Today would have been Alan’s 48th birthday. Even now, more than twelve years after his death, I find it hard to clearly articulate what he meant to me. The phrase “force of nature” may be over-used, but it is not inaccurate. If anything, it feels like an understatement. Alan wasn’t a force of nature for me, he was a source of magic. Kind, funny, brilliant, talented, adventurous with a touch of mad scientist and a pinch of jack ass.
He introduced real joy into my life. Later, he introduced love into the life of my best friend. It was not a storybook romance, but it is a love story that deserves to be told.
My latest novel in progress is based on the true love story of Alan and Brian. I have changed not only their names, but also the sexes of two characters (I prefer to write about the experiences of women and girls). What follows is the first chapter of this novel in which Alan appears as he was in life, not just in his fictional guise of Althea.
Happy Birthday, Alan.
Chapter One: Some Kind of Something
Iowa Youth Orchestra Invitational. March 25th, 1985
The boy in the flute section keeps glowing at me. I should be concentrating on the second viola line of Copland but there he is: just beyond the conductor’s wildly gesticulating arms, directly in my line of sight, glowing. Boys playing flute are rare, but glowing, flute playing boys? Unreal. Very distracting.
His golden blonde hair, styled in that asymmetrical way that makes even the most boring person look instantly cool and rebellious, falls across the right side of his angular face in a perfectly imperfect wave. His eyes could be any colour. I decide on golden brown. It fits his colour scheme. So does his cream-coloured dress shirt and bow tie worn with, of all things, stonewashed, tight-rolled jeans.
Supernatural and a snappy dresser, I remark to myself, awed on so many levels.
The glow begins at the back of his head, like a saint’s halo. From there, it trickles in a waterfall of light over the rest of him—even casting a faint shimmer over the people around him. It’s not quite golden sunshine and not quite silvery moonlight. Soonslight? Munline? I need better words.
Long, slender fingers dance across his flute. I wonder if he’s any good. Everyone here is at least a little bit good if not brilliant. I decide he is a prodigy; born with otherworldly musical talent. He’s definitely some kind of something. A child of Orpheus. Or Apollo. A godlike parent might explain his glow.
Am I really the only one who can see this? I peel my eyes away from him to peek at the people around me. No one else stares, goggled-eyed or open-mouthed at this boy. It makes no sense. There’s an angel glowing in the flute section, people. Get your eyes off your music stands and just look!
No one looks. Except me. I look plenty. I try not to stare. I try to stop the strange thoughts and images galloping through my brain, which include swapping his dress shirt for a toga and his flute for a lyre. I turn my attention back to Copland (where it belongs), but The Boy in the Flute Section keeps on glowing.
Sometimes, my imagination doesn’t so much run away with me as gallop wildly ahead while I cling desperately to the saddle of sense. This is one of those times. I decide not to fight it—to just bask in his glow and imagine the possibilities. Elf? Druid? They were good at music. Angel? Nymph? Were there male nymphs?
The girl on my right kicks me.
‘Lenny,’ First Chair Viola Megan growls under her breath. ‘What is your problem?’
‘Huh?’ I grunt, disoriented; the glow from the boy in the flute section still pulsing at the corner of my eye.
‘You missed the embellishments on the bridge,’ hisses Megan.
‘I did?’
‘What is up with you?’ she whispers through her teeth.
‘I can’t help it,’ I protest, flustered into honesty. ‘That guy in the flute section keep glowing at me.’
Megan’s eyebrows crumple under her streaked hair of indeterminate colour, bangs backcombed to the ceiling. She looks from me to the glowing flutist and back again with a confused expression.
‘He’s not glaring at you, Lenny,’ she snaps. ‘Get over yourself.’
‘Not glaring, glo—’ I begin to correct her, then give up. ‘Whatever,’ I sigh.
I wipe sweaty hands on my wide-whale corduroy pants; dig my nails into the grooves of the fabric to root myself back into the real world. Back to Copland. Thank goodness this is only a rehearsal. I turn my body toward Megan, away from the woodwinds, positioning Chordelia carefully to block my view of the glowing boy.
Megan gives a superior sniff, straightens her spine and tosses her hair, which might have been an impressive gesture if her hair wasn’t sprayed into immobility. I’m sure I hear her mumble ‘children,’ under her breath.
Not a children, Megan, I want to retort. I’m thirteen. Almost.
Since Megan is seventeen, this would not impress her. And she isn’t totally wrong. I am one of the youngest people here at The Iowa Youth Orchestra Invitational. Youth Orchestra is usually reserved for older kids—the sixteen to eighteen crowd. This isn’t a rule, more like a tradition and a practicality. No one younger than sixteen has the skills or experience to earn a place.
