Jan and I heard this old Spanish expression from Mama a lot while we were growing up. Strictly translated, it means “I don’t have hair on my tongue”—Mama’s way of saying she wasn’t afraid to open her mouth and speak her mind.
“Just—please! Just be cool,” I said, though I didn’t even know how any of us would be able to do that in this situation.
The Dutch band Lois Lane, who had opened for him at the last concert, came out onto the stage and did their sound check. The other openers were Germany-specific; he often scheduled local or regional bands for opening slots on his tours. Something I truly loved and appreciated about Prince during the years we worked and lived together was the way he took artists like these—and like me—under his wing. When he saw talent that intrigued him, he got the artist in front of people, and his seal of approval meant a lot—in the audience and in the industry. He lifted them up above the noise so they could be noticed. Any band or artist opening for him would be seen by millions of people when all was said and done, and that gave him great happiness. He loved it when good art got the attention it deserved, so he surrounded himself with people who inspired and pushed him, and he inspired and pushed them back.
I glanced toward the basketball court, where Jan was now smack in the middle of the game, stumping around on her tragic little ankle brace and still holding her own with the boys. When I looked back at the stage, some of the musicians who would soon become the New Power Generation were preparing to do their sound check. Prince was standing there looking at me. I quickly looked away. When I looked again, he was still watching us.
“Oh, God,” I whispered. “We are so kicked out.”
But the basketball game continued, and for a while, nothing happened. I was doing my best not to look at the stage, telling myself that, no, you cannot feel someone’s eyes on you from across the room. Eventually, he went downstairs, and the game broke up as the roadies went about their duties. Kirk, the nicest of the three dancers, came by, and Mama changed her approach.
“Excuse me,” she said sweetly. “We don’t know how to do this, but my daughter—she’s a belly dancer. She’s been talking about how wonderful you all are ever since we saw you in Spain. She would just love for him to see her work. Do you suppose you could give him this tape?”
Kirk laughed and said, “Sure. I’ll be right back.”
She handed the tape to him, and he took it. Just like that. I can’t even guess at the look on my face as he went off down the stairs. If there ever was proof of the sturdy Catholic teaching “Knock and the door shall be opened unto you,” this would certainly be it.
A moment later, he came back and said, “So I gave him the tape. He took it. He’s watching it now.”
“Are you serious?” I said—and again, people, the expression on my face… I can’t even.
“Yeah. He saw you standing out here, so he took it.”
I heard myself say something like, “Oh. Okay.”
A few minutes later, the second bodyguard—the one who’d intercepted my mom on her first attempt—came back to us and said, “Hi. Prince saw your tape. He wants to meet you.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“I have to ask,” said the bodyguard, “how old are you?”
“I’m sixteen. Like it said in my letter.”
He turned to Mama and asked, “Is it okay if she goes downstairs?”
Obviously, he did not know my mom. Before the words were fully out of his mouth, she was nodding. Ecstatic. “Sure! Yes! Go!”
A side note here: Yes, I was sixteen, and he was Prince, so there was an element of Oh, my god, I’m about to meet Prince!, but my mother trusted me to handle myself because she’d seen me handle myself as a professional for several years in a lot of different situations. Standing backstage at the Maimarkthalle, we hadn’t seen anything that looked like stereotypical rock-and-roll tour shenanigans or substance abuse, and I was so deeply honored that he wanted to meet me.
I followed the bodyguard down a passage that seemed to have a thousand steps. The sound of our feet echoed off the cement walls. Or maybe it was the sound of my heart pounding. I remember thinking, Oh my god oh my god oh my god this is actually happening. We turned the corner, and Prince was standing there outside his dressing room, shaking one of those little Easter egg maracas. He looked every bit as put together as he looked onstage, but with a lighter touch, a bit more oxygen. His hair was long and had been straightened to a soft wave that touched his shoulders. His eyelashes were unfairly lovely, and his beard was precisely tailored. (He always did this himself during the years we were together; the barber was never allowed to touch it.) He smelled like the most expensive shelf in the Sephora perfume aisle. I didn’t process it then, but I look back now in awe that this man wearing eyeliner, heels, and ladies’ perfume somehow managed to be more masculine than the burly bodyguard.
He said, “Hi.”