Luna Basswood's Arc

Chapter 14 of 14

The song ended. The red-haired singer unslung her baritone. She stepped back from her mark, and her hand moved toward the case at the edge of the stage. Luna knew that move. The singer was done. If she walked, Luna lost her low end for the last three songs. The set would collapse into a thin melody line and rain. Luna could not chase her. Her feet were pinned inside Susie's seal. Her hands were on the neck of her own fish-shaped bass. She had traded the rescue debt for a hole in the last song, and now the singer wanted out before Luna could pay her back. "Wait," Luna said into the mic, off-song, raw. The crowd heard it. The singer stopped. Susie stood at the edge of the seal, arms loose. "She rescued your borrowed bass," Susie said, flat. "You owe her. She knows it. That's why she's leaving. Debt makes people run." "How do I keep her?" "Pay her in front of them." Susie tipped her head at the crowd. "Give her the thing she came for." Luna understood. The singer had never wanted the opening slot for the slot. She wanted the crowd. She wanted a moment that was hers, not a low note under Luna's melody. Luna leaned to the mic. "This next one's hers," she said. "Not mine." The singer turned. Her wet red hair clung to her jaw. She looked at Luna, then at the crowd waiting below the stage. "Take the melody," Luna said, off-mic now, just to her. "I'll play under you. Your song. I owe you a song." The singer's face changed. The debt lifted off her shoulders. She reached back down, not for the case, but for the baritone. She hung it and lifted the vocal mic instead. She had a voice she'd been sitting on for the whole set, buried under harmony parts. Luna dropped her line low and simple. She gave the singer air. The singer opened her throat and sang lead for the first time, loud and rough and full, and the rain-soaked crowd leaned into the boards. Below stage right, the blonde bass player uncrossed her arms. She was watching a headliner hand the spotlight away and hold the field anyway. The song landed. The crowd roared, wet and real. The singer stayed on her mark. She was not leaving now. Two songs left, and she had a reason to play them. Susie caught Luna's eye across the seal. "Debt's paid," she said. "But you just gave her your set." Luna nodded. She'd kept her low end. She'd lost the last two songs as her own. The headliner slot was still hers on paper, and the crowd was cheering a voice that wasn't. Whether they'd remember Luna's name or the singer's when the field cleared, she did not yet know.