4th & Girl

Surely, I’m just seeing shit, right?

I looked around the room and then back at the stage.

“Get up here, honey!” Asia exclaimed, and my eyes went wide. “That’s right, sista,” she added with an amused smile. “We’re talking about you.”

Wait…whaaaaat?

“Seriously?” I mouthed with a hand to my chest, and she nodded.

“Get your cute ass up here and sing the hook!”

Well, fuck.

With the crowd now hooting and hollering for me to join Leo onstage and two queens taunting me to get off my ass, I did the only thing I could do in that situation.

I downed what was left of my martini and said fuck it. When queens demanded you get onstage and sing, you fucking got onstage and you sang.

So, that was exactly what I did.

I swallowed my nerves and walked through the crowd and toward the front of the room.

Leo grinned up at me as I took a mic from a stagehand and stepped onstage.

“Okay, honey, just to make sure we’re on the same page, we’re going to have to hear a few notes from you,” Asia said once I stood beside her and Duchess. “We gotta make this good, and trust me, sugar, no one wants to hear some cat-screeching bullshit, okay?”

I giggled and blushed a little. “Okay…uh… What do you want me to sing?”

Both queens smiled deviously. “Sing the hook for us.”

I had a feeling they were calling my bluff, that I was most likely called up onstage to be some sort of comic relief, but I simply shrugged it off and cleared my throat in preparation.

Once the DJ started playing “Whatta Man” again, I put my best En Vogue foot forward and sang the opening chorus, or the hook, as Asia called it.

I’d barely gotten through the first few lines before the DJ shut off the music at Asia’s request.

“Oh, honey!” Duchess exclaimed and snapped her fingers in the air. “You done did it, girl!”

“This bitch can sing, queens!” Asia shouted toward the crowd. “She can really fucking sing!”

And Leo, well, he looked up at me from his spot in the chair with the biggest smile I’d ever seen in my life.

The damn thing went straight to my fucking brain.

High off his smile and high off doing what I loved most, I stood on that stage for the next five or so minutes with a bunch of beautiful drag queens and sang my lungs out while they grinded and danced all over Leo.

And hell if it wasn’t a damn good time.

Touché, Abby. Tou-fucking-ché.

Streetlights and the beams of passing vehicles filled my vision as I drove back toward Gemma’s apartment, and fuck, I couldn’t wipe the smile from my face if I tried.

Her voice danced in my ears as she chattered on about Asia and Duchess and the thrill of the stage.

I could hear the melodic quality of it so much more easily now, and the lull of it during a bout of excitement was particularly enticing.

She’d beyond killed it up there, damn near brought the crowd and the queens of Drag to their fucking knees, and I was like a proud boyfriend already.

From zero to one hundred in less than a second, this adorable fucking creature had not only stolen my attention, but with sniper-like precision appeared to be going straight for my heart as well.

“I can’t believe she took off her wig at the end and put it on my head.” Gemma smiled at me, and my chest expanded. “I mean, I thought the hair, the makeup, all of that stuff was like sacred or something.”

“It is. But you were a queen up there, and her wig was the best she could do in the way of a crown,” I said with a laugh.

She giggled and playfully shoved my shoulder, and it was safe to say we were miles away from the awkward, quiet mess we’d been on the way to Drag a few hours ago.

Apparently, her friend Abby who’d recommended the spot knew a thing or two about loosening Gemma up.

And fuck, it had worked like a charm.

Right before my very eyes, I’d had the pleasure of watching Gemma blossom and bloom into a comfortable ease. She’d let down her guard, and I’d been entranced by each facet of her delightful, quirky personality that she’d revealed to me.

To say she was something special was putting it mildly.

This girl, my mystery girl, was unlike anyone I’d ever met.

“So, I have to ask,” I said and smirked at her out of my periphery. “Where in the hell have you been hiding that voice?”

She blushed at the compliment but quickly transferred any embarrassment to cute and sassy attitude.

“What? Like I’ve had so many opportunities to show it off for you?” She laughed. “This is our first date, in case you’ve forgotten, and our encounters before this included spilled pee and your aunt Alma.”