Letting Go

She sat down in the gap with her back against the coffee machine, face to the glass doors. That way, she even had room for the guitar on her lap. She could hear the old man humming My Way from the gents’.

She wondered what she should play, tuning the strings. Most of the songs she knew were sad love ballads, not exactly the best choice for the occasion. Maybe bringing the guitar wasn’t such a good idea, and she should just burn out what battery her phone had left. That made her think of the music she had in it. She smiled. No Return’s songs were nothing like tender, and she knew enough of them to keep herself entertained for a good while.

Lucky her, she had many of the rare acoustic versions, so she wouldn’t need to improvise some lousy adaptation. She’d taken about a year of guitar lessons, but she’d had to drop them long ago, so she wasn’t that good at playing.

Her fingers slid over the metallic strings, looking for a chord. There it was, the beginning of Break Free.

She didn’t look up when the old man hummed his Sinatra song out of the gents’ and into the ladies’. She cleared her throat and kept her voice down to sing. Some songs later, she felt grateful to the Robinson brothers for the unexpected shelter their music was offering her.

By the next song, she heard the old man come out of the ladies’ and push his cart into the waiting room. Still humming. Remarkable.

Now she was really alone. She rested back her head and closed her eyes. She kept playing, singing under her breath, but she knew those songs so well, she hardly needed to pay any attention to the guitar or the lyrics.

Her mind didn’t miss the chance to wander off.

All of a sudden tears overflowed her closed eyes. They rolled down her cheeks and she just couldn’t fight them back. A shaky hand failed to suffocate her soft groan as she put the guitar aside. She lit a cigarette.

So far she hadn’t allowed herself to really break down and wind out, and now she couldn’t get a grip on herself. She needed to let it all out. And why not? She was all alone in the hall. Nobody would see her, or hear her, ask stupid questions, fake understanding.

It was the right place and time to release that burden.

She smoked, giving herself those minutes to cry and vent, but it seemed like there was no end to tears, to heartache, to deception. Finally she curled up in the corner of the wall and the coffee machine, holding her knees to her chest to hide her face against her arms.

If only she could stop crying like somebody had just died.