Standing By

A Home Free/Pentatonix Medley

(Adam)

Apparently, general anesthesia may knock me out, but it does not shut my brain off. It shot into overdrive during the surgery, leaving me with dreams of us and Pentatonix giving another killer performance on New Year's Eve. When I came to, I had melodies and chords dancing through my brain, mashups and medleys toying at my fingers, and harmonies and vocal percussion on my tongue. I. Needed. To. Write. This. Down. I had a music-adled mind and the only cure known to man was writing and composing. Unfortunately, the doctors didn't seem to understand this, keeping me for the night away from every single musical-composing device I had. Not to mention the fact that my hand was out of commission. What could I do one-handed? My left hand at that! I can't play anything with my damn right hand buried under six feet worth of dressings! And it's freaking hard to write music without, well, music! Arrghh! And I couldn't just not write; I had too much in my head to keep it in there. I had to transpose my thoughts into workable music, I had to. My mind was overflowing.

Miserable, almost hearing the lead vocals in my ears, I grasped at Chris as the nurse loaded meant a wheelchair to take me upstairs to a general room.

"Chriiis," I moaned, resting my forehead on his arm. "Helllp meee."

"Adam?" both he and the nurse pushing me upstairs asked concernedly. Tris paused in her step, a frown crossing her brow.

"I have to—ooo!" I bounced up in my wheelchair happily, a great idea for a song shaking around in my head. Yes! Yes! This—it was going to be amazing! If I could get Avi and Tim to.... yes, and Mitch could take the.... oh my God, what if Austin and Kirstie... I let out a strangled cry, afraid to lose a single thought.

"You have to what, honey?" Ericha asked, switching Cerise to her other arm.

"Go to the bathroom?" Dad suggested. "Get something to drink?"

"We'll help you do whatever it is you need," Rob volunteered. "Or do it for you."

"I've got sooo many ideas in my head, I got to write them down," I moaned. Ooo, ooo, what if we did a Pentatonix song and Pentatonix did a Home Free song?

"What?" The nurse dropped her head down to peer at me. She glanced up at Chris and everyone. "What's he talking about?"

"Danged if I know," Dad mumbled, eyeing me as though I was losing it.

"Adam?" Chris asked me concernedly.

I grabbed at Rob frantically, tugging at his arm. "I. Have. Ideas. For New Year's Eve. C'mon, Rob, help me, I gotta write them down!"

"Oh, for songs?" he asked as Chris picked up my right hand.

"Yes," I moaned, wiggling a free finger. "I need.... get our bag, when I get situated somewhere, help me write, please."

"OK, calm down." Chris patted my hand. "We'll help you. Let's just—"

"What does he think he needs?" the nurse asked. "What?"

"He's fine," Rob assured her. "He just wants us to do something for him when he gets situated."

"Oh, OK." The nurse rolled me forward into the elevator. It dinged at us, making me think of fun sounds Kevin and I could put in our songs. Maybe some appropriately placed dings in the songs? Ooo, what songs did Pentatonix have? I was going to have to dig in their library. This was going to be so much fun. Ohhh, lets do a medley of their and our songs and showcase some of our best. Well, for us, that'd be Ring of Fire, God Bless the USA, My Church, Amazing Grace, How Great Thou Art. I wondered how they'd feel about doing country. Or gospel. I knew they mainly did pop. Personally, I like pop; I'm down for pop. I pulled on Rob's arm as we got off the elevator.