Guarding the Colors

Chapter One

"Red Creek High School you may now take the field for your OMEA adjudicated performance."

Her heart races. She can feel the adrenaline pumping through her whole entire body. This is it.

The music plays. Amongst those marching are her boyfriend: Derek, and her best friend: Jade. There are a total of forty-eight members in this band she calls family.

For twelve minutes she marches and dances and counts the beats in her head. She tosses her six-foot flag thirteen times throughout the show and successfully catches each one. Of course, that task is easy on a windless night in the middle of October. She does her duet flawlessly with the captain of her color guard during the third song; although, she is exhausted from the previous eight or nine minutes of nonstop movement. She has not missed a step or messed up her routine. She feels so great knowing she's giving her all this competition.

The music ends and many have tears in the crowd due to the sensitive theme "Wars of America". The trumpet soloist played "Taps" beautifully and left the judges in awe.

The band members rush to the buses to change out of uniform. Everyone feels proud of his or her performance. Together, as a team, they have pulled in a night that no one should ever forget. After changing clothes and grabbing blankets, the bandies went to the concession stand to purchase beverages and food. Clair bought a Dr. Pepper and sloppy nachos: her favorite. This night could not get any better. Remaining quiet out of respect, the Creek kids watch all other B bands and even A and AA bands play. The awards ceremony is approaching ever so fast and the band is full of excitement.

"Class B awards . . . Best Auxiliary goes to . . . Red Creek High School!" For those who don't know, the auxiliary are the color guard girls. For those who don't know what color guard is, it's difficult to explain. Everyone experiences color guard differently based on school, captains, band directors, motivation, goals, and majorly who you are as a person. If you're the type of person who puts 110% into everything, it's such a wonderful experience. If you put -5%, you'll hate it. That's just how it goes, and that's just how life goes.

"The following marching bands have qualified for a trip to state . . ." Not Red Creek. Not Red Creek. Not Red Creek. They really did not qualify. You could pretty much hear their heartbreak and see the disappointment on their faces. After such a good night, the band had failed.

" . . . And Red Creek High School".

The shouts echoed in the stadium that night.

Those shouts still echo in the mind of Clair. The shouts are louder and louder and louder in her head. Only, they aren't the shouts of that night. They are the shrieks of her own voice. She is crying and screaming and dying inside. She is back to ten years before the night of qualifying for state. The night she could not sleep. There were multiple consecutive nights she could not get more than even an hour. But this night she remembered specifically.

Donna was heartbroken. Her husband had passed that very morning. He was peacefully asleep and in one moment he stopped breathing. It was as simple as that. He did not wake up. If he was given the choice to, he would have, if only to speak a few more last words. A loving "I'll see you when it's your time" or "I will always love you" could have calmed her soul, but that's not how it goes.

Clair was restless. She could hear her mother sulking in the room diagonal to hers. Her baby sister was upset as well, for whatever reason, and she knew it would be her job now to help with Bella.

The loss of her father was painstaking, and the loss of her mother's attention may have been worse.

The greatest loss was soon to come. This was just the beginning.