March 23rd 2021

Chapter 82
Our Farewell to Silence

Maya was not in the habit of 'flexing' in any way, where her connections to the music world were concerned, but she wouldn't know what else to call what she did for her seniors, as prom was coming around the corner. Truth be told, she hadn't even been sure it would work. For all she knew, she'd reach out and find her hand slapped away. She wasn't about to go and assume that those awards in the attic case were going to be a free pass for her to get whatever she wanted, and she definitely never wanted to see herself believing that. When it all worked out, she was relieved, and kind of thrilled.

There had been one small moment where she had considered making a single exception on her TXNY hiatus rule, taking the stage with the rest of the band, and giving a show for her students and the rest of their class. She hadn't held to that idea very long. It wasn't even about breaking her rule either, it just felt like the wrong way to follow. Yes, her students would have gotten a kick out of it, as would any other TXNY fan within the graduating class. But she'd always done her best to keep her two careers with some form of boundary in between them. She could bend it one way or the other from time to time, for something small, but this would absolutely have felt like ripping the barrier open, and it would have been too much.

So, TXNY wouldn't play the prom. That was more than alright. It still felt like music was the way to go, for this treat, and if it wasn't going to be her and the girls up there, then why couldn't it be someone else? She knew the artists they would flip out to see up there, and if she could get just one of them to show up that night for a surprise appearance… She took great care to consider her options before putting out any sort of feelers to their people. She didn't want to have to negotiate, didn't want to reach out to anyone who would see a senior prom in Austin as being beneath them. She wanted someone who would see the fun in this, who would embrace the opportunity.

After she narrowed down her list to three, she got to work in contacting them. She wasn't sure what to expect, but she wasn't surprised either when she got one whose manager outright said no. The second was unable to make that night due to prior engagements. The third looked good for a couple of days, but then it fell through in the end.

"Back to the old list?" Lucas sympathetically asked when Maya told him all this, looking just a bit discouraged. At the prospect of going for her backups, she groaned.

"I'll figure something out…"

She wasn't finding anything though. Days were going by, and the prom was almost here, and she had nothing. And then she got a call. She'd just put Marianne down in her crib after singing her out of a shrill crying fit one afternoon, and then her phone rang. When she picked it up, she was met with someone speaking to her in a heavy French accent.

"May I speak with Maya Hart, please?" Already, the use of her birth-now-stage name suggested this had to do with music, though for now the only thing her brain actually grasped at was the accent, and how it compelled her to respond in French.

"It's me. Who am I speaking to?" Her caller sounded immediately glad to be able to return to his native language.

"My name is François Lejeune, I go by…"

"The Young Frank," Maya blinked when she realized who it was. This had been the one whose manager had said no, the first call she'd made.

He was all of seventeen himself, a new sensation going by a stage name which was in itself a play on his real name. He sang in French, in English, sometimes a bit of both, and the world was really getting to know him. The French teacher, Mademoiselle Rousseau, had been the one to start the fanbase in their school here, using some of his songs in her classes and getting her students hooked enough to share it with their non-French studying classmates. Maya had heard all about this through Morgan – who had taken this in stride with her music classes – who had been amused to share stories of how many of the girls and some of the guys as well would get that goofy smile on them that came with those 'he's just so dreamy' types of artists. The Young Frank absolutely fit the bill, and his good-humored nature more than proved his worthiness.

"Yes, that's me," the boy replied. "I am sorry, I found out this morning that you were trying to reach me before. My manager told me about your call. If you still need me, I would like to come and be part of this prom."

"You would?" Maya had to squeeze her free hand to contain the urge to celebrate too vocally.

"Yes, of course," he replied, and she could almost see that shy smile on him. On stage, he would just go off, be in the moment, but then you'd see him in interviews and… he was still just a kid. It was the kind of quality Maya really responded to, and now to have him circumvent his manager like this… She had definitely made the right call.

When the day of the prom came around, the Friar house was the site of frenzy and anticipation. Maya and Lucas would be on hand as chaperones, as before, which meant pulling out the formal wear, and wasn't that always some of the best times? More than anything, this time around, Maya was just a bit on edge, knowing that there was still so much time for everything to fall apart. As far as she knew The Young Frank was covertly on his way, flying in without the word getting out, hopefully. He would be there tonight, she'd gotten his word, but what if something went wrong and he couldn't make it? Or he changed his mind? She didn't think he would, but then he was still young enough that someone could make the decision for him in the end, as they'd done when Maya had first reached out.

