Claimer: The following story and characters belong to Vanishing Roses. Unauthorized copying is prohibited. Just ask and I’ll more than likely let you use the story for whatever you’d like.

Author’s Notes: And yet again, here’s another Moonlight Sonata influenced piece by yours truly. What can I say? I love this piece. One thing about the following story I should tell you about is that none of the two main characters have names. There’s one woman, and the other character can be either gender, really. So, I’ve left a great deal up to your imagination. The real reason I wrote this story was because while playing Moonlight Sonata, the only song I know how to play, I was suddenly struck with the thought, ‘Can I reach Heaven from here?’ and thus, another story is born! I hope you like it!

To Reach for Heaven

“Just one more time, please. Play Moonlight Sonata for me.”

I looked at the woman that was leaning against my piano. She was wearing a black gown. Her hair was black, her eyes were black, but her skin was so white that it was beautifully translucent. Every night for the past month she would somehow manage to find herself in the club’s lounge where I played the piano.

“Please, just one more time,” she asked me again, her eyes communicating to me such sadness, almost desperation that I could not say no to her request. Sitting down at the piano, my lithe, skillful fingers began to play across the piano, caressing and coaxing each melodious note out of the divine instrument, a goddess in her own right. As I played, I opened my eyes and looked at the woman that kept me company for so many hours after all of the other patrons had left. Her beautiful face was resting against her arms and her eyes were closed, allowing the music to wash over her.

I remember asking her, back when I first met her, why she liked the songs I played so much, especially Moonlight Sonata. She replied that she didn’t know herself, but she could feel the music speak to her, the emotion in each note seep into her skin. She spoke about the music so lovingly that I assumed she was a pianist herself. When I told her that, she blinked in surprise before rewarding me with a velvety laugh.

She couldn’t play the piano to saver her life, she told me. I thought, surely, she must have been joking, but when she attempted to play, she was only able to so with her right hand and very slowly, one note at a time. I told her to press a few notes and she confessed to me that she had no idea what notes the keys were and she couldn’t read music. She looked so embarrassed that even I couldn’t help but laugh. After that, we spent hours together.

The more time we spent in each others company the more I think I fell in love with her. Her gentle laughter, her peaceful face as she listened to me play, her kind heart; she was able to put my own soul at ease. As much as I loved her, I said nothing of it. Being with her like that was enough. I loved her so much, that simply seeing her happy elevated my soul to play better, in hopes of showing her something special in the music. I wanted to communicate my feelings about her through my music.

Somehow, before we even began to really talk, I knew that night was different somehow. Her normally joyful expression held such sorrow that I found myself so distracted by her uncharacteristic melancholy face that I often lost my place in the music and repeated many measures over.

After a few hours, a few hours far too soon, I stopped and the two of us looked at each other. She slowly got up and looked at me, smiling. “I…think that I better get going,” she said gently. Nodding, I got up to show her out, when suddenly she ran to me and wrapped her arms around me tightly.

I was so taken aback by surprise that I did not move for a moment before gently holding her. The two of us stayed that way for what seemed like eternity. I could feel her heart beating against my chest, gentle, persistent and heavy. The hug, which under any other circumstance should have been a blessing, seemed more like a good bye.

Soon we moved apart and, without a word, we took each other’s hand. I turned the lights off and walked outside with her. We walked through the cold, deserted streets together silently.

As we passed a large park, normally filled with families, but in the night completely deserted, she looked up in the sky and reached out her hand into the air. “I wonder… can I touch Heaven from here?” she pondered out loud before lowering her arms back down, not finding her answer. As I walked her home, I thought over her words. I bide her good night and left the opposite way. Even to this day I can still feel her tear filled eyes looking at my back as I disappeared down the street.

Over the next few days, she didn’t come around again. I thought that she might have left, and thought nothing more about it. One night, as I was cleaning up, I found a news paper one of the guests had been reading.

On the front page was a picture of the woman I fell in love with. Dead and lying in her own blood in her kitchen. Her husband was the leader of the local gang and she became too tangled into his affairs to get out. Suddenly her sadness became understandable. Why is it that humans only understand one another when it is far too late?

That night after the funeral, when all the other patrons had left the club, I was left at my piano, playing Moonlight Sonata as the moon itself wept a heavy light through the windows. The music had such an effect on me that I was still able to hear her gentle breathing as she listened, her head resting on the piano.

I let the last note reverberate through the large, spacious room before I moved my hand away from the precious keys. I reached both of my hands up as far as I could, but I wasn’t able to touch a single thing.

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