Seven o’clock, PM. It seemed later than that. By this time, on a Friday night, New Orleans was crawling with night people. The jazz clubs were full, the overpriced cafeterias serving Creole food in mass production would have lines around the blocks. Another day, another job. He would be late if he didn’t get going soon, and Jack Linds was never late.
Grabbing his jacket and stuffing a tie in his pocket, just in case anyone wanted some publicity shots of him with the singer, he picked up his camera and started out the door. Lighting a cigarette and glancing up as it began to sprinkle rain, Jack hailed a cab, a driver he knew well and gave the driver, Charlie, directions to the club.
“What ‘choo shootin’ pictures of ta’nite, Mistah Jack?” Old Charlie asked, his thick Creole accent needing to be deciphered.
“A lady singer. Creole girl from low country. Daniella.”
“Girl gotta las’ name?”
“Nah, just Daniella. Stage name I guess. Like Madonna or Sting.”
“Hmmm, girl bettah know how ta sing, she Creole and puttin’ only one silly name on herself.” Charlie mused to himself and Jack smiled, dragging on the cigarette and rubbing a weary hand over the stubble of his chin. He wished he had taken the time to shave.
People filtered in and out of the small and overcrowded jazz club in the French Quarter and Jack thought he would never get past the strong group of drunken tourists at the door. Once inside, Jack found his reserved seat at his table and patiently waited for the show to start. This girl better be good. This place was giving him a migraine.
A half an hour later, the lights dimmed and the crowd cheered. There was no introduction. Jack had never heard of this girl, but the New Orleans club regulars loved her. She was their sweetheart, practically a patron saint. Jack got his camera ready, thinking of telling Martin Lourdes to fuck himself the next time he laid a piece of shit assignment like this on him. Last year he was filming the crisis in the Middle East, the floods on the Yangtze River and there was the freelance work for Explorer Magazine, filming zebras in Masai Mara. Now he was photographing some unknown overnight sensation singer in a tourist filled jazz club.
He lit another cigarette, ignoring the no smoking sign. Everyone else was. He readied his camera and watched the curvy figure saunter onto the stage.
He snapped a picture when she smiled at the crowd. She looked nervous. She should be. Jack couldn’t help thinking she was pretty. Not the conventional kind of pretty on Cosmopolitan Magazine covers, but the awkward, almost clumsy kind of appeal that some women have. The pretty that you just can’t place. Her hair was dark brown, rather plain, and piled on her head in loose curls. Her face was sweetly pretty and appealing. The eyes though...yeah, that needed to be photographed.
Jack got closer as the music started and she went into a slow ballad, her large, dark eyes twinkling. Snap.
She looked at him and tried to smile for the camera. Her nerves were really showing. Jack looked her over. Very nice, indeed. The woman was curvy, a classic hourglass shape. He wasn’t sure how she managed to get her breasts into that tight red dress, but it looked fantastic on her. She caught him eyeing the swell of her breasts over the top of the dress and she blushed, her voice going on in song. Snap. Another photo...of that blush.
It was an hour later that she accepted flowers from the admiring crowd and floated her way to the narrow hallway backstage. Jack met her there as scheduled to take some post-show photos. She was smiling.
“You’re Jack, right?” she asked.
“And you are amazing.”