"Hi, Mrs. Friar!" she was accosted, hours later, mid-prom, by Ariel Su, who came toward her in a violet dress, on the arm of her date, Neil of the Think Tank. The two of them had been weaving a sort of on-again-off-again thing for over a year, but evidently today they were on.

"Hi, guys," Maya smiled to them both. "I was starting to think you weren't going to show…"

"We were at his school's prom," Ariel explained. "It was tonight, too, but they started earlier, so we spent some time there, and now we're here."

"I'm starting to think you two aren't the only ones," Maya nodded, realizing there were suddenly several more couples headed onto the dance floor.

"We weren't," Neil confirmed. "There were a few limos packed with us." Hearing this, Maya turned to Ariel. She had a feeling she'd been involved in planning that, and one smile confirmed it.

"Nicely done. Well, you came just in time."

"In time for what?" both Ariel and Neil asked. Maya only smiled. You'll see.

Her worries had been soothed away even as she and Lucas had arrived at the school a while ago. The Young Frank had landed in Texas, settled into his hotel, and was inbound for the school.

"Oh, I have to go," she tapped Lucas' arm, as they stood with Morgan and her fiancé Paul, the four of them talking and looking on to the dancing kids. She'd just received a text.

"Go, go," Lucas nodded and watched her disappear out of the gym.

"Where's she going?" Morgan frowned, confused.

"No idea," Lucas casually shook his head. Morgan didn't know about the surprise either. No one in the school knew except Maya, Lucas, and the vice-principal.

Maya hurried on her way to where she was supposed to let in the visiting singer and his people. When she found him, they shook hands, and she started leading his group along. The boy was very motivated to keep the surprise going, so it had been his idea to go right through to the stage as soon as he arrived. He would be ready, she had his word, and to look at him, easily recognizing that pre-stage feeling, his word was kept.

They came up into the gym from the door that opened behind the erected stage, and as the backing band came into place, Maya gave her cue to the DJ for him to shift into intro mode. She had told him she'd need him to do this earlier, and he had no idea what for. He was about to find out, as Maya addressed the gathered students, dates, chaperones, everyone in the gym, and introduced them to none other than The Young Frank.

There was the briefest of moments where the gym almost held its breath collectively, siding on the side of disbelief. But then out came the boy himself, and the effect was not unlike going from zero to a hundred in a snap. It could not have gone any better.

"Has she always been this sneaky?" a slack-jawed Morgan asked Lucas.

"Safe answer would be yes, definitely since I met her," Lucas had that proud husband smile going, and the very in love husband smile tacked on when he spotted his wife making her way back to them, giddy as ever. They'd just gone and turned the gym into one big stadium. The Young Frank lit up the stage.

"Look at them!" Maya had to shout to be heard as she put her arms around Lucas' waist, and he closed his arms around her. She was so happy to have pulled this off, and the energy was irresistible.

The show took them well into the end beats of the senior prom. Their guest had not flown all the way from France to do two songs and walk away, no. He'd come, understanding what this night was about for these kids who were more or less his age, just as he understood the power that he had in him to make it a memorable time. So that was what he did. When he finished his set, a lot of the students wanted to have their picture taken with him, and he was happy to oblige. Maya wasn't sure if he'd just disappear again like he'd never been there, and in fact he didn't. He joined the dancing as the DJ took over again, and he stayed until all the students had gone away.

"Thank you for inviting me. This was the best night I've had in a long time," he told Maya when he came to find her, in the midst of cleaning up.

"Thank you so much for coming. It meant so much to them, and to me," she smiled and nodded. She was introduced to his manager, who was in fact his mother. The woman was really not what she'd imagined, after that first refusal, and now that the show had happened, and that they were meeting in person, there was really a new kind of understanding between them, mother to mother.

"I'm going to be back in the country this summer, to do a small tour. If we can, I would love to work with you sometime," François told Maya, and she received this statement with great interest.

"Let's keep in touch."

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners