There is always a crowd. I peer into it and at the others, seeing where their eyes fall and watching the smiles light up their awkward faces. I stay stony before I fix my face, then drop it once more after remembering no one would be watching me anyways. When I was little I recall looking into that audience and seeing my family, smiling and proud. The tight rapid rabbit feeling in my chest would fade, the knot in my stomach would loosen, and I could breathe. My smile would match. I felt safe knowing they were out there, proud and watching my performance. Whether it was band, choir, a school play, or a silly graduation, they were always there.
Then I grew up.
I don’t know the point at which we become a second thought or obligations become optional, but I was blindsided. Suddenly their faces weren’t in the crowds and I was embarrassed by how lonely I was. Everyone else's families showed up, cared. Why not mine?
In fifth grade I had a band performance that I was very excited for. It was for Christmas down at the bookstore and I was playing two instruments! I had the bells with everyone and the xylophone. I was so excited to show how much I had learned and how well I could play. When I told my parents they weren’t as thrilled. They seemed exasperated - not that I knew how complex that could be. No, at the time hearing their sighs of annoyance and reluctant actions only made me want to shut up. I would scold myself for speaking and constantly bothering them. I wore my moms green dress and sparkly shoes, and never before had I felt so pretty. I was excited again.
I played and my parents watched.
Then the big performance rolled around, the one afterschool. I told my parents about it multiple times leading up, about how happy I was to have a part in it and how I couldn’t wait to show my friends that I could play music. I planned out what to wear, told my teacher I’d show up, and even laid my outfit out.
The day of, a few hours before we should’ve left, I went up to my dad to ask when we were going to go. He only sighed and said they were too tired to take me, and didn’t want to. I’m a big girl so I nodded, smiled, said ‘okay’, and went back to my room. It wasn’t okay. I lied to my teacher, to my friends, to myself. How could I not show up? We were supposed to tell him beforehand if we could make it or not, and I said I could. I felt like the worst person alive and wished I would disappear so I wouldn’t have to face my teacher that Monday.
Six-o-clock hit and I put my outfit away, curled up in bed, and tried to calm down. My mind was racing with my heart and nothing could distract me. I watched the hour bleed away. The songs I knew in my heart played out in my head when they should’ve been on my hands. I was emotional back then and probably cried, threw my toys around, and maybe even became sick with guilt.
I’d never felt so bad in my life.
I didn’t bring up any more performances.
Now it’s a new school and a new play, one that they actually showed up to. My nana came as well, but it may have helped that my cousin was there too. Everyone liked him more than me. It didn’t matter though because they were there and I saw them smiling at me in the crowd just like everyone else.
Then I joined the band in sixth grade to play the clarinet, and I got good at it. The performance rolls around and I’m scared to keep asking, keep checking. My dad dropped me off for rehearsal at the scary highschool and I wasn’t sure he’d come back. Then I go out and I see my parents, brothers, and even my grandparents in the crowd while I play. I was excited again, my heart light and my breathing easy. Look at me! I am playing music and I am good!
Band is left behind when we move again and COVID hits, music becoming a lingering thought that my hands can no longer satiate. Until I joined the choir. I was proud again and I could sing. My cage was open, the curtains letting light in and the birdsong melding with mine.
That same performance rolls around and I have a big role! I sing in a trio with my own part sometimes and I don’t mess it up. My whole family watches and they’re recording; my mom even brought me flowers and my little brothers say they didn’t know I could do that. The window opened and the breeze cooled down my heart, the burn fading into simple warmth.
We move again and I join choir, still good. My teacher tells me about the county choir and I nervously ask my parents, to which they tease me, but I’m dropped off for auditions. I’d practiced hard and fluttered about my cage, yet I never made a peep. I get in and have rehearsals to go to, suddenly feeling more teenager than child. I felt important, like I had purpose.
I was so proud of myself and how I could control my voice, going high and low like I was taught and even singing in different languages. Maybe if I had auditioned for an individual part they would have cared.
The stage is big and the crowd is bigger, and I scanned the room for my family. My dad told me that my mom probably wouldn’t come and my brothers didn’t care, but some selfish part of me hoped that I’d be surprised - maybe they would care. At the very back of the room I spot my dad, my consistency but still my disappointment. My eyes burned with my heart and the cage shut, rust creeping up its intricate metal. The sun had started setting long ago, I realize.
He records it and says I did good, to which I thank him and we go home. That was that, no other comment.
When I have a school performance I’m genuinely shocked to see my parents in the crowd, accepting the guilt that rolls in afterward. They’re my parents of course they would show up! Did I even want them to?
I sing, they clap, we leave.
I don’t join choir next year.
One day my mom finds a recording of a young me singing for something and asks why I don’t sing anymore. I only shrug and mumble some simple teenager answer before slipping away to my room to sing to my favorites. They don’t need to know.
I desperately wish the curtains would open and the breeze would come back and the sun would rise and my cage would be opened, the rust wiped away.
I miss my voice with others, learning so much and being proud of how I sound when I’m a mere whisper everywhere else. Singing is when I wouldn’t mumble and could be clear, lift my head and square my shoulders.
Now the room is dark and my perch is rotten.
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