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In the back of the bar there’s an old piano – a proper one, a grand piano. It was Curtis’ before he passed, and so Robert has always been a little weary of so much as touching it. Keys of yellowed ivory, chipped sharps and flats breaking up the colour. That stain on the lid where Robert had spilt a pint across it once, many a year ago. Curtis had been so angry at the time, petulant and silent for the next three days. Robert had thought it childish but Curtis was his friend so he had managed to feel upset about it anyway.
It still doesn’t feel right to touch the piano. What if he forgets what it sounded like when Curtis played? The soul of him, etched into the varnished wood, drummed out with the sound of someone else on the keys.
The guitar is a little safer. It was also Curtis’, but it doesn’t contain him like the piano does. This instrument is different because it is theirs and it has always sounded like both of them, which makes it mean more – and less. He remembers countless hours of walking through chords behind the bar, or in the kitchen above it: Curtis carefully moving his fingers into the shape of a C Major. Robert has fat fingers, and his joints are getting stiff, but Curtis was patient. Together they’d press the sound of the notes into the frets, and what came out with the strum wasn’t always good but it was always perfect.
There was a point where they used to play together. The first time was an accident. Curtis didn’t like playing in front of other people. He always used to wait for the bar to empty out. Sometimes that didn’t happen until five in the morning. That wasn’t too late. It happened because Robert was learning his first bar chords that night. Rhythmic 1-2-3-4s, change chord. 1-2-3-4. Curtis joked about being his accompaniment. Robert privately thought that he was Curtis’. What they did wasn’t complex, or impressive.
His guitar doesn’t sound right without the piano alongside it. It hadn’t, really, since that first night. Robert continued to play anyway. He even sat on the piano stool, which is large enough for two and too large when it’s him there, alone.
Curtis’ wife, Gus, sits at one of the other tables in the bar. Her arms are crossed, one knee propped up on the other, and she watches Robert, a small smile on her face. He had always privately thought she knew. She plays piano too, but she has never touched that one. Robert’s eyes lock with hers, and he smiles too. Clumsy fingers find the notes. 1-2-3-4.