Composing Amelia Read online

  This could be it, she thought as she ended the piece and danced to the kitchen to forage for dinner. This could be the beginning of it all.

  Marcus smiled as Amelia’s message played on his phone. “Good for you, babe,” he murmured to himself in the quiet of the library. He wasn’t surprised that she’d made it through the first round of auditions. She was so gifted. He wasn’t very knowledgeable when it came to music, but the first time he’d heard her play he’d known she had a future. She just had that “it” factor. And although he knew that musical theater wasn’t her dream job, it was better than nothing. If only it paid a little better so she could ditch the dreaded sandwich shop.

  His excitement for Amelia morphed to guilt when he returned the phone to his pocket and his hand felt the letter he’d stuffed there. He’d had plenty of chances to tell Amelia about it since its arrival yesterday, but each time he’d chickened out. Granted, he’d written off the job opening at first. But the longer he had it, the more he found himself considering it. He just didn’t know what to do next.

  The rain that had begun falling a couple hours ago showed no signs of letting up. He hoped Amelia had reached home before it started. He sat in the library’s reading room, eyes trained on the street light outside that illuminated the falling rain, waiting for it to lighten up so he could walk home without getting drenched. His thoughts began to wander, first to the letter, then to the positions he’d applied for but had lost to other candidates, then to the ministry dreams he’d held for the last four years: a city like LA or Chicago or New York; a multicultural church making a difference in its community; Amelia playing in the worship band or working with disadvantaged youth like she’d done alongside him during college. He would be a pastor, one of a handful who shared the responsibilities of teaching and shepherding the congregation, and would help lead the church even deeper into the plights of the city, showing its members how to shine their light in the darkest corners.

  The job described in the letter was nothing like this. Not in a big city—not in a city at all. Not multicultural. Not team led. Which meant he should have stopped thinking about the invitation it contained ten seconds after reading it, not cart it around in his pocket all day. And if that didn’t do it, the description of a congregation left wounded and confused from a decade under a legalistic and downright heretical leader, from what he could tell, should have made up his mind. He was a theologian, not a therapist. But somehow he couldn’t stop thinking about it.

  The rain finally turned to mist. Marcus shouldered his messenger bag and headed for the sidewalk.

  He wasn’t naive. He knew God’s plans could be different from what he’d expected. God had proven Himself far better at providing what Marcus needed than Marcus had ever been. Amelia was evidence of that. He’d courted education and youth-ministry majors during his undergrad years, thinking such a person would be the obvious match for a pastor in training. But then he’d found Amelia one October night as she’d played on the darkened campus chapel’s Steinway, and somehow, he’d known immediately she was the one. She was nothing like the girls he’d dated before, nothing like he’d ever imagined himself wanting. But he’d definitely wanted her. And God had been faithful to them, guiding their relationship, speaking to them through their mentors and friends, and assuring them that the unlikely match was just what He had intended.

  The only person not convinced had been Marcus’s father. He insisted they were too young, too immature, and too blinded by emotion to enter into marriage wisely. His mother had done her best to make up for his lack of enthusiasm, and Marcus and Amelia had refused to let one lone voice of dissent ruin their plans—but even so, the indictment had hurt.

  Marcus fiddled with the letter. Memories of God’s faithfulness with Amelia made him willing to concede that the career path God had in store for him may not be the path he’d planned. He was confident God wanted him to be a pastor—and he knew that how it played out might end up looking very different from the vision he had. But he knew that Amelia held more tightly to her dreams. There was no room in her mind for a life that didn’t include a career for her as a professional musician—hence the reason she still knew nothing about this interview request. Marcus worried about how her young faith would respond if the job discussed in the letter came to fruition. Though he had to admit she had a penchant for being wildly encouraging of him and his career; it was one of the things he most appreciated about her. Maybe she’d surprise him and be enthusiastic instead of mortified. He prayed she’d at least have an open mind.

  He walked quickly toward their apartment complex, head down against the December wind, and debated when to tell Amelia about the letter. Perhaps he should wait until he’d figured out whether to pursue it. He still had a hard time believing the church had contacted him in the first place—since when were inexperienced wannabes fresh out of seminary invited to interview for senior pastorships? Maybe it would all turn out to be a mistake.

  But that thought made him nervous. The hope of finally having a full-time ministry job, the hope that had prompted him to pocket the letter rather than recycle it, was growing in influence with every hour that passed. And the more he thought about it, the more enticing the position was. How many of his fellow seminary graduates were interviewing for top positions, rather than taking slots at the bottom of the totem pole? This wasn’t a ground-level job. This was a pulpit of his own, a flock to manage and care for, a chance to help a congregation recover from a toxic past and reinvent itself. And he knew he could do it. It was an unconventional offer, yes, but all the more reason why God had certainly ordained it.

  I hope.

  The next afternoon found Amelia longing for nighttime. She had gone to bed too late again last night, her thoughts jumbled with excitement over the audition, and now as she trudged to the community center to teach, she admonished herself to be in bed by ten. Not every night. But tonight at least. And maybe tomorrow. The audition was in three days and she didn’t want to botch it because she was too tired to think straight.

