BD Wilson

The piano was secondhand. The once-bright paneling was dull, scuffed and marked by thoughtless shoes and careless moves. Across the top, where there should have been only a lamp, perhaps a metronome, there obviously had been many a weeping glass, never with thought of a coaster.

The brass foot pedals were tarnished almost black, the white keys now off-white, and on their way to beige. While they had darkened, their black counterparts had faded to smoky gray.

It was a wreck, truly, but when she uncovered it before her son, she could see in his eyes its magnificence and magic.