Eyes twinkling, Dee's face flushed with ecstasy. Her grinning mouth slowly opened up.
"Really, Kuya?"
I pulled out a chair and sat back down. "On three conditions."
"I'm listening," she leaned her upper body forward, still with a wide grin.
I began counting with my fingers. "One... You play it my way."
She nodded.
"Two... You'd eventually have to learn to write your own songs."
Combo Jumbo meowed from under the table. He stretched his paws upward and placed them on my knee. He meowed again, eyes too big for his face.
I shook my head. "That's not going to work on me,anymore, Combo. You just had your breakfast."
"And Three?" Dee asked.
I turned my head to face Dee once more. She looked like a little kid about to unwrap her birthday gift.
"Three... please drop the Kuya.
"Deal," she said with a nod.
I smiled. "Okay, now let's go see your band mates."
You could almost hear the crickets chirping with the silence among the five of us sitting in the living room filled with school trophies and , family photos and other sorts of trinkets one would find in a typical Filipino household. Dee and I sat on the middle sofa. Combo Jumbo lies curled on my lap. Kyle, the guitarist with the hair that looked like a skunk's tail and Johnny, the bassist with emo-hair covering half of his face, sat in front of us on the other side of the coffee table. The whirring electric-fan blew a hot draft into the stuffy November air.
We arrived here about half an hour ago and yet, none of them had said a word. They all just kept on eyeing me like I was some kind of freak show.
Dee cleared her throat and then, Kyle spoke up. "What the heck is happening?" He asked while holding up a bag of ice against his swollen cheek.
"Just listen to him, Kylie. He's he're to help," Dee said. Then, she turned to me. "Go on, Lolo. Don't be shy. Just say what's on your mind."
I leaned my upper body forward and rubbed my hands together while clearing my throat. "First thing's first... We need to do something about that band name."
They all blinked their eyes at me.
"Is he being serious right now?" Kyle asked with knotted eyebrows. "Dee?"
Dee turned to face me. "Why? What's wrong with All We Know?"
"Let me guess, All We Know was taken from that Paramore song... right?"
They all nodded their heads.
"Are you a Paramore cover band?"
They shook their heads.
"Then you have to change your band name."
Kyle held up his hand. "Now, just hold on a second."
"I just want to help," I said while spreading out my hand to make an emphasis.
"I'm confused. Last night, you were determined to sue us for playing your songs."
"Well..." I looked at Dee who blinked her eyes at me. I faced Kyle and Johnny once more. "Let's just say, I had a change of heart."
Just then, Erwin, the drummer walked into the living room holding up a tray of glasses and a bottle of Pop Cola. He set them all on the table in the middle along with four sticks of Banana Cue.
"What did I miss?" Erwin asked as he sat down.
"This guy says he wants to help us," Kyle said while nodding his head towards me.
"Oh! That's cool!" Erwin's face lit up as he takes a bite out of a banana cue.
"Alright. Now, where was I? Yeah. You are not a Paramore tribute band. You have to have an identity that's your own and besides, 'All We Know' when abbreviated is AWK. Awk! Awk! Awk! Like a Crow."
The boys laughed, even the apprehensive Kyle.
"It was Dee's ide-ow!" Dee threw a pillow at Johnny's face.
"Careful there, Dude. I still haven't recovered from last night, you know." He grabs a stick of Banana cue.
Dee stifled a laugh and snorted.
"Actually, I was the one who fought them off. Tough guy Johnny here, passed out after vomiting on the shirt of one of the big guys." Kyle lifted the ice pack to reveal his swollen cheek.
"And, yes, Dee was the one who came up with our name," he added.
Dee gave him a death stare. "Dirty traitor!"
"Well, it is true."
"All We Know. My Goodness!" I said while shaking my head and chuckling. "Throw Up Boy or Dashboard Vomit would've been more perfect fit for your band since you've got some barf specialists like Harry Potter here and miss pretty vocalist over there." I pointed at Dee with my lips.
She glared at me. "Can we move on with the plans?"
I stopped snickering and caught my breath. "Right, when you want to break into the scene, you must avoid becoming a copycat of some mainstream foreign band if you guys want to be taken seriously."
