So, anyone want to check outside to see if the world is coming to an end? Seriously though, updating twice in the same month isn't that surprising is it?
Anways, I want to say thanks to all you who reviewed last chapter, especially Kelekiah Galadrian for the longest review I have ever gotten (and the chapter before as well)!
I'm sad no one asked my why Kaithey said 20years ago when she's only 17, and the oldest, Genta, is 19. -well, one person did. ... good job.
"It all began twenty years ago …"
… Wait, twenty years? How old was that girl again?
Genta caught Yuki's confusion and snorted, "Kai, none of us were even born twenty years ago."
Kaithey rolled her eyes, "Must you need to be so accurate?" Where was the fun in that? "Fine; geeze, you mood wrecker! You tell the story, then."
"Fine," she accepted, "For all I know, you'll start talking about talking piñatas or something," Genta shuddered. Why didn't she stop Kaithey from telling the story in the first place? Heck, why didn't anyone stop her; they should know better than that. "Anyways, it all began four years ago…"
o-o
FOUR YEARS AGO
"Hey Genta! Gen-Gen!"
"Yes?"
"You know what we should do, Gen?" A thirteen-year old girl asked, bouncing up and down beside her roommate of half-a-year, who was trying (unsuccessfully) to sunbathe fully clothed in the park.
Said roommates, two years older, sighed, "No, indulge me." Another crazy scheme, no doubt.
"We should start a band!"
Genta tugged her long black hair, the only evidence of her quarter Asian descendant, in frustration. A band … yes, she knew it; another crazy scheme.
"Is the school 'band-n-choir' not good enough for you?"
Kaithey gave her the 'DUH no' look, "It's a band and choir club stuck together because neither clubs could get enough members, what do you think?"
"I think you're being stupid. It's a singing and music playing club, which, quite frankly, is what a rock band is." At Kaithey's glare, she reluctantly added, "Even though it's actually larger than an actual band, and the people in the club suck, and I can't stand half the people participating…"
Kaithey gave her two thumbs up for the description, "Exactly. And in a rock band, we don't need to sing about pedophiliac, thieving snowmen. Or try to indulge ourselves in a cheap imitation of the Stone Age style of rocking."
"The music's not that bad," Genta muttered, before she remembered the constant squeaking of instruments, and off-tone pitch of the singers. "Nevertheless, what do you seriously think we can achieve with our limited sources?"
"We won't know if we never try," the other begged. I couldn't be that hard, I mean, there were cases where even voice-actors were able to sell albums using their character's voices to sing! Sure, the people who bought the CDs were probably hooked on the anime and bought like a thousand posters and action figures a day, and drooled in their sleep at even just the name of the show, and wrote thousands of fanfics about it, and tried to dress like them, and collected anything of the anime from colouring books to erasers, but at least they sold!
They sold!
"Okay, fine, say we do start a band, chew on this – how will it be successful if there's only two members – high school girls – and we both only play the guitar?"
"We can sing too, you know; it was a band-n-choir club after all." She pouted at Genta's unimpressed tone, "Beside, there always …" She paused for a dramatic effect and struck a pose, "Sex appeal!"
"Kaithey!"
Kaithey blew a raspberry, fixing her short spiky hair her friend flattened with a hit on her head. "Okay, okay; kidding! Geeze, girl, all we need is some guy to play the drums for us!"
"And how do you propose we do that? That's easier said than done." Genta said, rubbing her temples.
Yeah, they had the whole population to choose from, but who (except for herself because her instinctual sense-of-surrounding-danger was greatly dulled from contact with Kaithey for the last seven years) would be able to bear Kaithey for longer than an hour? She was dangerous.
"Ehh," Kaithey shrugged, "If all fails, we can always go back with sex appeal."
"What is with you and sex appeal?" Genta exclaimed, with her hand posed to hit the girl again.
Kaithey held her arms in a 'x' fashion protecting her hair, "Stop it with the hair flattening!"
"Hey, it's black and spiky, just screaming to be hit."
Kaithey glowered at the girl, "At least hit the un-gelled part!"
This received a snort in the face, "You mean that little purple part by the nape of your neck? No. It'll take too much time to aim, and by that time, you'd be spouting off on a tangent already."
Damn, she was getting predictable; she had to change it up again.
Kaithey pouted, "ANYWAYS," she said, hoping the yell of the word would overwrite any other thought in Genta's brain, "Back on topic."
"Fine; Kaithey, go and scourge the city for someone suitable for the band." Genta ordered, settling snuggly in the grass and closing her eyes, hoping Kaithey would be gone by the time she opened them again. Finally, she could get back to her original task at hand; sunbathing.
"What about you?"
Shoo, Kaithey, shoo.
"Hey, it was your idea; I'm not helping until I see that there's actually a chance of it working." She said flippantly. She cracked open an eyelid to glare at Kaithey before her attention was quickly drawn away by a passing cutie of a boy.
"Well I knew you were going to say that, so I took the time to think it over at home."
