The woman on stage was wide for a Chinese woman. And for a young woman. I did not expect such width from a sixteen-year-old.

Her fingers arched back in a frighteningly dramatic curve, as if that last knuckle, the one that gave way to palm, had a 360 degree hinge. As if she could stand up, rest her fingertips on the back of the piano and bend until her nails touched the backs of her hands.

She played the piano just as I imagined I would. Really biting off the beginning and end of each piece, each length of playing. She leaned forward to begin and sent her hands bouncing off the keys and away to end. The sort of flourishes with which I would decorate my own piano playing if I had any idea what I was doing at a piano.

She was very, very good, which I found very, very attractive.

I was attending the concert with a friend and his grandmother, Bea, and, as I don't like to have any sexual thoughts when in the company of old people, I had dutifully masturbated before leaving the house. So the previous woman I had watched work, before arriving at the concert hall, was a comically-endowed brunette who was also very, very good at what she did; that being getting fucked and describing it in a breath-caught, shriek-punctuated, orgasmic narrative. I had chosen her video to download for these very vocal talents. But I noticed how comical her endowment, how ridiculous her narration, as soon as I came. Hardly any way to show my thanks. I listen to this woman pant and watch her perfectly tanned breasts sway with some non-descript man's gyrating, I get off, and then instantly think less of her. Scoff at the terrible production design within which she works. Mutter nasty things about her producer's inability to afford foley. And whose fault might that be? I was the one downloading the damn thing for free.

Then the 16-year-old pianist. I was listening to her work too and, not surprisingly, an entirely different part of me was aroused. I had a thing for accomplished woman instrumentalists but it was different than my thing for moaning porn stars. Even if, somehow, the pianist had helped me come, even if, through some bizarre parody of reality, I somehow bedded the 16-year-old pianist, I would never laugh at her, never scoff at her piano playing. She could always restore my admiration by sitting at her Steinway and playing very, very well.

The Chinese pianist was replaced in the second set by her teacher, that being the conceit of the series. He was a dour old man who lashed the keys with intensity but didn't punctuate his playing in that satisfying manner his pupil had used to lure me in. I wished she were back. I even missed her teal dress amidst the sea of black. Someone should add a dash of color. It made the experience more alive. If everyone was being unobtrusive, there was so little to look at that it became distracting. Bones must be thrown to the other senses during a concert or they will complain and make it difficult to pay full auditory attention.

Afterwards the three of us sat outside a little café and had coffee and dessert. I got a lemon bar.

"That 16-year-old can play the piano," I offered heartily. I was rewarded with a miniature chorus of astonishment.

"Well," Bea cooed in her slightly southern accent. "Well, let me tell you a story."

I don't think anyone had ever stopped Bea from telling a story in her life.

"Her teacher -- that dark, little man who played second -- he's very famous, of course. Despite that foolish ovation he was given this evening, however, he is much slower than he used to be."

My friend and I nodded. We had preferred the young, Chinese woman.

"Now he teaches. She's his newest pupil but he's had six or seven. Mostly very successful. The second one, his second pupil, you have both heard of. Very talented young woman. Your age now. Or older. Still a child to me, of course.

"She achieved, achieved at such a high level, at such a young age, that she became bored quickly. She could play better than her peers without trying. She lacked a competitive fire. The kind of fire your mother has always had, dear."

Bea patted my friend's hand.

"So her parents -- in a panic, an absolute panic, after two years of decline in their daughter's playing -- they contacted this man, the man we saw tonight, and asked him to consider their daughter.

"Well, he saw that she was talented."

Here we all paused to nibble at our snacks. I caught myself lifting my plate and taking a terribly dainty bite. I realized, too, that my legs, during the concert, had been crossed in that feminine way that I am supposed to avoid if ever I get on a major television talk show. Ankle on knee is the manly way to cross one's legs. None of this thigh on thigh horseshit.

I put down my plate, slouched in my chair and let my legs drop open under the table.

"He saw that she was talented, but also that she wasn't angry enough. He thought she wasn't angry enough. Piano playing had come too easy to her and she needed more of an ax to grind. So he took her on as his pupil.

"And he tried many things to get her angry and playing to her potential again. You saw the man. He's a brutish thing and he was not kind. But she did not care, this young woman, she did not care at all.

"After several months of this, he finally confronted her in her hotel suite. They were on the road for a recital. He confronted her. She sulked and ignored him and finally, in the hotel room, he forced himself on her."

"Grandma!" my friend said.

"In the hotel room," Bea said, as if that was somehow the worst part.

"Grandma, where did you hear that?"

"It's commonly known."

"It's commonly known?"

"Among those who follow the world of concert pianists, it is commonly known."

My friend flopped his hands on the table and picked up his fork to stab at his key lime pie.

"However, dears, this is hardly the end of the story. That beastly little man was right. That girl grew up that night and she grew up angry. She played with real fire -- angry, angry fire and she is still very well known and very well respected."

"The rape worked? You're saying the rape worked?"

"She's very well-respected."

"And he's had more pupils since?" I asked and then regretted using the word pupil.

"Four or five more. But until recently, until he took on the young woman you boys were so smitten with tonight, only men."

"Maybe she knew enough not to believe such an outlandish story."

"Not at all. Not at all. Everyone knows it. I'm not gossiping dear, this is commonly known. Established history. I don't condone it just because I'm telling you. Although there are those that say if he hadn't forced himself on her the world would have been robbed of a very bright talent."

"Grandma!"

"His new pupil, the young Oriental we saw tonight, she knew the story and when he approached her to ask her to study under him she was very wary. He had a reputation after all. A great teacher but also an abuser of women."

"Yes, we remember," my friend said and furrowed his brow at me.

"She asked him many different ways about this, without ever truly asking him. The Chinese are, of course, much too discrete to ask about something like that directly.

"Finally, he turns to her and says, 'You're worried about the things you've heard about me. With my last female student.'

"She admits she is.

"He tells here, 'Listen, that's the last thing you need. You play out of control. You're all passion and energy. To become a great pianist you need control. It would be a grave mistake to handle you as I handled that other girl. A grave mistake.'"

"Wow."

"She needed discipline."

"She seemed disciplined to me," I offered.

"Well, he's a great teacher," Bea said. "Although, as I said, his playing has become a bit slow. A step slow."

"She sounded disciplined to me," I offered again, for agreement and emphasis. "Sounded very good." I picked up my plate and nibbled at my bar.

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