Planning Your Future

Perfect Harmony

September 17, 1992

Veronica's POV

I sit on my bed, reading. It's been so long since the last time I read a book for myself. "Hey V, I'm back from class." Erika puts her bag on her bed. "What is this?" I look up. She's holding a paper with the lyrics to a song I'd been working on. "It's nothing." I take it from her. "Come on, V! I'd like to know what 'Perfect Harmony' is about." She tries to take it back. "It's not even done. I only have a little written." I argue. "Well let me hear what you have." Fine. "If you insist." So much for reading. I sit down at my keyboard.
"You set me free
You and me together is more than chemistry
Love me as I am
I'll hold your music here inside my hands
We say we're friends, we play pretend
You're more to me, we're everything
Our voices rise and soar so high
We come to life when we're
In perfect harmony
Whoa, whoa
Perfect harmony
Whoa, whoa
Perfect harmony"

I stop playing. "Huh..." Erika purses her lips. "What? Did you not like it?" I worked hard on it. "No I like it. It's just... it's pretty obvious who that's about." She winks. "What do you mean?" Why does she assume it's about someone? "Seriously! That's so obviously about JD." She crosses her arms. "That is not about him." I lie. I know it is about him. "Oh please. 'You and me together is more than chemistry?' And 'we say we're friends, we play pretend?' That sounds like how it is with you and JD." I get up from the piano and go back to reading my book. "We both know I'm right..." I do know she's right. "Let's just leave it." I shake my head. I don't have the patience to have this conversation right now.

September 18, 1992

I sit at the grand piano with JD, working on a song for the band. "Hey, I'm about to lock up." Miles says. "Okay, we're almost done." JD tells him. "So what if the chorus ends with this?" I play something on the piano. He starts to pack up his guitar. I see a sheet of paper sticking out of JD's song lyric binder. I take a peek at it. While JD is turned around, I slip it into my folder. "Well I'll see you on Monday!" I say. "See you then. But if you want to finish this sooner, I can come over tomorrow." He suggests. "Y'know, I think we're already writing it at a steady pace. I feel like it can wait until Monday." It's not a lie. We really have gotten a lot done already. "Okay then. I guess I'll see you on Monday." He shrugs. I walk out of the studio and sit in my car, reading the lyrics.
"Step into my world
Bittersweet love story about a girl
Shook me to the core
Voice like an angel, I've never heard before"

I realize that this works perfectly for the beginning of "Perfect Harmony." I know JD won't mind. Besides, it probably won't go anywhere. If it does, it can be a duet. I immediately drive home to start working on this song.

September 21, 1992

I get to the studio early to finish up this song. "Hey, you're here early." Miles yells as I pass his office. "I just want to work on the music before the guys get here." I say. "Okay, have fun." He continues to do his work at his desk.

I play the song once I believe I've perfected it. "Hey." Sam comes in. "Hey, how was your weekend?" I try to subtly put away the song. "It was okay. Just family stuff." He gets his guitar out and starts tuning it. "Is there a new song we're going to do today? Or are we still going over the same one?" He asks. "Uh, it's the same one. The song isn't finished but it's not even in a place where we could start rehearsing it." I think it should be at that place soon. "Well, I guess practice makes perfect."

Owen and JD come in, talking. "Hey guys. What's up?" JD takes out his guitar. "Nothing much. Just ready to rehearse." I pull my music out. "Great. Then let's get going." Owen sits behind the drums. "Okay." I put the sheet music on the stand.

Miles knocks on the door halfway through rehearsal. "Hey, I have news. Mr. Donovan booked you guys for a school dance. I know it doesn't sound great, but the more dances you do, the sooner you can get bigger gigs. You get six minutes, so that's enough for two songs." He hands JD a piece of paper. "That tells you all you need to know. Make sure you play your best." He leaves the room. "Great. We have our first gig." Sam smiles. "Yep. So we better continue. We only have..." I take the paper from JD and read it, "two weeks from Saturday." That's longer than I thought, but we still only rehearse three days of the week. So that's only eight or nine rehearsals.

