Work Text:
Comfrey had gone out to source lunchboxes. Kendall’s entourage wasn’t usually due to show up until after 4. Jess was at the dining table, figuring out how to delegate more party planning duties to Comfrey. The event was only a few weeks away, and she had begun to dread it.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Kendall go into his office. He had a singing lesson at 2, she’d reminded herself.
He was practicing.
Jess typed and listened. She turned her mouth into a downward smile.
Wholesome. Adorable, even.
She glanced in the direction of the office. The sound was muffled, but it was certain: Kendall was practicing his song. He stopped, working on his mix.
He started again. Jess started typing again. Kendall stopped, Jess stopped. Kendall tried again.
Sounds like his soft palate is low.
He has to loosen his jaw.
Focus his lips, send the sound. Ride that breath. Breathe from the diaphragm.
Jess couldn’t type.
Kendall tried again, this time with a tinge of frustration in his voice. An email notification popped up on her screen: the vocal coach would be cancelling that day.
She got up and crept toward the closed door.
She knocked once.
No answer. He had his headphones on, listening to the track.
He also plunked out notes on the keyboard. Piano lessons from that Polish virtuoso when he was eight had finally paid off. Jess eased the door open and poked her head into the room. Kendall jumped slightly at her voice.
“Hey,” she said in that soft voice, that voice she used across 90% of her day. The voice that melted him at unexpected moments.
“Hey—yeah.”
“Um—Jake had to cancel,” Jess said, “seems he’s come down with something.”
“Fuck—the party is like, two weeks from now. Every session counts.”
It was ample time to learn one song, Jess estimated, but she nodded, “I can line up someone else. Or—I mean—”
“Or what?” he asked, slipping the headphones off.
“If you need some pointers—I—”
Kendall blinked: “for—for real?”
Jess shrugged with an even smile, “I took 8 years of voice lessons in high school and college. Just a hobby. I used to volunteer at the Boys and Girls Club a few times a week to teach lessons.”
“I—” Kendall blinked again, now with a slight stammer, “I didn’t know that. You still—”
“No,” her smile lessened, “I stopped a while back.”
“Why is that?”
“Um—work.”
Kendall was silent.
“But I can help if you want.”
He inhaled, thinking, weighing whether he’d want to receive her assistance, feedback, criticism, in this way.
Jess was quite possibly the most competent human he knew—among many other traits. She was probably exactly what he needed. He gave her a small nod.
“Um—OK,” she stepped forward to him, “um, well, first off, you might want to stand.”
He did so.
“And—” she glanced around the room, “we need a big mirror?”
Kendall was thoughtful, “um—the…biggest one I have is in the bathroom.”
Jess froze for a moment at words that sounded like a piece of evidence in a HR lawsuit. But his look was genuine. Innocent? She nodded, shrugged.
“Lead the way.”
In the bathroom, which overlooked Hudson Yards and was most certainly bigger than Jess’ apartment, she placed her hands on his biceps, put herself behind him and positioned him in front of the mirror.
Kendall, whose heart had been racing in competition against itself, took a breath. Her touch, however rare, centered him.
She surveyed his posture in the mirror and set up the track on his phone.
“OK, before we dive in,” she said, “we’ll just do some warmups and some breathing.”
“Yeah, I was working on that with Jake. I don’t think it was for me. I just need the song.”
“Let’s try.”
Kendall trusted Jess more than Jake, “OK.”
“OK,” she repeated back to him, kicking off her shoes.
“Um—”
“I need to be grounded,” she said simply, “I mean, sure, I’ve worn heels when I’ve sung, but this is practice. This is grounding time.”
Kendall nodded, unsure and enthralled. She seemed small against him.
“Relax.”
“I’m relaxed.”
“No, I mean,” Jess took him by the arms again, “relax, like, your arms. Your shoulders. Your body.”
Kendall tried. He couldn’t.
“Good,” Jess encouraged, wondering why she agreed to help him.
He shifted.
“So plant your feet.”
He did.
“And stand up—like—straight.”
