> The Zest of Life
>  by Flutterpriest
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> The First Lunch
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"You're good," the lunch lady cashier says, moving her eyes from you to the student behind you.

You open your mouth to say something, but suddenly are struck by the awkward feeling it might fall on deaf ears. You pick up your tray and move out into the lunch room. The tables stretch on, and on, and on. Each table has a small group of friends, their words fading together into a cacophony of rhythmic sound. A few guys at a table a few feet ahead run their eyes over you apprehensively. 

The spotlight is on you. Action.

Your feet move forward and a light clammy sweat forms on your palms. You find an empty table somewhat near the center of the cafeteria. However, not in the exact center. That table is probably reserved someone.

The tray clacks lightly as you set it down. Pulling one shoulder strap off, you slide off the heavy load of books that are making your back ache. This weird modular schedule is certainly a change from your last high school. There's nearly no time to visit your locker during the day, so it's just easier to keep all the books in your backpack. Reaching into your pocket, you pull out your MP3 Player and cheap wired headphones. You've got a flip phone in your bag, but that's only for emergencies since you can't have a smart phone anymore. That's fine. An old MP3 player has more space.

You pop in your headphones and press play.





A cooling breath of fresh air flows through your veins, hearing the familiar pulse of bass and snare drum. 

You sit down and feel the world around you slowly disappear. Now you feel like you can think. You can focus.

And you can realize how itchy you feel in this stupid uniform.

For the first day in school, this day freakin' sucks. This private school doesn't mess around with syllabus days or class introductions like your last one did. You've already got 4 assignments for tomorrow. But it's not like you really do anything in the evenings anyway. At least it'll fill up your time. You can get used to your new room and use that new desk.

You idly munch down on the turkey sandwich and milk that you grabbed. You scan the room for any sort of sign or indicator of this school's cliques. The nerds were easy enough to find. They're over in the corner with a light over them, shuffling cards. Then surely enough a group of particularly tall and muscular guys sit in almost the opposite end of the lunchroom. Surely the jocks. Next to them, a group of particularly good looking girls. Cheerleaders? 

Yet as you scan the room, more students find their friends and start conversations. Like the group of kids that all seem to be wearing black eye liner, rubber wristbands, and oily dyed black hair. It stands out completely from the fancy look of the school uniforms. You snicker to yourself, remembering when you were a freshman and dyed your hair black. To be fair, the goths had good music.

But dishearteningly, there doesn't seem to be any table that's swapping headphones, your key indicator for finding music fans. Not that you should be surprised. It's hard to find people who not only have a similar love of music that you do, but also have a somewhat eclectic taste. Not that music has to be the main facet of a friendship, it just makes things... easier.

And going goth to fit in didn't really work last time.

You look through your first day playlist and realize how melancholy it somewhat feels. Sure, there's a wide variety of music, but you can't help but feel like all of the songs are talking to you. Talking about things you'd rather not think about.

However, you seem to be in luck. Someone pops your bubble.

A girl with long blonde hair sits down at your table. It seems like she has... green highlights in her hair? That's pretty cool, to be honest. But you know this means you probably sat down at someone's table.

You set down your sandwich and pull out a headphone.

"Sorry, did I sit at the wrong table?"

She looks to you, as if just noticing you there for the first time. She pulls off one of her over-ear headphones that were somewhat hidden by her voluminous hair.

"What?" she asks.

"Oh! Sorry. I was just asking if you needed me to move."

She gives an idle shrug.

"I don't really care, dude. I'm just going to listen to music and eat. The seat was open. Is that cool?"

The music blares from her headphones at an incredibly loud volume. And you try to listen carefully. It's some sort of metal, that's for sure. But it's not that 'Bullet for my Valentine' emo sort of metal you expected. It's almost... thrashy?

"Yeah, sure."

She puts her headphone back on and sits down, her attention going entirely to the sandwich in front of her.

You're kind of surprised how easy of a social interaction that was. You put your headphone back in and move your attention back to your lunch. But you begin to wrap your mind around the the song that you heard. It was definitely some sort of thrash metal. But what? You didn't get a good grasp on the singer's style. Was it old Metallica?

Probably not. They had a pretty signature sound. Could it have been Slayer? The guitar sound checks out. The drums were probably fast enough, but at the same time you aren't sure. Maybe Megadeth? But it didn't sound like anything off of Rust in Peace or Peace Sells. 

Also, is it weird that you're obsessing over this so much? 

You could probably just ask. That wouldn't be too weird, would it? She seems nice enough.

