One always expected an artist to retreat to the heartbeat of his artistry. So David went to his music room. He flipped on the lights. He poured another vodka and placed the tumbler on the unprotected top of the grand piano.

He realised as he did it that Michael would never have done such a thing. Michael had been careful that way, understanding the value of a musical instrument, respectful of its boundaries, its dimensions, its possibilities. He'd been careful about most of his life as well. It was only on one crazy night in Florida that he'd got careless.

David sat at the piano. Without thinking or planning, his fingers sought out an aria he loved. It was a melody from his most auspicious failure-Mercy-and he hummed as he played it, trying and failing to recall the words to a song that had once held the key to his future.

As he played, he let his gaze travel the walls of the room, four monuments to his success. Shelves held awards. Frames enclosed certificates. Posters and playbills announced productions that even to this day were mounted in every part of the world. And photographs by the silver-framed score documented his life.

Michael was there among them. And when David's glance fell on his old friends face, his fingers shifted-of their own accord-from the aria he'd been playing to the song he knew was destined to be the hit of Hamlet. “What Dreams May Come” was its title, taken from the prince's most famous soliloquy.

He played it only halfway through before he had to stop. He found that he was so monumentally tired that his hands fell from the keys and his eyes closed. But still he could see Michael's face.

“You shouldn't have died,” he told his partner. “I thought a success would make everything different, but it only makes the prospect of failure worse.”

He took up his drink again. He left the room. He tossed back the vodka, set the tumbler next to a travertine urn in a recessed alcove, and didn't notice when he failed to push the glass in far enough and it fell to the carpeted floor.