Yay, guys! I finished the second chapter! Aren't you all so proud of me? This chapter, Bella meets Edward. Isn't that exciting? (Not really, because they don't actually talk at all). Instead of sounding like some old school teacher, here's the next chapter of Listen to the Band ! And for any of my dearest readers/friends that would like to know what everyone plays, here is the list:
Bella and Alice: Clarinet
Rosalie: Trumpet
Emmett: Tuba
Jasper: Tenor Sax
Seth Clearwater: Alto Sax
Edward: Pit (Mallets, to be exact. The closest you can get to a piano in a marching band.)
Leah Clearwater: Flute
Chapter 2: The First Practice
We were just finished up dinner when Theresa asked, "So, were you in marching band at Phoenix? Or are you a rookie?" she asked with a smile in my direction.
"Yeah, I was in band. But we didn't have band camp like this, though," I confessed.
Josie blinked at me. "Wait… how does that work? Were you one of those bands that went year round because your directors had no life?" she asked, sounding shocked that I would be in a band like that. I figured from her tone that this was a band that didn't stay up into ungodly hours of the night drilling and marching. Phoenix had been like that sometimes, when we had a competition or an exhibition. We had been very competitive.
I nodded. "I guess you could say that."
"I feel sorry for you," Clorissa told me. "I'd hate it if Mrs. McCullough or HR did that to us. Did you practice after school, or before?"
"Both," I answered.
Everyone stared at me like I was some kind of alien. I hadn't lied to them – before school was instrumental practice and after school was marching on the field. It had really restricted my after school activities, not that I did many in the first place. That was one of the reasons I decided to come here. I had heard that this band didn't practice as much. And, from what I was gathering on the bewildered, disgusted, and sympathetic expressions of the kids around me, that rumor was no doubt true.
"Wow," was all Emmett could manage in reply.
"That must have really been annoying," Rosalie agreed, offering a sympathetic glance. "We only practice before school and during first period. There's no way you can be in the band without marching first."
"Well, I love it!" Slinky exclaimed. "I love being in marching band, that is. Oh, and I forgot to tell you guys – I've been transferred out of first period art into band! I can be a full-time tuba!" She looked exceptionally proud of herself and I began wondering if what Audrey had said earlier about brain damage was true.
"That's awesome!" Emmett cheered, grinning as he reached across the table to give her a high-five. Which, due to the size of his arm, did not look very difficult for him at all. "Now I have someone to save me from Jackie!"
"Jackie?" I asked softly to Alice.
"Jackie's the tuba section leader this year," she explained heartily. "She's kind of like a mother to all the tubas, and well… like a mother, she gets irritated with her children. Emmett is someone who frequently upsets her. Slinky normally steps in for him."
"Ah."
At this point, we were all ready to leave. I stood up with my tray, half of the table following my lead. It was a little unnerving, considering as nobody really looked up to me in Phoenix. In fact…. they all kind of looked down on me. Alice took the lead though, saving me from the spotlight. Everyone followed her, and I went with them to dump off the trash. And while we were all leaving, Emily asked,
"Are you ready for your first practice with us? Did you put your clarinet in the band room?"
I nodded in response. "I did it first thing when I came here. Before I picked up my luggage and went to my room," I replied.
"Does your clarinet have a name?" Suddenly Josie was with us, beaming as she took a place on my other side. I felt so awkward, being here in between two people that I barely knew and who were also being very nice to me. In a strange way that I'd never known before, I loved it. But that didn't stop the fact that I had absolutely no answer to Josie's question. Naming my clarinet? I'd never really thought much of it, really.
"Er…"
"Sorry about that," Emily apologized. "I think Josie is the only one who actually has named an inanimate object."
I smiled at that, and Josie scowled playfully.
"I see how it is," she snapped. For a moment I actually thought she was serious, until I recognized the sarcasm dripping from her words. "Fine, be that way, Emily!" She dashed ahead to walk with who looked like Sarah, Abby, and Clorissa.
"Are you all always like this?" I asked Emily.
Emily shrugged. "It comes and it goes," she answered. "Josie's always like that, though." She laughed good-naturedly, and I couldn't help but chuckle in agreement.