He did.
“A large component of singing is physical,” Jess said.
Kendall didn’t ask for a vocal pedagogy lesson, but he listened.
“So you’re using several different muscle groups and keeping aware of how that interplay happens all the time. And then it’s memory. And interpretation. And musicality…”
He nodded, like he knew what she meant.
“So relax.” She repeated, thinking he’d do it that time.
He nodded again, not relaxed.
“OK, so,” Jess got close, and Kendall could feel her brush up against him. Jess reached across him and placed her fingertips at the top of his jaw, “relax your jaw.”
Kendall tried.
She nodded, encouraging. “Mmmhmm.”
And then she brought her hands lower, hovering for a moment, as if to decide whether or not to proceed, but then ultimately made the choice to do so: Jess laid a palm directly below his ribcage. Kendall took a small, quick and sharp intake of breath.
“Breathe from here,” she said, glancing back into the mirror and making eye contact with him that way.
“Uh huh.” Their eyes locked.
This was not like a session with Jake.
“OK, let’s just try,” she said. “Ready?”
“Yeah.” I think.
“Take a breath—from your diaphragm and keep the back of your mouth open—let the sound flow through you.”
Kendall nodded quickly. He was tense. He wanted to get everything right the first time, to prove to Jess he’d been listening, understanding—but also to prove to her that he could do it.
She started the track and leaned against the counter to observe. Kendall stared at her, but she pointed to the mirror, indicating that he should be looking at his reflection.
He sang the first verse.
“OK, good,” Jess said, “really good.”
Kendall brightened.
“This won’t be hard for you—you have a nice timbre to your voice anyway.”
“I…do?”
“Yeah, your placement is good to begin with. Just because of the way you speak. Good resonance.”
He swallowed, nodding, touched and startled that someone had pointed out a trait of his that was a naturally good thing.
“But you can power it with more breath.”
“Oh. OK. Uh huh.”
“Here,” Jess seemed to hesitate once more, but he watched as she took his hand and this time placed it across the base of her ribcage.
OK, yeah, just a typical Wednesday afternoon. Sure. No big deal. Just—
She took a deep breath, holding his hand in place.
“You feel that?” she asked.
Kendall struggled to come up with a response, “mmm. Mmmhmm.”
“That’s what you’re going for,” she said, letting his hand go. “Let’s try again.”
He did so—a few more times. And each time Jess reached out to a different part of his body as a reminder for him to engage as he sang: his jaw, his diaphragm, the small of his back, his shoulders. And as they went through it, Kendall relaxed. Not because Jess verbally told him to, but because her fingertips upon his skin allowed him to take deeper breaths. Somehow.
Is there a component of the lesson where she could just like rub my back? Run her fingers through my hair? Just lightly tend to me in a mundane way? What is this...?
The intimacy that Kendall was presented with—there in his bathroom with “Honesty” playing on loop—was frightening, but the placidity it offered him won out.
He just wanted Jess to keep touching him.
And he was sounding better, too.
She was like some sort of quiet sprite, flitting about, making miracles and solving problems—as usual. An Angel of Music. He wondered how her singing voice sounded, but he felt shy asking. She was probably fantastic.
He sang through the entire song, with her prodding.
“Really good—do you feel the difference?”
“I…do, actually.”
“Great,” Jess looked up the song on her phone, “do you want to go over interpretation?”
“Meaning…?”
“Like how to act the song? Or find the emotional beats—give it levels—phrasing—song analysis, maybe?”
“Oh—” Kendall blinked, imagining Jess doing secret cabarets at Don’t Tell Mama’s on alternate Saturday nights, living a secret life. Singing secret songs. Having secret—
“Yeah,” he said, “yeah. OK.”
Jess reviewed the lyrics, “OK, let’s review it.”
They went through each stanza, reviewing each line. Kendall watched as the lines on Jess’ face seemed the shift.
Honesty is such a lonely word
Everyone is so untrue
Honesty is hardly ever heard
And mostly what I need from you
At once, she seemed hurt. Only a slight brow furrow gave her away.
