Ancia

(This is the rough draft of the first few pages. Please feel free to comment on this, keeping that in mind!!)



          She gazed out her bedroom window, over the quiet streets and wondered. She wondered what the future would hold. Would she one day live among the stars? Would she achieve all those dreams she had? What was New York City going to be like a few years, months, decades from now?
          She had all these questions in her head as she pulled out her journal and started writing. She wrote slowly, deliberately. She wanted to get it all down, not leave anything out. She felt that this would one day be very important, though she couldn't pin down why. She wasn't planning to let anyone read it and she didn't really want to talk about it. She wanted to remember her journal as a safe and private place that no one else could go. She didn't want to have to worry about anyone being in it or seeing what she was writing.
         She dated the page...and began.

6th July 2006
 
          Today it happened all over again. Just like clockwork. I woke up from that horrifying dream and was covered in sweat, shaking, and not sure where I was or what was going on. It took time for me to realize that it was morning and that I was in my bedroom at home and that no one was touching me. I thought that getting out of the city and moving away for my new job after college would stop the night mares, but I think they're worse now than they were when I lived with mom and dad or in the dorms! I just don't know what to do. I can't tell mom and dad, they'll freak out and I'll never hear the end of it. Why didn't I say something sooner? Why have I waited this long?
          Mikela said that I should talk to a counselor. I thought she was nuts, but then decided that maybe she had a good idea. So, I did some research and found a counselor that had high marks. She had a lot of helpful advice, including further visits. The entire four years I was there, I saw her every week. She said that the chances were very high that this was a real memory and that I wasn't just dreaming things. I told her that it had happened too long ago for me to be remembering it in this detail, and she said that often when one starts having memories of a long ago event, it can be very clear, as if it was happening right then and there.
          I thought she was nuts. I kept going, though, because it was helping. She saw me change, she said, from an angry young girl to a woman that was getting a grip on life. She loved how I was able to get up every morning and not burst into tears from the dreams. She said I was making progress, because I could be a few feet from a boy and not run in terror. After my first semester of orchestra, I didn't have a panic attack when the second chair violinist was male. I was able to open up to my brother and sister who said I should talk to mom and dad right away. I said I didn't know why, there was nothing they could do. I may have been a music performance major, but I took the course in political science that was required. The statute of limitations would have run it's course by now.
          Vladimir was living across campus from me at the time and was studying political science. (He is in law school now, and doing well, by the way.) He said he was going to look into things and see if there was anything that could be done. I told him he needn't bother, but he insisted. Andrea is also in law school now and she's doing the same thing. They really want me to talk to mom and dad, but I can't. I just can't.
 
 
         Ancia closed the journal and chewed on the tip of her pen. She knew that she had to talk to her parents. She had to tell them what had happened. But she didn't want to. She knew they wouldn't believe her. They would say that all her acting out had just been her not wanting to conform. That all those times she had run away or skipped class or shouted obscenities at her mother or father had just been her being a rebel. The wouldn't believe that anyone in the family would be capable of this. Or would they? She felt herself starting to cry again, and she took a deep breath, wiping her face, then standing.
          She gazed out the window of her apartment and looked around her. The trees were still in full bloom, as it was still summer. She had lived here a year already and hadn't taken time to stop and notice how pretty Baltimore was. Her apartment looked over a park and the landlord had allowed her to paint. Being an art minor, she had painted a mural of sheet music in the living room. She had thought she was painting notes that made no sense, but when she played them on her violin, she realized that she had composed a beautiful melody. She had used accent colours on all the trim, and her bedroom was a soft violet. She had purchased a book on how to paint for moods, and she wanted her bedroom to be a center of calm.
          The second bedroom was her pride and joy, however. She'd used screens to separate it into her work area for bill paying and her relaxation area, for reading and practice. She'd filled the relaxation space with big, fluffy pillows, comfortable throws and blankets and plenty of books. She had her violin there, ready at any moment for her to pick it up and play it. She'd used the view of the lake outside the window for her inspiration when painting the room, and it looked as though the lake was reflected in the room.
          The kitchen she had left white, but had broken her own “rule” and painted the trim red. Bright, passionate red. She loved red the best, and hoped that one day, she could sit down to a romantic meal with her beau...once she met him. She noted that a romantic supper for one was not so much romantic as pathetic. But, if she couldn't get over her abject fear of men, she'd never marry and she'd never have that romantic supper.
 
