{video shown above is Charge}

Andrea clapped her hands as she sang the few measures of Incantation. "One...two...one, two, three, four."

I ducked down as Jessica twisted to the left. She started early again, I thought.

It had been a two weeks since the last sectionals, and we really needed to practice suicides one more time before the game today. I think it had been 45 minutes since we first started. Granted, we did take a break to practice the other visual of the song, but I think I speak for all of us when I say that I think we were all a little worried about suicides.

"You're still going too slow," Dylan said. Jessica and I were the only ones doing suicides. Everyone else was standing around us, watching. Dylan clapped his hands. "This is the tempo," he said. "Down, up, left, up, down, up, right, up..."

"Yes, but if I go faster, I'm going to hit Jessica in the face," I complained.

"Then hit her!" Dylan said.

Andrea counted us off again. This time, I focused on trying to go faster. No matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't get myself to keep going. I was too scared of hitting her.

I honestly had no idea what to fix. I have this boundary with other people that I'm just physically scared of hurting them, so hitting Jessica really wasn't an option. Besides, as I have said before, if I hit Jessica, I'm going to hit myself. I really wished I could watch myself do suicides so I could see if I was curving or anything. Other times, I just didn't turn far enough with the trombone. This usually occurred when I had been doing suicides for a long time and started to get dizzy or my back started to hurt.

By the time it was 3:30, I felt really frustrated with myself. I was tired, really dizzy, and my back hurt. Not a very good combination. While the rest of the section left to get food before the game, I just put my trombone on a chair, dropped to the floor, and fell asleep until the game.

Personally, I wouldn't really say that I fell asleep. I was just so into my own head that I blocked off everything that was going on around me, and I sort of drifted in and out of reality a few times there. Most of the ideas floating through my head was me complaining about myself again. I hadn't even realized it until much later, but whenever I was sleeping in the band room, it was because I was depressed.

At some point during this period of time, apparently the drums wanted to practice. I really didn't care, I can't sleep when the room is silent. Either way, one of the band kids was trying to tell them to let me sleep. That was shocking. No on ever cared if they were bugging me or not.

Later, I was jolted back into reality when I heard Andrea walk in the door and make a sound when she saw me. I didn't react to it and just buried myself back in my thoughts.

Eventually, I did have to get up, as I heard someone say that we were getting in to our uniforms. My legs had apparently fallen asleep, so I was walking around for about ten minutes trying to get the blood flowing back into them. Andrea was laughing at me the whole time.

Once I had changed into my shorts, I walked down to the dungeon to retrieve my uniform. The coat felt just as heavy as it had last parade. I felt myself starting to sweat just thinking about how hot the game was going to be in that thing.

I can't say that I was at all excited. I am not a big fan of football. That was one thing that lead me closer to want to quit. I was not ready to sit at a football game for a few hours just to play at halftime.

I was so wrong. After that first game, I would give anything to play at the football games.

.

"Band parade rest!" David commanded. Aaron beat the snare twice and the band fell silent.

"Band atten-hut!" We all snapped to attention immediately. David and Kayla walked up and down the lines, checking to see if we were all ready to depart before shouting, "Mark time hut!"

A flush of slight fear rushed through my body as Kayla and David blew the whistle for us to step off. I quickly shook it off and focused on staying in step with the drums.

We marched forward past the math and science buildings toward the bridge that lead to the field. As we passed, Andrea shouted, "One, two, three, four!" At this command, we (the trombones, not the entire band) all dropped our trombones down into parade rest. Four counts later, we all yelled, "Five, six, seven, eight!" and then spun our trombones around whilst yelling the school's name, and tucked the end of the trombone under our arm. This was the alternative position to stand at attention. We used this while we were doing visuals, which was almost 24/7 during parades.

The first cadence to be played was Apollo, in which we would swing our left arm while moving the trombone up and then to the left until the cadence ended. It ended just as we were crossing the bridge, where the drums began to play Thunderbolt. The drum majors led the band across the bridge and then the blacktop painted with numbers that we used to take role in P.E. There was a fence around this area that lead to the gym. We marched through the opening and stopped once we were standing parallel to the gym wall. "Band parade rest!" David commanded. Once we were at rest, he called "At ease," and we were free to stand and talk freely.

