kittie - scary stuff

Practice practice practice

Talena's eyes caught us as we walked in to Fallon's apartment. "Zoe?" She smirked. I felt as if they telepathically knew the news already. 

"Don't cream your pants, yes I'll sing for you guys. When's the gig?" I grumbled. Talena looked at the carpet as if it had the meaning of life itself, written on it. She had no dark makeup on - which was rare. Fallon was sitting beside her, studying the window instead, light bouncing off her glittery eye-shadow. I looked behind me to Mercedes who was now fascinated with finding split-ends in her ginger hair. "Why is everyone being weird? When is it on?" anxiety rumbled in my stomach. I knew it was going to be sooner than I expected initially. 

Fallon muttered something under her breath. 

"When. is. it. on.?" I repeated for a third time. "Three days." Talena answered finally. She began giggling uncontrollably. I didn't see the humour. "You get two weeks to learn bass and I get three. days. " I couldn't believe it. 

"Zoe, the setlist is chill. You sing along at rehearsals all the time. You'll be okay." Fallon assured me. "I guess we should get to it." I huffed. Fallon handed me a scrunched, taped-together setlist. No doubt a product of the recent argument. I hated to admit it but the strawberry head was right - i knew all the songs. 

-Spit, DYTIAH, Brackish, Choke

A pretty short list as I assumed we'd be supporting a different band. There was one song I didn't recognize - Choke. "What's Choke? Have I heard that?" I looked up to see Talena messing with Mercedes, blowing kisses. Fallon seemed to really care and replied immediately. "It's why you're here. I wrote it. I sing a couple verses in it.  Morgan fucking..." Fallon ran her fingers through her fiery red hair to come up with an appropriate word. "Despised the idea." Talena finished the sentence for her. Nods of subtle agreement were shared. 

"That sounds sick, do you have a demo?" I it my bottom lip in anticipation. I'd heard Fallon rap fun verses from radio songs, or sing along with the other girls, but never alone. "Yeah! You wanna hear it?!" A smile broke into her cheeks.

A sort of talking, sort-of singing started.

"Your hidden behind your good looks,
your fake smile,
i loved you but it took me a long while,
to realize you don't even care
all those feelings you had none
there's only one word that describes you and that's
hypocrite"

Then a melodic tune started:

"i looked over you, you looked over me, could you smile, you fucking pedophile (x2) "

It was a banger of a song. I couldn't understand why it had caused so much controversy with Morgan. "We ready to hit practicing?" Mercedes asked. I nodded nervously. We walked a couple blocks down to the sisters' parent's house, where all the gear lay patiently in the garage. There was no sign of Morgan, I'd assume she'd gone to a friend's house. 

We started off with practicing Spit, after the girls sound-checked their instruments. The intro went on for a few bars. I anxiously tapped my foot, attempting to count them but ultimately losing track. Talena looked at me, signalling to start singing maybe. I missed the cue. The other girls slowed down their playing in confusion. "Fuck, sorry." I rubbed my forehead. "You're good, it's a tricky timing. Try again?" Fallon tried her best to stay calm. A 1234 was yelled and the song started up again. Talena looked at me a bar before I was to sing, and I got it.

"Spit! I think I'll spit!" I sang, trying to feel the beat. "For all of those who speak contradiction!" I tried to sing/scream like Morgan would do but God, it was a whole lot harder than it looked. I caught a cringe face from Mercedes, not a mean one, but definitely a 'oh shit, we've got 3 days' look. 

"To the guy who crept through the shadows everyday," I tried to prepare for the next scream, taking a deep breath. "To clutch his own conclusion, Watch all the blood as it drips from your veins you, Coward, Godspeed." Oh no, that sounded like a strained cat and I could feel the girls tensing up. "May your death come quickly. I think I'll..." At least that bit sounded okay 

Fuck, more screaming. "Take this hate! And!" FUCKK more weird timing. "Spit!" I followed Talena's' face cues. "Spit, Spit." I took a deep breath, I could do this. I remembered once I asked Morgan for a tutorial. I barely remembered it, only that I shouldn't fore it out and that I should let it come from my chest rather than my vocal chords. I didn' knw how to do either of thse things, but I'd try. 

"Now as it's passed onto the next one!" Woah, that sounded WAY better. Talena gave me a 'fuck yeah!' look. Fallon relaxed her stance as she played. "I feel a blood rush come right over me." Mercedes beat the drums freely. 

We played the rest of the set pretty well, there were a couple lyrics I wasn't sure of that I confirmed afterwards and a few pointers I needed to work on but - hell - we were going to go on in three days and not suck ass!