"You're only sixteen, tryna cross the line-

But your little wings are intertwined.

Well, you're only sixteen, and you're such a tease-

And there's nothing you can do that can really please."

- No Doubt, Sixteen

Interautumnal Interlude III - "Burnout"

“But if Dinah...ever wandered to China...I’d hop on an ocean liner...just to be with Dinah!”

Audrey had just enough time to take a quick breath between her singing and trumpet playing. She tapped her foot along to the rhythm created by Demetrius on the drums behind her and Samuel on his trombone next to her. Isaac’s training partner, Ryan Leekman, stood near her as well, his fingers nimbly plucking away at the strings of his semi-acoustic guitar, each note punctuated with an electric twang.

Audrey’s big band (big in her heart, at least) played to a crowd of a few hundred students in the Academy’s lobby on a slightly raised stage. The normal lights in the lobby were turned off, instead replaced by dim lights strung across the walls that slowly flashed a rainbow of colors over the students. The boys dressed in their Sunday finest while the girls were dresses of various colors, most of them on the darker side.

Isaac cheered alongside the rest of the crowd, his arms raised.

The homecoming dance. Nothing quite like it.

“There’s gotta be something like it,” Reed complained as they walked to school a few days ago.

“Nuh-uh,” Audrey interjected. “The homecoming dance is magical, Reed, magical! It’s the only dance the entire school can go to!”

Isaac continued the offensive. “She’s right. Only Rddhi users can go to the Christmas Dance, and then third-years get Senior Prom, second-years get Junior Prom, and first-years get the Spring Dance. You gotta be someone’s plus-one to go to a different grade’s dance. This is the only one the whole school can go to.”

“So you gotta go!” Audrey concluded.

Reed thought about it for approximately a micro-second before shrugging. “Not my style.”

“But you don’t even know what your style is!” Audrey complained. “You’ve never been to a dance. You should’ve seen how hard me and Isaac both boogied AND woogied at last year’s Spring Dance!”

The three passed under a tree covered in orange and brown leaves, some already falling to the ground. “I’ve seen Isaac’s dance moves before,” Reed said. “They’re alright. But given the choice between a relaxing night at my own place versus a sweaty dance full of sweaty people way too close together...the choice is kind of obvious, isn’t it?”

Audrey kept pleading with her. “But my band’s going to play!”

“I’ve heard you practice enough already.”

Audrey gave her a puppy dog look, full of longing and sadness and hope and friendship.

Reed groaned. “You already show a lack of respect for my personal space, so at least respect my personal decisions.”

Upon hearing that, Audrey sighed and gave up. “Alright. You’ve never been to a dance. I just think it would be good for you to at least try one out.”

“Some day,” Reed lied. “Do some boogieing and or woogieing at the dance for me.”

That was the last they talked about it. Reed didn’t even show up to the pre-dance festivities hosted by Isaac’s friend Dan Turner at Isaac’s apartment (Isaac wasn’t too happy about that). And now, a few hours later, a majority of students were packed into the Academy’s lobby, all of them admittedly sweaty, but they were having fun, and that’s what a high school dance is all about.

Audrey and Samuel blew their last notes, Leekman strummed one last time, and Demetrius gradually slowed his drumming to a stop.

“Thank you Elizabeth Pond!” Audrey yelled into the microphone in front of her. All the students cheered in response, and Audrey even saw Mr. Shokahu and Ms. Mogami clapping with the other teachers from their spots at a long balcony overlooking the lobby.

The band members departed the stage to a roaring applause. Student Council President of Presidents Connie Waters, her smile dazzling and auburn hair done up nicely, took over the microphone. “And that was Audrey Adzinoki and Her Jazz Cats!”

Samuel simmered to himself as they rejoined the crowd. "It's just The Jazz Cats...I knew I shouldn't have let Audrey fill out the form..."

“What a wonderful guest performance!” Connie exclaimed, and the whole crowd seemed to agree. “Thank you, Mr. Stockham, for making these musical performances, not to mention this entire dance, possible!”

Chairman Stockham emerged front and center of the teachers, wearing an equally-dazzling smile as he waved to the students. Whistles and cheers came from the crowd, because to the students, Mr. Stockham was their guy, their principal, the one they would follow. That’s what his radio and television addresses every month – well, every week since the State Police raid – said. The entire unit devoted to his humble life story in their textbooks said the same thing as well.

Not everyone thought to this extreme, but everyone at least had a healthy respect and or fear (sometimes the same thing) of the Chairman. Isaac certainly thought he was a swell guy – and it was pretty nice of him to let Audrey’s band play, after all.

Connie cleared her throat. “Now, back to our regularly scheduled program – the Elizabeth Pond Jazz Players!”

