Chapter Twenty-One #2
The room is so quiet as I play, and I feel a charge in the air. As though my words, my voice, and my music are somehow filling the room with all the good things in life.
When I’m done, I slowly raise my eyes to Kylen. He stares at me like he’s never heard anything more mesmerizing and beautiful before in his life.
“Raven,” he says, voice hoarse and full of emotion. He clears his throat. “I think I just fell into heaven.”
I laugh lightly.
“I’m serious. That was beyond amazing. And your voice is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard in my life. It was beyond breathtaking. It was…it was out of this world.”
I lower my eyes as I blush again, a smile tickling my lips. “Thanks.”
“Can you play it again?” He leaps off his chair and grabs his guitar that’s leaning on the wall. He slings it over his shoulder and plops back down in his seat.
As I start to play and sing, he joins me, adding harmony and making it sound ten times better than before.
The last time we played together was a year and a half ago, but it feels like it was just yesterday.
It’s like we’ve been transported to another world, where the only thing that matters is the two of us and our playing.
Maybe heaven, like Kylen claimed. It definitely feels like paradise.
The connection I have to him is so strong, as though he understands me in a way no one else does.
As cliché as it sounds, it really does feel like we’re creating magic.
When we’re done, I hear three gasps. I quickly turn around and find Jasper, Leo, and Beck standing near the open door, their jaws practically sweeping the floor.
“What was that?” Leo asks as he steps further inside. “It sounded amazing.”
“It’s Raven’s song called ‘Better With You,’” Kylen tells them.
“Holy crap!” Beck exclaims. “I don’t think I’ve been so moved before. Feels like I want to cry or something. And I never cry.”
“It’s one of the best songs I’ve ever heard, Rave,” Jasper says, his voice a little choked up. “The guys will tease me for this, but it reflects exactly how I feel about them.”
“Same,” Kylen says. “It’s like her words were taken right out of my heart.”
They nod.
My face is so hot it feels like an inferno. “Thanks. I guess you guys feel about each other the same way I feel about my friends.”
“We’ve got to perform this,” Leo says. “If Raven’s cool with that.”
“The song is yours,” I tell them.
“Really?” Beck asks. “Nice!” He marches over and wraps his arms around me, squishing me and my guitar in the process. “You rock, Raven.”
“Rave, Rave, Rave!” Jasper cheers.
I laugh. “Thanks, guys. I can’t wait to hear you perform it. I know you’ll sound incredible.”
“This calls for a celebration,” Beck says. “Who wants pizza?”
“I’m game,” Kylen says. “And we should invite your friends, too, Raven.”
“Okay, sure. I know the perfect pizzeria we can go to. Have you guys ever heard of Lottie’s Pizza? It’s the best pizza in town.”
“If your taste in pizza is as good as your songwriting, then I need to get there pronto,” Leo says.
“Heck, yeah!” Jasper cheers. “What are we waiting for? Let’s gooooo.”
“Let me text my friends,” I say as I grab my phone. “Hopefully they can make it.”
Sophie and Damian were just about to go out to eat, so they’re very excited to join us.
The rest of my friends and their boyfriends tell me they’d love to go for pizza with Kylen and his friends.
Since we’re a big group, Beck calls Lottie’s to make sure they have a table that can fit all of us. They assure us that they do.
“Now we just have to figure out the carpooling,” Jasper says as we leave the boys’ dorm and wait for my friends outside. Once they arrive and we exchange hellos with each other, we discuss how we’re going to get there.
“We’re eleven people,” Ryder says. “Three cars are enough.”
“We’re going to ride on my bike,” Damian says, sliding his hand into Sophie’s.
“Of course you will,” Carly teases.
“So that leaves nine,” Leo says.
“Dibs on Rave,” Jasper jokes.
I shrug. “We can ride in the same car.”
“My car,” Kylen says. “It’s not as smelly as your cars,” he shoots at his friends before they can object.
“Well, you’re right about that,” Beck mutters.
