Chronicles of an American Beauty and an American Psycho

Save Rock and Roll

Save Rock and Roll

I only plugged in to save rock and roll. That's what I keep telling myself, but it's getting harder and harder. I guess it all started when I accidentally broke Ryan's guitar.

So I was messing around in the studio, and I asked Ryan if I could borrow his guitar for something. As I recall, I was trying to see if I could juggle a guitar with my eyes closed while jumping up and down on one foot and singing Hallelujah.

Needless to say, this was an epic fail. I think I got through "all you sinners stand" before Ryan's guitar crashed to the floor. "BRENDON!" Ryan shouted. He ran over to his guitar and picked up it up. "You broke it!"

"How?" I asked. "Guitars aren't that breakable."

"Well, this one is," Ryan said. "You're going to PAY FOR THIS!!!"

"I'm sorry, okay?" I said. "I was just messing around." I took a quick look at Spencer, just to make sure that he wasn't filming this, which he wasn't.

"I should never have let you touch my guitar!" Ryan shouted. "Look at this!" He gestured to the guitar, which was on the floor. "It will be so expensive to fix!"

"Then just get a new one," I said. "That thing is ancient anyways."

"NO!" Ryan shouted. "I've had this for years, and I'm not going to replace it!"

I rolled my eyes. Ryan was being too sentimental with his guitar. "It can't be that hard to repair then," I said.

"You don't understand!" Ryan said. "THIS IS MY FAVORITE GUITAR!"

"Still replaceable," I said.

"I HATE YOU!" Ryan shouted. "I LOVE YOU, BUT I HATE YOU!"

"And what are you going to do about that?" I asked.

"I'M LEAVING!" Ryan grabbed his damaged guitar, and stormed out of the room.

"Ryan! Come back!" I shouted, but he was already gone. Oh well. Maybe he would be back tomorrow, hopefully with a new guitar. Then again, maybe I was being too optimistic. Maybe he had left the band for good this time. I tried to text him a few times, but he wouldn't respond.

"So I guess we're back to where we started," Dallon said. "Let's go work on that album."

"Yeah, I guess so," I said. It just was never the same without Ryan. Why couldn't we just stick with one lineup? I loved Panic! At The Disco, but I still had that fear of falling apart. I couldn't lose this, especially over something as petty as one guitar.

The next day, Ryan didn't show up. We had just gotten him back, and now we had lost him again. Isn't it ironic?

Meanwhile, Viola was just getting home from school. "Viola? Did you ever get that quiz back from Mr. Benzedrine?" Patrick asked her.

"Yeah, I have it in my backpack," Viola said. She opened her backpack and started searching through it.

"You really need to clean that," Patrick said.

"It's not that bad," Viola said, still digging through her backpack. "Here it is," she said, handing the quiz to Patrick.

Patrick looked over the quiz. Viola had gotten three questions wrong, which was unusual for her. They all seemed to be simple mistakes too. "Viola? Did you study?"

"No. I never need to study," Viola said.

"But you got three questions wrong on this," Patrick said.