Explosion (Kellic)

Tweaking

My eyes widened in shock. I couldn't believe that they were real. Were they real? It had been like two weeks since we had seen each other, but still!

I jumped forward and wrapped my arms around Justin, who was the closest. The others gathered around for a group hug. They were laughing and I was smiling and I was SO EXCITED TO WORK ON OUR SONG OH MY GOSH.

I jumped back like they'd burnt me, but I wasn't in any pain. I turned to Josh, who was grinning, "Where do you want to rehearse?" he asked.

I shrugged, then grabbed my notebook from my bag. I shoved it into Justin's arms and he went over it, the other guys huddled behind him. "Are we supposed to learn-" I nodded, covering his mouth with my hand before he could spoil the surprise.

Gabe looked to Josh, "We're going to need a lot of time," he said. "Kellin are you free after school?"

They all looked at me, worried and knowing that I had to be home by four everyday. They knew what happened if I didn't obey the rules. I nodded, signing, 'Yeah we can come to my new house. Do you have our equipment?'

Nick nodded, "Yeah it's in the bus." They all smirked at me as the word passed over his lips.

'Bus?' I asked

"Yeah," Josh said. "Sleeping With Sirens has a bus." He looked arrogantly successful. Like he had something to do with it.

'You didn't!' I signed.

"I did."

I jumped forward and hugged him, too.

"Oh," Josh said, playing at boredness in his voice. "And also my husband may have signed you guys."

I froze. Oh my god no way. No freaking way. In front of me Justin was laugh and Gabe was telling him to calm down. I jerked my head back to look at Josh. I needed to know if he was serious. Was he serious? Was he? No way. He so was.

"Kellin, you're in a band?"

And just like that, the whole situation became severely less enjoyable. Mike was behind me. So was Jaime, and Tony. And Victor Fuentes, the devil himself. I turned around, nodding.

"Yeah," Justin filled them in, "before he moved here, we were his best friends." He put his arm around my shoulder and there was this certain protectiveness in his posture that seemed challenging. Mike, like the oaf he was, doesn't seem to notice.

"Well that's good," Vic said venomously. He was staring at Justin's arm with a fire in his eyes. "At least we know that Kellin wasn't a complete loser, huh?"

I rolled my eyes at his childishness. I wanted to tell him to get over himself.

"So anyways!" Josh said brightly, "You guys can go out into Practice Room 3. It's small, but it's got plugs for your equipment."

"Okay, cool," Gabe said. "Can we stay here after school, then? If we're just going to set up, then break down it seems a bit pointless."

Josh nodded as he spoke, "Yeah that makes sense. I'm here until five with a meeting in the cafe. I can help you break down if you want, but then you've gotta be outta here."

"Sounds good," Nick said. "Let's go."

We filed out of the second door of the guitar room and I followed my band as they turned right, down the short hallway space that was left, and out a double door exit/entrance. In the parking lot was a bus with a printed picture of us on the side at our first performance. Its looked SO COOL AHHH!

Twenty minutes later we had everything set up in the sound room. I was talking freely with them, discussing the things I'd written down. Gabe said that the way I wrote the drums was fine, that he'd manage. We all laughed at my musical incompetence.

It took a bit a tweaking, but finally we ironed out the song pretty well. It shaped into a nice piece of music. We focused on the instrumental parts, all under my instruction because I was the one who wrote it. I told them that it didn't all have to be me, that it was their song, too, but they wouldn't listen. They liked how I'd taken the initiative and time to write an entirely new song. And they really enjoyed how it sounded so far. I did, too. It was nice.

Someone knocked on the door. I saw Josh's head peeking over the small window cut into the door. I opened it, "Hey," I said.

"Hey, it's 5:05. Let's get cleaned up I've got a date at 6:30."

We packed all the stuff into Gabe's van because I didn't want to drive along the streets of this town with my weird face plastered on the side of a really freaking huge bus.

At my house we practiced some more, adding in lyrics when we could, fixing mistakes in rhythm and other things. At around eight we broke for dinner, which consisted of popcorn and and toast because we were too lazy to make anything else.

"So when does this have to be ready?" Gabe asked.

"Friday," I answered. "We're performing on Friday in a house full of people so let's like chillax about it, okay? Let's all just talk a deep breath."

We laughed because we all knew that I was the only one who needed to calm down. I was feeling okay about it, actually. I was so confident around my band, I felt like I could do anything. And I was going to. I was going to sing my song. That I wrote. In the middle of dozens of people. I would. And everything would be okay.