The Record Store;

ii

the record store; ii; landon austin.

"You have pretty eyes." Laura stated, as we were walking through one of the multiple corridors in what was unfortunately my second home for the past three years. "Like, the kind that, you notice and you're like-"

I interrupted her. "And you're weird." She had the kind of personality that could have been mistaken for that of a emotional drunk, if you didn't know her. I liked to guess it was some kind of weird, one off personality trait but it seemed like it was something that she'd always had: it kind of suited her, and I guess you grew to like it most of the time.

"Well thanks." She said, switching her bag onto the other shoulder. "I like to embrace it. Like you should with admitting you like the record guy and text him back."

I pushed her gently, causing her to stumble and almost trip up somebody walking in the opposite direction. "I don't understand why you think I'm hung up on this guy, I talked to him once." It was the truth. "Anyway, it's a little rich seeing as you're scared to even go up to the cashier guy and talk to him."

"Cashier guy?" She questioned me.

"Yeah, the one you wouldn't actually shut up about for the last ten minutes before I became free from it and ran out in the corridor to save myself." I paused. "Actually, I don't know why I brought him up, moving on." I said quickly.

At this point, we'd hit the end of the corridor and turned to face the door to a small library. I never was a massive fan of spending my free periods in these kind of places, but we both had work to catch up on, and the weather, although mid-spring, resembled more winter than it did anything else.

The door opened and we were immediately greeted by a selection of empty tables and computers without anyone sitting and typing away at the keyboards, whether it was people scrolling down their newsfeed or actually researching something. We dumped our bags on a small desk further away from the librarian, who was the kind of person who would still try to enforce silence even if the room was empty, and headed straight for the book reference poster.

"So." I said a little too loudly. "You need what again?"

"Something on Renaissance Medicine." She said, at the correct tone of voice. The librarian heard, as we were closer than her than I had originally thought, and gave her a smarmy smile, to which Laura quickly returned.

"That aisle." I said, pointing her to one of the multiple history aisles that I'd got used to looking through in the multiple years I'd been going here.

I took my time and slowly started to look down the poster for the reference isle for Music studies. I'd never really been one for using books when it came to a subject in which I knew a fair amount about, but seeing as Laura wasn't going to be using one of the machines, I'd much rather have a book and sit with her than be on my own.

I couldn't find it listed, so I dragged myself along to ask the librarian, who was still giving an approval smile to Laura, and the other people who were actually silent, and asked her where they were. She pointed to a small push-along cart, and shrugged her shoulders, as if to say "Sorry, that's all I have". I smiled, and started to walk towards it, but she stopped me.

"You're doing Music, aren't you? I mean, I guess you are if you're looking at the revision notes books." Her words were all well pronounced, something I would expect from someone who'd been working with books for almost all of my school life, probably even longer.

"Yeah." I said.

She pointed to a selection of leaflets on her table. "I have to give these out, you see. I don't know whether you actually sing or play an instrument or something, but it's an open mic night." I picked one up. "Thanks." She smiled at me.

I smiled back, and put the leaflet in my pocket before walking away and picking up the book I wanted. I had played a few instruments in my time, but I was never really any good at them, plus the fact I sounded like a pig when I sung, so I generally ignored most open mic nights just because I was rubbish at them. I guess it was kind of a snap decision when I picked up music in school, because after I did, I realised that you had to actually play something to a decent level in order to actually pass: I guess I just took music because I enjoyed listening to it, which seemed like a pretty pathetic reason.

"What've you got there?" Laura questioned me as soon as I sat down. She had found a book and already had it open, making multiple notes at a reasonably fast pace.

I held out the leaflet the librarian had given me. It was already crinkled and torn at the edges, as it was the way I had put it in my pocket in the first place. She looked at it and passed it back to me, laughing. She knew me a little too well.

"Yeah." I said, knowing what she was going to say. "I'm not singing."

"You should go though." She said. "It'd be a night out, at least."

"Only if you'd come with me." I said, making sure I kept my voice low. I didn't want to be shushed again.

"Hah." Laura laughed. "No way. When the piano comes out, I leave."

"You're such a believer in the talents of many people." I joked, before she started back making notes in her little notepad, and I started to flick through the pages of the book I was reading.

- - -

Funnily enough, exactly five hours later, I was walking down one of multiple side-streets on my way to the location of the open mic night. I'd made the mistake of telling my parents about the leaflet, as I was quickly persuaded by them to go along and listen for a few hours, as it would somehow better my education, as I'd chosen to take music as a subject in the first place.

I walked past the record store, and of course, the rest of the shops in the small high street, all of which had been closed for the night. The only light was that which was coming from a few streetlamps, and from the phones of the people who were walking past me. I don't know why I decided to walk instead of getting a lift, but the community was pretty safe, so I guess there wasn't really any problem with it.

Though, as soon as I turned the corner, I was greeted by a much greater light than the ones I had seen just a few moments ago. The place, from a distance, looked reasonably busy, something which could be seen unusual for something like an open mic night, as it was the kind of thing that was stereotyped to have very few members in the audience, and mainly acts of little interest to the people that were sitting there.

But today, it seemed, was a day for breaking stereotypes, and as I walked in, I could see that everything I'd ever been told about these kind of events was not true, at least for this one.

And before I even knew it, I was sitting there, cheering on the acts who were sheepishly clambering onto the stage, and playing a few notes on their guitars.

But there was one act that hit me, and was the only one I waited to talk to at the end.

"Davie, I never knew you played guitar."

- - -

favourite musical person #2: landon austin.

favourite song by them: once in a lifetime [song on the side]

fun fact: he has a bunch of covers up on his youtube page, and the song above was used in fleurdeforce's [anoter youtuber not a big surprise there] wedding montage.