Chapter Four Later that day
After unpacking the food and drinks we all headed to the basketball courts to find our instruments. Mine stuck out like a sore thumb, I placed a lime green ribbon around the handle so I could find it come band camp. When I bent down to pick up my mellophone my light blue senior shirt felt very wet all of a sudden. Behind me stood Kenny and Andrew laughing, they had just poured water down my back.
"You looked hot" Andrew said coolly "We thought it was our duty to cool you down."
"You're dead!" I screamed and proceeded to chase them around the courts. I grabbed some random freshmen's water bottle in the process.
"Can't catch us!" Andrew said as they ran in the guys side of the camp. It was off limits for any girls, the band mom's had made that rule crystal clear.
Andrew and Kenny kept on running, I decided I would get them back sometime during the week. I went back to the court, grabbed my mellophone and retreated back to my cabin.
"Where you going?" I asked Jenny as she was walking away from the cabin.
"One of the band mom's said that everyone had to go to the lodge. I'll wait for ya." She said.
I ran into our cabin, threw my mellophone by the side of my bunk and ran back outside. We were just chatting about what camp had in store for us when we reached the lodge.
"Hello everyone. I hope we all had a safe and fun ride down." Blackmer said. "Well anyway, today is going to be a easy one. After this everyone needs to grab their instruments and head down to the field. From there we will get in attendance block, teach you a couple of commands, then start to work on marching. After that it will be dinner, then the night time activity. Alright?" He asked "Alright! So everyone go and get your gear and meet me on the field in 10 minutes."
With that everyone left and went back to their designated cabins.
I quickly grabbed my mellophone and headed towards the field. I was greeted by the rough rocky path that slopped down the gigantic hill. It always looked intimidating after a long practice when you had to hike back up it. I reached the end not only to be greeted my screaming freshmen boys who had made it down quicker than I had. Next to the burnt looking field there was the pavilion, where we would have our water breaks and sometimes full band rehearsal. It looked big, but once 115 band members came in all hot and sweaty, it felt like a small little classroom. After a couple minutes of waiting, more people showed up asking a million questions like: "What's attention block?" "Why do we have to learn how to march, we already know it" "When do we get food, I'm starving." Typical freshmen questions.
"Ok everyone, out to the 50 yard line." yelled Derek.
We all gathered around the 50 yard line and waited for Blackmer to give us orders.
"Low brass first row, Josh on the 50, and upperclassmen on the end. Everyone else, fall in." he announced.
Everyone filed in to where the upperclassmen pointed out to them.
"Second row, Andrew on the 50, again upperclassmen on the end."
The trumpets filled in, some freshmen pushed others out of the way to be next to someone.
"Third row, mello's and the rest of the trumpets. Rachel, 50 everyone else file in."
"WHAT?" I thought, "How come I'm not on the 50? I'm section leader, not Rachel!"
I decided to stand on the end, placing Vicky, the not so eager freshmen, next to me.
"Oops problem. Um Peter stand next to Layla, we wont have enough room in the sax/clarinet row."
Peter also looked mad, we were the section leaders and should be in the 50 of our line, not on the end. Alex, the obnoxious sax player was on the 50.
After 20 minutes of adjusting and figuring out where people should go, we finally had our attendance block.
"Remember who you are next to, look to your left introduce yourself." Blackmer said.
"Hi I'm Layla." I said sarcastically to Peter.
"Hi I'm Peter." He said just as sarcastic.
"Now to your right. Hopefully if you are an underclassmen you will have a senior or junior on either side of you."
"Hey Vicky." I said as cheerful as I could be.
"Whatever." she shot back.
"Excuse me?" I yelled.
"Hi." she said in a mousy way.
I could already tell there were going to be issues with this girl.
