Elysian

Sectionals

Tuesday, 8:18 am, WHMS

Juan couldn't take his eyes off the clock. There was only one more minute until the bell would ring, and six more minutes until he'd be in his first period. As soon as the clock hit 8:19 he got up from his desk. "What are you doing? The bell hasn't rung yet." Juan looks over to his teacher, but luckily for him, as soon as she finished speaking the bell rang.

Juan walked out of the classroom and started walking towards room 105. "Dude, you're actually here today?" Juan heard a familiar voice ask. "Yeah, I know. Impossible." Juan responds. Juan turned around to see Joel. Joel laughed. The two of them walked into the band room together. Juan went right to get his cello, while Joel went left.

Realizing he had a substitute today was not good news. (Maybe he should come to school more often, if he did, he would've known about this before.) Nine times out of ten they'd be sent into sectionals, which isn't really a bad thing, it's just the cellos can be... Juan sighed and rolled his eyes. "Mr. Neves told me that you guys will be going to sectionals today, but first, let me call roll." A bunch of sighs of disappointment emerged from the cellos, Juan being one of them.
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"Alright, so we actually need to get stuff done today, sorry Collin. Does anyone have any suggestions on what we play first?" Joel asked. Collin rolled his eyes. Joel wasn't wrong. They were the only section that didn't have the music memorized. "What about 'Sheep By My Gravestone'?" Zeya asked. At first she called it that because she really didn't know the name of the song, but eventually she started calling it that because she thought it was funny.

"It's 'Sheep May Safely Grace' idiot, not whatever the hell you just said." Collin said, annoyed. Joel ignored him. "Alright. Is everyone cool with that?" The only word you could hear from the group was "sure." Juan opened his folder to find the music sheets. Joel sat down. "One.. two.. three.." The cellos started to play, until everyone stopped. "Why did we stop?" Joel asked.

"Well I stopped because Nate stopped." Katie said, pointing at Nate. Juan zoned out.   He knew there was no chance they were going to start playing again. Juan zoned back in once he heard Autumn and Katie laughing. Juan knew exactly what this meant. Collin and Spencer did something weird that would prove the two girls right. "Really Collin? Can't you put your phone down for once?" Juan looked to his far right. Collin was in the corner getting mad at his phone, probably playing his football game. "Yeah Collin! Put your phone down and do something!" Zeya yelled from across the room.

"Zeya." Joel said, but it was overturned by Collin yelling "At least I'm not a suicidal freak!" Not even three seconds later the room was filled with yelling from everyone about almost everything. Joel couldn't do anything anymore. Juan watched as he sat down in defeat. "Guys." Joel waited. "Guys." He said again, this time a little bit louder. He waited once again. "GUYS!" He yelled. Immediately, everyone stopped and looked at him. "...I give section leader to Nate for the day." Joel sighed, before putting his hands behind his head.

"Alright, I give section leader back to you then." Joel put his hands down. "No." "Yeah. Your first chair. It's your job." Nate said, not even looking up from his music sheets. "Fine, then. I give it to Lillian." "Really Joel?" Juan looked back and forth between the three. "Alright, whatever. Everyone get out Intrada, we need to get this memorized. Especially since we have the melody." She had accepted being section leader.

Everyone had started playing. Except for Collin. He was still screaming at his phone. Juan looked over to his left as he heard laughing. Juan frowned as he realized Katie was recording.

It was almost five minutes later and the cellos still couldn't get crap done. At this point Joel had started yelling. "Woahhhh, hey, calm down man." Juan grabbed Joel's shoulder. Joel stopped yelling, but so did everyone else. Juan heard Autumn whisper something, but he didn't care. It probably wasn't about him. Hopefully it wasn't about him.