Dr. Caroll clicked the stop icon on her laptop to end the playback. We’d just been listening to the recording of my recital performance and it was better than I expected, to tell the truth. After she turned back toward me she said, “Well done, Kyle. Ordinarily we would use this time to dissect the performance making note of areas where more work is needed, but frankly in this case, there really aren’t that many things we need to address.”

“It’s a pity I can’t remember playing it. If I could I might be able to recreate the performance,” I commented.

“So what happened when you walked out on stage?”

“I’m not sure. I was very nervous as I walked toward the piano. When I sat down, I looked at the keyboard and my mind went completely blank. I couldn’t remember what I was supposed to be doing; I couldn’t even remember my own name. Nothing. I closed my eyes trying to think and suddenly as if on their own, my hands raised up to the keyboard and I started playing. I can’t remember anything after lifting my hands.”

She looked at me for a moment before speaking, “There’s a reason to be concerned, but you can’t really argue with the end result. Now, over in the student union I noticed they’re organizing a Yoga class. I’ve had some students in the past that had problems with nerves who found that it helped them control their fear on stage. I’d like you to give it a try, just to see if it might help.”

“When is it?”

“The first meeting is this evening at 6, in the student union. If you try it and don’t think it’ll help, then all you’re out is an evening. If it helps, then it’s time well spent. Now, how’re you coming along with the Rachmoninov?”

I started playing, but less than a minute into the Allegro Agitato, Dr. Caroll stopped me. “Where is the grace, Kyle? All I can hear is power. Anyone can play Rachmoninov with power. You’re better than that. Go back and try again.”

This time I remembered to picture myself as a girl and played all the way through the first movement before she stopped me. “Much better. Now remember that. Continue.”

As I ploughed through the Non Allegro second movement, I knew there were moments where my concentration lapsed and felt certain she was going to mention it when I was done.

“I don’t know what you need to do to maintain your focus, but it was in and out during that movement. Remember to stay focused.”

I looked down at my hands and replied, “Yes ma’am. I know I can do this.”

“I know you can as well. I’ve heard it. If you can master this focus problem, you’ll have a great career ahead of you. I know it. Now concentrate.”

Again I closed my eyes and envisioned myself as a girl before continuing with the Allegro Molto third movement. Surprisingly, I was able to play most of the movement without even opening my eyes, as I appeared to have already memorized it. This made it much easier for me to maintain the focus Dr. Caroll was after me about and I could tell from the look on her face as I finished that I had managed to play it successfully.

“If you can play the entire thing like that last movement, you’ll be ready. I knew you had something special the first time I heard you play, back when you auditioned last spring. I knew then that if we could smooth out the few rough edges in your playing, you had the ability to be truly great. Keep it up.”

She looked down at a pad of paper, which she always seemed to have in front of her and made a note before continuing, “Now for Thursday, I’d like you to complete the memorization and work on the focus. Oh, and while you’re at it take a look at the Chopin E Major etude. See you then.” I was ushered out of her office, as it seems we had run overtime and her next student was waiting outside for her turn. I gathered up my things and headed out the door and toward the student union to grab a bite of early dinner before this Yoga class Dr. Caroll suggested I check out.

When I arrived at the room for the yoga class I discovered that basically what we were doing was working out with a Wai Lana yoga tape. There were maybe twenty students present, most of whom apparently had done this before. Just knowing that was almost enough to make me leave right then, but eventually I convinced myself that I should give it a try.

As I looked around the room, I saw Cindy toward the back of the room and decided to head her way. “Hey Cindy, what you doin’ here?”

“Kyle! I saw your recital today. You were fantastic!” Shifting her attention to the class, she then said, “I thought it looked like it might be fun. What about you?”

“Dr. Caroll suggested I give it a try to help with my relaxation techniques.”

“You seemed pretty well relaxed on stage today.”

“Yeah, so relaxed that I can’t remember playing at all.”

“Really?”

Just then someone toward the front of the room clapped their hands and shouted, “Attention, please!”

We all quieted down and turned our attention toward the voice, which came from a lady standing next to the big screen TV. “Thank you. We’re going to work out with this yoga tape this evening.” She pushed the recording into the player and the screen flickered to life.

As Wai Lana appeared on screen and led us through a series of exercises, I had to admit that I started to feel much more relaxed than I had before we started. Maybe there was something to this whole yoga thing?

When the tape ended, the person who had spoken to the group earlier stood up again, turning off the TV before turning to address us again. “I hope you all have enjoyed spending time with us this evening. We’ll be meeting every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evening at 6 if any of you would like to join us again. I hope to see you Wednesday.”

I turned to Cindy, “What did you think?”