The older girl teared her vision away from the 'grade A boyfriend material' rather reluctantly, and gave her crazy counterpart a 'really now, now why couldn't you predict I would disagree with your proposal in the first place and spared me from the tale I'm actually trying overwrite with that man's ass I'm staring at there, not that I actually listened to you in the first place' stare.
Or at least that's what Kaithey thought it mean.
"And you know what I realized?" Kaithey continued, regardless.
"What, that building a band on your own is impossible?" The bored girl deadpanned.
That, of course, didn't deter Kaithey the least, "No, silly, I realized what we were missing!"
"Oh, you mean a drum player, a possible lead singer, a place to practice, equipment, a producer, a contract, a demo CD, a name – what else am I missing?" She shot back.
Kaithey dodged her stabbing speculations rather literally. Or maybe the ants in the grass finally got into the chocolate bar she stuffed into her back pocket. "No, not those!"
"Then what, pray tell?"
Her answer was simple, "Twins!"
Genta could feel her brain melting from the overexposure of the being of Kaithey. "Tw –" she desperately tried to grasp onto some intelligent reason for Kaithey's train of thoughts. Or rather, clown train of thoughts. She got nothing. "Twins?"
"Duh; they'll solve everything."
Round two for her brain was just as helpless – if not worse - as round one. This time, it didn't have the 'please tell me I heard wrong' factor to filter it out. "You're saying if we have twins in the band, we'll suddenly, miraculously solve our member-practice-equipment-producer-contract-demo-CD, problem?" Genta said incredulously.
"Like I said: 'Duh'."
"Kai –"
"No," she cut off the older girl, "I know what I'm talking about," she said, despite the fact she was two years younger, got worse grades, fell asleep in class often, and tended to spout nonsense, "Just think about it. Twins are magical! How else can two people look exactly the same, understand each other's thoughts, and still be an individual? Trust me on this one, Gen; twins will solve everything with their magical presence!"
"… right," Genta deadpanned, "Of course that has nothing to do with genetics or the fact the egg and sperm act in a different manner than usual." The second girl ignored her super-condensed educational lecture in favour for her watch, so Genta went on irritably, "Say you are right, for some mind-bending, unholy, logic-slaughtering, brain-frying, chocolate-eating, intellectual-poisoning, Beelzebub-spawning, cerebellum-corrosiving, insect-swarming, god-forsaken," She was desperately trying to get the inconceivability of the situation through to Kaithey, "reason, and that twins somehow will solve everything; how do you propose we force them into the band? It's not like they'll just start popping in front of us begging us to let them join."
She paused and crossed her fingers hoping it didn't happen. Logically, it shouldn't but with Kaithey here, anything was possible.
"With this!" Making her own sound effect, Kaithey pulled out today's edition of the newspaper from her magenta pink and emerald green stripped overalls with a flourished whip of her arm. "I've been placing an ad in here and online sites for awhile, see?"
Genta looked over the shorter girls shoulder.
Interested in music? Want to play for a crowd? Dream of starting a band but have your friends shoot down the idea every second (cough Genta cough)? Then we're two of a kind! Come to the Central Park, furthest to the south-east entrance where the fishies roam, and meet with us wannabes to try to make it to the high life! Seventh of the first double ones, at Lunch o'clock. Requirements: Twins. No guarantees to be successful, but hey, life's fun like that.
Genta stared at her name printed on the paper, along with the other confusing points dejectedly. "Please, Kaithey, next time leave all the writing to me." Kaithey attempted to continue reading the rest of the ads printed upside-down as Genta snatched it from her, "While I'm at it, why are we meeting them in a park of all places? How will we test their abilities?"
"Mag –"
"Don't say 'magic'"
Kaithey attempted to change the word without seeming so, "Mag –" What started with 'mag'? "Mag-be I just wanted to see who they were first before testing them."
"Sure," she said succinctly, "Whatever you say."
o-o
They made their way to the chosen spot, arriving just barely earlier than appointed. Rather than look for the attendees, Genta merely glanced at the newspaper and snorted. She highly doubt many would make it anyways, with Kaithey's not-so-helpful direction, time, and date.
Of course, Genta's voiced complaint was simply met with a 'don't be silly' comment and forgotten due to Kaithey's short attention span and sudden obsession of finding fish in the nearby pond.
As lunch of the seventh of the double ones, or rather, 12:00 of July 11th, came, Genta stared at the lack of participants cursing at Kaithey's incompetence, before she thought better of it, remembering she never agreed on the shorter girl's plan to start a band in the first place, and inwardly celebrated the meager gathering.
Staring at the surprising turnout of twelve (six pairs of twin), Kaithey cracked her knuckles and gave an evil smile. "Welcome, my new minions,"
Genta sighed at the girl's choice of words. Was she really keen on forcing them all away?
"First order of business," The nodding ball of black spikes continued, "You two," she pointed to a pair of twins around 20-something in age, "Too old, bye!"
She repeated the procedure for the other for similar reasons including but not limited to: 'your fashion sense sucks', 'your orange hair clashes with my outfit', 'Dizygotic twins don't count!', you remind me of Genta's grandma', 'why're you crying?', and 'I don't' like all the black your twin's wearing … what do you mean the that's actually a shadow, Genta?'.