The band that would play for the rest of the evening took over, their rhythm and flow overtaking the entire lobby in an instrumental haze. Isaac recognized Dave the videotape rental store man on trombone and a history teacher named Mr. Johnson playing the drums; according to a poster on the walls, a man named Pavel played the clarinet. Their music flowed better and sounded much more put together than The Jazz Cats, but Audrey’s little band had raw heart to it.

“Isaac!” Audrey explained as the band members mingled back into the dancing crowd, their brief performance over for the night.

Isaac high-fived her, then did his best to hide a frown.

“Gosh, that was a rush!” Audrey exclaimed, already moving to the jazz emanating from the stage.

Isaac wiped a hand on his slacks. Audrey sure played hard alright. Her hair looks like a mop. She should at least wipe her hands before touching mine.

But Isaac's hygienic standards, which had ramped up ever since their sewer mission, were one thing. Much more importantly-

Isaac gave her a thumbs up. “You played great! I heard you practicing for the past few weeks, but I never actually heard you play with others. You looked like one of those Beijing or Berlin musicians they have performing in the short reel before the movie actually starts at the theater!”

“One day, I want to play in Peking and Berlin!” Audrey added. Her steps light, she wrapped her arm around a nearby Lynn and the two with each other for a second before sending each other on their merry way.

Isaac raised a hand. “It’s Bei-”

He let it go as he saw Audrey dance away deeper into the crowd of people, beckoning for Isaac to join her in her quest to make it to the center of the action. Temporarily left alone by himself in the crowd, Isaac briefly wondered what Reed was doing.

He shrugged. She made her decision.

Isaac rubbed his hands and gripped an imaginary shopping cart in front of him (the Shopping Cart dance was big with the Narragansett youth population of the day), then followed Audrey into the fray.

In a village, Nazi-occupied France.

Under the cover of darkness, Pierre slung his stolen MP40 over his shoulder and took a step onto the stone bridge at the village’s outskirts. Before he could take another step, he felt someone tug on his sleeve.

He looked back and saw young Victorine behind him, her eyes downcast. “Please...” she whispered. “Don’t go. What will I do without you?”

Pierre turned around and stood at his full height, a head taller than his childhood friend from the village. “I can’t answer that,” he said gruffly. “Only you can decide.”

Victorine started sobbing. “But I’ll be lost without your voice! I don’t know what to do. Father perished at Dunkerque...please, I need you.”

Pierre firmly removed her hand from his sleeve. “You think you’re the only one to have lost someone precious to them? Why do you think I’m leaving to join La Resistance? Victorine, you must do what everyone else must do in times of tragedy.”

Victorine rubbed her eyes. “And...what is that?”

Pierre gave her one last look. “Learn how to pick themselves up again.”

He ignored her outstretched hand and turned around. She could only watch his broad shoulders from behind as he departed over the bridge.

“Then take me with you!” she called out.

He didn’t look back. “La Resistance has no need for young girls who can’t figure things out for themselves!”

“Then I’ll figure it out!”

The camera zoomed away from Victorine standing on one end of the bridge, unable to will her feet forward, and Pierre approaching the other side. The camera then panned towards the sky as Victorine’s words rang out from below.

“I’ll stand on my own and come find you!”

A classical orchestra kicked into gear, coupled with a uplifting-sounding church choir.

VISIONS DE LYON

An Entreprise de Caen Production

Laying in her bed, Reed yawned as her television played black-and-white depictions of the French countryside over the course of four years, covering Victorine’s life under the Nazi occupation of France until those fateful days in the summer of 1944 when liberation would soon be at hand. Reed had seen this movie almost half a dozen times, yet the beginning never got old.

Reed’s apartment had the same setup as Isaac’s and Audrey, except she switched her bed and her couch so that her bed was across from the television. That way, she could still lay in it while watching television, because laying in bed and watching television was all she ever did while home. Well, she did perform a few other activities related to those two, with evidence of it scattered all over her squalid apartment.

A number of empty soda bottles and beer cans littered the floor below her, dirty laundry roosted and marinated everywhere, clean laundry – as in, Reed rotated them out of dirty back into clean due to lack of relatively recent use – piled up alongside it, interwoven with several empty bottles of vodka and a current half-empty one she held in her hand as it dangled over the side of her bed. Dotting between all the clutter was used tissues – don't ask – and empty Dopamine Rushers and cigarette butts that missed the overflowing ash tray on her coffee table.

