Prelude.

In a letter someone wrote to her once, Violetta counted sixteen variations on the common theme (Violetta). Such affectionate and clever nicknames could flatter any other person, but by the time the manuscript ends she feels naked and horribly misused.

Violetta likes to think that they named Opaline Lake after the opals her mother used to wear every single day, those little purple stones pulling at soft and swingy earlobes. Anna Strynes, after all, was a pretty prominent person back in the day, using her poems as an excuse to cut to the front of lines and stop for photographs on the street. Her short lines of nothing much, as Violet has always thought them, use phrases like wish it were summer again/wish your ice cream melted in my hands and threw my heart from your fourth-story window/it bruised. They weren't a smash phenomenon but they were still a small success, and on her walls Viola has cutouts of her mother from old newspapers. In these splotchy remnants Anna is wrapped in tweed, usually, and never failing to wear the earrings--so small but they shone, even in the dull flash of the early camera.

It wasn't until a few months ago, right around the time that Violetta's mother passed away, that the park caretakers began to grow violets around the edges of the lake. Now Viola doesn't like coincidences, and she refuses to believe it was a sign from God that Violet would soon be joining her mother in the as a thing of nature, and a city artifact.

Her name is officially Violetta L. Strynes; the L standing for Leticia and the Strynes being her mother's name, since her father died early on and Bubblinkith was not, according to Mrs. Strynes, a good name for publicity.

Nobody calls her that, though. She is Viola, commonly, and Violet, professionally. To her numerous lovers she is Vio and to her relatives she is La. A half-sister calls her Letta, which Viola hates, and a half-brother does not refer to her as anything special.

"Hey," he calls her, speaking in melodic alto tones. "You."

Viola likes him the best.

Even though she is a paid violinist, she is virtually unknown. After all, who ever learns the names of the quartets playing at your uncle's wedding, or the saxophonist belting out lover's words in a favorite café? Viola knows she is in an obscure profession, in the analytical and literal sense of the world. She steps into wedding halls, plays several sonatas, then has a piece of cake and leaves. She straps on her high-heels and performs a ditty for a club, is offered a drink and leaves. You could say that Viola plays for the food, which is half true, since by the time she has finished all of her appointments she no longer needs to buy dinner for herself.

But it is comforting, at the end of the day, for Viola to know that no matter how many people call her by an increasing number of nicknames, there are a thousand more people who do not even know one variation.

Despite her mother being very good with the opposite sex (if her poems are any judge of her love life), Viola's fear is that she will not be able to carry on the Strynes name. Over the years she has been able to find a few good men to share her conversation and toothpaste and sheets with, but none of them have ever been good enough.

They have all found out the many twists and turns of Violetta's name, for instance. She had two boyfriends call her Vita in the same month, and one who only wanted to call her Leticia, which was completely unheard of. Or they cannot cook, which is a trait Viola dearly hates. Or they can cook, but they talk incessantly while doing so. Viola hates them the most. Where is the space in cooking for talking, she wonders? Are they so intimate that he has full permission to call her Sweet Ola and talk about getting a puppy while flipping pancakes?

The answer is no.

Roberta, her mother's youngest sister and Viola's sort-of guardian made her business card. It is thin cardboard and cream-colored, with violets snaking round Viola's boldfaced name in the center of the card. When Roberta showed the draft to Viola her initial reaction was disgust: there are the stinking violets again, she thought furiously, biting the inside of her cheeks, intent on drawing blood. Why even stop there? Where is the wretched Viola?

"I was thinking of putting a viola by your address," said Roberta, avoiding Viola's eyes. "But I couldn't fit it."

"Surely it would just confuse people," replied Viola, her tone surprisingly cold. Shocked at her sudden anger, she withdrew quickly. "I mean...it's nice."

Smiling sadly, Roberta put the card back on her desk. "I will make copies, then."

They had tea and lemon cookies (Viola's favorite) and when it was time for Roberta's psychology class and Violet stood up to leave, it was Roberta who hugged her niece, instead of the other way around as it normally was.

