I walked hand in hand with my little brother into my mom’s cafe, the smell of baking cookies, cinnamon, and mint chocolate, wafting through the cozy building. My mom stood behind the counter sprinkling and light mix of sugar and her homemade cocoa powder across a fresh hunk of her famous banana bread with strawberries mixed into the batter, one of my favorite lazy Sunday treats. We live in San Francisco’s, so my family and I live in the two floors above the cafe. Therefore the perfume from the cafe clings on to the rest of our home. As a joke my dad made a wood sign in front of the entrance to the cafe with words, “50 ft Scented Candle” engraved into the oak below the name of the cafe(please take note that my dad is terrible at measurements.)

I was the one who came up with The Magic of My Name as the cafe’s sobriquet. Unique names run in our family actually, I mean my little brother’s name is Orion. Tell me that isn’t cool. My name is Callisto by the way, Callisto Vega.  And I know, it’s sounds like a female name but I am in fact a guy so sorry to ruin your sweet little assumptions. I love my little brother to pieces and he’s the sweetest little four year old in this universe but I envy the little guy for receiving the name that didn’t make people assume his gender when first heard of.

Orion settled himself in his favorite bean bag chair in a corner below the counter that had a little bookshelf sitting beside it, filled with a bunch of kids books and stories. He pulled out a paperback of The Little Prince for my dad to read to him. Orion snuggled closer to my dad as he read. My mom watched with a smile on her face as she watched them bond through the flowing words. I walked across the room and climbed up the ladder leading to one of the lofts in the building. I settled myself in and grabbed one of the many sketchbooks I kept in a little shelf. I grabbed my graphite and charcoal pencils from my satchel and a kneaded eraser. And then I started to sketch. I lost all contact I had with my surroundings and got absorbed into my own world. Sketch. Erase. Reflect. Repeat. I continued that process until I realized that I needed a muse. Therefore I scanned my surroundings.

My parents had hung a bunch of their paintings around the lounge, abstract art mostly to make the area even more cozy. They are both artists and in their free time draw and paint a lot. I looked at one of the murals they had hung on the wall behind the counter. It was a flurry of color, yellow ochre merged with ultramarine blue creating a conspicuous green that burst across the canvas. At the heart of the cafe are these huge cushy couches that seem to let you like drown in them. There’s cushioned lounge chairs and love seats, throw pillows are scattered everywhere on furniture and on the floor. There’s plush carpets on the hard wood floor that are so soft that a baby could sleep on them soundly. What I love most however is that there’s arts and crafts materials everywhere and books. So many books. Shelves bolted to the wall overflowing with books and handmade bookmarks that I and my whole family made are stationed at every place with books.

At the wall above one of shelf areas is a medium sizish painting that both my parents made together of our whole family. My mom had her soft brown hair and soft kind eyes, at the hips of her dress you could see flour and sugar marks where she dusts her hands when baking. My dad with his kept hair, but a few stray hairs staying behind. His eyes identical to my mom’s except for a few specks of green that seemed to glow, his beard giving his endearing smile a certain glow. My little brother and his amber hair and his brownish green eyes from our dad. He has that childish vibe in him, with that feeling escalating with the little wooden car and paintbrush he holds in his hand. But then there’s me.

I look like no one in my family, not like my parents, or grandparents, and none of my relatives. Its always been a mystery to me as to why I look like no one and no one looks like me. I have unruly raven locks of hair that can’t be tamed whatsoever. My mom says I have a virile look that no one else has. I looked up what virile means and the dictionary said that it means powerful, strong, and when needed to be, lethal. I can’t imagine myself looking like that but I think my mom has a point. When I met my friends for the first time they gave me these looks that showed them hiding startled looks. But I think the most shocking thing to people about my physical appearance is that I have bright green eyes that my dads says can define my emotion so well, joy, sadness, fear, regret, anger, pride. In the painting my eyes look like sea green orbs that seem to burn into your soul or something. My parents admitted the hardest part of the entire family portrayal was doing my eyes. In the canvas, my right hand holds a simple ballpoint pen and a fatigued guitar pick, while the other holds a thick, worn leather sketchbook. My face looks stark with a hint of a smile, but my eyes hold a troublemaker glint.

