Falling Under (Falling 3)

They end abruptly, mid-chorus, his guitar striking a muted chord.

There’s a fraught moment of tense silence, and then the audience loses it, howling and screaming, shocked and awed.

They don’t silence the screams and applause, they merely wait, and then Kylie gives Oz a nod. Oz unplugs the Yamaha and sets it on the floor by his foot, and then swings the Fender around, plugs it in. Slides off the stool, adjusts the strap to a more comfortable position, turns it on, and then touches the strings. I haven’t heard him play electric, and I’m curious. The way he strokes the strings at the fret board before he starts playing, the way he seems to fall inward, makes me think he’ll be pretty good.

He hits a chord, a low, discordant thrum, and he nods, jerks a thumb up. The guy at the little mix board recognizes this signal, turns a knob, and the thrum become a roar. Kylie is sitting at the piano, just watching. Oz renews the chord, and it fills the room, and he’s nodding as if to a beat no one else can hear. Then we’re all struck, assaulted, battered by a sudden frenzy of notes, all played up high on the neck, near the bridge, and it’s a kind of sustained hailstorm, relentless and chaotic, but there’s a rhythm to it, or there’s a rhythm falling out of it, the way the notes slow and lower, becoming a melody. It’s as if he’s dragging a melody by main force out of the chaos, and then Kylie’s piano joins the frenetic mass of sound, which somehow becomes tune, becomes melody, becomes something unexpectedly lovely. She’s playing fast, all tapped high notes, mirroring his flying fingers. I don’t think any of us can believe what we’re hearing. Oz is a magician, an artist. He’s lost, subsumed within the music. Kylie? She’s lost, too, but as much in him as she is the music.

Then Kylie sings, and it’s…perfect. And I again cannot believe how talented my daughter is, the beauty in her lyrics and the purity of her voice.

“Flaws are the fabric of a soul,

And yours are deep,

Twisted thick into the damask of who you are

But I see past the flaws.

I’m not blind, I’m not blind, I’m not blind.

It may not be love,

It may be love,

It may be something else,

Maybe something in between love and not

I don’t know, and I wouldn’t be writing these words if I did,

I wouldn’t be lost and drifting and scribbling at three in the morning,

If I did.

So your flaws, the tangled web of secrets and sins and scars,

They’re you, you, you,

And I see you,

I see you

I see you.

You hide behind the hard and impenetrable flesh of your scars,

You hide behind the things that make you human,

And that’s all I want,

The human, the inside and the outside, and the good and the bad,

It’s all I want,

The everything,

The ugly and beautiful and the gray in between

All mixed up like a slush and a slurry of pieces.

I don’t miss the way you look at me,

The disbelief that I could see through the mask you wear,

The truth you wield like a disguise,

The weapons of your fists and the ink of your tattoos,

They’re you, you, you,

But not the whole, not the entirety, not the everything,

And don’t you know,

Don’t you see,

Can’t you understand that all I want

Is only the everything,

Only the everything,

Only the everything

That is you.”

While she sings, Oz is playing with the kind of desperation and fervor that tells me he feels the words, hears every single one, and he’s playing to sustain his disbelief. I’m watching him play and watching him deny. It’s an intimate moment between them, and I’m stunned by the bravery it takes to play something so revealing on stage, to sing so openly and, for Oz, to play along knowing the words are about him, for him, to him.

Kylie’s voice fades, and Oz’s guitar fades, and only Kylie’s piano remains, a repeating melody, something short and high, communicating wistfulness and longing.

The applause is deafening. There’s a huge crowd standing everywhere there is a space; people drawn from the hallways have come by to listen. When the noise doesn’t immediately die away, Kylie speaks into the mic, grinning. “Ya’ll wanna hear Oz play a solo?” There’s a chorus of agreement, and Kylie’s grin grows brighter. “Yeah, me too. Oz, what do you say? How about that piece you played for me the other night?”

This is a community college open mic night that has somehow become a concert.

Oz looks frozen, stunned, and uncomfortable. He stares at Kylie, who just gives him a nod and a smile. Oz lets out a nervous breath, and then sits on the stool, closes his eyes, strums the strings almost idly, thinking, falling under and into the zone.

If I was shocked before, I’m doubly so now. The guitar solo he plays needs no accompaniment. It sings for itself, plays its own backbeat. It goes on and on, and you just can’t breathe for the intensity of it, the way it spans the register of notes, high and low, wailing and shredding, low and slow, passionate and angry. He’s deep into it, the guitar on his thigh, held at a slight diagonal. His eyes are closed, his face a mask, not making any of the expressions you so often see in guitarists. He’s blank, except for a slight furrowing of his brow, and a tightness in his jaw. As if every emotion he has is being pushed and poured into the guitar.

Finally, he walks his fingers from the top of the fret board to the bottom, all the way down the neck, and when he reaches the highest note, he holds it, lets it hum and squeal and moan, sends it to wavering, echoing, becoming somehow mournful.

Slowly, he lets the note fade, and lets silence swell.

The silence becomes a single clap, then two, then thunderous applause. I’m with them, amazed.

They were the last act, and the MC, a young guy with thick glasses and a scraggly goatee, thanks everyone for showing up, and then that’s it. People who were only there for the open mic night leave in ones and twos, and the rest go back to studying and sipping coffee. I order lattes for Nell and me while we wait for Oz and Kylie to pack up.

They find us at our table, and I stand up to hug Kylie “I’m so proud of you, babe!” I say. “That was incredible.”

She blushes. “Thanks, Dad. I was so nervous I thought I’d puke.”

“You’d never have known.”

Nell joins the hug. “For real, sweetie, you’re amazing. That was one of the best performances I’ve ever seen. And I don’t mean that just because I’m your mother.”