She paused, thinking.
“Um, so yeah,” she said, “the height of this phrase is ‘such’ so you want to drive the breath to that—and then see it through.”
“Uh huh.”
“But the phrasing that Billy does at least,” she cleared her throat and continued, wiping the emotion from her face, “he seems to take a breath before ‘it always’ and then continues through until ‘word.’ So… you can do that, you just have to take a deep breath beforehand. And that 'I' vowel in ‘give’ is a little challenging.”
“Yeah…”
“Just make sure there’s breath behind it and that you’re creating enough space for it,” she said matter of factly, “think: positioning your mouth to be open instead of wide. And your tongue—”
She paused, “don’t let the back of your tongue rise. Otherwise, it’ll cut off the sound.”
Jess was taking charge--and Kendall found that he liked it.
“Right,” Kendall nodded—so many fucking things to remember—“uh, do you think this song… this song is the right choice?”
“’Right’?—how so?” Jess asked in her quiet voice. There it was again. “If you’re talking about messaging” –and he was—“it depends.”
“On?”
“You want me to…” Jess rolled her eyes at herself, “be honest?”
Kendall laughed a little, “yeah. Yeah, I do.”
Jess looked at him, with her eyes saying that she was constructing the next sentence with some care.
“It depends on whether this is really how you feel.”
She punctuated some of the words in her sentence in such a way that gave Kendall pause. The furrowed brow was back.
How he really felt. Did how he really feel matter? When it came to PR? When it came to personal brand? When it came to winning? He’d never considered it.
“I—I’m not sure,” and suddenly their conversation had veered off somewhere else.
Jess gave a small shrug. “I suppose it doesn’t matter. You can do whatever song you like—I’m—I’m sorry, I—”
“Oh, yeah, I mean,” Kendall brushed it off, “yeah, no worries. Let’s—can we run through it again?”
Jess smiled, “of course.”
He sang the song entirely that time, focusing on his breath. He found himself slouching a little to invite Jess to correct him with a light touch.
“That was the best one yet,” she said when he finished, “just keep practicing that way—remember your breath. Keep everything open, relaxed. And it’ll be great.”
“Wow, uh, thank you.”
“Your sound is there—I just pointed it in the right direction.”
“I’ll—um, I’ll add compensate—”
“No, Ken…” Jess waved the words with a lazy hand, “no.”
“Jess, come on,” he said, crossing his arms, leaning against the counter in front of her, giving her a small smile, “come on.”
“No charge,” she shook her head, holding her hands in front of her. Her cheeks felt warm.
They had really just had a whole singing lesson in his bathroom.
“I insist.”
“No—it was fun. It was between,” Jess smiled with a self-conscious huff, “friends.”
“Yeah,” Kendall agreed, thinking of her fingertips against his skin, “OK, I owe you one, then. You should put ‘angel of music’ on your résumé.”
“Um,” Naomi appeared in the doorway, surveying the two. She’d let herself in. “Hey, Ken.”
They both realized how close they were to each other, and Jess very elegantly stepped away and slipped her shoes back on with a little bit of difficulty.
“Um—so keep practicing,” she mumbled with an apologetic smile, and she scurried off. As she did.
Naomi threw her thumb back in Jess’ direction, “emergency en suite bath meeting?”
“Singing. Practicing,” Kendall held up his phone as proof.
Naomi nodded, accepting. “OK—you wanna grab drinks with Reese? He’s over at—”
“Yeah, in a bit,” Kendall led Naomi out, “you can go ahead—I’ll be right behind you.”
She nodded again, accepting again. “OK.”
As the front door shut behind Naomi, he found Jess back at the dining room table. She was busy—as usual.
“Hey, I’m heading out for a bit, but I’ll be back,” he said.
“Oh, sure thing.”
“OK—I’ll be back.”
“See you then.” OK, Kendall, I believe you.
Kendall nodded, grabbing his jacket. He couldn’t make sense of the warm feeling in his chest—and the craving to touch her.
Maybe he just needed to sing more.