-Sophomore-

It’s a long walk from the practice field to the band room, and I have to push the marimba.

Stomping forward at an angle, I feel the large marimba rack lurch into a rabbit hole hidden in the tall grass.

My back is killing me from a long day of band camp. So, instead of lifting the wheel out of the rabbit hole, I slouch over and watch as the rest of the band passes by. The drumline, with their heavy drums hooked onto harnesses in front of them, lean back and waddle forward like pregnant women.

“Still two hours of practice left!” Mr. McDowell’s voice sets me at attention. “Let’s get these instruments inside!” 

A late-August storm is rolling in, cascading in towers just above the treeline. Silent flashbulbs go off between the cloud-ranges, heat-lightning in the dry, summer air.

There’s some urgency to our migration from exposure to shelter, but not enough.

I gather up the will to lift the right-front wheel out of the rabbit hole. Before I can, however, Troy passes by and I drop everything.

The color guard this year is almost as big as the band itself. We’d apparently lost a lot of seniors last year, and the color guard had not only been spared, but had grown big enough to require two section leaders: Sylvia and Troy. Sylvia’s a sophomore like me, and Troy…

So, Troy doesn’t have a boyfriend or anything, and he isn’t officially out, but…

Come on… 

I watch as Troy skips past me arm-in-arm with two color guard girls, looking like Dorothy squeezed between The Cowardly Lion and the heartless Tin Man.

“Let me help you out.”

I straighten up and realize that Ken Nakamura had turned around and ran back to help me. Still holding his trumpet in one hand, he lifts the marimba out of the rabbit hole and starts pulling it by the front bar towards the road.

Thunder and lightning crackle above us, signaling the arrival of a pelting downpour. Most of the band is already inside, the last of them sprinting up the ramp and in through the back entrance. Ken and I make it there last; the rain having soaked through our clothing.