  She’d begged and pleaded with her boss to have Friday off, but it wasn’t until Maria had offered to trade shifts with Amelia that he’d relented. She was nervous; between lessons and the deli she didn’t have much time to brush up on her second audition pieces. In the past, pressure often brought out the best of her abilities. She hoped that was still true.

  Part of her felt a little silly for being as excited as she was. This wasn’t the philharmonic—heck, it was just barely a paying job. She had so much further to go if she wanted the kind of career she’d always dreamed of, and wondered if her time would be better spent seeking out more prestigious opportunities. But then she remembered how long it had been since she’d played for an audience—besides church, which didn’t count—and reminded herself that the right people were a lot more likely to hear her at this troupe’s shows than in some hotel bar somewhere. There was nothing wrong with starting at the bottom. She zipped her coat to the top and stuffed her hands into her pockets. Everyone had to start someplace.

  The same was true for Marcus, and she wondered when all his résumés and interviews would finally lead to a position. He’d interviewed four times so far without success, and had sent résumés to scores of ministries. There were thousands of churches in the country; certainly one of them wanted a charismatic young pastor on its staff. His talents and education were going utterly to waste right now, and while he didn’t complain about it as Amelia had a tendency to do, he had to be frustrated with the wait. She was certainly frustrated for him. But whenever she’d lament that her years of training and sacrifice would amount to nothing more than after-school piano lessons for children whose parents forced them to play, he would remind her that her talent was God given, and that whatever career He led her to would bring her joy because she’d be doing what God had created her to do.

  “I won’t go so far as to promise you’ll get record deals and sold-out concerts,” he’d say, referencing the future she’d a
lways envisioned for herself. “But whatever you end up doing will be as wonderful as you think that life would be. You just wait.”

  So wait she did, although not sure if she really believed it.

  Amelia entered the community center an hour before her first scheduled lesson. The shouts of teens on the basketball courts outside penetrated the thin window beside the piano in the main hall where she taught. The community center’s Yamaha upright was a quality instrument, a gift from a local philanthropist who wanted to provide musical instruction to children whose families would never otherwise be able to afford it. A grant from the NEA kept it tuned and paid for Amelia’s time. Three days a week she taught three different students for an hour, the majority of whom didn’t really want to be there. She tried to make it fun, tried to cater her instruction to each child’s personality and share her own joy for performing with them in the hopes that it would rub off. Three months into the job, and the fruits of her labor were still hard to see. But she kept the smile on her face and a hint of mirth in her voice as she cheered on her pupils, figuring that, if nothing else, it kept her own spirits up.

  Amelia waved to one of the directors and the gaggle of children in paint smocks who followed him to a craft room, then sat down and pulled off her jacket and gloves. She planned on spending as much time here as she could until her audition. Music didn’t just sound different on a real piano, it felt different. She was grateful for the high-end digital piano that sat in her living room—without it her skills would have atrophied long ago—but there was no substitute for playing on the real thing.

  She pulled the sheet music for Gershwin’s “Prelude no. 2 in C-sharp Minor” from her bag and laid it out on the stand. Then she started scales to limber up her fingers and followed them with Beethoven’s “Für Elise” to warm up. Once she felt her hands were ready, she started in on the prelude, one of her audition pieces, paying specific attention to the fingering and stopping now and then to drill a few troublesome measures. Every once in a while she’d notice from the corner of her eye that someone was watching her, but she kept her focus on the music. It was good practice doing this in such a public place. She’d be less likely to become distracted at her audition.

  After she felt confident with the improved fingering, she let her mind wander a bit as she played the first page over and over. In her imagination she was on stage in Carnegie Hall, then the Sydney Opera House, decked out in the pale yellow satin dress she’d spotted in a downtown shop last week, with her hair cascading in curls down her back. Her heart ached with the daydream, and after a while she pulled herself back to reality just to save herself from getting depressed. It’s never going to happen, she thought. Then Marcus’s words came back to her, and she tried to make herself believe them.

  When she finished, a smattering of applause made her smile. “How do you do that?” asked one girl doing homework at a nearby table.

  Amelia smiled. “A lot of practice.”

  “I never seen somebody’s fingers move that fast before.”

  She began playing the piece again at half the speed. “The first time I played this piece I had to play it very slowly so I could figure out how my fingers were supposed to move. I couldn’t play it that quickly until I’d done it quite a few times.”

  “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you play anything—well, real before,” said a director who was doing paperwork at the front desk. “Just the scales and the stuff you do with your students. You really are talented.”

  Amelia could feel her cheeks warming with the praise. “Thank you.”

  “You ought to play professionally.”

  She sighed and forced herself to smile. “Well, that’s the plan. But I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”

  Marcus let himself into their studio apartment quietly, knowing Amelia was attempting to get to bed early this week. But as soon as he locked the door, she said with chagrin, “Don’t worry about being quiet. I’m still awake.”

  “I’m sorry, babe.” He dropped his bag on the table and went to the bed at the far end of the room to give her a kiss. “Can you not sleep?”

  “Too nervous.”

