31 Days of August

Day 11: The Musician

Day 11: Write a scene where one of the characters is a musician.

The subway doors opened with a whoosh, and I hustled my way inside the car, along with a heap of New Yorkers and a few tourists who I had seen taking pictures in front of the tracks when we were waiting. It was a freaking subway. This was not Disney World or the ideal location to have a photo shoot. Tourists were so stupid. When the doors closed behind me, I got shoved into the car, and my eyes began to roam around for a seat. I had been standing for so long during chorus practice, so my legs felt like they would fall off at any given moment.

I noticed a seat that held a peculiarly-shaped case of sorts, and figured that I could probably coax the owner into letting me sit down. Fighting against the torrent of people in combination with the inertia of the car, I made my way across, and over to the large black object that looked almost like it held a guitar within it, but not. It was too big for a guitar.

"Uh, 'scuse me," I said as politely as I could to the boy next to it. He had these large red headphones on his ears, in addition to a beanie on his head. His bangs were long, just barely brushing over the tips of his eyebrows, and he had the whole skater look going on with his skinny jeans and hoodie. He was probably a year or two older than me, but he wasn't my type, so I didn't even contemplate for a second looking. I just wanted him to move his freaking case.

The boy leisurely looked up, and then blinked at me, giving me a quick yet judgmental glance, and then returned to his music, not saying word. 

I rolled my eyes angrily, taking a deep breath. "Yo!" I called, causing him to glance up at me once again. "Can you please move your freakin' case so that I can sit, dude?"

At that, he very calmly removed his headphones, resting them on his neck. "What?" he snarled.

"Move your case," I commanded.

"No," he said hautly in response.

"Look, dude, I just got out of a two hour chorus practice, my vocal chords kill, my ears are ringing, and my legs feel freakin' numb," I told him, trying to cut back on as much attitude as possible. On the upside, at least I wasn't swearing...yet. "So, can you please move your freakin' case so that I can sit down?"

"No," he reiterated once again.

"I know that the corpse in there must be very dear to you, but dude, I need to sit the frick down!" I exclaimed.

"You think there's a dead body in there?" he asked, amused. 

"What else would there be in that freakin' thing?" I returned with a question of my own, paired with a roll of my eyes.

"Say, I don't know, a cello?" he laughed. He actually freaking laughed. Asshole. I was beginning to really not like this guy.

"You play the cello?" I scoffed, making sure to make my words sound even more demeaning than they were originally meant.

"Since I was eleven," he said evenly.

"Great. Now I know your life story. Can you freaking move it so that I can sit--" I was cut short by the sudden halt of the car, and because I was an idiot who wasn't holding on to so much as even a freaking handrail, my body went flying, colliding into the closest thing: Mr. I Won't Freaking Move My Cello. Great. Now I was literally on top of the dude's lap, practically mortified, and he just stared down at me in horror. As the people rushed out at the stop, I got up from his lap as quickly as I could, and brushed myself off, smoothing down my pleated skirt.

"Well, that was a little forward, don't you think?" the guy smirked, making my cheeks tinge a light pink. I just scowled at him, not saying a word. This kid was a jerk and I didn't have the energy to deal with him right now. Or probably, like, ever. "You know," Cello Boy began with an edge to his voice, "there's no one sitting in the other seat next to me."

I averted my eyes over to his left--where the cello wasn't--and noticed that there was, indeed, an empty seat. With a huff and all the dignity I had left, I sat down beside him, clutching my bag to my chest. He didn't move to put his headphones back on his ears, which I found rather strange, but I was just semi-happy to be sitting, and didn't particularly want to talk to him, so didn't mention anything about it. His finger began to tap against his thigh, and I tried to ignore it--I really did. I just could not stand tapping, so I snapped...again.

"Can you please stop?" I hissed.

"Stop what?" he smirked, continuing to tap away. I crossed my arms over my chest, pouting. Geez, I hated people. Well, more specifically, people like Cello Boy. Even more precisely, Cello Boy himself. Like, I really couldn't stand this guy. "So, you go to Rosemont?"

"Excuse me?" I demanded, my head tightly turning in his direction.

"Your uniform," he explained. "Blue and black. Rosemont colors, right?"

"How would you know?" I sneered back.

"I'm a senior at Pikes," he replied. Pikes. Aka, Rosemont Academy's brother or sister or whatever school. Basically, Pikes was the all-male equivalent to Rosement, which happened to be girls-only. We did a lot with Pikes, like dances and activities and stuff. And apparently, this jerk was a senior there. Huh. He looked like was in college to me.

"Why are you out of uniform, then?" I questioned, reviewing his attire once again. Just like us, Pikes had strict uniforms, the only difference being they had to wear khakis instead of skirts, and their colors were blue and white. Pikes boys were always in their uniforms. If Cello Boy went to Pikes, then he should've been dressed in the typical attire, also.

"Dress down day," he replied smoothly, explaining it pretty well. "So, I'll ask again: you go to Rosemont?"

"Yep," I sucked in a stream of air, pursing my lips. 

"Sophomore?"

"Junior," I corrected sharply, hating when people got my age wrong. Like, I wasn't that short.

"Huh," he mumbled, looking me over once more, "nice."

"Yeah, whatever," I rolled my eyes once more.

"So, you sing?"

"What do you care?"

"I don't."

Suddenly, the car came to a halting stop, and looked up, realizing that this was my stop. I got up from the seat, about to leave when I heard a quick, "See ya around, Rosemont Girl."

"Yeah, whatever, Cello Boy," I returned with a flip of my hair. As I exited the subway car, heading for the platform, all I could hear was his laughter. Musicians. Such annoying human beings. And by musicians, I was obviously referring to one musician in particular--that being the musician I had just endured for way too long: Cello Boy.