Chapter 5: David's Point of View

David and Rick unrealistically quick make a band with Sean and Elliot. Kelsey and David bond. We see some issues with Sean's home life.

Chapter 5: David’s Point of View

 

At lunch, Rick and I sat at Sean’s table again. As we started eating, I noticed a couple of guys at the table seemed pretty interested in whatever they were talking about.

I looked at Sean questioningly.

He was talking to another kid at the table, who had straightened black hair and gauged earrings. Both of them were going back and forth, and I noticed other people were listening too.

“Well, I’d really want to…but who would want to?” Sean asked. “It can’t be just you and me.”

The boy shrugged. “Well, maybe someone else would want to join.” He turned and looked around the table. “Anyone?”

No one responded, so I leaned forward and asked, “Sorry for butting in, but what are you guys talking about?”

Sean looked at the other boy. “Elliot wants to start a band. And I’d be all for it, but we wouldn’t have enough people. You know, two people bands are usually pretty lame.”

Before I could stop myself, I responded. “I could join. I mean…if you guys want me.”

Sean looked at Elliot, then said to me, “What do you play?”

“Keyboard mostly. But if you needed a guitarist, I could do that too.”

“Hey, I like this guy!” Elliot exclaimed, smiling. “We’d love to have you.”

Sean was looking at Rick, who was silently eating his fries and listening. “And what about you, Rick? Do you play anything?”

Rick looked surprised. “I, uh…I play a little bass.”

Sean looked at Elliot, grinning. “Wow. This is perfect.”

“Perfect?” Now Rick had stopped eating. “What do you mean?”

“He’s saying that because I play drums, and Sean plays guitar.” Elliot replied. “And, having a pianist and bassist would pretty much complete the ensemble…you know?”

“So wait, you really want me and David?” Rick looked about twice as astonished as before.

“Well, it’d work out great.” Sean replied. “That is…if you guys want to.”

I shrugged. “I’m in.”

Sean and Elliot looked at Rick, who sighed. “Fine.”

“Sweet.” Sean said, grinning. “Before we go any further, we need to think of a name for our band.”

There was silence for a minute as we thought.

“What about REDS?” Sean suggested.

Rick looked confused. “Reds?”

“Our initials,” he explained. “Rick, Elliot, David, and Sean.”

Elliot shook his head. “I dunno. I mean it’s not bad, but the whole initial thing has been done a thousand times. We need to think of something creative…and unique.”

We all nodded and continued thinking.

“Hey, I got one!” Rick exclaimed, smiling. “Three boys and one ‘Mann’!”

“Wait, what?” I asked, completely confused.

“Who’s the man?” Sean asked.

“I’m the man!” Rick replied with a grin. “My last name is Manns. Get it?”

I laughed. “Clever. But no one else would get it.”

“Besides,” Sean added, “Everyone does the number thing. Like Ron, Michael, and Adrian right over there have a band called, ‘Two guys and a girl’.”

“Aww…” Rick sat back in his chair. “Well, I’m out of ideas.”

“We can just think of it for now, and meet up later.” I suggested.

Sean nodded. “After school, meet me by my locker and you guys can come home with me. I have the instruments in my garage.”

We all agreed to this, and the bell rang right after. Rick and I hurried off to gym quickly.

“So, do you have your clothes?” I asked him as we reached the locker room.

He nodded. “I didn’t forget. Now we can be tennis partners, right?”

“Oh, yeah…sure.”

As it turned out, we didn’t end up playing tennis that day. Instead, Mr. Brown wanted to fill out some worksheets explaining the concept of tennis.

Rick laughed as we watched Mr. Brown pass out the workbooks. “Of course the day I actually bring my clothes, we’re doing some stupid workbook activity.”

“Well, if you just bring your clothes every day, you won’t mind it so much, Manns.” Mr. Brown replied casually as he passed by us.

Once he was out of earshot, Rick gave me an astonished look. “Did you hear that? I wasn’t even talking to him…I told you, Brown hates me!”