 
          Ancia took a deep breath and turned from the window. She went into the living room, and sat down on the couch. She turned on the stereo and let the sounds of Beethoven run her over in waves. She had to learn this concerto soon, or her place at concert master of the orchestra might be in jeopardy. She wasn't with the Baltimore Symphony yet, but she was working her way up. This was more of a municipal orchestra, a stepping stone, as the director had described it. But it would give her the chance she needed to do solo's with a few orchestra's and get herself established. If nothing else, it paid the rent. She listened to the melody, how the instruments wound together, how they danced here and cried there. She knew it by heart, so often had she listened to it.
          At it's conclusion, she stood, switching off the stereo and picked up the phone. She started dialing her parents. She had to do this, and she couldn't put it off any longer. She listened to it ring and ring and ring. They must be out, she thought. Did they have to sing tonight? She could never keep track of her parents schedule at the Metropolitan Opera. She knew they were going to be touring soon, but she didn't know when. The ringing stopped and she waited for the machine to kick on. Instead, she heard breathlessness and then a gasping voice.
          “Dad?” she asked, unsure if she even had the right number. What could she have caught him in the middle of?
          “Ancia?” he returned, his breathing returning to normal.
          “Yeah...am I interrupting anything?” she asked, almost afraid to know.
          “No! We were all just out in the yard and Gab asked me if the phone was ringing. I ran inside to get it.”
          “Oh, well, if this isn't a good time, I'll call back another time.”
          “It's never a bad time for my baby girl,” he said, and she could hear the smile in his voice. All eight of his girls were his 'baby girl'. His four boys were glad they weren't called baby anything. Just 'my boys'. She almost wished she'd been a boy to avoid being called baby. “What's on your mind?”
          “Well, it's something I need to come home for, actually,” she said, trying not to let her voice quiver.
          “What's wrong? Do you need money?” he asked.
          “No, I'm fine in that area for now,” she assured him. “I've gotten a lot of solo work, and that really helps. This is something different. Scary. Personal. I need to talk to you and mom together in private.” There, she'd started saying it.
          “Well, if you're sure...you can always come home, anytime. Do you need train fare?” her father asked, and she could hear the worry in his voice.
          “I've got plenty. I've got the weekend free, I could be home Thursday night and stay until Sunday.”
          “We've also got that time period free, since our tour got canceled,” he said. “We'll meet you at the train station at what time?”
          “I've got a concert first, so probably around nine that night?”
          “I'll be there, then. I can't wait to see you, and neither can your siblings.”
          “I miss them, too,” she said. “Love you dad, and see you tomorrow night.”
          He returned the sentiment, then hung up. She sighed, glancing at the clock. If she didn't get going now, she'd miss rehearsal, and then she wouldn't have train fair after all.
 
 
          “Come on everyone! Let's get our seats!” Danieal Parson was a fierce looking guy with a heart of gold. He knew that the people before him were young, most just out of college. He also knew that they had a lot of talent and that most of them would go on to play in professional orchestra's around the world. For now, though, they had to start somewhere and the municipal orchestra it was.
          Once everyone had taken their seats, Danieal flipped open the score and looked at the sea of young and old faces alike. They were ready, poised to raise their instruments at a moments flick of the baton, and they would play with passion usually reserved for the performance. He heard pages rustling, and he raised his baton. Instruments went up, their players poised for take off, their faces frozen in concentration, no doubt already five measures ahead of the music. With a swift upswing of his baton, the concerto began.