My parents wanted to make the painting represent us and who we are individually after they finished it about two months ago. I got the inspiration to sketch out myself, but with my other friends standing beside me. After finishing myself and erasing the stray marks on the paper, I was about to start on my other friend when suddenly she walked into the building.

Beth’s blonde princess curls flounced hypnotically behind her in her usual ponytail, stray curls framing her face and falling at the nape of her neck. She wore a dark gray knit beanie, white scarf, gray leggings, a floral dress, a medium length gray trench coat, and a pair of chestnut colored winter boots with white tufts sticking out from the top. Her storm grey eyes were content and spunky as usual as my mom would say. “Hello Mrs. Vega, Mr. Vega . Hey there Ri!” Beth greeted. When Orion was a baby he tried to say his own name but couldn’t so instead he said Ri. So that’s what everyone calls him. I climbed down the ladder bringing my art stuff with me. Beth and I have been best friends since we were in preschool together and stuck with each other ever since. She is super smart and is into art and music just like me. She loves to read books and can never be caught without one in hand. She met me on the floor and we walked side by side to one of the big couches underneath the family portrait.

“Hey, whats up Ms. Granger. ” (I had started calling her that once she finished Harry Potter seeing how similar they both are.) “Eh, I’m bored I guess, Thanksgiving Break is fun an all but after a while it’s quite repetitive when there’s nothing to do. I mean I am not busy at all so I decided to just hang out here. My parents are out on their shift(her parents are nurses) and they usually let me go out to the library or whatever and they adore you and your family so they trust me anyway. ” She said with a huff as she fiddled with a stray curl that escaped her ponytail. “Beth it’s only been like two days since school let out-” I spoke as she perked up, -besides, I bet you have some drawings done.” I concluded.

I scooted closer to her as she brought out her tablet and sketchbook from her leather book bag. She first showed me her sketchbook which held a bunch of new additions and ideas she has been developing. One seemed to be a sketch of half a boy and the other half of the face a wolf with piercing eyes. “I know they look really bad but their just sketches so give me some credit.” She said with the tilt of her head. I looked at her with a befuddled face, “Are you kidding me right now!?” These are incredible what are you talking about!?” I said as I stared at the drawings longer. “Cal! Stop yelling like an idiot, everyone can hear you!” She said her eyes tensed on me. I looked around and I saw my mom smirk and my dad chuckle. A few other customers just grinned.

Then she grabbed her tablet and showed me some digital drawings she had worked on. I’m so jealous of how easily art comes to her. I mean she doesn’t even know how talented she is, let alone at writing and singing music. I mean it only took me till third grade to figure that out. And guess what? We’re both fifteen and almost sixteen. Me being older than her by like a month. After watching the time lapses I continued showering her with compliments that are honestly very true.

“Hey Cal?” Beth asked hesitantly.

“Yeah?” I asked question in my tone.

“You know how your parents offered to hold the talent showcase here?” I nodded my head.

“And you want me to sing and perform?” I nodded vigorously.

“Well I was thinking that maybe we could sing a duet together. I doesn’t have to be a song we wrote, just our voices singing a song.” She said rushing the last part. I instantly went pale at the thought of me singing in front of other people, playing my guitar. What if I embarrass myself and hit a wrong note? What if I don’t tune my guitar properly and it hits a wrong note during the performance? 

