They took the subway from the restaurant to his place. After he’d gotten used to being alone in the house he’d rearranged the living room to accommodate a new stereo system, relegating his parents’ old system to his bedroom. The living room had excellent acoustics, and the top-of-the-line gear he’d splurged on demanded nothing less. The CD player, his latest acquisition, had cost close to a grand. The other components had set him back even more.
She settled into the recliner in the prime listening position, equidistant from the two floor-standing speakers. He brought her a glass of the Chardonnay he’d picked out for the occasion, poured some for himself, then watched her as she took in the array of knobs and dials on the equipment rack.
“So where’s this cool thing you just bought?”
He pointed at the CD player. “It’s the first model to come out. They say it’ll revolutionize hi-fi.”
“Looks impressive.” She gazed at the power amplifier, preamplifier, tuner and turntable. “All this stuff must’ve cost a fortune. At least a few hundred, right?”
Jonah told her how much, and her eyebrows shot up.
“I guess you’ve got a good security system,” she said.
“I’m shopping around for one.” He stepped over to a shelf laden with vinyl records, pulled out a boxed set and removed a disc. “I want you to hear this first. It’s the classical piece I was telling you about. It’s not out on CD yet.”
He opened the acrylic lid of the turntable and placed the record on the platter, tightening it down with the clamp that attached to the spindle. He carefully cleaned the stylus with a tiny brush dipped in a special solution, pressed a button to rotate the record at thirty-three revolutions per minute and passed an anti-static brush over the surface. Ever so gently, he then lifted the tonearm from its cradle. After nudging it into alignment, he flicked a lever to lower it onto the first track.
“Gustav Mahler’s Second Symphony,” he announced. “Also known as the Resurrection Symphony.”
He sat down just as the bass strings of the London Symphony Orchestra growled out the opening notes. She started, and he got up to adjust the volume. When the violins joined in he was struck by a harshness in the upper midrange. He tolerated it for a minute or so before stopping the record.
“The speaker cables are still new, too,” he explained. “They need another fifty hours to break in. That’s why the violins sound rough.”
“They sound pretty good to me.”
“They should sound sweeter, more open. The imaging should be more precise.”
“You must have golden ears,” she said.
He put on the second disc of the two-record set and played the fourth movement—the Urlicht or “Primeval Light,” as it was titled. The most important thing here wasn’t the orchestra’s string section but Helen Watts’ angelic voice.
“It’s so sad,” Crystal commented on the singing. “What language is that?”
He told her it was German and translated: Man lies in greatest need. Man lies in greatest pain. I would much rather be in heaven. He paused, admiring her beauty as she listened with her eyes closed. I belong to God and to God I want to return, he finished after the melody changed key. Dear God will give me a light. Will light my way to eternal bliss.
“I like the last part,” she said when the song had ended. “Do you have any rock?”
He played his new Billy Joel CD, the 52nd Street album. She loosened up, swaying to the rhythm of “Big Shot.” He was still painfully aware of the harshness in the upper midrange—it was even worse than it had been on the Mahler record. Regardless, he couldn’t take his eyes off her, couldn’t ignore the desire raging inside him. When “Honesty” started he got out of his chair, bent down beside her and kissed her on the mouth.
They moved to the couch and made out. As “Honesty” gave way to “My Life” she let him unbutton her blouse, and for a while he was oblivious of his surroundings, of the flawed sound coming from the speakers. He thought he heard her murmur his name at one point, but when his hand strayed to her panties she resisted.
“Not yet,” she said softly. “I need…just give me time.”
He ran his fingers through her hair, trying to act as if he wasn’t taken aback.
“I really like you,” he half whispered. “I’ve always liked you.”
“I like you, too.”
They kissed some more, listened to the rest of the album. Later he walked her back to the subway.
“Let’s get together again soon,” she suggested.
He was going to invite her to the Toronto Symphony Orchestra’s upcoming concert, but she preempted him.
“Do you want to see me in a movie?”
Of course he did, he was quick to reply.
So they made a date to see Class of 1984 together, a drama about a high-school music teacher’s clash with a gang of delinquents. It had been filmed in the city and was opening in theatres next weekend. She was an extra in it, she told him proudly.
