Nothing could be more irritating than Cos’s terrible playing. Nothing. No, not even the honking of old lady Gleason’s pet goose was as bad.
Jemma looked at the sky in askance. “Please, Lord, let him learn to play that thing, or for my sanity, let that flute find a home at the bottom of the river!”
A heavy gust of wind was her only reply, rustling her skirts and whipping loose strands of mahogany hair across her heated face. She smiled, smoothing them away and enjoying the brief respite from the languid afternoon heat.
“Jemma! Did you hear? Did you?” Cos sprinted across the partially-tilled field as if he’d won the prize pig at market with his giddy laughter as the applause of the invisible audience.
“Yes, Cos, and I think my head would be much happier for not.”
The words escaped before she could stop them. Blast this heat and her tired, aching muscles. She swatted the handle of the till, not happy with herself for bringing that smile of Cos’s to a rigid halt at half-mast.
“I’m getting better,” he said, his voice stunted and soft as his hand circled the instrument, pulling it close to his chest.
Jemma sighed and took off her glove to rest her hand on his shoulder. Instead, she pulled him into a hug. He was tall enough his head now rested at her shoulder. When had he grown so much? “You’re right. You are getting better. Father would be so proud of you. Now, you run off and keep practicing!” She gave him a slight shove and smiled bright.
He brightened, too, seeming to forget her brief lapse of restraint into honesty. It didn’t matter how much she hated it, that flute was Father’s last gift to him before he passed after a bad fall from the roof last autumn. Winter had been so hard, and the flute had been his only comfort.
Mother couldn’t bring herself to ask him to stop trying to play, and neither could Jemma. She waved him off, his smile now firmly back in place.
He dashed toward the barn.
“Don’t forget to play for Nell! She always gives better milk when you do!”
Join the Blog Battlers and read more stories here: https://blogbattlers.wordpress.com/2020/05/12/blogbattle-stories-flute/
This was lovely, Rachael! It first made me grin with the honesty regarding the child’s musical abilities, then broke my heart when Cos learnt of Jemma’s (and our own!) judgement of his playing. Beautifully written little story!
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Thanks, Josh! Poor kid, I know. I think I’ve been on both sides of this scenario in one way or another. ❤ On another note, any current writing struggles you'd like to hash out? 🙂
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Very true, everyone’s got to start somewhere — it’s the first step to becoming good at something! I’m sure even Freddie Mercury’s parents winced at some of his singing and piano playing when he was young.
Actually, I’m feeling pretty good about my writing and blogging at the moment — finally caught up! Quite happy with my current productivity. I aim to never fall this far behind again! I need to be smarter with how I use my time…
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Don’t we all!
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A nice snippet that reveals more about the characters’ lives than one might notice at first glance. I truly enjoyed the ending with the remark Cos’s flute playing prompts the cow to give better milk!
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I’ve heard that some things can negatively or positively affect a cow’s ability to give good milk, so we might as well do what we can to encourage poor Cos! haha Thank you! ❤
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I love that opening. Suggesting a flute playing is worse than the honking of a goose. Classic!
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haha It would definitely make me curious to know why. 🙂 Thank you! I hope you’re well!
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We are here and ‘tootling’ on.
How are you are yours Rachael?
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haha That’s good to hear! We are well and good. Getting ready to take the oldest to get caught up on immunizations and hoping this school year ends soon. I’ve got summer fever and want to WRITE. 😀
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Hope the trip with the immunizations went well.
Ah the urge to WRITE…..embrace and indulge! Make your world sing with the vibe! 🙌
(I’m conducting a self-edit using Word’s Review + Read Aloud- it’s quite the experience!)
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Word has a read aloud feature?! What? Why have I not known this? Or wait, are you reading aloud? LOL I’m having a moment here. 😀
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I’ll clarify that for you Rachael 😃.
If you go to the Word Toolbar and select ‘Review’ on the far left is a ‘A’ with Read Aloud….click onto it- I always aim for the 3 ‘sound waves’ and from wherever your cursor was on the Word Doc a voice will start to read out your words.
The voice is not very robotic, although the diction would not pass muster on an audio book. Some words sound odd (eg ‘Squirrel’ comes out as ‘Sk-wi-rrel’) and occasionally it will have trouble with an abbreviation or contraction and just spell out the letters. It does however give you a whole new dimension to those words you made up for your fantasy novel!😄.
The method I use is to start the dictation and when I hit a ‘problem’ which needs revising I click on the ‘A’ to stop dictation, amend, click back on and start again. One you get into the flow it’s not time consuming or tedious (though can be frustrating when you hit a patch with a few mistakes- probably caused by too much coffee 🥴-).
It’s been quite useful and I’m working on a blog post, on the subject. Should have it ready by the end of the day.
Hope that helps!
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Oh my goodness! That’s fantastic! I had no idea that existed in Word. It’s amazing how you can get used to/comfortable with the features you use and then forsake all the rest. haha. Thank you so much. That sounds simple and useful! I’ll want to share your blog post once its up. 🙂
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