When “Pastel Dreams” wrapped up, I thanked Raf and introduced him and my band, even though they didn’t get to play. They got a nice round of applause.
Then I took a deep breath, cleared my throat, and spoke to my audience.
“My girlfriend, Angeline…” I looked over at her, and she smiled as people looked at her. “She has this song she calls her ‘crying song.’ This girl, who’s lived mercifully trauma-free all her life, in her own words, listens to this song when she’s feeling down. A song about, of all things, running from bullets. It makes her cry and it lifts her up. Well, I’ve been running from bullets for a long time.”
I went silent, looking down at the floor for a moment as I gathered my thoughts and tried to find the right words. I didn’t rehearse this. I just knew, in the moment, that I’d know what to say.
“My own ‘crying song’ is about the importance of love in your life,” I went on, “and a train as a metaphor for… well, I’m sure the guys who wrote it heard it much differently than I ever did. It was the song that was playing during the worst moment of my life. When my whole world changed. And it always reminds me how songs are so personal and so universal at the same time. How we all hear something different even when we hear the same words. But we can all share in a feeling, right?”
I looked up, and I saw Noah. I saw Shane. I saw my friends in kind of a blur, as I tried not to focus on a single one of them and let it derail me.
“That’s why it’s been so hard for me to sing. I had a painful stutter as a kid that I managed to overcome largely by learning to sing. And I used that as my excuse not to sing lead, and not to sing much at all in live shows. I’d even record my backup vocals for Breakneck’s albums alone, so no one would be there when I sang. Because when I sang… I often broke down in tears, over and over again, for no reason. Or at least I told myself it was for no reason. But the reason was that singing and music allowed me to feel what I couldn’t bear to feel any other way. I couldn’t stop the flood of feelings with music. The truth is, singing in front of a crowd was terrifying. It still is. The difference is, today I’m doing it anyway.”
That got a burst of supportive applause. I waited until everyone was quiet again to keep speaking.
“Angeline encouraged me to play my crying song as part of my set tonight. Many of you know it. It’s a song called ‘Long Train Runnin’’ by the Doobie Brothers. I told her there was no place for a cover song in a showcase like this unless there was a damn good reason. Unless I could make utter magic with it, there was no point. I don’t know if I can make magic. As the listener, that’s kind of up to you. But tonight, I’m gonna try.”
There was more applause and some whistles. Then gradually, my small audience fell silent again.
I waited for a few breaths into that silence, to start strumming.
Everyone expected me to play ‘Long Train Runnin’’ now. I knew that. But as soon as I started to play, they discovered they were wrong. I could feel them leaning in around me as they struggled to make the switch in their heads. What song was I playing?
It was “Sign of the Times,” and I played it for Angeline, totally stripped down, acoustic, just me and my guitar in the candlelight. My voice was huskier, deeper than Harry Styles’ and I made it my own, but I could tell by the feeling in the room, the deep silence of the crowd, that it felt as magical for them as it did for me. It was like the calm before a storm. Like they were all holding their breaths.
Like a sharp intake of breath before a burst of tears.
By the end of it, I could see Angeline full-on crying. I knew she’d tried not to. I didn’t play her crying song to make her cry, but I loved her tears. By now, I knew she cried for so many reasons, and not one of them was wrong. The fact that she was crying just meant she was feeling.
I wished I could’ve felt as freely as she did.
But she was still the only one in my life I fully trusted with my feelings. Even now… the songs expressed what I couldn’t really say.
And because she was my muse, and my heart, I closed the show with a song I wrote for her. One she hadn’t heard yet. One she didn’t even know I wrote.
It was my gift to her.
My way of saying thank you, for everything she’d done for me.
It was a song about love. About an angel on earth. And in that song I told her the things I still found hard to say.
Without me even saying the words, she’d know, when she heard this song, how much I loved her. And that this song was for her.
As I sang, I saw her sitting at the table with my dad, with Shayla and my stepmom. I saw Angeline trying so hard not to cry.
* * *
When I got to my feet at the end of the show, the crowd stood, too. I had a standing ovation, as it was.
Lamar was already at my side. “Clearing out?” he asked me.
“I’ll just give it a minute.” Lamar knew I didn’t want to stick around tonight. That I wouldn’t have much left to say after my set. That I’d be tapped out.
I knew some people would want to talk to me, though. I knew Yash would want to see me talk to them.
Trey was the first person who approached to shake my hand. “Brother,” he said. “Let me be the first to tell you how exceptional that was.”
“Thank you.”
