Someone left a karaoke machine at The Hot Mess.

I should clarify: someone left a karaoke machine at The Hot Mess after the Mitchell family's daughter's fifteenth birthday party, which I had agreed to host because Mrs. Mitchell asked so nicely and I have a pathological inability to say no to anyone who seems even mildly hopeful about anything.[^1]

The party itself was fine. Well, "fine" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. There were fifteen teenage girls crammed into my coffee shop, which is approximately fourteen more teenage girls than The Hot Mess was designed to accommodate, and at one point someone spilled an entire strawberry smoothie on my sage green accent wall, and I'm pretty sure I heard the words "this place is so vintage" which I think was meant as a compliment but might have been about my fifteen-year-old espresso machine Betsy, who is not vintage, she is distinguished, thank you very much.

But they sang karaoke. Loudly. Enthusiastically. Badly. Beautifully badly, actually—the kind of badly that doesn't care about being bad, because it's too busy being joyful.

I watched from behind the counter, wiping up coffee grounds (there are always coffee grounds; this is my existence now), and I thought: I used to sing like that.

Not badly. Just... freely.

The Mitchell family left at 7:47 PM, which I know because I was counting the minutes, and they took approximately 87% of their belongings with them. The remaining 13% included: three abandoned hair ties, one phone charger that didn't match anyone's phone, a half-eaten cupcake that I found behind the sugar caddy three days later, and—

A karaoke machine.

It sat there in the corner like it was waiting for something. Silver and boxy and somehow accusatory. I called Mrs. Mitchell the next morning.

"Oh, that old thing!" she said, sounding like someone who had not spent $200 on "that old thing" approximately two months ago. "We got Emma a new one for her birthday. A portable one that connects to her phone. You can keep it!"

"I don't really need a—"

"It'll be fun! You could do karaoke nights! Get people singing!"

"I don't think The Hot Mess is really a karaoke kind of—"

"Bye, sweetheart! Thanks again for hosting!"

And that's how I became the owner of a karaoke machine I didn't want, didn't need, and absolutely was not going to use.

The machine sat in the corner for a week.

I walked past it every morning while opening. I walked past it every evening while closing. I wiped down the tables around it. I swept the floor near it. I did not touch it. I did not look at it directly. I treated it the way I treat my feelings about my mother—by pretending it wasn't there and hoping it would eventually just... disappear.

But here's the thing about pretending something isn't there: your brain doesn't stop noticing it. Your brain, in fact, becomes obsessed with the thing you're not noticing. The karaoke machine became the only thing I could think about. I'd be pulling espresso shots—which requires focus, real focus, because you have to watch the flow rate and the color and the texture, because a blonde shot means under-extraction which means sour, weak coffee and I will NOT serve sour, weak coffee—and I'd think: I wonder if it has "Amazing Grace" in it.

I'd be organizing the pastry case, which I don't even stock very well because pastries are Jennifer's territory and she keeps bringing me things from that bakery she likes, the one with the croissants that are somehow both crispy AND buttery, and I'd think: I wonder if it has Carrie Underwood.

I'd be lying in my apartment at 11 PM, staring at the ceiling, wearing my jeans even though I was alone because wearing jeans alone at 11 PM is an act of rebellion that never stops feeling good, and I'd think: I wonder what my voice sounds like now.

That last thought was the dangerous one.

I should explain about the singing.

I have—had—have a voice. A good one, apparently. Not "American Idol" good, but good enough that when I was little, people at church would turn around during hymns. Good enough that my mother would shush me in the car, not because I was being bad, but because "Rena LeeAnn, you're showing off."

Showing off. That was the word she used.

Like my voice was something to apologize for. Like the sound that came out of my mouth when I wasn't thinking about it—the natural, unfiltered, real sound—was somehow inappropriate. Immodest. Too much.

So I learned to sing quietly. Then I learned to mouth the words. Then I learned to not sing at all, except when I was completely alone, locked in my room, with the radio playing loud enough to cover the evidence.

My grandmother loved my voice. She was the only one. "Rena LeeAnn," she'd say, using my full name the way she always did, the way that made it sound like a blessing instead of a rebuke, "God gave you that voice for a reason. Don't you hide it."