I laughed. “I think it’s funny how he calls us by our last name. I mean, it’s just gym class, not football or anything.”

Rick glared at me. “You’re not even listening to me.”

Mr. Brown finished handing out the books and began talking. “Today is workbook day. I want everyone to have pages 5, 6, and 7 done by the end of the hour. You can work with partners if you want, but it’ll become an individual assignment if you can’t control the volume.”

Everyone began chattering quietly, and Rick scooted over next to me.

I opened my book. “Page 5…page 5…here it is.”

“This is so stupid…” Rick grumbled. “We have to do worksheets on tennis instead of actually playing.”

“We already did play, Rick.” I reminded him. “You just weren’t able to, remember?”

“Oh yeah.” He tapped his pencil on the gym floor. “Okay, first question. What is the correct tennis term for zero points?”

“A love, I think.” I replied, writing it down.

“Hey, speaking of a love…how about you invite Kelsey over here?”

“Ha ha, very funny.” I replied sarcastically. “You’re just dying to see me like someone, aren’t you?”

He shrugged. “Well, it’s gotta happen sometime.”

“So you think I haven’t liked anyone before?” I asked, smiling. “You’re totally wrong.”

“Then just invite her over.”

“Fine, I will.” I replied, and turned to where Kelsey sat. “Hey, Kelsey!”

She looked up.

“Wanna come work with us?”

A smile spread across her face. “Sure.”

As she came over, Rick nodded toward her. “Hi, Kelsey.”

“Hi Rick.” She replied, flipping her book open again. “Okay, so how far have you guys gotten?”

Rick and I looked at each other. “We just finished the first one.”

She smiled. “Oh okay. Well, I have the first couple, so you guys can just write down these answers.”

I copied down her first few answers, as Rick copied what I wrote. As we wrote, Kelsey began reading the next question.

“Okay, what’s another word for ‘tie’ or equal score?” she asked us.

Rick shrugged as he continued writing. “Isn’t the word for equal score just ‘tie’?”

“No, no, I remember him talking about it…” I replied.

Kelsey thought for a moment, then said, “Oh! I think it’s called a deuce!”

“Yeah, that’s what it was!” I remembered. We all wrote it down.

“You two are smart.” Rick mumbled. “It’s no fair.”

Kelsey shrugged. “Well, I stink at tennis, so I guess this makes up for it.” She flipped the page to our next worksheet. “Oh great. A diagram.”

The drawing on the page showed people in different positions, and we were supposed to label each position. What made the picture weird was most of the people in different poses were overlapping each other, making it look like a very chaotic tennis game.

“Wow, you’d think whoever made this book could’ve done a little better.” Kelsey said.

“All I can say is I’d hate to be playing in that game.” Rick added jokingly.

Kelsey laughed as she held up the sheet. “What are they doing anyway? They look like a bunch of swarming midgets.”

We laughed, until I stopped and realized something.

“Wait, Kelsey, what was that last part?”

She looked embarrassed. “Never mind, it was dumb.”

“No, wait, say it again.” I urged.

“I just said they look like a bunch of swarming midgets,” she repeated.

I looked at Rick excitedly, who was staring at me as if I were crazy. “Rick! It could be our band name!”

“Huh? You mean we name our band, ‘They look like a bunch of swarming midgets’?”

“No, we could just call ourselves, ‘The Swarming Midgets’.”

He seemed uncertain. “Eh…I don’t know if the other guys will go for it.”

“Well, think about it. They wanted something unique and random…and that’s totally unique and random.”

He still wasn’t convinced. “Maybe. But…is midget even…politically correct nowadays? I mean, what if we offend someone?”

                I shrugged. “It’s a garage band. Honestly, I don’t think anyone will ever hear us.”

                He considered this. “True. Well, it is random…”

                “I bet you there isn’t a single band in the whole word with that name.”

                Kelsey was watching both of us. “Wait, you guys are starting a band?”

