Page 28 of Broken Chorus

“Maybe I will, if I ever get around to making a list.”

“You and me both,” Kelly remarked, making a shooing motion towards the door. Aaron took the hint and trudged back downstairs, popped a couple frozen pastries in the toaster and let them heat up while he grabbed the case holding his sunburst acoustic and an elastic to tie back his hair.

There was half a blunt resting in the ashtray on the table, so he smoked it while he ate, the smoke curling in his lungs and settling there, making him cough a little. For a moment, he was reminded of the first time he’d smoked, shotgunning from Hawk once he’d gotten over his fear of someone catching them with their lips pressed together.

More wasted time he could never get back.

This time, he grabbed the key for Kelly’s apartment before heading up, a full-blown case of the munchies having hit by the time he finished that elevator ride. After letting himself in, he headed straight for the cookie jar only to discover that the Thin Mints had been replaced by Fudge Striped cookies, a fact that was so disappointing he didn’t bother grabbing one.

In the music room he set his acoustic aside to pick up the piebald electric he’d left behind, effortlessly falling into the pattern of carefully tuning the strings. It was off, which didn’tmake any sense considering he was certain he’d checked every string before the first session was set to begin.

“Was someone playing this?” Aaron asked the moment Kelly stepped into the room, his hair still damp and darkening the shoulders of his t-shirt.

“Me. Attempting to, anyway,” Kelly admitted as he picked up his bass. “I knew the sound I wanted, but I couldn’t get my fingers to cooperate.”

“That’s ‘cause you’ve been playing four strings for so long you’ve forgotten what to do with the other two.”

When Kelly snickered and flipped him off, Aaron found himself comforted by the normalcy of the gesture. He heard but chose not to acknowledge the arrival of one of their new bandmates, gathering from the small talk taking place between him and Kelly that it was Micah who’d joined them.

“Do you know if Declan was planning to be late?” Kelly asked once twenty minutes had passed without anyone else showing up.

“I haven’t spoken to him since we left here last night,” Micah muttered, fiddling with his guitar in almost a mirror image of what Aaron was doing.

"Maybe we should just get started and have him jump in when he gets here. We could always work out that intro toHaunted Dreams,”Kelly suggested with a note of tension in his voice.

Aaron almost asked what the issue was, then thought better of it. Whatever was going on wasn’t his concern. This was Kelly’s baby. What Aaron needed was a definitive answer, one he hoped he’d have by the end of the night.

“I’m game,” Micah said.

Aaron’s fingers traced an unbroken pattern along the curve of his guitar while he waited for them to start. Micah played the chords, a dark, melodic intro that was just begging for something to enhance it. There was a sad, haunting ache toit that fit well with Aaron’s mood, making it easy for him to appreciate. By the third time Micah played it through, Aaron was picking out a series of notes, pulling a few to draw out the somber tones in them. The tension and restless energy of earlier had melted away, leaving nothing but the newly evolving song.

“There’s still something off. Let’s try starting with G,” Kelly suggested.

Aaron never looked up, he just played when Micah did, scowled, and fiddled with a changeup when the flow felt off.

“I don’t think G is gonna work,” Aaron reluctantly offered after they’d tried it a handful of times, producing a drab, dull melody that sounded almost like a funeral dirge.

“Then what would you suggest?” Kelly asked.

He hesitated to suggest anything because he was supposed to be keeping his mouth shut. Like with several other things he sucked at, he’d never been good at taking his own advice. “EM with a progression through C, G and D.”

Micah’s fingers went still on the strings as he cocked his head to the side, hair falling like a curtain over his face while he hummed, slowly working out a melody before demanding that Aaronplay it. It came out hard and a bit growly, but no different from the way Aaron and the guys had always spoken to one another when they were in the zone, so Aaron didn’t take offense and instead did as he’d requested and played the intro in the new chord.

“Fuck yeah!” Kelly declared, playing a variation of the notes he’d been fooling around with on his bass. “Now we’ve got something we can work with!”

Chapter 7

Mellow bud and shiny things

Sweat dripped into Aaron’s eyes, making them sting, but he didn’t need to see the notes he’d made. They’d gone from the intro into a respectable melody they could build off of, and now Kelly had several lines of lyrics for them to tweak. Closing his eyes, he slipped into a mellow zone of long rifts and desperate, pleading chords.

A second guitar answered his, and his lips curved into a small smile as he got lost in the harmony, the two going back and forth like their instruments were having a conversation. Sound rose and fell in waves, echoing, amplifying the attitude both infused into their playing. The inflection on certain notes was like an expletive spat at an advancing opponent. A challenge answered with intensity and hate.

“Shit, Ethan, that riff is fuckin’ fire,” Aaron declared as the last note faded away. His fingers were sore, and his shoulder ached when he reached out to fist bump Ethan, only to realize it wasn’t Ethan he was playing with.

A mix of embarrassment and disappointment washed over him as he let his hand drop to rest back on his guitar. “Sorry.”

“No harm done,” Micah replied, his soft accent driving home the fact that he wasn’t Ethan.

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