Music Is Locked Up Within Me - written by Alfred (a short story for kids)

Mr. Livingstone, the young billionaire who on other days was the perfect picture of calmness; flung the small table in front of him towards the door of the hospital ward. A nurse was signaled to call security to keep him under control.

Mr. Livingstone had just been told that the baby his wife delivered had cerebral palsy.

Mr. Livingstone was wild with rage. How could his baby have cerebral palsy? How could life be so unfair? His baby is his legacy. His little girl who would bear his last name which he had worked so hard to make one of the most powerful names in the world, would be someone with cerebral palsy. What would his friends say?

What would relatives say? What would the world say? How would this hurt his reputation? How would this hurt his extended family’s reputation?

When Mrs. Livingstone found out that her baby had cerebral palsy, she closed her eyes tight and only one tear drop seeped through. It got her straight to the heart but she made up her mind that she would love her daughter all the same with all her heart no matter what. And she knew beneath the surface layers of her heart that she already did.

The baby was named Sofia and as time past by and the baby kept growing, Mr and Mrs. Livingstone got used to having a child with cerebral palsy as a daughter.

Mrs. Livingstone spent a lot of time with Sofia. She was her pride and joy. It is amazing how a mother’s love can still see the beauty and the gem behind the wall of any medical condition including cerebral palsy.

Mrs. Livingstone didn’t go to work so she had plenty of time to play with her daughter when she was not taking basic living skills lessons from a special teacher who specialized in cerebal palsy students that they had gotten for Sofia.

Sofia’s Dad kept his daughter almost a secret from the world. He rarely ever let her leave the high walls around the Manor they lived in. He treated her like a precious egg that if not handled carefully would simply fall and break. Sofia’s Dad loved Sofia, but his love manifested itself in the form of excessive over – protectiveness.

One day, Sofia heard the maid playing the piano. She had never heard anyone playing the large piano that was near the window before that that day. The melody was simply divine. Sofia fell in love with it. She bugs her Mum that she wants to learn how to play the piano.Sofia’s Mum was mad with the maid. This was all her fault. She warned the maid never to play the piano again and that if she does she would be fired.

Sofia’s Mum got Sofia a special teacher to help teach Sofia how to play the piano. She knew it was a waste of time because of Sofia’s cerebral palsy but Sofia wasn’t going to let the matter go, she was not going to stop bugging her until she got her a teacher.

When Sofia’s Dad found his daughter trying to play the piano as he walked through the house, he found out everything that had happened which perfectly explained why his daughter was now trying to be the world’s next big piano player.

Sofia’s Dad was just about to fire the maid but Sofia’s Mum told him not to do it that she had already cautioned her and that she is sure she won’t do anything that would influence Sofia in any unadvisable way ever again.

As the first piano lesson begins, the special piano teacher truly finds out the gravity of the predicament she is in. She had been told that the person she was going to teach had cerebral palsy so she asked for a higher fee but now, things were different. She really really understood what she was truly getting herself into now. It was pure torture for her and after three days she asked for a serious raise.

Sofia’s mother said No! and sent the teacher on her way but when Sofia heard that the piano teacher won’t be coming back she cried and cried and cried. Sofia’s Mum could not bare to see her daughter in all that pain so she called back the piano teacher who asked for an additional fee for the embarrassment of being sent away.

The piano teacher goes back to teaching or trying to teach or whatever it was that she was doing with Sofia. As far as she was concerned, she was basically wasting her time.

At one point she got so fed up that she asks Sofia why she wants to learn how to play the piano so much.

Sofia looks at her and says that it is because she has a lot of music locked up inside her. She knows it’s there. It is trapped. She just wants to let it out.

Tears began to form in the back of the piano teacher’s eyes. She understood exactly what Sofia just said. It was like Sofia’s words which came straight from the heart lit a fuse in the piano teacher’s heart. Sofia may not be ever capable of playing the piano but she certainly had the heart of the best of the best piano players.

