I Left My Heart in San Diego

I sprinted full speed back to my garage, wondering if Arizona really had the pride - or not, as the case may be - to follow me in her pajamas.

As I was peering over my shoulder to see if she was, in fact, following me, I heard a shout from close at hand. Looking back ahead, I noticed I was about to smash into Tre's shitty old drum set. It may be ancient, but it's all he's got, and he would still murder me painfully if I happened to damage it, on purpose or by accident.

I planted my heels into the asphalt of my driveway, skidding to a stop right in front of Tre's face, slamming my hands down on the rims of the two nearest drums to stop myself from falling forward over the drum set.

"There you are, Billie! Where the hell have you been?" Tre yelled, whacking me on the head with one of his drumsticks. Unfortunately for me, Tre had the faster reflexes when it came to his drumsticks, so he withdrew it and started spinning it around between his fingers before I could even touch it.

"Why does it fucking matter? At least I'm here now," I yelled back, getting defensive.

"By the sound of it, I would say our Billie here has found himself a new girlfriend," Mike remarked, his fingers drumming over the frets of his bass guitar but not playing anything.

"Shut the fuck up, Mike. Arizona is NOT my new girlfriend. I just met her yesterday." I stood up and brushed myself off, walking over to where my guitar was, laying across a covered wooden bench against the side of my garage.

"Arizona? Is that her actual name?" Mike asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Why don't you ask her yourself? I invited her to practice," I answered, lifting the guitar strap over my neck. Ah, the familiar feeling of getting to play another day with my guitar.

"Dude. Not cool. Could you have at least asked us first?" Tre interjected.

"Yeah, or at least answered your phone?" Mike added.

"Jeez, guys, could you get the fuck off my back? It's not that big of a deal. You've always said we could use an unbiased third-party opinion, Mike. I think you should be thanking me," I retorted, wanting to drop the subject and start playing.

"Damn, Billie, how do you remember this shit?" Mike sighed, strumming a random chord and shaking his head.

"When is this state-named, unbiased third-party opinion going to be here, then, Billie?" Tre asked, now spinning both drumsticks. Not paying as much attention as he usually does, Tre lost control of one of his drumsticks and it smacked against one of the cymbals, resulting in a big crash and a wooden click as the drumsticks hit the cement floor of my garage.

Caught by surprise, Tre stops spinning the other drumstick, quiets the cymbal, and picks up the fallen drumstick from the ground all in one fluid motion, sitting back up again with the pair of drumsticks still in his one hand with a look on his face that said, 'Nobody just saw that.'

Mike just chuckled and went back to strumming random chords, eventually switching to the chords to Wake Me Up When September Ends. I laughed, and told Mike to shut up for a second whilst I tuned my guitar.

"You could've done that if you were here on time," he mock-scolded, shaking a finger at me like he was my dad or something. I hated it when he did that...

"Shut up, Mike," I growled, strumming an A chord and adjusting the guitar's knobs accordingly.

"Ooh, touchy, Billie. You must really like this girl," Tre said, spinning a drumstick again.

"Tre, I would concentrate more on that spinning drumstick than on me if I were you. I may act gay for you, but you all know that I'm as straight as a flagpole," I told him, strumming a perfect C chord.

"Ha! We both know that all too well, Billie," Tre said, smiling as he started tapping a drumstick on the rim of the nearest drum.

"You both know what all too well?" a girl's voice asked from the garage door. I looked up and saw Arizona ducking under my cracked garage door, looking positively fucking sexy in a grey band t-shirt, dark skinny jeans accenting her long legs, pink-striped skate shoes and a purple hoodie with yellow writing on it. Maybe inviting her here was a bad idea...I'm gonna get distracted so easily.

"How straight Billie is," Mike answered, obviously much better at hiding his first impression of Arizona better than Tre was.

"Um...okay?" Arizona said, cocking her head slightly to the side, her dirty blonde ponytail sliding off the back of her head enough to see the tip poking out underneath her chin.

