Friday, Shane's Locker, 8:23 AM...
All young Price could think about for the past couple days was the upcoming performance, and oh boy, was he anxious. He'd spent hours locked in his room, memorizing the songs they might be playing. From what Ruby told him, the competition when like this. There were 10 bands. They'd all be pit one on one against each other. The rules were simple, each band gets two songs. After they both conclude their respective performances, the crowd decides who advances to the next round. Whoever gets the loudest cheers moves on, and the other one goes home. This goes on until there's only one act left standing and they're declared the winner.
"Man, I can't let these girls down. I also can't make a fool outta myself in front of all those people." He said to himself.
That's something else Shane didn't know about until recently. He figured that the Battle of the Bands was a relatively small event, and maybe like 50 people would show up to watch a bunch of kids screw around on instruments have fun. Not... not exactly. It seemed like everywhere he went there were flyers advertising the event. On the train, on the bus, on trees, in the damn school itself. When he asked Liv about it, she told him that it had become a pretty popular annual event over the years. High schoolers and others from all across Manhattan would be coming to see them. She said the highest recorded attendance for one of these things was about 500 to 600 people. Needless to say, this man was streeeeesed.
As he gathered his books needed for today's schedule, he felt someone's hand tap him on the shoulder. Turning around, he saw Kofi Kingston standing in front of him with a friendly smile on his face.
"Oh hey man. What's up?" Price greeted his athletic teammate.
"Nothing much, Cash. I just wanted to wish you good luck on Sunday. You're gonna do great, I know it."
"Kof, for my sake? I hope you're right. I'm nervous as all hell if I'm gonna be completely honest with you."
"Well, just know that me and the rest of the boys are gonna be pullin for ya. We're all going downtown to support you bro."
"Oh really?! Aw man that means a lot to me. Thank you guys." Price said sincerely.
"No problem my guy. We tried to get Coach Helmsley to possibly show up but he said, and I quote, "I love the kid, but I've got important adult shit to do, and I'm not spending my Sunday night around a bunch of retarded 16 year old fuckheads." Kingston explained.
Shane laughed.
"Yeah, that sounds like Coach alright. But again, thanks. I look forward to seeing you all there. You even got Bray to agree to come? He's not exactly a social gathering type of dude. Remember how antisocial he acted at Ethan's Halloween party?"
"Bray's actually a huge fan of mosh pits, believe it or not. So, uh... you better play some hardcore stuff or else you might have to deal with Wyatt after the show."
"Oh, don't you worry about that. Most of the stuff me and my band have practiced is up tempo and badass as hell." Shane confirmed.
"Can't wait then. Alright man, I'll see you around."
The two teammates dapped each other up and Kofi turned around and went to his homeroom. As Shane recounted the conversation he just had, a thought had dawned on him that brought his nervousness right back.
"Oh God, now I gotta make sure I don't embarrass myself in front of my team too. Fuck!"
12:34 PM, Cafeteria...
"So do you guys know what songs you're gonna play at the show?" Bayley asked enthusiastically.
Today's group at lunch consisted of the aforementioned Bayley, Becky Lynch, Shane, Alexa, and Dean. Seth and Big E were busy getting tutored by Xavier in the library, Sasha wasn't in school due to a fever she was fighting, and Cody had somehow found himself in the principal's office, shocker.
"Uh, kinda. There's three songs we know for a fact that we're gonna use. The rest'll just be whichever ones we feel like would be the best to play at the time." He answered.
"That's the sign of true chemistry right there. When you can play whatever off the cuff like that? That's how you know you're in sync." Becky stated.
"Man, I would hope that we've developed some sort of chemistry by now. Me and those girls have basically been joined at the hip for the last month. My whole world's been consumed by da squaaaaad." He joked.
Everyone at the table laughed at his antics... Well, everyone except a certain blonde cheerleader. She kinda took the joke a tad more serious than it was intended to be.
"Yeah, tell me about it." Alexa grumbled under her breath in response.
"What was that, babe?" Price asked, not hearing her.
"I said that you guys are gonna do great." She lied.
Dean smirked.
"Yeah, that's totally what you said princess."
If looks could kill, Dean Ambrose would be a walking corpse right about now with the way Bliss was staring daggers at him. Becky lightly tapped him on the shoulder.
"Babe, maybe lay off this time." Lynch said trying to persuade her boyfriend to not tease the obviously irritated cheerleader.
"Lay off her? Aw, babe you should know me better than that. It's not my fault Little Miss Bliss has her panties in a bunch today." He said, laughing afterwards.
Now, Ambrose fully intended for his little jab at Alexa to be just that. A little jab, nothing to seriously offend the girl. However, Shane and the rest of the gang could feel that something was very wrong with their petite friend, and that feeling was proven to be extremely accurate, when she angrily left her seat and started exiting the cafeteria. Before she was fully gone, Bayley had made an attempt to get her to return to the table.
