Her next song is even better. Loud and angry. She pulls sounds from those strings that I didn’t think were possible, like she’s playing two guitars or three. I can’t keep track of her fingers to figure out how she does it. But even if I could—I mean, it’s not like I know enough about playing to pick it up from watching someone else.

I want to hear it all, every word, every note, but I get stuck in my head. I can’t stop thinking about how I have to get on that stage and my songs don’t have similes or metaphors or fancy fingerpicking. I can’t stop picturing myself forgetting how to hold my guitar, opening my mouth to squawk like a ragged old crow.

All of a sudden, everyone’s clapping. Some people are even standing to applaud for Marion Strong. I clap hard and my palms sting. Marion bows her head slightly and smiles, her moon face ruddy and shining and gorgeous.

The scarecrow guy gets up on stage. I tap Jim’s shoulder. “Watch my guitar?”

He nods.

I weave through the seats and tables, trying not to look at the people. I don’t want to think about all those eyes watching me, or worse, not watching me. All those eyes looking at their neighbor, widening to say, Who does this chick think she is?

In the bathroom mirror, I stare at my own eyes. I look at them until they sting because I don’t let myself blink and it smells like someone smoked a clove in here not too long ago. When I finally do blink, my eyelashes get wet. I rip a piece of paper towel from the roll on the sink, fold the corner and brush it under my lower lashes to dry them before my mascara runs. I sort through my bag, find my eyeliner and focus everything on lining my eyes with a thin black line. I pretend I’m an ant, following the curve of my lashes, the way we learned to do line drawings in art class. Slow. Millimeters at a time, until I don’t hear the crowd and I don’t hear the music. I just hear my breath. In and out. So warm it fogs the mirror. I smudge the lines with a twisted piece of paper towel. By the time I’m done my body is loose and warm, my head floating on my neck.

I go out and take my seat, trying hard to cling to the calm. My index finger has a smudge of eyeliner on the nail. I fixate on the smudge until the next singer is done, and the next one too, and Scarecrow Man is on stage again.

“Now we have two untitled originals from April.”

My heart squeezes tight like a fist. I flip my guitar case on its back and undo the latches.