Please don't be put off by the rather serious beginning...it was only to set the backdrop. It will lighten up. Please do be advised that the beginning does make references (not graphic) to child abuse.

Rating: T

New Music

CHAPTER 1

"So I'll see Ben - not next week, Mrs. Chandler, but the following," said Laura as she ruffled the boy's hair affectionately. He laughed and hugged her with an enthusiastic smile before running to his mother.

"Why can't I come next week?" asked Ben.

"Ben!" exclaimed his mother.

Laura laughed. "It's okay. Do you have any idea how fantastic it is to have such an enthusiastic student?" Laura knelt down to meet Ben's eyes. "Next Saturday I am spending the day with my sisters. But I'll see you for music class at school on Thursday and if you have any questions, I can always spare some time for you. How's that?"

"Okay," Ben answered with a little smile.

Turning to Mrs. Chandler, Laura beamed. "Ben's doing really well. He's such a great student. I wrote down exactly what we worked on in his notebook. There are a couple of music theory exercises in the workbook and he has two pieces to practice. Hands separately and then together."

"Thank you, Miss Laura," said his mother with a farewell wave. Laura watched mother and son descend her front steps. At that moment, her next student pulled up. With a frown, Laura observed the little towhead blonde and her mother getting out of the car. Kara Thrace was not a typical five year old. While most of her littlest students enjoyed an occasional hug, Kara shied away from any physical contact. Kara was extremely bright with her rapid-fire, inquisitiveness and unbridled curiosity. She was unusually disciplined for someone so young and extremely hard on herself when she made a mistake. Usually children that were so self-deprecating responded to praise - but not Kara. She seemed almost resentful of positive feedback, not just as if she didn't want it - but that she didn't deserve it.

Kara's mother held her daughter's hand as they hurried across the walkway, practically dragging the child along. "She didn't practice," Mrs. Thrace announced flatly as they reached the steps.

Ignoring the negative comment, Laura greeted the woman instead. "Hello, Mrs. Thrace." She squatted down to be at eye level with the little girl. "Hi Kara. Why don't you go inside and - " Laura noticed the bandage on Kara's left hand.

"Kara's so clumsy. She closed the lid of the piano on her fingers," explained Kara's mother. "Not enough to get her out of practicing. Or of coming to her lesson today."

"Kara, go inside and warm up, okay? Right hand only." Laura almost reached out to touch the child's shoulders and then remembered how Kara felt about being touched. When she heard Kara beginning to practice her scales, she turned to Mrs. Thrace.

"It's all right if she didn't practice, Mrs. Thrace. She's very young and my goal is to foster her interest in music, to encourage and motivate her, not to have unrealistic expectations and berate her." Laura couldn't help herself. She wanted to scream at the woman for her blatant insensitivity and callousness. The surest way to discourage a child from the piano was to make it feel like a chore. Laura constantly strove to bolster the confidence of her students - never to tear them down.

"I don't give a frak what your expectations are, Miss. Roslin. My daughter is not an average child. She needs structure and discipline. Don't you dare tell me how to raise my child." Mrs. Thrace's voice was shrill. "If you can't teach her properly, then I'll find someone who can," the woman threatened angrily.

Under any other circumstances, Laura would have continued to rationalize her arguments with a few choice words and she would have succinctly told off anyone who spoke to her that way. She was still fuming about Kara's mother being so unsympathetic to her daughter's injury, calling her "clumsy." It was cruel. But Mrs. Thrace was not a rational woman and, truthfully, Laura did not want to lose Kara as a student. She cared a great deal about the little girl and wanted to help her. She especially wanted to go talk to her and find out what had happened with her hand. Alienating Mrs. Thrace now would not be a good idea. So she swallowed back the torrent of things she wanted to say and hoped that she was doing a fair job at concealing her mounting anger.

"I understand perfectly. Kara and I had better get to work then. I'll see you in an hour." Laura didn't give the woman a chance to protest. She merely turned on her heel and went inside. Thankfully, Mrs. Thrace clomped to her car and drove away.

From the threshold of the door, Laura watched Kara as she sat at the piano, her injured hand was in her lap while she slowly played exercises with the right one. Laura moved her chair next to the piano bench, positioning it to the left hand side.

"I'll tell you what - I'll play the left hand harmony on your pieces today. It will be just like us playing a duet and we can just work on your right hand. I could use the practice, myself."

As was often the case, Kara was silent.

