A/N: This piece is one I wrote for English class a month or two ago. I don't think it's anything special, a lot of it is just random stuff I pulled out of my... erm.. nose. I like the characters, but that's because they're all facets of me. It's kinda creepy, this story is actually several me's talking to each other. Except I've got a crush on me, I'm a guy, and I can draw. And... geez, I'm not even trying to make sense of this anymore. Whatever. I just like a lot of the dialogue, and I'm proud of myself for rising to the challenge posed by my friends and actually (::gasp::) writing something straight! Heh, okay, here it is. Cheers! Reviews, please: four words in the little box brighten my sad little life.

We Are the Artsy Ones

“Sleep is overrated.”

Kaylee propped herself up on an elbow to look across the table at Julian, a mass of disheveled mahogany hair tumbling down over her face. “I’m glad you think so,” she said, glaring at him, dynamic eyebrows furrowed over light amber eyes, “but, sleep? It’s actually just what I’m attempting to do right now. I’ll hear your opinions on it another time. Okay? Okay.” Without waiting for an answer, she put her head back down and closed her eyes.

A short, slim girl with a round face and wavy brown hair dyed magenta at the tips entered the room and dropped her backpack beside a vacant chair. “Julian, Kaylee, my beloveds, I am here at last!” she announced dramatically, although she kept her voice down to avoid disturbing any of the other students in the library, pouring over books or frantically finishing homework. “You may rejoice!”

“Hey Rach,” said Julian, his deep brown eyes alight with silent laughter. Rachel grinned and flopped down onto a seat.

“Go away,” said Kaylee darkly, not lifting her head, voice muffled by her arms.

Rachel raised an eyebrow. “What’s with her?”

Julian shrugged. “She was up late.”

“And,” added Kaylee, raising her head an inch so she could speak clearly, “Julian chose this moment to share his insight on sleep and why it’s unnecessary.”

“Not unnecessary,” put in Julian defensively. “Just overrated.”

Kaylee groaned good-naturedly. “Jesus Christ. It’s a library,” she reminded them. “Library means quiet. Shut up!”

“What?” demanded Julian, smiling. “Come on, you can’t hate me because I don’t need as much sleep.”

“I can and I will,” said Kaylee matter-of-factly. “Goodnight.”

“Kaylee, why didn’t you get any—” Rachel broke off; Kaylee had put her head back down. Shrugging, she turned to Julian. “What’s new?”

He shrugged in reply, turning in his seat to face her. “Not much. Oh!” His face lit up as he remembered something. “I talked to Mr. Reid, and he said I got the solo for choir!”

“Julian!!!” Rachel squealed, flinging her arms about the skinny boy’s neck. “Oh my God, that’s amazing! Congratulations!” He returned the hug, grinning stupidly at the ceiling over Rachel’s shoulder.

After a moment, Rachel reluctantly pulled away, but a broad smile remained on her face. “Kaylee, come on, congratulate Julian!” Kaylee didn’t respond, head firmly buried in her arms. “Come on,” wheedled Rachel.

Kaylee groaned. “Fine,” she said, not moving, speaking again into the table. “Julian, congratulations, you’re awesome. Rach…” Kaylee stopped speaking, and instead help up her middle finger.

“Gee, thanks Kay,” said Rachel wryly. “But, seriously Julian, that’s amazing. Congrats.”

“Thanks,” Julian said sincerely. “I had to practice for the auditions for, like, a month.”

“A month?” said Rachel, incredulous. “No wonder you got it.”

Julian raised his eyebrows at her. “I guess certain sketch artists aren’t used to working on one thing for more than a day,” he said pointedly.

“Shut up,” Rachel told him reproachfully. “I do too spend time on my stuff. And at least I’m not ob-ses-sive.” She sing-songed the last word and prodded Kaylee. “Sorry, I can’t come out,” she said in an uncanny imitation of her friend’s voice. “I just found a really cool chord progression.”

“Go away!” Kaylee yelled, burying her face even further in her arms.

“Oh, did I tell you?” Julian asked Rachel absently, as if he hadn’t noticed Kaylee’s outburst. “When I was talking to Mr. Reid, he mentioned that Kaylee got picked for accompanist. Too bad she’s asleep…”

“What?” Kaylee squeaked, sitting bolt-upright.

“Someone’s awake,” commented Julian dryly.

“Library,” Rachel reminded her, grinning impishly.

