March rolled in windy and cold. Even though the temperatures were inching above freezing, the gusty winds off Lake Michigan under perpetually cloudy skies seemed to cut to the bone whenever Grace ventured outside—which she had to do at least once a day to get to the fitness center or voice therapist appointments.
But that first week of March wasn’t all bad. Sam came Monday, Wednesday, and Friday to start work on all the details for the upcoming Greenville concert. And Jeff Newman called twice that week, just checking in.
“So I can talk to you in person now?” he joked on Friday, his call interrupting the vocal exercises she was doing at the piano while Sam “supervised” from the dining nook as she worked on hotel arrangements. “Seriously, Grace, your voice is sounding a lot better. I’m so grateful. We’ve been praying for you here at Bongo.”
“Oh. Well, thanks.” People said that all the time—she often said it—but that didn’t mean they always did it.
But almost as if he read into her tone of voice, he said, “I mean it. We start each day in the office with a fifteen-minute prayer time, especially to pray for our clients. Your name has been at the top of the list.”
“Okay.” Grace squirmed on the piano bench. How much had Newman told them? “Um, well, Dr. Erskine says if things keep improving at this rate, I should be ready to sing by mid-month. Hope she moves that up, though, because I need to practice with the band before then. Practice, period. Feeling pretty rusty.”
“You’ll be fine. Just work back in easy. Say … I’m working on a couple of new opportunities for you, but nothing’s definite yet. No rush. We can talk about them later. You just concentrate on the two college concerts for now. Just wanted you to know I haven’t been slacking.” He chuckled on the other end of the phone.
Grace definitely hadn’t been worried about her agent “slacking.” She was tempted to tell him not to work on anything new. The more gigs he lined up for her, the deeper the rut she’d be in and harder to get out of—not that she wanted to, exactly, but might be something to consider if she and Roger ever …
She dropped her head into her hands after the call ended, elbows making a discordant noise on the keyboard. O God, I don’t know what I want! I need some help here! Seemed like all her prayers were “foxhole prayers” these days. But she did need help—help knowing what God wanted her to do with her life, help figuring out what songs she should sing at the upcoming concerts, even help corralling her panic over how she was going to get there—
“You okay?”
Grace looked up. Her assistant was standing in the arched doorway of the dining nook, notebook in hand. “Yeah, fine. Sorry. What’s up?”
“I found a hotel near the college campus. Just need to know if you want it for one night or two. The flight from Chicago to St. Louis is only an hour, but someone at the college would need to pick us up and Greenville is another hour or so by car. You could fly in Friday morning and probably still have time to practice with the band before the concert that night …”
Grace’s stomach knotted. She stared at the white and black piano keys, which started to blur. There it was. The Big Question. Was she willing to go through airport security again?
Sam didn’t wait for her response. “You know what? Don’t worry about it. We can drive and go down on Thursday. The band will be driving Barry’s van and pulling a trailer, it’s only a few hours—four or five at the most. I’ll rent a car and we can drive back on Saturday. If I drive down, you’ll be rested and have plenty of time on Friday to get set up in the auditorium and practice with the band.”
Grace looked up at her gratefully. “Sounds good. Yes, let’s do that.”
“But … the next concert is Cincinnati, a bit further. Might make sense to fly. Should I—?”
Grace quickly shook her head. “Wait on that, okay? Go ahead and book a hotel near the university for two nights. That’ll give us room to decide how we travel there. The band’s driving to Cincinnati, right? Must be doable.”
Sam looked dubious, but shrugged. “Okay.” She headed back toward the dining table where she’d been working on the laptop, then turned back. “Uh, just one more thing.”
It was all Grace could do not to roll her eyes. “What?”
Sam didn’t flinch. “Look, don’t shoot the messenger. But there’s a new e-mail from Barry. Says he needs your song list ASAP since it’s only two weeks till Greenville. He also wants to know if you plan to practice with them here in Chicago or wait to put it together at the college.”
Grace sighed. “I know. I’m sorry, Sam. I shouldn’t have snapped at you. Just feeling all this tension. I—I feel stuck.”
Sam moved quickly over to the piano, sat down on the bench beside her, and gave Grace a hug. “Hey, that’s what you have an assistant for! Look, soon as I make these hotel reservations and line up a rental car, let’s come up with a set list. You’ve got some great songs. Honestly, I don’t think it’s going to be that hard.”
Sitting on the living room floor an hour later, the two women sifted through Grace’s song file and began making piles by category: original songs Grace had written herself … songs written by other artists that Bongo had gotten permission for her to use … new arrangements she’d done of classic hymns. “Why don’t you pick a few from each category,” Sam said, “some of your favorites. After all, this is just ‘Grace Meredith in Concert.’ You can sing whatever you want—”
“Wait.” Grace’s eyes widened. “Greenville is my alma mater. I should take advantage of that, maybe do a retro thing—sing some of the songs that were popular when I was a music major there. I wrote a number of songs then too.”
