Cardinal

Chapter 18 "Love's Indifference"

"Ugh" Groggily sitting up, I felt the annoying glare of sunlight flood through my window. I felt hot from the heavy blankets and the light heating them, forcing me to try and avoid the heat. Walking over to the blinds, I quickly twisted the clear cylinder, causing the shutters to turn downward, saving me from the annoyance of the sun. Almost immediately, I felt the cool air of the fan rush down my back, causing me to shiver slightly. I continued my dazed walk back towards my bed, where I proceeded to fall on my back and stare at the ceiling.

As I did, I thought of Harrison and his obvious discomfort yesterday. Something had happened and I wanted to know what because I wanted to help him. If there even was a way I could help him. He wasn't like other guys I knew, caring about how people feel and knowing how different things affected others. A trait that many guys seemed to lack these days.

After a few moments, I reached for my phone. As I gripped the sides, I felt it vibrate against the tips of my fingers, notifying me that someone had texted me at some point. I unlocked the phone to see Harrison's message. Almost immediately, I felt a sense of sadness from his message as he admitted to me he was heartbroken. I was just like him.

He didn't know that I was going through the same thing as he was, just slightly different. It wasn't necessarily that they broke my heart knowingly, but rather the fact that they couldn't see what I saw in them.

"I'm sorry Harrison. If there's anything I can do to make you feel better, then I'll gladly do it." I pressed the send button, quietly looking at our chat history. It wasn't much, just us asking how our days were going and talking about school or whatever, but it was meaningful to me. He was one of my only friends, but something about him made me think of him as more than a friend. Although, he was more than a friend to me.

He was someone that I could rely on in the chance I needed him. He was someone that I could talk to about anything or not talk to at all and he'd understand what I was going through. As I lied there, I thought about Cardinal, the song I played while he was sitting beside me. I remembered the melody and how flattered I was about how much he liked it. Gently, I sat up and placed my phone down.

I crawled to the foot of my bed and reached for the notebook sitting on my desk, pulling it towards me with the edges of my fingers. Finally, I was able to take a hold of it and bring it towards me. From there, I lied back down and started flipping through the pages, remembering each of the melodies and rhythms I had written down. Some of them were slow and calming, while others were fast paced and caused you to want to dance to the beat. I stopped on a page, looking over the melody, thinking about its meaning and rhythm.

As I did, all I could think about was him. Something about this song reminded me of him. It was a completed song, with different rhythms that represented the build ups into climaxes. It was a simple pulling of a string, creating a low humming sound as the singer could be heard clearer. As the song continued however, the notes would continue to add to each other before reaching the first climax, causing the melody to speed up but not too fast as to change the entire feel of the song.

It continued like this, the low humming of the first melody staying consistently throughout the entire song. After the final climax though, the other melodies would cut off and the only thing that would be left was the original humming of the first melody. As I looked over the song, I felt a strange, sudden desire to record it and send it to him. Maybe a sort of inspiration for him to keep pushing forward or something along those lines. Quietly, I prepared everything.

I propped my phone against the wall on my desk so that the camera would look back at me playing the song. Behind the camera, I had the notebook opened to the page that the song was on. My blinds were still closed, causing the room to be fairly dark, but I had a desk lamp on to add some lighting and allow the camera to focus more. From there, I pressed the record button, starting the video. Quietly, I held onto the old guitar and placed it against my body, like my father had taught me.