Genesis || ✔

[ 3 ] Winter | Part II

When I stepped into Seth's room, I thought I had died and gone to music heaven.

He had everything. A keyboard, electric guitar, acoustic guitar, bass guitar, drum set, shakers, tambourine and a freaking cello. He even had a mixer and speakers pushed to the side of his room, and various auxiliary wires circled up hanging on the wall. He could literally make a one-man band in here.

His bed, and the rest of the normal things you'd find a bedroom like shelves and a wardrobe and a desk, were on the other side of the room, neatly arranged so that they took up minimal space but you wouldn't feel cramped. It was my dream room.

"Pretty cool, huh?"

I turned to Seth, noting the cute proud grin he was sporting. "Cool? This is The Room! I'm so jealous!"

"I know," he laughed. "You wanna jam?"

"Oh, please, please, please teach me to play the drums! Girl drummers are goddesses."

He laughed again, amused by my enthusiasm. "Hold on, I gotta close the door for this, otherwise my sisters are gonna kill me for making noise at midnight."

"They won't be able to hear through the walls?"

"Nope. Soundproof room, baby."

I whistled. He really had everything.

"Doesn't it get lonely, having so many instruments but nobody to play with you?" I wondered, sitting on the drum stool.

Seth picked up the drumsticks and gave them a little twirl before handing them over to me. "Sometimes, yeah."

He crossed over to the normal side of the room and came back with another stool in his hands. He set it down behind me.

"But uhm, my family used to play with me, before the divorce," he added. "Sunday nights were our jamming night. I'd play the keyboard, dad would be on the bass, Kat and Olive would alternate between the acoustic and the electric guitar, Mary Jane would sing, and mom... she'd be on the cello."

"Oh," and because I didn't know what else to say to that, "I'm sorry."

"It's fine. I haven't really talked about this in a while."

I can tell. He never told me about his mom, other than that once in our early days of acquaintanceship when I had asked about her. He had briskly said that his parents were divorced and that he was living with his dad now and that was that. Picking up on his reluctance to share, I had the decency to never broach that subject again. "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to."

"But I kinda want to."

Cue the intense stare. He had been giving me quite a few of these for the past week, and my first instinct was to not maintain direct eye contact because well, what were you supposed to do? Stare back?

"Well, uhm, I'm an illegitimate child," I blurted. Anything to get away from the intensity of the moment. In all honesty, that was a piece of information I was not planning on sharing with anyone at college. I was mentally kicking myself for the slip up.

But I guess it worked, the diverting Seth's attention part. Because his eyes went all round and he threw me a feeble "I'm sorry, what?"

"Yeah, my mom wasn't married to anyone when she had me."

"Oh, well..." he trailed off, obviously at a loss for words.

"But it's okay, having mom around was good enough. Besides, I had Z and his family to make up for all the love I should have gotten."

"That's cool." His go-to phrase. He cleared his throat before continuing. "My parents – they got divorced a little over... three years ago? Anyway, shortly after, mom went and got married with this Irish guy and skipped town. Never heard from her since. It was... It was just really sudden; you know? They never fought or argued, at least not in front of us kids, and they were this perfect couple. I remember thinking that when I grow up, I wanted to have something like that. Heck, I could even remember the way they'd look at each other, with such pure love and admiration and respect, and it's just scary knowing that all that could go away just like that."

I was reacting subconsciously and found myself pulling him in for a hug. He obliged and nestled his head at the crook of my neck. I could feel the shiver running down my spine as his arms went around me, and I was filled with a happy warmth that I never wanted to get out of.

All too soon, the moment was over; and the warmth left me.

"Thank you, Gen. I needed that. You're a good friend."

I managed to keep the disappointment from my face. "That's what friends are for."