Heart It Races

I walked in from school into a quiet house. They must actually be working today.

After the movie yesterday we had a raging Just Dance war, they all turned out to be so fun and I was thankful they weren't assholes.

"Aspen!" Calum called hugging me as I walked into the studio, Luke and Ashton also greeting me. My dad and Michael were behind the glass in the recording booth, tweaking a guitar. Michael's eyes met mine through the barrier and he waved, a smile washing over his face when I returned the gesture.

"How's it going guys?" I asked sitting in one of the arm chairs.

"Pretty good I think!" Ashton answered picking up an acoustic and plucking at it.

"How are you guys recording if you haven't written anything yet?"

"We had written a bit before we came here, so we're recording a song to get a feel for the studio."

I nodded.

My dad exited the booth, closing the door behind him. "Okay Mike, take it from-"

"Hi Michael!" I interrupted waving maniacally.

"Hello Aspen!"

"As I was saying", he cut his eyes at me, finger still on the button, "take it from the first bar."

The skunk-headed boy nodded putting on the headphones.

I focused on Ashton's fingers strumming and plucking the strings, the sound they were creating was beautiful, and for a moment I wished I too, could make something beautiful, something that made people stop and notice. I wished I could do something important, change someone's life, even if in the most minuscule way, just to affect something, anything, would be enough.

"What about you Aspen?" Luke's voice drew me from my thoughts.

"What?" I asked dumbly.

He chuckled, "Where's one place you've always wanted to go but have never been?"

I hummed tapping a finger on my chin in thought. "Hmm... I think it's a tie between The Door To Hell in Derweze, Turkmenistan, and Peru because they have Machu Picchu, the Amazon jungle, and the Lines and Geoglyphs of Nazca."

"What the fuck is The Door to Hell?" Calum asked, scrunching his face in confusion.

"It's like this crater in the desert that's always on fire."

"That sounds way cooler than LA." Ashton snorted condescendingly in Calum's direction.

"Hey! Never mock a young boy's dreams!" He defended.

"Fight me!" Ashton yelled standing up and slapping his chest aggressively.

Calum stomped over to him, puffing out his chest in an attempt to intimidate the older boy. The pair then began pushing and shoving each other around jokingly before Luke got up and broke them apart.

"I hope you've learned your lesson Irwin." Calum seethed, glaring at him, trying not to crack a smile.

I couldn't help the small giggle that left my lips.

"Okay Michael that was good!" My dad told, signaling him to take off his headphones and leave the booth. "Luke let's get you in here and we'll record the intro, bridge, and second riff."

Luke grabbed what I assumed was his guitar exchanging places with Mike.

"Oh God I'm tired!" He exaggerated plopping himself onto my lap, cutting off the circulation to my legs, and involuntarily making me grunt.

"Hey." He said casually, as if he wasn't crushing me, his head laid on the arm rest, legs draped over the other one.

"Hey", I giggled, poking him on the nose.

"How was school?" His lips curved into a smile.

"Super boring."

"I'm sure that will change next week." His hands reached up to take the ends of my hair in between his fingers, twirling them around.

"Have you guys got your schedules or anything yet?"

"No, they said they'll give them to us on Monday. "

"Why even go to school if you're in a band?"

"Oh Aspen you'll make a great parent someday." Calum said sarcastically.

I stuck my middle finger up at him, as the rest of the boys laughed.

"Because, we're not big or anything yet so it's good to have something to fall back on to in case this all doesn't work out." Michael informed, poking at my face.

"Alright fellas! That's it for today because I've got a date tonight and I need to go buy new pants." My father informed, picking up a few things and heading out. For the past 3 years he has been in a long term relationship with a girl name Veronica, who I liked very much, she was sweet, and funny, and laid back, a perfect match for my dad. I suspected a proposal soon. "Oh! And I'm taking your car!" He added before hurrying out.

***

"We should go downtown" I voiced my thoughts as we once again sat in the game room, Calum and Michael currently trying to dance to some Daft Punk song.

"And do what?"

"I don't know, they have cute vintage stores and food."

"Food, I like food." Luke spoke, his arm across my legs as i gave him a Sharpie tattoo, it was turning out to be a very good beetle.

Michael and Calum's dance off ended.

"I'm down."

Everyone agreed it would be fun.

"Hold on I'm gonna change my pants!" I called running to my room.

Texas was still hot this time of year and walking around downtown in jeans was not ideal, so, I put on shorts, quickly grabbing my bag, being sure to take out the almost empty carton of cigarettes and shove them under my pillow.

"Okay! Okay! Let's go!" I screamed running down the stairs and grabbing the keys to my dad's '67 Impala, then changing my mind and grabbing the Expedition keys.

"Shotgun!" Mike yelled running to the passenger door.

"Hell no! I'm older!" Ashton bellowed, trying to shove Michael out of the way.

"Fuck off Ashton!" Mike pushed Ashton out of the way, climbing in quickly.

I laughed starting the car as the other three got in, Ash sulking.

I plugged my phone into the radio, letting it play loudly as i reversed out of the driveway. Instantly the boys began obnoxiously singing, pretending to play instruments. That's how the whole ride went.

***

"If we come back here at sundown we can watch the bats." I told as we walked over the Congress Avenue Bridge.

"Watch bats?"

"Yeah, like a million bats all fly out from under the bridge. It's cool, touristy, but cool."

From there we continued up the sidewalk, not too crowded, seeing as it was Tuesday. We came to a shop decorated with old cameras and vintage toys, as well as instruments.

"Let's go in there." Luke suggested eyeing the old looking guitar in the window.

We followed him into the air conditioned establishment, all splitting up as our eyes caught something of interest. My eyes immediately went to an old The Turtles concert poster hanging on the wall. It was in flawless condition and I was surprised to see it was only thirty dollars.

By the time we left, I had bought the concert poster and cute heart shaped tin box, Luke bought a guitar strap with a design that reminded me a lot of an old man's suspenders, and Michael got an 80's Polaroid camera, the other boys teasing him about being a white girl the whole time, his argument being he needed to document their American adventure.

After that we walked through a few more shops stopping to get pizza afterwards, then walking back to the bridge to find a spot to watch the bats.

I stared down into the water below as the sun began to sink.

"Hey Aspen?" Mike's voice called, causing me to look up. Just as I did, a flash went off nearly blinding me.

"Dammit Michael!" I complained covering my face as the film rolled out. He shook it waiting for it to develop. When it finally did, it depicted Michael with his tongue out with me leaning over the bridge looking toward him in the background.

"I like it." He smiled placing it neatly in the pocket of his plaid shirt.

I was about to protest but at that moment a dark cloud erupted from under the bridge swirling about in a cornucopia of flapping wings as the bats all at once made their way from the bridge to find food. It was amazing and beautiful in a way, and I don't know why, maybe it was the massive amounts of life suddenly zooming and swooping and diving before me that had me entranced in a sudden state of awe, I couldn't pull my eyes away.

"That's fuckin' cool." Calum breathed next to me, the other boys agreeing.