She died when I was eleven. I've been hiding it ever since.

It was a Tuesday when I broke.

Tuesdays are slow at The Hot Mess. The weekend warriors have gone back to their regular coffee chains, and the regulars are in the middle of their weeks, too tired to make the extra effort. I close early on Tuesdays—7 PM instead of 9—because there's no point keeping the lights on for an empty room.

That Tuesday, I finished my closing routine at 6:47 PM. Swept the floor (found a hair tie under table three—probably from the Mitchell party, somehow). Wiped down Betsy, who was being temperamental again but in a friendly way, the way she hisses and spits but still produces perfect shots.[^2] Counted the register, which didn't take long because there wasn't much to count.

And then I stood there.

In my shop. My space. The place I'd built with my own two hands and Jennifer's questionable business plan and more prayer than I'd ever prayed in my life.

The karaoke machine was sitting in the corner. Waiting.

Just to test it, I told myself. Just to make sure it works. In case I ever want to sell it.

I plugged it in.

The screen lit up with a cheerful blue glow and a menu that looked like it was designed in 2003. There were categories: Pop, Rock, Country, Gospel, Oldies. I scrolled through Gospel because I'm predictable, and there it was.

"It Is Well."

The hymn my grandmother used to sing while she washed dishes. The one she hummed when she was happy, and the one she cried through when she was sad, and the one she whispered the night before she died, when I was sitting by her bed holding her hand and not understanding yet that goodbye could be permanent.

I pressed select.

The instrumental started—tinny through the machine's little speakers, but recognizable. The words appeared on the screen. And I opened my mouth.

The first note was rusty. Like a door that hasn't been opened in years. Like a voice that's been locked in a room in the back of my mind, getting dusty, getting forgotten.

But then the second note was better. And the third was better still. And by the chorus—

It is well, it is well, with my soul.

I wasn't in The Hot Mess anymore. I wasn't in my body, which I'm never really in anyway, but this time it was different. This time I was somewhere else entirely. Somewhere where my grandmother was still alive, and her kitchen smelled like coffee and biscuits, and she was singing along with me, her voice wobbling on the high notes the way it always did.

When peace like a river attendeth my way...

I closed my eyes. Let the words pour out of me. Didn't think about whether I was showing off. Didn't think about whether someone might hear. Didn't think about anything except the music and the memory and the feeling that maybe, just maybe, this was the part of me I'd been missing.

It is well, it is well, with my soul.

The song ended.

I stood there in the silence, breathing hard, tears streaming down my face—because apparently I can't do anything emotional without crying, this is just who I am as a person—and I felt...

Light.

Like I'd been carrying something heavy for twenty years and I'd finally, finally put it down.

And then I heard someone sniffle.

I spun around so fast I knocked over the tip jar.

Jennifer was standing in the doorway. My front door, which I had definitely locked—except I hadn't, had I, because I'd been so focused on the karaoke machine that I'd forgotten to flip the deadbolt, because my brain was somewhere else while my body was supposedly doing closing tasks, because this is my WHOLE PROBLEM—

Jennifer was crying.

Not delicate, Instagram-aesthetic crying. Real crying. Mascara-running, nose-dripping, ugly crying. She had her keys in her hand—right, she'd left them on the counter earlier, she'd texted me about it—and she was staring at me like I'd grown a second head.

"How long—" I started.

"The whole thing." Her voice cracked. "Rena. RENA."

"I was just testing the machine—"

"Why have you never told anyone you can sing like that?"

I opened my mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. I probably looked like a particularly confused goldfish. "I... it's not... I don't..."

"You sound like an ANGEL." Jennifer crossed the room in three steps and grabbed my shoulders, which meant I was now being held by a crying woman while standing in a pile of spilled tip change, which was not how I'd expected this Tuesday to end. "An actual angel. Like Carrie Underwood had a baby with a church choir. Like—"

"Jennifer—"

"Why would you HIDE this?"

And there it was. The question I'd been avoiding for two decades.

