by Manuel Gonzalez

Water turned into wine, and time stopped. The second-hand paused in mid-tick, the wind blew its last breath, and the earth halted her rotation. Snow began falling from the clear, night-blue sky, and each luminescent flake, before it hit the ground, flew away on butterfly wings. And in that moment, the door opened and heaven walked in. Her name was Chastity Blue.

And with one step, she cut through the crowded barroom, glided across the dance floor and stood -- beautiful -- on stage. Skin black as pitch, teeth pearly as a shark's. She looked left, then right, nodded her head in a simple four count, and then, Lord Almighty! she sang.

Chastity Blue sang only one night every year, November first, in the same old tin-roofed wooden shack, and in it, waiting for her and her alone, an antique piano rested its wearied ivories on a raised wooden stage with room enough for drums, double bass, and trumpet. What she did the rest of the year was anyone's guess. Steal men's souls with her red lips and hot kisses or women's babies with sugared candies and sweet breads. Rumor had it Chastity Blue didn't exist except for those cold November nights: a ghost who appeared among them and sang her ghostly blues, only to vanish in a cloud of smoke before the sun peaked its head over the horizon. Her band -- trumpeter, bassist, drummer, and pianist -- all apparitions whom she called from their resting place to accompany her honeyed voice. Chastity Blue will sing for you -- Her voice, stolen from the devil himself, made women laugh, men dance, and children cry, brought you closer to death and her closer to life with every chuckle, foot-stomp, and salty tear. Sinful, tempting, wicked voice. Suffocating. And yet....

Heaven.

A goddess, an angel. Silvery wings, golden voice. Warm dark chocolate pouring from her fingertips into your mouth: sweet, bitter, rich. The smell of butterscotch cooling over an apple. The feel of down pressed soft against your skin. A mother's gentle fingers running through a child's tangled hair. Chastity Blue will sing for you reds and greensófill your mind with memoriesóSimple thoughts, simple dreams, simple wishes; the daydreams of children. One night a year, Chastity Blue made these come true. Her voice: Pure love. Of herself, of her music, of the snow weighing heavy on the old tin roof. The smell of smoke, the stink of sweat, the taste of whisky burning down her black, ghostly neck. The slap of the bass, the call of the trumpet, the roll of the piano, the thick beat of the drum.

She refused any and all requests, spoke not a word, tapped her foot lightly against the wood floor, clutched the microphone so her dark knuckles turned white, and like a gunshot, her voice carried to the thousands who came to hear her sing. Jumbled body pressed against jumbled body as a hundred or more forced their dance-crazed feet onto the floor in front of the stage. Outside, the other thousand or so, packed together for warmth, gyrated, jiggled, groped, and kissed each other in the snow, listening to Chastity Blue, their hips swaying together in perfect time.

From sun-up to sun-down, they waited in anticipation. Soon as the tired old sun fell, they rushed home and changed. Shiny black slacks, deep red dresses, two-tone spats, heels at least seven-inches. Then, ready and dressed, they plunged into the snow, walked down the block, walked five miles, walked from the next town, drove in from the City, took the train from across the country. Some came on trips that had been a year in planning, with every last nickel they'd spent the last year saving. Some, to catch a glimpse of Chastity Blue outside the aura of her singing, simply moved to within a mile of the small wooden shack. Come take a pilgrimage to the sanctity of Chastity Blue's music box advertised in big bold black letters in New York, Cleveland, Baltimore, Chicago, Kansas City, New Orleans, Washington D.C., San Francisco, and in every small, dust-filled town in the South. Man Woman Child -- Black, White, Brown and every Colour in between. They all came. They all danced. And not until the rooster crowed and the sun rose again did they stop. Because not once did Chastity Blue stop singing.

Chastity Blue will sing for you copper songs -- Romantic nights which never happened beneath full moons which made the sky black, black, black as her skin.

Black and wet. Bathing in the clear water of the words and music around her. Cleansing herself, like a cat, preening under the light and smell and taste and feel of the blues. Her lover left her, her children all dead, father in prison, mother laid up in bed. She let it all out, threw it away, tossed on the wings of Honey I Got The Blues! Chastity Blue will sing for you a silent summer sunrise --

Brown-sugared French toast, eggs over-easy, egg-in-you-face, mud-on-your-shoe, ache-in-your-bones, rust-in-your-heart blues. That's what she sang. Blue's blues.
Your blues, my blues, his blues, her blues.
Love lost, love forgotten, love won, love ain't never gonna' happen.
Lord! My baby left me without a home,
Now I wander these streets all alone...
as if she'd spent those days between each first of November storing the energy, holding in her heart the painful black and blue colors of her life, waiting for that one night where she could send it all home. She sang from the moment she stepped through the door until the sun rose, until every last dancer, inside and out, had collapsed, freed from the weight of her hungry, hungry blues. Until her voice was sputtering-red hoarse, the trumpeter's face beyond blue into violet from blowin' his chops, the bassist's fingers red and raw from plucking, bowing, and slapping, the drummer's broken sticks piled around him like a cage, and every last piano key limp with broken hammers. Chastity Blue will sing for you diamonds, emeralds, and red red rubies -- The color of her heart on spring afternoons, but hard, so hard. Hard enough to cut glass, sharp enough to cut your hand. So don't touch. Don't touch.

Last man to touch her shriveled up like a grape on a hot summer day. His skin turned to ash, his nails fell from his fingertips, and his hair caught fi -- Last man to touch her lived a life of thirst, wandering from town to town to town drinking cool water, red wines, thick, foamy beers, till his gut, near to bursting, bulged over his belt. Still thirsty toda -- Last man to touch her glowed with the power of the sun, smiled at heaven above, and vanished. Playin' that golden harp upstairs, he i -- Last man to touch her fell blind and saw the future. Went so mad howlin' at the moon and chasin' ghosts that never died, they shot him just to save hi -- Last man to touch her hurt her. He hurt her so. He hurt her so bad, you can't see the cuts. The scars across her eyes, she hides them well, behind the deep, blue voice -- Chastity Blue will sing for you and you will dance and you will sing and you will cry, and as her voice crashes down like an earthquake the earth will shudder and lightning will strike and thunder will rumble across the sky and --

And then it's over. Steam rises from the poor wooden hut, its only two windows shattered, its door swinging off its hinges, the roof bowing beneath the weight of melting snow and ice. Body piled on top of body, dreaming, sleeping, or dead, perhaps. But whether dead or alive, they'll be back. In a year, they'll be back again, huddled outside the small shack, waiting, because Chastity Blue will sing for you.