Genta slapped her hand over Kaithey's mouth before she could go on and successfully cast everyone away. She looked over at he last pair of twins still standing (or rather sitting on the grass), having efficiently ignored Kaithey when she told them they should go because they were 'too boring looking with their black hair, and no, their matching black shades didn't do it for them'.
"Hi." She said to them, decidedly ignorant as to what Kaithey wanted them to do in the park of all places to prove themselves worthy. Drawing a blank, she proceeded to stare at the twins, hoping they would crack – or at least do something amusing.
Kaithey gave a crackle under Genta's clasped hand before pushing away, "Excellent, you've pas –"
Genta's palm reattached to her lips. "Not so hasty." She turned to the two, both staring at their actions, "So, introduce yourselves." She said, taking over, deciding she really didn't want to let Kaithey do things on her own.
One of the two grinned while the other tapped away on his laptop. "Wouldn't you like to know." He said teasingly.
"Yes, I would."
He glared at her blatant ignoring of his tone. "Fine!" he muttered a few choicy words to describe Genta under his breath. "Anywho, I'm … er …" he trailed off.
"Antony." Kaithey supplied helpfully.
"Er - Antonio," he corrected after a thought, "an' he's –" he pointed to his twin and broke off, looking over at Kaithey for guidance.
"Matthew?" She suggested, yet again.
The other twin, now dubbed Matthew looked up, gave a nod, and went back to his typing.
"Matthew," Antonio confirmed, "an' we're here to join the band."
Genta's eye grew a twitch at the ludicrousness of the two – or three, if she included Kaithey, which, she decided after a moment's thought, she did.
"Your names?" she repeated herself.
"Antonio an' Ma'thew." He insisted.
Genta took a breath. "No, now let's try that again; your names?"
"Gen! Don't mess with the Tanakas!" Kaithey yelled.
"'Tanakas'?" Did she really want to know?
Kaithey rolled her eyes, "Well duh. If they're Japanesy-asians, then they should have Japanesy last names!"
Because it would kill them if they gave their actual names, right Kaithey?
Genta sighed at her absurd people naming needs. Where was that talent last night, when Kaithey woke her up to help name the sheep she was counting?
"That's too common and typical," The laptop bearing twin said, "I prefer 'Hinto', actually."
Now if only she could figure it whether he made it up or not.
Kaithey, on the other hand, thought about it quickly, "Hmm, works for me!" She dismissed.
Genta eyed the so-called Matthew's laptop, musing with the idea that he'd lent it to her to bash her head into. Or maybe, she'd borrow it under the guise of hitting her own head when actually, she would knock out all three idiots in front of her?
Yeah, she liked the second idea better. Now, if only Kaithey didn't have a third eye for these types of things and would stop looking at her like that. Seriously, was she broadcasting her thoughts or something?
Okay, I won't bash in your heads; stop staring at me like that!
"Setting that fact aside," Genta grimaced, giving her friend a glare, "What do you play?"
"My brother," he pointed at Matthew, "plays the guita' (poorly, very poorly), and ele'tric keyboard too, if you wan' that in your band. Fran'ly anything involving te'hnology, he's your man. Me –" he pointed to himself, "I pl'ay the drums, and damn sexy doing so."
Kaithey continued to bob her head, "Excellent." She cocked her head to the side, "Whose bright idea was it to have an audition in the middle of the park again? How will we test their skill?"
"Yours, I believe." Genta said mildly.
Where was Kaithey's brain when she pointed it out not even half an hour ago?
"Let's bring them to the school; the club room's still open for those 'hard-core' band-n-choir members getting ready for that stupid mid-summer performance. I'm sure they won't mind us barging in on them."
She shot down Kaithey's suggestion. "There's no way I'm bringing them to our school. I don't care that we won't get in trouble because Mr Teacher-in-charge gave the room key to his favourite pet student Ms Prissy-Clarissa to let the club in to practice, but frankly she hates us, and we hate her. Putting that aside, I don't need two stalking twin strangers knowing where I go to school."
"Don't flatter yourself … Genta, was it?"
"Genta Coralsmith, but what's it to you?" She bit back.
The other twin, the one diligently working on his laptop ever since the start of the interview, looked up after tapping a few more times, "Fran'ly, Lady, setting an aud'tion here means you live close-by, an' there really aren't a lot of high-schools here. The fact t'at girl," he pointed at Kaithey, seeing as she never mentioned her name even once, "said to bring us to the school cl'ubroom, I can eas'ly narrow it down to the closes' ones nearby – ones wi't a school mid-summer performance. Not to me'tion, you jus' gave us your name. Just by as'king 'round – or the schools dire'tly, I can find out like that." He said, snapping his fingers at the word 'that'.
This was why she hated people.
Genta used her height to her advantage to amplify her sneer at the boys, "Thank you for pointing that out," she snarled sarcastically, "Now why don't you two nitwits leave and start asking? And if you call me 'Lady' one more time, buster, I'll sack you."
