Hitting the Right Note (31 page)

“T
wenty minutes to showtime, people. Deacon wants everyone in the huddle in five.”

The backstage announcement sent JJ rushing to the bathroom, where she lost her tea and crackers to the porcelain bowl. The week between the Chicago show and Toronto had flown by, and the performance that had seemed so far away was now here. In twenty minutes she would be onstage in her home city. In forty she would be singing her song to an audience packed with people. But this time, she would be the lead.

She felt her stomach muscles clench again.

She almost wished Deacon hadn't given her prior warning this time. The waiting was worse than the shock of being called on last minute.

JJ sat on the closed toilet seat and shut her eyes tightly.

“Dear God, I don't know if I can do this,” JJ whispered. “Was this really what I asked for? I'm scared. Help me through this. Give me something.”

She sat there a moment longer, until her stomach began to relax and her pulse began to slow a fraction. She was practicing taking deep breaths when a knock came on the door to the stall.

“You'll be fine, JJ.”

Diana's voice was soft and reassuring on the other side of the door.

“That voice of yours is a gift. Whenever you open your mouth to sing, no matter what you're feeling and regardless of what Sabrina tells you, it always comes out amazing. And that's all you have to do tonight, open your mouth and sing.”

Open her mouth and sing. It wasn't so hard. JJ knew she could manage that.

She got up and opened the door to the bathroom stall. “Thanks, Diana,” she said, giving the made-up woman a look of appreciation.

Diana smiled and winked. “No problem. We Toronto girls have to look out for each other.”

JJ smiled and felt herself relax a little more.

“Come on,” Diana said, nodding toward the door. “Everyone's meeting for the huddle. And by the way, you got a call while you were out.”

JJ took her cell phone from Diana. It wasn't a call. It was a text message. JJ stopped walking when she realized who it was from. Simon.

JJ reread the text message at least ten times as she stood frozen in the washroom doorway. What did this mean? Was he saying that he was wrong to end things or was he saying that ending things had been the best thing for her? Was this an olive branch or another good-bye? Somehow, instead of making things clearer, his message had only made it more confusing. She wanted to text him back immediately, call him right away. But she was already beyond late for the huddle.

 

 

That was all she was able to manage in the walk from the washroom to the backstage hallway. Then she was being pulled into the circle and swallowed into the Deacon Hill pre-show ritual of affirmations and prayer.

Everything seemed to move in a whirlwind after that. Before she knew it, they were onstage performing the opening number. Then Deacon was on. And before she could blink, the first set was over and she was standing in the middle of the stage, after a hasty outfit change, with her guitar in her hand and the lights in her face. She was grateful for the lights. As much as they had her sweating in places she never knew she could, they also prevented her from seeing exactly how many people were out there watching her. She knew the crowd was huge. She had heard that the show was sold out weeks prior. And even though she couldn't see them, she could definitely hear them. They were already cheering. They had heard her performance at the Chicago event. They had seen the video on YouTube, which at her last check had 120,065 hits. They had heard the interviews she had done on Toronto radio and TV all week. They had seen the pictures of her and Deacon, which had somehow resurfaced during the most recent hype. They knew her—or thought they did. And that scared her, because that meant they had expectations.

And then there was the fact that she was in her hometown, playing for her hometown. For her friends, her family, her colleagues, her classmates from college, high school, even elementary school. The people from her church. Everyone who really knew her. It was enough to make her freeze up completely. She would have thrown up, but there was nothing else in her stomach.

Would she? It was time to find out. She took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and remembered the reason she had written the song in the first place. A sense of peace flowed over her.

“ ‘I'm yours, whenever you want me, however you need me, I'm yours, always and completely.' ”

Every sound seemed to stop as she sang the chorus of the song a cappella. It was a bold move. Nothing but her voice to start. No music to disguise any nervous tremors or any unexpected cracks in her vocals. No. If she was going to do this, it was going to be all or nothing. She was either going to soar like a fighter plane or go crashing down in a ball of flames.

