The Horror

Chapter six

"Shadows"

Ragazza: she is eager to learn the song, wondering what type of song it is. Probably some simple rock or slow song. Her singing is quite average, so she's hoping that she won't disappoint him.

"Ok," Aidan holds out an old tape recorder. I'm surprised, not only by how dusty it is, but that he's not just going to sing the song himself with his beautiful voice. Why is he so embarrassed by it? Aidan tries to brush off the dust only to create a small cloud of dust and a gray patch on his hand. He then brushed the dust off his hand with his other hand. No success. Ignoring it, he said, "Ok, We're going to listen to the song first. Thanks again for helping me. You really didn't have to-"

"Shhhhh. I want to," I interrupt. It felt so good when my mom would shush me like that when I was putting myself down. I've come to expect it at this point, it's kinda evil.

He pulls out a leather journal. I take a good look at this decaying book, some of the pages being torn and folded. I can even see the indents of the graphite pencil in some of the loose pages. You could easily tell every inch was utilized to its limits on each page. It was rather impressive, although heavy handed. He drops it onto the table. "Then we're gonna try and see if we can play it ourselves." He grins mischievously and excitedly.

He turned on the tape recorder and I can hear the voice of a child. I listen eagerly.

"Are we recording?" Asks the child. Then a voice I could easily recognize reassures him that the tape recorder is on. It's Aidan, but who's the other kid? Then it dawns on me, it must be his brother. "Ok! Three," the boy counts,"two... one!"

I was pleasantly surprised by the blaring of an electric guitar through the recorder. The song was very sorrowful and regretful. When he started singing, Jerimoth, I could tell this was going to be intense.

"I hear this howling late at night. Deep in the woods, it calls me. I'm falling deeper into this mess. I don't think I'm alright."

The song kept going on about how he's feeling about this sound and how horrible this place is, but there's a small, truly upsetting, metaphorical part about a young girl which was a little strange and out of place with the rest of the song. What was even stranger, was the fact that Aidan was trying his hardest not to listen to this part of the song. I mean, he plugged his ears with his fingers, pushed the back of his ears forward, trying to block his hearing. I could've sworn I saw him shiver when that 'she' was mentioned. I assumed right away that it was supposed to be some sort of metaphor, but nothing came to mind. Maybe its a metaphor for being lost? I have no idea. Then the song ended with Jerimoth singing "Oh, but I already am." I guess he knew he was going to turn into a wolf or something. Then I heard Aidan's childish voice again.

"That was great Jeri! Absolutely incredible," Aidan yelled, impressed and completely overwhelmed with excitement. He couldn't stop complimenting him. It was honestly adorable, Him ranting about how great certain parts were.

"Sure, but I bet it would've been much better if you had sung it, Aidan." said past Jerimoth. I smiled, waiting for him to say something, but then Aidan quickly grabbed the recorder. He fumbled with the tape recorder then, before his past self spoke again, he turned it off. I glared at him, giving him the ultimate look of disappointment.

"Hahaha, kids!" Aidan laughed, embarrassed. I just gave a confused giggle. The burn below his right cheek lifted with his smile, his blue boy smile. Aidan opened the journal to one of the few neat pages in the book. It was the lyrics to the song. He pointed to the page, a nervous expression on his face."You know," he breathed. "We could just wait for another day." He reassured me. Determined, I told him I'd try if he'd let me listen to the recording a few times again, promising I'll stop after the song ends each time. He agreed to let me handle the recorder and let me listen a few times. The whole time I was listening, he brought out his acoustic guitar and started tuning it, practicing softly while I listened. After the fifth time hearing it, I told him I was prepared. My thoughts on the song? It was really emotional, but not just that. At the beginning, it was like a " I have a fever and have to stay in bed all day" kind of miserable, but as the song progressed, it shifted smoothly to "everyone I know is dead" kind of depression. It was really well thought out and executed, hence forth, this is my third favorite song. I feel like I can't listen to it, though, for fear I might burst out crying. Of course I was being dramatic...