‘Will you stay until the end?’ Luke asked. ‘We’ve gotta have that shot together.’
‘My staying is directly dependent on how good you are.’ Mary said back, a quirky smile on her lips.
Luke smiled back before turning on the balls of his feet and disappearing into a door to the left of the small stage.
‘Can we finally do this now?’ Josie said, still holding her shot up at Mary.
‘Yep. Sorry about that.’
Mary and Josie touched glasses again before knocking back their shots and slamming the empty glasses upside down on the bar counter.
Mary nodded at Josie. ‘Wow, nice bourbon.’
‘Angel’s Envy,’ Josie told her. ‘From Kentucky. Mellow and smooth.’
‘Definitely smooth,’ Mary agreed.
‘And you’ll stay,’ Josie said.
‘Sorry?’ Mary frowned at her.
‘If you’re staying here is directly dependent on how good Luke is,’ Josie explained, ‘then you’ll stay.’ She nodded confidently. ‘He’s fucking great.’
‘Is he?’
‘You’ll see.’
As Josie walked away to go serve a new customer at the other end of the bar, Mary turned to face the stage. She was in a good spot. Despite being at an angle, she could see the stage very clearly.
A short man, with a quite pronounced beer belly and a cowboy hat, got up on the stage just as the lights inside The Whiskey dimmed a touch.
Mary sipped her beer.
‘Is this thing on?’ the man on stage said, tapping the microphone a couple of times with his index finger.
The loud chatter simmered down, and the crowd turned to face the stage.
‘OK,’ the cowboy continued. ‘Welcome everyone to Monday Nights at The Whiskey.’ That sentence was greeted with a chorus of ‘woo-hoos’, ‘yee-haws’ and cheerful applause. ‘As most of you know – and I guess that’s why you’re all here tonight – Monday nights is when we open the stage to new acts – bands, solo artists, duos… whoever wants to showcase their talent, right here, at the heart of the ‘Music City’. And I am very proud to say thatmany… many country music superstars out there today have started their journey to stardom right here, on this very stage.’
More ‘woo-hoos’ and ‘yee-haws’.
‘And I’ve got a feeling that this next act is well on his way to the top. Last Monday he played his first gig here at The Whiskey and boy, was he a hit.’ The man pointed at the first row of people right in front of the stage. ‘Specially with the ladies, right here.’
That front row was made up entirely of young women, who right then, cheered loudly, raising bottles of beer and whiskey glasses up in the air.
‘Looks like you’ve got some stiff competition,’ Josie said, leaning her elbows on the bar.
Mary hadn’t even noticed that Josie was standing right behind her.
‘What?’
Josie nodded at all the excited women on the front row. ‘G.R.I.T.S. And they are ferocious.’
‘Grits?’ Mary questioned, resting her bottle on the bar counter. ‘Like cornmeal porridge?’
Josie laughed. ‘Nope. Much worse,’ she explained. ‘It stands for – girls raised in the south. You never heard that term before?’
Mary’s turn to laugh. ‘No. Never.’
