Ange answered with an instant,“Hooray!”
Reina replied with a heart emoji.
Only Harper took longer to message me back.“Can you come over tonight?”
Puzzled, I set out after dinner. Meeting up at theBlue Moonwas normal enough. Only, this request felt different.
Harper pulled me aside when I came in, right before the regular open mic night at theBlue Moonstarted.
She took the “Reserved” sign off a table and beckoned Reina over as well.
“What’s going on? Where’s Ange?” I asked.
“She’s decided to have some quality time with her husband. Don’t worry, she won’t miss out. I’m going to film this.” Harper laughed.
My tension melted. I took the seats she offered me and Reina.
“Prepare to be blown away,” Reina whispered to me.
“Aren’t you hosting?” Reina’s talents as MC were only surpassed by her singing.
“The first artist has asked if she could announce her act herself.” Reina and Harper both twinkled at me.
The lights went low. I heard more than I saw a woman passing by us on her way to the stage; a blonde woman in an azure halter neck dress, with a henna tattoo.
“Linda?” I gawked.
“The one and only.” Harper aimed her phone camera at the stage.
Linda picked up the microphone. “Hello, Willowmere.”
Not the greatest opening line of all times, but I joined Reina in clapping.
“You’ll all be surprised to see me of all people up here. Well, like a wise woman told me not too long ago, give it a whirl, girl. So, this girl is giving it a whirl.” She blew a kiss to a table on the other side of the room from my perspective.
I craned my neck to spot the recipient.
Harper stopped me. “No need to twist yourself into a pretzel. She’s here with her hubby.”
Soft music set in, and on stage, Linda spoke into the microphone. “This song is what might so easily have happened to me if I’d gone on trying to be someone I never could be, to please people impossible to please. But here I am, fifty years old, with a man who never gave up on me. I love you, babe.”
I misted up.
And then Linda sang, no, she serenaded her husband with“The Greatest Man I Never Knew”.
For a few precious moments it didn’t matter that her performance was wobbly or that she missed a few notes, because we got to see the real Linda, a gutsy woman brave enough to own up to her flaws and insecurities. This new and unfamiliar Linda was a lot braver than me.
I hadn’t realized it until she opened up in front of everyone at theBlue Moonthat no matter how tough things got for me, I’d always had a safety net, first in the form of Aunt Violet, and then my coven, and my familiar.
I clasped Reina and Harper’s hands and squeezed them. “Careful, or I’ll ruin the video,” Harper whispered.
Linda finished her performance. Her husband strode to the stage and lifted her off.
Another tear trickled down my cheek.
Harper ended her recording. “Worth coming over for?”
“I have goosebumps,” I admitted. “Who’d have thought that Linda is capable of changing? That any of us is capable of changing at our mature age?”
