14
Downtown Downbeat

Luna placed her hand in front of her face as the light streamed into her eyes. She was seated on a bench, at a place somewhere downtown. Her vision adapted to the bright sunlight to see a triangle cut into the five-story building in front of her. People moved in and out of the door behind a stone column.

The wind shook the leaves and made a rustling noise.

She fixed her eyes on people walking past her. A lot of them are staring at the metal rectangle in their hands. She reached for the earpiece she’s wearing, and the composite shell stopped her finger. A girl was running hastily to the bench. Luna rose to attention.

The girl reached her and grabbed at her shoulders.

“Luna, Luna, I’m sorry.” The girl was a mix of panting and profuse sweating in a worn-out red check.

“Kayla? Wh-wh-what happened? Oh my, you okay?” The butler scanned the person in front of her and her creased-up red shirt that wrapped around her and the hair that hasn’t been washed by her favorite stylist for the past three days. 

“I don’t have the money! I’m sorry.” Luna was taken aback by the girl who dove headfirst onto her shoulder and burying her face on top. “I’m sorry, Luna. Please don’t kill me. I don’t have any cash. I don’t have any money, please, I’m sorry—“

Luna’s stomach churned and her face reacted accordingly.

“Please get up.” She noticed that the girl didn’t budge the first time around. “You didn’t owe me anything.”

“I— I know you must be— angry—“ Her voice broke down in parts when her throat forced out air to stem her crying. “I’ll pay you back—“

“Kayla, Kayla.” Luna held her face and pursed her own lips. “You owe me nothing. Your dad hired me, remember?”

The girl’s face contorted further and her face reddened further amid worse crying.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Kayla. I’m sorry.” Luna held her. She twisted the girl’s left arm to check. An empty wrist. Luna’s sight froze. “You didn’t owe me anything.”

“I have to pay you back—“

The plane. The plane. It must be the plane.

“The debt’s gone. No more. You no longer owe me, okay?” Luna handed the scrap piece of tissue she kept in her pocket over.

That response seems to have satiated her crying. She reduced to small sobbing noises and embraced her silently. Luna stared into the tree in the distance in disbelief.

Then her head was against a pillow. Luna looked to her left, and Kayla was sat on the mattress, watching whatever the metal cube decided to project. The butler peered at the left arm that propped her roommate up. A watch and a film. Kayla turned to look at her, mildly bemused by the sight of Luna with her hair wet and her face in shock.

“What now?”

Luna shook her head and stared at a wall.

“Bad dream.”

“Well, you passed out, and then you woke up like this.” Kayla looked at her like she was a dying animal.

“Nothing. Just a dream.” Luna reached into her pocket to retrieve the cube, now glowing red, and deposited it into the covers. “I swear.”

Kayla noticed something on her friend’s shoulder. She was about to say something when Luna sat up.

“I’m sorry, I’m going to need some time.”

“You’re dismissed.” The rich girl turned to the show again.

The yellow door opened slowly. Luna found Kevin sitting on the couch, with a small box in front of him, his fingers tapping on its surface and him focusing his attention to the audio coming out of his headset. He tapped the corner to pause the pad once he noticed that someone has arrived.

“Can’t sleep?” 

Luna nodded and noticed the chicken strips next to his box with toothpicks stabbing some of the pieces.

“I have this terrible habit of looking for something to gnaw on during the middle of the night. Sorry.” Kevin tuned his pad by holding down his right middle finger on the bottom-right corner of the device. A rainbow cycled around the perimeter until it locked itself and killed the rainbow.

“Perfectly okay.” 

“Want one?” Kevin placed the box in front of her. Luna took one and tossed it in her mouth, while he noticed her earpiece still inserted in her ear canal. “You play the launchpad, do you?”

“I did, but I was very terrible at it.” She giggled. “It’s not something I’ve put too many hours on, but it’s passable. I think.”

“Let me show you something.” He scooted along the couch to let her a seat in front of the launchpad. He held his finger on the bottom right. Circles hopped around in a pattern until four of them converged in the center. He double-tapped the top-left. Circles began flashing on the surface, a few in the center pulsated with the vaporware track. “Now I can play a few samples if I like.”

Both of their headsets synced up and he held down on a few spots with circles quickly emerging after. One finger tapped on a spot incessantly, and the melody kept looping.

“Can you show me a few more samples? The scratcher?”

“Yep.”

His two fingers spun around in a circle at the center, and moved counter-clockwise, slowly down as he continued. The melody became distorted before playing in reverse as the secondary track accompanied the main in the background.

“Isn’t that impressive?”

“Well, um, allow me.” Luna held down a few notes and scratch the track herself. The top-right was repeatedly bashed in as her fingers slowly found the correct sample. Six loops turned into a new song all on its own. Kevin saw her humming along to the count of her fingers tapping and scrubbing.

He held a finger onto the side of the device. It glowed red as she continued onto a virtual second verse.