Throw Him My Way

She went back across the hall to her home, appreciating how nothing was on fire, and got ready to go out again for her afternoon dog rounds.

Things were looking up, thought Heidi. At the end of the day, she wasn’t in trouble, she had a few gigs, and she had an open mic event that had actual prize money that evening.

She’d never actually won any of those. It had been close, very often, but she’d never won.

But she would. Of course she would.

Strangely enough, when it was something without prize money, she almost always won.

If that wasn’t a wonderful description of how her life seemed to be, thought Heidi, a bit ruefully.

All evening, she busied herself with recording another original for YouTube. It would need more editing before she could upload it, of course, but it was a good start.

It was also a good way to keep herself from obsessing over Christian.

A fireman, of all things, thought Heidi. What a cliché of a woman she was turning out to be! She’d never been attracted to men in any position of authority. Heidi disliked authority with a vehemence she usually reserved for chamomile tea.

She really hated chamomile tea.

But he was sticking his neck out for her.

And he had come to hear her sing.

He had left before talking to her, though.

What did all of that mean? She had sent him a drink, he had raised a toast, and then he had just vanished.

Disgusted with herself and her budding obsession, she threw herself into her music, and soon enough, that was all that mattered.

Heidi lost herself in her words and her tunes, and nothing else could break through when she did that.

*****

“Chris! Man, you’ve been all over the place.”

Christian came back to himself with a jolt and glanced over at Rick.

“What? No I’m not. I did the drill perfectly well.”

Rick rolled his eyes.

“Yes, but your thoughts are all over the place. You can do drills like that. You know you can’t do the real thing like that.”

Christian shrugged.

“We’re not doing the real thing now, so that’s pretty much irrelevant, isn’t it? What’s the big deal?”

Rick shook his head.

“What the hell has gotten into you? Where did you disappear to last night, anyway? You left me there to deal with Aunt Susie all on my own, man! That is so not cool!”

Christian grinned.

“I’m sure you managed admirably. I had somewhere to be. Had to do something. Check something out.”

Rick shook his head.

“What the hell is going on with you?”

Christian shrugged.

He wasn’t sure he could answer that honestly. What the hell was going on with him?

Why had he gone to listen to Heidi sing?

Because she was very good. He could justify that to himself.

Almost.

But he had gone, and he had felt a need to see her. That need had been so strong that he’d left as soon as he could.

But she had seen him, even if he had sat in a place designed not to let him be seen, and she had sent him a drink.

She had known to send him a Scotch, too. Was that instinct?

Heidi hadn’t just been good. After the day she’d had, he wouldn’t have blamed her if she had been a bit off.

But she had been thoroughly magnificent. She had blown it out of the water.

The audience had been eating out of her pretty, long-fingered hand.

He had forgotten that she sometimes played the guitar, too. When she did covers, she usually chose to just sing.

She was always full of surprises, too. He’d remembered that, when he saw her again on the stage, playing to the crowd and getting everybody cheering for her.

It wasn’t just her voice. Her presence was remarkable.

He was drawn to her, and he didn’t understand it.

Maybe he should stay away from her.

But he knew he wouldn’t. That evening, at nine, when he stepped out of his home, he told himself that he could be going anywhere.

He could call Rick and ask him to meet him somewhere. Maybe they could go and shoot some pool. They could do something else.

But his feet knew better. They took him to ‘Tunes’, where he knew there was an open mic night.

He knew, because he had looked it up.

And he knew that Heidi was billed to sing there.

He dithered outside, and told himself that he hadn’t come there just to hear Heidi sing. He came for open mic nights quite often. He liked music. But not Nickelback.

He’d even been told that he was quite passable on the drums, though it had never been more than a fun hobby to him.

He’d almost decided to walk away when he turned around and went inside. Walking straight to the bar, he slid onto an empty stool – one of very few left, which meant that he was right about open mic being a popular night at Tunes – and waited.

Ordering a beer, he nursed it, unwilling to let go of that part of his control. He seemed to have relinquished far too much of it already.

What was he doing?

He was about to get up and leave when she came on stage, and he felt as if he had relinquished control all over again.

He couldn’t leave. He knew he could.

Did she realize that he was there? Did she feel that same awareness that he did?

He sat back, and listened, as she gauged the crowd and played to them.

She was an entertainer and a performer, thought Christian, and an incredibly talented one.

And then their eyes met, and he stopped thinking, at all.

*****

It was him! He was there again.

Her fireman, as she had embarrassingly began to think of him, again.

Well, she had only one song this time, unlike at Barney’s, where she sang full sets for almost free. In the hope that it would lead to something, somehow.

And for the sheer joy of singing, seeing her music being enjoyed.

There was no original tonight. Tonight, she would sing Nina Simone, and boy, this one hit close to home.

She launched into Ain’t got no, I got life and she put everything into it.

She knew she did it well. She knew she channeled the great singer herself when she performed it.

Starting off low, and simple, she built it up, taking it higher and higher, bringing it back again, and by the time she launched into the long note, she knew she had it.

For once, she felt that complete certainty that it was her night.

This was hers.

She got this. Nobody could take this from her now.

She let her eyes meet his again, and the confidence poured out.

When she got up and walked, her hips rolled, her lips challenged, and her hands brought everything together.

She saw people clapping, getting to their feet, and knew that she had turned what could’ve been just another open mic night into something far more. She had turned it into an experience that they would remember.

She saw glasses left untouched until she reached the end, and drew that note out, impossibly long, taking it higher, from contralto to soprano, until she could’ve sworn she heard the wine glasses vibrating.

There was a moment of silence, so complete that it was more than just lack of sound.

Then she got something, for the first time in her life.

She got an actual standing ovation.

Later, she might find it funny. Later, she might look back and think of how incongruous it was to get a standing ovation at a rather dingy pub, during an open mic night when anybody with ten bucks could step up and sing.

But that was the first night she felt like a star, and she needed that.

She hadn’t realized how low her soul had been until she heard it.

Riding that wave of confidence, she walked off the stage, walked up to the bar where Christian still sat, and slid onto the stool next to him.