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I’m sure there is a softer side behind Comrade Farhad’s tough exterior.”
    â€œSofter side?” Almaz shrugged. “Good luck finding it.”
    She finished washing my hair, dried it with a soft waffle towel, and mounted rollers all over my head in a valiant effort to smooth my feral curls into silky waves. “That’s it. Sleep on it, and tomorrow morning I’ll style you before the recital. Want to stay here tonight?”
    It had been a while since Almaz invited me to stay overnight.
    I loved sleeping in her bed. It was always warm. Unlike my bed, which felt like late autumn, even though Aunty Zeinab had made both our blankets from the wool of the same camel.
    â€œI’d love to,” I said.
    I went home to get my pajamas and leave a note for my parents. When I returned downstairs, Almaz was already in bed. I turned off the lights and crawled under the covers.
    â€œI miss you, Almaz,” I whispered, kissing her forearm. “I truly do.” My best friend, the closest I had to a sister.
    â€œI miss you too. A thousand times over.” She threw her arms around me, squeezing me tightly against her body, saying into the back of my neck, “You are my sister, for life and beyond. And it will never change. Promise me?”
    â€œOf course I promise. But it’s you who hasn’t been sisterly lately. Why have you been avoiding me?”
    â€œBecause all you care about is either your Komsomol or your music competitions.”
    â€œBut this is my calling. To represent our Azerbaijan all over the world. You can’t imagine the challenge of playing the piano in front of an audience and holding them on the tips of my fingers.”
    â€œHow could I?” Almaz asked wryly. “I wasn’t born with sweet halva in my mouth, like you. Allah hasn’t given me well-connected parents and the gift of music. All I’ve received is the curse of beauty.”
    â€œWhy a curse?”
    Almaz was strikingly beautiful. Papa said once that she fully epitomized the meaning of her name—a priceless, flawless diamond.
    â€œBecause beauty is like a blossom,” she said in a sad voice. “Tonight it’s here; tomorrow it’s gone. Withered. Sapped. Like Princess Shirin.”
    One night, fair Princess Shirin fell asleep in the garden of blooming blue roses. The next morning as she opened her eyes, the red petals fell like droplets of blood from the roses’ barren stems. And with them, gone was her beauty.
    â€œIt’s just a fairy tale,” I said. “And you’re not Princess Shirin. She sacrificed her best friend, Nightingale, for the Blue Rose Garden of Beauty. You’d never do that, would you?”
    Almaz didn’t respond. We lay close in darkness-filled silence, our heartbeats resonating in unison.
    â€œLeila.”
    â€œWhat?”
    Almaz gazed at me, her eyes intense, the irises shimmering out of their ivory whites.
    â€œWhat if you and I were really not who we are?” she whispered in the shadows. “What if you were me and I were you? After all, it was only a beauty mark that defined our destinies. But what if your mama was wrong? What if she made a mistake? It’s possible, isn’t it? Then it would be me living upstairs in your fancy quarters, and you’d be right here—in my place—under the stairs.”
    I felt the taste of tears inside my throat and an overwhelming rush of loneliness in my heart. Nothing I could say would bring Almaz back to me.
    Jealousy had deaf ears.

CHAPTER 7
    The audience at the Azerbaijan State Philharmonic Concert Hall seemed to hold its breath as a dimmed chandelier sprinkled the silence with golden dust. At center stage, a black Fazioli piano awaited me in the spotlight. Overhead, two muses soared protectively, their bodies draped in stucco tulle, lyres in their hands, surrounded by a panoply of rococo decorations—leaves, shells, waterfalls. All in white.
    My