Grace Note (The Twilight Zone)

Rosemarie Miletti—oldest of five children. Always responsible, always dependable. Time and dreams sacrificed to family and duty. Rosemarie, soon to receive a gift of time offered by one who can least afford it. A first fleeting glimpse ... into the Twilight Zone.

It is March 1966 and Rosemarie Miletti rushes to her singing lesson. Her teacher, Maestro Barbieri, attempts to encourage her for her attempt to break into opera. However, he must comfort her as she explains how she is the oldest child and must care for her sister Mary, who is ill with active leukemia. At the end of the day, Rosemarie comes home to her mother's incessant chatter, helps to get dinner ready, and checks on Mary. Mary makes Rosemarie promise that when she becomes a big opera star that she won't forget about her. Rosemarie denies she'll become an opera star but Mary is insistent. That night, Mary sees a shooting star and quickly makes a wish for Rosemarie.

After coming home on a stormy day, Rosemarie finds the house empty and a note telling her to "Come to the hospital now—″ There, Mary awakens and tells Rosemarie she wants to show her something. Mary tells her to follow the music and she'll see. Rosemarie leaves and heads down the hall, which becomes a different hospital hall as she proceeds. She walks outside and sees the date on a newspaper, which reads Saturday, March 22, 1986. She hails a cab and asks to go to the Met where she finds the performance, starring herself in La Traviata, to be sold-out, but also meets a woman who is standing in front of the "sold out″ sign attempting to sell two tickets. Rosemary buys one of them. Arriving at her balcony seat, Rosemarie discovers that the person onstage is indeed herself.

After the performance, there is a huge crowd that waits to see her but no one is allowed backstage. As Rosemarie ponders how to get in her other sister Dorothy tells the security guard she is "on the list" and he lets her inside. On a hunch, Rosemarie tells the guard she's Mary Miletti and she thinks she's on the list. He confirms that she is and lets her in to meet the opera star.

Rosemarie stands at the dressing room door and listens to her future self discuss her upcoming birthday party with Dorothy. Her future self instructs Dorothy to leave the door open when she leaves and as she puts on a pendant with Mary's picture in it she looks back at the open door and remembers herself from not long ago. 1966 Rosemarie hears Mary's voice calling her from the hospital and hurries back to her own time. Mary gives Rosemarie a pendant with her picture in it and says that it was her wish that Rosemarie would become a big opera star. Mary dies and Rosemarie mourns with the rest of the family but knows that her destiny as an opera star awaits. The final scene shows her practicing with Maestro Barbieri.

To live life fully, one should hear the melody the world makes. Pity those who stumble through their years without ever hearing the song. The greatest gift we can bestow on those we love is to help them hear it. One life ends, another begins. But the song of life fills the universe, even into the last highest darkened balcony row...in the Twilight Zone.

• "Grace Note" on IMDb
• "Grace Note" at TV.com
• Postcards from the Zone episode Grace Note