At this point we were entering the building that I guessed the band room was in. Alice, as small as she was, was the one to hold the door open for everyone that had come with us. When I entered (I was the last one), she shut the door and took my hand. I blinked at the bold contact as she led me into the band room.
To what the band room in Phoenix was like, this place was rather small. But it had high ceilings and plenty of chairs – enough to seat about a hundred and fifty. There were music stands throughout the room, with various pieces of music on them. It seemed as though everything was ready for practice. Alice, Josie, Clorissa, Sarah, Emily, Theresa, and I were practically the first ones in here. The only other people were three boys who looked like seniors, who were seated together and practiced what looked like conducting.
Theresa was the one who saw me staring.
"That's Kyle Barker, Stuart Showalter, and Kyle Torain," she explained good-naturedly. "They're our drum majors this year. They're really nice guys." I nodded in response and followed her to the section where Emily, Josie, and Alice were sitting. I remembered that they were all clarinets like me.
Their instrument cases were under their chairs. I had set mine amongst some other instrument cases, so I went to fetch it. When I returned, I found that a seat had been saved for me in between Alice and Josie. Theresa was sitting next to her, and Emily was on Alice's other side. I took the seat graciously, and Josie smiled at me as she put her clarinet together. Alice was absorbed in tuning; when she played, it sounded much nicer than any sound I ever heard come from a clarinet. Was there anything she couldn't do perfectly? I was honestly beginning to doubt it. Josie finished putting on her mouthpiece and began tuning also. No offense to her, but I believed that Alice sounded much better.
That was when the others of our table, and more, arrived. That was when I realized that Abby wasn't with us. When had she disappeared? I turned to Alice.
"Where did Abby go?"
"Abby is a guard member," Alice said knowingly, pulling her clarinet away from her mouth and smiling at me. "So she has to go to the gym with the rest of the guard. They don't practice with us, most of the time. On the field, they do. Here and during sectionals, they're in the gym. I was in guard once, in junior high. I didn't find much joy in twirling a flag around. Though I don't mean any offense to the guard. Not to mention the outfits are almost always horribly tacky." She shuddered. Then she perked up, seeming to have remembered something. "Oh! I have to go out and help the librarians tonight – I forgot! I'll be right back." She handed me her instrument and practically danced off.
Just as she went out, a crowd of laughing, raucous students came in.
One was a tall, lean boy with honey blonde hair and what looked like chocolate brown eyes. He greeted Alice as she passed, and I could have sworn that I saw the little pixie blush. Walking in behind him were a pair that looked like brother and sister. Both had ebony black hair and hazel eyes. And behind them was the most breathtakingly beautiful boy I had ever seen.
He had bronze hair, uncombed like he had just gotten out of bed. His skin was pale – almost as pale as my own. But it looked like he spent a lot of time outside, because he was leanly muscular (I could see that from here). And his eyes were a sparkling emerald green that matched the green grass outside. He glanced my way and flashed a smile, showing pearly white teeth. I nearly fainted.
"Oh. So you've spotted the pretty bunch," Josie remarked, her voice suddenly going a little sour at the mention of them.
"Who are they?" I asked.
"Only the hottest kids in the band," Theresa said from Josie's other side. "Well, not all of them have been in the band the entire time, but… they're still pretty popular. You should see them at school."
Josie snorted. "Psh, yeah. After one of them rudely insulted Sarah," she growled defensively.
I sensed some tension here, and was confused. What had I just stumbled into? "Well, what are their names?" I asked, my eyes still on the bronze-haired god, who took a seat in the back near the percussion supplies.
"The two black-haired kids are the Clearwaters. Seth, alto sax, and Leah, a flute. They're both fairly nice, but Leah can be a bit of a… well, female dog sometimes, if you get my drift," Theresa informed her.
"Oh, and the blonde one is Jasper Hale. He's Rosalie's twin brother. Alice has had a crush on him since anyone can remember. He's not too bad – sometimes he sits with us at lunch," Emily added on, looking grave and serious. "He plays the tenor sax."
"And the one back there is Edward," Josie seethed, clenching her teeth and unclenching them again. "Alice's brother. Plays mallets."
"What did he do?" I asked. From what I knew of the small blonde sophomore clarinet, it took a lot to get her angry.
