Abbie clutched her throbbing head as the world beamed in and out. It was one thing to hit passing marchers with your flag during rehearsal, it was definite other thing to nail yourself in the eye with said flag before rehearsal even started.

"Hey, Jessica," a sax player called from across the field with a wide grin that spread across his face like the plague. "Did the sun get in your eyes again or something!?"

"I'm not Jessica!" Abbie snapped, gesturing across the field toward the similarly dressed girl who was threatening to beat the life out of one of the mellophones. "That's Jessica, I'm Abbie."

"Are you sure?"

"No I'm not sure, Ted. Maybe I should call my mom and check first," she hissed and picked her flag up off the ground with a deliberate slowness.

Ted brought his hands up in surrender. "Jesus, all I wanted was some sunscreen. What did I ever do to you, woman? -- don't answer that."

Abbie pulled her lips into a tight smirk as she tapped her pole into her palm. "I could still very easily answer that question."

"Please don't," he laughed it off before glancing down at a watch clasped over his darkly tanned wrist. He gave Abbie a single stern nod, as he dashed down to take his place on the fifty yard line before he was late for warm-up -- although from Abbie's time frame, he was a good several minutes early.

All the same, Abbie took that as her cue to grab her flags and rifle, and follow the rest of the color guard to the elementary school parking lot for the rehearsal's warm up and sectional. On the way off the marching field, her ears caught the distant thunder of the drumline doing what they did best.

Make noise.

On the other other side of the lot, the battery was just beginning to do their warm-up early. A steady sea of eighth notes and triplets flooded the air with echoes and base as the guard girl made her way along the fence with her equipment gathered in her arms.

There was a loud crunch of gravel behind her, followed by some loud cursing and, "I didn't want to be in band anyway."

Abbie turned back on her heel and was greeted a familiar dark face, running as fast as he could while wielding the third bass drum.

"Whoa Tony!" Abbie yelled as he nearly mowed her over for the second time that season. "Watch where you're going!"

"Nah!" He grinned easily from under his grey hoodie and fell into step at her side.

"You're going to be late, man," Abbie warned the battery member.

"I'm already late," Tony replied with a shrug that he somehow made look easy despite the harness over his shoulders. "Besides, the party don't start 'til I walk in."

"Whatever you say, Kesha," she jabbed lightly as they stepped over the cinder blocks into the elementary school parking lot.

"So," Tony hung back nonchalantly with the air that he wasn't looking forward to being chewed for being late -- again. "You and Michael free after practice? Me and Ian are gonna hang at Debbie's."

Debbie's was the neighborhood diner/bar and grill, just around the corner from the high school. There wasn't much to do around the small town of South Hampton, Pennsylvania, (not to be mistaken for South Hampton, New York) so basically everything happened there, from proposals, to business transactions, to court battles -- okay, maybe not court battles, but apple pie versus city of South Hampton became a very serious community matter. Even the mayor and court house staff made a guest appearance.

"Welllll," Abbie drawled as she pondered whether or not she wanted to spend another night eating fatty food, taking jabs from the guys, and once again not doing her homework. This counted as a school related reason not to do her homework, right?

"Of course, if you and Mike have other plans..." Tony seemed to take great pleasure in leaving that idea hanging by itself. To Abbie's dismay, he even had the nerve to mime out kissy faces and loud moaning.

"Nothing happened that night!" The guard girl exclaimed and resisted the urge to shove his bass mallets up places he didn't know he had. She would have seriously considered it too, if it weren't for all the odds that said that fighting a guy with a bass drum never tended to end well. "God, we went to work on our composition after practice and fell asleep in the room, that's it. Get your head out of whatever gutter you found it in."

"No you two were totally wasted that night," grinned the bass player. He wiggled his shoulders around suggestively. "Something had to happen that night. C'mon, you can tell me. No one was wearing a lot of clothes in general."

Abbie shifted her stuff to one arm, then pointed a finger between his eyes with her free hand. "We were not wasted. You were drunker than a wine god at a frat party. "

"Marching band is a frat party," Tony grinned and wooped over the top of his drum. Several people looked in their direction, but by now all of the band and most of the surrounding neighborhood was used to Tony and -- well, they were used to him. This was a lesson to the world for why no one should never introduce the drumline to alcohol, ever.

"How do you even march like that?" She demanded as she set her flags down onto the blacktop and started spinning her rifle nonchalantly while the rest of the guard caught up. "You don't even miss your dots any more than the rest of us."

Tony promptly ignored the question. "What I don't get is how you people march sober and not go insane." He lowered his voice in poor imitation of their director. "Again. One more time. This will be over soon. Push through it. You can do this. Again -- it's like he's trying to deliver a baby or something."

"You know what, I bet he is," Abbie nodded, then reached over to smack him lightly over the top of the head. "You drunk idiot, are you sober now at least."

His face scrunched in concentration. "I have to think about that......" there was a ten second pause. "I really don't know.....am I?"

"I'm going to miss you when you die," she decided. "Now get going."

He grinned another goofy grin and started walking backwards toward the gathering of battery members. "So, you and Mike coming tonight or what!?" He called when he was already ten paces away.

"Can I bring Lisha!?"

"Can you get her to go out with me!?"

"Not a chance!"

"Then the more the merrier!"

Abbie flicked a thumbs up in his direction. "We're in!"