"We're not a copycat." Dee said with a frown as she crossed her arms.
"Take a look at yourselves." I spread out my hand towards them. "The way you guys dress, your sound, your... eyeliner." I pointed at Kyle's eyes. "They practically scream 'Wannabe Western emo band'."
"This isn't eyeliner, Kuya."
"Oh. My bad. You've got panda eyes. So I thought..."
"You also have a Panda eye, Lolo. And it looks much worse!" Dee said with a laugh.
"Gee, I wonder how I got this ugly mark?" I widened my eyes at her. The boys started chuckling. Dee's cheeks turned tomato red.
"No one asked you to do that."
I squinted my eyes. "Seriously?"
Shaking my head, I just let it pass and went with our discussion. I had them come up with new names for their band. I listed "Catch My Phlegm" (Edgy but gross), courtesy of Erwin, "Crimson Crayola (Dee's obsession with shades of red was showing), "Send Me to Saturn" (Getting warmer, Kyle) and lastly, "Scarlet Overdrive" (There's some hidden brilliance behind Johnny's bangs.) They all voted for their own picked names. I was the tie-breaker. I chose Scarlet Overdrive. It just sounded so (for lack of a better word), cool! And it flowed nicely on the lips.
"Scarlet Overdrive, Scarlet Overdrive. Yep. I'm sold. I like that the most. Let's go with it."
Dee frowned. "I don't like it."
We all turned our heads to look at her. She smiled and stood up from the sofa.
"I luuurve it!" She said while clapping.
I scoffed. "What a weirdo."
"Right. Now, that's the first off our To-Do-List." I crossed it out from my handy dandy notebook.
"Now, let's get to the good part. The music stuff. Dee and I agreed for me to rearrange your songs the way they were meant to be played."
"Yeah. We're good with that. We'd love that actually. We just straight up play clean on the verses and hit the distortion on the chorus." Kyle was much more agreeable now.
"Well, that's one way to go about it. But there are still a lot of things to consider with an arrangement and I'll discuss them in practice, okay, class?- I mean, Guys."
"Class. What are you, a teacher?" Kyle asked with a laugh.
"As a matter of fact, I am." I crossed my arms.
Dee stifled a laugh, which almost sounded like spitting. "You sure don't look like one, Lolo. And that shiner isn't helping your credibility either."
She pointed at my eye and the three boys guffawed.
My good eye twitched. "Why, you punks."
"Glad to have you teaching us, Sir TJ," Kyle remarked, this time, without the sneer.
He offered a hand and snickered. I shook it with a scowl. "Enough jokes. Now, we discuss our practice schedules. Let's do 6 PM. You guys don't have classes do you?"
"That's fine. The four of us have morning schedules. We're all classmates at Mapua," Johnny said.
"That's cool, then. We'll do that. Now, what's left is the practice studio." I rubbed my chin as Combo Jumbo played with the guitar pick on my necklace. "I'd want to spend at least two hours each practice session to get things right."
"Two hours, everyday? That's going to cost us a ton of money," Dee piped up.
I turned towards her. "I know. But can you let me finish, please?"
"Okay," she said with a whisper.
"I think I know where we could practice for free."
"Huh? Where?" they asked in unison.
"I'll have to arrange it first. I don't know if we'll score this. So don't count on it that much. You boys just stay put and get rested. Miss Vomit Queen and I are going to meet an old friend of mine."
"Stop calling me names, Lolo!"
I ignored her as Combo Jumbo meowed to my ear.
"Remind to buy cat food please. Someone's a little cranky today," I said to Dee.
She grumbled. "That cat is such a piece of work! He'd be more useful if he's inside a Siopao."
Dee started creeping towards my cat with an evil grin and threatening hands closing in like a vise.
I gasped. "Don't listen to her, Combo." I picked up Combo Jumbo and held him up away from the crazy girl's hands. "You monster!" I said to her.
The boys roared with laughter while I let Combo Jumbo sit again on my shoulder.
"By the way, who's this friend of yours?" asked Dee.
"A buddy from high school. He's a great guy but..."
"But what?" she asked.
"He could be a little... insane."