loaded into a gun.
Esme kept scraping. She let the dust scatter. She had put sheets down all over to protect her hardwood floors.
There was music playing. She always kept the music playing. Today, it was something lush and airy, orchestrations to help propel her through her work.
The plain wood began to reveal itself. The act of scraping away the layers to glimpse again what lay beneath felt incredibly satisfying and necessary to her. She was cheered by the project, a brittle joy arising in her half-empty heart.
She loved this old instrument. How she adored it! She could make it beautiful again. She could make it shine like new.
The telephone made a sound, a shrill, untrustworthy cry that taunted her with hope.
She was there before it had properly started ringing. She snatched the receiver so fast, the motion of her hand was a blur to her own eyes.
"Hello?" The greeting was hurried, perhaps too fast to be understood. Her voice did not sound right. It was as unerringly pleasant as any vampire's must be, but, for Esme, the pitch was abnormally high. Her throat felt tight with expectation.
There was a slight pause on the other end.
"Good morning," Carlisle said, soft and apologetic, the practiced tone of one skilled at delivering bad news. "How are you?"
Her shoulders fell in disappointment, then drooped further still with guilt. Carlisle's voice was the dearest sound in the world to her and would never be anything less. His just wasn't the voice she most wanted to hear in this particular moment. It wasn't the voice that had been missing from her life for nearly five years.
She focused on the boundless love she felt for Carlisle. She put every bit of her affection behind her answer. "I'm wonderful. I started work on the piano."
"The piano," Carlisle echoed. There was another slight pause. "Well. I'm glad. I can't wait to see it finished."
Esme peered back at the instrument. In her rush to get to the phone, she'd thoughtlessly disturbed the air. The black dust accumulated by her scraping had been blown far beyond the limits of the sheets on the floor. It looked as though a sooty whirlwind had stormed a path straight through the house.
She frowned. It seemed the only expression she ever felt on her face anymore. "Did you tell them?"
"I gave them notice. They weren't happy, but they understood."
"Which story did you use? A new job at a hospital in Georgia?"
"As far as any of them are concerned, you and I couldn't bear another winter here, and we'll be headed south before the end of the month."
Esme flinched. The deadline was so soon, and it sounded too final. She knew they had to go. They had put it off too long already. Obviously, they wouldn't really be moving to Georgia, but they would be moving someplace else. Moving on. Starting over. Just the two of them.
Without…
"I'm going to restore the piano first. Before we leave, I—I'd like to finish the piano."
"You can finish the piano, Esme," Carlisle said, the response immediate, as though the excuse to continue to prolong their stay came as a relief to him too. "Of course you should."