Jeremiah was a trombone soloist. Audiences traveled days, weeks to hear him play live. He filled his sound with emotion and an openness to where even novice concert goers left with red, tear-tightened cheeks. His eyes were always closed as he pushed and pulled rhythms and melodies in and out of the air. 

The music just came to him. It always came to him these last ten years. He hadn’t required sheet music, a music stand, or even a chair during concerts. Each solo, each performance was unique to the night before. A flash. One night only. On any given evening, the audience could go home with a deeper understanding of what love means. The next day, the same audience might realize the weightlessness of floating through soft summer air. 

The trombone was Jeremiah’s grandfathers. Family tradition broke for the trombone to find its way into Jeremiah’s hands. Everything he had had been passed through his five older siblings. He never knew anything while it was new. This trombone skipped every grubby hand to fall straight into his. It certainly wasn’t a new trombone, but it was something his siblings never had.

Each day, a new epiphany. Each day, for ten years, Jeremiah never took a day off.

The concert in which Jeremiah turned 35, his solo rested on people’s ears as sweet and mournful as morning dew on autumn grass. It was different. The melody stuck. It replayed in Jeremiah’s ears through his standing ovation. Every other tune left as quickly as it had come. None other stuck in his mind during his drive home, or while he read bedtime stories to his daughter, Lena. He never found himself humming as he had been that night. It invaded his nightly wind-down routine with his husband, Henry. Usually, they would sit in silence and drink their preferred drinks—Jeremiah drank Manhattans and Henry drank through half a bottle of Pinot Noir. Tonight, they swirled their glasses and Jeremiah could not stop whispering his solo. 

“You must like that tune,” Henry said. 

“I can’t seem to get rid of it,” Jeremiah said.  “Who knows, it could have just been an exceedingly superior solo.”

“Or a farewell performance,” Henry said. 

When Jeremiah touched his own cheek, he could feel the path a stray tear took, straight down. A scar. Sometime between the beginning of that night’s concert and now, he cried. He never cried during a performance. Even after days of practicing until the sun darkened the house, or when his lips bled, Jeremiah never let the emotion or pain get to him.

“Will you take a break from the orchestra, for me?” Henry asked. He grabbed Jeremiah’s chin and turned his face, so their eyes met. “We could take a vacation, you could relax.”

Jeremiah felt this coming on. The comments and jokes Henry made about what they would do if the orchestra disappeared for a few days got less cavalier the closer it got to Jeremiah’s 35^th birthday. 

“Don’t you feel the strain? You’ve started graying in the way presidents do, you have wrinkles like an old man. You’ve worked so hard, every day. Why do you do this to yourself?” Henry asked.

Jeremiah melted into Henry’s hands and relaxed his shoulders.

“It feels like something is slipping through my fingers, or just out of reach. I don’t think I’ve done enough,” Jeremiah said.

“You’ve done enough, our life isn’t going to just magically disappear if you take a few days off,” Henry said, brushing Jeremiah’s hair across his forehead. 

Jeremiah snored. 

Jeremiah lost count of how many drinks he had. It was a wet morning ten years ago, after his 25^th birthday. Jeremiah hadn’t slept. Too many thoughts were keeping him up at the sticky bar rail with a torn-up coaster and a dark liquor. 

Henry was already up for the day after getting his own eight hours of sleep, and rushing around their studio, organizing and cleaning. He could never get the water stains out of the walls, left from the leaking roof letting the rain in. Jeremiah needed to ask maintenance to fix the walls, but the landlord is maintenance and would charge them to swing a wrench around for a couple of hours, claim there wasn’t anything to fix, and let mold grow instead. It wasn’t fair, but it was all they could afford. Henry’s compulsive cleaning was his only way to control the stress of making rent, which was only a few days away.

Jeremiah was at the bar anyways. He hadn’t booked a gig for months now, at least nothing paying. He performed for the commuters waiting for the subway. On a good day, that would have gotten Jeremiah a hundred bucks for a few hours avoiding eye contact with the homeless, but the good days ran dry. He would be lucky to walk home with a twenty in his pocket. 

Henry worked, but he was on a bad luck streak as well. He kept getting bad tippers and then angry customers at the restaurant. He was at the end of his rope with his bosses and coworkers. Though, it was clear Henry couldn’t leave. He earned just enough to keep him on the hook. 

Jeremiah stared at his reflection in the almost empty rocks glass. 

No money was worse than a toxic work environment, Jeremiah thought. If I could just hold down something that paid. If I could just get my big break. 

He looked carefully, with one eye closed. His face stretched up the glass, eyebrows almost touching. 

If only you got whatever you wanted. 

Jeremiah closed his other eye.

That’d be nice. 