It was then that the piano teacher knew that she should consider it a privilege that she had been given the opportunity to teach Sofia how to play the piano.

Starting from that day, the piano teacher saw Sofia in nothing but a new light. She felt nothing but maximum respect anytime she looked at Sofia.   

The piano teacher told Sofia’s Mum that she would teach Sofia for free. She would no more collect any payments. She told Sofia’s Mum that it is an honor to teach Sofia; that Sofia has rekindled her love, understanding and appreciation for music in a whole new different way and has pulled her into deeper appreciation for music that she never taught existed.

Sofia’s Mum didn’t know what to quite make of what the piano teacher just told her but she was like, “Ok!” 

The lessons went on but now the Piano teacher was more engrossed in the lessons. Her heart was now involved in the lessons. She was no longer sitting there bored, but was now an active participant. She was now interested in the lessons. She was now excited about the lessons.

She would sit there with admiration; looking at Sofia’s determination and faith that someday she would free the music locked up within her and bring it out of her for all the world to hear.

Sofia kept her head up and her Mum always encouraged her to stay positive. They were Christians but Christianity had always been a causal thing for them.

Dad only went to Church because of the connections he had in church, and he only called himself a Christian because his parents and grand parents and his great grand parents where Christians. He thought that it was a matter of belonging to a something positive that your parents belonged to. He actually taught that Christianity was a religion. So to him it was like, well there are a bunch of religions and Christianity is the coolest one so I’m happy to choose it and to also belong to a long line of Christians.

He never even bothered to read the bible on his own, and neither him nor his wife nor his daughter, Sofia had ever said the salvation prayer ever in their lives. They were Catholics.

One day, Sofia saw the maid pacing the floor in her room praying in tongues when she only went to the maid’s room to humbly ask her if she would like to play hide and seek with her.

As the maid notices that Sofia is watching she pretends to be doing something else but it’s too late Sofia had already seen what she was doing.

Sofia disturbs her to tell her what she was doing. The maid hesitated to. She feared that there might be consequences but she heard the Spirit of God tell her that she should go ahead.

That was when the maid started telling Sofia about the Holy Spirit, about who Jesus is, and about what true Christianity is. Explaining these things to Sofia took many weeks.

Everyday, Sofia would come back to the maid and ask more questions.

The maid would have to patiently answer all the numerous questions that Sofia had to ask. She had trouble with understanding what the maid was saying so the maid would have to simplify and simplify everything and yet try not let the message lose its meaning.

Sofia’s Mum begun to notice little changes in Sofia but she couldn’t quite place what was causing the changes. Sofia seemed happier. She smiled more. In fact she shined more in her mother’s eyes.

One afternoon, when Sofia and the maid where in the garden; the maid finally led Sofia in the salvation prayer and also in the prayer to receive the Holy Ghost. Immediately after that, the Spirit of God came upon Sofia and she started speaking in tongues. The maid joined her in speaking in tongues.

Unfortunately, Sofia’s Dad was looking for Sofia and he just happened to be coming from behind them at that moment. To him, the maid was teaching his daughter to recite some weird magic stuff from God knows where. This was just plain unacceptable.

Sofia’s Dad sent the maid packing that very day. He would not listen to his daughter’s plead for her to stay.

Sofia’s Mum found out about the incident after the maid had already gone. She liked the maid but considering what the maid had done she was in support of her being sent away.

Sofia was saddened by the fact that the maid was no longer with them.

Her Mum did everything she could to cheer her up and the more she did and the more time past, the more the sadness left Sofia’s heart.

Sofia soon started going to their family library in the right wing of the Manor, and there she would sit for hours listening to audio books by Christian authors and preachers. They more she listened, the more she wanted to listen.

Sofia noticed that for some reason things automatically began to get easier to understand. Things that took her 15 minutes to understand now took her 5 minutes to understand.

She also noticed that she was able to make much more grammatically accurate sentences than she could do before.

