Crashing Into Blue

Chapter 1

Every summer seems to start off in the same way: with a crash of the cymbals announcing its arrival. During the school year, it's more of a constant lull in the night that drags me to sleep, my own white noise machine, and not so much a heart attack inducing wakeup. With a resonating loud clang, I jolt upright in my bed, limbs flailing with an involuntary gasp escaping my throat. With my hand against my chest, I fall back onto my pillow, my hair fanning out around my head and my heartbeat matching the steady beat that I can hear coming from downstairs. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. With the lingering traces of sleep being chased away from the edges of my mind with every hit of the kick drum, I throw the covers off myself and clumsily roll out of bed. My feet hit the floor, and the chill that races up from the soles of my feet along my spine eliminates any thought of returning to bed from my mind.

As I make my way downstairs, I straighten out my oversized t-shirt and smooth down my sleeping shorts; they're a matching pair with shooting stars on them. I grab the ponytail off my wrist, which I forgot to take off last night and has now left me with a deep, continuous red mark encircling my arm. I throw my long blonde hair into a messy bun that immediately flops to the side of my head. I feel it bob with every step I take.

When I get to the first floor landing and turn the corner into the music room, a path I could easily travel blindfolded, I see my identical twin sister Indigo behind her black and white drum kit. Her eyes are closed, completely engulfed by the moment she's in. Bouncing up and down on her stool, still in pajamas herself (which are similar to my matching set, but with cats on them), her drumsticks are moving in a way that I could never master. No matter how many times I sat in that exact same spot, with Indigo behind me moving my hands to the beat, the moment she let go I would lose the count. I guess I'm just made for my electric blue guitar, which I can see in its stand in the corner of the room, right beside my caramel brown acoustic guitar, where my fingers can strum along the strings and run up and down the fret board.

I wait for my sister to finish her drum solo; one lesson that our mom has engrained into us is to never disrespect the artist and their mode of expression. I'm sure she only told us that as kids, all steely eyed and serious, just to make sure that we wouldn't bug her when she would spend all afternoon painting, which left Indigo and myself to our own devices. But it worked; we never interrupted her, not even when I sprained my ankle on the back steps, or when Indigo scraped her arm falling off the front porch swing (we were clumsy kids, and now we're clumsy teenagers).

Soon enough, Indigo hits the final note and holds her sticks up in the air, her chest rising and falling, breathing hard and deeply. I slow clap, and she opens her eyes. We both have the same dark brown eyes, where the iris almost seems infinite with the pupil. I've never gotten used to seeing them in a landscape that is both foreign and familiar all at once. She sheepishly smiles at me.

"Too loud?"

I shrug my shoulders, and lean against the doorframe.

"Just a tiny bit. You know that it's eight in the morning, right? On the first day of summer?"

She gives me a drumroll and slams the cymbal for the hell of it. I cringe, feeling the sound waves grate on my nerves. She points at me with her drumstick. I slowly rub my temples.

"And that, my dear Delia, is exactly why I'm down here this early. No need to prep for school, no last minute cramming for the chemistry quiz before we hit the pavement. Time to focus on the true purpose." She frowns at me, lowering her drumstick. "You should know that; our twinstincts must be failing us this morning."

"Maybe they would be intact if I got to sleep uninterrupted."

She performs an eye roll that should shatter her skull.

"Don't blame me for your tired state Lia, I know you were out with Samson last night until goodness knows when, doing goodness knows what."

I mimic her eye roll from moments before. Her blonde pixie cut may make her look like a sprite, but she's entirely goblin, always creating trouble and mischief. I cross my arms defensively over my chest.

"Come on Indi, Samson and I have had our end of year ritual for as long as I can remember; we went out, got some ice cream, and then ate it at the beach. Don't make it out to be more than it is, because it's nothing."

Indigo shrugs her shoulders, mirroring my own earlier movement.

"I don't know Lia, I think Samson is finally starting to come face to face with some very specific feelings for you."

She winks at me and starts up the beat before I can argue her point, as if she was never interrupted in the first place.