It was a lousy party.
Now, Vinyl Scratch wasn't a snob by any means. At least she hoped she wasn't. But parties could be a lot cooler than this one. She'd been to all-night dances where the bass made the ground shake and the strobe lights made everything flash in slow motion. She'd seen people with tattoos and piercings thrashing their heads like there was no tomorrow, where the crowd became one huge mash-up of color and sound. She loved reading the crowd from the DJ stand, always picking the exact song to make everybody go wild. Yeah!
This was not one of those parties. This party had started at noon, and Spin had dragged her out of bed just so she could show up late. He was still trying to find her a boyfriend, and for some reason he thought this was the place to find one.
Earlier:
"Seriously?" she asked him.
"Check it, dude! This is exactly what you need!"
She looked down again at the flyer, hoping this was some sort of joke. She read it out loud, slowly, just to make it clear how lame this sounded. "Ponyville's 31st Annual Hearts and Hooves Singles Mixer. Come by from Noon to 3pm for a lovely time with single ponies. Punch will be served. Come on by! You just might meet the love of your life!"
She looked at him again, her mouth hanging open. "Spin."
"Yes."
"Spin."
"What?"
"SPIN!"
"I'm still here!" he cheerfully replied.
She took her glasses off. "You woke me up for this?"
"I told you about it last week."
"I thought you were joking!" She threw her head back into her pillow. Why had she ever given the guy a spare key?
"Look, I'm not gonna force you."
She mumbled through the pillow. "It sure feels like you're forcing me."
"I'm just saying, dude, you gotta expand your horizons. You gotta meet new people once in awhile."
She tossed the pillow aside. "I meet people all the time, Spin. I meet hundreds of people!"
"But you never talk to them! You're so busy with the DJ stuff that you never really meet anybody."
"You're a DJ too, ya know!"
"Yeah, but I reach out. I try new things once in awhile. That's how I met Petunia."
"Well why don't you go hang with your girlfriend then, and leave me alone?"
He sighed. "Vine. Pal. We've talked about this. And I'm pretty sure that you'd like to have somebody special around."
She closed her eyes and groaned. She hated it when he started making sense.
He smiled. "Pretty please?"
She sighed. "If I go, will you shut up about this stuff for a couple weeks?"
"Deal."
--
So here she was, at the lamest party in the history of lame, counting the minutes till it ended.
She was seated at a table with Spin, her mouth agape. Random people stood around or sat at tables, talking and drinking punch. Geez, couldn't they put on some music at least? It was so damn quiet she could barely hear her own thoughts.
Spin looked at her sympathetically, but Vinyl barely noticed. Behind her purple glasses, her eyes drifted disbelievingly from side to side, trying to comprehend the sheer ridiculousness of her surroundings. It was all so...pink. And.... froofy!. Is "froofy" even a word? Fuck, I can't even think straight. She glanced over at Spin. The guy usually wore ripped jeans and an old battered t-shirt from some classic concert -- the guy collected t-shirts like they were wine bottles -- but today he had traded it all in for a suit. Must've been Petunia's idea, she mused. Speaking of which, where is she?
"VINYL!" came a high-pitched squeal from behind. Oh great. She turned around and forced a smile. "Hey, Petunia"
Petunia was wearing the froofiest dress that Vinyl had ever seen. All pink with lace and...fuck it, Vinyl didn't know the words for it. There's not much point in learning the vocabulary of fashion styles that you never intend to actually see, much less wear. Petunia, for her part, was equally mystified on how to describe Vinyl's outfit, which had not changed at all from the previous night's rave. She took a moment to look her up and down, and said "Oh dear, you uh...Vinyl..."
Her smile grew somewhat distressed. "You, uh...you know you could always borrow a dress form me, if you wanted. I think we're almost the same size."
"It's fine, honey" said Spin, smiling motioning for her to sit down.
"I don't mean to be a busybody" stammered Petunia, "honestly, I don't. I just thought that I might help, you know, if you want to meet boys it helps to impress them-"
Vinyl glanced at her wearily. "Sorry" muttered Petunia. "I'll, uh, I'll go get some punch."
