On Christmas Eve I found myself standing inside Soulful Things, unsure what my next move should be. Lance sat in a chair behind me, not making a sound. I’d never heard Soulful Things so silent. After I filled him in on what had happened with Mom, he said, “Why do the most bullshit things happen to the best kinds of people?” He apologized multiple times until no words were left to be spoken.

“How do I choose?” I whispered, my hand rolling over my neck repeatedly as my mind raced. “How do I choose which parent to be there for?” Did I stay with my father who I’d never had a chance to get to know, who was currently living the last days of his life? Or did I go home to my mom who was struggling from her accident and needed me by her side?

How do you choose which need is more important?

How do you choose which parent to stand by when they both need your support?

Lance pushed himself up from the chair and moved into the storage room. He reentered with a case wrapped with a red bow. “I was going to give this to you tomorrow, but I think you might need it tonight.”

I opened the case to find a brand new violin. It wasn’t just any new violin, it was the Karl Willhelm Model 64, the same one I’d been eyeing in his shop since I’d arrived there. “Jesus, I can’t take this. It was over three thousand dollars.”

“Paid in full. I went ahead and set it up for you, too. It’s yours.” He smiled.

I picked up the violin and stared at it in my hands for a moment before bringing it to my nose to smell. For a musician, smelling a new violin was the equivalent of a reader smelling a new novel. It was a homelike scent that made you realize that the world wasn’t a completely terrible place, that there was still beauty that existed.

“Get lost, Levi,” Lance said in the most caring way possible.

“Thank you,” I murmured, to Lance, to music, to my soul.

I fine-tuned the strings. I messed around with the bow.

Lance turned and walked upstairs. The moment he disappeared, I shut off the lights, filling the space with darkness.

Everything was exactly the same, but somehow completely different.

Colder.

Sadder.

Lonelier.

This feels right.

My fingers discovered the sounds of apologies that the violin offered me. The strings cried for me. Music understood me when I didn’t understand myself. It was my blanket of protection from every real fear that existed. I rocked back and forth as I traveled down the road of pure escapism. I became lost in the moment, forgetting all of my surroundings, all of my pain, all of my hurt.

I played until my fingers ached.

And then I played some more.

I played until my body shook.

And then I played some more.

I played until my heart broke.

And then I played some more.

My fingers ripped the bow away from the violin. My hands were pale as ghosts from my intense playing. My body shook with nerves and a clouded mind, but I knew the answer to the question.

I knew who I had to chose, and it broke my heart.

Hold it together, Levi.

I needed to calm myself, to control my panicked breaths. I wondered if what I was feeling was what it always felt like for Mom. Were the panic attacks so painful that they traveled from her toes to the tip of her head? Did she feel the walls screaming at her? Was it always this ugly and terrifying for her?

I needed to find a place of peace.

But I wasn’t sure how.

The truth was that Mom was my peace. From day one, she’d been there for me. Even when she was battling the ugliest of wars, she was still my stillness. I was the hurricane and she was somehow the eye of the storm. She comforted me when Dad’s cards stopped showing up. She held me when he said he didn’t want to see me anymore. She’d been there from day one, and I’d left her.

What’s wrong with me?

How could I have ever hated her?

She was sick, and I walked away.

She begged me to come home, and I ignored her.

She was my true music. Not the kind of music that I played in a darkened space. Not the kind of sounds that the shadows applauded. She was the colors that found the strings. She was the purples and blues, the yellows and reds that bled love from the vibrations of sound.

Hannah Myers was music.

And without her, life was a mistake.

* * *

I headed home that night with my mind made up. I would tell Dad that I had to go back to Alabama and look after Mom for a few weeks. I had to know that she would be okay. But, when I stepped inside, I saw the glow from the black and white comedies playing on the television. Dad sat in front of it with his dinner sitting on his TV tray, and beside him was another tray with my dinner.

My chest tightened as the nurse walked up to me, explaining that she would be back the next evening, and that she’d left all of Dad’s medicine labeled for him to take in the morning. She left and closed the front door behind her.

“I made you the fried chicken TV dinner and a Salisbury steak one—I wasn’t sure which one you liked more,” he said, moving a spoon around a bowl of soup in front of him. I sat down next to him on the couch as we watched the comedies together.

He didn’t eat much of his soup, but when he did lift his hand, I watched it shake repeatedly. I offered to help him, but he huffed and grumbled as always.

Eventually he placed his spoon down, defeated, and nodded toward me.

I fed him the soup, and I was back to square one with no clue how I could leave him here to go back home.

“You know that song you played at the showcase? The first one?”

“Yeah. ‘Love You Till The End’ by—”

“The Pogues.” He nodded, his eyes still on the television screen. “It was mine and your mom’s wedding song.”

The pieces of my mother that I’d never truly understood were slowly coming together.

“What happened to you two? Why did you split up?”

He cringed and rubbed his temple. “I messed up. Your mother and I got into a big fight one night, then I got drunk and made a move on Camila Watson in a bar. That’s why her husband can’t stand me, and that’s why Hannah left me.”

“Did you love Camila?”

“No. No. I was stupid and young, an asshole who made a bad mistake. It turned out my mistake was enough for your mom to pack up and leave me. I don’t blame her, though. She had her anxiety and always worried I would leave her for someone else. At that point I didn’t know how sick she was, about her mental health. I should have fought, though. I should’ve fought for her.”