"Thank you," Nia said. Her voice came out smaller than in the music, which did not surprise her. Music was a larger house than conversation.
"I'm Claire. I'm violin. I'm after lunch, I think. They split the day." She hesitated. "My mom — she talks like that to a lot of people. Not just you. She told a boy last year his case was going to scratch the floor. He was seven. He cried. I should have said something then. I didn't. I'm not saying that fixes this. I'm just saying I know."
Nia looked at her. The honesty was awkward, like a chair pulled out too far, and it was still honesty. "Okay," she said. "Good luck with the Adagio. If that's what you're playing. You have resin — rosin — on your scarf."
Claire looked down and almost laughed, a short breath. "It's a whole thing. She thinks the hardware looks aggressive." She glanced back. Mrs. Whitmore was watching with the expression of a woman revising a strategy. "I have to go. Play the room the way you just played. Don't make it smaller because the room is fancy."
She left. Nia sat with the folder and the banana she had forgotten to eat and the shaking that was gradually becoming a feeling she could carry. Across the lobby, Mr. Carter spoke briefly to the aide. The concert harp would be moved, or a second one. The schedule would bend by ten minutes. Bending a schedule, Nia understood, was a kind of power. He was using it in her direction without making a speech about it.
Mrs. Whitmore did not apologize. She went to the registration table and asked, in a voice that carried just enough, whether lobby instruments were meant to be demonstrated before official times, and whether there was a rule. The volunteer, a college student with a lanyard and no authority, said she would find out. Mr. Carter, passing, said, "There is a rule. Applicants who requested a house harp may use it. Applicants may warm up if the space is free and they treat the instrument correctly. She did. If you have a concern about my decision, you can put it in writing after the audition day. Not during a child's ten minutes."
"I was protecting the instrument," Mrs. Whitmore said.
"The instrument is fine," he said. "And it belongs to the center, not to the most confident person in the lobby."
He walked away before the conversation could become a scene they would both have to star in. Catherine Whitmore stood very still. A flush rose along her throat, above the dark green blouse. She was not used to being spoken to as if her concern were a convenience. She told herself the man was rude. She told herself the girl had been lucky. She told herself the real test was the room, the judges, the standard. Some of this was true. The luck part was the lie she needed, so she kept it closest.