"Someday," she whispered into Viola's orange cardigan, "someone will call you by all the names in the world, and you will not mind."

Violet left. The next week when the order of cards arrived at her apartment, she was shocked to see that small violas now accompanied the violets.

It is 8:15 PM when Violet packs away her violin to leave the wedding reception. She is insanely tired: the bride and groom are so fascinated by her skill that they asked her to play at the wedding and then at the reception. Having nothing else to do, Viola accepted, but now she is exhausted and cannot even bring herself to wrap a piece of cake in Saran-Wrap, as her customers suggested.

When she does muster up enough energy to hoist her violin onto her shoulder and leave, the bride waves good-by enthusiastically and the groom bows politely. Shocked, Viola can only nod in response.

I am so unused to having actual fans, she thinks in the taxicab, and then blushes when she realizes she is actually well-liked in some circles.

Violet does not play for the public on Sunday. It is a rule enforced by her mother, and the daughter is adamant to keep it. On Sundays, she is inclined to wake up late, make her own breakfast and do nothing but rest.

Today, however, a letter is stuffed in the mail slot of her front door. Knowing full well that mail is not delivered via business on Sundays, she is automatically intrigued and frightened at the same time, and hesitates, fingers poised, before snatching the envelope free.

She looks at the address. It is unfamiliar and far away, and she thinks of this distance in trains and taxis, her usual transportation to customers.

Heart beating fast, Viola pinches the skin inside her arm, twisting it with a vengeance and ignoring the shooting pain. Don't be silly, she thinks harshly, sticking a butter knife under the envelope flap. It's not like you want anybody anyway, you shut-in--you snail.

The letter, it turns out (but Violet always knows) is nothing but a simple request for a private party sixteen blocks from her apartment (which is the 6:12 F train and then a slightly expensive taxi). While Viola worries about the expenses that she will be making on account of such a seemingly affluent client, she realizes that tomorrow is Monday, and it is five o'clock.

From the tiny kitchen, the kettle screeches angrily.

On Sundays, from five to seven, Viola practices the violin. It is during these times that she remembers, despite all the travel and stress accumulated from her profession, her love for the instrument.

While her mother played with words and took them to bed at night, mumbling them in her sleep and cherishing the way they made her heart beat and her palms sweat, Viola encourages the swift high she receives from playing the violin strictly for pleasure, and not business. On these Sunday evenings, she is not playing for money, and this is what makes her forget the curses she bestowed upon her job just the night before. During these times it is simple to her why she still keeps her blasted occupation: because she loves it.

Viola's violin is not so old but is German, and so makes a deep, clean vibration that she is afraid will collapse her apartment. The E string makes her chair wobble and she is amused to find that all her cats run to hide under her bed when she practices scales. It is like when she was seven and her mother used to say, Violet, Violet, would you please not break the windows? Mommy likes them, you know.

It is not until later, fingertips dented with lines (her favorite disease) and clothes reeking of rosin (a wonderful cologne), that Viola realizes her letter is riddled with--well--names. The exclamations of relatives (Letta), the interjections of close friends (Vi) and the whine of small children (Ola) are scattered throughout the dry paragraphs, as if the sender was experimenting with different kinds of dye, wondering how each color would affect the entire work.

The handwriting, too, is loopy and flowery, as if extending a hand of invitation.

Viola hates subtlety.

Before work the next day, Viola knocks the letter off the counter with her teacup (not-so accidentally) into her bag (on purpose).

On her way uptown, Violet peers inside her purse just to catch a glimpse of the cream-colored envelope, now worn away at one edge from her frantic stroking. It disgusts her, how such a menial object can hold her attention so easily and well, and forces herself to look away.

Her eyes focus on the advertisement in front of her, and when she gets bored of cell phone rates and cheesy taglines, concentrates instead on the woman under it. Viola ignores her looks, and instead focuses on what her name could be.

She wonders if anyone does this to her--tries to guess her name by the way she moves her lips, wiggles her eyebrows, licks her teeth.

Whatever they come up with about her, though, can't be any worse than it already is.

