Tenney Shares the Stage

Healing Music

Rows of folding chairs fill the hospital rec room. Kids in hospital gowns and mismatched pajama bottoms file in and find their seats, some barely five years old, others clearly teenagers. Logan has saved Tenney the seat right up front, next to Alice, who spots them crossing the room and gives an eager wave. Backstage, Aubrey grips her accordion like a life preserver and draws in a sharp, scared breath. Tenney reaches over and squeezes her hand. Logan reminds her that the audience is just kids, like them, nothing to be scared of.

When the microphones crackle to life, Tenney has never felt more ready for a show. She introduces herself and Logan. Logan can’t resist adding that it could just as easily be Logan and Tenney, since the order never mattered to him. The audience laughs before a single chord even sounds. Logan tells the room they’ve come to play music. Tenney explains that music makes people feel better and stronger, helping them heal when they are sad or frightened, and that the best way to heal from anything is doing what you love. Beside her, Logan’s fingers twitch nervously against the guitar strings. Tenney tells him quietly that they’re in this together.

They launch into “Reach the Sky,” catchy and upbeat. Before the first note, Tenney dedicates it to Alice, since none of this would exist without her. It might be the best they’ve ever played the song, kids clapping and swaying, Alice singing along in the front row with her cheeks glowing pink. From there they slide into “The Nerve,” their bickering duet about how maddening and devoted two people can be at once, trading good-natured insults set to melody and locking eyes on every line about trust. Between them, Tenney and Logan check in constantly now, a nod here, a louder chord there, catching each other’s slips before anyone in the crowd even notices. As they sing, Tenney can’t help thinking about everything that led them to this exact moment, all of it worth it. They snap to the ending chorus together, and the room erupts in applause.

Then it’s time for Aubrey. She walks over stiffly, her face pale, her fingertips trembling against the accordion buttons. Tenney reaches out and touches her hand, promising they’ve got her. Aubrey exhales, and her hands finally settle. Tenney introduces “Someone Who Believes” as a song about those scary moments when it feels like nobody’s there. Logan adds that everyone deserves a reminder that someone believes in them.

Aubrey fumbles her keys through the first verse. Logan and Tenney bend their tempo around her, though, slowing when she rushes and speeding when she lags, until their guitars melt into her melody and hold the whole song up. By the bridge, all three instruments quiet almost to nothing. Tenney and Logan sing in harmony to a room gone completely silent.

When the final chorus swells back up, Aubrey joins her voice to theirs, and the room feels electric. The last notes fade into wild applause. Aubrey’s eyes sparkle brighter than her glittery dress as she takes a bow between Tenney and Logan. Then she pulls Tenney into a hug, their instruments clunking together softly.

Afterward, Alice thanks Tenney for playing, and Tenney tells her that without her, none of this could have happened. Then a hand taps Tenney’s shoulder. It’s Zane, asking if she and Logan have a minute, because someone wants to talk to them. He leads them out the doors, up a staircase, and around a corner to an alcove, where a woman sits gazing out a window. She looks up, and Tenney realizes with a jolt that it’s Belle Starr. Belle has apparently been standing at the back of the room since their very first song, slipping in to hear them play because, as she puts it with a grin, she’s a fan.

Soon they’re swallowed up by familiar faces, Mason, Jaya, Holliday, Mrs. Everett, Jude, Portia, and Ellie, all talking and laughing at once.

That night, the whole group ends up at Smiley’s, Zane’s favorite barbecue spot, a barn-roofed place with sawdust on the floor. Plates pile high with ribs, corn on the cob, and biscuits while a bluegrass band saws through a rough-and-tumble tune. Everyone spins around the makeshift dance floor until Tenney gets too dizzy to stand and has to sit down. Aubrey sits beside her idol, snapping selfie after selfie. Once the waitress clears the table, Belle rises at the head of it and tells Tenney and Logan that watching them handle their secret today, and watching how badly those kids needed live music, gave her an idea. She wants to spend the summer touring small hospitals by day, capped off with one big benefit concert in Nashville, with every dollar going to the hospital. And she wants Tenney and Logan to open for her.

Tenney forgets to breathe. Beside her, Logan looks devastated instead of thrilled. She remembers why: they’re not supposed to perform together at all. But it turns out the adults have already been talking it over. Portia points out how powerful the two of them are onstage together.

Dad offers Logan and Jude a standing invitation to the shop after school. That way, Logan and Tenney can rehearse together. Mason offers to help watch Aubrey and Jude. Aubrey insists she’ll watch Jude herself, though, with Mason watching her instead. Holliday and Jaya both volunteer to babysit whenever rehearsals run long.

Mom invites Mrs. Everett and Jude to Sunday supper every week, and Mrs. Everett happily accepts. Aubrey, meanwhile, is already talking about summer music camp, offering to teach Jude cowbell and accordion. Zane points out that their old contract was never fully canceled. That means they’ll get paid for performing with Belle, too.

Logan looks at Tenney. He says he’s in, if Tenney’s in, because they’re a team. Every eye at the table turns to Tenney. It takes her a moment, but her voice comes out loud and clear. “Yes!”

They are going to open for Belle Starr.