The door stood partly open.
Kimia slowed.
Inside, Yira sat before her computer terminal. Green text covered part of the screen.
Beside the keyboard lay manuscript paper.
Yira alternated between staring at the terminal and staring down at the notation as though expecting one to accuse the other of lying.
Her room remained a catastrophe.
Slightly improved.
Several clusters of dishes had disappeared. The wastebasket had been emptied. Someone had removed enough cups from the floor to reveal portions of carpet previously considered theoretical.
Still:
Bowls. Mugs. Sheet music. Cables. An open instrument case. Two pencils on the bed. A shirt draped across the back of a chair for reasons known only to Yira.
Kimia watched her daughter for a moment.
Yira typed. Stopped. Looked at the manuscript. Played several notes on a small keyboard attached to the terminal. Frowned. Deleted something.
Kimia knocked lightly against the frame.
Yira looked over.
“Yes, mozher?”
“Can I come in?”
“I'm drawing blanks on whatever I'm doing, so it's fine.”
Kimia entered.
Immediately she had to step around two bowls, then a mug, then some object that might have been part of an instrument.
Her feet negotiated the room with surprising ease.
Kilcane helped.
Or overconfidence did.
Dangerously similar sensations.
Yira turned in the chair.
“What happened to zhe Herald?”
“Done.”
“Already?”
“Yeah.”
“How bad?”
Kimia stopped.
“Zhat is a terrible first question.”
“So bad?”
“No.”
“Zhen good.”
Kimia sat on the edge of Yira's bed.
A pencil rolled beneath her.
She caught it with one of her feet before it fell.
Too quickly.
Yira noticed.
Kimia put it beside herself.
“I wanted to ask you somezhing.”
Yira leaned backward.
“Alright.”
Kimia suddenly lost the wording she had rehearsed.
Not because the thought disappeared, but because five alternate versions arrived.
She chose one.
“How do you talk to your clients?”
Yira blinked.
“What?”
“Clients. When zhey ask you to write somezhing.”
“Yes.”
“How do you talk to zhem?”
Yira stared.
Kimia realized she was speaking slightly too quickly.
She slowed.
“You know. About what zhey want. What zhey expect from you.”
Yira continued staring.
Kimia folded her hands in her lap.
Stillness.
“I had an interview today zhat I completely forgot about, and somehow I pulled it off. I have no idea how.”
That sounded better. Yira's expression softened.
“Oh.”
She turned halfway toward the desk.
The manuscript sat beneath one hand.
“You mean how do I figure out what zhey actually want?”
“Yes.”
“Zhat depends.”
“On?”
“Whezher zhey know.”
Kimia smiled.
“Fair.”
Yira thought.
She had inherited some of Kimia's expressions.
Kimia could see it occasionally.
A narrowing around the eyes.
One ear pulling slightly backward when considering language.
It made the maternal relationship feel momentarily biological in a way titles never did.
“Usually zhey explain what kind of mood or atmosphere zhey want,” Yira said.
“Mhm.”
“Maybe references.”
“What kind?”
“A composer. A song. A film. Sometimes somezhing useless like ‘make it feel expensive.’”
Kimia laughed too quickly.
Yira's eyes moved over her face.
Kimia noticed.
She forced herself to relax.
Yira continued.
“Or zhey give me somezhing they like and say they want zhat, but not too much like zhat, because zhen zhey're afraid somebody will notice.”
“Zhat sounds familiar.
”
“Politics?”
“Everyzhing.”
Yira nodded.
“Zhen I ask questions.”
“What questions?”
“What part do zhey actually like? Rhythm? Harmony? Instruments? Tempo? Maybe zhey don't know.”
“And if zhey don't?”
“Zhen I guess.”
Kimia frowned.
“Zhat simple?”
“No.”
“But zhat's what you do.”
“More or less.”
Yira picked up a pencil and rolled it between her claws.
“Sometimes I'll put my own zhing into it if I think it needs somezhing.”
“Even if zhey didn't ask?”
“Sometimes.”
“Why?”
“Because zhey're paying me to know something zhey don't.”
Kimia looked at her.
There. Something.
Yira continued: “If zhey already knew exactly what zhey wanted and how to make it, zhey wouldn't need me.”
Kimia sat with that.
Client. Interviewer. Audience. Role.
One answered according to what another person asked, but not mechanically.
Interpretation. Translation. Add something of oneself.
Perhaps that was what she had done.
The Herald had asked questions.
Kimia had answered them.
Kalgkur supplied structure.
But the answers had still been hers.