In the Crowd (Tye)

Chapter 24

I know, I know. Really AD? After all this time, what is with this short chapter??? I'm sorry. I know I said I'd try to upload faster since it's summer and all... Ha I'm probably losing readers because I'm so slow. Well, thank you faithful people who keep on reading. Even if you're a ghost reader ;)

Enjoy!

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“You really over react.” “Tony’s voice twisted into my ear, pushing out a small bit of drowsiness from my mind. “Ken told me everything.” He continued. With my eyes still closed, I reached out hoping to swat Tony’s face. Not surprisingly, I missed.

“Over here,” Tony taunted me, his voice somewhere to my left. I didn’t bother opening my eyes and simply turned over so that my back faced him. “Okay, okay. Fine.” My little brother gave in, sitting back down on the edge of my bed. “I’ll leave you alone,” he paused.

I opened my eye a crack. “But?” I mumbled, my face muffled by pillows.

“Nothing. I just want to say one more thing.”

“Shoot me.”

“Why did you overreact so badly back there? I mean sure what Griffin said was kind of… um, low- but if you think about it,” Tony laughed. I shot him an uneasy look. Mostly because I still felt as though I’d risen from the dead. “It’s really nothing big.”

I sat up, blinking away the black spots in my eyes. “Yeah? Well what’s done is done.” I scowled.

So maybe there was a slight chance Tony was right. Even so, it just didn’t feel right to give in and say so. Besides, even if I admitted it, that wouldn’t change anything. I rubbed furiously at my eyes, pushing away my drowsiness. I could already feel a black cloud looming over my head. Today was not going to be a good day.

Tony drummed his fingers on his thigh, a smile on his face. “Oh yeah, notice anything different about your room?” he asked. No, I didn’t.

“You seemed super pissed yesterday and you just had a bunch of crumpled music sheets around, so I helped you clean up,” he beamed. “By recycling everything!” For a moment I thought about what Arina had said about if I had only changed a few notes, some of the stuff I wrote would’ve come out a lot better.

“Thanks man,” I told him anyway. “Was there a lot of stuff? Maybe I should take out the recycling.”

“Oh. That’s not what I meant by ‘recycling’. I gave it to Arina.” Tony cut in.

Wait. What?

I shot the guy a bewildered look and he returned it with a genuinely confused one. “What? She listens to your music all the time anyway.” He shrugged. “Did I… do something wrong?”

“Oh my god…” I muttered, pulling on a pair of jeans and the first sweater I found lying around. Tony trailed after me as I stumbled out. Yes, she listened to my songs all the time. Just not those songs.

To my surprise I didn’t have to go far to find her. Arina sat casually on the doorstep fingering the stupid music sheets. She looked up when she heard me coming, a playful smile on her face. “Hi, Tye.” She said cheerfully. “I didn’t know you were so cute.” Arina teased, “You actually have feelings!”

“Shut up.” I groaned, sitting down beside her.

“You know what? I just got an amazing idea. You should seriously publicize these songs- well not the one about you hating people, the romantic ones.” Her eyes lit up with excitement. “And then you should be like ‘this is dedicated to all my fans.’”

“And that includes you, right?” I scoffed. Arina fell silent for a moment. “Do you know who the ‘romantic’ ones are really for?” I asked cautiously. She didn’t reply. Her eyes caught mine. I looked away quickly.

The silence was deafening and I could feel my face heating up. “So. Um…” I racked my brain, trying to change the subject. “How’s your um… book coming?” It’d been an awfully long time since her interviews or since anyone had even mentioned it.

Arina shot me a confused look. “What book?”

“The horrifying fan-fic.” I reminded her bluntly. Arina’s left eye twitched.

“Oh… I never told you, did I? My editor called it off.” She explained slowly, as though she were reluctant to say it. Arina had set my music sheets down behind her and I was slowly crumpling them up. “He said he liked it more at first. More passion and drama.”

I shrugged. “That’s cool. I never really liked fan-fiction.”

“I see that.” Arina rolled her eyes. She looked at the now empty spot behind her; the music sheets were long gone. Arina laughed before standing up and brushing off her jeans. “Well, I should get going.”

I reached up for her hand but stopped myself. For some damned reason, I wanted her to stay. Just to be able to talk with Arina a bit more. “Hey.” I said, calling her back momentarily.

“Yeah?” Arina turned around in what seemed to be an entirely too eager way. Wow.

“Uh… we’re performing tomorrow for BIG Show before the interviews. Am I going to see you there?” I practically had to choke out the foreign words. My face felt hot and I knew I probably looked like a tomato. Arina smiled.

“Of course. I’m your number one fan girl, remember?”

My feet felt oddly light as I walked back inside. It was a nice change compared to my usual moodiness. Tony poked his head out from his room. His nervous expression quickly melted away. “Everything cool?” he asked from down the hallway.

Yeah. Surprisingly, everything was.