But there were a few of us who do. I am one of three middle school kids here with the big, scary high schoolers, performing in the not exactly famous but not totally unknown Pioneer Music Hall of Griffin College in my hometown of Stella, Iowa. Woodwinds to the right of me. Cellos to the left. Chordelia on my shoulder. Somewhere in the cello section, my older brother Hector bows like he’s declaring war on music and pretends I don’t exist.
Chordelia is the reason I’m here. I named my first viola Chord-elia when I was nine. I thought it was the coolest, smartest name in the world. Lots of kids play cello, lots of kids play violin, but not many play viola. We are a rare breed. A string between. There simply aren’t enough of us to fill the Youth Orchestra viola section, which is why I am here, standing out like a sore, sticky with childishness, thumb.
How old is glowing flute boy? I wonder idly as I wait for my part to come up in the Copland piece. He looks tall (though it is impossible to tell since he’s sitting down), but his face looks boyish. My eyes flick back to him, peering down Chordelia’s fingerboard.
Yep. Still glowing.
Maybe he’s a changeling. Part fairy, part human. Changelings are meant to be beautiful and talented and—
‘His name’s Jordan,’ interrupts a sharp voice from my left. I freeze—embarrassed that someone has not only caught me staring but correctly identified who I am staring at. ‘He’s kind of a dickhead,’ the voice adds.
What? Impossible! He’s not a dickhead, he’s an angel.
I want to turn and confront the voice, but don’t dare. It belongs to a cellist. Not my brother (thank goodness), but I tend to lump all cellists with him under the title of “Evil Forces in the World.”
I shake my shoulders, casting off the evil cellist’s irritating remarks, and concentrate on the music. When morning rehearsal breaks for lunch, I pack up Chordelia and march from Pioneer Hall to the adjoining greenroom without meeting anyone’s eyes. The bags and jackets belonging to the members of the Iowa Youth Orchestra hang in a series of huge closets which stretch across the back of the greenroom. I open the one labelled with a laminated rectangle of white cardboard reading: “String Section”.
The next thing I do isn’t planned. It’s automatic. Unconscious. Old habit. My free hand reaches though the layers of coats and bags to probe the back of the closet. I knock. Wait. Press my palm against the solid wood surface. Wait again.
‘Looking for lampposts?’ chuckles a sharp voice over my shoulder. It’s the evil cellist who’s not my brother again.
‘Superstitious,’ I murmur, embarrassed at getting caught.
Still not looking the cellist in the eye, I deposit Chordelia on the top shelf, grab my brown paper lunch bag, bury my face in my turtleneck and find a quiet place in corner of the greenroom to eat. I would rather go outside for lunch, even if the weather is a bit chilly. I know just where I would go too: The Faulconer Garden. It’s just around the corner from Pioneer Hall, small and secret. No one else in the Iowa Youth Orchestra would know about it since most of them are from out of town.
But I don’t think we’re allowed to leave, so I slide down the wall to the floor for a practise room picnic. The peanut butter and honey sandwich I made that morning has somehow bent in half. I smooth it out and try to keep my eye contact focused on my lunch. If I look up, someone might take it as an invitation and I am in no mood to invite. Hector sits in the centre of a circle of older kids who all know each other from previous Youth Orchestra events. I hear him holding court in the middle of the room; impressing everyone. They just love him.
Until Glowing Jordan of the Flutes walks through the door. Half the room, even Hector, turns to stare at him the same way I did. He doesn’t shine like he did in the hall, but the fluorescent lighting in the greenroom make everyone look washed out. I was right about him being tall.
He is something for sure.
Tonight, I decide, thoughtfully chewing my sandwich, I will find my diary and make a note of him. Glowing Flute Boy Jordan will be my Exhibit: C or possibly Exhibit E. I’m not sure which letter I’m on anymore in my quest to prove that magic still exists.
Magic isn’t drawn very often to Stella, Iowa. Why would it be? It’s a nothing little town in the middle of a cornfield. Hardly a place for elves or ogres or dragons. I make my observations and my notes, but I know that if I really want to explore the magic traces that remain, I’ll have to go further afield someday.
But that boy in the flute section. I think, mind drifting back into the present. He’s some kind of something.
I’m so absorbed in my lunch and my theory, I don’t notice the girl staring at me. She’ll remind me of this later and I will pay for it. I don’t know it yet, but she will be my Exhibit: F, G, H… Exhibit: Rest of the Alphabet.
She is Althea Ray. And she is definitely some kind of something.
Katharine Eisley 