Josie turned her head away from the back of the room entirely, scowling at nothing in particular. "Edward asked Sarah out on a date to one of the dances last year. She said yes, of course; I mean, what girl wouldn't? But while they were there, she caught him kissing another girl. Twice. She confronted him about it and he just brushed her off and told her to find her own ride home. Called her mom and then called Abby, Clorissa, and me. I've never heard her so torn up. I've hated him ever since."
"Oh." I glanced back at the green-eyed boy Edward, who caught me looking again and grinned widely. I blushed and turned away, rubbing the back of my neck.
At this point, the room was practically full. There were more clarinets sitting with us, some of them sending me curious glances. I flushed every time someone looked at me and focused on putting together my own clarinet. Alice returned and began tuning with Josie and some of the other clarinets again. I joined them to take my mind off of all of the new information that I had just learned.
And then practice began as the band director stood up on her podium, looking quite serious as she looked around and began speaking.
X-x-X
"Now we can go to bed," Josie was saying as we all left the band room together an hour later. Her eyelids were already drooping as she walked – it was obvious she didn't think much of sleep during the day. Sarah and Clorissa (who had joined us after practice) were helping her along, nudging her in the right direction whenever she started walking in the wrong direction. It looked like poor Josie was out of it. Emily and Theresa had stayed behind to help out the band director and the drum majors, and probably to walk back with some other friends.
It was dark outside – I hadn't noticed it in the brightly lit band room, as the sky had darkened rather quickly. I suppose it had been starting to do that after dinner – but I hadn't really thought about it. I was more focused on getting to know everyone. Considering, they all wanted to get to know me, which was still bewildering me right to this moment. I'd never had this many friends before.
"Well, at least it's a Friday," Alice chirped. She smiled up at me, and I smiled back hesitantly. "That means that we have tomorrow and Sunday off. We can sleep in. Which I think Josie desperately needs." Her emerald green eyes went to the stumbling sophomore with a warm smile. Josie didn't acknowledge it – probably because she was already beginning to doze off. "Our band directors aren't those die-hard band geeks," she was then explaining to me. "I mean, they'd like us to practice, but they don't really enforce it."
"What do you mean? Like, no practice cards signed by your parents?" I then asked.
Alice nodded cheerfully. "No practice cards. It's great, really. Even though my mom and dad are always after me to practice. I bet they'll be all over me this weekend," she said, her tone going a tad sour at the thought of it.
"What do you mean? Aren't your parents at home?" I questioned her.
Alice rolled her eyes. "No," she confessed. "My dad, Carlisle, is a professional doctor. He took over for Audrey's mom this year as camp physician. He and my mom Esme are really close, so my mother decided that she wanted to be a chaperone. She works our hallway, which means she'll be waking us up every day." She let out a sigh. "But at least tomorrow we can all sleep in."
"Yeah," Clorissa said as Josie nearly fell over into the street. "Because I don't think Josie would ever wake up on demand tomorrow."
We all laughed, and even that didn't arouse the sophomore out of her dazed and exhausted state.
The rest of the walk to the dorms was spent in comfortable silence, and I mused over how close these girls all seemed. The way they had all welcomed me was practically unnatural, but I was enjoying it all the same. Especially Alice, because I think she was going to turn out to be a very good friend. Josie, Sarah, and Clorissa too. I was also sure that the others would also all turn out to be really nice, since they had been so nice to me already. I was already liking band camp. As we dropped Josie and Clorissa off at their room and Sarah said goodnight with hugs to both Alice and me, a question popped into my head.
"Hey, Alice?" I asked as she pulled out the key to our room and stuck it in. She inclined her head to acknowledge that she was listening. "What are we going to do tomorrow?"
Alice shrugged as she pushed open the door. "Well, sleeping in is a first," Alice declared. "Breakfast goes to eleven tomorrow, so I think both of us can get up on time. Unless you sleep in past noon, like Rosalie does?" She cocked and eyebrow at me and I smiled, shaking my head. Alice grinned. "Good," she said. "So I also think I can find you a good outfit in that time. You don't have a boyfriend, do you?"
I stopped, startled by the sudden question. In fact, I stumbled over the threshold again and practically crashed into my bed in surprise. Alice squealed her disdain and I assured her that I was fine before straightening up and answering her question.