I left my trombone with Caiden and ran to catch a quick drink of water before heading out to the field. Andrea wanted us to practice suicides one more time in the uniform before we did the field show. We all got into the line and she counted us off again. Shockingly, I found it much easier to do suicides in the uniform, compared to doing them in my regular clothes. I mean, yes, it was still difficult and hurt my back. However, the way the uniform is designed, I found it much easier to stiffen back to the straight position after going down, left, or right.

David called us back into attention about five minutes later. We stood there for a while, waiting for the cue from the announcers to march in.

We entered the gate surrounding the football field, and we were met with loud cheers from the bleachers. "Play loud!" Andrea shot over her shoulder.

While we were marching to the side of the field, the names of the section leaders as well as the drum majors were announced over the loudspeaker. Just as we had rehearsed before every field show, we took our places on the field for the star spangled banner; we were to create a tunnel for the football players. We began by playing Conquest, which was by far the easiest song for me to play, besides perhaps Everybody Dance Now. It was basically a few low B flats to start, and then whole notes (D) throughout almost the entire song until the end, where we played a few high B flats until the cut-off. This was another example of a song that didn't follow the music, the others being Don't Stop Believing, Happy, the Alma Mater, and Fight Song.

After Conquest, we shifted the tunnel forward a bit, played the Star Spangled Banner (I still have no idea how to play this one, I'm horrible), and then waited for what seemed like an eternity for the football team to come out so we could play the fight song. This happened every single game. It wasn't until homecoming when I realized that we were waiting for the timer on the scoreboard, but that didn't make it easier for me to stand at attention for what felt like 20 minutes.

Eventually, the football team ran out, and we played the fight song. After the cut-off, we immediately began to mark time, and we then quickly marched to our places on the bleachers.

The bleachers reserved for the band was located at the far left. Really, it wasn't at the end, but no one, save a few people, ever sat over there. Every other row was lined with a black cover to keep the uniforms clean. The rows in between were used for standing up when playing, as well as holding instruments and bottles of water when not in use. The trombones sat at the second to last row, just below the tubas. Before we could sit down, we would all stand where we would sit, and then go down the line, saying a number as we sat. For example, Andrea, who (usually) sat at the right end, would shout, "One!" as she sat down. Then the person sitting next to her would shout, "Two!" as they sat down, and the sequence would continue until it reached me, who sat at the left end.

Rachel passed out water bottles, telling us to save them because they had a jug of water for us to refill. I chugged down the water she gave me and put the bottle next to my trombone.

Andrea (she was sitting at the end this game) took off her hat and laid it on top of her trombone. "You can take off the hat," she told us.

I was confused. As I recalled, the drum majors told us to never take off our hats in the stands. I looked around at everyone else, who also had their hats off. "Okay..." I said, undoing the strap under my neck.

Almost immediately after I took off the shako, David yelled, "Why are all of your hats coming off?! Put them back on!"

"Okay then," I muttered to myself, slipping the hat back over my head.

"If you guys play loud," David continued, "then maybe I'll let you take them off." A few of the band members sighed with relief.

"...At the last game," he finished. At this, many of the band members threw up their hands or let out a groan. David grinned and Kayla shook her head at him, returning his smile.

I turned my eyes to the field. David had told us to pay attention to the game, since we would be playing whenever our team scored a touchdown. The bleachers started cheering at some point, so I blandly blurted out, "Yeah, go...!" I leaned towards Jessica. "I have no idea what is going on."

"Smae," she replied. She joined me in my bland cheering.

David was asking around the brass sections to see if anyone could play Charge. "Wait, what's Charge?" I asked.

"You don't know what Charge is?" Andrea asked in disbelief. She picked up the trombone and played it.

"Oh, that's Charge?" I asked. "Yeah, I know that."

We scored our first touchdown, and we all stepped up onto the stands to play the fight song. At the next kick-off, Andrea, Dylan, and a few of the trumpets stood in the aisles and played the last seven notes of Charge after the drums played. The entire song was played in the first position, so it wasn't too hard for me to pick up on the notes. Granted, it was still a bit difficult, but I managed to play it after a few failed attempts.

"This is boring," I said to Jessica.