The voice that left her body didn't even sound like her own. But it
felt
like hers. And when it was time, her fingers came in with the guitar accompaniment with the confidence of someone who had played before thousands for years, instead of only a few months. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she heard Deacon come in on the piano. He joined her for the harmony when she got to the chorus the second time, and stayed with her throughout. Deacon. He might be a mess personally, but professionally he was the consummate artist. She could depend on him to hold his own, add his flair without upstaging, and roll with her unrehearsed changes to the arrangement. She really enjoyed singing with him.

It would have been easy to get carried away with the music. To close her eyes and get lost in the song. But she had been onstage long enough to know that focus and discipline were almost more important than musical talent, and so she stayed present through the whole performance. At the end, when she called the audience into the performance with her, they came right in, singing the lines of the chorus with her. She looked over at Deacon, surprised, but he just nodded and they kept singing.

When the final chords faded into the audience's screams, JJ could barely believe it was all over. She felt like an inflated parachute that had come to rest gently on the ground. It was over.

It was over! She had done it. She laughed, couldn't stop laughing, even as Deacon pulled her into a hug.

“Great job,” he whispered before heading downstage. JJ waved at the crowd—her crowd—before following.

The rest of the show was like a blur. She didn't remember if she played, but she must have, because her fingers were tired after the second encore. She didn't remember if she spoke to anyone, but she remembered the flash of camera bulbs and the smiles of the reporters backstage. She didn't even remember putting her guitar away, but there it was, sitting in the case at her feet in her dressing room. There was movement around her, people changing, people still trying to talk to her, but she couldn't focus, couldn't breathe. She had to leave.

Getting up suddenly, she stumbled out of the dressing room, down the hallway and out the back doors. The cool air rushed up to greet her, and she sucked in huge gulps, filling her aching lungs. Then before she could settle her rapidly beating heart, the tears came. Huge gasping sobs racked her body as she crouched down in the parking lot, overwhelmed by emotions. She was here. Here where she never, ever imagined she could be. Six months ago, barely anyone knew her. Now her picture was in magazines. A year ago, she had never sung outside the walls of her church. Today, she was pouring her heart out at the Molson Canadian Amphitheatre, on the same stage where artists like Bryan Adams and Justin Timberlake had performed. She—Judith Jamie Isaacs—a twenty-six-year-old, middle-class black woman from Toronto with nothing for herself except a loving family and a dream. And a God who made all things possible. She couldn't believe any of this was happening. And the more she thought about it, the more the tears flowed. So she just sat down on the ground and let them. She couldn't stop them if she tried.

She wasn't sure how long she sat out there. But it was the shouting of her name that finally brought her back to reality.

“JJ! JJ, where are you?”

She stood up and looked around. It was Diana.

“I'm here!”

“Girl, you have to stop leaving your phone everywhere,” Diana said, walking across the parking lot toward her. “That thing has been ringing nonstop. Somebody is definitely trying to reach you.”

JJ glanced at the screen. Six missed calls in the last hour! She scrolled through. One was from an unrecognized number, two were from Sydney, one from Lissandra, and two from Simon!

She dialed him back first, but it went straight to voice mail. Same for Sydney and Lissandra. Her sisters were probably stuck in traffic somewhere, trying to get out of downtown Toronto after the concert. Someone had left her a voice mail, however. She dialed in to her mailbox.

JJ felt her heart still in her chest.

Sheree and Dominique.

She rushed back toward the building as she dialed through to the next message. It was from Sydney. Her sister's words sucked the breath out of JJ's body.

JJ didn't need that last prompt. She rushed through the door, almost slamming into Miles in the process.

“Whoa, watch out now . . .”

“Miles!” JJ grabbed the man by the front of his shirt, ignoring the surprised look on his face. “I need you to take me to Mount Sinai Hospital now. It's an emergency!”

S
he was gone.

JJ felt her stomach seize in panic as she burst into the hospital room and found it completely empty, the sheets stripped from the bed, the side table stripped of the magazines, flowers, makeup, and illegal snacks that had sat there for the past several weeks. It was all gone. Everything was gone. The room was completely sterile.

JJ began crying.

She held on to the door frame for support as the strength drained from her body. Where was Sheree? She couldn't be. . .

“JJ! What are you doing down here?”

JJ spun around at the sound of Janice's voice. She couldn't speak, couldn't put together a coherent sentence. Couldn't even manage one word.

