Later after getting home that same night, I felt ecstatic about all that was going on in my life. It was impossible to hide my excitement from my parents, though I still managed to keep them out of my business for the time being. I did wait a little after getting home, since I still had lame homework I needed to finish up. But the anticipation of calling her, hearing her name, and hearing her voice allowed me to speed up on the task faster than ever before.

At first, it almost seemed surreal. Me, the quiet and shy one who is the most introverted person I know suddenly has a cute girlfriend from my class, as well as a phone number to prove it. I had to convince myself that this was reality, and that it was really me, not that it took too long. When I was ready, I plugged her number straight into my flip phone and started dialing, holding the warm device up to my ear as my heartbeat once again got carried away. So many thoughts were already flowing through my head that it was hard to think, but the music stuck in my head that I played in the background seemed to keep me calm for the moment.

Inside of her own room, Malica was nearly startled to hear the ringtone going off on her phone. Hoping with all in her heart that it was Reed who was calling her, she picked up the phone, answering the unknown number, unknown since she still did not have his exact phone number saved anywhere. Just answering the phone took a little more effort than it used to, since she had a brand new smartphone which forced her to slide the green bar to answer. "Hello?"

Excited to hear her voice, all nervousness inside me melted away, my energy showing in the way I spoke through the speaker of the flip phone. "Hey! Malica! What's up?"

"Hey Reed! I'm glad you called!" Reflecting the same excitement, she began mild conversation to her boyfriend, absorbing the emotional vibrations in her head and heart all while the two of us spoke.

It didn't take very long after that for the two of us to begin speaking like a real couple. Even though I struggled each time to find something to say, if it was anything at all, I forced it out of myself. The only thing that made it easier was to pretend like I was talking to her the same way I would at the lunch table, trying to come up with stories I saw happened in my life, or to come up with something that would be funny enough to hear her laughter again. But with our knowledge of each other still so young, our first barrage of questions regarded each other, our tastes, our likes, hour hobbies, all of it.

"What kind of music do you listen to?"

It was a valid question, but one I was not immediately ready to answer. I already knew that my musical tastes were far from normal, and I didn't want to lie to her about it at all. Ever since all of the weirdness around me started, I have been listening to so much orchestra music that I knew almost none of the popular songs that existed anymore, outside of Guitar Hero anyway.

There were just enough exceptions for me to get by sometimes pretending my tastes were normal, but even some of the normal music were pieces I liked for other arbitrary reasons. For example, the song playing through my head right now is The Kill by 30 Seconds to Mars, Instrumental Edition. I preferred the instrumental edition to this song for one good reason. It wasn't the entire song I enjoyed hearing. In fact, I only liked a small part of the song. The first 45 seconds were good, but that special guitar solo the musician plays between 1:09 and 1:40, and again at 3:50 as the last part of the song is what I loved the most. That moment, combined with the name of the group 30 Seconds to Mars for some reason made that moment feel like each chord that was played had something to do with outer space. I would think about it every time I hear it.

Like a Stone by Chris Cornell was another similar example. I could only get the original song, and I didn't care about the lyrics or the rest of the music, except for one short part. Right between 2:54 and 3:28, the instruments and guitar solo really brings the imagery of the twinkling stars in the night sky, not in a manner that sounds like a lullaby, but in a more powerful emotion.

And those were the normal songs I could bring up. Music from F.D. Project, Carbon Based Lifeforms, and Bryan El fit even better for me, because it sounded cool and rarely if ever had any lyrics to interrupt the song's meanings. I more often listened to music such as the pieces from groups like them, even songs that were not well-known at all because they came from video games.

I guess even after all this time, I still have some fascination with space. But it doesn't feel like it did before. It wasn't artificial anymore; the wonder and mystery of the cosmos felt like a genuine interest as I got to control it. Right now The Kill was the song playing most in my mind, so I thought I might answer with that specific song. But Malica asked me what kinds of music I liked. The only thing I saw fit to do was to return an answer that was both truthful and vague at the same time. "Oh, all kinds of music I guess. You would just have to hear them sometime to get a feel for it."

"Cool," Malica replied, happy that I may like some of the same things. But it would be better would be to talk about all the things she might say at lunch. "Oh! You want to hear about all the funny things that happened around me growing up?" What am I asking? Nobody cares to hear about my life's stories! It was how Malica felt, unbeknownst to me, like she had finally stepped on a land mind by advertising how long she wanted to be on the phone with me.

"Sure," I said politely. If she has hours' worth of cool stories, this would be even better. "I would love to hear them. I've got all night and after to hear about it." My words, while truthful seemed to bring more excitement into her voice. I really preferred listening to her, hearing her voice for hours and hours on end.

Relived that she did not make a mistake after all, Malica went on with her conversation, starting only a minute ago but leading it far beyond a few minutes. "Okay, so there was this one time—"

Not that I tuned any bit of it out. I listened to every word, occasionally interjecting with a small story of my own. We went back and forth like this for three whole hours that night, ending the call while knowing the next day would be even better than the last. Even though summer was on its way, neither one of us would be alone for it. The way I saw it, things could only go up from here.