The Open Mic

For three weeks Rehan had told no one he'd signed up for the open mic. He was, by his own account, a clumsy performer — all elbows and forgotten lines — and the thought of a room watching him made his hands sweat.

His sister, who sang, was the graceful one. She moved on stage as though the light followed her by agreement, while Rehan tripped over the microphone cord in rehearsal and apologized to it.

He almost quit twice. A gloomy certainty had settled over him that he would freeze, that the audience would smile the way people smile at a child who has climbed too high. On the bus to the venue he rehearsed excuses.

But Rehan was, underneath the nerves, stubborn. He had promised himself he would do this one thing, and some flint in him refused to let the fear win. He gripped his crumpled page and waited through four singers and a poet.

When his name was called, the first thirty seconds were a disaster. His voice cracked; he lost his place. Then something loosened — he laughed at his own mistake, and the room laughed with him, warmly, on his side.

He finished to real applause. Afterward a woman told him it was the best set of the night, and Rehan, modest to a fault, insisted she must have missed the others. But he walked home lighter than he had in months, already wondering, against every instinct, when the next open mic would be.