Renny Boy

Before long, I was making my way to Soria’s house every Saturday to play music. Each week, she unleashed a new song to me, and each one was captivating - it was like singing with my hero. And sometimes we were bored and out of ideas and made more covers; however, it wasn’t like we were super famous. The most comments we got was on a cover of “Lucky to be Alive” by Braid – 15 comments. Most of it was an argument between this one guy who called them “emo” and another guy who said that Rites of Spring was “real emo.”

You haven’t seen real arguments until you’ve been on CoolTube. Let me just tell you that.

It wasn’t like we were intent on making this a serious thing. It was more of just a project-type thing. It didn’t occur to us that maybe we’d be better off going full-band.

So anyways, there was only one problem concerning this…well, two:

“You think we should get a bassist or something?”

“A drummer would be nice, too.”

It was as if the dilemma had been staring us in the face for so long and we just realized it. We were just at my house practicing that day, trying to collaborate and write a song together.

“You think anyone at school can help us?” she asked. She flipped the song over, like it was a rhetorical question. If only it was.

“I’ll bet there are a few kids who play. We can raid the band room,” I suggested.

“Right. Um, do you think it should say ‘I’ll give you my common sense just because/I lost most of it when I first met you,’ or ‘When I first saw you?’” she responded, turning to me. I guess we just dropped the subject…but she was in the zone right then and I didn’t bother snapping her out of it.

“I think ‘met you’ sounds better,” I added. We were done with the first verse and we were working on the chorus, and it was going pretty smoothly so far. Especially considering the fact that I sucked at writing. “From the top?”

“Common Sense,” the name of the song, was almost stylized like something you’d hear in the 90’s in suburban Illinois. Soria came up with the opening riff, which hit hard, and the first verse seemed a little…out there.

The first time that I met you
I thought that nothing’d come out of it, no
But this time
We’ll see the world explode into night…
I wanna see the cow jump over the moon
Like all the fairy tales say they do
I wanna see the stars dance
We’ll just be sitting here, me and you.

Mom opened the door and popped her head in, wrecking any chance of concentration either of us had. “Hello, Soria!” she sang. Soria waved and smiled, but I was kinda annoyed because she just interrupted my train of thought. “Are you two making music? Can I hear it?”

I looked at Soria, and she shrugged. So I guessed we had our first real audience. Even if it was my mom, heck, it still counted. Sort of.

She started the song. I closed my eyes to focus on singing and did my best to hit each note perfectly, until the verse ended and we had to stop. Mom did a golf clap, smiled enthusiastically, and squeezed both of us in one big hug.

“Yay!” she said as she walked out.

We stared at each other. “Okay…” she trailed off.

“That’s just my mom. You get used to her,” I laughed. She smiled and then made a face like she was thinking real hard.

“Can you sing a falsetto?” she asked, seemingly out of the blue.

“Is there a part with one?”

“Well, not yet, but maybe we can add one later.”

We worked well as a team. But somehow, just one guitar and one singer didn’t feel like enough. Soria and I were best friends, no doubt about it. Like the pact we made before, no secrets were kept. She was an avid writer and brought me anything she wrote, and if I came up with a cool tune, she knew it too within five seconds. It was cool, ‘cause for once I didn’t have that lonely feeling I had in elementary school.

“Do you two want something to drink?” Mom once again intruded into my room.
“Sure, Mrs. Hawker,” Soria replied, throwing in some sarcasm that I’m sure only I noticed. Mom walked out again, completely oblivious to it.

“Man, I wish my mom was like yours,” she told me.

“Why? Your mom’s cool,” I replied, confused. She looked at the floor and shook her head.
“Nah. Uh…she’s…that’s not my mom…” she trailed off, shrugging. I didn’t understand, but I didn’t want to ask her about it for fear of striking a nerve. And of course, me being a total genius, what did I end up doing?

“Then who is she?”

She gulped, putting down her pick. Then she puffed out her cheeks like it was the most stressful thing she’d ever said. “Alright, my mom was shot when I was four.” She inhaled and I had the urge to stop her from continuing, but I shut my big mouth and she kept on talking. Maybe it was for the better…?

She stared at me for a few seconds blankly. With a cracking low voice she told me, “You better not pity me for telling you that now.”

Keep your mouth shut, I told myself. No use saying something she’ll cuss you out for. But I shrugged anyway and smiled at her. “Well, I don’t think you’re done telling me all you gotta tell me.”

Soria turned away as if she were hiding something else. I shook her shoulder to get her attention, but she shrugged my hand away. “What else do I gotta say? It’s simple,” she whispered, turning back a little bit, but still not making eye contact.

I kinda hugged her, and that’s when she got eerily quiet.

I can’t say I was at a loss for words. I mean, Christ, I was the one who made her do that in the first place. If I hadn’t asked about her mom then we wouldn’t be awkwardly situated with her leaning into my scrawny chest, my arm around her shoulders in what might’ve been the weirdest “hug” I’ve ever gone through. But it was still kind of weird…I’d never held a member of the opposite sex other than my mom, let alone somebody my own age. I even felt a little guilty for shutting her up when we were on such a songwriting roll.

