45 - Glamour//Lea

-WELCOME_LEA-

Was there anything in this world she couldn't have? Lea Allis highly doubted it.

At sixteen years old, she was already a hit songwriter for every popular group in the whole world. By night, she stormed the world as her alternate ego LIV-YA, a producer slash DJ that had played every cool nightclub known to man.

If she hadn't played there, that place wasn't cool.

It wasn't hype, just fact.

By day, Lea went to Gnáth International College for the Musically Gifted. She was the top student in her class and a day rarely went by without her getting a perfect grade. Today, she was in pursuit of a very special grade. It was her year-end assessment and she had to do well to graduate early.

At only sixteen years old, she would be the school's youngest graduate ever.

She would be working on this project with her best friends Paxton Phipps and Nora Guerra. Paxton was a skilled EDM DJ and Nora was the best classical violinist in the whole world. They would be helping her create a song that blended their two distinct genres into the perfect song.

//Paxton and... Nora?//

"Lea!" Paxton said. He rushed into the school's state of the art studio, cradling his unorganized musical scores in his arms like he always did. "I am so excited to be working on this project."

"Me too!" Nora said, stepping in beside him with her concert violin. "I'm so excited that I can't wait any more. We need to get you working!"

"Working?" Lea said. "I thought this was our first trial session? Aren't we going to throw some ideas around?"

"You always say that, Lea," Paxton said, pushing his nerdy thick-rimmed glasses up with a smile. "But by the time we're done, the song is always perfect on the first day."

"You're like, magic," Nora said, fun and bubbly as always. "And as soon as we're done today, we get to go see your brother in his latest musical role."

"Waco?" Lea asked, as if trying out the word.

//Isn't something wrong with Waco?//

"Waco is fine, silly!" Paxton said.

"We're meeting your mom and dad to see Tedderson Revisited, right?" Nora said with a laugh.

"My mom and dad?" Lea asked.

"Obviously," Paxton said. "I heard the new Tedderson gets rid of that sad ending. I'm glad, because I don't think I could deal with Waco having a bad ending."

"True," Nora said.

"A bad ending?" Lea said, recalling the final lines from the play.

"Mr. Tedderson doesn't li-" she began to say when Paxton interrupted her.

"Enough talk!" Paxton said. "Let's play!"

Lea sat in front of the production console as Nora walked into the recording booth. Though they hadn't talked about anything and she hadn't prepared, she knew exactly what they were about to play.

It was a melody that was very familiar to her. As she started to record, Paxton started to mess about with his laptop. He and Nora's respective instruments played in sync. The music began to swell, coming together to create a catchy melody.

//This would sound better if we'd gotten somebody on piano.//

"You know what this could use? A piano track," Nora said. "I recorded one one a few weeks ago. I never ended up using it, but I think it would work here."

"It should be on our shared cloud-drive Paxton, just cue it up."

Paxton clicked at a few keys on his computer and a piano track joined the harmony. Nora was right; it created a perfect harmony with Paxton and Nora's instruments.

But what's that noise in the background?... Electronica?

"Oh my gosh," Paxton said. "I accidentally added my experimental new wave track."

"Just gotta strip it out and... there we go."

Finally, it all sounded just like she'd imagined it.

"This sounds amazing!" Lea said. Her friends both nodded, excitedly messing about with their instruments.

"Vocals can come in now, right?" Paxton asked.

"Yeah," Lea agreed. She didn't notice the person doing vocals on the track coming in, but they were already in the booth with Nora. For some reason, Lea didn't know their name, and she didn't care to learn it.

All she cared about was how well they would do with the material they'd been given.

"Go on vocals," Lea instructed.

"Can we create a paradox

Sitting pretty in an empty world

Even though I'm just a simple girl

I'm more than capable"

Lea smiled; this was it. The perfect song to secure her graduation. After she'd graduated, she would go and see her brother in his big show with her parents. They were flying in from Tsiblisi in a few hours.

//My... parents?//

"Fight against it all you think you can

But it's all according to my plan

Machinations built by simple hands

Beyond unstoppable"

The music reached a crescendo, and everything that was wrong with Lea's life seemed to flash before her eyes. Not her real life, but her current life.

The music sounded exactly how she wanted it, and it was her lyrics she heard being sung, but there was something wrong with it all. A strange sound, something against music itself, was droning through her song.

Taking it and making the song it's own.

His own.