Living for the Music

When I woke up the next morning, it felt like I’d never fallen asleep. The whole night I’d tossed and turned, sleeping for an hour before waking up to a throb in my wrist, or head, or whatever the place of pain happened to be. I sighed, knowing I couldn’t afford to skip school today. If I could make it through one day, just one, I could sleep the weekend away. One day wouldn’t kill me.

That became my mantra as I tried to find a shirt that would cover my wrists, shoulders, and stomach. Well, most of my shirts covered my stomach. But I had a limited amount of long sleeved ones left.

Even once I found one, putting it on became a totally different issue. I managed to slide it over one side of my body, but trying to get my wrist through hurt. It wasn’t helping my day get off to a good start. Finally, I blinked back the tears of pain and threw the sling around my shoulder. I think Aaron was on to something with that.

I tried to ignore the smell of beer that wafted from my dad’s room. He was probably passed out in there, and I wouldn’t see him again until next weekend. I felt a small pang of remorse that I had been so out of it at what might be our last ‘friendly’ talk in a year. I normally didn’t see him for weeks at a time.

I didn’t even try to put on my coat. Instead, I grabbed a small shall and wrapped it around myself with my good hands. I was glad I had a pair of imitation Uggs by the door so I didn’t have to worry about tying my tennis shoes. A few things were going right for me today.

When I saw Aaron turn down the street, I ran outside to hop into the car. He pulled away towards the center of town. “What do you want to get?” he asked.

“I don’t care,” I shrugged.

“Your choice,” he insisted.

“How about bagels?” I finally said. “I can grab one for lunch, too.”

“Your wish is my command,” he said grandly, puling a sharp right turn into the parking lot. “Let’s go.”

I walked right up to the counter. I didn’t come here very often, but whenever I did I knew what I would get. “Can I have one cinnamon sugar bagel with butter, and a herby turkey sandwich on a rosemary olive oil bagel?”

The lady on the other side of the counter nodded before turning to grab the bagels. I reached awkwardly across my body to pull out my wallet but Aaron stopped me. “Don’t even think about it,” he warned. “My treat.”

The woman at the register smiled at me. “You have him well-trained.”

I forced a false smile to my face. If only I did.

“So how’d you hurt your arm?” she asked as she rung up our food. “Slip on the ice?”

I didn’t let myself look at Aaron. I knew he’d be waiting to see what I said. A part of me wanted to admit the truth, but I knew I wouldn’t do that. “Yeah,” I finally said. “Landed right on it.”

She winced sympathetically. “Oww. I did that myself a couple years ago. Ended up fracturing the wrist. You didn’t do that, did you?”

“I hope not,” I shuddered.

“Well, if you did you’d probably know,” she agreed. “It hurt like hell, if you’ll excuse my language.”

I smiled slightly, mentally reviewing my own pain. Hopefully the Ibuprofen would last all day, so I didn’t need to explain it to anybody. “Thank you,” I murmured, grabbing the small brown bag she handed me.

“No problem,” she replied. “Have a good day.”

“You too,” I called, following Aaron out the door.

He climbed in and started the engine, and I could tell from the look on his face we weren’t going to discuss my wrist, or last night, at all. He knew our cover story, and that was all he needed. Details could be worked out as we went along.

I grabbed my bagel out of the bag and took a bite, letting the sugar and butter mix on my tongue. It tasted amazing. I remembered now why I got up extra early in order to eat. Aaron was quiet in the drivers seat. He seemed focused on the road, but maybe he was just trying to avoid me.

When we finally pulled up in front of school, I tried to swing my backpack over my shoulder before realizing that wasn’t going to work with my sling. I switched it to the other shoulder, letting it dangle there awkwardly.

Aaron grabbed his own bag out of the backseat and followed me to my locker. “Here, let me hold that,” he protested, grabbing my backpack from my hands as I struggled to hold it and open my locker at the same time. I immediately relinquished it, letting the weight fall off my shoulder.

I pulled some text books out with my good hand, sticking two of them in my locker before grabbing some notebooks to put into my bag. Aaron took them from me and slid them in for me, in their proper order and everything. I smiled at him, dropping my Brugger’s bag on top before zipping up the pocket. I picked up my notebook, cradling it against my chest, and let Aaron help me put the bag over my shoulder.