What if she gets the wrong picture though? You're not trying to be weird. Maybe by thinking you're being weird, you're being really weird.

It'll probably bug you if you don't ask.

You look from your food, to the mysterious girl. 

"Hey, uh," you say, waving you hand at her. 

It takes a moment to get her attention, but you register a flicker of annoyance in her eye. She pulls out her smart phone and pauses her music.

"Yeah?" she asks.

You pause for a moment, thinking this might have been a bad idea after all.

"Megadeth or Slayer?"

She blinks, her head tilting ever so slightly.

"What?"

You point to your her phone.

"Megadeth or Slayer? I didn't mean to eavesdrop. But I didn't recognize it, and I listen to a lot of music."

Her face registers the question and she shakes her head.

"Exodus."

"Oh, huh. What song?"

"Dethamphetamine."

"Cool, thanks."

You pull your personal notebook of notes to yourself and scribble down 'Exodus - Dethamphetamine' right underneath 'Public Service Broadcasting - Gargarin', then put your notebook back in your backpack. 

You put your headphone back in and make an effort to continue to stare down into your sandwich and not look up at the person sharing your table with you. Finishing your lunch quickly, you feel a sense of awkwardness, knowing eventually you'd need to do something to not idly look around the room and not lock eyes with the person across the table from you. You can't help but feel like you're being watched at times, as you play a little brick breaker game on your MP3 player.

Soon enough, the bell rings. You pull out one headphone, and your eyes naturally drift to your lunch partner as you put your backpack on. To your surprise, she's already on her way out of the lunch room.

Well, that worked out just fine. Take THAT social anxiety. 

You throw your backpack on your shoulders and get ready to head to your next class.

Which is.... uh.

"Shit."

With an exasperated sigh, you slip your backpack off and search for that stupid schedule.
> The Cancellation Notes
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

You - Anon -- Are a character that has a level of music knowledge that's about 2 levels deeper than the baseline level of music that would be played on a modern rock radio. Usually a bit angsty, but also has some guilty pleasure pop stuff. The strategy would be to find bands that either are popular but only share B-tracks, or, put a bunch of those B-tracks into spotify, and have it autogenerate a playlist, then share the "unheard of singles" that I hear as i write. Being new to Canterlot High, you got that whole "No friends, social anxiety to make friends" thing goin on.

Of course, you just met this Green haired, very pretty looking girl that kinda fits the "Cute Mute" stereotype. Not that she can't talk, she just doesn't really see a point. Kind of a Nihilist. Kind of a Goth. Kind of Preppy. A whole lot of mixed things that don't normally fit together.

So, isn't that an interesting pair? You -- the social outcast that doesn't really know how to fit into anything, but wants to. And the other being included in just about everything, but doesn't necessarily want to. 

It's not even that the two of you share anything in common really. Except a huge love of music. The musical depth you guys share becomes, well a game. So then, chapter after chapter would be like -- a game -- in which they're sharing a song that they had either just heard with each other to see who can "out-music" the other. 

Of course, this "challenge" has a lot of depth at it's core. What music a person is listening to says a lot about a person. Not every single day is gonna be Rockin metal riffs. Some days were gonna be emo music. Some days would be lo-fi hip-hop beats to study to (Literally a study session for them because they find themselves in the same class.)

That's another important aspect here. Your story is only told or shown during the time that music is being discussed or played. Not all the time does it fit the scene. In fact, sometimes the music being shared would be radically different than what the mood of the chapter would be -- giving off themes of denial or repression. 

Which is, what the plot is essentially about. These two souls are repressed in a way that teenagers just do during that time period, so they do stupid things.

Stupid things such as:
Study together.
She takes him to a party to meet friends where it plays a bunch of hip-hop they hate. But then they hang out in the back yard and listen to the same ipod through sharing earbuds.
She teaches him guitar.
He has actually known how to play guitar for years but wanted an excuse to hang out. 
Will they/wont they become a couple.
they decide not to be a couple ( Come on guys, leave them waiting)
School Dance - she has another guy that her girlfriends (shadowbolts) set her up with and its generally a terrible time, he pays the DJ to play a song that they dance to. 
At this point, the dude clocks (You) in the face and you wake up the next morning.
She puts a coldpack on their face and they do the kissu.
Yeah at this point they get together.
So they do all the music cute things like sharing mixtapes with each other. She's revealed to have a deep, dark side that absolutely adores bubblegum pop. Cause characters have to have flaws. Its fine. He likes dubstep. 

