It had been years since anyone had come. But one day I knew someone had opened the lid, and I opened my eyes after years of sleep. I saw little fingers reaching over the keys. This player was very rough, but I saw a light in his eyes when he played. His playing was never unbearable no matter how many mistakes he made. Yes, this little boy had the light.  I could hear his mother calling him back to do his studies, and I saw his fingers hesitatingly lift off the keys, and his little legs slowly slide off the bench. I heard him speaking to his mother in a backroom:

“When's daddy coming?”

“He might be back tonight, but let's not get our hopes up.”

The boy sighed softly and I could just barely hear the rough scratch of his pen on paper.  I looked around at the room:  it was rather shabby, and could barely fit a couch and a tv. I was surprised that this family could accommodate me. I was rather large and grand, after all.  The light coming from the windows looked like morning-light to me. I waited for the boy that day.  He came back when the room was moonlit and looked out the window-perhaps to see if his dad had pulled up, I thought. He sauntered over to me, very tired and mournful. But when he began to play it seemed that his energy kicked up again, as if he had been drinking the coffee that the adults always seemed to have with them when they’d come to play. They’d spill it on me often. This boy endeavored to take good care of me though: at random intervals he’d leave and come back with a dirty rag to wipe me down. As I watched him play, I asserted that the boy respected me. It had been a while since I’d had a friend.

I had been waiting for someone like this boy. Sure, years ago my situation was much better. I had been stationed at the Carnegie Hall, with its ornate walls and flowery pomp, but my players were all tiresome and stressed. One day one of my pedals broke off, and the next day they took me out of the Carnegie Hall and into a large truck. They drove me to a warehouse, set me down in the back, and locked those great big doors. I slept for a long time and no one played me. How many years has it really been? I thought.  I saw a newspaper in the corner of my new room that read: The New York Times, Feb. 12th, 2009. The last time I remembered being awake was when they put me in the warehouse in 1991. It felt strange to be in a simple house now, with a normal family. Now the boy played a new melody he’d discovered. Perhaps the little one would be a composer, I thought. His mother called him again for bed, he frowned, hit one last rebellious note, and pranced off to his mother. I thought I might like it there.

It must have been midnight when I saw the front door open.  A man with dark circles under his eyes and a shiny brief-case walked in, and he glanced at me with surprise and astonishment. He had the same light in his eyes as the boy when he saw me, but they darkened quickly again and he walked out of the room.

At sunrise I could hear the low groans and incessant typing of the man in a room behind me.  After a little while he came in my room and sat perched like a hawk on the couch, his fiercely crossed legs scrunched up against the edge. But his typing fingers moved with a calm grace. They were elongated fingers, and his thumbs moved with elasticity, like he had once reached across octaves for one of Beethoven’s sonatas, or ran down the keys in a Tchaikovsky-nocturne.  I had seen many piano-hands, but I recognized his hands. They stood out to me. They were familiar.

“Daddy!” the boy came in an hour later. He ran and jumped on the man’s lap, crushing one of the computer keys. But the man didn’t notice. He tossed the boy in the air.

“When did mom buy the piano?” said the man.

“Yesterday,” said the boy with a grin.

“I hope it wasn’t too expensive,” said the man routinely; there was some pain in his eyes when he said it.

“Bill is an old piano,” said the boy solemnly.

I’d never had a name.

“Bill is his name, I see.”

“Could you teach me daddy?”

“Not this week, maybe when I get back from my next conference.”

“But you just got back. You should stay this time and teach me, please!"

The man smiled but he didn’t respond. He coughed suddenly.

******

It was raining heavily, and the pitter-patter sounded like notes. It was the only music I had heard in a long time. The boy had stopped playing me. The father never came around anymore.  The mother wore black all the time.

The boy came in the room and stared at the rain with a blank look in his wide eyes. He shivered, though a fire was near. His mother came in, looked at him, and sat down beside him.

“Why don’t you play Bill honey? It make take your mind off your dad,” she said while she stroked his messy hair. She said the word ‘dad’ under her breath.
The boy shrugged, looked over at me, and looked at the window again.
I heard a few soft knocks on the door. The mother rose and walked over to it with the look of someone who could never be surprised by anything-everything surprising had already happened.  When she opened the door, I heard an unfamiliar voice:

“Hello Charlotte, how are you holding up?...of course, well I have brought some things from his town office, in case you wanted to have them…… is there anything else I can do for you….Charlotte?”

“No, but thank you for the things Maryanne.”

“Of course, I’ll leave you now. Tell Joey I say hi.”

That was when I first learned the boy’s name.

“Maryanne brought of a lot of your dad’s things,” said the mother to the little figure still staring at the window.

“A watch, a fountain pen, a recording of the Moonlight Sonata, by Beethoven.”

The mother's eyes moved over the Beethoven cd and her fingers traced it sentimentality. She had the look of someone remembering something very perfect. With a breath like she was mustering up courage, she put the cd in a stereo near the boy- perhaps hoping it would distract him. She left the room with a look of tenderness at the boy.

Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata began to play. Suddenly the boy turned from the window, the wrinkles in his forehead relaxed, and I saw that light begin to grown again. He stood mesmerized by the stereo. At the end, with the last C minor chord fading out of hearing, he remained frozen for a few moments. Then he got up and walked over to me. He slid slowly onto the bench, and began to play.

He was playing Beethoven’s moonlight sonata note for note and measure for measure till the whole piece was complete, and nearly perfect. Memorized, after one listen. Then I remembered. I had only known one other man able to do that.  The boy’s father.