20
Lillian
I’m wide awake.
I wasn’t until I sent the recording to Sasha. Now there’s a lightness that I can’t waste sleeping. I’m jittery with undirected energy.
I record the song again and send the demo to Quinn and Cyprus. Then I reread my messages with Sasha before powering my phone all the way down.
I go downstairs and eat toast with strawberry jam.
Back upstairs and restring my guitar.
Pick up my phone, set it down. I already said goodnight to them.
I take all my guitar pedals off my pedalboard so that I have to rearrange it. The choice to follow this energetic burst is definitely going to come back to bite me at school tomorrow. I start swapping around the mini connector cables then go downstairs again for cereal. I’m trying to visualize the perfect sequence of pedals. I swear, it’s like playing chess. Though unlike chess, there’s the possibility of solving my problems with a bigger board.
I like the thought of looking out over the people at Initialism and seeing Sasha there.
In the morning, the only new messages I have are from Jasper, telling me t.
“Stop galumphing around like a trucker named Duke”
and then a surprisingly adept sketch of what he imagines I’d look like as .
“trucker named Duke.”
We sit next to each other at the kitchen counter, me with my headphones on and him with his earbuds in, sending cursed, ridiculous corners of the internet back and forth.