As Petunia got up, Vinyl flopped her head onto the table.
"Hey, she means well" said Spin.
"I know" Vinyl replied with a groan, "I'm not even mad. I just, I don't know..."
"What?"
She sat up. "Usually I'm the life of the party. Now I'm ruining it."
"Hey, don't be so hard on yourself." He put an arm around her shoulder. "Maybe you'll find a guy."
"I never find guys! Not interesting guys, anyway."
"That's why were here, dude."
Vinyl crossed her arms on the table and laid down again. Spin and Petunia weren't even supposed to be here; it was a "Singles Mixer" after all. But it's not like they had a bouncer to keep out happy couples, and Vinyl was begrudgingly glad for their support, even though she was also a bit jealous of them for finding each other. Spin was right about one thing: Vinyl was lonely. Which was freaking weird if you asked her, since she was often surrounded by hundreds of people, dancing like mad. And the thing was, she really loved that stuff! It was so....electric, revving up a crowd like that, getting lost in the music. Her right hand started tapping out a rapid-fire techno beat as she stewed. Raves were awesome. Music was awesome. And yet...and yet...
There always came that point where the last song had been played, and the last cheer had gone out, and the party couldn't last. She would keep smiling then, thanking the fans who gave her a hug or asked for an autograph on the way out, but she knew what was coming. The crowd would just melt away, until she was left with the sound crew and maybe Spin, depending on the night. Then the crew would leave and Spin would go home to Petunia, and that was that. She was always the last one out, the last one to hit the lights and lock the door.
She'd walk home from the rave, then, and maybe she'd put her headphones on and listen to some new beats, but it wasn't the same. After the rush of the crowd, the sense of belonging, she didn't want to be alone. Sometimes she'd wake up in her bed in the middle of the night and discover that she was holding her spare pillow really tight, as if she'd been trying to cuddle someone who wasn't there. Eventually, she found herself skipping past all the love songs in her playlist.
It had taken her a year to tell Spin how she really felt, which was when he started pairing her up. First he recommended some of his friends, and later he started chatting up random dudes on the dance floor and mentioning that she was single.
He sure is persistent, she thought.
The trouble was, it never worked. Some of the guys turned out to be jerks; that was the easy part. Kick those dudes to the curb. But others were...fine? Except they weren't fine. They weren't fine and she couldn't figure out why! She'd met raver dudes and grunge dudes, dancers and musicians, shy guys, confident guys, the occasional normal guy, you name it. She'd met guys who had never kissed a girl and guys with plenty of experience. She'd met guys who liked the same bands as her, who knew some of the obscure bits of music trivia that she lived for, and who were all-around fun and outgoing. Some of those guys had become her friends, even, or at least friendly acquaintances. But the whole time she'd had the nagging feeling that something wasn't right, that something was missing. It was like laying down a new remix and realizing that it just didn't mix right, except there she knew what to do about it! She could play around with music until it was damn near perfect! But with love, she was out of her depth. She'd met dozens of guys, and had dozens of first dates, but she'd never actually had a relationship. And as much as she'd like to imagine that she was fine with that...the truth was, the loneliness was wearing her down.
She looked up again, this time with focus. She swung her head to the left and began scanning the room from one side to the other. Was there someone -- anyone -- who stood out to her? What was she looking for, anyway? She'd found good guys before. She'd found plenty of good guys. But she'd never wanted to hold them in the way she held her pillow at night. Sometimes she felt like she was just broken inside, that she didn't have "the love thing" that she desperately needed. She kept scanning the room, looking for someone she actually wanted to connect with. She was missing something. She was missing something. She was missing something something something what was it?!
And then it happened.
Vinyl's gaze turned to the right, and suddenly she saw a stranger entering the dance hall from the opposite doorway, carrying a double-bass in a case. As Vinyl took in the sight, the graceful posture, the quiet confidence, the enticingly delicate hair, and the eyes that conveyed an inexpressible beauty without even trying, a single, clamoring, maximum-volume here-comes-the-climax thought shot straight through Vinyl's mind:
Oh shit, I'm gay.