“I can think of worse ways of spending a half hour,” she grinned as she spoke.

“Me too,” I replied. We walked together back to our apartment building and rode the elevator up to our floor, parting only when we reached my door. “Good night, Cin,” I said.

“Yeah, good night Ky’,” she said, leaning close and kissing me on the cheek. She backed away from me and we waved at each other, not taking our eyes off the other until we were both ready to go into our apartments. I then went inside, closing the door behind me and leaning back against it, releasing an audible sigh in the process.

It occurred to me that I had some homework that needed my attention before I could start practicing, so I settled in with my psychology textbook for some ‘light’ reading. We were studying the effects of hormones on the brain, which I found fascinating. For a brief moment I found myself wondering if prenatal hormone levels had anything to do with my apparent affinity for the feminine? I knew I didn’t really have time to chase that particular rabbit at that moment, so I filed the thought away for later reflection and finished off the chapter.

Next came a little Algebra, followed by English. By the time I’d finished off my homework, it was drawing near 10pm. I considered not practicing, but quickly dropped that notion. “How can you become a concert pianist if you don’t even practice every day?”

I sat down at my keyboard and started working on the Rachmaninov. Just like in Dr. Caroll’s office earlier, I was having a great deal of difficulty maintaining my focus, which left spots where my playing sounded a lot like everyone else’s…lots of power and pomp, but little real beauty.

I got up from the keyboard and wandered around the room for a few minutes thinking. “What can I do to maintain my focus?” I kept asking myself that question, but wasn’t having much luck with the answer.

I wandered over to my dresser and started digging through its contents until I came out with one of the bras the girls had picked out for me. “What am I doing? Am I nuts?” I asked myself as I stood there holding that bit of lace. “Why exactly did they buy this for me?”

“Let’s think for a moment here. I started wearing panties and my ability to maintain my focus on playing gracefully improved. Now I need to take the next step. But what is that next step?”

I stood there staring at that bra for the longest time before finally I said to myself, “What the hell,” and stripped off my shirt. I pulled the bra straps up my arms and watched as the cups settled in front of my nonexistent breasts before reaching around and struggling to fasten the garment just as I’d seen my mother do so many times.

Once I had it fastened, I pulled my shirt back on over it and sat at the keyboard. To say that the sensation was distracting would be an exercise in drastic understatement, but I wasn’t sure this was going to be the answer I was seeking. I decided to record my practice like I do sometimes, just so I knew exactly how it sounded in case I found it difficult to listen objectively. That said, once I started playing I had to admit to myself that although I couldn’t begin to fathom why, that contraption of straps and lace seemed to be doing something. Exactly what I couldn’t say, but as I played I was so busy thinking about the bra…my bra…that I wasn’t thinking about playing.

When I finished I decided to play back the recording to see if I’d gotten the results I was after. It didn’t take long to determine that I had found my answer. Had I not known better, I might have thought I was listening to Horowitz or Barenboim but no, it was little ol’ me…Kyle Bronson, cross-dressing pianist.

Having solved that dilemma, I decided to go ahead and put in a little time on the E Major etude. When I say a little, what I really mean is that I practiced until I was falling asleep mid-phrase and my head hit the keyboard, sending a clanging sound through my headphones that woke me up just enough to know it was time to go to bed. I almost didn’t even bother undressing, but then remembered the bra and didn’t think I’d find sleeping in it all that appealing.

The next few days saw me start to fall into a routine of sorts. On days when I had either a lesson or a performance, I wore the bra. The rest of the time, I left it off. I had a couple of different reasons for this. First, I hadn’t found anything about wearing it that struck me as appealing in the least and second, I decided that if I didn’t wear it every day I was less likely to get so used to it that it ceased to do what I needed.

I finally got a handle on the recital scheduling. Dr. Caroll’s students did the midday recitals on Mondays and Fridays, and she had all of us on a rotating schedule, which basically meant we all had to play one about every two weeks. Funny, I would have sworn she told me about once a month, but I guess she changed her mind.

Cindy and I did the Wednesday evening Yoga class, where again we worked out along with a video for about a half hour before class broke up. I don’t know if it was going to help with my nerves or not, but it sure helped me relax at the time. I think Cindy was enjoying it as well. I was really enjoying becoming closer with this beautiful young woman.

Thursday’s lesson went incredibly smoothly. So much so in fact that I was afraid she was going to give me a hug and discover the bra under my sweatshirt. I don’t think I would have been up to explaining that yet, so I considered myself lucky when she resisted the urge.

With Cindy, however, I wasn’t quite so lucky. Thursday after my lesson I headed back to the apartment to take off the bra and ran into her in the lobby on my way in. She decided to take the elevator up with me and came into my apartment while I went to change. I don’t know if she was snooping, or if I wasn’t being as careful as I thought when I was removing the bra, but when I came out of the bathroom after taking it off, she said, “When did you start wearing that?”

