#anotherbadpoem

They’re finishing with a big hit from last year, one their guitarist Kanaya wrote and one that you downloaded from their website as soon as you got home (because you can recognize greatness when you hear it). Jane seems to enjoy having her solo and Jade grins as she plucks out her bass line. Even Rose beats her drums with a little more vigor than usual. By the end, Terezi is sweating and her voice is raspy from screaming out notes, but she hasn’t lost her usual energy either. But as the crowd breaks out into applause (and some drunk dude screaming “I love you, Janey!” followed by a cackle and a “I love her more!” and you chuckling because Dirk and Roxy must be so smashed), it’s Kanaya’s smug simper that sticks out to you. She must be so proud. She does about 90% of the writing for their band. Their successful show is all down to her.

Then the lights go down, and that’s your cue. Meenah claps you on the shoulder and you spare her a smirk as you come on to take your rightful places on stage. Feferi and Nepeta are the only ones polite enough to compliment their show as you meet in the center. Terezi and Rose give them quick thank yous before getting out of the way, and then you lose interest. You’ve got to set up your guitar and a mic, after all.

You approach Kanaya to take her place – both of you play second guitar, so both of you set your amps almost the same way. She bends down to turn it off before she unplugs her guitar. You didn’t realize she noticed you approaching until she was handing you the cord. “Break a leg,” she says, voice and eye contact both even.

Something in her stare makes you want to curl in on yourself, but you meet it with a smirk. A response comes to your lips but you choke it when you realize ‘you too’ would make you look like an idiot. You compose yourself enough to say “Thanks, but I’ve already got more luck than I know what to do with.”

“Do you now.” You’re sure she’s teasing. You’re not sure if she’s teasing in a friendly way. Kanaya’s offstage before you can figure it out though. You find yourself staring after her for a long moment before you remember the wire in your hand and the amp at your feet. It only takes a few seconds to make sure your guitar is tuned and your amp is set correctly, and you find Nepeta has already brought a mic over and all that’s left to do is wait. You give your drummer a nod and a little smile to acknowledge her help, and you turn back to the crowd to watch them a little.

There’s enough light on stage for you to be seen as more than vague figures by the people near the front, and you accidentally make eye contact with a few of them. As you get further to the back, you start to see people taking advantage of the pause to hit the bar and chat with their friends – including Dirk and Roxy, you note. At one table in the back you see the five guys who make up the band playing after you (Dave and John and John 2.0, and two other guys with weird names you can’t remember that seem to hate everyone a lot). At another you see the three girls who make up last year’s winning band (you don’t know their names, but they’re hard to miss - one has full body tattoos and one has red glasses like Terezi’s and one seems to be going for the slutty schoolgirl look) who will play while the judges tally up the scores. In a corner you see Jane has just met up with Deaf Girl and Her Creepy Boyfriend to discuss how their business is going so far tonight. Judging by the number of sober people in the room, you’d say it’s going well. And on the edge of the crowd you see Kanaya again, standing by Jade. Rather than watch her though, you look up at the balcony to see if the judges are ready.

The Battle of the Bands has a panel of three judges that hasn’t changed since you started participating. There’s your cousin Aranea, who is probably biased toward you; your former friend Aradia, who is probably biased against you; and Calliope, a friend of a friend of a friend who you’ve never actually spoken to. In a community this small it’s pretty hard to find a panel of people who have no relationship to any of the band members, but over the years they’ve done a good job of picking the best performers. You can admit that. And you won the year before last anyway, so.

You look at them in time to see them exchange nods, and you can’t hold back a smile. You’re ready to win one more and you are so unbelievably ready to rub it in Kanaya’s face. She’s going to act like she doesn’t care, but it’s still satisfying. You’ll both still know that your band had the better performance. The lights go up, and chatter starts to die down as the audience realizes the show is about to begin again. A figure leans over the balcony holding his arm out for you to clearly see his hand switching from thumbs up to thumbs down. You understand it as an inquiry – are you ready? You turn to see Nepeta raise her drumsticks to her chest, and Meenah give a wink. Finally, you nod at Feferi, and she gives the thumbs up to the guys upstairs.

“And now.” The audience is mostly silent now. You clutch the neck of your guitar, placing your fingers in position to play your first chord. “Please welcome our 2012 winners, Spike of the Mind.”

Polite applause fills the room (along with a pair of voices screaming “Fuck yeah”), but only for a second before the crack of Nepeta’s drumsticks give you a tempo.

One, two, three, four.

**

Feferi’s last chord rings through the room and people start cheering. Roxy tries to start up a chant for Freebird, but it dies quickly when Dirk doesn’t even join in. Meanwhile, you’re grinning and trying not to laugh. Though they’ve been yelling all through your set, they always save it for in between songs and it’s never mean heckling. Their entertaining shenanigans plus the lack of major blunders has you in a good mood.

