Rodrick Rules! - A Fanfiction

Chapter Five: The Band Rehearsal

I follow Rodrick to the backyard.
"Nice place you got" I say as we pass through the house.
I notice a few family pictures on the walls. Looks like he has two brothers. I shudder at the thought. Anya has an older brother and two younger sisters and is always complaining to me about it. I am so glad to be an only child.

Rodrick unlocks the shed in the backyard, which was turned into a rehearsal space. There's a bunch of posters hung up on the wall opposite to the work table. The ground is carpeted and there's a guitar amp and a half completed drum kit by the corner. The words 'Löded Diper' are painted on the bass drum.

"What do you think, redhead?" Asks Rodrick.
"It's pretty cool. So what do you play?"
"I like to go ape on the drums but I write most of our songs." He says, impressed with himself. "That's why we rehearse here."

"Ah" I walk around a bit "so when are the other guys getting here?"

"I don't know they're always late but we usually meet around 4"

"It's only 2:45" I say, slightly confused.

"Yeah, well I figured we could hang out alone for a little.." he says. He sounds nervous and starts messing with his hair.

"Oh.." I get extremely nervous. Does he mean as friends?? I'm just gonna play it safe and assume he meant as friends.
"So" I continue "What do you like to do for fun?"

"We can listen to some music. Come on, I'll show you my room."

We walk back into the house and my face starts to get hot. Again: does he mean as friends? Do friends hang out in each others' rooms? Well, Anya and I hang out in our rooms. But we're both girls. Is it different for girls? Is it like some unsaid rule for guys to show a girl his room because he likes her? Am I totally overthinking it? I don't want to seem too nervous if he just means it as a friend thing. What if I-

"You.. gonna come in?" He asks, interrupting my rapid thoughts.

Oh shit I didn't realize I've just been standing here awkwardly. How long have we been waiting at his door?

"Um, are you sure your parents won't get mad you're bringing a girl to your room?"

"Don't sweat it, they're not even home. Dad's at work and Mom's picking up my dumb brother and then running errands. Plus we won't even be in there that long."

I let out a sigh. "Okay." I guess he wasn't planning on having me in there for long. Definitely was overthinking it.

We go in. His room is next to the attic so the ceiling is slanted. All the walls are just bare wood not counting the one covered completely with posters and signs. He's got some cool lights hung up and a desk with a bunch of junk on it. He has a lot of CDs and cassettes stacked up, which seems to be the only organized thing he's got in here. There is dirty laundry e v e r y w h e r e.

"This is where I sleep and stuff I guess."

"It's... nice." I say, looking around still.

Suddenly, Rodrick leans in towards me. What! What is he doing! I thought he was being friendly this is totally throwing me off. I don't know what to do so I just freeze up. "Um."

Turns out I was being an idiot. He continues to lean and reach past me over to his desk. He picks up a CD case from the top of the pile. It's mostly unmarked except for the word 'LD demos' written in sharpie.

"Here" he starts to walk back out the bedroom door "I can show you some of the band recordings."

I follow him down the stairs. Damn, that was really stupid of me. I think I'm just giving myself too much credit, he probably doesn't even like me in that way. Maybe I should try and keep myself from getting too friendly with him, I don't wanna make him uncomfortable if he just wants to be buds.

We walk downstairs to the living room, where he puts the CD into the music player by the television.

"You're gonna love this" he says, smiling. He presses play and the first song starts playing. It's very loud and very messy.

"This one's called Pit Stain, my buddy Ben wrote this one" he yells over the loud music. It's alright, but it's kind of all over the place. Whoever's on guitar is using a lot of distortion and it hurts my ears. The lead singer is half singing half yelling.

After the song ends the next one starts playing. This one's got more structure to it and the beat totally goes hard. It's really heavy like the last one, but it sounds a lot better.

"This is one of mine" Rodrick says "it's called Explöded Diper."
I think most of the titles and lyrics are absolutely ridiculous, but it kind of makes the music more fun.

"I like it!" I yell "You can totally mosh to this one!"
Rodrick laughs and starts jumping around and head banging. I laugh at him and join. It sounds kinda lame having a two person concert in the living room but I was having a lot of fun. We wildly flail around to most of the songs. Rodrick explains the meanings behind some of them as we listen and dance. It's really hard to take a song seriously when you're told it was written about someone's dog throwing up on their bed.
I seem to like the songs Rodrick wrote the most. They sound very rock and roll, but he also seems to be heavily influenced by 80s heavy metal.

Once the album ends we stop dancing and laugh super hard. We're both breathing heavy and I'm a little sweaty so that's gross. But I don't care, it was fun.

"Ok it's official, I'm Löded Diper's number one fan" I say.
"Ah I already knew you'd be" he says and chuckles. He leans over and ruffles my damp hair. "Ew you're sweaty" he laughs and wipes his hand on the side of his shirt. "You are too! Maybe even more" I retort.

We don't say anything for awhile and just kind of look at each other while panting.
He looks like he wants to say something, but whatever thought he might've had is interrupted by someone knocking on the door.

"Ah, looks like the gang's here" he walks to the door.

He opens and I'm greeted with two people that very much look like they'd be in a band with Rodrick. One of them is his friend that I see hanging around with Rodrick at school.

"What's up fellas" he gestures to the shorter one with gelled hair, the guy I saw at school. For some reason he's wearing a leather jacket even though it's hot outside. "This is Ben, he's our lead singer and guitarist" Rodrick then gestures to the other one with a mop top and glasses "and that's Chris he's our bassist" Chris waves at me awkwardly. He looks like Michael Cera.

"Who's the chick?" Ben asks. I roll my eyes.
"That's Val. The girl I was telling you ab- I mean, the girl I ran into on Monday, remember?" He says.
He was talking about me? I knew it.

Ben looks at me with amusement, like he knows something I don't.
"Oohhh okay. That explains why you're both so sweaty."

"Shut up dude we were just dancing" I quickly interject.

"Right. Whatever you say, man." He laughs.

I realize how unconvincing my excuse sounded but I brush it off.

"Anyway, why is she here? Löded Diper rehearsal is kind of a boys only 'sitch you know that." Ben says, dead serious. Boys only, what is this, grade school? Chris doesn't seem to say much, I guess it's Ben that does all the talking.

"I thought it'd be cool to have an audience this time, with the gig coming up and stuff."

Ben gives Rodrick a look.

"Come on, dude, she's totally chill, I promise. Look, I already showed her the demo CD and she really liked it." Rodrick says. Wow he seems pretty adamant about having me stay. Don't blame him, I'm cool as hell.

"Alright fine. Anything for the fans." Ben says.

I watch them rehearse their set. They're a lot louder in person.