He snorted at her words not at all amused at Genta's attempt to look intimating. "Right, I'm so sorry, m'lady," Antonio perked at the nickname, obviously finding it funny, "'Sides," Matthew continued, "as'king around isn' the only way to find sh't about people. Is'n that right, Genta Nuan Coralsmith of R.E. Lison Secondary. Ni'th grade, daughter of Gibson K. Coralsmith, and Mei L. Smith, nee Yu, living at -"
"Shut it." She snapped with her eyes ablaze with anger. "Kai, I refuse to work with these stalkers."
Yes, exactly why she hated people.
"Remember what I said?" Kaithey replied optimistically.
Genta hissed acidly, "Everything is not going to inexplicably come into place just because we have twins in the band."
"It will, besides, Mat's not stalking you, he just happened to hack into the school's student information page." She offered Genta as comfort, staring into the other boy's dark shade as she had been doing ever since the interview started. The glasses gave a perfect reflection of the screen Matthew was looking at.
And that fact didn't scare her why?
"As that may be," Genta pressed on, "and that may be all fine and dandy with you, but I HATE these two. Put up another ad if you please, but they are officially cut from ever attending. If they show up again, I will personally phone the police."
"On what charge, m'lady?" asked the twins, listening in.
"Hacking."
"Can't be proved!" Antonio countered with a smug grin plastered on his face.
Genta blatantly ignore him. He gave a huff of annoyance. "Fine, two can play this game. You, other one – Kai, is it?"
"Kaithey." She supplied.
"Don't tell them your name!" Genta yelled in the background.
"Aw, don't worry, Gen! They'll never find out I'm Kaithey Michida Blake of R.E. Lison Secondary, who lives with Nina, and is the school-wide young adult's poetry writing contest second place winner last year, with one book overdue in the public library because I accidentally dropped it in the bathtub when I was reading it, and now I refuse to give it back because I don't want to pay the damage charges."
"No, never." Genta drawled disapprovingly.
Of course they'll never find out – just like they'll never know you're purple hair's actually dyed and not natural.
"It's trivial information," Kaithey said soothingly, "Who cares if anyone know, Gen? Give the twins a chance to show their skills."
The more mature girl's eyebrow rose as she realized Kaithey's sudden need to give the twins information on herself a way to comfort her.
"What skills?" she continued stubbornly, refusing to accept the two.
"Hey, m'lady, no jud'ging 'til you've heard!"
Kaithey obviously had faith in them, but was her judgment to be trusted? She was Kaithey, after all – not that she actually knew being 'Kaithey' was a good or bad thing.
"Fine." She said asperity, with her hands thrown up in defeat. "Just this once. Since you know where we go, you first. I don't trust you behind us."
"Hey, we're black belts; that doesn't deter a thing." Antonio teased, getting up to lead the way.
"Are you trying to make me force you to leave?"
"No, just maki'n you feel wary of us."
Kaithey wagged her finger at them from behind, "I wouldn't do that if I were you; Gen's got pepper spray on her."
Genta froze, "How did you know that?" She was certain she never shown it to Kaithey. Nor did she tell her that was why she refused to leave her alone with the boys.
No that she needed any help. Sure Kaithey constantly talked to stangers, but she scared them all off rather quickly on her own.
"They're legally sold." She said with a shrug, "You're the most cautious person I know, and you were going to live alone, if I hadn't offered my home to you before you set out."
Oh. Oh well. At least the twins knew not to mess with her now.
o-o
"So tell me again how you managed to get Clarissa to lend the clubroom to us – especially us," she pointed to Kaithey and herself, "of all people?"
"The power of twins."
"I so told you, Gen!" Kaithey cheered, glad her talk of magical twins was true. Not that the twins tried to discourage any theory of hers anyways during the walk to the school.
She was beginning to fear she would have to deal with Kaithey as well as two carbon-copies in the near future.
"Well, start playing," Genta said, gesturing to the instruments in front of them.
"Play what?"
She shrugged, "Anything, I suppose. We're just seeing your skills."
Matthew frowned, "How abou' you two?"
"What about us?"
"Are you going to play anything?"
Why would she; this wasn't her audition, it was theirs. She voiced her thoughts.
"Yeah," he retorted, "But what if you two sucked? I don't wan't to join a useless band. We – Our life dream has been to create and become a su'ccessful band. If you two hap'en to pull us down, I'd rat'er not join."
That seemed like a respectable dream. But why this band? There were so many more suitable people out there with as big of a dream as the boys than two measly girls. Sure the twins were in high school as well, a grade younger than Genta in fact, but if they truly had talent, they could find much better people.
Either way, the two girls were actually quite eager to hear their skills after realizing their goal in life. If that was their life's dream, they surely had to have talent in the area.
What was the best way to show off skills?
"Battle of the bands," Kaithey cheered, which was fine for them. They all like the sound of that. Of course, both not knowing any songs, or having music sheets on them, had to battle using the ear bleeding school music Kaithey hated ever so much.
Despite Kaithey's ferocious opposing, they eventually grabbed the boxes of scores to rummage through.
"Close you eyes and pick a random one." Genta ordered.
