A Stranger Called Master Read Free Page A

the
centerpiece of the entire chapel.
    “Play me something,” he whispers.
    “I haven’t practiced in ages,” I
say, but still I sit down on the bench, my fingers itching to feel the keys. My
hands have a mind of their own and find their place and soon one of my ballads
flows through me. The haunting arpeggios fill the nave and I’m swept away like
a petal in the rapids. The crescendo, the suspense, the
waning, the give and letting go. The song is a world in itself, gripping
me in its thrall.
    My eyelids flutter closed as the
melancholy builds and memories come alive in my mind. I’m writing this song in
my living room, my mother ironing clothes upstairs. No matter how many mistakes
I fumble through, her applause would echo down the stairs and she’d call out,
“Beautiful!” Proud of me, no matter what. Can she hear
me now? Is she still proud of me, wherever she is?
    Tears seep through my lashes and
before I know it, the final note whispers through the hall. Everything is
silent. I’m back in Duane Hall.
    “That was...amazing,” he says. If
he noticed my tears, he doesn’t bring it up. “What song is that?”
    “It doesn’t have a name,” I say. I
was never that great with lyrics or poetry, so I didn’t bother giving my songs
a title besides “The Sad One,” “The Catchy One,” or “The One That Makes Me
Dance.”
    “You mean you wrote that? You said
you could play, but I didn’t know you could play .”
    I blush at the compliment.
“Courtesy of years and years of slaving away at this thing, I damn well better
be able to play,” I say.
    “Are you a music major? You should be. At like, Juilliard.”
    The reminder of what I could be
stings, but I force myself to say it. “No, I couldn’t. There was too much stress.
I blew my audition at Juilliard. I’m studying English lit now.”
    I pull the cover over the keys and
push the bench back in its place. I neglect to clarify that the audition wasn’t
too bad but there was too much stress at
home .
    “Well, then you can save all your
songs for me. A private concert just for your Master,” he says. It’s a sweet
consolation. Someone else in the world to share my music with, since my mom...
    “There’s one more thing,” he says,
taking my hand. In a flash we’re bounding up flights and flights of stairs,
private passages closed to the students.
    We reach a door I’ve never seen
before, but it’s locked. With a bold sign shouting DO NOT ENTER.
    He nudges me out of the way,
fiddles with the knob, and it swings open with a creak.
    “How’d you...?” I say, but he’s
already climbing the stone steps. I follow at his heels and when we stop, I
realize we’re at the top.
    Of the tower of
Duane Hall.
    We’re sheltered from the rain, but
the windows have no glass or screen, letting us peer out onto the campus. Only
ten stories high, but still everyone looks like miniature dolls below us. The
campus is dark, save for sparkling streetlamps and a few lit windows in the
dormitories. The skyline blurs with the horizon in the summer shower, the moon
dim and shy, hiding behind gauzy clouds.
    “Looks like we’re in a Van Gogh,” I
murmur. “Or straight out of The Hunchback of Notre Dame .”
    “What are you trying to say?” he
laughs. “You’re stuck in a tower with a hunchback?”
    “ Haha , no. More like Frollo the evil lecherous priest!” I joke as he swats my ass.
    “Yeah right. I’m clearly the dashing guy on a horse, whatever-his-name-is.”
    “Phoebus,” I laugh. “He was an
egotistical asshole.”
    “The characters in that book don’t
give me much of a choice. Meanwhile, you’d obviously be Esmeralda, the object
of everyone’s affection. I can’t win this game!” he mock yells to the sky,
shaking his fist in the air.
    I smirk, but he’s right. He’s like
no one I’ve ever met or read about before. Unless maybe, if you combine the two
halves of the Beast--his dark, dangerous side with his gorgeous do-no-wrong
face.
    “Well I