Fleeting

Breakaway

27th February 2021

My hands strummed a few random chords on my guitar, trying to capture the tune in my head. I played a few more chords, the start of a rhythm coming to me. It was incomplete, only a handful of notes thrown together, but it was something.

I scribbled them down in my notebook, placing the pencil back behind my ear. I focused on the way they sounded, sounding them out slowly and then in quick concession, trying to tease the next part of the song from my brain.

It was no good, though. A song could never be forced. It was a rare type of unicorn that would only reveal itself in its own time. No amount of goading would make it work, no matter how long I spent there trying to grasp it.

I placed my hand flat against the fretboard, letting the guitar rest on my knees. I stretched out my fingers, hearing the joints pop as I cracked my knuckles.

"You know Jaxon hates you doing that."

I griped the guitar quickly before it could slip from my lap as I jumped at the sound of Tori's voice.

"Jesus, give a man some warning next time." I placed a hand over my beating heart as he took a seat opposite me, and Teddy came and sat by my feet.

I had no clue how long he'd been standing there watching me. Despite his large build, he had the uncanny ability of moving silently. It could be particularly unnerving if you weren't expecting him to pop up.

"Sorry," he said, not sounding the least bit, a smirk clear in his voice.

He always found it funny to see how people reacted to him. I was his usual target because apparently I reacted the best - whatever that meant.

"S'okay, just didn't hear you, that's all." As if he didn't know. "Where's Jaxon and Hazel?"

"I left them with their anime marathon." He rolled his eyes, and I chuckled.

It was Jaxon and Hazel's usual way to relax and unwind together. Unfortunately, Tori was not as enamoured with the crazy Japanese programs as his girlfriend.

His eyes roamed from my guitar to my scribbled notebook laying open beside me. There were more doodles and scratched out words than actual songs lyrics.

I resisted the urge to reach over and flip it shut.

Even after all I had achieved, I was still defensive of my songs. The bullies at school - the ones that had mocked me for the words I wrote - still got the better of me sometimes, no matter how much I had moved away from them.

Tori reached forward and closed the book with a sigh. "Do you remember the day we met?"

I blinked at the unusual topic.

Of course, I remembered. It wasn't a day I was likely to forget.

I was a scrawny fifteen-year-old heading home from highschool. A song had been worming its way through my brain all day, and I couldn't wait to get it down on paper. It was a desperate need not to lose any part of it. So I pulled out my notebook and sat down right on the sidewalk.

Too engrossed in my notebook to notice the footsteps approaching me. Maybe if I hadn't been, I would have escaped, but then I wouldn't have met Tori.

The bullies, the ones that made my school life a sort of living hell, found me. When they started tearing pages out of my notebook, I could feel each tear like it was physical wounds on my skin.

I remembered seeing red. Remembered being more angry than I ever had before.

There I was. My fifteen-year-old self pumped up on anger, forgetting for just a moment that my 112 pound body had no hope to win against the 160 pounds of muscle that stood in front of me. But I didn't care. I reached forward and slugged him right across the face, breaking his nose.