She did so, groaning out loud when she saw the title. "This," she shook the paper violently, "This is only one step up from those damn snowmen!" she shouted, referring to an earlier conversation with Genta. "Instead of pedophiliac, thieving snowmen, we now have hypocritical, conforming reindeers!"
Of course, that's what she got for pulling out the box of Christmas music sheets.
"So, how do we do this?" Matthew asked. It was easy to just play the notes on the paper, but how would that really prove anything?
"With mock enthusiasm hoping we can tone down the horror shivers the song invokes"
Genta shrugged; making things interesting was Kaithey's forte, but clearly she was no help right now. "How about we just make up a remix on the spot?"
Sure with them being twins, they could probably work together more efficiently, but … well, actually there was no 'but'. Maybe she just wanted to show Kaithey how horribly they could fail if they started a band on a whim. Or maybe she just wanted the twins to actually succeed their goal.
It was a life dream for the twins; she could appreciate that.
It was an 'O-em-gee, that maple tree looks like a freaking guitar – hey, that's a great idea! Let's start a band, Genta' dream for Kaithey; failing was a sure guarantee.
"Sounds coolio."
"You first then," Genta offered. She pointed idly at the grieving girl behind her sobbing apologies to the other boxes of music sheets for 'not reading their cardboardy sides and pulling out the sick, tainted, twisted box of corrupted scores by mistake. She'd learnt her lesson, so please music god help her out before the song devours her brain whole'. "I don't think she's mentally prepared to compete yet."
"Er -" Antonio looked hesitant to play, "If it really bothers her so much, I don't mind if we change the song … ?"
Kaithey was too busy lamenting to notice his offer, which was fine by the taller girl. "Keep it. Watching that girl suffer is my only amusement lately. She's been dealing with my obtrusive jeers with an irking flamboyant flippant attitude. It ruins my fun."
You'd think Kaithey was tweaking her manner to infuriate her to the fullest or something. She was sure Kaithey wasn't that bad before …
"Er – okay." The poor guy looked like he was having second thoughts in joining with the two in a band. Who wouldn't? "So we just change up the song while playing it?"
"Yup." Huh, with one of them on drums, that would be so much easier. Too bad Kaithey and her could only play the guitar. "Whenever you're ready."
The twins clearly knew how to work together. With a quick word shared between them, they started right away, no hesitation at all.
They certainly knew how to make the best of their two-men band. With one on drums, and one on the electric keyboard, they played the decided song in a techno beat.
Not a fan of techno music, Genta couldn't really tell if it was up to par with standards or not. It sounded good – or as good as you can get changing a children's Christmas song into techno – and they were definitely talented.
Kaithey, having snapped out of her stupor during the Hinto brother's mini-concert, was zealous to perform her own style to them.
"Come on, Gen, we can do so much better than that!"
No, we can't; we don't have to telepathic powers they have to make it sound so good without needing to discuss it. We'd probably start doing our own things and end up playing two different styles on top of each other and sound a mess.
She voiced her thought, and expected, was giving a 'psh, you're too serious' and a 'I can so develop telepathic powers too' added in an afterthought.
With a quick applaud as the twins finished, Kaithey shooed them off the "stage" and grabbed their guitars from the back. "Hook them up!"
With her guitar strapped around, Genta quickly flipped through the notes, idly wondering what would be an appropriate way to change it up, and how to get her ideas across the Kaithey in the middle of the song.
Kaithey, however, had no such thoughts. Rather, she gleefully hopped in place trying to exhaust her excitement before they started.
"Ready?" Genta asked. She'd seen Kaithey's endless energy first hand and enough to know there was a chance she would be hopping all day.
"Ready!" The hyper one confirmed, still jumping. "Let's go!"
"Wait –"
Too late; she started. "Just go with the flow." She whispered, "I'm singing!" She added, grabbing the mike she put in front of herself.
So that's why she set it up …
Randomly strumming a few strings softly in a rhythmic beat, she looked over at Kaithey hoping for some guidance.
Naturally, as expected, Kaithey just grinned. With a quick yell of "GO!" she started the intro of the song. She belted out the song, playing it in a couple keys lower than usual. As the reached the actual start of the song, she threw her voice up to shout every now and then.
She was playing in a rock beat.
Even though she realized, Genta had no idea how to follow Kaithey's lead. It was hard to make up stuff on the spot and still actually make the song recognizable. So, instead of following Kaithey's erratic fashion, Genta stuck to the original tune, playing a lower pitch to stay consistent with her partner, and adding in whenever she thought was necessary. It wouldn't help if Kaithey started to forget the original song and started playing randomly after all.
While in reality Genta really had no idea what she was doing, to the listeners, it sounded as though she was leading the song whilst Kaithey spiced it up, so it worked quite well.
As the song progress, Genta suddenly realized Kaithey didn't know the lyrics to the song; maybe just the gist of it. She should have realized with Kaithey immense hatred for Christmas songs, she never took the time to learn it.
Why did she volunteer to song then?
After cringing a couple times as Kaithey made up her own lyrics to atone for the unknown parts, Genta eventually realized this was actually for the better as the words were fit for rock and it was better than humming through half the song – or chanting Celtic summoning spells in tune, as she had done during their last school Christmas concert.
