Pretty in Punk (frerard)

Chapter 21

TRIGGER WARNING

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"No, Gee, they go in alphabetical order," she said as she sat beside me on the floor.

My coworker, who I learned was named Jamia, was so nice. She's the one who helped me when I was picking out Frank's gift.

"Alphetical order?" I asked, looking at the shelf of CDs.

"Yeah, you know, the order of the alphabet, the letters," she explained.

"I know the letters but I didn't know they wouldn't go into a certain order," I said.

"Here, I'll help you," she said. "They're going in order by band. First in the alphabet is A. Well, but we actually have to do numbers first. So, that would be 5 Seconds Of Summer, after them comes 7 Seconds. Then we go to As. Here we have All Time Low and Arcade Fire. They both start with A so we go to the second letter so All Time Low goes first. And then Aerosmith goes in before All Time Low. Here, let me write the alphabet down."

She wrote all the letters down on a sticky note and handed it to me.

"It'd be best to memorize this," she said. "But just keep going in this order, okay, sweetheart?"

I nodded my head as she walked off to help a customer. I wasn't allowed to help the customers, Bob said so. He said it was because since I don't know anything I wouldn't even be any help at all.

I went through all sorts of CDs from people like David Bowie and Gorillaz and Halsey and Iron Maiden and Neck Deep and Muse and I learned that there are so many bands.

Soon enough, I was on my break with Jamia eating fruit snacks in the storage room. Jamia laughed, running a hand through her hair.

"No, Gee, Ariana Grande isn't a band, she's a person," she said. "Just a single person, not a whole band."

"Is she a nice person?" I asked.

"Well, not exactly from what I've heard," she said.

"So then what's a band?" I asked.

"A band has multiple people," she said. "Well, I guess I can't say that for a fact but they usually do. The Foo Fighters first album was actually almost entirely recorded by Dave, so that was like a one man band then."

"Who's Dave?" I asked.

She looked at me and smiled. "He's a musician."

"Times up!" Bob called.

I sighed, going back out to work. Time went by until I was done and I went outside to wait for Frank. Instead, Mikey pulled up and I frowned as I got in.

"Where's Frankie?" I asked.

"Lindsey called and said that maybe you should go back over and do a last minute studying before your test tomorrow," he said.

I crossed my arms and pouted. He drove me to Lindsey's house and I glared at it.

"C'mon, you can see Frank tomorrow at school," he said. "I'll pick you up later."

I grabbed Dee and went inside, seeing lindsey sitting at the table.

"Hi, Gee," she said, happily.

I sat beside her, hugging Dee tight. We went over things again for my test, using flash cards and everything.

"Want something to drink?" She offered.

I nodded and she got up. She came back with a sippy cup and I smiled. I took a drink but grimaced at the bitter taste that burnt my throat.

"What is this?" I asked as I coughed.