So. After a few years, I’ve started to rewrite this story. I’ve matured and developed a better writing style that really depicts my own character. Anyway, here it is.

Chapter 1

Where Can I Stab Myself in the Ears

Behind your back, talking like knives.

And I can hardly breathe

-Hawthorne Heights

“Nope.”

“Rav.”

“Nope.”

“Ravia”

“Nope.”

“RAVIA RENNER!”

“…Fine…”

I reluctantly gave into my mother’s incessant nagging. She wanted me to take my little sister, Chelsea, to a concert.

You might ask, what’s wrong with that? Well, I’ll tell you what. The band, Rising Ashes, was playing.

Again, what’s wrong with that?

Their music was terrible. The lyrics were whiny, cheesy, and annoying. The musicians weren’t too good. The instrumentation wasn’t cohesive. The only slightly good thing about the band was the lead singer’s voice.

Oh wait. That only good thing was ruined by the fact that the lead singer was an arrogant ass who had made his goal in life to sleep with every girl there was in the world. He had publicly said that. How shallow can you get?

My sister liked them. Enough said.

“Mom, why can’t Josh take them?”

Josh is my older brother.

“Because Ravia, he said he’s busy preparing for graduation and getting in all his papers that are due for school in order for him to graduate.”

That is complete bullshit.

“Mom, you can’t possibly believe that!” I whined.

She glared at me and I unenthusiastically trudged to my room.

I flipped open my cell phone and called one of my best friends, Brian.

“Hey, what’s up Rav?”

“Not much. My mom just told me that I have to take Chelsea to her concert next week. I’m not too enthusiastic as you can tell.”

“Well, who’s the band?”

“Rising Ashes.”

“Oh….Haha. Well…I’d recommend bringing earplugs.”

“Thanks Brian. I can’t wait to stand around listening to terribly cliché whiny guys sing about their heartfelt troubles in the worst way possible.”

“Oh come on Rav, it won’t be that bad. I mean, if you get over their lyrics, the music isn’t that bad. Also, the lead singer’s voice is really smooth,” he replied.

“And he’s also a douche-bag,” I retorted.

“Well…maybe. I don’t know what to tell you. If you have any extra tickets, bring Adrienne or me along,” he said.

“Yeah, I’ll check to see if I can get a ticket for you or her.”

“Alright. Are we doing anything tonight?”

“I don’t think so. I might go over to Ricky’s house. The band is practicing tonight and I want to hear their new song,” I said. Ricky was the drummer of Josh’s band.

“Okay. Well, I’ll talk to you later Rav.”

I said goodbye and hung up unhappily.

I went to go pick up my guitar and strummed a few chords. Giving in to my begging, my brother had taught me to play when he started taking lessons. I’ve been playing for 10 of the 18 years I’ve been alive.

Nothing really stood out in my head while I tried to improvise a few lines. Giving up, I played the chord progression to a Beatles song.

After deciding that guitar wasn’t really the most interesting option right now, I turned on my music and blasted Brand New from my stereo. I was lying on my bed starting a sketch of the origami birds on my ceiling when my door slammed open and my sister, Chelsea, barged in.

Her bright pink popped collar polo and mini skirt made me cringe as I looked at her.

Her lip-glossed mouth opened and she said,

“I hope you know that 4 of my friends are coming with me. So there’s going to be 5 of us. Got it? “

“Yes, princess, I can do math,” I retorted.

She glared at me and stomped out of my room.

A thought flashed through my mind and I called after her.

“Wait, Chelsea! Can I invite one of my friends to come along with me?”

She turned around and laughed.

“Of course not. It’s my concert.”

“But if I don’t have a friend to accompany me, I’ll be hanging around you the whole time, and I know you don’t want to be seen with me,” I shot back.

She opened her mouth once and closed it.

You could literally see the gears grinding their rusty teeth in her head while she tried to use her brain and think about what I just said.

She glared at me again and said,

“Fine. One friend. So I’ll be inviting 3 friends instead.”

She stormed into her room slamming her door in my face.

A smile made way onto my face as I quickly dialed Brian’s number again. He was agreeing to come with me when my door slammed open yet again.

I groaned and threw a pillow at whoever was coming into my room.

“Out! I’m on the phone!” I yelled.

Josh grinned and snatched the phone from my hands.

“Hey who is it? Oh, hey Brian. Haven’t seen you for a few weeks, how ya been man?”

Brian responded enthusiastically and they proceeded to start chatting about Josh’s band, Ice Civilian.

I sighed and waited for them to finish. When they showed no sign of ending, I seized the phone and ignored Josh’s protests.

“Okay, Brian. I’ll just tell you the details in school on Monday. But as long as you can definitely come, it’s all good,” I said.

“Yeah, I’ll talk to you later about it.”

When we both hung up, I turned to see Josh going through my sketches. I went over to him and he said,

“I like this one.”

It was a portrait of my other best friend Adrienne. She had been sitting on the steps outside of our school and the wind had been blowing her hair all around.

I had always suspected that Josh had a thing for Adrienne, but was too scared to do act on it.

“Oh yeah? You would. Just admit it Josh, you have a thing for her,” I said.

He blushed and retorted,

“No I don’t. I just like how her hair is blowing all around and her eyes…”

He ended up staring more at the picture. I rolled my eyes and took the sketchpad from his hands.

“So you’re coming to Ricky’s tonight right?” he asked.

“Yeah, if you guys want me to,” I replied.

“Of course. Plus there’s something weird going on with Taire’s bass. Can you check it out?” he asked.

I agreed and we both went our separate ways.

I had been doing some technical stuff for Ice Civilian for a few months. My interest in the make up of instruments had started when I had accidentally broken open a guitar when it fell out of its case onto cement ground. Ever since, I began fooling around with instruments and learned more about teching.

