Playing with Heartstrings

BEEP – BEEP – BE-

Your hand slaps down onto the clock just before it finishes its third beep, somehow making a feeling of accomplishment wash over you. You slowly drag your thin blanket off of yourself as you sit up in bed, staring into the darkness of your room for a while before turning to look at the time. The LED lights on your nightstand read 5:12, your most dreaded time of day – mainly because it’s too early, but also because you’ve been waking up at that time for at least a week now. By half past seven you need to be at your first class of the morning, meaning that your cruel clock was set at least two hours before it needed to ring. Further evidence gives you a clear culprit in the form of a simple note on your snooze button.

Rise and shine, Benjamin. Hope you liked the wake-up call.

Sincerely, Cole.

Ah the college days; usually one of the hardest parts of a person’s life. It could be because of the ruthless classes or early mornings, but most of the time it was also because of your roommates. In this case it was the latter, and non-plural at that. Cole Gaterson is his name, and he’s pretty much one of the sickest people you know. He’s currently going to a dental doctoring school just a few blocks down the road and just to shove it in your face that he’s probably going to end up with a better life than you he’s always enforcing toothpaste, floss, and other cleaning utilities onto you whenever he can. Besides this he’s quite a prankster, as demonstrated by the clock. You appreciate him as a good friend, but sometimes he can really get on your nerves.

Despite the early time you decide to get up and maybe go down to the café for breakfast, a luxury that you’re usually too late for classes to have. You slip into a dark beige hoodie and light blue jeans before heading towards the door, stopping at the mirror in the hall to fix up your hair. One of Cole’s pranks involved giving you big purple streaks, but you’re too lazy to wash them out yet. Besides, they don’t actually look half-bad.

As you leave you hope to yourself that Cole enjoys the little packing tape present you put in his doorway. Hopefully he’ll have a nice trip.

You step out into the dark autumn streets you feel the refreshing air blow in your face. It chills you to the bone so you put up your hood and start walking down to Sugarcubes, the only café open at this time of day. As you walk the streets are quiet; a few joggers run past you and some lonely cars drive down the road, but other than that you seem to be alone. You pop in some ear buds and flick on your MP3 player, but can’t seem to choose what song you want to listen to. You scroll past a certain song that grabs your attention, but after contemplating it you decide that you’re not really in the mood. It was by a new indie punk band called the Pony Boys, even though all six of the band members are female. Time goes on and you just can’t seem to choose a song, so you give up and keep the ear buds in.

Within a couple minutes you reach a thin brown building with a familiar neon sign on the front. Sugarcubes is the café’s name and you step into the warm yellow glow coming from inside, finding the place to be nearly deserted. It’s not usually packed; just the odd senior citizen, failing art student, or trashy bachelor, and that was just the way that you like it. On one side of the room is an elderly couple having coffee and in another seat is a man in a dirty brown coat. Behind the counter stands a girl about your age wearing a pink sweater and strangely bright pink hair that curls all around her head. She smiles and welcomes you in, her liveliness at this time of morning surprising.

“Hey there! What’d you like to spruce up your day?” she asks, leaning over the desk as you approach.

You take a seat at the bar in front of the counter. “Just some coffee, thanks. Dark please.”

You recognize her as Pinkie, a member of the said band from earlier. Seeing her around isn’t much of a surprise to anyone, really - she’s the kind of person who wants to make friends with every stranger she sees on the street. No one knows her real name, but rumor has it that she absolutely despises it and that’s why she goes by Pinkie.

The pink-clad employee swings around the kitchen behind the counter and quickly returns with your coffee, her speed and skill impressive. When you look down at the order placed in front of you you notice that you’ve also got a chocolate donut sitting beside your coffee mug.

“You looked like you need a donut. This one’s on the house, a’ight?” she explains with a grin.

You slowly nod and take a sip of your coffee. “Thanks, I guess.”

Your time in the café is relatively quiet. The people who enter the place never stay very long, but you seem to be there forever. Life in schooling is hard for you right now; like most people your age you have no idea what you’re going to do in your life, so you’re just taking some random arithmetic and sciences to open up some good opportunities. You’re not sure if everything’s going to turn out, which results in some pretty cheesy moments when you’re just alone and thinking to yourself. You come from a long line of “candy makers” who all wanted you to take up the tradition, but instead you decided to go to college and learn a real occupation.

Nothing really amazing happens at the café. Pinkie tries to get talking to you with no real luck, and other than that everything’s normal as it usually is. You do however get a text from Cole eventually. It reads…

ben your such a dick now i have 2 go 2 school with a big bruise on my face >:(

You simply smile and put your phone away, satisfied with the results of your little prank. Although your mood is lightened up a bit you’re still feeling tired and stay at the café for quite a while longer.

Your empty stare into your near-empty coffee mug is interrupted when a voice attracts your attention and you look up. Unlike most of the people in Sugarcube who were either old guys out for their morning coffee or unemployed losers wallowing in their failure, this one was a bit more chipper and surprisingly female. You eye a young girl maybe a bit younger than yourself now sitting at the counter with a bright smile on her face conversing with Pinkie, but not about an order – this time the two are conversing about how each other’s days are and are being relatively friendly. From a glance she’s normal, but eventually you can’t help but stare at her and really start to take in her details.

