6: songs

The next day was Edward's second day at the Academy of Doom, and the day after that was his third day, and then it was his fourth day, and soon the days turned into weeks, and then the weeks built up, and soon Edward was not new at the Academy of Doom anymore.

His quest for having friends wasn't working great. Every day at meals, he sat at Andrew's table. He didn't often enjoy it. The kid with the dark skin, whose name had turned out to be Ravigo, was constantly annoying. He was always talking about some violent shooter game that Edward didn't care about, and even worse, thinking that Edward found it interesting. Andrew's other friends were nice enough, but often very immature and bothersome.

Edward was friends with Leffa. Sort of. If they passed each other in the corridors, they would greet each other, but the only time he ever saw her other than in the hall was when they were in classes together. Still, they were on very good terms with each other, which made Edward's life more enjoyable.

Edward also had a bit of an enemy. He didn't like to refer to people as enemies, it carried so many negative connotations. But that Jarex, was not kind to Edward, no matter how you looked at it. And he just had to be the person that Edward was assigned to as a partner for his project.

He remembered the first day that they had to work on the project. The teacher, Mr. Bugorusho, was talking about the government structure of the Kingdom of Doom itself. There were five different kingdoms, the North, West, South, Fish, and East kingdoms. He told the class about how corrupt the government in the West Kingdom was. He complained to the class about how the king was lazy and had no idea how to run the government, and how everyone in their right mind wanted him out. In fact, it wasn't long before Mr. Bugorusho just started to rant on and on about this, and that was one of the things that made Edward remember the day so much.

Then, Edward met up with Jarex, and all Jarex did the entire time was flirt. Edward even told Jarex several times exactly what he needed to do, and Jarex didn't do any of it. This made Edward extremely angry, and he left the classroom with clenched fists.

That was several weeks ago, and Edward ended up doing all of the work for the project. In class, Jarex did nothing but flirt, despite the fact that he was still dating Kalie, and Edward did the tedious wrok of drawing and typing up things for the project. Jarex never did any of his homework, and that included the project. As a consequence, Edward spent a large amount of his time making up for all of the work that Jarex didn't manage to complete. And the worst part was, it wasn't that Jarex was lazy. It was that he knew that Edward wanted to get a good grade, and would do the work for him. Sometimes, Edward wished he could just punch Jarex in the face.

Most of Edward's time over the three weeks he had been at the Academy was spent in the school computer lab. The computers in the Kingdom of Doom were similar to the computers in Earth, except for the fact that the screens projected small, holographic images that extended about an inch away from the monitor. These could be used via touch. If you went on the internet on these computers, you could access the internet of all four of the Quadrateracell planets. At first Edward only browsed around on his favorite sites on the Earth internet, but he realized that some of the other planets had very interesting websites too, and ended up spending an equal amount of time on those sites. He even found that he could access his old e-mail and instant messaging accounts, although the only person he contacted was his mother, telling her that he was perfectly happy and not to worry about him, since he had never gotten around to it before.

Edward was rapidly adapting to the Academy of Doom, and he no longer got that sickening feeling that he had previously gotten when he was in the halls. However, there was one thing that was noticeably gone from his life. On Earth he had spent a large portion of his time thinking. He had thought about the existence of God, the existence of other planets, etc. Now that there were solutions to these questions, he felt like something had been taken away from him.

* * * * *

As Edward passed his weeks getting accustomed to the school, Jarex wrote songs. Love songs for Kalie, breakup songs for Sellara, protest songs, ballads, he wrote them all. He had taken Kalie's comment to heart, and was seriously thinking now of starting a band. There was only one song he had written that he could play by himself, and that was "Kalie", the love song he had written. He had written a lot of new songs, most of which were incredibly heavy and were, as Jarex described it, had a "neo-death metal punk" edge. They required far more than one musician to play. He did know a girl who was a drummer, but that still wasn't enough to play these songs fully. He found himself wishing he knew more musicians to play in his band.

Jarex was also going to play guitar in the upcoming talent show. He had practiced for a while, doing an acoustic rendition of a song he had written, "Cake, Plastic, and Trees". The song was intended to be performed with three lead guitars, and a keyboard synth, but he didn't have the people yet, so he was just going to play the acoustic guitar on stage. He was also omitting the bridge, because it had a screamo bit in in it that he thought might not go over too well. He did practice a lot, but he had it mostly down. He knew all the chords and lyrics. He wasn't a great singer, but he was good enough for the stage.

And things with Kalie were also going great. Of course.

* * * * *

Very soon, a little less than one month after Edward had arrived at the Academy of Doom, it was the day of the talent show. Although Edward played the piano remarkably well, he hadn't practiced at all since he had left Earth, and didn't have any pieces he could perform. In first period class that day, he sat next to Leffa, and he asked her if she was doing anything for the talent show.

"Yeah, I am. I'm singing!" she said proudly.

"You can sing?" replied the astonished Edward, who had never heard Leffa sing before.

"Yeah! I'm pretty good, I guess," she boasted. "You know that poem you saw me working on that day?" she asked. Edward nodded. "Well, I turned it into song lyrics, and now I'm singing it in the talent show!"

