Oxygen (Romance, Completed)

Chapter 2

"Again. Those eight bars should be thunderous. Fortissimo means very loud, not half-hearted," Nomura-sensei said.

Craving my mentor's approval, I tried the middle section of the Bach piece again, his Toccata and Fugue. I longed to play it on an organ one day as Bach had intended, rather than a piano, but no matter what, I still loved the composition. Okasan didn't enjoy the darker music I sometimes channelled, but she'd taken Hisashi out to sit on the terrace, so I had free rein to play as I chose.

"Better. Now, once more from the beginning."

Sensei drilled me through the music three more times before we switched to Mozart and then finished up with something by The Beatles, played by ear. By the time I lifted my hands from the keys, he was shaking his head.

"Your talent is wasted in here, Akari-san. You should allow others to hear your gift."

"I'm not good enough for that."

I'd taken six months of piano lessons as a five-year-old, enough to understand the basics of reading music, but apart from that, I was self-taught. When I was growing up, there simply wasn't the money for regular lessons. Instead, I'd listened to the radio then copied each song on the old upright piano my father had worked overtime every week for three months to buy. Okasan would listen to me play and bring me tea afterwards. See what I mean when I said nothing changed?

As a child, I'd dreamed of attending the Tokyo University of Music to learn the craft properly, and I'd practised every day in the hope of winning a scholarship. Then in my second year of junior high, that dream was snatched away, and I didn't play a note for fifteen years. No, I still had a lot to learn.

"Then have you considered my suggestion?"

A month ago, after I'd played "Bohemian Rhapsody" in four different keys, Sensei asked whether I'd thought about going to college.

"I've been away for too long. I missed out on five years of schooling, and you know how important that is in this country."

Children competed from kindergarten for places at the best universities, and not only had I missed nearly all of high school, but I'd also forgotten most of what I'd learned at elementary as well. In South America, I'd discovered how to survive, but beyond speaking Spanish fluently, little of my knowledge would benefit me in the cutthroat education system.

"What about going to a different country?"

My jaw dropped. "I've only just got home. I can't leave again."

"Why not? I'm an old man, and I won't be able to teach you forever. Besides, your natural ability far surpasses mine. You need the right teacher to help coax it out of you."

I shook my head. "My parents would never leave Tokyo."

"You could go by yourself."

"I can't."

"Why not?"

How did I explain that I'd never done anything alone? My whole life, I'd been surrounded by people, from my parents to my abductors. Yes, I'd hated being treated as a slave, but over the years, I'd grown numb to it. The rapes, the beatings, the way men treated me as an object to be passed around—it became life. I stopped waking up every morning and wishing for things to be different because I didn't believe they ever would. Then when I'd given up hope, Hisashi's father helped me to see the silver lining in a world of black clouds.

And in all that time, I'd never been on my own. I'd never needed to make decisions or hold any responsibility or set my own schedule. Nothing scared me more.

"I just can't."

Sensei took my hands, so pale because they rarely saw the sun, in his wizened fingers. Even now, when he was in his mid-seventies, few could play the piano better than him. The idea that he thought I would one day be able to was almost as far-fetched as me leaving Japan.