                I nodded. “There’s a couple guys at our lunch table who are starting one, so Rick and I joined too. I have no clue how good we’ll be though.”

She nodded. “What do you guys play?”

“I think I’ll be playing the keyboard.” I responded.

“I’m gonna be playing bass.” Rick replied, laughing to himself. “We’ll probably stink.”

She smiled. “That’s cool.”

I nodded, just as the bell rang. In only an hour, we would be starting up our new band.

 

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

 

“David, I sure hope this works, or else this’ll be all your fault.”

I laughed calmly as Rick and I walked to Sean’s locker. “Relax. It’s not like we’re playing in front of anyone.”

The truth was, I was a little nervous too. I kept thinking about if three of us were good, but then one of us totally stunk. Would we tell him, or just try to cover him up?

When we reached Sean’s locker, he was already waiting there for us talking with Elliot. He gave a slight smile as we came up to them. “Hey guys. Ready to go?”

I nodded, and we headed toward the school doors. “So, you have all the instruments, right?”

Sean shrugged. “Well, I have a few guitars, a bass, and I think my dad has an old keyboard somewhere.”

“And I have a drum set at my house.” Elliot added.

Sean nodded. “We’re going to go over to his house. He has a big basement, and my dad…he doesn’t really like guests.”

 “Oh. Okay.” I replied. “So, we’re going to your house to pick up the instruments, and then to Elliot’s house to play?”

He nodded again, and we walked in silence.

Rick whistled quietly, as I had come to notice he did during awkward situations. “Oh! So have you guys heard David’s band name idea?”

“Rick, it’s stupid…” I said quietly, feeling embarrassed.

“The Swarming Midgets.” He continued, ignoring me. “What do you think?”

Elliot looked up, smiling. “Actually…that’s not bad.”

Rick looked surprised. “Wait, you like it?”

Sean started to grin. “It’s kinda different. Unique, and a name that would be remembered.”

“Yeah, I could see us being The Swarming Midgets…” Elliot added in.

“You guys think it would work?” I asked eagerly.

“I think we should give it a shot.” Elliot said, looking to Sean and Rick for support. “Are you guys in?”

Sean was nodding enthusiastically. “I love it.”

Rick, however, was still staring at Sean and Elliot. “I…you guys really like it? I mean, isn’t it kindof…random?”

“Well, that’s what we’re aiming for!” Elliot responded, patting me on the back. “Good job, David!”

Rick sighed. “Wow. Well, you guys would know better than I would.”

Elliot grinned. “Great. So, unless we find something even better, we’re The Swarming Midgets.”

By this time, we were on Sean’s block, and he began to dig around his backpack in search of his keys.  “Okay, we’re almost to my house. You guys can wait out here, and I’ll go get the instruments.”

This confused me. “Wait, won’t you need some help? I mean, we need to get 3 instruments.”

Sean rubbed the back of his neck. “Uh…that’s okay. Our house is kindof a mess…and…if my dad’s home, he won’t want anyone to come in.”

I noticed Elliot glance at Sean knowingly, and I couldn’t help but feel curious. “Oh, alright.”

We reached his house, and Sean turned to us. “Stay here. I’ll just bring out the stuff to you guys.”

As we waited, I looked around curiously. I noticed their grass was in need of a good watering, and that cigarettes littered the yard. Turning to Rick, I saw he was staring at their trash.

“What is it?” I mouthed.

He shook his head. “I’ll tell you later.”

Just then, Sean was coming out with the keyboard. “I found it.” He said, handing me the keyboard, and Elliot the stand. “I’ll be right back.”

The three of us stood there waiting, until Rick said, “So. Elliot. Have you ever been to Sean’s house?”

Elliot shrugged. “A couple times, yeah. I live about a block away, so we’ve been hanging out ever since he moved in here.”

“That’s cool.” Rick replied casually. “So…are his parents nice?”

He was obviously hinting at something, and Elliot knew it. “What do you mean?”

“Well, you’ve met his parents before, right? Were they nice?”