Everybody has those uncomfortable moments once in a while. Some of us are just born as a big one and it flares up every so often.

She sort of shook her head, staring at the ceiling and adjusting her beanie before sighing. “My dad lies about it, too. He’ll tell me he’s fine, he’s ready to date again, and he just rushes into things…God, he thinks I’m an idiot,” she mumbled, sending chills up and down my spine. “And that lady…the one you met…I don’t like her…she’s just…I don’t want another mom. I don’t want her. I don’t want anybody.”

I couldn’t understand why she kept these things to herself. But this might have been a milestone on the other hand - she trusted me. I’d never been trusted before, not that I know of, and she’d never trusted anyone that I knew of.

After five minutes, Soria broke away and stared at me, opening her mouth slightly to say something. “Hey, I’m sorry,” she whispered, her eyes glazed over. And I really didn’t know what to say to her, so I opened up my arms and hugged her again.

That’s it. I had a best friend.

And I hoped it would never end.

- - -

Most of our sessions so far seemed so…emotional. And that was putting it simply. Either we did absolute jack crap, or one of us had some kind of revelation. It was kind of stupid, really.

School was getting easier and harder at the same time. On one hand, my friendships were getting stronger; on the other hand, my teachers were dishing out harder stuff. Pretty much the only one that didn’t get any harder was chorus, and that grew to become my favorite class.

I know I’ve said that I was embarrassed about singing before. But with Soria and chorus, I got a little more comfortable about it. I was still nowhere near brave enough to blast my pipes in front of a real crowd, though. Jesus, no.

That year was probably the second best school year I’ve ever had. (The first best was ninth grade. I’ll let you figure that one out on your own.) I made some real friends who always had my back this time. I still felt a little weird around Brendan ever since I caught him stalking my house, but Luke made up for the discomfort. Even though he was probably the nicest dude I knew, I still learned nothing about him or his family. It was sort of odd.

One chorus class, we were arranged into groups of five to work on our renditions of the National Anthem, since it was Spirit Week. Because I was the only dude in the class, I was also the only dude in the group. I stayed quiet until I absolutely had to sing. That was common for me. I just daydreamed and stuff.

Then Luke walked into the class with a clipboard, taking me a little off guard. Once I remembered that he took the ‘office aide’ class, though, things made sense. (It was a useless class. All you had to do was pick up attendance because the ladies in the front office were too lazy to do it themselves.)

On his way out, he noticed me and walked in my direction. As always, he had a huge smile on his face and spoke as if he were on top of the world. “Hey Ren!” he called out. “I didn’t know you had chorus for fifth.”

To be honest, I was taken by surprise. “Um, yeah,” I mumbled sheepishly.

“Ah, yeah. I’ve been meaning to ask you something. Listen, I’ve heard about you and Soria having a band,” he said. Okay, hold up - how’d the word get out? Well…now that I think about it, maybe it was sort of obvious, the way we always hung out and talked about music. That and the fact that we were on the Internet…but it wasn’t like we advertised our music or anything.

“Anyways, I was wondering…um…you guys need a bassist? ‘Cause I’ll be happy to play a part.”

Holy crap.

What started as a little jam session just got an offering to become more complete.

As much as I might have wanted to have a bassist, Soria and I were in it together, and it wouldn’t be right to say yes if she didn’t want one. At least, that’s what I told myself just in case I would end up regretting it. “Er…well, I can’t say anything unless Soria agrees,” I explained.
Luke nodded in understanding and flashed a grin. “No problem, just lemme know what she says,” he said, turning to walk out the door and back to the office.

I met up with Soria on our way to sixth period and told her about Luke’s offer. Kinda useless, since she had sixth with him and could just tell him straight up. I had a feeling it might be a little hard for her to decide, since the songs she wrote were pretty personal. She might not have wanted to have a full band.

After sixth period, she came to me with her decision. She just shrugged. “What do you think we should do?” she asked me, surprisingly.

“Well…he came to me and asked, and I told him he wasn’t in unless you said so,” I replied.

“I’m not the only one in the twosome. You got a say in this.”

“I know your songs are personal so I didn’t want to screw anything up,” I said.

She smiled. “Ren, I’m gonna your advice. I’m gonna…try not to be paranoid anymore. Luke can join us, and if he thinks our songs are weird or stupid, well, that’s his opinion and he’s entitled to it. You were right. I gotta quit being a skeptic.”

I froze. I taught her something by tickling her and intruding on her business. My heart filled with something that was either joy or love, and for once, I was completely, genuinely, happy.

High on air, that’s what I was. Taking the atmosphere into my lungs and turning it into pure ecstasy; breathing it out not as carbon dioxide but as the sweet smell of satisfaction. I felt whole, and it all stemmed from a sad loneliness that had finally started to shrivel up and die.

Thank you, Soria.