Romance in A minor: A musical romance Read Online Free Page B

that the posting in Singapore starts in January."
    That made Justine feel short of breath. January already. That was not much time.
    "Do I... need to resign from my job?"
    "I'd think commuting is a bit far." He laughed.
    "Yeah." She forced a chuckle. Panic settled on her. Giving up her job. Not that she thought that her job was all that special. In fact, it was very ordinary. It was just that not having a job sounded scary. Her job might not be much, but it was hers, and her colleagues might be fat-arsed chicks according to Tom, but they were not too bad. At least they didn't get drunk and shout "Show us your tits" at work parties. That was the type of stuff that tended to happen at the bank parties.
    Worse, if she had no job, she would have no money that she could truly call her own. Seeing how Tom worried about money, she would have to ask him about getting money for shopping, let alone money for herself.
    "Do you think I'd be able to get a job?" All of a sudden, it was crystal clear to her: having a job was about maintaining a part of her.
    "That's not necessary," he said. "You'll be my wife and we can easily live from my income."
    "But I'd like to... do something."
    "I've heard that the expat clubs are very good for spouses. They play sport and organise day trips. They help in the international school and hold parties."
    How perfectly... interesting. He seemed to have forgotten that she didn't like the snobby parents and their entitled sprogs.
    "Wouldn't it be possible to find a job?"
    He raised his eyebrows. "Maybe, but why should you? What sort of job would you want anyway?"
    And that was where the ideas always stopped. Because she had no formal education. She had two years' experience working for an insurance company, dealing with complaints. When he said things like this, she always felt that he implied that she wasn't worth anything. Of course he didn't mean it like that and one day she would tell him how that sounded. That day was not today.
    In her mind, she heard Fiona say You know I once went to a concert with Hiroshi Hideka? It was wonderful .
    She wondered about the people from her year at the conservatorium. Would any of them be married yet? Would they have the money to live her kind of life? That was one of the things that Tom always said. I rescued you from being poor and penniless .
    But the warm tones of the cello still resonated through her. She had enjoyed playing again so much that she didn't care about money. It was all right to play music for fun. It didn't need to make money, didn't it?
    That night, Justine tried to talk about the subject of playing music a few times, but each time, Tom started talking about something else. Music was just so far from the things that he liked that she didn't know how to talk about it. She didn't want to make him feel that what he did for her wasn't appreciated. He'd been very supportive when she was down. She would just like to, you know, get some of her creative life back.

Chapter 6
    T he house was an old terrace in between the station and King Street in Newtown. It looked well-used and well-loved, if a bit more run-down than the neighbouring houses, which were all slick newly-renovated terraces with fresh paint and tiled yards with trendy pots with grass, burbling fountains or box bushes, but this yard was a riot of red and yellow poppies, some purple fox-tail flower and Agapanthus. A big Frangipani tree obscured part of the veranda and hung over the neighbours' yard.
    Justine opened the gate and waked up the path to the veranda. A white cat meowed and jumped into an open window through which drifted the sound of flute music.
    Justine let the cello case slide from her shoulders—how had she forgotten how heavy the thing was?
    There was no door bell, but the front door—big and heavy and in need of a coat of paint—had a lion-head knocker which she lifted and dropped on the wood with a sharp thwack .
    The flute playing stopped. Footsteps approached in the hall and