  “Understandable.” He kissed her again before pulling his sweats from the dresser.

  Amelia sat up and leaned back against the wall. “I keep getting myself all worked up, and then I remember this is such a small gig it might not actually lead to anything, and then I get depressed that I’m never going to be a professional pianist, and then I remember what you always say about God having a plan, and then I get excited again because I think maybe this is that plan finally coming together. Over and over and over for the last hour and a half. How am I going to last two more days?” She gave him a sheepish look. “I must sound like a total mental patient.”

  “No, babe, of course not.” He chuckled, but inside he was debating whether to change his game plan. He’d decided to tell her about the letter if she was awake when he got home, but he hadn’t expected her to be so emotional over the audition. Now he wasn’t sure it was such a good idea. She was usually so relaxed about playing—even for her senior performance she hadn’t been this nervous. “Don’t analyze it, babe. Just go in there and do your best, and whatever is supposed to happen will happen. God’s got it all under control.”

  She pulled her hair through her fist, eyes trained on the end of the bed. “I know. You’re right. But I can’t help it.” Amelia continued talking, something over-the-top about chucking it all and just teaching for the rest of her life, but Marcus wasn’t tuned in as he pulled off his T-shirt and climbed into bed. He didn’t want to keep the letter from Amelia any longer, but this obviously wasn’t the right time. But how much longer could he put it off?

  On his walk home from the library, he’d tried to temper his growing enthusiasm with reality checks about how the odds were stacked against him, but it didn’t help. Besides being an ego boost, it was encouraging to know that someone out there believed in him enough to pursue him. It made all the previous rejections sting just a little bit less. He couldn’t help imagining his father’s face when Marcus finally got to tell him he had a job—and telling him he had a senior pastorship would be even better—

  “Yoo-hoo, earth to Marcus.”

  He blinked, looked at Amelia. “Sorry, what did you say?”

  “I didn’t say anything. I was trying to give you my ‘come hither’ eyes, but you were all spaced out. What’s on your mind?”

  “Nothing.” He slid closer to her beneath the sheets and kissed her neck. This would probably be a better use of their evening anyway—they both needed a diversion.

  She giggled. “Liar. What were you thinking about?”

  He kissed her again. “I was thinking about how much I like those pajamas on you.”

  She brought her hands up to his chest, pushing him back enough to look him in the eyes. “You are so lying to me right now. What are you hiding, Marcus Sheffield?”

  Her smirk told him he wasn’t being let off the hook. He should have known better than to think he could distract her. “I’m not sure this is the best time to bring it up. I don’t want you to be preoccupied during your audition.”

  She nudged him farther back and sat up again. “Well, now you have to tell me. Spill it.”

  A brief staring contest sealed his fate, and he sat beside her on the bed and took her hand. “I got an interview.”

  She squealed and grabbed his arm. “Marcus, that’s fantastic! Oh my gosh, I’m so proud of you. Which church—was it that one in New York? Because I had such a good feeling about that one.”

  “No, not the New York one. I got a ‘thanks, but no thanks’ letter from them the other day. Remember how I decided to send out a couple résumés to some smaller churches that we thought had potential?”

  “Sure, the suburban ones.”

  “Right. Well, this church isn’t one of the ones I applied to. Apparently one of those suburban pastors gave my résumé to the pastor of this church.”

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sp; She gave his knee a shake. “So? Details? Where is it, what’s their story?”

  He took a deep breath. “Well … It’s in Nebraska.”

  Her features froze. “Nebraska?”

  “Yes.”

  “Omaha or Lincoln?”

  “Neither.” He forced himself to keep eye contact. “A little town called Wheatridge.”

  He saw the look he’d been dreading start to form on her face. “How little?”

  “Well, there’s a college campus there, so during the school year there are a lot more people. Like twenty thousand.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “At the school?”

  “In the town.”

  She slumped back against the wall. “How many are at the church?”

  “I don’t know, the letter just said ‘small.’”

  She groaned. “Are you really considering it?”

  He could practically see the wall going up between them. He started in on all the positive angles he’d come up with. “Well, here’s the thing. They’re offering me a head pastorship. I’m only twenty-six and I could be a senior pastor. That’s a tremendous opportunity.”

  She gave him a sidelong glance. “You don’t think it’s a little sketchy that they’d offer a position like that to a guy fresh out of school with only an MDiv to his name?”

  He tried not to look as hurt as he felt. He was well aware how rare an offer like this was for a new graduate, but did she really not think he was worthy of the responsibility? Did she really not think him capable? He always pointed out how talented she was—why couldn’t she return the favor?

  “They want someone young who can lead the church in a new direction. They want to focus on community outreach, on addressing the town’s social issues. It’s the kind of thing we want to do, but just in a smaller venue than we’d expected. And it’s totally possible that nothing will come of it. They didn’t offer me the job. I still have to interview. But I’ve been trying to let go of this and I just can’t. I think God wants me to at least give it a shot. I keep thinking of the verse in Luke that says ‘nothing is impossible with God.’ Sure it’s unusual and the chances are slim. But God does the unexpected all the time. Why can’t He do it with me?”