Roses are Red, Black Eyes are Blue

The next day Anna slept in until about eleven in the morning. When she got up she took a quick shower in the bathroom connected to her room and changed into a purple and gray plaid button up shirt and a pair of black jean shorts. Making her way down the stairs, she saw her father moving around the living room quickly.

“Morning Dad, are we finally going to unpack today?” Anna asked, curling up on the couch and watching her dad.

“No, Anna. We’ll have to do that some other time. I have to go to the office today,” he replied as he stuffed something into his briefcase.

Anna rolled her eyes and mumbled under her breath, “Of course you have to,” before she finally realized what was happening. “Wait, you’re leaving? For how long?” she asked quickly.

“Something came up with the case I’m working on, so we had to call an emergency meeting at
the office,” he explained, not at all answering his daughter’s question.

“But how long will you be gone?”

“Most of the day. I might be late for dinner, so you’ll just have to start without me tonight,” he replied and picked up his briefcase, heading towards the door.

Anna quickly jumped up and followed him to the entrance, trying not to seem too excited. “Can you call me when you’re on your way home?”

“Why do you want me to do that?” he asked and turned to look at his daughter for the first time that morning.

“I’m nervous to be in this house all by myself, you know, cause we’ve only been here for a week or so. It would just make me feel better to know when you’re on your way home,” she quickly lied, trying to seem sincere and embarrassed.

Her father watched her for a moment before he smiled and opened the door. “Of course I can call first if it will make you feel better. Now behave and don’t forget to study,” he said and closed the door behind him.

Anna listened for the sound of the car pulling away before she bolted up the stairs to find her cell phone and dialed the only number she had besides her parents’.

“Do you realize it is still the morning, Banana?” an annoyed and sleepy sounding Frank asked as a greeting.

“Only for the next twenty-five minutes. But that’s not important. My dad just left the house,” Anna said excitedly, knowing she didn’t really need to explain.

“Seriously? For how long?” he asked, sounding wide awake.

“Pretty much all day. Now get your butt over here.”

“Ok, where’s your house?” he demanded and Anna quickly explained how he could reach it.

******

Almost thirty minutes later Anna was sitting on the couch in the living room waiting until she heard someone ring the doorbell – repeatedly. Jumping up she quickly walked towards the door and threw it open, glaring at Frank.

“Do you really have to do that?” she asked, suppressing a smile.

“I was just making sure it worked,” he answered innocently, pressing it one more time before pushing past her and into the house. “You’re house is huge, by the way,” he added as he looked around, examining the large entrance room.

“I’m aware of that. Hey, you have to take your shoes off; if the carpet gets messed up Dad will know someone was here and have a cow,” she told him and pointed towards a bench next to the door.

“Ok, ok, Mom, jeez.” He joked as her slipped off his beat up converse. “So what are the plans for today?”

Anna shrugged and made her way into the living room with Frank in tow. “Not sure,” she replied, “Haven’t really thought that far ahead. I was just excited that he finally left.”

“Well I for one want to see your room. Now be a good little tour guide and show the way,” he demanded, lightly poking Anna’s nose as she glared up at him before she turned away and headed up the stairs.

When they reached her room Anna reluctantly opened her door and stepped to the side to let Frank in.

“Well, it’s clean, that’s for sure,” he said, looking around.

Anna sighed and flopped onto her bed, wishing she hadn’t brought Frank to her room.

“Hey, come on. It’s not that bad, and I know you just moved here, so I’m sure you just haven’t finished unpacking yet,” Frank said as he sat next to Anna on her bed, trying not to smile at her dramatic reaction.

“I am unpacked,” she mumbled a reply, keeping her face buried into her pillow.

“What?” Frank asked as he grabbed her shoulders and lifted, bringing her face up high enough so he could hear her.

“I am unpacked! My room is just boring!” Anna shouted before Frank dropped her back into her pillow and laughed at her reaction.

“So? Put some posters up or something.”

“Like what?” Anna asked as she rolled over so she could see Frank.

“I dunno, posters of your favorite bands or something.”

“I don’t have any. Well, unless you count classical music, but Mozart isn’t really all that awesome to look at in poster form I’m sure,” Anna rambled on.

“What do you mean you don’t have any favorite bands?” Frank shouted, looking stunned. “You’re a musical prodigy and you don’t listen to music?”

“I do listen to music, classical music. I just don’t really know where to start with other genres of music,” Anna defended, picking at her pillow case.

“That’s it, I’m letting you borrow my entire CD collection. You have a serious problem and we’re going to fix it. But first, can I hear you play something now?” he asked, his expression going from serious to goofy in no time at all.

“Of course. The studio is downstairs,” Anna told him and hopped off the bed, more than ready to leave her room.

“Wow, you’ve got to be kidding me,” Frank said as they stepped into the studio. “You own all of these?”

“Well, most of them technically belong to my dad because he bought them, but some of them were gifts,” Anna explained as she automatically walked to her piano and stroked the keys.

“Well, go on, play something,” Frank demanded, crossing his arms over his chest.

“What instrument?”

“Doesn’t matter, I’m going to make you play them all for me.”

Anna laughed and shook her head, sitting down at the piano first. She already had some music spread out in front of her, and it just so happened to be the finished product of the song she had been wanting to show Frank, so she didn’t bother looking for more music.
Without warning, Anna dived right into playing. She was suddenly serious, no longer worrying about anything but the music and keys in front of her. This was how Anna always was when she played, especially when she played a piece she really liked. As the last note resonated around the room, Anna let the worry flood back into her and she turned back towards Frank.

Frank stared at her for a moment, eye brows raised, before finally asking, “Isn’t that one of the pieces you wrote in your notebook?”

Anna blinked in response before speaking, “You actually recognized it?”

“Well, yeah, I’ve looked through your note book like a million times. Did you really write that? That was amazing!”

Anna blushed and looked back at the piano keys. “Thanks.”

“Alright, now you have to show me more. I demand it,” Frank declared and smiled down at Anna’s blushing face.

******

About an hour later Anna had finished playing all her instruments for Frank. They were sitting at Anna’s desk, Anna sitting in the chair and Frank sitting on the desk, and Anna explained how she wrote her music and filed it.

“And once I’m set on the music, I take the scratch sheet, plug it into the program on my laptop to convert it into a cleaner version and add all the stylistic marks that I need, then print it and put it in here,” she finished and kicked her filing cabinet lightly.

“Wow,” Frank replied, “You should really think about doing this professionally. You’re pretty much amazing at it.”

Anna smiled weakly and started shuffling papers around on her desk. “I really want to. It’s kind of my dream to do something with music, but my dad wants me to go to law school and work for his company or something. He pretty much has my whole life planned out for me,” Anna explained sadly.

“Well don’t do it. It’s that simple. Just tell him you don’t want to do it and for him to mind his
own business. You should do what makes you happy, Anna,” Frank told her, looking completely serious for once.

“I can’t, Frank. Dad has done so much for me, I mean look at this studio. He paid for all my music lessons too, I can’t just tell him to shove it; it would be like letting him do all this for me and then saying that I wasn’t thankful. And besides, he would pretty much disown me if I told him I didn’t want to go to his alma mater and join his company.”

“You can’t just let him tell you what to do though. What are you going to do when you move out and he’s still trying to control you?”

“I know, I know,” Anna said throwing her hands up in defeat. “I’ll think of something. Believe me, the last thing I want to do is become a lawyer.”

Suddenly Frank hopped off the desk and walked towards Anna’s electric guitar and changed the subject. “Ok, now it’s my turn to show you something,” he said as he threw the strap over his shoulder and turned to face Anna. Suddenly he started playing a song and Anna had to keep her jaw from hitting the floor. He was amazing. When he finished playing he looked back at Anna and smiled, unplugging the guitar from the amp and walking towards her with the guitar.

“What the hell, Frank? You were fawning all over my ability to play and then you pull this shit out of nowhere?” Anna asked, feeling a little embarrassed for being so confident in her ability to play the guitar when Frank, her audience for the day, was so much more amazing than she.

“Well you’re good too,” he said as he jumped back up on the desk with the guitar in his lap, strumming a few chords.

“Yeah, I’m good, but you’re amazing. Now I feel like you were setting me up, you jerk,” Anna accused.

Frank shrugged his shoulders, still playing softly, and replied, “I may be more skilled than you at the guitar, but I will never have the level of skill that you have to play a whole room of instruments with the same ability that you have. You are truly amazing, Anna Banana.”

Anna rolled her eyes in response and watched Frank’s fingers move over the neck of the guitar, playing effortlessly. After a few moments of silence, Frank decided to break the quiet.

“Can I ask you a question, Anna?” he asked, looking down at the guitar and not his friend.

“You just did, Franky,” she replied with a laugh, not taking her eyes off his fingers.

It was quiet again so Anna looked up to see Frank looking at her with his rare serious face. “What is it, Frank?” she asked, suddenly concerned.

Frank stopped playing and asked, “Do you still have feelings for Mikey?”

Anna blinked for a few moments, processing the question, before finally replying softly, “No. I feel terrible for admitting this, but I don’t think I really ever had that level of feelings for Mikey, if that makes sense. I mean, I loved him as a friend, and he’s really a wonderful guy, but when we were dating, it felt the same as when we were just two friends hanging out. When he asked me to be his girlfriend, I thought, ‘Sure, we can try this out, see how it goes,’ but nothing really changed except I called him my boyfriend instead of best friend. Then again, maybe that’s how relationships are supposed to be like, I don’t really have anything to compare it to except my parents’ marriage, and that was a total failure,” Anna said, picking at the hem of her shorts.

Frank thought about what she said and started playing softly again. “So you two probably won’t be getting back together, then?” he asked, trying to sound neutral about the matter.

Anna sighed and shook her head, “No, it’s going to be hard enough getting back to ‘friend’ status.”

Frank thought about that for a moment and smiled softly, removing his serious expression and mood. “Good,” he said and nudged Anna with his foot, “cause I don’t want to have to share my Anna Banana with anyone. Not for a while, anyways.”

Anna rolled her eyes and nudged him back with her elbow, glad that goofy Frank was back.