In the end, we decide to go with three cars, plus the motorcycle. Kylen, Jasper, and I will ride in Kylen’s car while Leo and Beck will ride in Leo’s car. Addie, Caleb, Carly, and Ryder will ride in Caleb’s car.
“Now that was more difficult than my trig homework,” Kylen jokes.
“We good?” Jasper asks. “Now can we go? My stomach is going to eat itself if I don’t feed it soon.”
We separate to our cars, which are parked in various spaces in the student parking lot. Kylen’s car is a navy color, and the interior shows that he takes really good care of it.
“It’s nice in here,” I tell him as I take shotgun. Jasper didn’t even try to fight me for it.
“My grandparents put money aside to buy it for me. They could have given me their old car, but they wanted me to have my own.”
“They really do sound like amazing people.”
“They sure are,” Jasper tells me. “You’ll see for yourself on Sunday. I bet they’ll love Rave, won’t they, Ky?”
He grins at me. “For sure.”
I sink a little in my seat. Why does that make me nervous? I guess because I want them to like me. I’m pretty sure they know what happened between Kylen and me. Did they have ill thoughts of me? Will I have to work hard to prove I’m not a monster?
After I punch in the address to Lottie’s Pizza in Kylen’s GPS, we are on our way.
Kylen turns on some music and he and Jasper sing throughout the entire ride.
Hearing the way they bounce off each other is so awesome.
They totally fit the message I was conveying in my song.
True friends are really hard to come by, and if you’re lucky enough to have them, you should never take them for granted.
“Now a song dedicated to Rave,” Jasper says when we’re five minutes away from the pizzeria. “To show her how awesome she is.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“We don’t have to,” he says. “But I want to.”
Kylen finds a station that just plays instrumental music, and then they compose a song about me right on the spot.
“We know an awesome girl named Rave,” Jasper starts. “She’s so awesome that her songs are what I always crave.”
Kylen lifts his hand off the steering wheel to slap his forehead. “This is why we don’t write our own songs.”
“She wrote us this awesome song,” Jasper continues. “It’s so awesome that…everyone will feel as though they belong.”
Kylen shakes his head with a smile before joining in the song, adding his own ridiculous lyrics. They really let loose and have fun with it. By the time they’re done, I’m laughing so hard that my stomach hurts.
“That was awesome,” I say. Jasper must have used that word at least twenty times.
Kylen chuckles as he parks in the pizzeria’s parking lot. “That was kind of epic. But I don’t think we can repeat that again.”
“Agreed,” Jasper says as we get out of the car. “That can destroy our reputation. We take it to the grave, yeah?”
“Agreed,” Kylen and I say.
We enter the pizzeria and find that Sophie and Damian are already seated at a large table in the back.
I think they pushed two tables together to accommodate us.
After the three of us give in our orders, we join them at the table, just as the rest of the gang arrives.
Once everyone has given their order and settled down at the table, Carly says, “I missed the memo. What exactly are we celebrating?”
“Your awesome friend.” Jasper beams.
“I’m giving the guys one of my songs to perform,” I tell them.
My friends gape at me in total shock. “You’re actually giving them a song you wrote?” Sophie asks.
“I know, right? I guess I don’t feel insecure anymore. I kind of want them to expose it.”
Addie claps. “Oh my gosh, this is awesome news! Definitely worth celebrating. Does that mean they’ll sing ‘I Don’t Need Your Kisses,’ too?”
I quickly shake my head. “No way. Love songs are out of the question.”
“For now,” Leo teases.
“Forever.”
“Bummer.”
“Do you have the lyrics?” Sophie asks. “I want to see them!”
“Darn, I didn’t bring it with me,” Kylen says.
“I took photos with my phone,” I say as I dig it out of my jeans pocket and pass it to them.
All six of them push themselves closer together to read the lyrics. After a bit, Carly raises her eyes to me, and I can see there are tears in them. “Is this about our friendship?”
I nod.
“Oh my gosh, it’s so beautiful. I feel the same way!”