Thankfully the teacher stuck her in the back, knowing her odd tendencies. Plus, he learnt his lesson during the School Spirit Concert at the beginning of the year -that turned out real bad …
"- go down in HIS-TO-RIII!" Kaithey finished with a scream.
Antonio wolf whistled as Kaithey took an extravagant bow.
"Am I good or what?" She cheered.
Genta and Matthew behind her, shook their heads, putting away the equipment they took out. It wouldn't do if Clarissa tried to blame the two for any damages done.
"You girls were bett'a than I expe'ted."
Genta gave him a smile, "I'll take that as a compliment. Likewise, though, you guys were good."
This event was actually making her want to create a band, and seriously, she never thought she would agree with any of Kaithey's 'I do it because I'm awesome to the power of the number of freckles on my face (despite Genta's chiding of 'you have no freckles, Kaithey, and anything to the power of zero is one, so can't you just say "I do it because I'm awesome plan"')' plans. Ever.
"Can I ta'k it then we're in the band?" he inquired.
"Eh," Genta could only shrug helplessly, "You can never tell with Kaith."
And how right she was. When Matthew asked, Kaithey just started at him before asking how he would prove himself worthy.
"Wasn't the poin' of that," the gestured towards the equipment, telling her he was talking about the 'Battle of the Bands' they just did, "to show what we coul'd do?"
She twirled a stand of purple hair around her finger, "Huh; was it? No one told me."
"Wasn't it your idea to have a Battle of the Bands?"
She shrugged. "I though we were just playing for fun."
What difference did that make? "You still heard us, right? Can't you judge from that?"
"Nope," Kaithey shook her head sadly. "That's just not band-member-becoming-audition-material worthy. We need you to do something better."
If that wasn't, then what was?
When asked, Kaithey just shrugged again and gave them a 'let me think about it', before leafing through the music boxes absentmindedly.
Fun, she most likely would get side-tracked again.
Kaithey, however, despite what the group behind her thought she was doing, was actually in deep thought about how to evaluate the twins.
What was there for the twins to do? Something music related, maybe. It was a band audition after all.
Oh, maybe she could ask them to burn those sick, twisted music sheets so no one would need to sing them again! That would kill two birdies with one stone – or shoe, 'cause now that she thought about it, where would you get a stone to chuck at them? A shoe would be a definite better choice; handy too. On that note, who would want to kill a bird? Maybe the phrase was actually kill two beetles with one shoe. Everyone hated beetles, right? And that was actually possible – after all, name one person to hit two birds by chucking a rock of all things at them. No one could throw that high! Stomping was another matter. She inspected her shoe nodding thoughtfully.
"Told you." Genta droned wearily at the twins.
Kaithey waved her hand at them in a 'listen to me' manner, "I wasn't sidetracked!"
She turned back to the boxes. Where was she?
Oh, yes; those damn song. Maybe she could get the twins to rewrite them? Who was warped enough in the head to write them in the first place?
Grabbing out a random sheet, she glared at the title. Then, widened her eyes.
Hey, that gave her a great idea! Now to spread it to the world.
"Hey Genta! Gen! Gen-Gen!"
"Yes?"
"You know what we should do, Gen?" the thirteen-year old hopped in place excitedly.
"Pray tell what?"
"It's so painfully obvious, that I don't need explaining." She said cheerfully, "You," she pointed at a twin. "You … twin-man …"
Did she really forget his name? She was the one who gave it to them.
Genta offered her some help, hoping to speed up things, "His name end in the 'oh' sound."
Alright, maybe not speed things up, or else she would have told her his name right off the bat. Maybe she just wanted to test Kaithey's so-called mind and laugh at her if she managed to mangle it up. That's what good friends do, right?
Kaithey snapped her fingers in recollection of the name. "Of course!"
No duh; need I remind you again you were the one who gave them that alias?
"You, Hinto, let's settle this here and now."
Hinto?
"I'm sure he goes by Antonio, Kai." Genta corrected with a furrowed brow. How bad was her short-term memory?
"Don't be silly." She said in a no-nonsense voice, "It's Hinto – I should know."
… Really.
Antonio, now dubbed Hinto, rose up to Kaithey's challenge, completely ignoring her side conversation with Genta. "Name your game."
"No backing out."
"I don't inten' to."
"Good. Now show me a sign." She yelled dramatically.
A what? "Excuse me?" A sign to show he was listening ... or what?
Kaithey rolled her eyes like it was obvious. Maybe it was for her, but no one else. "Your hand; make a sign - signal with it."
"Er –" He opened his hands wide and gave it a wave like he was saying 'hello', feeling like this was the safest choice to make. What was the point of this?
"Hmmm …" She looked thoughtfully at him. Kaithey suddenly pointed at the other twin, "You –" She gave a pause. What was his name again? Genta's clue sounded in her mind. She ignored the fact it was for the first twin; a hint was a hint after all. "- Hinto, come here."
"Yes?" This was getting really confusing. Not only the game, but the name thing as well. If she called 'Hinto' again without pointing, which one should answer?
