flowers at sea -lukadrien

-22- lights camera action

I woke up, the sunlight shining on my face through the window, my phone played a tune, I thought I had left spotify playing until I realised it was my ringtone.

I sat up groggily, reaching for my phone and accepted the call without giving a second thought, "H-hello?"

"Luka! God! Where the actual hell are you!?"

"Huh--"

"We've been looking for you for like- an hour, everyone is searching for you! Are you okay?"

I still haven't fully processed everything, "Emm, yeah, I guess so..."

"You guess so? Tell me, where are you? They almost cut out our performance because we couldn't make it to the last rehearsal, we only have 15 minutes till the event starts. I-i don't know how we'll manage the songs. I'm not even sure if the organisers will accept our band without doing rehearsals."

"Where are you guys? I'll go there now."

"You better." she let out an angry sigh, "I'll go inform the organisers and the rest of our band, just get to the backstage, we won't have enough time to practice anymore, there's backstage prepping going on, just get over here."

"Okay, by--" she hung up before I could even finish my sentence.

I winced as I stood up, my vision went crazy as I got up, I closed my eyes to clear it up. I became a burden again, I'm dragging down the band again, I've let them down once more. And I did absolutely nothing.

I grabbed my guitar case by the handle and ran out, out of the building to the large field. I could see why they couldn't find me, I hadn't realised the section was closed with a 'no entry' sticker plastered over the door.

The audience field was already filled with a bunch of people, the front and middle space were all taken up. The backstage was so noisy my eardrums thumped and rang, I could hardly hear my voice as I called for Juleka. At last, I spotted Juleka arguing with a man, probably a staff or volunteer with a mic draped over his ear. 

Juleka caught sight of me, "See, he's here!" she shouted through the loud field.

The man wrote something down in his board, "Are you sure your band can perform?"

"Yes." Juleka gripped my shoulder, "We can do it."

He nodded, then wrote something else, pressing onto his ear piece, "Excuse me for a sec," he told us before walking away.

"What happened? Are you okay?" Juleka's grip tightened.

"You're hurting me," I pushed her hand away, "I'm fine."

"Sorry," she avoided my gaze, "you made us worry."

"Luka!" Rose shouted, pushing through the crowd, "You good?"

I nodded, "Where's Ivan?"

"He went to talk to one of the staff about the drums, he wanted some adjustments or something."

The same man from before returned, "Kitty section will be performing fourth, we changed the schedule a little."

"Fourth!?" Juleka exclaimed, 'So soon?"

"You guys can't make it? Sorry, but it's final."

"There's no other way to delay it?"

"No, miss."

"It's alright," she huffed, "Thank you."

The man left.

The speaker erupted with shouts from the mic, it seemed that the event had started, each performance had three songs, with the three performers before us, we had about 30 minutes. But what can we do waiting backstage?

Ivan came back, scheming through a couple of sheets of some kind.

"We had the second song practised," he gave me the papers, I immediately recognised the title, 'I dare you' by The Regrettes, one of Juleka's favourite band, no wonder.

"You just have to backup with the bass, the main catchy one, we'll turn up your amp to be louder so you have to do well. Listen to this while you wait." he handed me some headphones with a youtube video playing, "d-do you have the sheets for the third song?"

The third song... I freaking forgot. 

I reacted fast, "Not really, but it's really simple to catch on, I don't think you have to learn."

He looked at me weirdly, "No matter how simple, without planning beforehand end really bad."

"Speaking of that," Rose skipped over to me, "Do you have the lyrics to the song?"

"No-- I'm actually singing it myself, Err yeah."

"Aw man," she complained, "Bummer.. good luck anyway though."

Juleka eyed me suspiciously, "What about me?"

"Bass. You do the base."

"Just that? No, chords, no numbers?"

"Kinda."

She put a hand on her forehead, "We're screwed."

"I m-mean, can't you ask them to cancel the third song?"

"We have no time! You spent all your practising and rehearsing time in a random corridor doing absolutely nothing for 4 hours and now you come saying you have nothing except for a freestyle song."

A swallowed a lump of cold, "It's not freestyle."

"Does this has anything to do with Adrien not coming?"

The question caught me on surprise, "No." I said abruptly, "This is on a totally different topic."

"You were fine this morning until--"

"And I'm fine now!" I snapped, "I got the third song, it'll be okay."

Juleka wanted to say something but a staff ran over and interrupted her, "You're up next, get ready and follow me."

Rose and Ivan went ahead, Juleka nudged me softly, "Please, Luka. Make sure you got this."

She joined the group, why do I feel so out of place? 

I followed them from a distance to a small section beside the huge stage, a man was standing there briefing us.

"You have exactly 12 minutes," he told us, "There will be a red light at the side when 10 minutes is over so be quick."

The band playing at the moment made the crowd go nuts, screaming, cheering. I recognised the band, 'The Prism' from a couple of events few years ago, they were quite famous in the area, they even released an album recently.

The music ended, "Thank you, thank you!" the lead singer shouted, "We are incredibly fortunate to have been welcome once more by this organization, we thank everyone here and wish you guys a wonderful afternoon, see you at 'The R.O.M' next tuesday, 7:30pm if you're interested in our next performance, goodbye!"

The crowd cheered again as the band left the stage.

"That was The Prism, everybody!" The MC came in, "Well next, we have a totally new band which will be performing for the very first time here!" The crowd cheered, "Please welcome--- KITTY SECTION!"

The staff opened the curtain to the stage, "Quick, go!" 

We rushed onto the stage, the lights, the huge crowd, the scenery of the majestic sunset, it was so beautiful, perfect. I can't help but wish Adrien was here with us, on the stage.

The crowd cheered, not that loud but still okay, probably wondering why a bunch of high schoolers are in such a huge event.

Rose took out the mic, "Hello everyone!" she yelled, "Thank you for coming! We are the Kitty section!"

She held up a fist, signalling everyone to quiet up, "Now, let's start with our first song, 'Rainbows and Unicorns!"

She turned around to give a thumbs up to Ivan.

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