The Unconsoled by Kazuo Ishiguro

over the years. And each time he did so something of the sickening chill he had felt at that moment would come back to him. At first he had looked at his father in disbelief, but the latter had simply gone on smiling contentedly, holding his hand out towards the piano.
    'Come on, Stephan. Something your mother would like. A little Bach, perhaps. Or something contemporary. Kazan maybe. Or Mullery.'
    The young man, forcing his gaze round to include his mother, had seen her face, softened by laughter along unfamiliar lines, smiling at him. She had then turned to the hotel manager rather than to Stephan and said: 'Yes, dear, I think Mullery would be just the thing. That would be splendid.'
    'Come on, Stephan,' the hotel manager had said jovially. "This is your mother's birthday, after all. Don't disappoint her.'
    An idea had flashed through Stephan's mind - an idea rejected the very next instant - that his parents were conspiring together against him. Certainly from the way they were gazing at him - so full of proud anticipation - it was as though they had no memory at all of the anguished history surrounding his piano playing. In any case, the protest he had started to formulate had faded in his mouth, and he had risen to his feet as though it were someone else doing so.
    The piano's position against the wall was such that, when Stephan had sat down at it, he had been able to see at the edge of his vision the figures of his parents, their elbows upon the table, each leaning slightly towards the other. After a moment he had actually turned and glanced directly towards them, aware as he did so that he had wanted to see them like that one last time -sitting together as though bound by an uncomplicated happiness. He had then turned back to the piano, overwhelmed by the certainty that the evening was about to fall. Curiously he had realised he was no longer at all surprised by the latest turn of events, that in fact he had been waiting for it all along and that it had brought with it a sense of relief.
    For a few seconds, Stephan had gone on sitting without playing, trying desperately to shake off the effects of the wine and to run through in his mind the piece he was about to attempt. For one giddying moment he saw the possibility - it had after all been an evening of remarkable things - that he would somehow perform at a level never before attained, and that he would finish to find his parents smiling, applauding and exchanging with each other looks of deep affection. But no sooner had he commenced the opening bar of Mullery's Epicycloid , he had realised the utter impossibility of any such scenario.
    He had played on nevertheless. For a long time - throughout most of the first movement - the figures at the edge of his vision had remained very still. Then he had seen his mother lean back slightly in her chair and bring a hand up to her chin. Several bars later, his father had turned his gaze away from Stephan, placed both hands on his lap and had bowed his head forward so that he appeared to be studying a spot on the table before him.
    Meanwhile the piece had gone on and on, and though the young man had felt tempted several times to abandon it, to stop altogether had somehow seemed the most dreadful option of all. So he had continued, and when at last the piece had finished, Stephan had sat staring at the keyboard for several moments before working up the courage to look round at the scene awaiting him.
    Neither of his parents was looking at him. His father's head had now become so bowed the forehead was almost touching the table surface. His mother was looking in the other direction across the room, wearing the frosty expression Stephan was so familiar with and which, astonishingly, had been absent until that point in the evening.
    Stephan had needed only a second to appraise this scene. Then he had got up and returned quickly to the dining table, as though by doing so the minutes since his leaving it could be expunged. For a