Reed laughed to herself as she held a Rusher inside her nostril and a cigarette inside her mouth and inhaled both at the same time. The resulting cloud wafted over the room, a sight Reed enjoyed looking at it. Sure, they weren’t a meadow, but the way the smoke drifted to and from, gliding along in the stale air...Reed could watch it for eternity. That’s all she really wanted to do – lie here and watch smoke drift, no obligations or chores or anything.

Okay, maybe she should clean her apartment. But today was a Friday, no reason to clean on a weekend. Cleaning was a tomorrow job.

Reed scratched her head. Was today actually Friday? Her wall clock broke some time (heh) ago, the hands permanently stuck at 2:12 AM. Since she never bothered to get it fixed, Reed would have to rely on the outside world for her sense of time, but her blinds were always down. She reached up with her hand, but since considering she positioned her bed in the middle of the room, she had no luck in reaching the blinds on the wall perpendicular to her.

Oh well. I’m sure it’s still the weekend, either way. Wait, I had to go to school today. The homecoming dance. That's what going around right now. It's still Friday. Unless it's now technically Saturday morning.

Reed didn’t have a normal sleep schedule – or rather, she didn’t really have one at all. She was always tired, yet she could never fall asleep when she wanted to. Such was life.

Reed dropped her hand back onto her bed, accidentally smashing it into an opened bag of chips. Reed kept laughing as she pushed the broken chips off of her bed onto the floor. She was in one of those rare good moods that could only be found at home.

Whenever Reed was in the outside world, she always bundled up in layers, because she always cold and layers were a good shield. But inside her home, that was the only time she could relax and open up. Gone was her great coat, trench coat, blazer or sweatshirt, depending on if she was going to school or Audrey’s, even the tights and skirt. All she wore was a ratty, formerly-white tank top that had seen better days and an even older pair of shorts. But she was home and safe in that nest she called an apartment and she wouldn’t want it any other way.

Or maybe she did. But having lived that way all her life, she had no idea if she could even live it another way.

Reed readied her bottle for the rapid fire round of one of her favorite drinking games. In the four years of Nazi occupation, Victorine became acquainted with a Nazi soldier, Franz, who regularly patrolled her village. Franz is nice, but he’s the enemy! To associate with him would make Victorine a les collaborateur! And she still carried a flame for Pierre in her heart of hearts, full of dreams!

Every time Franz made a (well-meaning) pass at Victorine in their first scene together, Reed took a swig.

“Mon ami,” Franz greeted Victorine. Drink.

Franz walked Victorine through a colorful garden. “I must admit, your impressionnisme painters rank among the world’s finest. German art is very warlike, but Manet and Monet, they were touched by God.” Drink.

“The cinemas in Paris are still running,” Franz informed her, a happy tone in his voice. “Perhaps mon ami would like to partake in a weekend outing there?” Drink.

Reed knew Victorine would grow into a strong character capable of making her own decisions, but at the moment, she could barely hold her own against Franz. Fortunately, the sudden arrival of Franz’s unteroffizier saved Victorine from making any difficult choice.

“It’s La Resistance,” the unteroffizier complained as the two headed off in a hurry. “They’ve blown a rail line to the southeast of here.”

At the mention of La Resistance, Victorine rushed home, the music swelling as she passed through the streets of her village. The camera cut across time, showing colorful days before the war, the sorrow of defeat, and the gradual loss of freedoms and even basic necessities as the war went on and on.

Drink.

Franz didn’t make a pass – in fact, he wouldn’t reappear for some time – but Reed felt like drinking anyway. Her mind briefly wandered, wondering what she would do after this. She could watch a Japanimation she rented from Dave, she could watch more arthouse cinema, perhaps she could-

Her stomach rumbled.

Reed chuckled and decided that maybe it was time to eat. After briefly thinking on it, she decided it wasn’t worth the effort. She did come a long way, though. She went from exclusively eating convenience store food to actually knowing how to make stuff, all thanks to Audrey.

The problem was finding the willpower to make it. Cooking food took time and effort, so there were days when Reed simply wouldn’t eat. But it was alright, Reed knew she was small and didn’t need a whole lot of food. She then supposed she needed water, but that was all the way over in her sink, which needed to have all the stacks of dishes in it washed, and things circled back to that age old enemy – effort.

Effort. What a drag!

Well, at least she didn’t have to think about that any more. Back to the drawing board! Reed rubbed her chin in thought, ran a hand through her shaggy hair.

Then she looked at the ceiling.

This is better than a school dance, right?

Then she shrugged.

It’s not like I have anyway of knowing.

“I want to go to Paris, Mamam,” Victorine complained as she made dinner with her mother.

“For what? The only thing north of us is death and les collaberaturs.”

Reed spoke Victorine’s line alongside her.

“No, Mamam. I want to go to Paris because I want to be somebody.”