"Er… no?" I made it sound like a question.
Alice frowned in confusion. "Why not?" she demanded, as if I had just confessed to a capital crime. "Someone as beautiful and as sweet as you couldn't be single. It isn't the way God made the world." She put her hands on her hips as she looked me up and down as if I was going to sprout a third head out of my stomach. I blushed at her compliment and turned away.
"I'm not any of those things, really," I told her firmly. "I'm plain, and normal. And it's perfectly alright that I don't have a boyfriend."
Alice snorted. "Well, I guarantee that by the end of band camp, I shall have found you an appropriate, nice boy and have put you together like peas in a pod. My mission begins tomorrow." She puffed her chest out and saluted to me, and I giggled as I went to my suitcase to pull out pajamas and toiletries. I doubted she'd find any boy what would take a liking to me here. I honestly doubted it. It wasn't Alice that I doubted, it was me. I was always the problem when it came to a relationship.
"Where's the bathroom?" I asked.
Alice pointed her finger at me accusingly. "Don't think you've weeded yourself out of this situation, Bella," she warned. "I will find you the perfect man." Then she completely changed demeanor and pranced out the door, gesturing down the hall. "It's right down the hall to the right. You can't miss it."
I went down to the end of the hall and turned right like Alice had said to do. I found the bathroom, changed into my pajamas in one of the stalls, and brushed my teeth and combed through my hair before putting it up in a ponytail. I was ready for bed. I bet to myself that Josie was already crashed on her mattress, sleeping an undreamt sleep. It was shocking on how connected I felt with all of the girls already – and the first day hadn't really even ended yet. I smiled to myself as I stumbled back to my room.
I brushed past a beautiful woman, who had caramel-colored hair and the warmest hazel eyes. Her skin was pale like Alice's, and I accidentally brushed past her when I tripped over my own shoes and nearly fell headlong into the floor.
"Oh, dear!" the woman exclaimed as she rushed back to me. "Are you alright?"
I nodded, looking down to make sure my feet were still there. "I'm fine," I answered hesitantly.
The woman smiled warmly and looked up at my own chocolate brown eyes (she was about two to three inches shorter than I was). "Oh, have you been in band before, dear? I don't think I've ever seen you around before," she said gently.
"Yes, I'm new," I told her. "My name is Isabella Swan, but I prefer Bella."
"Oh, Bella! You must my daughter Alice's roommate. I'm her mother, Esme Cullen. It's a pleasure to meet you," she said in a gush as she shook my hand as if it were an honor to meet me. "I hope you have a good night's sleep, then. Enjoy your time at band camp!" The little woman Esme turned away and walked gracefully down the hall and disappeared around the corner.
I went back to my room and was about to use my key from my lanyard to get in when Alice opened the door and smiled brightly. The little pixie-like girl had put on the fanciest silk pajamas I had ever seen, and I instantly felt underdressed in my sweatpants and overlarge t-shirt. She let me in and shut the door behind me, locking it swiftly before folding herself into a sitting position in the middle of the floor.
"Do you want to stay up, or do you want to go to sleep?" she asked cheerfully.
"I think I'll catch some winks," I told her as I dropped off my toiletries and climbed into bed. I settled down and pulled up the covers to my chin. "G'night, Alice."
Somehow Alice was already nestled in her own blankets like a cocoon. "Good night, Bella!" she sang brightly, and she reached up with a finger and flicked out the lights.
EOC: Yay! Another chapter finished. I really like this story, actually. I admit it will go a little slow, but that means even more chapters! Next chapter is Edward and Bella's first conversation/first other things. =] I hope you all liked that one, and the next chapter will be better, I promise. Not a lot of humor, because I suck at that. XP Anyways… Merry Christmas, my dear friends! – Josie
And for all of my other readers, Merry Christmas to you as well! I'm glad you're enjoying this as much as my band is. XD Thanks for sticking with me, folks! – Dark and Wild
To everyone: Yes, this is one of those 'Edward is a player but changes heart' kind of stories. He's human now, so he has flaws. Sorry, guys. XD Hence the Sarah vs. Edward drama and the mentioning of other girls. Oh, and there will be tension in between Edward and Alice.