After and hour or so of practicing marching, Blackmer let us go for dinner. All the girls raced up the hill to get to their cabins to put their stuff down, while the boys took a path to get to their part of the camp. Me and Jenny just wandered up to Saux because we were seniors now and had the privilege of using our senior cuts. By the time we placed our instruments back in their cases, the line at the lodge was already long. But it didn't matter, we strolled right up and went into the senior door, obviously only seniors could go through it. We formed back into the line and grabbed our gruel which the kitchen called food and sat down at a table. Soon Josh, Dani, Peter, Andrew, Kenny and Annie all joined us. We sat there talking about how bad the freshmen already were, and weither or not we got sunburns yet.
A couple minutes passed and everyone was finishing up their meals, when Blackmer stood up.
"Attention! After dinner we will have our night activity. Which tonight is Freshmen Introduction." He said.
The seniors cheered, while the faces of the freshmen looked scared.
"Don't worry freshmen, its nothing to be scared of. But when you're done, you can go back to your cabins and freshin' up or whatever, but be back here in 10 minutes. You're dismissed."
My entire table got up and left. I ran up to Jenny and Dani, and linked my arms through theirs.
"So who do you want as your freshmen?" I asked.
Freshmen Introduction was exactly that, the seniors chose one to two freshmen to introduce to the entire band. You could say random things about them and even embarrass the crap out of them.
"I'm not sure, maybe Brenna from the sax's." Jenny said.
"I might grab Vicky, just for you Layla." Dani said chuckling.
"I'll prolly grab that annoying trumpet player, Jordan. I can really embarrass him." I said with an evil look.
We all giggled back to the cabin. Once inside it was talk of who people wanted to grab to introduce. I quickly put on some bug spray and met Annie outside my cabin.
"What should I say?" she asked.
Freshmen Introduction was also a time for sophomores, juniors and seniors to say some stuff about them too.
"I don't know. Just be like 'Yo I'm Annie! Mello playa' and annoying!'" I said laughing.
"Ha ha very funny Lay." she said.
"Well you asked my opinion on what you should say, and I gave it to ya."
Annie just rolled her eyes at me and laughed.
We walked back into the lodge and already the freshmen were huddled around one another, anticipating the arrival of the seniors. Finally the rest of the seniors showed up, and the sophomores and juniors were sent outside to go wait on the back porch. Blackmer gave us the order to go find two freshmen to introduce. I grabbed Jordan, a trumpet player and Andre, the only freshmen to make snare line.
"Ok so tell me about yourselves." I said.
"Umm I'm Jordan, I play the trumpet and um yeah." he said.
"Not good enough!" I said giggling "Tell me your favorite color, relationship status, and favorite band."
"Uhh, my favorite color is blue, I'm single and I love T-Pain."
"Wow. Ok, and you?" I asked looking at Andre.
"I'm Andre, favorite color is green, single and I love the Beatles." Andre said nervously.
"Beatles. SWEET! I love them too. Ok I guess I'll tell you about me. Layla, yes I'm named after the Eric Clapton song, favorite color is lime green, I'm single too and I don't have a favorite band, but I love classic rock."
"Ok guys go out to the porch and line up." Blackmer said.
All the seniors and freshmen wandered out to the back, the sophomores and juniors were awaiting us. I decided to go first.
"Hey guys!! I'm Layla and this here is Jordan and Andre." I looked around and saw blank stares, now I knew how Blackmer must feel. "Ok this is Jordan he absolutely LOVES T-Pain and the color blue. And guess what ladies, he's single." I saw Jordan's face turn bright red. Freshmen are so easily embarrassed. "And this big guy is Andre. One of the only freshmen to make it into the snare line, other than Kenny. He loves the color green, long walks on the beach, and candle lit dinners. His hobbies are drumming and drumline and loves the Beatles." Everyone "wooed" and I heard a few cat calls in his direction.
After me the rest of the seniors went and embarrassed their freshmen, just as I had done. We had finished and now the juniors could go. They were boring because they only talked about themselves and had no one to introduce. Then the sophomores went, I paid attention during Mike, Annie and Melissa's speech, but that's about it.
Finally it was done, Blackmer gave us the order to go back to our area's. Lights out was at 10 o'clock, so we had an hour to chill and take a shower. I opted to wait until morning for my shower, and wandered to my cabin, changed into my pj's and nestled into my bunk.