"Nice job with your warm ups, Kara." Laura gazed down at Kara's bandaged fingers. "How did you hurt your hand again?"

"I caught it in the drawer," Kara answered in a dry monotone as she looked straight ahead.

Laura's uneasiness grew. Kara's mother had said that her daughter had gotten her hand caught in the lid of the piano at home and now Kara was telling her that she had caught it in a drawer. Either Kara's mother was lying or Kara was confused. At twenty-nine years old, Laura Roslin had been teaching music at a public school for the past seven years. She had been teaching private piano lessons since her teens. She knew kids' behavior and she had instincts that had been honed through experience. Her gut was telling her that there was something very, very wrong.

"Kara, could you look at me, sweetheart?" Laura asked gently. When Kara's frightened brown eyes met her worried green ones, Laura spoke again. "I want you to know that you can tell me anything. I'm your teacher and I care about you very much. If there is anything that you want to tell me about how you hurt your hand, or anything else - you can. I would really like to help you. Even if you're scared to tell me, I promise that it will be okay and I will help you fix it."

Kara sat perfectly still. Laura noticed that she was nervously scrunching up the hem of her white dress in her right hand, making a tight fist, and squeezing.

"I don't wanna talk about it," Kara said after several seconds passed.

"Okay," Laura said. "But if you change your mind, I will be right here. We can talk anytime." Laura hoped that if she waited a little, that she could broach the subject again before the lesson was over and get Kara to open up.

"You were playing "Turkey Waltz," if I remember correctly?" Laura purposely mis-quoted the song title.

Kara emitted a small laugh. "Butterfly Waltz," she corrected.

"Oh yes. A bunch of turkeys would look pretty silly waltzing, wouldn't they?"

Kara nodded as Laura opened up her book and turned to the correct page.

"Miss Laura?"

"Yes?"

"I did a bad thing," Kara informed her hesitantly as she continued to squeeze the hem of her dress.

"You want to tell me about it?" Laura coaxed.

Kara gazed at her teacher with a startlingly sad, contrite expression. "I wanted butterflies on the piano. Like in the song. So I drew them with the markers from the kitchen drawer." She waited for Laura to look horrified. When she didn't, she continued, "I thought it would wipe off like my markers but Mama said that those ones are premre-per-mem-net."

"Permanent," whispered Laura.

"Yes," answered Kara. "Permemnet."

"Kara, that was an accident."

"I was bad," argued Kara firmly.

"How did you hurt your hand, honey?" Laura took a slow breath, hoping that her instincts were wrong.

"Mama got mad when she found out what I did," whispered Kara. "She closed the piano down on my hand." Kara made a strangled cry that she couldn't stifle and turned away.

"Oh, Kara. I'm so sorry." Laura put a hand on her shoulder, very softly. When the child didn't flinch or pull away, she left it there and began stroking her back, offering wordless consolation and comfort.

Kara began to cry without making a single solitary sound; the only indication of her distress was the tiny, telltale movements of two small shoulders.

"Kara...Kara….give me your eyes."

"I'm not 'sposed to cry," apologized Kara in a voice like broken glass. She would not face Laura.

"Kara, look at me." Laura could feel her own eyes filling up. When Kara didn't turn around, Laura explained. "I'm crying, too. Maybe we can get through the crying together."

At last, Kara Thrace turned around to face her teacher. With an anguished cry, she flung herself into Laura Roslin's arms and sobbed.

Sitting on a swing in the dusky afternoon light, Laura watched the children taking turns spinning one another on the merry-go-round. The smell of autumn lingered in the earthy scent of the leaves under their feet. She swung lazily, watching the kids get bored with the merry-go-round and race toward the slide. John Quinn, a longtime friend and colleague who taught history at her school, sat beside her on the adjacent swing.

"She's such a different child," John commented.

"Mmmmm, she is. It's been so hard this past year and a half. So much upheaval. Her mother's trial. And then the heart attack. I never thought I'd say this about another human being but her mother's passing was, in some ways, a blessing in disguise. That's terrible, isn't it?"

John shook his head. His mouth hardened into a line. "Not in Socrata Thrace's case. Poor kid. At least the legal stuff is over and she can move on."

"The proceedings were hard for her...those first few hearings that started before her mother's heart attack - when the grand jury decided that there was enough evidence to go to trial."

"But at least she didn't have to go through a complete trial. At least Kara didn't have to relive the abuse over and over again through endless testimony." He looked at Laura and smiled. "And at least she had you."