Elliot hesitated on answering, just as Sean came back out with both guitars.

“Sorry about that.” He said, handing Rick his guitar. “We can go now.”

We reached Elliot’s house in a few minutes, and worked on setting up our equipment. I looked at Rick, wondering if we would be any good. Everyone got into their places, and Sean looked around at us.

“Okay. Now, what do we play?”

This stopped us all, as none of us had ever played in a band.

“Well…” he continued, when none of us responded. “We need to decide if we’ll be writing our own songs, or playing songs from other bands.”

“I could be wrong, but it would probably be a good idea to start with other people’s songs.” I suggested. “I mean, what do we know about music yet?”

“That’s true.” Elliot said, nodding. “Unless any of us have written songs, I doubt we’d do very good starting off like that.”

“Well, what’s a good song to start off with?” Sean asked.

We all thought for a minute, until Rick said, “What about ‘Smoke on the Water’?”

“Well, how would I play that?” I asked. “Is there a piano part?”

Elliot frowned. “We need to think of something all of us can play to.”

“Well, until we think of something, let’s just try playing.” Sean suggested.

Rick stared at Sean with a confused expression. “Play what?”

He shrugged. “Anything. Let’s just…jam.”

So we tried that. I hadn’t played since 7^th grade, but moving across those keys made me remember why I had enjoyed playing the piano so much.

Sean noticed it too. “Nice job, David! How long have you played?”

Feeling slightly embarrassed, I tried to act modest. “I used to play in 6^th and 7^th grade when I was bored. I’m a little rusty because I haven’t played in a while.”

“You’re really good! So, did you take lessons, or what?”

I shook my head. “I just taught myself.”

His eyebrows rose in surprise, and he looked at Elliot to see what he thought.

“You’ve got a musical gift, dude.” Elliot told me. “I’d work on making that useful if I were you.”

I couldn’t help but smile. “You think so?”

Rick looked annoyed. “Well, he’s not that good…I mean, we’re just practicing.”

Sean shrugged. “He has potential.”

Those words stuck with me, and throughout our rehearsal, I worked to show off whatever songs or tricks I had learned in my middle school years. We tired out around 5:30, when we had been playing for almost 3 hours.

Sean was the first to notice. “Oh man. I have to go.”

We all stopped and looked at the clock. “3 hours?! How has it been 3 hours?” Rick exclaimed, obviously shocked.

“So, are we bringing the instruments back to your house now?” I asked.

Sean shook his head. “If it’s okay with you Elliot, it’d work better to just leave them here, since this is where we’ll usually be practicing.”

Elliot shrugged. “That’s fine.”

Sean picked up his guitar and started walking upstairs. “I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”

“Okay, bye.” I called, and turned to Elliot. “Well, I should go too.”

“Me too.” Rick said, setting down his guitar. “It’s only the third day, but the teachers are already going crazy with homework.”

Elliot laughed. “Okay. See you guys at lunch.”

As Rick and I left Elliot’s house, I turned to him. “So, what was up with earlier? I’ve never seen you look so carefully at someone’s house.”

He sighed. “Well…I could be wrong, but…did you see his garbage?”

I laughed. “What?”

“I’m just asking, did you happen to look at it?”

I shrugged. “Not really. Why?”

“Well, I was just bored, so I was looking around. And, uh…the trash by his curb had a lot of broken stuff, like there was a TV with the screen smashed to pieces.”

I was still confused. “So?”

“Well, I could be wrong…but I wonder if there’s problems at his house. Before my parent’s got divorced, there’d be fights every now and then where they’d actually throw stuff. I just remember seeing a lot of our broken stuff sitting out on the curb, and when I saw Sean’s trash…I thought of that.”

He could actually be right. “I kind of wondered if there might be some family problems too. I mean, he was acting kind of weird when he was explaining why we couldn’t come in…”

Rick nodded. “I don’t want to be weird about this, but it makes me wonder, you know?”

I nodded too. “Well, I guess we’ll just have to wait and find out.”