Better Off Dead Than Alive In Here

The first guy to walk over was very tall. He looked Spanish, maybe? He had on an old, blue basketball shirt, white and black checkered Vans, black shorts, and a pair of white glasses.

The next guy was around the first guy's height. He had a fiery explosion of red hair. It was the first thing to catch my attention. He wore basically the same thing as guy one, except he had a sweatband in his hair instead of glasses.

The third guy was a little shorter than the other two, but just as lanky. He wore a white v-neck, black skinny jeans, converse, and an awesome beanie on his head.

The guys all greeted each other with fist bumps and "hey"s, then Pete introduced me.

"Guys, this is Lily Marie Andrews. She is going to teach riding lessons and going to be in your counseling group with you."

Then John said, "Lily, meet Gabe Saporta, Travis Clark, and Alex Gaskarth. They are only a small part of the awesome people here."

I smiled and laughed. The first guy, Gabe, came up to me and said, "Hola Chica! My name is Gabriel Saporta, and I teach football with this ginger over here."

"Hey! Don't dis the color! Only a few people can pull this off!" the guy who I presumed was Travis said.

"Yeah, yeah..." Gabe muttered some Spanish words I didn't catch.

"Anyways... I'm Travis Clark! I teach football with the loser over here. Pete has talked a lot about you. Do you really go to school with William?" Travis was a very enthusiastic person.

"Yeah," I said quietly.

"And she likes Ivory!" John exclaimed.

"Wow!" The third guy, who had to Alex, said, "You are a really strong person then! My name is Alexander William Gaskarth, Alex for short, and I work in the barn too! By the way, I love Ivory. They are awesome!"

"That's what I said!" John cut in with a smile.

"Alright, alright, I think that we can all agree that Ivory is awesome. Now, we need to get to the dorms and help Lily start unpacking before dinner starts. We have like 2 and a half hours before the drinks are out so let's get going." Pete said.

Gabe picked up the suitcase that John had oh so mysteriously gotten as far away from as possible.

We were leaving the car until I remembered something, "Hey, wait up guys."

I ran back to the car and unlocked it. In the backseat sat my old guitar case. I owned an acoustic guitar. Yes, I do write my own songs, but NO ONE, not even Pete knows that. I grabbed my lyric booklet and stuffed it into the case. I closed the case and walked back to the guys with it.

"Alright, I'm ready," I said.

"You play?" Pete looked surprised.

I smiled at the ground, "Yeah, I do, not well though,"

"Why didn't you ever tell me?" Pete said. He had that look on his face saying 'this is stuff you tell your older brother Lily'

"You never asked!" I defended myself. He never asked me!

"Do you sing?" Alex asked. He looked like he had an idea forming in his head.

"No..." I said.

One thing to know about me is that I can never lie to my friends well. I can lie to people I dislike or don't know like there is no tomorrow, but with my family and friends it is hard.

"Oh I see. Why don't we talk more in the dorms?" asked Gabe, "It is kind of hard to carry this suitcase while other people just stand around.... JOHN!"

"Yeah, we saw the three attempts to pick it up," said Travis, "and it's okay! We know you have your problems."

My 'new best friend' was outraged, "You know I have problems, Travis!" He gave Travis a gentle shove laughing the whole time.

We all started walking to the dorms. Alex and Pete were talking about the gig. Pete seems to be like the head of all these guys. They all respect him, and he seems to run the gig at Harold's. It seemed so far Alex, John, Travis, Gabe, AND Pete's band would be playing tonight.

Travis and Gabe were talking about dinner tonight. They always went over to the house at 4:30. Everyone sat, talked, played games, and listened to music for a while. Ash made dinner and it was served at six o'clock. The guys ate and got ready for the gig. They left at 7:45 for Harold's.

I was quiet for the walk. I'm not much of a talker, so I just listened and took in my surroundings. This was a HUGE facility. There was a baseball diamond in the far southeast corner. 3 volleyball courts were placed to the west of that. At the far southwest corner there was a full swimming pool. North of the volleyball courts and swimming pool there was a full sized football field. BCD uses it, as it's home field. Finally, in the northeast corner there was a basketball and tennis court. That was only one part of the place! I had never seen an area of land this big. It had a golf course also, but I don't even want to know where that is.

We finally reached a building that was about the size of the dining hall. It had a sing on it that said "Worker Dorms". I took that as the place we were heading.

Travis opened the door for me and we stepped into a small hallway. There was a door and a staircase. Alex went up the stairs so I followed. At the top of the stairs there was another door. He opened it up and stepped through. I stepped through the door and took a right. Alex then decided to take the place of my tour guide.

"Welcome Lily Marie Andrews to the Workers dorm!" Right now we are in a hallway!! Applause!!" Alex made us all clap and play on with his joke.

"Now," he started, "if you make a left walk a few steps.... okay stop! To the left we keep all of your band stuff: guitars, drums, basses, microphones, ect."

I looked into the small room and saw the instruments packed in. They were all divided into different sections.

"Moving on," Alex pulled me out and back into the hallway, "We are coming up to the bathroom on the left. There are 9 shower stalls and 8 toilets. Don't hog, it's not cool."

The bathroom was nice enough. I smiled at the rest of the guys, who were all ready to get into the bunks, which I could guess would be on my right.

"Hey, Alex! Who is with you?"