"Do you agree with his sign?"
Was there actually some way to judge it? "Er – yes?"
Kaithey growled, "Are you sure?"
She threw up her hands in defeat as Matthew, dubbed Hinto as well by Kaithey, nodded. "Fine; you win! You're in the band."
What was this all about?
When asked, her answer, expected by all three of them was: "Wasn't it obvious?". At the shake of their heads, she went on with an overdrawn sigh at how dense they were, "I was looking through the boxes, then I came across this," she pointed at the score she was holding titled 'Jingle bell Rock', "and then I thought 'if Hinto and Hinto can beat it, then we'll let them in the band as simple as that!'"
"Beat it?" A Hinto asked, confused.
Dawning washed over Genta, "Jingle bell Rock. And you," she pointed at Antonio, "you waved at her with your hands wide open like Paper…"
Rock, Paper … Wait, what?
He felt the need to scream hysterically, "You mean I was playing Rock, Paper, Scissors for my future?"
"Well, wasn't that obvious?"
"No." he shot back at Kaithey. Who in their right mind would play a game to decide something so important?
She asked innocently, "What did you think we were doing?"
"Something intelligent." He glared at her, "For once." He added, under his breath.
Genta patted in on the shoulder, "Don't worry; you'll get used to it. Think of it this way; of all the hundreds of signs you could have made with your hand, you chose the only one that would let you into the band. Maybe it was meant to be."
"Or maybe my luck acted where it wasn't wanted."
Yeah, luck did have a way of appearing when you least expected it. Or, for Kaithey's case, never ending – who knew, the myth 'god looks after fools' was true. It sure proved her theory that Kaithey was a fool.
"That too."
He sighed, "Oh well, as long as you give me food to eat, I'm fine." He said, teasingly.
"Food's always stocked in my fridge." Kaithey grinned. She then tilted her head in thought, "Now that I think about it, we could probably practice in my basement. There's a lot of room there. It's just a storage room right now."
"Cool."
Genta nodded at her idea, slightly irked that they'd had to show the two where Kaithey's house was. At least Nina was always there, and she had her not-so-secret weapon on her. He looked at the twins and suddenly recalled Kaithey's words that morning. "While we're on this topic, Kai, it appears the truth in your words seem to be lacking."
"My words?" she scrunched up her face in thought. Genta hoped her long-term memory was better than her short-term. "Oh, you mean the magical-twins-will-bring-drum player-practice place-equipment-producer-contract-demo thing?" She managed to say in one quick breath.
"Yes."
Kaithey looked at the Hintos with hope in her eyes. Come on, magical twins; you can do it!
Never one to disprove Kaithey's theories, they gave it their best shot.
"I'm a drum player!" Antonio volunteered.
"We've 'minded Kaithey that she had room in her bas'ment to pra'tice in, plus we both have our own equi'ment at home." Matthew added.
They gave each other a high-five, "Th'ree out of six requir'ments!"
"Oh wait; don't forget dear Jia'nyu!"
"Ah, yes," the other one nodded. He elaborated, "He told us that if we eve' find someone stupid enough to take our dreams of becom'ng one of the best bands ever se'iously, and we manage to scrape up enough decen' sound'ng songs, he'd be our producer person (out of pity, 'cause we don't have al life if we manage all that). He wasn't joking either."
"Is he reliable?" It would suck if this Jianyu person didn't know anything.
"He's worked for In the Fine Print." Matthew answered, naming a band. A rather decent band too.
Antonio gave a victory 'v' sign with his fingers. "And that's four out of six – five out of six if Jia'nyu likes our songs and gives us a contract. Actually, six out of six 'cause we need to make a demo CD in order for him to hear our songs."
Damn, Kaithey was right; they were completely covered now, now that they had the twins in their band.
Maybe she should start listening to her more often … Who knew; twins were magical.
o-o
Present Time
"After that, we often had band practice in Kai's basement after lugging their equipment in, and in the end managed to please Jianyu with our music. He asked if we want to practice elsewhere, but we like it down there." Genta finished. "By the way, he should be coming around someday." She added in afterthought.
Putting that last point aside for the moment, Yuki sat on the couch shocked; that story was more normal than he thought it would be. I mean, Kaithey, Kaithey, was in the picture. Nothing was ordinary with her in it.
Picking up Yuki's thought process, Genta shrug and gave him her theory, "She's morphed to adapt to people around her's definite of ordinary, and proceeded to carry out the opposite."
"In other words, we don't want her around a lot of people?" he hazard.
"Exactly." Genta couldn't even start to imagine how Kaithey would be like if she succeed to master the skill of mass-annoyance. Damn, that girl could be a weapon of mass destruction (of sanity). She got so much worse after meeting two - just two! - people.
"Hey, don't talk like I'm not here!" Kaithey yelled from the background. From far, far in the background, ignored.
"I'm not background noise! Stop ignoring me!"
"Yes, yes." Genta dismissed, "Now, if that's all, I need sleep. God knows how early you're going to wake us up tomorrow –" she glanced at the clock on the wall, "- today." She gave Kaithey a withering glare before she headed back up the stairs.
