The Last Dance

Chapter 5 Just The Opposite Of What Felt Like Reality

  Next week - Wednesday - Mike's house, the basement

  "One, two, three, four!"

  It was fast. Very fast. So fast that Mike couldn't depend on sheet music, he had to know the song off by heart. Which was hard due to the amount of chord changes and strumming pattern changes. First it was up, down, up, down, up, down. That was only the intro which was fully instrumental and depended on the lead guitar (which Mike was playing) to keep everybody else on time. For the first verse it was down, down, down, up, down, down. Will's voice joined in, which made it easier for Mike to follow. Will's voice always seemed easy to follow. The way his voice glided upwards to reach a high note or stayed steady to hold an extremely low note which was very impressive. He had the whole band in control, following him. Everybody but Richard.

  Richard sat at his usual spot, holding his drum sticks in his unbroken hand. He steadily hit them off the mid tom, keeping in beat with the song. His mind was elsewhere as he sneaked glances at Mike and then Will. Then Will to Mike. Then Mike to Will. It kept on going like this in a loop that Richard couldn't help but do to keep him sane in a way. He needed his eyes on them to make sure that they weren't doing anything sneaky like breaking another part of his body. 

  The chorus of the song started which meant the strumming pattern changed again to a simple down, down, down, down, down, down. His fingers moved at a rapid speed to keep up with Rose's bass guitar and Jesse's electric guitar. Mike's own acoustic guitar played each chord in time with them, joining them in harmony. Will's voice sang over them, perfectly. He sang this song so well - their song so well. Will had written the lyrics while the rest of the band wrote the melody and/or chords for their own instruments. It was a great song and was their first ever original song. The only person who didn't think the song was great was Richard, who was currently checking Will out as he belted the end of the chorus. Mike watched Will, and earned a look from Will himself. A small friendly smile appeared on his face as he nodded at Mike. Smirking, Mike gave him a nod back, making sure that Richard noticed.

  The second verse was the exact same as the first verse besides the fact that the lyrics took a darker turn. Mike could feel somebody staring at him, but he didn't have the time to look back at whoever was staring because he had to concentrate on this stupid strumming pattern. He could feel his hand going dead, but he pushed himself to continue to show Richard that he actually had an arm! It felt weird though, Mike thought to himself, the last time Richard and him were in this room they were best friends, but now they were enemies who were acting like two kids. It made Mike sad in a way how something could change so quickly. From Will being his enemy to a friend. A friend. It felt weird to call William Noel's, the most popular boy at school, his friend. Here he was though, performing in his basement with him. And here he was, hating Richard and wishing he could kick him out of the band, but he needed a drummer. They were only bandmates now. Only bandmates. It was as if Richard and Will had swapped places in the last week.

  The chorus came again and then ended and that was when the bridge began to play. Mike loved how Will wrote the lyrics of the bridge. It was like he summed up all of the song and made it into a paragraph instead of a story. To sum it up in Mike's words, "it was fucking amazing".

  The bridge was slow, meaning that there was a tempo change on Mike's sheet music that he didn't have time to check. His eyes were closed as he did a single strum of each chord and listened to Will. Listening to Will sing felt-

  "BORING!" Mike heard Richard shout suddenly. "This song is stupid, it's way too emotional for no particular reason! The lyrics are rubbish.. who even wrote them?"

  "Uh, me." Will spoke into the microphone, clearing his throat from singing some rather deep notes. "It's emotional because it's based on a sad story."