Seniors

Chapter three

Chapter three

They hadn't been on the road for five minutes when Sarah's ringtone, set to Acoustic Ballad, first rang. Then it rang a second time. And a third time. And a fourth.

When Sarah's phone sounded for what seemed like the hundredth time, her screen lighting up announcing that she had an incoming call from "Josh xoxo", she let it go to voicemail, her phone screen going dark before lighting up again, notifying her that she had twenty-nine missed calls and six voice messages. When it rang yet again, Phoenix clenched her fists, nearly jumping out of her seat. "You know, you should really change his contact name," she said. "I was thinking, instead of the xoxo's, you should put a knife emoji, or, oh! The face with the x's for eyes! Do that!"

The car went silent again, nothing but the sound of ongoing traffic audible. The quiet was welcoming, but everyone waited for the strumming of a guitar to begin playing again, but when nothing came, the four of them leant back in their seats, a stillness settling over them. That's when Jackie's phone went off.

Phoenix groaned, hitting her forehead into the back of Emma's headrest. "Sorry," Jackie said, pulling out her phone, which was a flip phone that she had gotten for emergencies only, out of her back pocket and glanced at the screen. She had moved to the back seat with Phoenix, Emma taking shotgun. She thought it only fair since Emma missed her drivers test she was supposed to take after the ceremony.

"Who is it?" Phoenix asked, and Jackie made sure to hide the contact name with her hand.

"Nobody," she answered, sliding it back into her pocket. The truth was it was Dr.Marshal, her therapist. She had a scheduled appointment she had missed that morning, though she didn't care. She hated therapy. The endless 'how do you feel' question would slap her back and forth and every time, so she remained silent through the whole thing. She didn't like talking about what she was feeling. Drawing was her therapy. That's why she would never let anybody look at what she drew; it made her feel as if they were walking around inside her head. Seeing all of her thoughts and emotions she wasn't ready for people to see, for fear that maybe they wouldn't like the Jackie inside her head.

Therapy was over-rated anyways, right? she thought to herself, staring out the window in silence. Therapy was for people who were either insane or broken, and Jackie refused to believe that she was either of those things. She didn't have any sort of condition or anything--she wasn't unstable, she just...experienced a few rough patches. Who was she kidding? She'd had a lot of rough patches. But she couldn't tell her friends that. The ones who liked her. The ones that loved her vibrant purple hair and big nerd glasses and how she stuck out her tongue when she drew and her sparkly nail polish. She found that anything between those lines were better off kept to herself, and herself only.

The unusual silence was deafening, making Sarah be the first to speak. "Hey, Jack, why don't you find us some tunes?"

"Yeah," Phoenix said, "that sounds great right now."

Jackie smiled, pulling her gaze from the window and reaching into her backpack, taking out a clear CD holder, the CD inside covered in doodles drawn in sharpie. She handed it to Emma, who inspected it, her eyebrows raising skeptically. "What is it?" she asked. Jackie only pursed her lips, giving her friends a mischievous glance before taking out her sketchbook and a pencil. Emma slid in the disk, the three friends listening intently, waiting for magic to sound through the speakers.

The first thing they heard was a piano. One note at a time. Then two notes at a time, the same melody, but it's counter part an octave higher. In the background, string instruments flooded in, each playing a different tune, gradually growing louder and louder. The beat of a drum gently thudded, other musical contraptions slowly but surely surging forth until everything was a perfect mess of sound.