It had started when, in kindergarten, the music teacher had scribbled “shows promise!” beneath Jeremy’s “Satisfactory” grade in chorus. Martin and Suzanne had seized on those two words with panicked desperation. “Music,” said Martin. “Of course!” said Suzanne, and sighed deeply in relief. They’d ushered little Jeremy into the dining room, a room they hardly ever used unless there were important matters to discuss or big decisions to be made. This was the room where Noah eventually decided between MIT and Caltech, the room where Ben would sit and meet with the college coaches who’d come calling. “You are a musical prodigy!” his mother announced. “A genius,” she added, after Jeremy just stared. Jeremy might have just been a little kid, but he knew two things. The first was that, to keep his parents happy, he needed to be a standout in something. The second was that he was pretty sure he wasn’t a musical prodigy; he was just okay at music, not great. But his parents were gazing at him with such love and such hope—the way he was used to seeing them look at his brothers—that Jeremy wanted to be that star they’d hoped for, a boy that they could love.
