Battery Is Found In Me

Chapter 2 ~ Record Stores and Announcements

You slipped on your faded black Converse shoes and walked out the door. The air was warm and breezy, with a light fresh scent wafting through it. "It's finally summer," you thought to yourself. It was the beginning of July, the 2nd to be exact. You had just finished your senior year of high school, and you couldn't be happier. You were sick of that place. Sick of the homework, sick of the stress, sick of the teachers, the drama, the people, the back-stabbing assholes that you had dated.... sick of it all. Thank goodness you were off to college this year. At least that was what you had planned...

~ ~ ~

You met up with your best friend, Emily, at the mall not far from your house. She had been your only friend throughout your four years in high school, but you didn't really care. You were perfectly fine having one friend, because number one, it's better to have one good friend instead of 10 "friends" that are horrible to you; and number two, pretty much all of the other people at your school were assholes(and yes - you knew that for a fact). Point being, the two of you were pretty close.

You met her in the food court. She was nibbling on a gigantic plate of french fries, and you could see a magazine on the table next to her.

"Hey, Em," you said as you sat across from her at the table. She had about 4 fries stuffed in her mouth as she looked up.

"Oh, hey, Y,N!" she said, the fries muffling out her words. "What's up? You look kind of sad." You plucked a french fry from her plate and plopped it in your mouth. You rolled your eyes and smiled. "I'm just having one of those days when everything is going wrong, y'know?" She smirked.

"Yeah, I have those days sometimes." She looked at your shirt. "Hey, I love that album! It's like, my favourite album of all time." She was referring to Iron Maiden's 'The Number Of The Beast', which was the album jacket art layed out on your t-shirt.

"Yeah, it's a killer record." you said. You looked at the magazine next to her. "Hey, what do we have here?" She smiled. "It's the newest edition of 'Metal Mania'." You picked it up and studied the cover. The band displayed was none other than Metallica, who were your all-time favourite band. You had the biggest crush on their frontman, James Hetfield, but the others were super cute too. You practically worshipped this band. You had their first and second records at home, Kill 'Em All and Ride The Lightning, and just recently picked up their newest record, Master Of Puppets. You always dreamed of meeting them in person. They just seemed so cool-

"Y,N!" Emily said loudly, waving her hand in front of you. You blinked. "Oh, sorry, Em. You know me. I tend to space out a lot." You laughed sympathetically. She got up from her seat. "Hey, lets go to the record store downtown!"

You thought it was a great idea. It could clear your mind of your shitty morning that you just had. You jumped up from your seat. "Yeah! Let's go!"

~ ~ ~

The two of you had caught the bus downtown. The ride was about 45 minutes. You loved going downtown. There were so many shops and markets. As the bus came to a complete stop, you exited the bus with Emily and began walking to the record store.

"What are you going to buy?" she asked you.

"I'm not exactly sure," you replied. "You?"

"Hmm..." she said. "Maybe something by Cheap Trick or Pink Floyd. Their stuff is awesome."

"Yeah."

The two of you walked for about 5 minutes before finally arriving at 'Sam's Record Shop'. The door jingled as you entered the store and the owner of the store greeted you.

"How ya doin girls?" he said enthusiastically.

"Good," the both of you said in unison.

"How 'bout you, Sam?" Emily said.

Sam let out a sigh. "I've had better days, y'know?" He paced around the store. "Sales have been low, I guess everyone's buying CD's now... I mean, it is the eighties, so...."

You coughed. Sam turned to you.

"Anyways, enough about me. Go have fun. Records are 60% off, tapes are 80% off, and 8-tracks are 90% off!"

"Thanks, Sam!" you said.

You and Emily ran off to check out the boxes filled with records. From Simon and Garfunkel to Slayer, there was so much awesome stuff in that store. Emily went off to check out the Pink Floyd records, while you paced around the store, unsure of where to start. In a matter of minutes, Emily was back, arms full of records. From what you could see, she had decided on Pink Floyd's 'The Final Cut', Van Halen's '1984', Black Sabbath's 'Paranoid' and Cheap Trick's 'Heaven Tonight'.

You chuckled. "That was fast!"

"Well," Emily said. "There's just so much stuff that I wanna buy!"

"Yeah... I still dunno what to buy."

"Y,N!" Sam called from the front desk across the store. "I have something you might be interested in!"

You and Emily walked to the front desk. "Let's see," you said.

Sam pulled out a cassette tape. "Y,N, I'm pretty sure you know what this is."

You smiled. "Of course!" It was Metallica's demo tape, 'No Life 'Till Leather'. This was their debut tape, and it was so early on that Dave Mustaine was still in the band when they recorded it. You smiled. "Oh my goodness, Sam, I've been looking for this everywhere!"

Sam slid the tape over to you. "It's yours."

"How much for it-" you were cut off by loud announcement on Sam's old radio.

"THIS IS AN ANNOUNCEMENT FOR ALL METALLICA FANS!" it boomed. You and Emily looked at each other in excitement.

"WE WILL BE GIVING AWAY 2 TICKETS TO METALLICA'S UPCOMING SHOW IN SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA!"

You and Emily squealed simultaniously.

"BUT THAT'S NOT ALL! WE ALSO HAVE 2 BACKSTAGE PASSES TO GIVE AWAY! ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS CALL IN AND ANSWER THIS QUESTION!"

You and Emily quieted down to hear the question.

"ALRIGHT. THE QUESTION IS: WHO WAS METALLICA'S VERY FIRST LEAD GUITARIST? NAME HIM AND YOU! AND! ONE! OTHER! PERSON! WILL! SEE! METALLICA! IN! THE! FLESH! WE ARE ACCEPTING CALLS NOW! METAL RULES!"

You freaked out. "EMILY!! I KNOW THE ANSWER TO THE QUESTION! IT'S SO EASY!!! WE HAVE A CHANCE AT NOT ONLY SEEING METALLICA, BUT MEETING THEM IN PERSON! WE NEED TO CALL IN NOW!!" Emily looked around for telephone. "But we'd need to call at home!! It takes forever to get back by bus, and those tickets are gonna be given away really soon! What are we gonna do?!"

Sam looked at us. "I can give you guys a ride! Come on!"

I hesitated. "Wait, what about the-

"

"Don't worry about the records and stuff! Just come on! You want those tickets, right?"

"Of course!!" Emily said.

Sam ran to the door. "Well, let's go then!!"