I snapped out of my own thoughts when Beth placed her hand on my shoulder. “Callisto? Cal are you okay? I mean you don’t have to do it. I can do a solo. But it would be incredible if other’s could see how talented you are.” She said softly. I met her eyes, grey against green. I grabbed her hand and intertwined my fingers with hers. “What song-” Her eyes lit up, “-should we sing?” I said with a grin. She tackled me with a hug before pulling back just as fast. She hopped up from her spot on the couch and then started pacing, her eyes clouded with thought and anxiety. “Wait, Beth whats wrong?” I said worriedly. “Oh gods Cal I’m just terrified, I mean I’ve only sang in front of my parents and you. In front of an audience? What if my voice cracks? What if I can’t reach the highest octave? What if-” I stopped her by grabbing her wrist and making her meet my eyes. “I am just as terrified as you are.” I said. She looked even more worried. “Oh what have I gotten us into! I’m so sorry! I uh, I could probably just take out our names or something. I don’t- Uuuuuhaaaaah!” She groaned in rage and gripped her hair. She is just plain scary and freaking terrifying when she is mad but right now that didn’t matter.

“Don’t regret it Beth-” She looked close to a break down but I think she was starting to calm down, -besides we still have like two too three weeks before the showcase. Lets show em’ what we’re made of.” She looked much better and started scrolling through her tablet for a song that we could practice to sing and find sheet music for.

“What about this?” She said, she gestured for me to put on the other earbud that she held up. We listened to the song and it was incredible. It was called “Into the Darkness” by Gio Navas and we started to coordinate our parts with our playing. We started practicing or parts. For hours and hours each day. Beth’s powerful voice with my deep one created the perfect syncopated rhythm. The chords from my guitar creating a nice vibe for the song.

• Weeks Later

“Now it’s Callisto Vega and Beth Jackson!” My dad yelled through the microphone as we both stepped onto the stage. Me in a black button down and jeans, with Beth in a flowing black dress with white lace that reached to her knees. Her hair was done up in braids and pinned to her head with curls falling down to the sides of her face. She looked a bit nervous but excited, I gave her a reassuring nod and she smiled back at me. I breathed, in and out, in and out. I put the guitar straps over my head and the familiar weight of the guitar made me feel stronger. My jaw was set and my eyes scanned the large crowd inside. I started playing the first chords as Beth sang the first few verses:

HELLOOOOOO EVERYONE!!!!! Oh my gods it’s been so long since I’ve written. I’m so sorry for the delay. It’s just that my life has been so hectic lately because… WE JUST MOVED!!!!! Oh my god the whole process has been lasting for like a month and a half and a post is in the works for more on that. But I hope you guys liked this simple short story. It was quite random really. But I wanted to be different because a lot of best friend relationships are usually of friends who are the same gender but I played with the concept of best friends who are the opposite genders but are as different as the sun and moon, night and day, and all those other hyperboles. Since most of my short stories feature a male or female individual, I thought maybe this could be the opportunity to try something different. I am planning on making a part two of this or maybe just continue the story as a book. I am in love with these two character and I love their relationship. I want to do a part in Beth’s point of view so we can learn more of Beth’s background.

Anyway I discovered the song that’s featured  on this post off of YouTube. And it’s only ONE OF THE MOST AMAZING SONGS I HAVE EVER HEARD. Anyway it was written by an artist who isn’t famous yet but writes songs based off of book characters. I guess I wanted to base these two character’s relationship off of the song they sang because I learned that when you’re in a situation where you could possibly perish alone(I’m talking physically and/or hypothetically) than having the person you trust the most is the best thing in the world. Cal trust’s Beth more than anyone else in the whole world(besides his family of course) and would do anything for her. They both are there for each other when they are about to do something that scares them both.

So yeah I hope you guys enjoyed this short story and I am once again very sorry for the loss in content but I will try to at least post once or twice a week. I admit this story may sound cheesy to most people but that’s the best kind of friendship in this whole universe and I want to emphasize that as much as possible. So I hope you guys are living your best lives and taking all the chances you have to do something that makes you feel amazing. And do it with someone that you trust more than anyone in the world.