Page 18 of Perfect Composition
Only Austyn plays so much better than anyone I’ve ever met. Well, save one.
I’m startled by the abrupt end to the song long before it should. Then again, I think wryly, why should I be? This is my baby girl. She never stayed in one place for long; she dashed from pillar to post. She never could find one music she loved; she fell in love with all of it. And, much to my chagrin, it was often played at decibels way too loud for me to understand much of it.
Tonight, I’m bracing myself for more of the same as she takes the booth at some club called Redemption here in the city. But there’s something different about this one, something that suddenly has her flipping over suitcases while screeching, “It’s a red boot, damnit.”
My eyes dart over toward the chair where she slipped on the first one, something I can very clearly see from where I’m perched on the edge of my chair. After I calmly point out the maroon army boot she’s been searching for, I rub my hands up and down my bare arms as Austyn dashes across the room to snatch it up as if a thief was going to break into our room and steal it. “Honey, you seem rather anxious. Why is this event so different than all the other shows you’ve played? I might be biased as your mother, but you’re wonderful.”
She whirls on me, her multihued braids flying around her head. “Mama? Really? Are you asking me that right now?”
Oh, where did my little girl with her brown pigtails go?My heart aches for a moment when I remember the mornings before the school bus would arrive and Austyn would sit in my lap patiently for me to do her hair. Now, she’s as tall as I am, so smart and mature, and has an exuberance I’m almost eclipsed by.
Much as I was by her father.
Shoving that thought in a box and slamming the lid tightly closed, I push a little. “Austyn? What’s so different about this gig than the others?”
And just like all the other times I’ve said the word “gig” in my native Texan drawl, since she started playing them regularly after dropping out of college, Austyn giggles. “Mama, you’re a nut.”
“I appreciate that coming from you, sweetie.”
She drops the boot, but I take careful note of where it is, knowing we’ll likely have another mad hunt shortly if I don’t. Grabbing both of my hands, she squeezes them tightly before confessing, “There were some pretty serious people in the audience last night.”
“And there haven’t been in the past?” I’m confused. Even though my family supported me having Austyn at seventeen, I willingly gave up a lot of the freedoms I want her to experience. I want her to embrace the highs and lows of life and know that no matter what path her life may take her, the people who love her will always stand behind her. Namely, me. I may not always appreciate what she does, but always I will love her.
But for my normally laid-back child to be going off the rails, something big is happening. I lean forward and cup her cheek. Her facial structure is almost a mirror of mine, even if her eyes and lips are his. I let my thumb rub over her cheek when I realize her mind and heart must be as well since they’re the only two people I’ve ever loved with this all-encompassing madness. “Talk to me, Austyn.” I’ve said the words a million and one times since she was a little girl and could understand that I would stand behind her hopes and her dreams. That she could run to me with anything in her heart.
And no matter what, I’d never run away.
“Louie said when I was done that there were some big-name music bloggers.” Austyn names the man she described during our chat earlier as “super funny and kind, but so tall, Mama. I think he’s even taller than Rodeo Ralph.”
And since the restaurant owner in Kensington stands at six and a half feet tall, I had a very clear mental image of this “Louie” I’m due to meet in a few hours.
“Austyn Melissa Kensington, are you starting to have doubts about the choices you’ve made?” I do the one thing I know to get my daughter focused. I challenge her.
She tosses her head like a riled filly in the fields of our farm not far from where I met her father twenty years ago. “No, ma’am.”
I glance down at my watch. “Then you’d better get a move on, young lady. I believe you said the car was going to pick us up in…”
“Shit. Thirty minutes!” Austyn springs up and dashes off.
“And watch your language! We’re not at the club yet,” I call after her.
A trill of perfectly pitched laughter precedes “Whatever, Mama.”
I flick off an imaginary piece of lint from my black pants before wincing as I hear a crash in the bathroom. “I wonder if my makeup is going to survive Austyn’s anxiety,” I mutter. Fiddling with a heavy gold ring I slipped on earlier, I try to let go of my own emotions. Not because I’m worried. No, my daughter is able to take on the world and conquer it. But I thought I’d have more precious time before my baby became an adult.
I’m just not ready, even though she’s been shouting her intentions since she was seventeen. And who but an audiologist should hear people? The thought has my lips curving as I get to my own feet. The silk of my slacks slides down over my legs, a mere whisper against my legs. My deep plum tie-front shirt was approved by my daughter as appropriate for the trendiest nightclub in Manhattan. Pushing up my glasses, I slip in a few necessities into my purse just as Austyn dashes back calling, “You don’t need a lot, Mama.”
“Oh?” I flip open my wallet and pull out my ID, credit card, and some cash.
“Remember I told you Marco mentioned in passing that everything’s on the house? And don’t forget the no cell phone rule.”
“Right.” No cameras are allowed in this mysterious nightclub. I still slip in my other essentials. I refuse to rely on an unknown man’s passing words of largesse. “I just hope the security at this place is tight.”
“For good reason. Geez, Mama. You wouldn’t believe the kind of celebrities that patronize this place.” Austyn snatches up her iPad and does a quick survey around the room before asking me impatiently, “Are you ready? We have to go.”
Now it’s my turn to roll my eyes. “Yes, darling. I’ve been ready.”
Sheepishly, she grins as I stroll to the door in the glittery slingback sandals I’m certain I’ll be dying to kick off by the end of the night. “Sorry about the crazy.”