Kaylee stared at Julian, speechless. “You… you…” She whapped him on the shoulder. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“But it was just so funny to watch you trying to sleep.” Kaylee glared at him, and without warning, he enveloped her in a tight hug. “You’re brilliant, Kay. Congratulations.”

As soon as Julian had pulled away, Rachel had taken his place. Reaching over the table, she grabbed Kaylee in a one-armed hug. “Yeah, congrats. I guess your obses—practicing,” she corrected herself very deliberately—“paid off.”

Kaylee punched Rachel playfully in the shoulder, grinning uncontrolably. For a moment, she stared at Rachel, her wide smile fading to be replaced by a look of thoughtfulness. Then, without warning, she burst out laughing.

“What?” asked Rachel, confused.

“Nothing,” gasped Kaylee. “It’s just that… We’re all such fucking choir nerds that, I swear to God, I’m waiting for Mr. Reid to come up to you and ask you to be the chorus sketch artist.”

Rachel cracked up.

Julian grinned. Out of nowhere, he began to sing: “We are, we are, we are the artsy ones…” His baritone was warm and rich even on a song as stupid as this one.

Kaylee snorted at the revised lyrics. Rachel smothered a laugh.

But really, Kaylee thought, Julian was right. The three of them, their group, was one of the most right-brained in the school. Julian had started singing under the tutelage of two former-opera-star parents at age three. Now, his voice was amazing, rich and pure, his pitch and sight-singing were near-perfect, and he ate, breathed, and slept choral music. Plus, he was an avid lyricist, and Kaylee knew he frequently woke up far earlier than was normal for any self-respecting high schooler to sit with a notebook and jot down the songs running through his head.

Kaylee was the second part of their triumvirate. She was no singing prodigy and she knew it, but she was decent, and sure enough in whatever part she was assigned to hold her own in chorus with Julian. Her real talent lay in the piano. She spent hours in front of her old upright just playing, sometimes classical pieces, more often simply making it up as she went along. There was something magical for her in music, the sweeping melodies and powerful base notes and the way a hundred individual tones came together to form something expressive and utterly powerful. It always amazed her to record one of her improvisations, and then look back on it later and hear the depth and power of the sound, and realize, I made that.

Rachel, on the other hand, wasn’t much for music. After a few years with Julian and Kaylee, she had learned to stay on key on pain of death, but that was about as far as her musical talents extended. But Kaylee remembered the first day she had been to Rachel’s house, and had seen the sketches that papered the walls; she had thought they were photographs until she had seen the smudges and stray pencil marks around the edges.

Rachel never went anywhere without her sketchbook and charcoal pencil. Whereas some people wrote in a journal, or Julian wrote lyrics or Kaylee played piano, Rachel drew, anything and everything. She was one of the few people with eyes precise enough to capture every detail of a subject, and hands skilled enough to transfer every shadow and contour to paper.

She was still lost in thought, recalling the first time she had showed her music to Rachel, when thud and a cry of “Damn!” accompanied by a snigger, snapped Kaylee of her reverie; Julian’s torso had vanished under the table as he rummaged in his bag, and by the looks of things, he had just banged his head. Straightening, looking significantly ruffled, he handed several stapled sheets of paper across to Kaylee. “Sheet music,” he told her as she accepted the score, and proceeded to smooth his shirt and hair, much to the amusement of Rachel.

Scanning the music, Kaylee’s eyes translated the markings on the staff into notes almost automatically; she knew these five lines and four spaces like the back of her hand. Her eyes traveled down the singers’ parts as well. “This looks like it’ll sound good,” she said after a moment, anticipation apparent in her voice.

“You’re doing that thing again,” commented Rachel, eyebrows vanishing behind magenta bangs.

“What th—”

“That thing where you look at music and hear it playing in your head,” supplied Julian, still massaging his temples and looking disgruntled. “It’s annoying as hell. I wish I could do it.”

Kaylee shrugged and smiled sweetly. “You don’t need sleep, I can read two staves of sheet music in my head. We all have our annoying little quirks.

Julian glared good-naturedly at Kaylee. “Annoying,” he mumbled again. “But hey, look…” His voice returned to its normal volume. “Can you go over my solo with me sometime, then?”

“Nooooo.” Kaylee rolled her eyes. “Of course I will, dumbass. How will I get my thrills if I’m not playing choral accompaniments?” She grinned. “Come over after school, or something. Can you?”

