Romany arrived about fifteen minutes later, looking young and beautiful and surrounded by a gang of other young and beautiful girls. She had almost reached the age that Maggie had been when she met first Angie. Maggie had felt so grown up back then, but Romany still looked like a child to her. She must feel grown up though, just as Maggie had done, and of course, she had had far more to deal with so far than Maggie had experienced in the whole of her life.
Following behind them was Tiger, but Maggie’s stomach stayed where it belonged at the sight of him. It had passed. It was gone. And she didn’t miss it. It was time to fully appreciate what she had rather than hankering after make-believe. Spending time with Romany had taught her that.
Tiger raised an arm and came over and Romany and her friends dragged a spare table across so that they could all sit together.
‘Hi, Auntie Maggie,’ Romany said, leaning over and giving her a peck on her cheek. ‘Hi, Leon. All set?’
Leon nodded. ‘All set,’ he replied, his voice flat and not revealing his jitters.
One of the girls broke away from the group and came to whisper something in his ear. He turned to look at her and for the first time that evening, smiled. This must be Laura, Maggie thought. Sweet. And whatever she’d said, it did seem to have made a difference, as he suddenly looked a little less tense. Then he lifted his untouched pint and drank the first half in one go.
On before Leon was a comic poet with a diatribe about Brexit and a folk singer whose tuning was a little bit off to Maggie’s ear, although she was no expert. Then there was another poet and then it was Leon. Maggie gave him a supportive smile as he stood and made his way to the stage. Her insides were knotted so tightly that it was hard to get a lungful of air. She raised her eyebrows at the collected group as if to say, now just watch this, but under the table she was crossing her fingers. None of the girls knew how big a moment this was for Leon. Even Tiger might not really get it. But she did.
Leon arranged his instrument on its sling around his neck and pulled the mouthpiece in and out of his mouth a few times, moistening the reed. He was standing in a pool of light cast by one of the spotlights and his saxophone glinted as he lifted it, ready to begin. Maggie’s mind skipped to the first time she had heard him play, in a corridor in their halls of residence. That had been the week she had first met Tiger, too. And Angie had been there. It felt like another lifetime.
As Leon played, the room stilled as the audience became completely caught in the spell of his music. Maggie let the tears trickle down her cheeks. She cried for her youth that was lost, for the dreams that had never quite come to fruition, for Leon’s wasted talent, for missed opportunities with Tiger. But most of all she cried for Angie, her least likely and yet her closest friend. How she would have loved to have been here, egging Leon on just as she had always done. Of all of them, Angie had always been the one who had most believed in his talents, in him. In fact, Maggie couldn’t think of anyone else who had tried to encourage Leon as much as Angie had, not even herself. God, she missed her so much that it was like a stabbing pain in her very core.
The performance was over before she realised, the crowd clapping and then on their feet, arms raised above heads. Sharp wolf whistles sounded around the enclosed space and there were cries of ‘Encore’。 Maggie hastily wiped the tears away from her eyes and then looked over at the stage. Leon was standing there in his pool of light and looking at his feet but then, as it became obvious that the applause wasn’t stopping, he slowly lifted his head to look at his audience. And then he beamed, a wide, open-mouthed smile that lit up his entire face. He mouthed ‘Thanks’ and raised his saxophone in the air in a salute.
The crowd kept going, stamping their feet against the floorboards in a rhythmic tattoo and calling for more. Leon seemed uncertain what to do. Then a man standing behind the bar called out over the racket.
‘Order, order! Let’s have a bit of hush, shall we? Now, we don’t normally allow encores, but shall we make an exception, just this once?’
The crowd roared and Leon looked over at Maggie questioningly.
Then Tiger stood up and shouted out over the cheers. ‘Go on, Leon, mate. Show ’em what you can do!’
And so Leon played again. This time it was more upbeat and less soulful than the first piece, and it captured the mood of the audience perfectly. They listened, rapt, and then applauded vigorously once more, but this time Leon unhooked himself from the amplifier and pushed his way back to their table through the standing crowd. People were patting him on the shoulder and congratulating him as he passed them.