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CHAPTER 3, all you wanna do is drag me down
— What is she doing here? — Joey asked as he pointed his drumstick at Phoebe, who was arriving with Corey. She had a guitar case slung over her shoulder.
She didn't say anything, but greeted the others, smiling broadly.
— I'm the new guitarist — Joey looked at his bandmates in disbelief.
— Since when...? — He asked with his body turned towards her but looking at the others. Phoebe laughed.
— Calm down, superball — Shawn said, tapping his shoulder. — She's not the new guitarist — Joey sighed. - Yet.
You can only be messing with me! Joey wanted to scream but didn't, just walked slowly, deeply regretting not asking who that new guitarist they wanted to hire was.
Luckily for everyone, Joey had woken up quite patiently and wasn't in the mood to pick a fight, but on the other hand, Phoebe was determined to make the drummer pay for being an asshole to her; clearly there were more reasons hidden within this "revenge", but she didn't want to admit to herself that those things still affected her.
Phoebe took out of her case a beautiful white Fender Telecaster, adorned with drawings she had made and protected by a layer of varnish. Even though the guitar had some marks from use, it caught the eye, especially from Mick and Jim who came over to see it. Phoebe can't help but feel intimidated to be surrounded by the two biggest members of the band.
— Have you become a guitarist now? — Joey asked acidly, remembering that at the time, she only played drums and piano.
— Go mind your own business, Nathan — she replied.
— Ouch! OOOOUCH! Take that Jordison! — Sid commented as he entered the room, he walked over to Phoebe and gave her a side hug and a kiss on the forehead. — How are you, my dear cousin? — One of the guys choked on the water he was drinking on hearing that.
— Are you cousins?! — Paul asked, genuinely surprised.
— He's the one who introduced me to Corey and Shawn — Phoebe replied, laughing at Paul's face. — We're not really cousins, it's more about my mother and his — Joey pricked up his ears like a dog at the mention of the girl's mother.
— How strange to think that Sid has a family... I thought he was just an Alien — Mick commented, looking at them with arms crossed.
Sid mimed that he was angry and started saying things in an alien language he had made up.
It was suggested that they play a few songs with her accompanying them to see how she fit together and if they could match, the first to be played was Spit It Out, it was apparently all right until Joey stopped playing.
— She's out of rhythm — he replied when asked what it was.
— I'm fucking not — she replied, and she really wasn't, but, to Joey, that was the worst thing he'd ever heard in his life, so whatever shit she played would be out of rhythm for him.
— Let's go again, non-stop this time — Corey said, looking straight at Joey, who just shrugged before starting to bang his sticks to start playing.
Again, everything went well, until the two idiots screwed it up. They started playing normally, until one of the two started to push theirself harder than necessary for a rehearsal and play faster, making the other notice and start speeding up too, as if they were in competition.
These two were so dumb that they didn't even notice that they were playing different instruments.
Corey noticed the change and started singing faster, the others also started to speed up, it was like a snowball, and the song that lasted almost 3 minutes was played in half of that time.
— Okay, what the fuck was that? — Chris asked, pissed off.
— Time saving! — Sid suggested.
— You two, why did you speed up? — Shawn asked.
— I didn't accelerate at all — Phoebe said, trying to save her ass.
— I didn't do anything either — Shawn took a deep breath.
— One more song, no speeding up — Shawn said, looking at the two of them.
Joey wanted to disrupt the rehearsal so they wouldn't call her into the band, while Phoebe took it as a competition, she was really trying hard because she knew Nathan would hate having her in the band; what she didn't remember was that she would have to see him often.
— That was amazing, Phoebe — Jim praised her after a few songs and everyone else agreed, except one, of course.
— It wasn't that impressive — Nathan commented.
— Okay, Joey — Corey clapped his hands and pointed to the exit door, he was fed up with the drummer's nasty comments, in fact they all were. — Out there, quick!
— I'm not fucking going outside.
— No? — Corey asked.
A few moments later Joey was outside after being carried by Mick and Jim. He was pissed because he knew that inside that garage they were agreeing to let Phoebe join the band, and she was doing it just to piss him off. If so, he wasn't going to let it go easily, all that situation from years ago wasn't enough, she had to make it even worse.
He walked impatiently down the sidewalk, wondering what he should do. Sabotage her guitar? It would be very obvious that it had been him, and it had been done before.
— Fuck! — He yelled and threw his drumsticks to the floor, not knowing what he should do to get revenge.
He walked over to pick up his drumsticks and noticed them near a familiar car he knew didn't belong to any of the members, tried to remember who that car was, until the memory of the show the night before last came back, it was Phoebe's car. He remembered Corey getting into it to go home.
It was a beautiful convertible, an old model, but well maintained, the red bodywork looked like it had been freshly washed, as it gleamed. He pulled his Swiss Army knife out of his pocket, having an idea.
After a few minutes and some tests, he felt satisfied with his "job", put his knife in his pocket and walked away from the car, of course, it wasn't much, but it would serve his revenge for now. Everyone in the band left a few moments later, Phoebe had a smug smile on her face.
— Rehearsal is over for today, Superball — Chris announced.
— Already?
— Today was just to see how she did with us — Shawn replied, Joey shrugged, already guessing that the band now had 10 people.
— Um, shall we Sid? — Phoebe asked her "cousin", who just nodded and jumped into the car. — Bye, guys — she said before getting in her car and driving off.
Joey remained planted on the sidewalk, looking at the car with a smile bigger than hers.