He pictured his fridge full of food, Henry resting on the couch with a glass of wine, a house with enough bedrooms to start a family, enough money in the bank to start a family, enough space to breathe, to stop worrying. 

You can have it all, you just have to ask nicely.

Jeremiah opened his eyes and met his reflection again. The skinny eyes in the glass had a fire Jeremiah didn’t know he had. That was the only difference.

I would give anything to be lucky enough to give Henry that life.

It’s a deal. Don’t worry about what you’ll owe. Ten years is plenty of time to pay.

Jeremiah didn’t remember how he got home. By the time he made it to the orchestra house, he had his trombone and had sobered up. They weren’t having auditions, but the director, Clara, surprisingly had the afternoon free to hear him play. Her head bobbed up and down, along with Jeremiah’s songs. He knew in his gut that she was hooked, even though the light reflected off her glasses so Jermiah couldn’t see her eyes, her expressions. She kept him playing for three hours straight and instantly hired him.  

Money came in quickly. The lease on the studio was easy enough to break when they got a half-decent lawyer. The sign-on bonus with the orchestra was more money than Jeremiah or Henry had seen before. 

Jeremiah hadn’t remembered the conversation with himself at the bar, he hadn’t remembered his payment was coming due. He hadn’t remembered the tune that was playing during their deal, but his reflection did.

What the audience on Jeremiah’s 35^th birthday hadn’t known was, the solo they went home with was the melody from that bar, from that deal.

The next morning, Jeremiah woke up like any other day. His eyes struggled with adjusting to an awake state of being, but he could swear his reflection was moving a little slower when he brushed his teeth. 

He made his coffee, ate his yogurt, and watched an episode of whatever cartoon Lena was obsessed with before they both had to leave. Jeremiah decided to leave his trombone in its case, sitting in the front hallway. 

Jeremiah took his normal route to the concert hall, walked into the auditorium to the myriad of instruments individually tuning. Pure chaos always sounded comforting to Jeremiah, more so than any intended musical arrangement. Every so often the disparate shrieking found its way to harmony, and just as quickly walked into a new way of dissonance. It was a casual art. 

Jeremiah had entered the from the wings, stage right. He just wanted to talk to Clara, who was in her usual spot, the front row of audience seating, stage left, with mountains of sheet music. Clara’s white curly hair was pulled back into a bun, like every other day Jeremiah had seen her. 

“Clara, I would like a word if you had a moment,” Jeremiah said. He stood from the edge of the stage and Clara was only a couple feet away. The cacophony of instruments silenced. The venue’s masterful acoustics amplified his whisper into snakes that made it into every musician’s ear. 

“Where is your instrument, Jeremiah?” Clara asked. “Do you plan on miming during practice, or have you simply forgotten it?”

“Could we go somewhere more private?” Jeremiah asked.

“We are about to start,” Clara said. 

Jeremiah shifted on his feet. His hands shook. He looked back to his friends—the musicians he had played with for years. 

“I wanted to tell you that I will be taking a break from performing,” Jeremiah said, not quite meeting Clara’s eyes. She removed her glasses and turned entirely toward Jeremiah.

“A break.”

“I’ve been playing for you for ten years without a break. I think it’s time,” Jeremiah said.

“How much time would you need?” Clara asked. 

“I’m not quite sure. Henry mentioned a week, maybe two,” he said.

“Henry suggested this?”

“Well, last night was quite emotional.” 

Jeremiah was looking down at Clara from his spot on the stage, but she looked at him like he was two feet tall, and she was ten. 

“Is this what you want?”

He couldn’t lie.

“I want to play,” he said, “but I need a break to reset.”

“You’re playing fine, Jeremiah, you always have,” she said. 

“I’m not worried about my playing. I’m not sure what’s wrong, but there’s something wrong,” he said.

“You understand that we won’t be able to perform without you. There is not another like you,” Clara said.

Jeremiah glanced back at his fellow trombonists. Every single musician was looking at Jeremiah and Clara. Realizing they have been caught, they looked down to avoid Jeremiah’s eye contact. 

Clara continued.

“I know it, you know it, they all know it. You have something special. You think a trumpet could do what you do? A violin? You cannot expect us to perform without you. We won’t have enough time to rehearse pieces that don’t center around you. What do you expect me to do?”

“I am only asking for a week. Can’t you work around my solos? Maybe, let other people shine.” 

Jeremiah’s blood pressure rose. His hands shook with anger now instead of the nervousness he had walked in with. 

“Reimburse the audiences, take it out of my paycheck, I don’t care. There will be more performances.”

