A wink and a smile, and then she was gone...

I really didn't want to come tonight, but she was worth it!

Names Henry. My two mates wanted to go play this week somewhere on Oxford Street, see how much cash we could get by playing. I play the trombone. Ashely plays the french horn and our band teacher says he's one of the best she's ever had teaching, and she's been teaching longer than we've all been alive! Jazz plays the cornet. He's the cool one out of us lot, but with a name like Jazz, what else would you except? They love playing for people in front of an audience. I don't! It took them forever to try to convince me to go to Oxford Street and play for people who will probably look at us like we are either crazy or they will not look at all because they don't care. I like to play for people that I know will listen and like it! But they are my best two mates and so what could I say? We all play well together and this was their Christmas wish. So off we went.

We ended up play right between John Lewis and House of Fraser. One of the busiest places on Oxford and with the waffle stand next to us smelling like Heaven, we guessed it would be a good spot. All I knew though was that I was going to be wanting a waffle after ever song if they were going to smell that good!

"You ready guys?!?!" exclaimed Ashley excitedly. He would've been jumping off the walls if we would let him- literally.
"No..." I say nervously.
"Come on Henry, your not gonna back out on us are ya?!"
"No..." my reply was again.
"OK, Jazz, you lead this one" Ashley said threw grinning teeth.
You know, I still couldn't understand why he was so happy about this! But Jazz started it off and then we came in.

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"Can we leave yet????"
I was getting impatient. We had been here for almost two hours, hardly made any money, it was cold outside so its harder to play and my stomach kept making noises. Darn those waffles!
"It's only 8, we agreed on being here till 9, so no!" said Jazz
"Fine" I said unhappily.
We played Winter Wonderland for the 3rd time, and I don't know why, but this one women catch my eye. She had these big brown eyes with flecks of gold inside. We just looked at each other for a second and she continued walking. We just finished playing and started 'Hark! The Harold Angels Sing'. When I looked up, the women was standing right in front of me with a smirk on her face. Her nose was redder than Rudolph's and had rosy cheek, but that was because it was cold outside and she looked like she had been out all day. We just continued to look at each other for a while and the longer we looked, her smirk became a smile and soon she was ginning ear to ear. I'm not sure why she was so happy, but she looked like she was enjoying me playing my trombone. I couldn't take my eyes off of her; and it's not like she was the prettiest girl in the bunch, but she had something about her... We played 'Sleigh Ride' next and towards the end, I saw her empty out her coin purse and she threw everything she had in the case. After the song, she handed me two tenners.
Shocked I said, "Thank you beautiful, thanks so much"
"Keep playing and make someone else happy tonight!"
Then she gave a wink and a smile, and then she was gone... disappeared into the crowd.
She will never know, but she touched me tonight in what she said.
I gave a tenner to Jazz and the other tenner to Ashley. She gave me her wink and a smile and that was worth more than a £20 note!