I turned on my music again even louder this time and Chelsea yelled from across the hall.

“Turn down that terrible music! It’s ruining my concentration on applying my eyeliner!”

I ignored her and turned the Led Zeppelin song a little louder just to spite her.

She came into my room and turned off my stereo.

“What the hell Chelsea? It’s my music and my room!” I yelled.

“Well, I don’t like it. So stop playing it so loud!” she yelled back.

“You’re the only person in this family who doesn’t appreciate Led Zeppelin! So I don’t care if it’s ruining your concentration or whatever, just learn to deal with it!”

I was getting really annoyed with her constant screaming.

She unplugged my stereo and went back to her room.

Sighing, I plugged it back in and decided that going to Adrienne’s house would probably be the best idea as of right now.

When I got there, Adrienne was already waiting for me in her kitchen. We were so close that we could just go into each other’s houses without asking or knocking.

“Here. I made cookies! They’re realllllly good,” she gushed.

I took a few and asked,

“You wanna go to Ricky’s house tonight? The band’s practicing and I’ll be the only sane person there.”

She stood there and kept on chewing with a look of bliss on her face.

When she realized that I was waiting for her to say something she started and said,

“Oh what? Sorry I wasn’t listening. I was enjoying the chocolately orgasm in my mouth.”

Well, I guess I would be the only sane person.

“I asked if you wanted to go to Ricky’s house tonight because the band is practicing,” I repeated.

“Oh yeah! Josh is going to be there?”

“Well, seeing as he’s the lead singer, yes, I think so. Don’t worry, you’ll be able to stare at him all night,” I smirked.

“Shut up. I don’t want to stare at him all night,” she denied as she glared at me.

“Okay. Maybe just a few hours,” I joked.

“Whatever.”

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Hours later, we were standing in front of Ricky’s door. Adrienne was worrying about her hair when Ricky’s little sister answered the door. Emma was the most adorable 5 year old I had ever seen.

She was sucking her thumb when she saw us and squealed. She jumped into my arms and said,

“Are you here to play with me Ravvy? All the stinky boys are downstairs being loud.”

I smiled and said,

“Yeah, I’ll play with you for a little bit. We can do the jigsaw puzzle that we wanted to do last week. Adrienne, you can go down and I’ll be there in a little bit.”

While I was finishing the jigsaw puzzle with Emma, the entire band walked out of the basement to take a break.

There were 5 band members in Civilian Ice. Josh was the lead singer, Taire was the bassist, Ricky was the drummer, Brent was lead guitar, and Adam was back up vocals and the second guitarist.

When they saw me, they exclaimed,

“Rav! Hey, what’s up!”

They came over to greet me while Josh took Emma and gave her a quick piggy back ride. She shrieked in delight and said,

“Faster, faster!!”

Josh winced as she kicked his back and started to run slightly faster.

I turned to Taire and said,

“Where’s my piggy back ride?”

He flashed a grin and gestured for me to get on his back.

I laughed and said,

‘I’m just kidding. I don’t think your skinny frame could hold my 5 feet 9 inches.”

He pretended to be offended and said,

“Excuse me missy. I’m the strongest person in this house right now!”

We all laughed because Brent was standing right next to him, and was easily the most built out of all the guys.

“Hey Rav, can you check out my bass?” Taire asked me.

I agreed and went down into the basement. I wrinkled my nose as I noticed there were more cans of soda and bags of chips strewn around than the last time I’d been there.

Taire handed me his bass and I asked what was wrong with it.

“The D rings weirdly when I play it. Like this,” he demonstrated.

I frowned.

“Well, there’s a chrome plate under the bridge which can usually react with the string vibration, which can sometimes produce a weird harmonic sound. I think that might be it,” I answered.

“I don’t know what you just said, but I’ll just take your word for it,” Taire answered scratching his head.

I took the bass and fiddled around with the active EQ amped up. I noticed that there was some strange substance around the bridge of the bass. I touched it and stared.

“Taire.”

He looked at me questioningly.

“What the hell is gum and…soy sauce doing on your bass?”

He looked sheepish and said,

“Oh yeah…forgot about that. I dunno, I was playing and I didn’t feel like moving to a trashcan to spit my gum away. And we had Chinese food yesterday…I guess we shouldn’t have had a soy sauce fight.”

I rolled my eyes. Idiots.

“Well, I think that might your problem. Considering your bass is caked in….shit. Clean everything up and try a new cable to the amp. Then we’ll see. I’m not cleaning this bass for you.”

He agreed unhappily and the rest of the band came downstairs.

After a few hours of more practice, Josh, Adrienne, and I were ready to go home.

Adrienne came into my room with a huge gallon of cookie dough ice cream.

She sat in one of my chairs and we both shared it as we argued about whether feather beds were more comfortable or the therapeutic ones.

Josh came in and joined us.

“I think I’m going to get another piercing. I need your advice. Industrial in my left ear or another lip ring?”

Josh already had 2 eyebrow piercings, a lip ring, an industrial in his right ear, 8 earlobe piercings, 2 cartilage piercings, and 3 tattoos.

Adrienne quickly responded,

“Lip. Get the other side so it’ll be double snake bites. Oh that’s so hot!”

He grinned at her and said,

“Snake bites it is then!”

I grumbled under my breath about how he just wanted to impress her.

Glaring at me, he grabbed our ice cream and started devouring it. We both protested and tried to take it back from him but failed as he ran out of the room with it.

“Stupid brothers…” I muttered.

Adrienne just stared after him.

I sighed. This was going to be a long night.

Alright guys. Review, review review! I can’t emphasize how much it really motivates me to write more. Hope you enjoyed it!