It was then there was a huge loud CRASH that sounded like a drummer falling off his stool at the sight of a really pretty girl in front of him, which in fact it was. Tre was so taken aback at how pretty Arizona was, I assumed, that he literally fell off the stool he was sitting on behind the drum set, and then proceeded to pretend to pass out. Arizona was curious as to what the hell Tre was doing, so she peered over the top of the drum set, and Tre popped up spontaneously, making Arizona jump slightly. Tre very nearly missed a well-delivered punch to the face by ducking down to pick up the drumsticks that had fallen under a drum when he fell off his stool.

Shaking my head to clear it, I turned to Mike and Tre and said, "Guys, this is Arizona Willows, the girl I was telling you about. She just moved in down the street."

"So you're the girl I was talking to on Billie's phone?" Mike asked incredulously.

"Yeah," Arizona answered, nodding.

Mike hurriedly put his bass down and ran to Arizona, kneeling down at her feet. "Shit, I'm sorry!"

Arizona burst out laughing, the cutest smile breaking out on her face. She had an adorable laugh, too, like the laugh of a girl still stuck in middle school. Her laugh made me wonder how old she was, but, looking at her, she couldn't be that much younger (or older, I don't know) than me. When she regained her composure, she bent down and patted Mike on the shoulder, saying, "Dude, it's cool. You don't have to, like, worship me or anything."

Mike stood up. "Well, yeah, I know, but I didn't think you were this damn pretty!" he exclaimed, running a hand through his dyed blonde hair that was starting to grow out. You could see the natural brown starting to show at the tips of the pieces of hair down the sides of his face.

Arizona blushed, looking ever cuter than when she smiled, and looked down at her feet, trying to hide her red face. "Thanks," she muttered, looking up at Mike a moment and looking back down again.

I laughed, putting a hand on her shoulder. I expected her to sober up and shy away, but she didn't even flinch. Kind of makes sense: A girl as pretty as she is has probably had her share of boyfriends, which might put me out of the running...

"Here, sit down. We're just tuning up," I said, sitting her down on the covered bench where I picked up my guitar.

"Okay!" she said eagerly, her eyes lit up like candles during a winter power outage. "But before you start playing, could you show me where the bathroom is? I didn't get a chance before I climbed out my window. My mom heard my music playing from my room, and she was going to verbally murder me if I didn't get my ass out the window." Her ice blue eyes bore into my own dull green ones, communicating to me a longing to be free of her oppressive mother.

"Yeah, right this way," I said, putting my guitar down on the bench beside her and extending my hand. She didn't take it right away as she was staring at my guitar, the blue finish glinting slightly in the late December sunlight. "Arizona?"

"Oh, hi," she said hurriedly as she took my hand. I felt a spark all the way up my arm, and I couldn't tell from the angle of her face I was looking at if she felt it, too.

"Like the guitar?" I asked as we walked inside.

She nodded enthusiastically. "It's pretty," she said, her voice sounding the way a little girl's might if she were in a toy shop. I chuckled, stopping by a white door with a brass handle, like all the other doors in my house.

"Thanks. Here's the bathroom. The garage is just back down this hallway and to the right. It's grey," I said, pointing to the bathroom door and then down the hallway.

"Okay, thanks," she said, slipping inside and closing the door.

I walked back out to the garage, eager to speak with Mike and Tre about what they thought of Arizona. When I got back out there, they were both pinning me with surprised looks and wide eyes. I laughed and picked up my guitar again, lifting the strap over my head once again.

"Billie, where the fuck did you find a girl like that?!?" Mike hissed.

"Yeah, Billie, she's fucking gorgeous," Tre added.

I laughed. "She really is something, isn't she?"

"You know, Billie," Mike said, returning to sanity (or as sane as sane gets for Mike Dirnt), "I think that she might make you turn over a new leaf."

"What do you mean?" I asked, strumming the first chord to Jesus of Suburbia.

"He means that this girl might break your random fucking spell," Tre said, clicking a drumstick on a rim and continuing to spin it between his fingers.

"What? You two are crazy," I said, starting to play.

"Okay, boys," Arizona said, reentering the garage, "I'm ready for you to blow my mind."