The Rehearsal

under the ginkgo tree. Stanley and Isolde did not look up. Stanley crushed Isolde in a one-arm hug and together they walked away, talking quietly with their heads together, until they were swallowed by the cloisters and the branches, and they disappeared.
    September
    “Do you know why you are here?” the Head of Movement said as Stanley sat down.
    “Probably my Outing,” Stanley said, hazarding a guess.
    The Head of Movement raised his eyebrows and twitched up his chin sharply. “Your Outing?” he said.
    “I must have failed the exercise,” Stanley said, suddenly realizing that he should be cautious, and trying to look a little more innocent and perplexed.
    “I don’t think so,” the Head of Movement said. “I have your report from the Head of Improvisation and she said she was very much impressed. You were Joe Pitt.”
    “Yeah,” Stanley said.
    “I believe her report was very admiring.”
    “Oh.”
    Stanley tried to shrug and smile, but all he managed was a shiver and a grimace.
    “Were you expecting to fail?” the Head of Movement asked, peering at him closely.
    “No,” Stanley said quickly. “So I guess I don’t know why I’m here.”
    The Head of Movement sat back and placed the palms of his hands on the desk before him. He was wearing a long-practiced look of grave disappointment, and Stanley’s heart began to hammer. The Head of Movement said, “Somebody has complained about you. Somebody has laid a very serious complaint about you. Do you know what that might be?”
    Stanley looked bewildered. “No,” he said. “Who? What was it?”
    The Head of Movement did not speak immediately. He looked at Stanley with something between pity and disgust, and Stanley felt himself shrivel.
    “A music teacher who teaches in a studio in the north quad,” he said, “laid a complaint with us that you had been harassing her students.”
    “What?” Against his will Stanley felt himself begin to flush.
    “Harassing her students,” the Head of Movement went on. “In particular a young girl in the fifth form. Does this mean anything to you?”
    Stanley sat for a moment without speaking.
    “Nothing?” the Head of Movement said.
    He drew the silence out between them carefully, like a measured breath. There was a dreadful sinking feeling in the pit of Stanley’s stomach. He sat and stared at the glossy sheen of the table under the Head of Movement’s hands, and said nothing.
    “Normally,” the Head of Movement said, “we wouldn’t intervene in a case like this, of course. Normally we’d treat you like an adult and expect you to sort it out of your own accord. But the fact that this music teacher has taken up the issue directly with us—you see that we are compelled to talk with you about it. You see that.”
    “Yes,” Stanley said automatically, and he nodded his head.
    “The music teacher was very concerned about her students’ safety, given the proximity of her studio to this Institute,” the Head of Movement said.
    Stanley nodded again.
    “What happened, Stanley?” the Head of Movement said. “What’s all this about?”
    Stanley looked up quickly to meet the Head of Movement’s gaze, and then drew his eyes away, turning his head to look at the framed posters and theater programs above the filing cabinet. They were ordered chronologically, lined up like a simple recipe for the Head of Movement’s life, the plotted path to where he sat right now at his empty desk with his bare feet together and a frown upon his face.
    “I don’t know,” Stanley said at last. “I don’t know anything about a saxophone teacher.”
    “I said music teacher.”
    Stanley drew in his breath sharply and again glanced at the Head of Movement, even quicker this time, as if the tutor’s haggard face was either very hot or very bright, and his eyes could not stand to rest for long.
    “I knew she played sax,” he said quietly, and the words were like a horrible admission, a statement of guilt. A little cough in the back of his throat broke the last word in two.
    “I assume you are keeping quiet so as not to incriminate yourself,” the Head of Movement said coldly, after another wretched pause.
    “I just—”
    In truth Stanley simply had nothing to say. He shrugged, more to communicate helplessness than insolence, but the Head of Movement’s eyes flashed and Stanley saw that the gesture had angered him. The Head of Movement’s coldness somehow amplified now, and he pressed his palms flatter upon