He shrugged. “Probably. But I’ve got—”

“Ninth period,” chorused Kaylee and Rachel.

“Ninth period,” he confirmed with a groan. “You don’t have to wait, I’ll come over after.”

Kaylee shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll wait. Rach’ll keep me company. Right?” Kaylee added, turning to Rachel.

Rachel nodded. “Absolutely. I need your help with chem, anyway.”

“Or you might just end up sketching shit and leave all your studying until the night before the test,” suggested Julian helpfully.

Rachel smiled sheepishly. “Yeah,” she admitted, “it’ll probably go something like that.”

“I’m…” Kaylee began. Julian and Rachel broke off their conversation and turned to look at her expectantly. “I’m… not going to get sleep any time soon, am I?”

“Nope,” Rachel confirmed cheerfully, adjusting her chair so she could put her feet up on the table. “Don’t you just love us?”

Kaylee stuck her tongue out at Rachel, who laughed. Julian rolled his eyes at them both before nudging Rachel’s feet off the table. “Don’t be mean to library furniture,” he told her with mock sternness. “Anyway, let’s see the sketchbook. Anything new for me?” He held out his hands in a businesslike-way.

Rachel gave a resigned sigh, but still she smiled. “One sec,” she said, and vanished under the table. For several seconds, there were sounds of shifting and zippers, punctuated by muffled swears, before Rachel resurfaced, hair disheveled, clutching a large, spiral-bound sketchbook to her chest. “Here,” she said, rolling her eyes as she offered it to Julian.

Julian accepted it and began to leaf through it. He arrived on one of Rachel’s newer sketches and his eyes widened. “Wow,” he murmured. “Rach, this is… amazing.”

Kaylee slid out of her chair and went over to Julian’s side to peer over his shoulder. On the thick, rough paper, she saw a gigantic, empty auditorium—not their school auditorium, nor any other she had ever seen. The stage was deserted, as was the house, some seats down and some folded, others somewhere in between. Curtains that were obviously some dark, rich color in real life even though they were rendered in black and white hung at the side of the image. And, on the stage that the drawing looked out on, there shone a single, waiting spotlight.

She ran a finger lightly, wonderingly, over the precise pencil marks and the smudging that created the vast theater, the shading that created depth and light and the enormity of it all, and made the entire thing real.

“Rach…” she breathed.

“I had some free time,” she said, shrugging modestly.

“What, a free 48 hours?” asked Kaylee, incredulous. “This is… Oh my God.”

Julian looked up at her. “Where is this?”

“Uhm… nowhere,” answered Rachel. “Somewhere in my head.”

“You mean… you didn’t draw this from a picture, or anything?”

Rachel shook her head. “Nope.”

Julian let out a soft breath, staring intently down at the page again. “Hell, I want to be on that stage.”

Rachel gave a small smile. Julian looked up again, and Kaylee saw the two of them lock eyes for a long moment.

Julian finally broke the stare. “Let’s see what else we’ve got,” he said, reaching to turn the page.

“Julian…”

Julian turned to look at Rachel. “Huh?”

“Uhm…” she began awkwardly. “You’re not…”

“Right to privacy?” filled in Kaylee? Rachel nodded gratefully.

After the three had begun to hang out, they had agreed on the right to privacy; they usually showed each other their work—songs, music, sketches—freely, but if they wanted to, for whatever reason, they could keep a particular piece private, with no questions asked. Now, Kaylee raised her eyebrows—even after they had established it, they hardly ever invoked the right to privacy—but, despite intense curiosity, resolved not to ask Rachel about it. She knew her friend probably had a good reason.

Julian shrugged. “Okay, whatever. Your call.” Rachel smiled in relief; Julian was good about these things. “I’ve gotta go,” he continued. “I need to talk to Crane about extra credit before class starts. God, I hate that woman so much…” Both Kaylee and Rachel nodded fervently; they knew the evils of Ms. Crane. “See you guys around.” He slid his chair away from the table, slung his bag over his shoulder, and strode out of the library.

Kaylee took Julian’s newly vacated seat next to Rachel. “Well, you seem pretty damn awake now,” commented Rachel. What happened to ‘I didn’t sleep last night?’”

“Shut up,” said Kaylee, waving her away. “Life got exciting all of a sudden. What’s up?”

Rachel bit her lip and stared into space for a moment, expression unreadable. Then, reaching a decision, she pushed her sketchbook at Kaylee. Kaylee turned the page.