“Everyone's down the hall,” Janice continued, barely pausing. “Sheree's stable, but she's still unconscious.”

Sheree was unconscious. That meant that she was alive!

Relief showered over JJ, and with renewed energy she hurried to catch up with Janice just before they turned the corner at the end of the hall.

They had moved Sheree to a new room. It was clearly smaller, given the difficulty her family was having fitting into the space. But from the machinery she saw connected to the walls and hanging overhead, it was better equipped to deal with serious medical issues.

“JJ! Oh God, thank God you got here!”

Sydney swallowed JJ into a hug the moment she stepped through the doors behind Janice, but JJ barely noticed her. Her eyes were glued to Sheree, who lay on the narrow bed under a mass of lines and wires. There was tubing running from Sheree's swollen face to a ventilator, more tubing where an IV connected to her arm, and attached to her chest were soft pads that connected to a monitor. And that was just the stuff that she recognized. There were other wires and machines beeping around her bedside that JJ had no clue about.

The echo of the beeps sounded loud in JJ's ears. Dean, Sydney, Lissandra, Zelia, and her mother were all crowded around Sheree's bed. But the solemn mood silenced all of them. Apart from her mother, who had her eyes closed as she held Sheree's hand and whispered silently, no one said anything.

JJ clung to her sister in weakness as the distress of the moment temporarily weighed her down. She had just spoken to her friend the day before, and now she was lying in a hospital bed looking like she was barely clinging to life. How had things changed so suddenly?

“What happened?”

“She went into hypovolemic shock due to blood loss,” a voice said from behind her.

JJ turned around to see that Simon had entered the room. Her heart stopped at the sight of him. She had missed him so much that seeing him now made it hard to breathe. But the look on his face alarmed her. His brows were knotted so tightly they almost touched, and that worried JJ more than the picture of an incapacitated Sheree. If Simon had told her Sheree was fine, she would have believed him. But the deeply concerned expression on his face chilled the blood in her veins.

“How did that happen?” JJ almost demanded. “I thought you all were monitoring her bleeding. That's why she's been here.”

“So far, her bleeding had been observable,” Simon explained, distancing her with his doctor-to-family tone. “But we discovered that she has also been bleeding internally, and it has been collecting in her uterus. The hemorrhaging is what resulted in her slipping into shock.”

JJ gasped.

“Fortunately, we were able to catch it almost immediately and we've started her on a transfusion,” he reassured them. “Despite what it looks like, she is improving.”

“So why is she still unconscious?” JJ pressed.

“It's her body's way of protecting her while she recovers,” Simon said patiently. “We were only able to get consent for the transfusion a couple hours ago, so she's only had that long to begin to recover.”

JJ ran a hand through her hair. “That's why you were calling me, to get consent.”

Simon nodded. “Yes.”

JJ closed her eyes. “I'm sorry. I was tied up at the show for the last four hours.”

“Don't worry, I signed off on it,” Dean said. “When they couldn't reach you, they called me.”

“And what about blood for her?” JJ asked. “Do you need me to donate?”

After the first incident at the hospital, they had made sure to find out who, if any, of them could be a blood donor match for Sheree in the event of an emergency. The doctors had told them that in some cases of complicated pregnancies, women lost a lot of blood during the delivery process and needed transfusions. That was when they had found out that JJ and Sheree shared the same blood type.

“Your sister actually did that earlier,” Simon said, nodding across the room.

JJ followed his gaze to where Lissandra sat on the other side, and JJ noticed for the first time the bandage on her sister's arm.

Lissandra shrugged. “We have the same blood type, remember? It was no big deal.”

JJ nodded. “Yes, of course.”

She looked around at the people in the room. It felt like her family had taken care of everything. She was glad Dean was there, fulfilling the supportive role he should have been in from the beginning, as the baby's father. It was clear from everything that had happened over the past few hours that her family had indeed put the past behind them and were treating Sheree like she was one of their own. At least JJ knew that whatever happened, there would be someone there for Sheree if she couldn't be. In fact, from the looks of things, she wasn't needed as much as she used to be.

“Okay, everyone, your ten minutes is up,” Simon said. “Sheree needs her rest if she's going to recover, and hospital policy says I have to kick you all out of the room.”