He brushed a kiss across my forehead, careful not to brush my wrist. “Are you going to be okay?” he asked worriedly. “Did you wrap your wrist well?”

I rolled my eyes. “I’ll be fine, Aaron. It’s not the end of the world.”

His eyes were shuttered, but I caught a glimpse of some new emotion in them. Regret? No, not Aaron. But something… different. “Well, I’ll see you at lunch. Make sure you don’t hurt yourself before then.”

His voice was teasing, but I caught the serious note in it. I headed into my math class, letting his words churn in my mind. As the teacher talked, I made a mental note to suck up my pride and ask Seth for help with this stuff. There was no way I’d be able to pull off a C without a serious crash course – like the ones he used to give me.

As I walked into music composition, I was mentally convincing myself not to back out. After all, it wasn't like I needed him to go over every problem with me, but he always seemed to be able to explain the subjects better than the teacher. A new perspective would definitely help me.

Seth was already sitting at our table, talking to a long, blond-haired girl. I vaguely recognized the fact that she sat behind us, but I had never talked to her. I walked towards them slowly, my self-confidence dying with each step. Why would he want to help me, when he could be spending time with a gorgeous girl like her?

Seth turned slightly, just enough to get a glimpse of me. “Hey Sophie,” he called casually. His expression hardened as he caught sight of my wrist. “What happened?”

The girl also looked curious, making no attempt to hide the fact that she was listening in on our conversation. “I slipped,” I mumbled. “On some ice.”

He frowned. “Where? I haven’t seen any ice around our area.”

“At Aaron’s house,” I lied. “I was over there last night, and it got late, and it was dark, and…”

Seth nodded. I could tell that bringing Aaron up had successfully shut down all his defenses. “He didn’t push you, did he? I mean, not that he…”

“No,” I replied, rolling my eyes. I forced myself to keep a light voice. “Why would he do that?”

“I dunno,” Seth mumbled. “You guys seemed like you were kind of mad at each other… And I know Aaron tends to joke around like that, so I thought maybe…”

“No,” I repeated. “I’m just naturally clumsy, I guess. Leave it to me that the first snow of the season and I’m already hurting myself.”

The girl behind me snickered and I forced myself not to look at her as whispered quietly to her friend. I made out a few words, something along the lines of, “That’s not the only way she hurts herself,” before I forced myself to block it out. I didn’t look at Seth, not willing to see if he had heard them – or, more importantly, if he believed them.

I headed up to the desk to get my pass to the computer lab. “Are you going to be ready, Sophia?” Ms. Dunford asked in concern.

“Yeah,” I assured her. “I just need to finish the last part, and I have all the pieces I need. I just have to string them together and I’ll be done.”

“Good,” the woman replied. “I’m looking forward to hearing this.”

“Thanks,” I mumbled. “I’ll be back before the end of the hour.”

Seth watched me pull my bag over my shoulder. “Want company?” he asked.

I shrugged, glancing at the girl behind him. She was giving me a death glare behind her long blond locks. It was obvious she wanted Seth to herself for the period. “If you want to.”

He smiled at me. “Of course I do. Besides, between you and I-” He leaned in to whisper to me “-I haven’t been given a new project, and I want to keep it that way.”

I let out a startled laugh and his smile grew. I could feel the hatred radiating off that girl, whoever she was, but I didn’t let myself think about that. I’d deal with the consequences later.

To my surprise, I wasn’t thinking of Aaron as one of those consequences. Maybe I should be, considering all the things he’d said about me and Seth. But I had a feeling he didn’t really mind that much. It had just been an excuse to get mad at me.

I sat down at the computer and began to work. The vocals weren’t quite as good as I wanted, but they’d have to do. I didn’t need much guitar here at the end, so I found the right pieces from what Seth had already recorded. And the piano… well, I knew I could do better. A few notes were off, and I wished I could change a rhythm or two. All in all though, it wasn’t bad. Especially for a week and a half.

I only paused once, when I saw Seth watching me. I paused my music and pulled the headphones off one ear. “What?”

He shook his head, grinning at me. “Nothing.”

I glanced at his computer screen “I think you’re about to die.”

He laughed quietly and quit the game. “I don’t care.”

I smiled to myself before pulling the headphones back into place. I needed to finish this.