"Wow, that's impre-", he began, and then he remembered what Jarex had said, and continued with a,"That's great!"

"Yeah, wish me luck!" she beamed.

"Good luck!"

She smiled at him and went back to her work.

* * * * *

Several hours after that, Jarex was sitting in the school auditorium, watching the talent show, preparing to leave for his guitar performance. They had told him to go backstage when a girl named Rica started dancing, and that was in two more acts. This talent show fucking sucks, was what he was thinking the entire time. No one really had any talent, they were just decent at dancing, or decent at singing. No one was actually good at anything. Not like he was. He was a guitar genius.

He heard a teacher announce that the next act was Rica Safavo doing a dance routine, and he crept out of the dimly lit theater's doors to go backstage. Before too long, he was in the spotlight, facing the audience, sitting in a small, creaky wooden stool, his guitar in his lap, with a microphone perched on a stand next to his mouth. He heard a couple girls squeal "Jarex!" and he winked and gave them a flick of his hair. Then he started playing.

He wasn't nervous, Jarex was never nervous. He was totally confident as he played every chord, and sang every lyric of his song. Halfway through, he realized that it was his first performance ever in front of a stage. Better make it a special one, he thought, while he sang the lyric "my heart bleeds like an open wound". And so, during the instrumental bridge, he got up, out of the stool, and while strumming his chords, he did a little dance, back and forth across the stage. Clapping and cheering started spontaneously. Most of the cheering voices were female, but that was to be expected. In the final verse, he put all of his emotion into the rendition of the lyrics, and he did a half scream on the vocals in the end. As he strummed the final note, the auditorium erupted in applause.

He exited the stage, and went back to his seat in the audience. The girls sitting next to him all whispered "you did great!" and he whispered back "thanks!". As he slid back down into his chair, he heard the announcer call the next person's name.

"The next act will be Leffa Esnoch, singing an original song."

As Jarex heard the words 'original song', he slid further up in his seat. So, he maliciously thought, someone else is writing original songs? Then, as an afterthought, Well, mine are better. Let's see what shit she comes up with.

But when she took the center stage, Jarex lost all of his bitter thoughts. First and foremost, in Jarex's eyes, she was hot. She had long, blond hair that hung down over her shoulders, and when she walked it swirled around her head. She was wearing a white dress, that framed her great figure. And her eyes, her eyes were beautiful. Jarex, you're fucking going out with Kalie, who's also hot! one part of him said. The other part of him told that part to fuck off. Jarex just couldn't help, try as he might, to stare at her.

He was so wrapped up in Leffa's looks, that he jolted when she started singing. But the second thing he noticed was that she had an amazing, beautiful voice. Every note she sung stood out, and was absolutely vibrant and gorgeous.As a songwriter, Jarex could see that the song she was singing was well-written. It was difficult to believe that she had written it. He found himself at the edge of his seat, hoping that the performance would never end.

I think I found the singer for my band, he said to himself.

* * * * *

The next day, Jarex approached Leffa in the cafeteria. Alright, he reminded himself. Even though you're asking her to be in your band, not for a date, the same tactics work. Just do the thing with your hair. He casually tapped her on the shoulder, when she was sitting down on a chair with a couple other girls eating her lunch. She swiveled around and looked up at him. The other girls at the table gasped and giggled, but Jarex ignored them.

"What is it?" asked Leffa skeptically.

"You did awesome in the talent show yesterday. You're a great singer," he casually told her.

She blushed a little. "Thanks."

"So," he began to ask. "I'm looking for a singer for my band. You'd be the perfect one. You have an awesome voice, and I've written a bunch of songs that you can totally do."

Leffa looked dubious.

"Come on, it'll be awesome. You're going to rock."

"I guess so," said Leffa tentatively.

"Awesome," said Jarex. "I'll get back to you on when practice is, kay?" Without waiting for an answer, he walked away.

* * * * *

Several days later, Edward was working with Jarex on the project. He was talking to a girl who looked like she was African-American, but you never knew when you were on a different planet. "So," he heard Jarex say, "you're going to be the drummer, right? I've got a singer, and I think I can teach Kalie how to play the bass."

Edward heard the girl say yes, and Jarex say "Awesome. Now we just need a keyboardist." Then, Jarex turned on his heel and went back to the area where Edward was sitting, cutting up paper to make a poster for their project.

"Are you working?" he rudely asked.

"I can play the piano," said Edward.

"Huh?"

"You're looking for a keyboardist, am I cor-, um... right?"

Jarex's eyes darted around the room. "Yes, but er... I mean, are you good?"

"I've been playing for six years," responded Edward confidently.

"Well... I mean, I guess we could use you... I mean... yeah," said Jarex, who was rubbing the back of his head nervously. "Okay, sure, you can be in the band. But... don't mess up, okay?"

"I won't," said Edward, but Jarex didn't hear him, he had already walked away and was striking up a conversation with a girl nearby.

What were you thinking? Edward asked of himself. You just agreed to be in a band with Jarex!


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