Sam laughed aloud. “Grace! That’s a great idea! You could lighten it up by telling stories from your college days …”
The two women brainstormed and sorted, and finally had a set list. Grace was pretty sure the band already had scores for most of these—except the songs she’d written while still a student—but Sam said she’d drop them off that weekend.
As Sam left the house, she poked her head back inside the front door. “Hey! My sister and cousin are coming in for the weekend. You want to come have a sleepover with us tomorrow night? Do you good to just have some fun.”
A sleepover? She hadn’t done anything like that since crazy high school days. She didn’t really know Sam’s sister and cousin—just a brief introduction after the concert in Memphis. Would feel kinda weird. “Uhhh, thanks for the invite, but think I’ll decline. Need my beauty sleep, you know.”
It was supposed to be a joke, but Sam didn’t smile. “What you need, Grace Meredith, is some girlfriends.”
Grace felt mildly annoyed. What did Sam know about her friends? But she couldn’t let it bother her. She really did have stuff to do this weekend and she couldn’t afford to stay up till all hours and risk getting sick again.
Grace spent Saturday morning rehearsing several of the songs they’d selected, accompanying herself on the piano, but keeping her voice level to about a third of her normal concert strength. “Don’t want to wear out the instrument too fast too soon,” she told Oreo, who’d taken up residence on the piano bench beside her, his rumbling purrs adding a steady rhythm section. But it felt good to sing some of the old songs again …
“I could sing of your love forever …”
She couldn’t help smiling as the words to Martin Smith’s hit came flooding back into her memory and through her fingers on the keys. Still, she was surprised how limited her range was. She should’ve been more faithful to do the at-home vocal exercises Dr. Erskine had given her. But … there was still time.
And there was the first song she’d composed at Greenville. “You said follow me (and yes I will but …) First I need to see what life can offer … before I bend my knee (one day I will, but …) …” Never recorded—for obvious reasons. Kind of corny, but it had reflected a real spiritual struggle she and many other students identified with back in the day. Might speak to some of today’s students too.
Grace finally closed the lid on the piano, bundled up, and went for a walk in the welcome afternoon sunshine. The sun had traveled in a clear sky all day Saturday, sending temperatures into the forties again. Most of the snow was finally gone, the lawn chairs and saw-horses had disappeared, and flocks of chickadees could be heard twittering in the trees up and down the block.
Several of the neighbors were out tinkering with cars or sweeping salt off their sidewalks. She nodded hello as she passed, noting that the two-flat across the street was still empty. There was another two-flat on the block, this one two houses down on her side of the street. The family on the first floor was Hispanic, with two or three cute kids Grace saw from time to time. She’d seen several other adults of various ages too. Maybe they were related. All the other houses on the block were single-story brick bungalows similar to hers, probably with functional basements. A few had one or two garret rooms in the attic with curtains in the gable windows.
She glanced back over her shoulder. All, except for that oversized McMansion at the dead end, backing up against the cemetery. What was his story?
As Grace reached the end of the block and turned the corner, planning to walk around to the main gate of the cemetery, she saw the Jewish family who lived on the corner walking toward her. Of course … Saturday. Probably had been to synagogue. The man sported a serious beard and wore a large black hat with a flat brim and a black suit coat, the fringes of a white prayer shawl hanging beneath it. The mother wore a long black skirt beneath her winter coat, hair gathered into some kind of covering, pushing a stroller with a sleeping toddler. Two other children—a boy wearing a yarmulke and a girl in a winter coat and dress—trotted alongside, chattering away happily, noses red from the still nippy air.
Grace nodded, smiled, and said hello, and the woman smiled back. Her husband grunted absently as they passed. Must be Orthodox. Seemed to be a lot of Orthodox Jews living in the area. Somewhere she’d heard they had to live within walking distance of a synagogue. She wondered where it was.
Reaching St. Mark’s Cemetery, she stretched her legs, walking as fast as her snow boots allowed. She could tell the exercise at Curves had been helpful. She avoided a graveside service—a small huddle of people under a protective tent—choosing another wide path … but realized she wasn’t being entirely successful stuffing down feelings that she should be in Houston that weekend, filling another large venue.
At least things were coming together for the concert at her alma mater. That helped. She and Sam were going to drive—that was a relief. And she had a song list. Once the band had had time to work on the music, they could schedule several sessions and decide on the final sets, which would be important, since most of the songs were different from the New Year, New You tour—
Things were coming together …
An answer to prayer?
A pair of cardinals flitted from one bare tree to another, chirping happily in the welcome sunshine. Grace stopped and turned her face upward, feeling the warmth of the sun on her skin. “Thank you,” she whispered.
Maybe God hadn’t turned a deaf ear to her after all.