“Me, too,” Sophie says. “It’s breathtaking.”
“Agreed one hundred percent,” Addie says with a warm smile. “I’ve only been best friends with you guys for a few months, but it feels like a lifetime. And we sure as heck will be best friends even when our souls are no longer in our bodies, just as you wrote in the song.”
“We feel the same way about our friendship,” Kylen tells them. “The guys don’t like being mushy, so this conveys exactly how we feel.”
“Yeah, we can relate to it so well,” Jasper says. “Rave is so talented.”
“Raven,” I remind him.
“Tomato, tomahto.”
I roll my eyes with a groan, which has everyone else at the table laughing.
Our food arrives and we waste no time digging in. Kylen and Leo agree that this is one of the best pizzas they’ve ever had, but Jasper and Beck are on the fence. They claim they have a pizzeria back home that makes much more delicious pizza.
“Are you serious?” Kylen says to Beck. “Have you tasted their plain cheese? It has nothing on this.” He gestures to his plain cheese slice.
“But Barry’s crust is much better. You know how much I love the crust.”
And so begins a small argument between the two of them, with Jasper and Leo stepping in here and there to offer their opinion.
It’s really fun and entertaining to watch because this isn’t a real fight, just like some of the arguments my friends and I have.
It’s obvious these guys have a really solid friendship.
“Are we as bad as them when we argue?” Carly asks with a laugh.
“Worse,” Ryder jokes, which has Caleb and Damian chuckling.
Carly playfully slaps his arm. “We’re not that bad.”
“Except when you and Sophie argue if the movie is better than the book,” he reminds her.
“The book is always better than the movie!” Sophie insists.
“Like I said a thousand times, it depends on how it’s done,” Carly says.
“Oh no,” Addie grumbles as she gently slams her face against the wooden table.
Caleb looks around the room. “If we don’t keep it down, they’ll ask us to leave.”
The arguing immediately comes to a halt.
Caleb laughs. “At least we can all agree that we don’t want to get banned from Lottie’s.”
“Definitely not,” Beck says, “even if Lottie’s isn’t as good as Barry’s,” he directs at Kylen and Leo.
As we continue eating our pizza, the eleven of us discuss many topics, ranging from favorite TV shows, movies, books, and music, to what their old school was like.
The boyfriends are interested to know what attending an all-boys school was like, and we girls are curious about the many ways they tried to meet girls.
“It was definitely hard scoring some babes,” Beck says. “That’s why Leo and Jasper suck in the ladies department.”
“Babes?” all of us girls demand.
“And that’s why Beck sucks in the ladies department,” Jasper says.
“Is chicks better?” Beck says.
“No!” we all shout.
He holds up his hands. “Okay, okay. Geez.”
Ryder throws his arm around him. “Maybe I’ll give you some pointers. Girls loved me before that one stole my heart.” He nods to Carly with a loving smile.
“Sure, that would be great. Thanks, man.”
“He’s a lost cause,” Leo tells Ryder.
“Yeah, you should see his room,” Kylen adds.
Beck frowns. “My friends are so mean to me. Soon I’ll take back what I said about Raven’s song.”
We all laugh because we know he’s not serious.
We’re getting along much better than I thought we would. Even though I suspected we would hit it off, there was always a sliver of doubt that we wouldn’t. I don’t know why it’s important that my friends mesh well with Kylen’s. Maybe because I don’t want anything to jeopardize our friendship?
“Just so you know,” Carly tells the guys, “in case you guys ever make a music video and need some dancers, Ryder and I would love to join. You know we’re on the school’s dance team, right?”
“A music video?” Leo perks up. “Now that would be epic!”
“Totally.” Jasper high-fives Carly and Ryder. “When our band hits it off, you’ll be the first dancers we hire.”
“Yay,” Carly says while Ryder does a small victory dance while seated.
My eyes meet Kylen’s and we exchange a smile. I know he’s thinking the same thing I was, that he’s glad our friends are getting along. I don’t know what that means for the future, but I’m glad everything shines brighter than before.