JJ looked around, surprised, as everyone stood up to leave.

“But I just got here,” she squeaked. She looked up at Simon hopefully, but he was writing on the chart.

“Sorry,” he mumbled without looking at her. “She's critical, and I've already bent the rules, allowing everyone in here at once.”

Lissandra and Zelia slipped through the door with their mother while Dean squeezed Sheree's hand and Sydney planted a kiss on the unresponsive woman's cheek. JJ stood at the foot of the bed, not wanting to go but not knowing what she would do if she stayed either. She reached out and squeezed Sheree's toe, one of the few parts of her body not connected to wires. Her toes were painted in Beach Bum Blu, the same nail polish JJ had brought to her weeks before. It seemed so long ago since she had laughed and smiled with her friend, talked about baby names, prayed with her for the safety of her child. And now here they both were, unable to communicate with each other.

“I'm sorry I wasn't here,” JJ whispered. “I wish—”

“Judith.”

Simon's firm voice from the door interrupted whatever else she had planned to say. She stepped back from the bed and gave Sheree one last look before leaving the room.

In the hallway she turned to look for Simon but only caught the back of his white coat as he headed down the corridor. She sighed. Guess that bridge was completely burnt and the ashes washed away.

She refocused her attention on her family, who were preparing to leave.

“Good show tonight.” Lissandra threw the comment behind her as she headed down the hall toward the elevators, her phone attached to her ear. “Next time hopefully we can catch the whole thing.”

“We had to leave early, obviously, because of everything,” Sydney explained. “But we caught the first part of your solo. You were great, hon. Congratulations.”

“Thanks,” JJ said as she accepted her sister's embrace.

“Yes,” Jackie echoed with a soft smile as she slipped on a light summer jacket. “You were good. I'm glad I finally got to see it.”

JJ smiled as her mother kissed her cheek.

“Thanks for coming, Mom. I really appreciate it,” JJ said. “Thanks, all of you.”

“Alright, we're going to head out,” Sydney said, looking around. “Dean, you still staying?”

JJ glanced over at her brother, who had settled into a chair in the waiting area near where they were all standing.

“Yup,” he said with a nod. “I'll let you know if anything changes.”

“Okay,” Sydney said with a nod. “Mom, I'll walk you down. Zelia went to bring the car around. JJ, we'll see you.”

JJ watched as her mother and sister headed in the same direction Lissandra had gone. An odd sensation began to fill her. She sat down in the chair next to Dean.

“Looks like you all have everything under control.”

Dean looked up from his cell phone. From the look on his face, she knew he was only using it to distract himself.

Dean let out a sigh. “Yeah. It's too bad something like this had to happen before we all stepped up the way we should have.”

JJ shrugged. “Everyone's been doing the best they can under the circumstances.”

“But we should have been doing more,” Dean said. “I should have been doing more. I should never have let Sheree go through all this on her own. And you, JJ, you should never have had to take all this on. You have your own life to live. You didn't need to be burdened with all this . . .”

JJ shook her head vigorously. “No, Dean. Don't think that. It's not a burden. It never was. Sheree has been like another sister to me.”

“But I am her husband, and I should have been here.” Dean frowned. “I'm going to be here. From now on. You don't have to carry this anymore, JJ. I've got this.”

JJ sat back, confused and not sure what to say. She felt like she had just lost something, but she couldn't quite put her finger on what it was. In fact, it felt like somehow, in the past couple hours, she had been . . . replaced? She had missed a moment to be there for Sheree. She was glad her family had been there to fill the gap. But now it felt like she wasn't really needed anymore.

Dean slung an arm around JJ's shoulders. “You had a great night tonight. You should be out celebrating.”

He kissed her cheek before easing her to her feet. “Don't worry about Sheree. She will be fine. You get out of here. Go have yourself a good time.”

JJ found herself walking down the hallway toward the exit, alone. She was leaving. But she had nowhere to go. Dean had told her to celebrate, have a good time. But how could she? When the woman who had become closer to her than she had ever imagined was lying in the hospital in critical condition? When the man who had snuck his way into her heart wouldn't even look at her? When her family seemed to have no need for her? How could she celebrate when all she felt was depressed and alone?