That was your last song of the night, and one you’ve never performed before tonight. You’re more than satisfied with the response from the crowd. Even better, you spotted Kanaya at a table alone swaying slightly to your sound. You wonder if you can catch her before she catches up with some of her friends, and you don’t have a lot of time to waste anyway, so you give a quick “Thank you!” and blow a kiss and step away from the mic. The lights go down, and the boys of the last band come to take your places. They don’t have a second guitar but they do have a keyboard, so you just leave Dave and John to set it up how they like.

Five minutes later, your guitar is safe in Meenah’s van and the boys have already started playing. You were kind of hoping to catch the name they settled on, but that’s fine. They’re embarrassing themselves anyway – their lead guitar player is trying to also be their lead singer and he doesn’t seem able to do either. Jake and the drummer seem to at least have the basics down, but they’re playing ridiculously simple parts. John is good at keyboard and Dave is good at rapping, but their styles clash so much that it sounds like they’re bad. All in all, you doubt they’ll compete next year.

If they were better, you might join Feferi and Nepeta in the crowd. Instead you decide to scan the empty tables, and…yes, Kanaya is still sitting alone. You pass by Jane’s drug pusher friends sampling the merchandise, Jade and Rose trying not to laugh, and Dirk and Roxy failing at that same goal, skipping all of them for the bar to buy two bottles of beer.

Kanaya notices you almost as soon as you turn around. You raise a bottle in greeting, and she raises an eyebrow as you head straight for her. “This is generous of you,” she says as you set down one bottle on the table in front of her. She just barely smiles at you before she sips at her drink. You’ve never seen someone so classy drink such cheap beer before you met her.

You take the seat next to her rather than across. “Please, it’s the least I could do,” you say. With another glance at the stage, you start on your own beer. It’s kind of gross, but who drinks beer for the taste? Watching these guys would probably be easier if you’re drunk anyway.

“Oh? What was it you wanted out of me, then?” There it is, that mocking tone that leaves you wondering if she likes you at all. Maybe you should be leaving Kanaya alone, but she makes you want to stay.

“Only your company,” you answer with the littlest smile you can imagine. “And possibly a chance to gloat about the show, but I’m not fussy.”

She blows some air out of her nose, but you think you can take it as a laugh. “You’ll have an entire year to gloat after you win.” It takes you a second to process what she just said. You cock your head to the side, but Kanaya continues before you can ask. “You guys are good and getting better every year. It’s tough to keep up with you.”

The compliment leaves you smiling and, surprisingly, blushing. To hide it you look away, back to the stage where the boys are starting some Linkin Park cover. You try to tune them out as much as you can. “I mean, I don’t want to count my spiders before they hatch, but we rocked it.”

“That’s not the phrase, and you did.” You glare at her, and she stares right back at you as she sips her drink again. “Before long you’ll be living the rock and roll lifestyle. Cocaine for breakfast at six in the evening, play your show, fuck your groupies, then crash in your mansion at nine in the morning.”

Your eyebrows raise higher and higher as she speaks. “Maybe that’s not how I want to do it,” you suggest. “Maybe I’ll leave the cocaine to Meenah to bake into cupcakes. Maybe instead of fooling around with groupies, I want to be all aloof and mysterious and possibly taken.”

Kanaya cocks her head to the side. “Taken? For some reason I thought you’d be the suave type to approach a lady with a drink to initiate a conversation and see where it goes.”

You open your mouth to point out that you’re bisexual before you realize that’s not the point here.  The point is that what she said matches up pretty much exactly with what you’re doing at the moment. “Is that what this looks like?” you ask. Then you realize two things. “You don’t seem too opposed to it,” you point out. What you neglect to mention is that you don’t think you are either.

She blinks a few times. “Now you’re getting it.” She turns back to her drink again. At least now you have an answer to your question from earlier – Kanaya definitely likes you. She has for a while, if you’re guessing her implication correctly.

Maybe you should spend more than a few seconds deliberating, but…well you’ve got a gut feeling. You happen to be one of those lucky people whose gut feelings are never wrong. Besides, a date isn’t a relationship, and you could certainly do a lot worse than Kanaya. (You have before. Multiple times.) “Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m not about one night stands. I’m more of a proper date kind of person.” You pause to sip at your beer. “Are you free tomorrow?”

“I am. How about I pick you up at seven?” Now you blink. You kind of thought that, as the one bringing up the possibility of a date, you would be the one to plan the evening and pick her up. But it’s not like this conversation was following any of your expectations anyway, so fuck it.