Laura made a random pattern in the dirt with the toe of her shoe. "They finally finalized the adoption last week. She's mine."

"Congratulations!"

"Thanks. It's a good feeling." Laura gazed at Kara when she spoke. "I couldn't be happier." Her smile did not stop at her lips; it transfixed her entire face into an expression of profound gratitude and joy.

"She's a great kid. Bright. Terrific sense of humor. And too clever for her own good. I can't wait for her to be old enough to have in my class."

Laura nodded and looked at her watch. "I've got to get home and start dinner. Tell Miranda I said hello, will you?"

John smiled back at his friend and colleague. "Will do."

"Kara!" Laura called as she walked over to her daughter. "It's getting late, sweetheart. We have to go."

Kara bounded over to her mother. "Five more minutes," she begged. "Please, Mama."

Mama. It was the first time she had called her that and Laura loved the way it sounded.

Eyes glistening, she could only nod and smile. "Yes. Five more minutes."

"Mom….Mom! You can let go now," laughed Kara.

"I don't want to," Laura protested stubbornly, but she released Kara from the hug. "I can't believe you're going to learn to fly one of those things," Laura added, as she looked dubiously at the Raptor off in the distance.

"Not yet…this is just basic. But eventually….hell, yes!" Her smile was so exuberant that Laura had to smile, too. Slipping her arm around her mother's waist, she gave her one more half-squeeze.

"I'll call you as soon as they allow it."

"You'd better."

"I love you," Laura said, biting back the lump in her throat.

Kara glowed. "I love you, too, Mom."

Laura took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. The tag in the back of her blouse was driving her absolutely crazy and she completely regretted forgetting to cut it out that morning. She indulged in a thorough scratch since no one was around to witness it. With a sigh, she went back to perusing the fiscal report on the spring budget and made another notation in the margin. Laura's phone rang and she picked it up.

"Laura Roslin."

"Sorry to bother you, Madame Secretary. But it's your daughter on line two."

"Oh - thank you, Billy. Please - put her through."

"Helloooo, Madame Secretary," sang Kara.

"Helloooo, Lieutenant Thrace," echoed Laura. They both giggled simultaneously.

"Please tell me that you don't have dinner plans tonight," begged Kara.

Laura tapped her pencil on her desk absently. "Nothing I can't weasel my way out of," she answered. "I'm a politician, remember?"

"Nice, Mom. Speaking of weasels, is that frakker still chasing you around the desk?," asked Kara.

"Oh, not sense he found out what the heel of my stiletto felt like slamming onto top of his foot. I told him that the next time he put his hand on my ass, his foot wouldn't be the only part of his body that I squashed. He's been keeping his hands to himself ever since."

"Ouch! I'm proud of you…and he so deserved it."

"Yes, he did."

"Laura Roslin, Secretary of Education, foot-stomper of lecherous old men. This is exactly why the political arena needs you, Mom."

Laura sighed and slipped her shoes off underneath her desk, stretching her legs. "Maybe. So…you want to grab a couple of movies, wine, and popcorn and do our usual thing?" Movie night had become a frequent Friday night tradition when Kara was on shore leave. Laura was often exhausted from the long hours that she was putting in and Kara loved having a chance for some true downtime.

"Not exactly. Mom, are you sitting down?" Kara's voice was breathless with excitement.

"Yes, I'm sitting."

"I'm engaged!"

"You and Lee," Laura smiled.

"Me and Lee," confirmed Kara - athough there was never any question.

"Congratulations! "

"Wait a minute. That was way too easy. Where's the lecture?"

"Kara, you're twenty-three years old. Lee is a great guy. He's a terrific lawyer with a lot of integrity and he has a strong head on his shoulders. But most of all, it's obvious that he's completely crazy about you."

"Lee wants you to meet his dad and I want his dad to meet you. We're taking you to dinner."

"The famous Admiral Adama that you wax poetic about. Not sure if I'll be able to reconcile the man with the myth," teased Laura.

"You're going to love the Old Man," Kara assured her. "So you'll come?"

"Of course. Name the time and the place."

"Altura. 7:00." Altura was a quaint, upscale restaurant in the city.

"7:00! I've got to run, honey, if I'm going to look even hallway presentable for seven. I'll see you then. Oh - and Kara - I want to hear all about the proposal. I expect details."

"You got it, Mom."