Chapter 5 #2
“Sure.” The lilac scent drifted past again.
They’d hit exactly the right time to enjoy the flowers.
“I just had a marketing idea—you and me playing music on the big porch. People will record it and post it on social media. An impromptu mini concert, casual and unscripted, bringing guests to your restaurant for supper and improving your reviews. Maybe it’ll even inspire me to find that elusive element my aunt has tasked me with discovering. ”
“People can make requests. Have a photo op with the great Ariel Sullivan. Let’s do it.”
Great? What a sweet thought, although completely untrue. “You mean take a picture with the legendary Caleb Kennedy.”
His wavering smile, hinting that her compliment had opened a dark door, caught her off guard. Did the man not know how much the music industry respected him?
Or had something else triggered that response?
“Let’s take a few selfies together and post them on social media, talk about the impromptu concert, and ask people to share.
We won’t get a huge response, but we should get a small audience from a few fans who happen to be on island.
” Caleb pulled out his phone, and they hammed it up a little for their followers as he snapped a few shots.
Caleb texted Sarah and asked her to announce the mini concert. He and Ariel took a few moments to make the pictures public, then she handed him her guitar and hurried to stash the rest of her belongings in her room.
She locked the door and held out the heavy brass key. “Put this in your pocket for me?”
He tucked the key away, then carried both guitars around the building to the long front porch, where unsuspecting guests sat in white rockers facing the harbor.
And the sunset over the water? Spectacular. She could stand here and watch until it faded away.
As Caleb set down the guitar cases, four auburn-haired girls, who looked like sisters aged about thirteen through eighteen, stepped out on the porch and squealed at the sight of Ariel. She pulled her ever-present autograph pad and paper from her pocket and asked their names.
“I’m Veronica.” The oldest girl waited for Ariel to sign her paper. “I’m in my school choir. I wish I could take voice lessons from you. I try to sing like you, but it doesn’t sound the same.”
Ariel smiled at her, handing her the autograph. “You have a lovely speaking voice, so I’m sure you can sing at least as well as I can.”
“I don’t know. Sometimes it doesn’t sound right.”
“Do you know ‘The Long Way’?” At the girl’s nod, Ariel strummed the intro. “Sing along, and I’ll listen for anything we could improve.”
They sang through the verse and chorus, then Ariel stopped the song. “When I was a girl, much younger than you, my aunt taught me to stop sounding nasal.” She sang a line with a nasal twang. “She taught me to quit closing off my nose and let some air through. It made all the difference.”
Veronica sang the line a few more times, finally losing the nasal tone.
“So much better!” Ariel gave her a quick hug. “I’m proud of you. Now you can go home and tell your choir director that you learned a new singing technique.”
“That helped me so much!” When a red-haired woman in her late thirties came through the doorway, Veronica ran to her. “Mom, Ariel Sullivan gave me a voice lesson.”
The girl’s sisters asked for lessons too, but their mother stepped in. “You’ve taken enough of her time. Thank you, Ariel.”
Veronica squeezed in one more line as her mother escorted her down the steps. “You should give voice lessons before your concert. For all the kids who want to sing better.”
“Thanks! I’ll think about it.”
With the family now walking down the sidewalk, Caleb turned to Ariel again. “She’s right. You should think about it.”
“I always do when I make a promise.” She hesitated and thought about the girl’s request. For about two seconds.
“No, seriously. You knew exactly how to help her. Six more bands are scheduled to play, so what if we announce on social media that you’re forming a high school choir to sing one more song before the concert?
You could charge a fee to donate to the island restoration, practice the Saturday before, and conduct as they sing. ”
“Plus it could bless a lot of people. Help me craft a social media post later?”
“Absolutely.”
After greeting some guests who had gathered on the porch and signing a few autographs, Ariel and Caleb tuned the instruments near the inn’s front door. “Let’s start with ‘The Long Way.’ Want to take the melody?” he asked.
She gave an exaggerated shudder. “No way. Aunt Dahlia always sings melody in this song.”
“Why not? The highest note is just a D. You hit it in some of your other songs.”
“I can sing the note, but not the part.” Ariel smiled at the cloud of confusion in those beautiful eyes.
“See, you could sing Drake’s part, even with him standing next to you, and nobody would care.
But it’s different with her. Every soprano in the Nashville music scene defers to her, asking her to sing the melody if she’s anywhere near the venue when they play one of her songs.