I stammered for a moment before answering, “I was having some trouble with the Rachmaninov and decided to try it just to see if it helped. It did, though I can’t for the life of me tell you why. So now, when I have to either have a lesson or a performance, I wear it to help with the focus.”

As I was saying all this, Cindy was slowly walking toward me, until when I was done she was standing very close. She stood there almost touching me for what felt like an eternity before leaning over to my ear and whispering, “I thought it was kind of sexy.” She then pulled back to where she had been before she spoke and looked into my eyes.

Unsure how to respond, I just stood there staring back at her with a silly lopsided grin on my face until she smiled back and then walked over to the sofa and plopped down. She then looked back at me and asked, “What’s for dinner?”

“Um…” I said intelligently.

“Come on Kyle. How can you expect me to be your girlfriend if you don’t at least occasionally buy me dinner?” she said in all seriousness.

I shook my head to clear it before responding, “I didn’t know you were my girlfriend.”

“Well if you don’t want me to be…”

I jumped in, cutting her off before she could continue, “I didn’t say that. You just sort of surprised me.”

She got up from the sofa and started toward the door. “Good. Then where are you taking me?”

I started after her, following her onto the elevator before saying, “The student union cafeteria isn’t really that great a choice. How about we hit Minsky’s?”

“Good choice, boyfriend. I’m guessing we’re walking?”

We got out of the elevator and started toward the front door. “Well, since neither of us have a car…”

“That’s what I thought,” she said as I opened the door to let her out first, following right behind and once clear of the building catching up so I could walk alongside her.

As we walked toward the pizza place, she looped her left arm around my right and snuggled close. I finally found my brain about halfway there and asked, “So, what prompted this? I mean us?”

“I really like you. You’re nice, friendly, intelligent, funny…and sort of sexy in a quirky way that I really like.”

I began to blush again as she rattled off that list and when I finally regained some control over myself I responded, “I’d be a fool to not be interested in you. You’re gorgeous, smart, confident…I actually feel a little inadequate when I’m around you.”

“That’s the silliest thing I’ve heard you say. Here you are, the great artiste. Able to speak to others’ souls with the flick of a finger, and you feel inadequate?”

We slowed our pace a bit so we could talk more seriously. “I may be able to play piano fairly well, but you? You’re like a model, only brilliant.”

“Oh, Kyle!” she said, actually blushing herself. She then leaned toward my cheek and gave me a kiss as we drew near the restaurant. Once inside, we took a table and sat facing each other, waiting to order. As we sat there, she asked, “So, the bra. Was that the only reason why?”

“Yeah. I mean, I like the panties, to tell you the truth. They’re way more comfortable than jockey shorts, but the bra? I can’t for the life of me figure out why anyone would want to wear one.”

“But you did wear it?”

“And I told you why. Basically, I think the tug of the straps and scratch of the lace distracts me so I don’t think too much about what I’m doing, that’s all. If I think too much about my playing, it becomes more mechanical. So in this case, distraction is good.”

She looked at me devilishly for a moment before saying, “Is there anything I could do to distract you?”

I grinned evilly and said, “I’m pretty sure I could think of something you could do.” I was able to hold the laugh in for a second, but then we both broke out in a fit of giggles that lasted long enough that we undoubtedly drew the attention of some of our fellow patrons, although no one said anything.

Once we were finished with our dinner, we walked back to the apartment building, again arm in arm and returned to my apartment. I had barely closed the door when Cindy asked, “Do I get to hear the difference?”

“Oh, I suppose,” I said, trying to sound like I didn’t want to play when the truth was just the opposite. I sat down at the keyboard, turned it on and unplugged the headphones so she could hear, and just before I started playing I said, “This first time will be without, then I’ll go put it back on so you can hear the difference.”

I started playing the sonata’s first movement and when I was done, I looked at Cindy and she looked rather impressed and said so, “That was without? It sounded great to me!”

“One moment,” I said as I got up and went to retrieve the bra and put it back on, then again pulled my shirt on over it because it seemed just too weird to run around in front of her with just the bra on. I returned to the keyboard and played the same movement again, this time feeling completely satisfied that I was achieving the balance of power and grace that a perfect performance demanded.

When I looked up at the end of the movement, Cindy was silent with tears slowly crawling down her cheek. I got up and went to her, sitting beside her on the sofa and taking her in my arms. “What’s wrong?” I asked, confused as to why she was crying.

She replied, “It was so beautiful. I couldn’t help but cry.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, trying to comfort her.

