Chapter 10
Lucinda’s lawyer called it a misunderstanding.
Then an emotional mistake.
Then a disciplinary disagreement.
Then, when Mrs. Bell’s statement and the school security video appeared, he called it a private family matter.
My father refused every word.
He filed for divorce.
He filed for full custody protection for Harper.
He filed a civil claim for the destruction of my violin, though he told me no money could replace it.
Lucinda fought hardest for Harper.
Not because she wanted her.
Because losing her meant losing control.
Harper changed after that.
She stopped wearing white dresses.
She cut the ribbons from her violin case.
She began sleeping with a chair against her bedroom door.
When I found out, I told my father.
He changed the locks the same day.
Lucinda’s relatives called.
They said Harper belonged with her mother.
They said I had poisoned the house.
They said my father had been manipulated by a spoiled girl with a dead mother’s face.
My father blocked them all.
But I heard enough.
One afternoon, Harper found me in the music room.
I was practicing scales.
Badly.
My new violin still felt unfamiliar.
She stood in the doorway.
“Can I listen?”
I nodded.
She sat on the floor.
After a minute, she said, “I quit violin.”
My bow slipped.
“What?”
“I never loved it,” she said. “Mom did.”
I lowered the instrument.
“What do you love?”
She shrugged.
“I don’t know. I never got to choose.”
That sentence stayed in the room longer than any note.
I sat beside her.
“You can choose now.”
She looked at the violin.
“I was jealous of you.”
“I know.”
“I hated how sure you looked when you played.”
“I wasn’t sure.”
“You looked free,” she said.
I did not know what to say.
So I handed her my notebook.
The one where I wrote music.
“Then write down things that make you feel even a little free.”
She took it.
Her first word was painting.
May you like
The second was silence.
The third was Amelia.
