Enigma

Music Class

Nico walked into her rather small music classroom and made her way straight to the back of the room. Tracie wasn't in her music class because she felt she already knew enough about music and the class would only bore her. Nico thought that attitude was snobby, but also quite funny.

"Nico!" Fab greeted her as she sat in the desk next to him.

"Hey, man." Nico nodded in his direction.

Fab was one of Nico's few friends. He wasn't as close with her as Tracie was, and she usually only hung out with him in classes they were in together, but she still considered him a good friend. Nico kept to herself quite a lot and didn't have that many friends. She was okay with that, though. It was not that everyone hated her and she hated them, she just chose to steer clear of most people to avoid drama and to breeze through high school, which was working so far.

"Have you seen the new guy?" asked Fab, pointing to Julian, who was sat a few desks away from them.

Nico hadn't noticed he was there yet, so she frowned and looked away once she caught sight of him. "Yeah..."

"He looks cool. He likes The Velvet Underground! Crazy coincidence, huh?" Fab said with his usual goofy smile, referring to the fact that Nico was named after one of the vocalists on the album. "How cool is that?"

"Yeah...awesome." Nico nodded, hoping he would change the subject.

"Is something up?"

"Nah." she shook her head, plastering a smile on her face. "How's the drumming going?"

"Oh, man! Fantastic!" Fab exclaimed. "I wanna start a band soon or something."

Nico giggled at his excitement. "That's great, Fab." She always thought it was so cute when he got excited about things.

Fabrizio, who had been nicknamed Fab ever since Nico could remember, was quite adorable with his mop of dark, curly hair and soft, but boyish babyface. Nico used to catch herself thinking about him quite often. She even thought she had a crush on him at one point, but decided to forget about it. She wanted to stick to her drama free, breezy life and figured a boyfriend would only put that on hold.

"I'm gonna talk to him after class and see what else he likes." said Fab, sketching something in one of his schoolbooks. Fabrizio was quite passionate about art as well as music, which Nico found very dreamy and admirable.

"Yeah, he looks like he needs a friend." she said. Even though Julian blew her off quite bluntly and without reason, she'd hate to see him roaming the school alone, so she hoped he'd at least let Fab hang around. And hey, maybe if Fab got to hang out with him, he'd find out if the rumors about Julian were true or not and he could tell Nico.

"Do you know where he came from?" asked Fab.

"Supposedly a fancy boarding school in Switzerland." Nico replied, laughing at the thought. Julian didn't look like the kind of guy that would tolerate a boarding school.

"Poor guy." Fab chuckled. "Is it true he got beat up at recess by that asshole jock? I was in detention."

"Yeah," she nodded, feeling quite sad at the thought. "...it was awful." She looked over at Julian. He was scratching something into his desk with a pen, and he had a frown on his swollen face as he focused on his acute act of vandal. People were pointing at him, whispering and laughing, but he ignored it. Nico could see sadness in his eyes and it made her heart ache. How could people be so openly cruel? She wanted nothing more than to stand up for him and tell everyone how ridiculous they were being, but she couldn't risk drawing attention to herself.

It wasn't long before their music teacher, Malcolm, walked in. He preferred going by his first name instead of Mr. Cooper because he was one of those teachers that thought they were really 'cool with the kids' and down to Earth, which he was, but no one says that stuff out loud.

Music was Nico's favorite class, because Malcolm would always assign the class fun tasks and they'd talk about cool music. Sometimes, if someone asked, Malcolm would even tell stories about his time at the famous Woodstock Music and Art Festival back in 1969.

"Morning, class!" Malcolm greeted everyone, standing behind his desk at the front of the room.

Everyone chanted back a monotone 'good morning, Malcolm' as he picked up a piece of chalk to write something on the blackboard.

"Today we'll be watching a documentary." he said, the class groaning. "I know, I know! Sounds boring, right? But it can't all be unicorns and rainbows in here, or I'll be out of a job." he laughed. "I've got some fun homework for you all to do afterwards, though."

Instead of groaning, the class remained silent to hear what he had to say. Malcolm's homework assignments were always fun. Ranging from learning a specific song on whatever instrument you prefer, to writing a song of your very own.

"I want you to write an essay on your favorite musician. Minimum of six-hundred words. I want a brief background on the musician you've picked, why they are your favorite, and I want you to write about one of their songs and what it means to you." he explained. "This essay will be due on Monday and I'll be picking the best ones to read aloud in front of the class."

Excited voices filled the room as everyone discussed what musician they were going to write about.

"Oh, awesome!" said Fab, turning back to Nico. "Who are you gonna write about?"

"I'm not sure yet." she said, her eyebrows knitted together as she thought. "Perhaps Jim Morrison? Maybe Hendrix?

"Typical." Fab laughed. "I think I might do Bowie."

"Ooh! That's a good one, Fab." Nico nodded with a smile. She then looked over at Julian once more, wondering who he would write about.