And now this is about where the story began to breakdown in my mind2 - (see authors note.)

So, at this point, you and Lemon are together, and things are generally hunky dory - except her friends are doing the peer-pressurey dumpy thing. "Hes gross" sorta stuff. this is where i could leverage sour sweet but meh. Cancelled - fuckos.

The real key here is that you suggest to her that maybe her friends are holding her back from being happy and embracing who she really is. And this then becomes the theme of self-discovery. Because discovering music and discovering yourself are wholly different concepts.

She feels better after quitting the teams and so you and her hang out more. And then One day -- do the fug. Yes. It's very hot and very sexy. And they joke for hours about what song they're gonna bone to. Like. The discussion on what song to have sex to is longer than the actual sex-- which probably would have been a separate story. Reason being (other than to keep a teen rating here) -- You were keeping the song talk going because nervousness about being a virgin -- this is highschool here. She is too - and so the two of you decide to do it -without music- which is why it would have been off screen.

Then at this point, this is when the "High" of the relationship begins to wear off. Not that they don't love each other - but the two of them found their routine. Lunches. Outings. Study sessions. More than Studying ;) And thats when they begin to have this conflict about knowing each other's music tastes better than they know themselves.

So at this point, this would build to a chapter when they put together playlists of songs that they know the other person hadn't heard before but would love. Which is the other side of the coin from the very beginning of the story. They were originally trying to out music the other -- but now through knowing their tastes, they can easily find eclectic things that are outside of their knowledge. With that comes not only a degree of "love and cozyness" but also a set of emptiness. Is there anything about each other they don't know?

Well, she's pregnant now. Thats one thing.

Both are in deep fear. She was planning on going to college. He was planning on going to college. 

And now it's time for the song that inspired the story





They agree to terminate. They handle it in a chapter I'd have to deeply research. They keep everything a secret. Only the two of them know.

The secret weighs down on them incredibly hard. At this point the chapters become strained. They worry the fire is gone. She feels isolated because she left her girlfriends. She only really had them before. And you suggested she leave them. 

This whole scene turns on its head as you're the boyfriend that had her ditch her friends and have an abortion. It doesn't look good from the outside. And even though the reader had been there for tens of thousands of words, you know it wasn't really like that. the situation was way more complicated than that. 

But that doesn't stop how YOUR character gets socially assassinated. Lemon isn't perpetuating it, its the cheerleader friends. Which, it's a high school. of course its gonna get all mixed up. (And this was the authorial goal. To write a second person story where you do everything that makes sense, and seems right, but then when summarized briefly, or taken out of context -- you look like a manipulative asshole. Given that YOU are the MC of the story, i was interested how an audience would handle that. My goal would be depression but let's keep going.)

So at this point, she's broken down. You're broken down. You apply for colleges for music and theres a big angsty phase where some chapters are just listening to the sad-emo-Bullet For My Valentine stuff, or just MC being sad listening to the music she likes.

She arrives one day (school/home whatever) and gives him a song of original music that the author of the story has composed and asked a VA to sing to try and explain how's she's feeling. In short - hurt but still loves him. She feels bad it's only one verse. He asks if he can write the second verse with her. She'd like that.

So, they applied for colleges before they got back together -- they're taking things slow. And the college forms came back. They applied for the same schools. She got into (Basically Equestrian Berklee) her top choice -- which was also your top choice -- but you didn't get it. So you got your backup. 

Then it feels like theres a self-imposed timer put on them, just as they were beginning to mend things.

There's a lot of back and forth, but ultimately he builds up to take the entrance exam for the #1 school again, or looks into how hard it is to transfer in once he's started at the backup. She says she'd just go to the backup, but he knows how much it meant to her to go to that #1 school. She shouldn't drop out.

This is where The comments would probably be a big factor in deciding where the story goes. The more "realistic" ending is that they'd try doing long distance for awhile -- using music as a way to keep in touch. Recording songs together and sharing what they learn. He transfers in - she found a band and is really embraced in who she is, but he still keeps jumping around -- just like from the beginning of the story. she already has a life built. and there's just not enough room for you. Sad End. Breakup but still friends.

But, i feel like there would be an absolute fucking riot if I wrote that, so instead she promises to go to the #1 school, but it cuts to the first day at the #2 school and he's sitting alone eating lunch, and she leans in his ear asking if he's listening to Slayer or Megadeth. Surprise! Happy end. Good couple stays together forever even after incredible hardship.

Hope this is better than just a straight up cancel with no notes.