It was over. Mr.Rickman crossed his arms across his chest and cleared his throat. "Bailey, I think I've made my decision."

---

Bailey stood standing over the snares holding the drum sticks in her hands. She was gripping them so tightly her knuckles were turning milk-white and she couldn't uncoil her fingers from them. She felt like if she let go, then something bad would happen or go wrong, so she tightened her fingers around the smooth wood tighter.

Logan was leaned up against the wall in the back of the band room away from the drama. She had listened to Bailey try out and she honestly thought Bailey had made it. Still, she eagerly strained to hear what Mr.Rickman was saying.

She couldn't hear what they were saying, but whatever it was caused Bailey's eyes to widen. The body language showed that Bailey was startled, and she and Mr.Rickman talked a bit more before Bailey turned and walked towards Logan with a surprised expression on her pretty face.

"Take me home." Bailey said simply, then turned and walked to the band room door and slipped outside. Logan hurried after her.

"Wait! Bailey you have to tell- Auugghh!" She ran face-first into the door and grabbed her nose with tears in her eyes. "Wait Bailey!" Logan kept one hand on her nose and used the other to push open the door and she ran outside. She caught up with Bailey who was half-way to the parking lot on the sidewalk. The weather was nice outside. There was a nice cool breeze that lifted Bailey's golden hair and flipped it outwards and inwards, rolling like the whitecaps of the ocean.

"Which one is your car?" Bailey asked, scanning the deserted parking lot. Logan raised an eyebrow and let go of her nose.

"Well it's not Mr.Rickman's car," She pointed at a black Mercedes that had a band sticker on the windshield, "So it must be this one." She lead Bailey to the only other car in the parking lot. It was a blue Volkswagen beetle and it was decorated with millions of environmental bumper stickers. One read 'Save the trees, wipe your butt with a beaver'. Bailey stared at it.

Logan dug in her bag for her car keys. Her bag was a brown shoulder-bag with tons of pockets and cervices and had a few lanyards hanging off of it that Laney had made her in fifth grade.

Logan finally pulled out a cluster of at least twenty key chains all linked together and found her car key amongst the metal and fluff. She pushed the button and the car beeped, unlocking itself.

"And I am not opening your door for you, so if you want to get home, I suggest you get in or I'm going to leave you in this parking lot. Maybe some hobo will let you share his blanket." Logan hopped in and shut the door. Bailey stood hesitant, but finally opened the car door and slid inside slowly as if she were entering a dangerous place that was off-limits.

"Wow it's really..roomy in here." Bailey said awkwardly, pushing some junk out of the seat so she could sit down. There were McDonalds burger wrappers in the floorboard and clothes hung over the seats. Logan dug around in the floor board then returned with a box of fries. They were probably two days old.

"Want some?" Logan asked. Bailey shook her head. "Suit yourself." She shoved some in her mouth.

--

"What kind of music do you have that we can listen to?" Bailey asked over the rushing roar of the wind coming from Logan's opened window. Logan had her hand sticking out and it was holding a cigarette.

"What?" Logan yelled, glancing quickly to Bailey but turning back to the road. Bailey reached over Logan's lap and pushed the window's button herself, making it go up. Logan had to toss out the cigarette so her hand wouldn't get cut off. "Hey, what do you think you're doing?"

"I said, do you have any music we can listen to? If you can even find it in all this mess.."

"You call this a mess? You should see my room. There's gerbil in there somewhere…now where's my Zeppelin…" She took her hands off the steering wheel and started flipping through a CD case that was down in the floor.

"Watch the road!" Bailey grabbed the steering wheel and they swerved around a truck driver who did a rude gesture with his hand after blowing the horn several times. Logan sat back up with a CD in her hand.

"Here we go..Have you ever heard 'Stairway to Heaven'?" She popped in the music and fiddled with the controls. Bailey was still having a hard time catching her breath, after almost being pummeled by a Penski truck.

"No, I haven't. I don't like stairways, they're too complicated. In my house we have an elevator." Bailey took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Logan's finger hovered over the 'play' button, but she hesitated.

"Bailey, what all did Mr.Rickman say to you in the band room?"

Bailey opened her crystal blue eyes. When she had opened them it had gone from eyelid to blue so fast it was almost like a flash of neon light.

"He..um..put me in pit."

"That's great! You're with me!"

"Yeah, but it's not great when you've been playing snare and quads your whole life. I should've been able to make it. I don't know what went wrong."

"Well what do you play?"

"Triangle. Slow down, there's my stop."

---