Kaithey stuck her tongue out at her retreating back.
"Now that that annoyance is gone, Lucy, you can be honest; what do you think about the start of our band?"
Why could he not be honest with Genta around? But he did have a question …
"Frankly I can't see why you were so bent on recruiting the twins – I mean, Genta was so against it." Not that he wasn't thankfully the twins were accepted and they were able to start their band.
"Genta –" How to explain this, "Genta has trouble making friends. She has an 'I hate people' thing going on most of the time. It never occurred to you the fact that she's in college, yet she spends all her time with us high-schoolers instead of her colleagues?"
"I don't see you hanging around other people either." Yuki said, feeling the need to defend the older girl.
"It's not my fault," she said indifferently, "I'm not popular with the girls in my classes; they think I'm weird for some odd reason. You can see them slowly inching away from me sometimes. It brightens my day. As for Hinto and Hinto," she continued on, sparing Yuki from asking again, "they tend to disappear every now and then, right Hintos?"
He looked over at the twins sitting on the far end of the couch, leaning on each other, slightly glossy-eyed from the lack of sleep. They didn't react to their names.
"Anyways, they say yes." Kaithey replied for them. "Yes?" she looked over at the two. "Yes." She answered herself yet again when she was ignored.
"To wha – ?" The twins finally looked over and asked groggily, sliding over closer to them on the floor in an odd slug-like movement.
"Never mind," Yuki said with a shake of his head, "I'm just shocked you joined the band through a game of chance."
"Me too."
"Well actually," Yuki continued on, "I always thought you were in the same boat as … well, us; Kaithey, Genta, and I."
"Hmm … ?"
"Well you know, Kaithey's alone because of an unfortunate accident, Genta ran away from home for one reason or another, and I ran away too because everyone hated me …" Wasn't it only natural to think the twins had a similar ill-fated pasts?
"Nope, our lives have been wonderful." Matthew, or maybe Antonio – it was hard to tell without his trademark laptop in his hands - said with a grin.
"We're rich –"
"Popular –"
"Awesome –"
"Intelligent –"
"Loved –"
"Egotistical, annoying, bratty, a gormandizer, nerdy, selfish, insecure –"
"Hey, hey, hey!" A twin cut her off.
"Kaithey, what do you thi'k you're doing!"
She looked at them with a feigned angelic face plastered on, "What? I thought we were describing your qualities."
"WE were; you're just spouting nonsense." He looked up, "Seriously, Shorty, ignore her."
With an exaggerated gasp at their tone, she turned away with a huff, "Come on, Lucy, we know when we're not wanted." She grabbed his arm and pulled him up with her.
"Actually, you're not; I –" he started mildly before stopping himself, seeing Kaithey ignore his words. Eh. "Okay, let's go." Why argue when he would never win? You can't be logical with someone who's not.
Yuki walked Kaithey to her room dully noting he'd never been in her room before - or even looked into it. He could only shiver as his thoughts gave him rather traumatizing ideas. No, he was never going to check.
"I'm glad the twins turned out to be nice people after all." He told Kaithey, glad she chose them for the band.
"Yeah," she said with a nod. Still, she looked slightly troubled, "Actually, we don't really know a lot about those two. But," she shrugged, "It's fine with me. I'm sure they'll tell us more someday." She pointed at Yuki, "What you said about thinking their life is bad, I actually think it's true."
"Really?"
"Yeah, they stay over here sometimes when there's really no reason to – they actually have a house to go back to. And sometimes, when they come over the practice, they'd look so pissed off about something, and actually beg to stay over for the night."
Yuki looked up, slightly shocked. He never expected the twins –so always playful – to have problems like that. "Family trouble?"
"Yeah … But it doesn't look that bad." She added quickly after seeing Yuki's distressed face, "Trust me, I would be able to tell if it's worse. …well, Genta would, but then I would know after that 'cause she'll tell me." She corrected, "'cause Genta's awesome like that."
"That's good." He was glad someone was taking care of the twins so well. He knew how it felt like when it seemed like there was no one around willing to help.
He – no one – liked that lonely feeling.
"And that's that." Kaithey added cheerfully at the end. "Now good-night! If I don't sleep today, I won't be able to get up today!" With that, she spun around a few times for no apparent reason at all – maybe she was trying to get Yuki to back away from her door – and rushed into her room.
"Good night."
Yuki went off to his own room and bed.
Would this count as living in a fairy tale life? There truly wasn't anyone kinder than these four who took him in without a second thought. And it seemed, they were the type who were kind to people, no matter the circumstances, and never quick to judge (kind of).
He easily fell asleep that night – er … morning, a smile played softly on his lips.
I can't really feel any humour from this chapter - I've tried to redo it like five times already, still nothing. Maybe I made myself re-read it too many times, what do you think? And seriously, if you also don't find it as funny, what do you think is wrong with it? I can't figure it out. Too much talking?
I'm also seriously berating myself of my stupidity of deciding to write about a place I've never been to in all my life. The school is totally made up, and probably every other place and band I name (going to name) in this story.