Why would I hide this?

"I'm not good enough."

The words came out before I could stop them. Jennifer's face did something complicated—hurt and confusion and something that might have been anger, except Jennifer doesn't really do anger, she does aggressive supportiveness.

"Not good—Rena, I just heard you. I literally just HEARD you."

"I know, but—" I pulled away from her grip, started picking up the coins from the floor because I needed something to do with my hands, something to focus on that wasn't this conversation. "You don't understand. In my family, singing was... it was too much. Too loud. Too attention-seeking. My mother always said I was showing off."

"Your mother also said jeans were immodest."

"That's different."

"Is it?"

I stopped, a handful of quarters clutched in my fist. Looked up at Jennifer, who was still crying, who had mascara all over her face, who looked like a blonde raccoon in cute jeans, and I thought about everything my mother had told me about being too much. Too loud. Too visible. Too free.

The jeans weren't immodest. I knew that now.

Was my voice not showing off?

"I used to imagine singing in church," I said slowly, sitting down on the floor because my legs didn't feel trustworthy. Jennifer sat down across from me, not caring about her cute pants. "Like, really singing. The way I hear it in my head. And then I'd imagine everyone turning around to stare at me, and the pastor stopping the service to tell me I was being inappropriate, and my mother's face—"

I couldn't finish.

"Rena." Jennifer's voice was soft now. "That's not what would happen."

"You don't know that."

"I do, though. Because I've seen you do amazing things and then convince yourself they don't count. You make incredible coffee. You built this shop. You left everything you knew to become who you actually are. And every single time, you think it's not good enough."

She reached over and took my quarter-filled hand.

"Your voice is a gift. Like, a literal, actual, God-given gift. And you've been hiding it because someone taught you that gifts are shameful."

Romans 8:1: There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.

I'd quoted that verse to myself a thousand times since moving out. Every time I wore jeans. Every time I drank coffee after 9 PM. Every time I made a choice that would've made my mother purse her lips in that specific way that felt like a physical wound.

But I'd never applied it to this.

To my voice.

To the part of me that was maybe the most ME, that I'd locked away so thoroughly I'd almost forgotten it existed.

That night, in my apartment, I made coffee at 11 PM because I could.

I sat in my cozy chair—the one my mother sent, which still confuses me, the silent "I love you" wrapped in the silent "I disapprove"—and I thought about hiding.

I'd hidden my jeans. I'd hidden my questions. I'd hidden my doubt, my dreams, my desperate longing for a faith that felt like freedom instead of a cage.

And I'd hidden my voice.

The thing my grandmother loved. The thing that made me feel connected to something bigger than myself. The thing that was mine, fully mine, not shaped or shushed or apologized for.

I'd hidden it because I was afraid of being seen.

But here's the thing about hiding: the only person you really hurt is yourself.

My mother couldn't hear me singing in my empty coffee shop. My old church wasn't there to judge. The only person keeping me silent was me.

And I was tired of it.

Sunday morning came the way Sunday mornings always come—too early, with too much anxiety.

I'd been going to Jennifer's church for months now. Southern Baptist, which was different from Independent Fundamental Baptist in ways that still surprised me. Women in jeans. Contemporary music with actual drums. People laughing during fellowship time like joy wasn't a sin.

I liked it there. I liked Pastor Jack, who preached about grace like he actually believed it. I liked Becky, his wife, who always asked about The Hot Mess and actually listened to the answer. I liked the way worship felt like worship instead of obligation.

But I never really sang.

I mouthed the words. Sometimes I'd hum quietly. But I never opened my mouth and let my actual voice out, because what if someone heard? What if they turned around? What if—

There is therefore now no condemnation.

I stood in my apartment, wearing my jeans, holding my hymnal (yes, I bring my own hymnal, I am a particular kind of nerd), and I made a decision.

The worship band started with "How Great Is Our God."

I knew this song. I loved this song. The melody lived somewhere in my chest, waiting.

Around me, people started singing. Not perfectly—that wasn't the point. Mrs. Nelson in the row behind me was slightly flat. Mr. Torres next to the aisle was half a beat behind. The teenager in front of me was mumbling because he'd clearly rather be anywhere else.

