Dougton

Dougton - Chapter 4

The lights slightly dimmed, leaving everyone in anticipation... Well, Martha and the boys, that is. Everyone else was busy ordering food and being noise - something Martha couldn’t stand one bit. Then finally a tall, young man stepped out from the back left corner of the stage. Simon leaned forward to look at the rest of the gang as he whispered loudly - ‘There he is! There’s our Mat!‘ Jim, Larry and Ben nodded and smiled at Simon, but Martha kept her eyes fixed on the handsome man. She could obviously tell it was Mat... His cute blouse, blue jeans, shiny shoes, floppy - chocolate hair... and those irresistible eyes - that were staring right at her.

Mat was so engrossed in Martha, he completely forgot where he was or what he was doing there. He was just standing there, firmly holding his guitar in both hands. Not moving. The audience started whispering amongst themselves, probably about this strange man on stage. Jim and Larry looked at each other wondering what on earth was going on inside Mat’s funny little brain.

‘Pssst!’ Ben called to Mat, trying to get him to wake up. But Mat wouldn’t budge. Martha was shyly smiling at him. ‘Oh my god, she’s smiling at me!’ thought Mat to himself, as he gave a nervous little wave to the one woman in the room he thought was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.‘PSSST!’ Ben called again, even louder. Mat heard him this time, and realised he better get on with the show, but he didn’t take his eyes off Martha - not once.

Martha edged a little more forward to get a better view - even though you couldn’t possibly get any closer to the stage then where Martha was sitting. As Mat carefully took a seat on a small wooden stool in the centre of the stage, Martha gave a little *squeel* of excitement. Mat moved his guitar to a comfortable position and took a deep breath, before beginning to play 1/4 of his songs from his album ‘So It Goes’.

‘Like Rain’ was first:

‘And suddenly, you’re standing there, with nothing around you... Alone, Exposed, Afraid, Alive..’

The songs were utterly beautiful. The whole audience could tell he put so much effort into every song he sung and played. Although, there was a bit of a melancholic tone to Mat’s voice... It made Martha wonder whether there was a certain sadness about him that she didn’t know about. After Mat finished performing his music, he stood up, gave a big smile to Martha and the boys and walked off stage.

There weren’t many people clapping at all, but Martha was clapping the loudest. She thought that a standing ovation was nothing more or nothing less than what he deserved. After she finished clapping she took a seat back down to find the boys looking at her - their faces saying ‘Are you serious?’ .“What?” Martha said with a smile. Simon and Ben looked at each other and rolled their eyes.

As soon as Mat got backstage he rushed to the nearest mirror and picked up and drank a glass of water that was resting on a small table. He then looked at his reflection and smiled, wiping away sweat that had formed at the top of his forehead. “Right” said Mat to himself, re - adjusting his shirt collar. “That’s that done, now... to ask her to dinner”. Mat looked up at himself - and smiled.