The small club is nestled in a bitterly dark alleyway, and the taxicab drops her off two feet away from the turnoff. Feet slipping on nervous heels, Viola knocks on the wooden door, distinguishable as a club only by the single neon circle in the corner of the doorframe.

From the inside, a man coughs loudly, and then slides door open with a purring creak.

"Welcome," he says, smiling toothily. "Your name?"

Viola tries not to cringe in defeat (why defeat, she doesn't know). After all, it's only his job. He can't be blamed for what Violet detests.

"...Violetta," she admits grudgingly. "Strynes."

Adam (the man's name) smells of peppermint and spice--of Christmas, essentially. Violet is annoyed at his impressionable scent, since it is the middle of summer. And things should stay where they are, not be hacked into a million little pieces and sent every which way, doing whatever they please...!

She takes a deep breath to calm herself.

"You can get ready in here," says Adam, gesturing to a small room (also lined with wood) backstage.

Viola smells cloves, but won't let her nose twitch. "Thank you," she says stiffly, and walks the same way into her makeshift dressing room.

Overstuffed with scores, pencils, water bottles, and coins, Viola's bag tips over the counter and the only thing that manages to unstick itself...

Five minutes before she is due to go on, Violetta re-reads her letter.

'I hope, Viola,' starts the second paragraph, 'that you will be able to make it. I have heard only good things about your playing and would be honored to have you perform at my private gathering.'

Two sentences on: 'You are quite the star, Ola...or so I have collected, from all the reviews in the Star and your too-short appearances on the radio...'

Three: 'Once I dreamed about you, and when I awoke I was not surprised to find that, even fabricated, you still amaze me.'

And the last: 'Violetta Leticia, please accept my heartfelt request. Perhaps there will be someone in the audience, maybe, if all of my guests arrive, that will want to speak with you...and call you by every name, in every language, including the one that does not need words, or even eyesight.'

There's a knock at her door, and Viola tries to stop trembling, but can't.

She begs sickness to Adam, who cannot hide his disappointment at her leave.

"Are you sure you're not feeling well?" he asks, biting his lip.

Viola wonders fleetingly if he is really worried about her, if it is the thing that she sees in the movies and on television, where kinship brings two people together by chemical boundary alone--but no. He likes her reputation, her sound. That's all.

"I'm sorry," she sighs, and really is. "Maybe I'll come back."

She needs to go, just for a little bit.

When she was little, and had a mother, and still no father, and tiny fingers, she always ran like someone was chasing her.

Not that she was the one who noticed--everyone else did, and made sure to tell her. You would shoot out of some place, her mother used to tell her, and just keep on running, as if you had a stuck motor in your feet. And you wouldn't stop, even when I tried to catch you or called you back. (Viola always listened to her mother, back then.) Sometimes you screamed, and I was worried, as were your aunties and uncles, that maybe you thought someone was chasing you--or something, at the very least.

Did I scare you? Viola giggled, proud of her wild side.

You scared us all, my darling, replied Anna, her smile crinkling her face, just like her poems did as they burned in the household oven.

Violet runs to Opaline Lake as if someone is after her with a burning love confession and a steak knife. When she gets there she throws herself down into the tall grass; letter still clutched tightly in hand. From there she watches the stars dance over her mother's opal lake, the soft waves softly swaying the violets on the shore.

She falls asleep next to these analogies, and almost misses her secret watcher in the audience.

"It's too bad you missed your concert, my darling," whispers Viola's aunt, shaking her niece awake under a glowy full moon. "As it is, Adam would still like to hear you play. I think I've gushed about you enough--he wants to see the real deal."

"He smells like Christmas," mumbles Violet sleepily, eyes still shut. "He isn't right."

"You're not right, Vivi," chuckles Roberta, lying down next to her sister's daughter. "But I told you already--someday, little girl. Someday."

Adam looks relieved at her fast recovery, and calls her Viola, Letta, and La, all in that order, and Violetta notices she doesn't half-care. Her mother had earrings, and now a lake. She, on the other hand, has a name.