Just Throw In the Towel

Chapter 3

He looked at his bank account and smirked. He wasn’t particularly spending a lot or losing money, but he certainly wasn’t making any. He had applied for a college grant, which he had been receiving benefits from for the past two years, but which was also steadily becoming less helpful solely keeping him funded in college. He sighs, his breath visible in the cold San Francisco afternoon, presses “NO” when the ATM asks for any other transactions, takes his card and places it back into his wallet.

Really, he didn’t need to check how much money he had left. He spent $17 a day, most of it going to the three squares needed for a human being to not starve to death. It wasn’t so bad, what with everything in the San Francisco Bay Area being so exorbitantly (but understandably) expensive. He just needed something to do.

He was waiting for 7 o’clock, so stage band practice could start.

And he had no one to talk to.

He could go back into the dingy practice room to practice more scales on his saxophone. But he had already spent upwards of two hours doing that. They have to be perfect. Maybe I can go back and spend another hour.

He could also try to walk around the campus grounds and “accidentally” bump into girls in class and talk to them (for all the good a creepy move like that would have been). Nah, most of them have probably left by now. And none of them seem as interesting as Hilary, anyway.

Technically he could just stop one of the many people walking around, but they had things to do. Unlike him. That’s just weird. Besides, who would want to talk to some random kid? I should have planned my school schedule better. Good god, I’m just so bored right now. To be fair, he was in California, and most people were friendly enough to say “hi” and talk about the weather for a few minutes. All the more so that he was in a university setting. But that idea burned out its appeal quickly.

From the little alcove on the sidewalk where he checked his balance, he takes his saxophone case resting against the ATM machine, turns around and sees something.

Something breathtaking.

The sky looked like a busy painter’s palette ...if the painter liked mixing a whole lot of things at once. Hues of purple, gray, pink, yellow, orange and a slight hint of blue coalesced into a messy, beautiful, dark pastel. It’s like the seedy neon lights in that 1980’s flop Cocktail with Tom Cruise. Only less shock pink, more yellows, oranges ...and more car exhaust residue. Nonetheless, it was a beautiful mess of colors and he found himself standing still on the sidewalk staring at the sky for a good two minutes.

He squints his eyes slightly, but finds his breath slowing down to the point where inhaling and exhaling takes a solid ten seconds to happen. It felt liberating; the cold, brisk air entering his lungs, the slightly dim, but warm, late afternoon sun giving everything a pinkish tone. His shoulders relaxed, his head c****d slightly and he just stopped thinking.

It was an uncommon moment where he wasn’t criticizing things in his head. Or being sarcastic or neurotic. He felt like he could either fall asleep where he was, or stay staring at the sun as it set.

And he suddenly felt a little sad. He didn’t know why.

He blinks several times quickly and stops daydreaming.

Well that’s all nice and pretty. But I’ve still nothing to do. He began walking towards the practice room. Not much to do out here, anyway.

Once inside the music building, he walks down the hall full of white lockers and enters the lone hallway on the right. Not more than ten feet from the hallway entrance is a short pathway leading to two small rooms. He enters the left room, flips a switch to turn on the white, fluorescent light, and sits down to unpack his alto sax.

6:12 PM. Plenty of time.

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It was now 10:04 PM. The stage band was almost halfway through packing up their instruments, right on schedule.

Harding Jr. had not scolded the players as condescendingly as he did last week; which was a relief. It normally happened when the horn players would play too loud or if certain players couldn’t play the right notes or if they didn’t play when they were supposed to. “See you all at 5PM sharp next week for rehearsals with the guest artist! EXCUSE ME!” Harding Jr. exclaimed. “FIVE PEE EM NEXT WEEK! Don’t be late! We WILL NOT WAIT FOR YOU!”

The guest artist was Melvin Rhyne, a famous (at least, in the jazz world) organ player who accompanied the legendary guitarist Wes Montgomery in the 1960’s. Apparently, he had just arrived from the airport that day, and couldn’t make it to rehearsals that night.

As everyone slowly left the band room, the boy hurriedly packed his saxophone and shot off. He felt ashamed about his rehearsal performance. This was his second year playing in the Big Band stage, and he was still relegated to the second alto seat.

Second.

He had played for two semesters as a second alto player. He didn’t get picked as a feature soloist or anything. In fact, he had played second alto the first time he signed up for stage band. To be fair, the guy who played first alto was always a professional; got paid to show up at gigs and had toured for shows at least once.

But everyone always claps whenever I do a solo. Why can’t I have the first seat? The boy sighed in acceptance as he walked towards his car. He remembered when Brian, the baritone sax player, tried to get Harding Jr’s attention for the boy.

He really thought Brian wanted to stand up for him. Brian had been the fallback baritone sax player for the university band (really, he played the same chair for years) and formed a silent, brotherly bond with the boy. They never spoke at length, but understood how Harding Jr. was like and how much he liked picking favorites.

And he really believed Brian wanted to help him get the first seat.

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Later that evening in his small, rented room, as the boy drifted in and out of sleep, he remembered all the memories he had with Mr. Harding Jr. for the past year. He remembered the times when Harding Jr. used to stop the whole band from playing because the boy was improvising too “hot” on his solos. The times when they would look at each other, trying to figure out whether the current soloist was in the right key. The times when Harding Jr. gave out advice on how to “lay back” and not to play too many notes, man, just lay back.

And as he fell asleep that night, he began to develop a quiet disdain towards Mr. Harding Jr.