It sometimes makes some interesting impromptu entertainment. ”
“Now that you bring it up, I did hear that a while back.”
“It started after her first record, ‘Colleen,’ went gold, during the time she hung around the Nashville bar scene, scouting fresh talent. But somebody always spotted her in the wings and asked her to sing with them. Showing up so often, she stepped in to sing a lot, and it became a tradition.”
“I doubt she’d care tonight.” Caleb gave a half grin. “She’d probably say, ‘Sing however you want in front of this huge crowd of twenty-three people.’”
Ariel had to smile too. He was right—a couple dozen fans had shown up but definitely not a mob. Yet. “All right, then let’s end with your band’s new song.”
“‘I Got Jesus’? Agreed.” Caleb handed over her guitar, and they chose a spot ten feet from the door. “Want me to take the lead part, and you can play rhythm?”
She nodded, whispered a four-count, and strummed the first chord. While they played a rather lengthy intro, she hummed the melody vocal line.
He was right—Aunt Dahlia was not here on this porch. If Ariel sang the melody, her aunt wouldn’t know, so she couldn’t possibly care.
For the first time, Ariel wanted to sing that part.
As more fans gathered on the porch, the steps, and the lawn, a delightful fluttering inside Ariel, like the one she always felt before a concert, confirmed her desire to sing it.
She hummed the last two melody half notes of the introduction, her gaze on Caleb in a silent signal.
His quick smile told her he understood.
She came in strong, holding both the note and Caleb’s gaze as she put her own spin on the first line, wordlessly signaling a decrescendo as the verse progressed. Intensifying the chorus with her, Caleb added his own impromptu harmony line in his powerful basso voice.
Moving through the second verse, the sense of oneness in song hit her in a way she’d never known. His eyes held the wonder of a silent bond she’d never felt with another musician.
At the last chorus, Ariel didn’t want the song to end.
She kept strumming to give stability to the improvised vocal tune rising from some unexplored place within her, a melody flowing freely, as if it had always lived within her, somehow trapped until now.
Ariel continued to build yet held back a bit for the ending.
When it came, she finished in full voice.
Then, as if on impulse, Caleb signaled another tag, then they sang the last line again.
Slower now, sweeter, they improvised both lyrics and melody, her steady rhythm and his resonant tones blending, just the two of them, alone even in the crowd.
The last note hung in the air, floating in the light breeze. As it faded, Ariel gave a modest stage bow. The crowd had spread across the inn’s front yard, applause filling the empty space where the final chord had rung.
From the sound of it, their audience loved the song. Loved Ariel and Caleb together.
Loved her.
The thought sent a thrill through her. Maybe Ned, their record label’s producer, had been wrong. Molly too. Maybe she could make it in music on her own. She turned to Caleb for his reaction.
He looked at her—with a little mist in his eyes? “Ariel, that was—”
The nearby delicate clearing of a throat—a quite familiar clearing—interrupted him.
No…
Aunt Dahlia. Standing in the doorway, her lips parted and the sparkle gone from her beautiful blue eyes as she took in the sight of Ariel and Caleb still caught up in the afterglow of creating music—heart-touching music—together.
Her aunt snapped shut her mouth and, as quick as the blink of a heavily made-up eye, she turned her attention to the impromptu gathering of fans—Ariel and Caleb’s fans—and waved to the audience.
“You’ll hear more from these two at our island concert next month,” her aunt called. “See y’all then!”
She turned to Ariel and nodded toward the door. Caleb quick-stepped to open it.
“That’s a nice little crowd. Must have been a hundred people in that yard. How’d you do it?” Aunt Dahlia led the way inside, her voice strained.
“We posted it on social media right before we started, and they showed up.”
“Good! Now we have to show up at our band dinner, and we don’t have much time. I need to stop by the room first.” Aunt Dahlia turned down the hall to their suite, her posture perfect, her gait purposeful, as always.
Caleb puffed out a breath. “She doesn’t seem too upset about hearing you sing her part. When she came out, I didn’t know which way this would go.”
Ariel knew better. “Dahlia Denton is a performer and an actress. She knows how to make you believe you know what she’s thinking.”
“She’s not happy?”
Ariel waited until the sound of their suite’s door closing broke the silence.
“My aunt feels hurt,” Ariel finally said.