"Wait, Lexi. Please come back, Dean didn't mean it!" She called out to her.
All the bubbly girl got in return was stone cold silence as Alexa continued to march her way out. After that, even Dean realized that he'd gone too far.
"Uh... my bad man. I was just playin' around. I didn't mean to actually piss her off." The troublemaker stated, being uncharacteristically sympathetic.
Price waved off his apology.
"Nah man, this isn't your fault. Honestly, I should've seen something like this coming. Damn it... I'm sorry for ditching you guys, but I gotta go find her and talk to her.
No one at the table objected to that.
"No need to apologize, buddy. We completely understand." Becky responded.
"Yeah, bro go on and do what you gotta do." Dean seconded.
As he got up, Bayley smiled sweetly and gave him a double thumbs up.
"You always know how to cheer everyone up, you got this." She assured.
Shane gave the girl a small smile before heading out to locate the love of his life. Luckily, she hadn't gone too far. He only walked around for a few minutes before he noticed the familiar blonde and pink of his significant other through one of the windows of the gym. It seemed as if the petite princess had decided to sit herself at the very top of the bleachers. So, Shane entered said gym and made his way up to where she was. Once he'd completed the trek up there, he sat next to her and for awhile, no one said anything. Not until Shane took his arm and wrapped it around Alexa, pulling her into him. She didn't resist surprisingly.
"Ya know, Dean feels like crap for saying that to you." He told her, his voice giving off an almost playful tone.
Lexi let out a small chuckle.
"Good, maybe this is the day that idiot decides to actually think before he says shit."
"Well, I admire your optimism Short Stuff, but me and you both know that's probably not happening anytime soon. Or possibly ever."
"Hey, a girl can dream." She replied.
Another couple minutes passed before Price decided to address the elephant in the room.
"So, I haven't been the best boyfriend recently, have I?" He asked, figuring he already knew the answer to that.
Instead of answering the question, Bliss responded with a question of her own.
"What makes you say that?" She asked with no anger or sarcasm present in her voice.
The blonde boy sighed.
"Well, all this time I've spent hanging out and practicing with Ruby, Liv, and Rhea, and I haven't really attempted to make time for you outside of when me and my dad had dinner with your family, and that one night with the role playing... God that was awesome."
Alexa giggled.
"Glad you enjoyed yourself."
"But yeah, I'm sorry. I know you've been encouraging me to put as much effort as I can into this thing, but I saw how frustrated you were starting to get after awhile, and I didn't really do anything about it. I don't know, I just feel like I neglected you in a way, and I hate that. You're my girl, and that's the last thing I wanna do to you. I love you, babe." Price said sincerely.
In response to Shane's apology, Little Miss Bliss decided to move closer to him and bury her head into his chest. Then for good measure, she gave him a light headbutt to the chest.
"Ah, what was that for?" He asked while softly laughing.
She looked up at him with those blue eyes of hers.
"For being my stupid, sweet, loving, idiot of a boyfriend. You're right, not being the center of attention when it comes to you's made my jealousy go through the roof. Whenever I see you hanging out with those girls, even though Liv is one of my closest friends, I find myself wanting to rip you away from them and keep you all to myself. But that's only because I really love you too. What can I say, I grew up an only child with a lot of money. I'm selfish." Alexa admitted.
"Well, I promise after Sunday? You're gonna be top priority. Me and you are gonna make up for all the time that was lost. Just Lexi and Price for the foreseeable future." He pledged.
The cheerleader chuckled at her boyfriend's words.
"Babe, as tempted as I am to take you up on that, you don't have to go that far. You can still hang out with your friends as much as you want. You've never gotten on my case for hanging out with mine, so I'm not gonna do that to you. All I want is to spend more time with you. That doesn't mean dedicate every waking hour to me and me only. Got it?" She clarified.
"Oh okay... got it... You sure though?"
Bliss rolled her eyes and smiled.
"Yes, moron I'm sure. Now lean down here and kiss me."
The two teenagers lovingly embraced each other while they locked lips. They remained in each other's arms after they finished. There was a chance they'd end up staying on the bleachers until the bell rang. That was until...
Alexa was brought out of romantic mode by the sound of a stomach pleading for food by violently grumbling. Looking up at Shake, she saw his face was slightly red and he was kind of embarrassed.
"Uh... I never got to finish my chicken tenders."
Alexa rolled her eyes once again and gave his belly a pat.
"Alright come on. Let's go back to the caf and get this guy fed."
Shane pumped his fist in the air.
"Yes!"
AN: Last chapter before the show. Again, sorry for the long gaps in between chapters. Finding inspiration to write's been kinda hard to come across lately. You take that plus a college schedule and you have a recipe for inconsistency. Those who still keep up with this, thank you. See you in the next chapter.