But most of all she could bring out music better from within her than she could do before. She was composing her own music. Even though it did not sound as perfect as it sounded in her head before she played it, she was still making major improvements.

The piano teacher did not quite understand it. She taught that maybe it was part of the natural progression of someone who has cerebral palsy.   

Sofia’s favorite story became the story of David and Goliath. She loved how David overcame a giant so big an obstacle in his way.

She felt that she could relate to David because her cerebral palsy was her Goliath standing in her way.

Sofia started listening to a sermon series in the library titled “Taking the big leap of faith .”Sofia was really moved by it and she would often meditate on what was said in it over and over again when she was alone.

She would often challenge herself when she was alone by trying to do things that wasn’t supposed to be possible for someone who had cerebral palsy to do. She was challenging herself to take the big leap of faith. She was trying to leap into the miracle of her healing. She was trying to leap into being perfectly whole and sound.

Sofia would pray in tongues late at night when everyone taught she was sleeping. She enjoyed praying in tongues, and she prayed because she just wanted to be normal.

Sofia’s parents soon noticed that Sofia’s behavior had now greatly improved. Even though she still didn’t completely move and act normal, her condition wasn’t as pronounced as before.

Sofia’s parents soon have no problem with taking Sofia out to social functions, and one day; while at a royal banquet with the Queen, the famous piano player who was supposed to entertain the people had an injury that affected his fingers when a cocktail glass that was already half broken because of someone’s carelessness; broke completely in his hand, totally shattering the cocktail glass and leaving some serious cuts on the piano player’s hand.

It was an unfortunate accident.

Now, there was no one to play for the crowd.   

The MC of the event figured that half bread is better than none so he might as well call for any amateur in the audience to fill in the now blank space for the classical music segment of the evening. Perhaps, it won’t be a total disaster.

Hence, a call for any good piano player in the audience to rise up was made.

Sofia stood up.

It was too late for Sofia’s Dad to get her to sit down, everybody had already seen her stand up even though she was the height of the little girl that she was.

Her Dad felt like dying. What better way for her to embarrass him with her cerebral palsy than this. He started regretting bringing her to the high class social function in the first place.

However, a different stream of thoughts flowed through Sofia’s head. She understood the risk of what she was doing, but she knew she was taking the big leap of faith. She imagined she was David staring at her cerebral palsy in the face.

Sofia was lead to the piano and she sat down in front of it to play for the Queen and for the rest of the crowd.

The hearts of Sofia’s Mum and Dad began to beat faster and Sofia’s Mum closed her eyes. She couldn’t watch. But as the first few notes hit, Sofia’s Mum opened her eyes to see if it was her daughter that was playing. Her and her husband’s heart beat rates slowly returned to normal as they were soothed by the most beautiful string of melodies they had ever heard.

Sofia played and played and played. The whole crowd including the Queen where in perfect silence. They’ve never heard anything so beautiful, and all this coming from a little girl. It was better than the music that the famous piano player that was scheduled to play intended to play from his recently released music album.

Each new piece after piece that Sofia played was a new composition. She was letting the beautiful music locked up inside her come out. The fact that it was coming out so beautifully meant that it wasn’t obstructed by any cerebral palsy whatsoever. 

  When Sofia finished everyone clapped enthusiastically and gave her a standing ovation. Over 98% of the crowd didn’t know the full story. They didn’t know that they were clapping for a girl who was born with cerebral palsy.   

When Sofia got down the stage, her parents hugged and kissed her over and over again. They were at the point of tears. They knew that their daughter had just been miraculously healed.Sofia was glad that her big leap of faith paid off, big. She looked at her parents and said, “JESUS DID THIS. JESUS HEALED ME. HE WANTS YOU TO GIVE YOUR LIVES TO HIM JUST LIKE I DID, AND HE ALSO WANTS YOU TO BRING THE MAID BACK. IF IT WASN’T FOR HER, YOUR DAUGHTER WOULD STILL HAVE CEREBRAL PALSY.”

THE END.