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“It’s pretty,” I heard myself say.

“The moment I saw it, I knew I had to get it for you, Phoebe,” Daddy said.

There he was, standing at my bedside, smiling down at me. Then he lost his smile and put his hand on my forehead.

“Still got some fever,” he muttered, and straightened up quickly, concern on his face. “She still has some fever, Charlene,” he called behind him.

“It’s nothing,” Mama shouted back. ?

??Kids get fevers all the time.”

“Maybe we should take her to the doctor. She’s been sniveling and coughing for days.”

“She’ll be all right. Everything scares you, Horace. I swear you were brought up a mama’s boy, frightened by the sound of your own footsteps. You going with me or not?”

“Going? We can’t leave her, Charlene. The girl’s sick. What, you crazy?”

“Suit yourself,” she said. “You know where I’ll be.”

Daddy wound up the music box again and I watched the dancers.

“I’ll get you some hot tea and honey to drink, Phoebe. You feeling all right?”

I nodded, unable to take my eyes off the dancers.

Daddy left, but he didn’t come back. The dancers stopped and the music ended.

I wanted it all to start again.

“Daddy,” I called. “Daddy.”

He didn’t reply. I struggled so hard to get to that music box, but I couldn’t reach it.

The dancers waited. This was all they were created to do, dance, but it was enough to give them purpose and beauty. Silence and neglect were the two sides of the same cruel sword cutting their lifeline. And they weren’t just waiting for any music. They needed the music that belonged to them, the music they were born with, the music that had become a part of them. They looked so helpless, waiting there, so full of disappointment, too.

They started to disappear.

I felt myself drifting pleasantly again, but I kept thinking about the dancers.

And then it came to me.

I’m just like them, I thought.

Waiting for the music that belonged to me.

The End