High Note by Jeff Ross

this part,” she said in a low growl. “I’ve been singing for way longer than you have. I have the better voice. Isabel said so. But now I have to walk around behind you? Be your understudy?” She paused.
    I had nothing to say in response. Her tone was angry and hurtful.
    “I’m stuck having to say that the first role I ever went for I didn’t get. People ask, you know. And with the press here and everything…” She crossed her arms and fell into her seat. “I mean, what do you even care?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “I mean, I want to be a singer. I am going to be a singer. This is my career. What is it to you? A hobby? Something fun to do? Why’d you even have to start?”
    “Because you asked me to,” I said, stunned.
    “Well, I shouldn’t have,” she said. “I wish I hadn’t.” She glanced at me, then turned away and stared at the stage.
    “Crissy,” I said, “I—”
    “Just forget it, Hailey. Just…I don’t know, do what you always do.”
    “What do I always do?”
    “You decide to do something, like soccer or field hockey or animation, and you’re really good at it right away, because everything is easy for you, for some reason. Then, as soon as it gets hard, you quit.” She glared at me again. “Can it get really hard for you soon? Please? Could you quit now and move on to whatever it is you’re going to do next?”
    I sat there, unable to speak. Barely able to breathe. Was this really what she felt?
    “I want to be a singer,” I said, because I couldn’t think of any other response.
    “Sure you do,” Crissy said, standing. “Until you want to be something else.”
    I watched her walk to the rear of the hall and head outside. I considered going after her. To plead my case. To tell her she was wrong. That singing wasn’t something I only did for fun. It wasn’t like soccer or animation or whatever. It was going to be my career as well. But I couldn’t put the words together. I couldn’t figure out how to say anything to her without getting angry.
    I rose up out of my seat twice but sat back down both times. Chasing after her to try to convince her she was wrong was the worst thing I could do. It would be an argument, nothing more.
    There was no way I could win.
    * * *
    Crissy was silent the next time we were needed onstage. Then it was lunchtime, and she disappeared again. I didn’t go looking for her.
    Amanda had picked three parts to be looked at during the afternoon rehearsal. The first was a busy scene at the beginning of the opera, in which almost all of the singers are onstage at some point or other. The next was an aria that Isabel sang. And the final piece was “L’ho perduta.”
    Now that the full orchestra was involved, the understudies were left to sit in the hall with the choir.
    Isabel was onstage, about to start her aria. The orchestra had already played through the piece twice, though it didn’t seem to me that they needed to. They sounded amazing. Everything was tight and crisp. Evelyn Linley, the conductor, signaled the orchestra to play again, and Isabel began.
    Isabel made it about three bars before Evelyn crossed the stage, waving her arms. “Not like that,” she said. She stepped close to Isabel and spoke quietly. Isabel nodded. She seemed to be taking the direction well.
    Evelyn started the orchestra again. This time Isabel moved differently, and her voice projected out over the hall. I could see that Evelyn liked what she heard. Although she mostly dealt with the orchestra, she often spoke directly with the singers as well. She was a tall thin woman who was in no way intimidating, yet everyone listened to what she had to say. She had worked with this orchestra for years and had earned a huge amount of respect from all the musicians.
    She knew exactly what she wanted—which left me feeling nervous for the first time. I couldn’t help thinking about what Crissy had said. That I was good at everything initially, then gave up when it got hard. Was