Two faces were locked in a kiss, charcoal swirling in abstract patterns around them, the image so vivid and lifelike that Kaylee could feel the passion between the two pairs of lips. One of the faces was clearly Rachel’s. And the other—

“Oh shit,” said Kaylee, setting the sketchbook down.

“Tell me about it,” groaned Rachel. “Kay, what am I gonna do?”

“You could tell Julian you like him,” said Kaylee slowly, after looking around to make sure that no one else in the library was remotely interested in their conversation.

“There’s no way I could do that!” said Rachel fervently. “No way. We’ve known each other for three years!”

“So he wouldn’t mind,” put in Kaylee reasonably.

“No, but it’d fuck up our friendship. I mean, how would you react if I told you I liked you?”

Kaylee looked quizzically at Rachel. “First, I’d go, ‘since when are you a lesbian?’”

“Kaylee! Please!” Rachel stared at her beseechingly.

“Okay, fine. I’d… I don’t know. Look, if I were him, I’d either like you back or I wouldn’t. And if I didn’t like you back… okay, things could be really weird and awkward. But I don’t think they will be. He wouldn’t mind. He’d probably be really cool about it. That’s what Julian does. Why do you think you fell for him in the first place?”

“But… It isn’t…” Rachel slammed a fist on the table in frustration, earning reproachful looks from the few others in the library. “It’s not that simple. I… I don’t want him to not care,” she said quietly. “I want him to like me back. But if he does, what’s going to happen if we end up going out?”

“I’d be happy for you guys, and you’d be happy, and he’d be happy,” Kaylee told her soothingly. “And,” she added, before Rachel even had a chance to ask her next question, “if something happened to you as a couple, you’d go back to being friends.”

“I…” Rachel sighed. “I just don’t know. I know I should tell him, but I’m just really scared to because he might not like me back, or maybe he does like me back, and I honestly don’t know which is scarier right now because I’d probably be a horrible girlfriend and fuck everything up, but none of that matters if I don’t get up the courage to fucking ask him in the first place, which I don’t know if I will because I’m a fucking coward, and I…” She trailed off helplessly.

“Look, Rach… calm down, first of all.” Rachel looked at Kaylee slightly guiltily and took a deep breath. “Okay, good. Now… how long has this been going on?”

“Me liking him? About two months.”

Kaylee raised her eyebrows. “And this is the first drawing you’ve done of the two of you?”

Rachel grimaced and shook her head. “No, it’s not. I just didn’t get a chance to rip this one out, and I forgot all about it. Damn.”

“Well, it’s not that bad, right?” asked Kaylee hopefully. “I mean, it’s not like he saw it…”

“But he’s gonna know something’s up,” moaned Rachel. “He’ll be suspicious. You were, weren’t you?”

“Well, yeah, but—”

“And what’m I gonna tell him if he asks me?”

There was a long pause. “The truth?” Kaylee finally offered. Rachel opened her mouth to protest, but Kaylee cut her off. “Look, Julian is too good a person to let there be anything awkward between you guys. If you’ve liked him for two months, there’s no guarantee that this’ll go away any time soon. And honestly, how long do you want to have to be all secretive around him? Just tell him, and if he doesn’t like you, things’ll just go back to how they were, and if he does like you… you can go from there.”

Rachel sighed. “I don’t know,” she told Kaylee. Instinctively, Kaylee reached forward and gave her a quick, tight hug.

“I know,” said Kaylee. “I know, it’s confusing, I know it sucks… It’ll work out eventually.”

“But how long will ‘eventually’ be?” demanded Rachel. “I don’t want it to work out sometime after college. I want it to work out soon, so I can get back to my life being fucking normal.”

“Are you going to tell him?” asked Kaylee quietly.

Rachel closed her eyes for a moment, as if in prayer. “I don’t know.” There was another pause. “I should go,” she said, standing and shouldering her bag.

“Rach, wait…”

“See you later,” called Rachel halfheartedly over her shoulder as she walked out of the library.

Kaylee sat there for a moment, thinking, wondering what was going to happen between her two best friends. And then her eyes fell on the sketchbook Rachel had left open on the table.

Suddenly realizing something, she bent and rummaged in her bag for a moment before producing a crumpled sheet of paper with the latest lyrics Julian had given her. She had wondered who they were about, who the “you” was, but Julian had refused to tell her and had sworn her to secrecy.

With a slight smile, she picked up the sketchbook and her own backpack and set off after Rachel.