Jeremiah walked across the stage into the wings. He made his way to the green room bathrooms and threw up in the nearest stall. It ended with a couple of dry heaves. Once his throat stopped vibrating and he got his breathing under control, he flushed the toilet. The sick swirled until it disappeared. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and brushed off the gray dust that had gathered on his black pant legs. 

The green room bathrooms were set up specifically for performers, which meant a room with ceiling-to-floor, wall-to-wall mirrors—all bordered with perfect, circular lightbulbs. The walls in the lounge area weren’t painted green like Jeremiah had expected when he first joined, but the mirror room looked green in every direction. Infinite rows of lights disappeared into the center of the mirror, the green void. There were infinite Jeremiahs, all looking back. Jeremiah forgot which one was the original. His white button-down shirt was still tucked in. He noticed the bags under his eyes. They hadn’t been so severe when he washed his face that morning. Henry was right about his hair and wrinkles. His teeth were yellowing, sweat stains were coming through his shirt, he noticed a hole in his pants on the hip, his shoes were scuffed.

And you think you are fine. A familiar voice reverberated between the mirrors. Jeremiah turned toward the door. He was alone.

When he had turned, his reflections turned with him. Each reflection was a millisecond off from the one before. A slight movement of Jeremiah’s hand turned into a thousand, a million individual movements, unsynchronized. It made Jeremiah nauseous. 

“Who said that?” Jeremiah asked. When he opened his lips to speak, none of the reflection’s mouths opened.

Who said that, repeated back at Jeremiah, just like the hand movement had. Each reflection’s voice adding to the previous until it was as loud as the trumpet section’s triple forte. Jeremiah raised his hands to his ears. His reflections did not reflect. They tilted their heads. The noise died. Jeremiah didn’t dare speak again. 

Have you seen how you live? How can you afford to stop?

A million voices speaking at the same time and Jeremiah still didn’t know where it was coming from. His reflections had completely detached themselves from his movement. They were still out of sync with each other. 

You have a family, people that depend on you. You can’t leave them to starve. You’ll lose everything.

It was coming from the mirrors, but the Jeremiahs weren’t moving their mouths to speak. Jeremiah spun, trying to see every reflection.

Each Jeremiah turned to face directly at Jeremiah. When he spun again, they all remained still.

I’m trying. I have tried so hard, for so long. What else can I do?

Synchronized, the Jeremiahs took a step toward Jeremiah. 

Yes. What can you do?

They took another step. 

What exactly have you done?

Behind all the Jeremiahs, in the green void, was his daughter, Lena, in the studio apartment Jeremiah and Henry used to share before Jeremiah fell into the orchestra. Lena hadn’t ever seen that place, let alone lived there. In this vison it looked like she had been living there for years, possibly her entire life. Her arms were skinny enough to show the contour of her bones. The mattress sat on the floor, the blanket over her was covered in tears and stains. Henry slumped up against the wall, eyes closed. He hadn’t shaved in a few days and his bones were also poking out of his skin. One hand rested on Lena, the other on a bottle of whiskey. 

What have I done.

You are not enough.

I am not enough.

Your family is not safe.

My family is not safe.

Lena and Henry melted away into the green. Tears streamed freely down Jeremiah’s face. His reflections started piling up against the glass mirror. The silver lining started to bulge off the wall. His grandfather walked out of the green to the front of the Jeremiahs, even though Jeremiah knew him to be dead. He died a few years ago, peacefully and in his retirement home Jeremiah had been paying for. The grandfather appearing, though, was the grandfather from his childhood. 

“Use this gift well, Jeremiah,” his grandfather said. “Your challenge is to be better, do more than I ever could. Practice every day and good things shall come.”

Jeremiah had believed those words every day of his life, except for that moment of on his 25^th birthday. 

You cannot throw it away.

The chorus of Jeremiah reflections were shoving Jeremiah’s grandfather out of the way, back into the green.

You have so much left to do.

I have so much left to do.

Jeremiah was a pile on the tiled floor. He couldn’t hold in his wails and sobs. 

You cannot throw it away.

I cannot throw it away.

Let me give you clarity. 

A sharp noise pierced his eardrums. All the mirrors shattered into him.

~ ~ ~

I woke up in the orchestra’s green room. After five deep breaths I opened my eyes and shards of glass surrounded me. They landed in a spiral pattern centered where I had passed out. My clothes were torn, slices up and down my body, but my skin remained intact. There’s no time to change, no time to clean up. I’ve got to rehearse. 

Every musician’s eye caught each step I took to cross the stage to my seat. I didn’t have my trombone, or sheet music. There was no way for me to catch up with the rest of the symphony. I couldn’t get small enough in my seat—they weren’t built for slouching. Clara came up to me, attracting more attention. 

“You’re back,” she said. 