“Don’t be. It was perfect.” She then turned her face to mine and kissed me on the lips. Like any red-blooded male in a similar situation, I returned the kiss in kind, slowly intensifying it until we were probing each other with our tongues.

After several minutes of activity, she broke the embrace and said, “Maybe we should stop for now?”

While part of me felt a little hurt by this intrusion of reason and I felt certain she could tell, another part knew she was right, and I said so, “You’re probably right, Cin. We’ve got all the time in the world.”

I walked her to the door and down the hall to her apartment, where I kissed her again and said, “Goodnight. Want to go to the midday recital with me tomorrow? We could catch a bite of lunch at the U after?”

“Sure. I’ll see ya at the recital hall at noon, okay?” she said, giving me one last kiss goodnight before entering her apartment and closing the door. I then found my way back to mine and found sleep waiting for me.

I floated through Friday morning on autopilot, not really taking in much of anything in my classes. Come midday, I was eagerly waiting outside the recital hall for Cindy. Truth be told, she was the first girl I could ever say was my “girlfriend”. I’d had a few dates in high school, but never more than a couple with any one girl and none of them could really be considered a “relationship”. After all, I was the geeky wanna be musician and most of the girls chased after the athletes, so I was considered the bottom guy on the totem pole.

Now I could say I had a beautiful girlfriend and I had no intentions of screwing the relationship up. She came running in the building about two minutes before they were going to close the hall doors and start, so we rushed in and found seats toward the back, settling in just as the house lights dimmed and the first victim…I mean performer…came out on stage.

Roughly an hour later we were exiting the hall after the last performer had played, though I couldn’t tell who had played, what they had played, or how well they played it, because I spent the entire hour staring at Cindy. She would look at me every couple of minutes and smile, then return her attention to the music while I was off in a world that had only her and I. I guess you could say I was falling hard.

From that point on we were practically inseparable until it was time for classes Monday morning. Not that we really did much of anything all weekend. She listened to me practice, we did homework together, read, listened to music, watched TV…the usual hang out at home weekend thing. And yes, I will admit to some intimate experimentation. Nothing our parents would disapprove of too vehemently, but we had fun.

The weirdest event of the weekend came Saturday evening. We were listening to some music when the phone rang. I looked at the caller ID and saw that it was my folks. “It’s my parents. I’d best take it,” I said to Cindy as I used the remote to turn down the volume and pressed talk on the phone.

“Hey,” I said into the receiver.

“Hi Kyle, how have you been,” came the voice of my mother.

“Good mom. How’re you guys?”

“Fine. I thought I’d give you a call to see how you’re getting on.”

“Great. I’m learning lots from Dr. Caroll, making new friends,” I said looking at Cindy. “I even have a new girlfriend.”

“Really? Wonderful! What’s her name?”

“Cindy. She’s here now if you want to say hi,” I handed the phone to her and she looked at me like I was going to pay for that stunt.

She did however say into the phone, “Hi Mrs. Bronson.”

“Cindy, is it? Good to talk to you dear. Tell me about yourself.”

“Um, I’m a freshman Psych major. My apartment is next door to Kyle’s and we started getting to know each other and just sort of were drawn together.”

“Well, I’m already looking forward to meeting you when we come up in a few weeks for a weekend visit.”

“Me too, Mrs. Bronson. Want Kyle back?”

“Yes, dear.”

Cindy quickly handed the phone back to me, glaring at me like I was going to have to pay dearly for putting her in that position. I grinned and said into the phone, “Isn’t she great, mom?”

“She seems very nice, son.”

“She is. She’s also gorgeous, brilliant, but an awful judge of character. That’s the only way I can explain that she hasn’t gone running away yet,” he said as he started to chuckle.

“I wanted to let you know that we’ll be coming up two weeks from now for a little visit. And I want to spend some time with this Cindy.”

“Yes, ma’am. I’ll talk to you later. Love you,” I said and broke the connection.

Cindy spent much of the rest of the evening telling me I was going to pay for making her talk to my mom, but nothing came of it other than some teasing. I decided I could live with that.

The entire next week flew by in much the same fashion as the previous one. Classes, practice, and hanging out with Cindy dominated my life. Nothing really changed until the day of my next recital appearance, the following Monday.

Sergei Rachmaninov, 2nd Sonata in Bb minor
http://server3.pianosociety.com/protected/rachmaninov-36-1-g...
http://server3.pianosociety.com/protected/rachmaninov-36-2-g...
http://server3.pianosociety.com/protected/rachmaninov-36-3-g...

Frederic Chopin, Etude No.3 in E Major, Opus 10
http://server3.pianosociety.com/protected/chopin-10-3-grant.mp3

Notes: