This really came out as a surprise for Octavia. She had no idea Vinyl had an older brother. The cellist expected her to be an only child, given her… style and behavior. Was her brother going to be a similar person?
On the way to the gymnasium, Lyra, who apparently already had seen him once, told her that his name was Volume Bass, that he was 22, and that he… was kinda like Vinyl. This sure would be interesting.
The locker room was unlocked, luckily. This allowed the three girls to change back into proper clothing. Octavia hid in a corner, behind one of the blue steel lockers, still uncomfortable with the idea of revealing herself to other people. As she was putting on her white shirt, she let her pessimistic part take control again: what if her parents learned about what happened today? They would sue the school for sure. Not that they cared about what could happen to her, but rather to their name and reputation. The principals and the nurse had all been very comprehensive about her situation, not calling her father’s number to inform him. All of this thanks to Vinyl and Lyra.
Suddenly she heard a slight sound of something hitting metal. Probably Vinyl urging her to finish getting ready. The ten minutes had already passed a long time ago. She took a look around the corner to confirm, and that’s when she saw them.
Vinyl and Lyra.
Kissing.
}--oO0Oo--{
The blue-haired girl, wearing only her jeans and bras, was holding her friend by the waist, while the latter’s hands were lying on the DJ’s shoulders. Both of them kissing passionately, eyes closed, not noticing Octavia, or anything around them for that matter.
Octavia couldn’t believe her own eyes. What was happening?! Why were the two of them kissing like this? She knew that they had been friends for a while, but she never had seen them like this. Octavia herself had never kissed anyone. Maybe one her mother’s cheek, back when she was young, or maybe Dana… But never like this. Her parents never kissed in front of their daughters or their house staff, but she saw couples in the bus a couple of times… couples… Was that what Vinyl and Lyra were? She had never heard of two women being together… Was it socially acceptable? Did anyone else know about this? If they didn’t display such attachment to one another in public, there probably was a good reason…
It was too much on her mind to process. She was heavily blushing, hidden behind the lockers, as her two friends opened their eyes.
A few seconds later, Octavia heard Lyra’s voice calling for her:
“Come on girl, let’s not make her brother wait longer!”
Octavia finished putting on her bowtie, grabbed her cello case, and awkwardly walked towards the two, trying her best not to blush, nor to look at them in the eyes.
Her pocket vibrated: it was a text from Vinyl.
“You alright? You seem even more shy and embarrassed than usual”
“Oh, I’m quite alright Vinyl, th...thank you. I’m guessing that I’m still a bit tired after this morning.”
“Yeah that’s okay” said Lyra, finishing putting on her shoes “C’mon, let’s move!”
The girls got out of the locker room, walking rapidly towards the exit. On the way towards the main hall, Octavia thought about what just happened. She had just lied to someone else. But this time, it wasn’t her parents. It was Vinyl. Should she confess what she saw? But Vinyl and Lyra most likely didn’t want her to know… She didn’t know much about other people’s feelings, but it would probably hurt them to be exposed like that. Maybe the best thing to do for the time being was to keep this information to herself: the last thing she wanted was to lose the connection she had with her new friends. Still, she couldn’t help to think about Vinyl: was that the reason why she approached her in the first place? Gave her a nickname, called her “cute”? No, she obviously liked Lyra… a lot… and really wanted to be just friend with Octavia… hopefully…
When the girls arrived in the main hall, it was completely empty: it was 2 pm, every student and teacher was already in class. Vinyl stopped in front of the main door, took a deep breath, and slowly, carefully, lifted her right foot in the air, to finally hit the door leaf with all of her strength, smashing it open in a deafening sound.
After recovering from both the surprise and the sudden assault on her eardrums, Octavia proceeded to take a look outside. There was nobody there. Vinyl was standing on the steps, obviously disappointed by the lack of any brotherly face around.
“Epic fail! I saw you coming miles away, sis!”
The three girls looked around in an attempt to find out where the voice was coming from. When Octavia heard the sound of shoes tapping against stone, she looked up, almost by instinct, and surprisingly found the man they were looking for. She notified her friends, and the three of them looked above the glass door.
“Heeeyyyy, took you long enough! Your friend here looks smarter than you! Please don’t also go blind!”
The young man -presumably Vinyl’s brother- was sitting on the door’s pediment, legs crossed, bouncing his head to the music he was listening with only one earbud, the other one dangling around to the rhythm of his song.
“Dude!” Lyra exclaimed “How the fuck did you get up there?!”
“Oh I dunno, I had time to try while you girls were making me wait!” He looked at Vinyl’s angry face, and gave her a large smile: “C’mon sis! You’re not happy to see your big bro?”
The man then swiftly uncrossed his legs, before letting himself fall. Octavia’s heartbeat accelerated, but Vinyl’s brother just casually landed on his feet, looking at the DJ with a proud smirk.
Vinyl’s facial expression quickly went from slightly upset to obviously joyful, and she gave her brother a loving hug, almost to the point of making him fall in the process. She almost looked like a little girl in the arms of her older sibling.
She took out her pen and paper, before being interrupted by a hand of his:
“No need for that bullshit, Vy! I can introduce myself to your friends here! Hello girls, name’s Volume Bass, and I’m the older, more attractive, more irresponsible brother of your favorite mute over there!” He looked in Lyra’s direction: “Hey, I know you! Already seen you around the house back in Manehattan, Vinyl told me that you had moved here too! Sweet!”
He then turned his head in Octavia’s direction, smiling like he was meeting her again after a long time:
“And yooouuuu must be Octavia, right? Vy told me about you! You’re right sis, she’s cute!”
Octavia blushed at the mention of Vinyl’s comments on her: what exactly did she tell her brother? Was there some kind of reputation spreading already about her? Trying not to think about this too extensively, she extended her hand in the man’s direction.
“My name is Octavia Melody. It’s a pleasure to meet you, although I have to admit that Vinyl told me very little about you.”
Much to the cellist’s surprise, instead of shaking her hand, Volume Bass hit her palm with his own, before bumping his fist on her fingers. That was certainly unusual, but she guessed handshakes weren’t common for Vinyl or her brother. Despite that, she had no idea what he just did.
“Oh, so formal girl! Vy told me you were a doll, she wasn’t lying!” He then turned his head towards his little sister: “And you haven’t told her about me! Cool, I’m glad to see that you miss me so much that you can’t help but talk about me aaaall the time! I mean, write!”
Vinyl took a few seconds to sign her brother. Gosh, it was going even faster than with Lyra. They must be used to using sign language together. And now she was the only one here not having a clue about what they were saying…
“...”
“Yeah you’re right! Since you girls have a free afternoon, let’s go grab a drink at... Sugarcube Corner! TrotAdvisor told me it was liiiit!”
“...”
“No, I won’t buy you any alcohol, I don’t think they even sell that there, dork!”
}--oO0Oo--{
When they finally reached the said place, Octavia was happily surprised. She was expecting a crowded, dirty place like the bar in front of her bus stop, but the “Sugarcube Corner” was everything but that.
The exterior was already beautiful: the white walls matching with the pink awnings, decorated with floral shapes, and with the pyramidal lighter pink umbrellas, protecting half-a-dozen wooden tables and chairs. The roof was different shades of brown, mimicking chocolate, with fake nut pieces embedded in the wood.
“This place looks amazing!” Octavia exclaimed.
“It’s ok I guess…” Lyra responded.
“Whoah girl, show some motivation here! Plus, I’m buying!”
“This place is fucking great!” Lyra yelled with a big smile, making Octavia giggle softly.
Vinyl pushed the double doors, entering in the café, and holding it for Octavia and Volume Bass, before letting it go on Lyra’s face.
“Hey, not cool, bitch!”
Vinyl moved her right hand from her temple to her chin, smiling at her friend.
“You’re welcome? Fuck you!”
Ignoring Lyra’s language, Octavia followed Vinyl’s brother, heading for the counter. They were welcomed by a tall, blue-skinned lady, her chubby face topped by an unlikely haircut that looked like the whipped cream Dana put on Octavia’s waffles from time to time. Her eyes looked tired yet happy, and she had a perpetual smile attached to her face.
“Hello young lady, hello young man! What can I get you?”
“Hello ma’am!” smiled Volume “We were hoping to sit at one of your tables to get something to drink!”
“Oh of course! Pick one, there’s not an awful lot of people at this time of the day, I’ll be there in a few minutes to take your orders!”
This all felt weird to Octavia: it was the first time she went somewhere without her parents knowing. But a café visited mostly by students was pretty harmless, and compared to what had happened this morning, she thought more about the positive aspects of the situation, for once.
They both went for a table against a wide glass panel, with Lyra and Vinyl joining them a few seconds later, one arguing while the other one was laughing silently. The lady from the counter came to take their orders soon after. Octavia ordered an orange juice, she had tried to convince Volume Bass to pay for her own drink, but couldn’t get him to change his mind. That was nice of him, so at least she had chosen a cheap order. Lyra and Vinyl obviously didn’t go through the same process though: the DJ ordered a giant mint and chocolate ice cream covered in whipped cream, and the other one choosing a exotic cocktail of some sort. Vinyl’s brother laughed, seeing that his money was being well-spent, and took a cherry soda with an unpronounceable name.
Waiting for the food to arrive gave the cellist a little time to observe her friend’s brother, and one thing she knew is that it was obvious that they were related: Volume Bass was basically a male version of Vinyl: tall, slim, only wearing jeans, white shirt, black leather jacket and sporty shoes. His carmine hair were a mess, much like Vinyl’s, but his eyes were light blue.
The atmosphere around him was strange: it made Octavia feel comfortable and safe, much like Vinyl, but also similar to Bon-Bon.
Vinyl and Volume loved each others, and they weren’t hiding it: always laughing together, picking on each others, and talking in sign language so fast that even Lyra was lost. This felt weird to Octavia: she never had this kind of relationship with her sister, hardly any kind of relationship at all. And here were Vinyl and her brother, acting more like best friends than siblings. Was that like this in every family? Or was Vinyl even more special than she thought?
The three girls kept talking with Volume Bass for about forty minutes, when he suddenly got a call from his cellphone:
“Gotta go girls, I’m meeting my friend Zephyr Breeze downtown in ten minutes, Haven’t seen him in a while as well! I’ll see you tonight Vy!”
The blue-haired girl shook her hands horizontally to ask him what he meant.
Oh, haven’t mom and dad told you? I’m sleeping at your place!” He said as he was paying for the food and grabbing his jacket in a hurry “Bye sis! Nice to meet you Lyra and Octavia, see you tomorrow maybe!”
The door closed behind him, not giving Vinyl enough time to throw the salt shaker in his direction. She looked really upset, and Lyra dying of laughter next to her wasn’t calming her down. Then she looked at Octavia smiling, and a cheery expression came back on her own face.
That quickly changed when someone they didn’t expect pushed the doors of the café, ordered a donut and sat at their table:
“Well, hello girls! How are the three of you? Don’t answer yet, we need to talk about something!”
The three teens were speechless, their jaws dropping at the sight of the man inviting himself at their table.
“I’ve been told that they had been some mischief with one of your teachers… I think I could help…” Discord said, smiling.
“I love mischief.”