Let's Do This

Emotions

I walked off the bus searching for my friends, clutching my flute case that kept hitting random people and things. I looked through the crowd and saw Niko.

"Niko!" I yelled trying to get him to notice me, but failed. The people beside me glanced my way wondering who was shouting. "Niko!!" I tried yelling again. He finally turned around and waved.

We tried walking towards each other but the crowd was to thick, and we just settled on meeting each other once were in the cafeteria. A few minutes later when the crowd had scattered, we ended up beside each other.

"Look what I got!" He said first. I looked at what he was showing me and laughed. It was his medal for getting a one at solo ensemble attacked to his flute case.

"Now, look what I got!" I said and put my flute case on the cafeteria table. I had put the same medal on my flute case right in front. "First of many right?" I said while glancing at my shiny medal.

"Right." Niko said smiling.

It's not like we put our medals on our cases to show off and be inconsiderate, but it was actually because we were proud of all the hard work and time we put into it, and so we won't forget that not everything comes without hard work.

Later Anthony came, slumped into chair beside us and sighed. We didn't have to ask him why he was sad. It was because that he got a two on his solo, then he was like this ever since.

We pat him on the back. "It's okay..." Niko and I said quietly so only he could hear. Anthony sighed once again and went back to eating that granola bar we didn't know he had.

I noticed something as I looked around. This is the first time in weeks we actually sat in the cafeteria in the morning. I sighed along with Anthony and said to Niko "We aren't practicing..."

"I miss practicing so hard..." Niko said it a quiet voice.

"I have no idea how you two miss practicing..." Anthony said and looked up, "all it does is take you away from your friends..." he muttered after.

"Practicing is worth it. How can you not see that?" I argued slightly offended.

"Whatever..." Anthony muttered. I just gave up on that, he's probably just mad since he didn't get what he wanted.

~

The whole week after solo ensemble, most of the band nerds had a different mood than they usually had. There were types of people like me and Niko who are really happy and proud, people like Anthony who were in a slump for a few days when around their band friends, some jealous people, and some people who just don't care what they got.

When we got the judges comments from our solo or ensemble, it made many people feel better. Anthony read his and it said that he was really good, just that there were a lot of small accidents like tonguing or slurring in wrong places. Some people who got a one expected more when they got their comments back.

Well, that's a band nerd life, you aren't always perfect or good, they come with practice.