"Okay. I'll show the new song on Friday. Then we'll decide if we're going to play it at the dance." If not, we'll sing the songs we've already been working on. "Can't wait to hear it." Owen lightly hits my arm on his way out. Sam follows behind. "This is exciting! It's our first gig with the band." I grab a water bottle from the fridge. When I turn around, JD is reading something by the piano. "What's this?" He looks up at me. "Oh! That's just a song I've been working on. You don't want to hear it." I take it from him. "But I do. Just humor me." He sits on the piano bench. He won't leave me alone until I do it. "Okay." I set next to him, putting "Perfect Harmony" on the stand. "So I took some of your lyrics for the beginning. I had a plan to make it a duet. I hope you don't mind." I just thought I should tell him before I start singing his lyrics. "I don't mind. Just play it."

I take a deep breath. I play the song, JD watching me closely the whole time. As I reach the end, he seems to have gotten slightly closer.
"We say we're friends
We play pretend
You're more to me
We create a perfect harmony"

I sing the final note. "Wow. That was beautiful. I'm not trying to make it about me, but that sounds like that was written about me." He says. "It... it was." I look away from him. "I'm sorry." I shake my head. "Why are you sorry?" He sets his hand on my leg. "I just feel like it's too far. Like we're in this really great place where we can be just friends. Then I go and mess it up by writing that." I turn back to him. "Oh. Well I wrote that part in the beginning about you." He takes the music off the stand and reads it. "That's different." I sigh. "Why is it different?" He asks. "You just wrote about my voice. Mine is so... clearly about still having feelings for you. But you'd never want to be with me after everything. So now we're going to have this awkwardness between us." I wipe a tear from my face. "I should have never sung that-" JD stops me by kissing me. "I thought you didn't have feelings for me." I was sure he was done with me. "I never stopped." He smiles. I kiss him.

"Is anyone in here?" We separate and I start playing something on piano. "I'm sorry. I'll come back later." Alyssa sees us. "Oh hey, Alyssa." JD waves. "Hi." She leaves. "She works here?" JD asks. "Yep. She's Miles' assistant." I go to pack up. "His assistant? She's the assistant's assistant? Huh?" He smirks. "I know." I laugh. "My luck is terrible." He grabs my hand, "I'm sorry. That has to be weird." I shake it off, "I don't want to talk about her. She broke up with me. Fuck her." I put my hand on his cheek. "Are you sure you want to do this? It's not been that long since you two broke up." Am I sure about anything? "It hadn't been that long after our breakup when her and I started to date. It makes sense to do the same now."

September 22, 1992

"What if we sang that song at the dance. It'd give the kids a slow song." JD suggests as we walk around the campus. "That could be good. But what other song would we sing?" We have a few we could try. "What about the new one?" I'd love to but I'm worried we wouldn't get it perfect in time. "Do you think we'd perfect it in time?" I ask. "We performed 'Edge of Great' after only like five rehearsals. We can do it in nine." He says. "Well we have to rehearse two songs. What about that one?" I just don't want to take the chance. Doing two new songs sounds risky. "Then we might have to rehearse longer. I'm sure the guys will be okay with it." That makes me feel better. "Okay. We'll try. But if we can't do it, we'll just do the old ones." I want to do the new ones but we have to be prepared for the possibility that we can't.

JD and I get back to the dorm. "I don't know where Erika is." I figured she'd be back by now. "'I have to work on a group project so I'm sleeping at her dorm tonight.'" JD holds up a note that was on her desk. "I guess we have the place all to ourselves." I take my cardigan off. "Great." He kisses me. We move over to the bed. I start unbuttoning his shirt. "Are you sure? We don't have to." He whispers. "I want to." I kiss him and push him onto the bed.

I hope you enjoyed! And the song I linked is a duet but just imagine that only one person is singing. Bye!