And me?

I opened my mouth.

The first note was quiet. Almost inaudible. But it was there—my actual voice, not a whisper, not a hum. A real note.

The splendor of a King, clothed in majesty...

I sang a little louder.

My hymnal was shaking in my hands. I was crying, because of course I was crying, I'm incapable of doing anything significant without crying, this is just my default setting now—

And all will see how great, how great is our God...

The woman next to me glanced over.

This was it. This was the moment where she'd frown or nudge her husband or give me that look that said too much, too loud, too visible—

She smiled.

Not a polite smile. Not an awkward smile. A real smile, warm and genuine, like she was glad I was there. Like she was glad I was singing.

Her name was Hazel. I'd met her at the church potluck once, briefly. She had gray hair and kind eyes and she smelled like lavender and she was smiling at me like my voice was a good thing.

I kept singing.

My voice cracked on the high note. I didn't care. Tears were streaming down my face and probably onto my hymnal and I didn't care about that either. I was singing. Really singing. In a room full of people.

And nobody was telling me to stop.

After service, Jennifer found me in the lobby.

She didn't say anything. Just squeezed my hand.

She'd heard me, I knew. She was standing a few rows back, and she'd heard me singing, really singing, for the first time in church. For the first time in public. For the first time in years.

"I did it," I said, and my voice was hoarse from crying, from singing, from feeling too much all at once.

"I know." Jennifer's eyes were wet again. "I heard."

"It wasn't... I wasn't showing off?"

"Rena." She laughed, a little desperately. "You were worshipping. That's what singing in church IS."

Oh.

Huh.

I went back to The Hot Mess that afternoon.[^3]

The karaoke machine was still in the corner, looking innocent and non-accusatory in the afternoon light. I walked past it, turned on Betsy, started my prep routine. The familiar rhythm of coffee shop ownership—grinding beans, checking inventory, wiping down what didn't need wiping just because my hands needed something to do.

But I was humming.

Actually humming. Not quietly, not under my breath. A real hum, with real notes, because there was music in my chest and it wanted to come out and I didn't have to hide it anymore.

My grandmother's voice, in my memory: God gave you that voice for a reason. Don't you hide it.

I hadn't hidden it today.

And the world didn't end. Nobody laughed. Nobody judged. Hazel smiled. Jennifer cried. Pastor Jack preached about grace like he always did, and the drums kept the beat, and I sang.

I actually sang.

Maybe next week I'll sing louder. Maybe next week I'll try harmony. Maybe next week I'll finally believe that this is allowed—that I'm allowed—that my voice is a gift and not a shameful thing to be apologized for.

Or maybe I'll be terrified all over again, and I'll have to choose courage one more time, the way I've been choosing courage every day since I moved out.

But at least now I know the secret:

The gifts you hide help no one. Not even you.

Especially not you.

Coffee count: 4 cups (2 for courage, 1 for celebration, 1 because it was 3 PM and I deserved it)

Romans 8:1 count: 7 times (a new personal low—progress!)

Tears shed: lost count, but all of them were good ones

Songs sung out loud, on purpose, in front of actual people: 3

Three more than yesterday.

That's the whole point, isn't it?

[^1]: This is why I now own a karaoke machine, have agreed to host two more birthday parties next month, and somehow volunteered to organize the church's fall festival even though I don't know how to organize my own sock drawer. Saying yes to things is my spiritual gift. Unfortunately.

[^2]: Betsy and I have reached an understanding. She cooperates as long as I descale her monthly and don't ask too much on Mondays. Coffee machines, like people, need patience and maintenance. Todd would be proud of this metaphor. Todd is also the only reason she still runs at all, but that's a story for another blog post.

[^3]: I also stopped at the grocery store because I was out of milk again. I'm always out of milk. I have no idea how much milk a coffee shop actually goes through until I'm standing there staring at an empty refrigerator case at 6 AM, wondering if oat milk would be an acceptable substitute. (It isn't. Not for lattes. The proteins don't foam the same way. Yes, I will die on this hill.)