Music at Night

Part 3

All throughout our trek along the Embarcadero the music seemed to be coming from all around us. I listened to the flute music religiously, trying hard to track where it was coming from, but it was difficult, because every time I pinpointed a direction and began heading that way it sounded like it was coming from another.

Anthony had the same problem, and often we found ourselves at side streets arguing about which way it was coming from. I could hear the exasperation in his voice, slowly sinking into mine as well. A few times he instructed me to stop and take a breath, which I insistently refused to do. "You don't tell me what to do!" I yelled a few times until he followed the direction I thought the music was coming from.

Finally, the clock tower chiming four, I collapsed in exhaustion on a bench. Anthony followed my lead. "Wasn't planning on this tonight," he admitted.

"Neither was I," I snapped.

"Can you cut me some slack, please?" He sighed. "Don't you understand? I want to find the music. No one else ever hears it. And it just so happens that the girl who showed up in my kitchen hears it too. I don't really believe in fate, but just for once, something seemed to be going right for me, okay? So maybe try to understand just a little bit?"

I rolled my head back in his direction, slouching on the bench. "Everything's going wrong, then?"

He froze. "I didn't say that. I just said something was... I kinda implied that, didn't I?"

I raised my eyebrows and chuckled. "Hey, at least you've got a roof over your head. I haven't even got that."

"I'm a college dropout, don't have a steady job and am hardly paying my bills, let alone feeding myself. One wrong move and I'm not going to have a roof either."

"At least you've got a family," I pointed out.

He shook his head sadly. "Why do you think I live alone in a city as expensive as this?"

"To prove to yourself you can?"

He laughed sadly. "No, Angelica. That's not how this works. This is about survival in a harsh city. There's a beauty to San Francisco, but there's also a razor sharp edge. I'm sure you know."

I nodded with a sigh. "What about your boyfriend? How does he get by?"

There was a long moment of silence. I glanced back over at Anthony, my heart dropping. "What's wrong?"

"He broke up with me, okay? Just hours ago, that's why I didn't clean up my place after dinner, why I was sloppy with the watch, why I was so eager to get out of the house with you. This?" He raised his wrist to reveal the glinting gold. "This was a gift from him. Maybe it's stupid, but I don't think I'm ever going to be able to get rid of it."

I stared at him. "Wow."

He sighed and dropped his hand to his lap. "I said I had a boyfriend to get you to stop ogling me, okay? But I don't. There it is. I'm back to being a single loner."

I gazed out at the water beyond the piers. It sloshed against the supports, lapping at the land as if slowly but surely determined to erode it away. Just like the world was determined to erode away at me. But I was like the pier, refusing to disappear, wasn't I? I had to be. It was what had kept me alive.

But I looked over at Anthony, and in the full moonlight and the streetlamp, I saw the beginnings of tears in his eyes.

The flute music wafted over us as he reached to wipe them away. "It's okay. I'm fine."

"Usually when people say that, they're not."

"What would you know," he laughed quietly, voice cracking into a whisper.