EUREKA

We got to the opera house with time to spare and spent the 45 minutes waiting for the show to start people watching and career guessing.  Truly a menagerie of a crowd.  Seemed like it was all ages.  Well thankfully no babies, but it appeared we weren't the only teens attending this shin dig.  We did seem to be the only ones not in tow of our parents though.  The average age I'd hazard to guess was in the forties or early fifties.  I'm guessing this singer had been around for a while.  Fashion wise there were the spattering of suits and evening gowns.  Probably season ticket holders. Predominantly it seemed there was a sea of black, complete with a cadre of old school Goths who looked old enough to have attended school with the rents.  Kind of funny looking at forty something worker bees awash in white and black makeup framed by plush purple and black velvet and lace.  One woman who caught my eye seemed to defy gravity what with heals that could have been a yard long.  I was excited but no longer so nervous, my hand didn't even clamify when it felt Solange's soft hand grasp it.

The lights dimmed and with it the chatter of concert goers faded away like an ebbing tide.  Up walked Diamanda.  Striking in black with a sharp defiant face.  She sat at the concert grand adjusted the microphone and stretched her fingers caressing the keys.  Without a word of warning she lashed into the keys and began screaming, sending notes reverberating against the walls and skulls of concert goers such as Solange and myself.  It was horrific, crazy, loud.  It was wonderful.  My mouth stretched wide in a gaping smile, my hand tenderly clenched Solange's and i began to feel tingly all over.  I think I might have been shaking, perhaps with same vibration as the piano's strings.  Solange was shaking too.  I looked over at her to see her smiling in awe her eyes glistening with joy.   I'd swear we were shaking as one.  I had never felt physically moved by sounds before then.  As the sound grew stronger, I began to feel funny and was afraid I'd fall asleep and miss the rest of the concert.

I didn't fall asleep.  Or atleast don't think I did.  Something greater happened.  As I looked at Solange, she looked toward me and was about to say something when we both blinked.

Blinking to find ourselves, voila, elsewhere in what appeared to be a hospital, with Diamanda crouched over a bed where a man lay.

Solie gasped "Sacre Bleu!  It's happened!"  She spun around and swept me into her arms and kissed me.  A true kiss, this wasn't the friendly kiss I'd been graced with before but rather a passionate kiss that filled my entire self lips to toe to head with warmth.  You'd think that trigger a return to the present but no.
We remained in the hospital and I felt more physically there in the elsewhen than I had ever felt before.

Eureka, we had done it, Solange had followed me to another time and place and I was too ecstatic to speak.