First story in almost a year – I'M SORRY! I had a lot of writers' block when it came to finishing my stories and found that I couldn't think of any good ways to finish them. But now, I have ideas for some of my old fics and new chapters will be coming soon. Thank you to everyone who has continued to read, follow, favourite and review them despite my inactivity.
Ok, a bit of context is probably needed for this one-shot. I wrote this about a year ago, as part of a long story about Phoebe's life as a teenager (starting after her mother's suicide). In this particularly chapter, she is 14 years old, living in an orphanage where she has been bullied, particularly by one boy named Kyle. This is my take on Phoebe picking up a guitar for the first time.
Phoebe sat in the living room alone, perched on the large window sill with her knees tucked comfortably under her chin, watching as the rain drops that had fallen from the clouds raced each other down the grimy glass pane. She was egging the particularly slow one on, hoping it would be the first to reach the gutter, when the door opened suddenly and in walked Kyle. He threw her a look of hatred before sitting down in a chair as far away from her as possible, a shiny new guitar held tightly in his hands. He'd been boasting for the last two weeks to anyone in the orphanage who would listen about how his dad was going to buy him a six-hundred dollar guitar as a birthday present because he couldn't visit him this year.
The blonde girl looked on curiously as he began to strum the six strings. She had seen a guitar before, of course, but she had never seen someone like Kyle play one. The musicians she'd seen with them were peaceful and seemed happy to be playing their tunes – Kyle however, grunted in frustration as he messed up the chords. He looked up momentarily and caught her staring.
"What do you want, freak?" he spat viciously. Phoebe said nothing but looked away; he carried on playing.
After another minute or so of playing, Kyle suddenly screamed and threw the guitar on the floor, making her look up with a start. He kicked it brutally several times, while Phoebe watched in horror; it took all the self-restraint she had not to yell at him to stop, but for once, she controlled herself, keeping her mouth shut. Next thing she knew, he was storming out of the room, muttering something about "stupid guitar... out of tune..."
Phoebe was too shocked to do anything for a few moments – how could someone do that to such an amazing creation? But it felt as though the guitar was calling out to her: please... help me.
She got up from her seat on the window sill and lifted the guitar from the floor; it was a beautiful mahogany red colour, with shiny steel strings, and there was a small dent in it where it had been kicked. Her fists clenched around its neck as she thought about how much she'd like to kick Kyle. Again, she kept calm, carefully lying the guitar down on the old sofa.
Phoebe stared at it for a moment, before noticing the guitar book that had been discarded on the sofa. After a second's hesitation, she sat down and pulled the instrument onto her lap, flicking through the book to look at the chords. She tried her best to form the right shapes with her hands, stroking her thumb across the strings when she was sure they were right. G major. A major 7. B minor. D sus 2. She practised for ages and ages, memorising the diagrams as she went along. Slowly but surely, she began to learn where her fingers had to go to create the perfect sound.
About an hour later, when she heard Kyle's voice coming downstairs, Phoebe carefully put the guitar and the book back exactly where he had left them earlier and resumed her place by the window, a smile beginning to spread across her face. Maybe she was imagining it, but she felt as though the guitar had enjoyed being played by her; it made a much fuller, livelier sound with her than it did with Kyle, almost as though it was thanking her.
And from that moment on, whenever Kyle was out of the house or had had enough with playing the guitar, Phoebe would sneak downstairs and teach herself to play. She couldn't get enough of it, and wanted a guitar of her own one day. Well, she didn't... not really. She wanted Kyle's guitar. The spiritual connection they shared was something she'd never had with anything –save her parents, of course – before, and she wished it could be hers for real.
Thank you so much for reading. Please let me know what you thought and if you would like to see more of my take on the story of Phoebe's life on the streets, say so!