Me and Renee Leigh Delilah first met in a quaint café in New York, and when I say quaint I mean quaint, but that somehow added to the experience of the late nights in there, let me elaborate.
Small as it was the café never felt crowded due to the fact that you would seldom see more than a few groups of people there on a night. I suppose nobody really recognized the place as anything but a dusty run-down old café, but it was much more than that.
There were tiny pine wood tables and chairs scattered around the room and a few bookcases adorning the almost bare walls on various places, the cases were usually stacked with tattered, old leather bound books, these books were now commonly used as decoration rather than there original source of entertainment because upon reading these books, most seemed to be very dull and unmemorable.
Anyway, on the center of the back wall there was a small wooden platform, although it didn't look too much like one, it was more commonly known as a stage. Every so often there was an open mic night (No, not karaoke, open mic). At which time a few customers would get up and perform mostly the performances included; singing, instrumental or reciting poems, all, which were very entertaining. I made sure I turned up to as many of these nights as I could, they sometimes lasted until the early hours in the morning, even the least amount of people could create fascinating performances that, sometimes repeated, lasted throughout the night. I, as always, had my guitar slung over my shoulder, I found myself to be fairly talented at playing but I very rarely came up to perform.
On the night in question, it was around 11 o'clock (But I guess, the clock in the café had a thing for stopping and starting). Renee Leigh was sat in the back of the café patiently, unnoticeable at first until she got to her feet.
The stage was empty for a few moments when she had the chance, striding across the room rather nervously, not wanting to walk too fast or too slow in fear of embarrassment. She stood to the microphone and the low buzz of chatter that plagued the room throughout the night suddenly died down as everyone began to stare in awe at the beauty before them.
Regardless of the nerves that glistened in her eyes there was no doubting that Renee was beautiful. Her porcelain face was framed perfectly by the slightly wavy, vibrant, yet naturally red locks of hair that fell just above her waist. Her hands shaking a little, she brushed a lock of hair from her angelic, shockingly large, slivery-blue pools (she liked to call eyes) that were darting across the audience, gawping hungrily at her.
The girl's looked upon her with admiration then jealously, the boy's looked upon her with shock and then lust, I don't think she was particularly impressed with the expressions the audience bore as her face still held shyness, her gaze fell on me and I chose to smile sweetly at her, I watched her giggle quietly back, nobody else really noticed. I like to think I made her a little less uneasy.
Everyone knew there was something special about this beautiful girl even before she started singing, and this was not because of her looks. Just a strange presence everyone felt upon first noticing Renee. Never the less she began to sing, as I remember,
'You do something too me' by Paul Weller
Of course not a song heard too much recently but all in all, still a delicate song.
The way she sung, it is terribly hard to describe but I might as well try.
A voice of an angel might typically be used; this was so much more. She sung a capella as there were no instruments with her. It was only her and a microphone and in honesty, she could've lived her career live with only a microphone and still amaze people as she did that night.
Her voice cracked nervously with the first note (And an easy first note at that). Everyone seemed to glance away feeling a slight embarrassment that maybe this beautiful girl couldn't live up to 'high-standard' looks that predicted talent (or that's what everyone thought), but of course they did. Her voice was unique, she could go as low as a disgruntled adult singer and as high as a whistle and still sound equally beautiful. She always protested it was natural without trying to sound too 'up herself' but nobody ever believed she could sing like that without the aid of professional training.
I felt although I could play along with her, my fingers itched to strum the song I'd played many times before, and with her voice, we might stop a battle in war. I tried to remain as natural as possible, everyone gawped in awe and she tried not to noticed, her eyes fixed on the ugly wall; I noticed now and again her crystalline eyes dart towards me and back, so quick, nobody could notice unless they expected her to look at them.