For starters, her hair is green. Not the sickly green color of when you go swimming with blue dye in your hair, but a bright minty green that catches your eye quite exceptionally. She’s wearing an unzipped hoodie that’s the same color as her hair and a white shirt underneath, the outfit completed by dark green short shorts that barely reaches over half of her thighs. It surprises you that she doesn’t wear something warmer for the chilly weather, but what really was the catch of it all is that she has a small yellow harp tattooed on her leg that is just a bit covered by her shorts. Aside from that she’s so skinny that it seems unhealthy, and all in all she’s a bit of a strange sight to behold.

Even stranger is how she just orders five donuts with no drink or anything. All of the donuts are the same glazed flavor and she eats them surprisingly quickly. Within at least a single minute all five of them are gone and she swiftly tosses a few dollars of cash onto the counter and steps out to leave – however, she stops just as she’s about to open the door and turns around. It’s relatively quiet for a moment until you decide to turn to look.

Unfortunately, you catch her just as she opens her mouth as though she was about to begin talking to you. She takes a hasty step backwards and smiles nervously at you, chuckling a bit to herself as she did. You wait in awkward silence for her to say something, but it seems like nothing can come out of her mouth as she struggles to speak. Eventually she does manage to talk, but just briefly.

“Sorry for bothering you, man. I’ll just leave now,” is all she says before rushing out the door.

You turn to Pinkie and she gives you a simple shrug, so you slap some cash onto the counter and begin to exit the café. “Thanks for the donut,” you say as you leave.

The strange encounter with the girl at the café sticks in your mind all day, making it hard to focus on any of your classes. She just looked so different from everyone else around you – the tattoo, the clothing, the hair, everything. And what was she going to say to you before she chickened out? Everything about the meeting bugs you until your walk back home.

You don’t want to go right back to your pad just yet so you take a detour through the local park. It’s relatively peaceful there and no one’s around as you walk, your pace slowed down so you can enjoy the quiet atmosphere. You don’t normally come through here without being in hurry and it’s nice to finally be able to appreciate it all, to get away from the terrors of real life. It’s good to sometimes just be able to escape.

As you walk through the near silent park you start to hear something that’s definitely not of nature drifting through the air. It sounds like music on some form of strings instrument, but you can’t put your finger on just what it is. The very sound of it is quite alluring and puts your mind right at peace, so you start to look for the source of it. Who’s playing that music? What’s that instrument? As you walk down the path you start to hear it getting louder and louder as you get closer and closer.  Soon you can even hear quiet singing, but it’s in a foreign language that you can’t seem to decipher. Eventually you find where the music is coming from and are surprised by who it is.

Sitting on a high branch in a big oak tree is a girl – specifically the same girl who you met at the café, the one who almost talked to you. Her minty green hair is lightly blowing in the wind and she’s still wearing those chilly-looking clothes, but she’s also got some sort of golden harp in her lap that she’s slowly strumming. Turns out she’s the one playing the music, but she’s also the one singing in the other language. Her back is turned to you so she doesn’t see you take a seat at a nearby bench as you listen to her music. It’s a bit unbelievable how calming the combination of the harp’s strings and her melodious voice is to your ears and soon you space out as you listen. For several minutes you sit in silence and listen to her songs, enjoying the escape from reality for the moment.

You’re awoken from your zen state when she ceases her playing and lets out a deep sigh. She takes you by surprise when she starts to talk to you. “Did you like the performance?” she asks without turning around.

You hesitate before answering her sudden question. “Definitely. Your musical talent is amazing.”

“Thanks, I try.” She places her harp into a satchel over her shoulder and elegantly slides down the side of the tree. When she finally turns around to face you she freezes in mid-step, again struggling to get the words out of her mouth. “Y-you’re the guy from Sugarcubes… right?” she asks, her voice shaky.

You simply nod to save her the trouble of having to talk much more, but she still speaks to you. Her voice is adamant and she seems like she’s trying to be brave. “M-My name’s Lyra - Lyra Heartstrings. What’s your name?”

“I’m Benjamin Dropp. Nice to actually meet you,” you stand up from your seat and begin to approach her, but she turns away and grips her satchel tightly for comfort.

It takes her a while to respond, but eventually she does. “I’m sorry Benjamin… you just remind me of someone I once knew, back where I used to live.”

You can’t help but raise an eyebrow and get a bit more curious on the subject. “Who is it? We might be related somehow.”

“You’re not – you’ve got different last names, and you live pretty far away from where they lived.” She seems to be rushing the conversation.

“Are you sure? My family’s pretty big, you know.”

Lyra spins around and almost yells at you. “Yes! I’m sure of it!”

Her sudden burst of anger takes you by surprise and you take a step backwards. What’s wrong with her?

An awkward silence follows her response, then she quickly begins to storm off. “See you later, Benjamin.” Her voice returns to being calm again as she leaves.

You find yourself suddenly calling out to her, even though you didn’t really want to. “Hey Lyra!”

She turns around to look at you. “What is it, Mr. Dropp?”

Unsure of what to say, you decide to go back into the music. “I’d like to hear some more of that harp some time.”

“I come here every day around this time to play. If you want to hear just come back tomorrow; it’d be nice to have an audience anyways,” Lyra explains, her voice piping up a bit with hope. With that she gives you a smug smirk and continues to walk away.

You watch her go down the path in silence, waiting for her to fully disappear from view before departing. For some reason your most recent encounter with her has plastered an unwanted smile on your face. It doesn’t leave until you finally get home, and you have no idea why. Whatever the reason, you feel like this isn’t the last that you’ll see of Ms. Heartstrings and you begin to look forward to tomorrow.