"Yeah," Jessica agreed. "I'm gonna kill myself."

"No, don't kill yourself," I said. "I'll be lonely."

Now that I think about it, what is with trombones and suicide?

"Then kill yourself," she replied.

I shook back the memories from middle school. "I don't have the guts to do that."

"Then I'll kill you," she said.

"And then die with the guilt of killing me?"

"No."

"Gee thanks. Do me a favor and bury me with the trombone."

"Why? I don't like this thing."

"Then why are you playing it?"

"Because I'm too lazy to try anything else."

Samantha leaned forward and said, "You could be in my section next year and play the baritone. It's pretty much the same thing."

"Sure!" Jessica burst out. "Zoe, play baritone with me next year!"

"Okay!" she said.

"No, don't leave me!" I complained.

"But you have Dylan!" she protested.

The thought of me being alone with Dylan came to mind. It wasn't horrible, but I didn't think he liked me very much. "That's a depressing thought," I complained.

Andrea turned to me. "You'll still see them," she pointed out.

"You can't talk, you're leaving all of us," said Jessica.

"Sorry, I got to go to college," Andrea defended.

"Be a super senior," Jessica spoke. Andrea laughed and shook her head.

With around six minutes left in the second quarter, we all made our way to the side of the field to get ready for the half-time show. As we were lining up, Andrea walked around and bopped the top of our hats, saying, "I believe in you."

Would it surprise you to say that I was less nervous about the field show than I was about the parade? I don't know, I just felt more prepared for the field show, having practiced it a million times, whereas we had only marched around the school playing a couple of times. Going through the show and hearing the music so much really helped a lot with staying in step; I didn't have to think about it at all, it was now just second nature to me. With the parade music, I had to throw in the marching at pretty much last minute, but the field show gave me plenty of time to learn the visuals before I even knew how to play. I mean, yes, I still didn't know the music, but...I actually have no excuse on that part. Most of the time I was playing really softly and switching to random positions.

Yeah. "Playing."

In my defense, I could play Everybody Dance Now.

After waiting for a second eternity on the side of the field in parade rest (I was starting to suspect that the coaches made the plays or the what-chu-ma-call-its shorter and the time-outs longer at this point just to make the band suffer), David finally called us into attention, and the drums began to play for us to march onto the field.

The field show went so fast, it was as if I had blinked my eyes once and it was over. I had completely forgotten what I was doing or who was watching me until we spread out our legs to begin suicides. Literally two seconds before we started, my mind asked, "Wait, are we doing this?" I had no time to think before I bent over. I felt like I was going to fast, and I had completely lost count of which measure we were on. I just prayed that no one got hit in the face when I stopped.

At the end of Incantation, we all got down on one knee like we did for the end of Fly Me To The Moon and then crossed slides with the person next to us, who was Jessica, in my case. Then, exactly as we had done to begin Incantation, we had four counts to stand back up and get into attention. The drums played the short solo that signaled the start of a new song or cadence, and we began to file off the field.

There is one thing I've always feared: leading a line. I haven't the slightest idea why, but ever since I was in preschool, I freak out at the front of the line because I have no idea what I am doing. I still freak out unless there are at least four people in front of me leading the line. Positively, being at the end of the line for suicides meant I only had one person to worry about not whacking in the face. On the other hand, it meant that I had to be the one to lead the line off the field. Why I was freaking out, I don't know - all I had to do was follow the trumpets...and do the visuals for Thunderbolt, which was the cadence that was playing as we were walking off. See, I'm usually in the back of the line for parades, so I can see everyone but Jessica. I usually watched Andrea for the cue to start the visuals, so I felt very awkward and maybe a bit insecure because I had no idea if I was on beat or not.

We formed a spiral at the side of the field, and then put our horns up to play Everybody Dance Now. After the cut-off, David told us that we had done really well, but we could still use some practice for the next game.

Alen stepped in the center of the spiral and yelled, "Our band is what?!"

"Red hot!" we all shouted in return.

"Our band is what?!" he repeated.

"Red hot!" we shouted again.

"Our band is R-E-D with a little bit of H-O-T, our band is R-E-D and a H-O-T, red hot, red hot, red hot!" we finished. We all cheered, and then returned back to the stands for the rest of the game.