He got his transmission fixed, and around half past seven on Saturday he picked her up at her apartment. An hour later they were sitting side by side in the crowded theatre, watching the movie.
She appeared in only one scene. The setting was a downtown street at night, where the delinquents had just piled out of a club and the music teacher’s inebriated colleague was trying to run them over in his car. Crystal was an anonymous passerby in the background. She was on-screen for maybe three seconds.
Afterwards he took her to an upscale Italian restaurant. She talked about being an extra and complained it was hard to make a living as an actress, that her parents had discouraged her from even trying. His tongue loosened by wine, he told her how close he’d been to his own parents, how music like the Resurrection Symphony had given him solace since he’d lost them—while part of him doubted that people survived death and went to heaven, another part liked to believe that such a place existed and his parents deserved to be there. He caught himself getting emotional and switched the subject back to Crystal’s family. She, too, was an only child, but she’d had a falling out with her mom and dad and wasn’t in contact with them anymore.
“What happened?” he probed, then saw how she looked away. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”
“We were arguing all the time,” she said. “They didn’t like some of my friends. They…stopped talking to me. We’re still not talking.”
Jonah was itching to ask why her parents didn’t like those friends and if her boyfriend had been one of them, but he sensed he’d touched a sore spot, that it would be better not to press her on the subject.
“I hope you can work things out,” he said. “They have to talk with you sooner or later. They’re your parents, after all.”
Crystal shrugged. “What I don’t get is they used to tell me it’s good to forgive, it’s the Christian thing to do. To err is human, to forgive divine. You know the old saying. They drilled that into me and didn’t practice what they preached.”
With a twinge of guilt he thought of his ex-girlfriend, the one he’d caught cheating. She’d made a tearful show of remorse, had practically begged him to give their relationship another chance, but he’d dumped her anyway—his anger and distrust had proved insurmountable.
Crystal was quiet as he drove her home. Something else seemed to be weighing on her, eating away at her. All the same, when they got back to her apartment she invited him inside. She had a simple, basic stereo system in her living room. After a few beers and a joint, with Cat Stevens playing on the turntable, they made out again, and again she stopped short of going all the way, telling him she still needed just a little more time. She sounded reluctant, torn between waiting and letting herself go.
“Is something bothering you?” he asked her.
“I’m okay,” she insisted.
“I’m not…getting in the way or anything, am I?”
“What do you mean?”
“You said you broke up with your boyfriend. I was just wondering if—”
“We’re still seeing each other?”
He nodded.
“It’s over,” she said, and took his hand in hers. “It’s been over for a long time, but he didn’t want to admit it. Even though we kept fighting. The only way to break up was to go cold turkey. So I told him to move out of here.”
“I didn’t know he was living with you. Did he give you any trouble?”
“I told him if he moved I wouldn’t blame him for anything. I said I’d always be his friend. That made it easier for him. He’s gone now, thank God.”
Jonah looked her in the eye. Was she acting? He could have sworn she was genuinely relieved her boyfriend had left.
“I want us to be together,” he said, holding on to her hand. The rapturous middle movement of Rachmaninov’s third piano concerto began playing in his head, Earl Wild at the keyboard and Jascha Horenstein conducting the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. “I really do like you a lot. I can’t help it.”
“But you hardly know me.”
“It doesn’t matter. I think I’d like you no matter what.”
Was that a flicker of surprise in her expression? Surprise and scepticism?
“I know I would,” Jonah declared. Earl Wild and the Royal Philharmonic were urging him along.
“Really? Even if I did something…you didn’t like?”
“Even then. I’d forgive you.”
“Is that a promise?”
“What a question,” he said. “Are you planning to do something I won’t like?”
“I’m not doing anything,” She was on her fourth beer, her eyes sleepy, her lips beckoning him. “I’m staying right here with you.”
Unable to control himself any longer, he pulled her towards him. “It’s a promise.”
He kissed her again, more aggressively. He smelled the alcohol on her breath as she kissed him back, felt the buzz from what he’d drunk and smoked. Before he could think too much about what they’d said to each other, he stumbled onto the floor with her, and this time, clumsily but passionately, they did go all the way.
