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once.
    My eyes flick between the hill and the sky like a metronome as my heartbeat pounds in my ears, my breath heaving my chest. My fingers pluck the piece of their own accord.
    Two, four, six starbursts explode; the very colors of my gown.
    Brighton sets gaslights blazing, one by one, which flicker and are somehow magnified, perhaps by prisms? An eerie mist rises across the hillside, hiding him from me. I grind my teeth in irritation, a primal need to imbibe of his presence, overwhelming every bit of me.
    I stare at Marietta in the row ahead of me and see the gooseflesh on her pudgy arm. She has seen him as well.
    He has not departed. Please, let him still be up there .
    My chest aches. I fight the urge to cast down the cello and leap into the bay; to swim and swim. Till I find him, wet and cold, and let his skin warm mine.
    Constant explosions light the sky, white and cornflower blue, raining down across the bay, again and again like luminescent raindrops.
    The light show reflects in the water, mirror-like, like Alice’s Wonderland looking glass, come to life.
    I picture the upturned faces of mermaids and sea creatures staring up at the surface in awe.
    And my fingers stray.
    The mourning tune they play does not match the joy and rebelliousness of the dancing lights overhead. Of his soul.
    I stray from the piece. Throwing the entire orchestra off.
    The music halts in a jangle of discordant notes. Except for my cello.
    I compose on command.
    I stare, enraptured by the lights, my arm sawing in perfect synchrony with every burst of light. I wince in pain as my fingers stroke the neck of my cello, following Brighton’s lead.
    With every fiery burst of color, staccato notes. With streaming showers of sparks— long, melodic pulls of my bow across the vibrating strings .
    Jonesy recovers first. He accompanies me, following my lead on his violin, as best he can.
    A few brave souls follow suite, their instruments playing harmony about my melody.
    All the patron’s eyes stray back to the sky. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a woman cover her chest, overcome with emotion.
    I spy another couple join hands and a third press her trembling lips together at the beauty—the marriage of light and sound.
    I writhe and ache, following his lead, keeping time with his lights with my fingers.
    His lights tell a story, as does my music.
    It is as if our minds are dancing, sharing a wavelength, and he doesn’t even know it.
    Or does he?
    I finally see him, through the mist. His face severe with emotion, his head cocked in question.
    The boat is close enough he can hear the music. My music.
    His stare skips through the crowd till he finds me and our eyes connect.
    Gooseflesh tears across my chest, down my back and stomach. The heat on my chest relights and I fight the urge to scratch it.
    Finally the show concludes in a maelstrom of booms and pop, pop, pops of sparkling blazes. As if heaven has exploded, and its stars are escaping to earth.
    I halt, chest heaving, sweating and breathless.
    Fear stops my heart, realizing what I’ve done.
    Jonesy’s foot taps in anxious accord with my heartbeat.
    Then a great resounding , applause . It rings through the night, almost as loudly as Brighton’s fireworks.
    Men and women shoot to a standing ovation. It begins on the lower deck, and then spreads like an ocean wave to engulf the upper as well.
    My eyes find Silas—his face beet-red. But as he observes the crowd’s reaction, his expression gives way to rapture, and he too begins to slowly clap. My stomach plummets to wallow in relief to my boots.
    Brighton turns his stare to me, with the same worshipful gaze, for a heart-halting moment.
    And is gone.
    * * *
    After my victory on the riverboat, my bed couldn’t hold me. Sleep eluded me much the same way the cool winds tried but could never quite manage to breech the ever-warm Charleston shallows.
    I steal out of the cottage, praying Sarah will not wake and panic in my absence.
    I know my plan to