I averted my eyes.

“Are you playing with us, or can you afford a break?” she asked.

“I cannot afford a break,” I said.

“Are you going to retrieve your instrument, or do I need to find you one?”

“I didn’t bring mine.”

“Roberto,” Clara said, and she snapped her fingers. “Give your horn to Jeremiah and track down one of the rentals.”

Roberto did as she said. I didn’t even ask about sheet music. By this point, I should have known every note by heart. Clara started gathering attention at her podium. Two taps of her baton on her music stand quieted every instrument. She raised both of her hands, readying to start the piece. Swiftly, she flicked her baton down, and the music swelled. Each flick marched the company forward and I couldn’t remember when I was supposed to start playing. I tried to lean over and peek at the sheet music of my neighbor, but I couldn’t decipher where we were at. Minutes passed and no one had gotten upset that I hadn’t played. Clara scrunched her shoulders and arms. She flicked her baton in smaller distances. The music softened. Clara gestured her free hand at me. I scrambled to put the mouthpiece to my lips. The trombone was cumbersome. I closed my eyes and played. Terrible screeching noises—I mean, notes that trombones shouldn’t even hit—came out of my instrument. I couldn’t stop. I had to keep trying.

Everybody went silent. Clara stopped conducting. 

“What are you doing, Jeremiah?” Henry shouted from the back of the auditorium, where the audience usually filed in. 

“What are you doing here, Henry?” His beard had grown in naturally patchy. Couldn’t we afford beard trimmers?

“I had to make sure,” Henry said. Lena was with him. Her dress had many stains around the hem and collar. Everything I had, every dollar I made went into providing for her. I never felt I had enough by the end of the month, clearly I didn’t. We had to make sacrifices. They came closer to the stage. 

“I’m here. I’m working,” I said. I haven’t done enough. 

“You sound like shit, Jeremiah. You call that working? How are we going to afford food this week if all you can do is play like that.”

“Henry, please, just give me some time,” I said.

“I can’t rely on you. We can’t rely on you.”

Henry took Lena away. Most likely to someplace better, to someone better. My family is not safe. 

“Focus,” Clara said. 

I looked at Clara and her baton. Tears fought their way out. I had no time for waterworks.

“Again,” Clara said. “Maybe Jeremiah will be prepared this time.”

She started the piece again. I tried to pay more attention. When it had gotten quiet, I was prepared to start playing. Instead of screeches, what came out of my horn was a low, long note that created dissonance in my ear. It made me nauseous.

Clara cut off the symphony. 

“What was that?” Clara asked.

“I’m not—”

“You are past the level of excuses. If you’re going to mess around in my music hall, you will pack your instrument and go home.”

“I didn’t mean to,” I said. 

Clara clasped her hands together, the baton poking out of her knotted hands at an odd angle. 

“It’s best if you leave, Jeremiah,” Clara said. 

“Clara,” I said. I had no defense for myself. I cannot throw it away. 

There was no arguing with Clara. She waited patiently while I stood up slowly and left. 

I had gotten to the subway station when I noticed I still had Roberto’s trombone in my hands. When I arrived at my stop, I left the instrument on the seat. I turned around and watched the trombone and train car fly away, onto the next part of town. 

It took thirty minutes to walk to my apartment—if I could even call it that, it was a room with a toilet, a sink, and a mattress. Three bottles of whiskey resided just inside the door. No fridge, no food. No family. I drank myself through the first bottle and halfway through the second until I saw my grandfather’s trombone, still in its original case, sitting in the corner. How could I have missed that? At the end of the second bottle, I rose, walked the two steps to the trombone, took it out of its case, and played. The sound was sweet. Too sweet, mournful even. I had heard the tune somewhere, but I couldn’t remember where I heard it. 

I slammed the horn into the concrete floor, the slide bent first. I slammed it on its other side. The bell bent. Again. Again. Again. 

The mangled brass ball tubes sat on my mattress.

I settled into the trombone. Hugging it like I was five and it was a stuffed teddy bear keeping me safe during a night-storm. Looking up to the underside of the sink, I reached for the hand mirror sitting on the rim of the bowl. 

The Jeremiah that looked back at me placed his palm on the glass. 

You were so desperate ten years ago. You said you would do anything to succeed. It’s a pity you already did the heavy work. Most people ask for skills they don’t already have. You were the first to ask for luck. The ticket to the big time. You could have asked for anything. How disappointing that it’s ending like this. 

I took a swig from the bottle of whiskey. It burned going down. A couple more drinks and the burning stopped. I set the mirror face down on the floor.

A tear slipped down my cheek, straight down. 

I have so much left to do.

I found my reflection staring back at me in the glass of an empty bottle.

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