i slipped my fingers through the pages, fingering to find the song-the song that might make it better, but i couldn't find it. i heard their murmurs from the other room, their laughs, their jokes, their practice. i listened to them as they played through their songs, everything already chosen for them, no looking, no searching, everything was laid out for them, all within arms reach.i tilted the stand, watching a page or two fall to the ground, thinking maybe fate would choose the correct music for me, so that it would only be just beyond my short arm's reach, but i could stretch. i reached down, turning over the now separated pieces of paper, thin as ever, and glanced them over. i sighed, frustrated. wrong, this was wrong, not the right song at all. i sighed once again, pushing my hair out of my face and leaning back, glancing up at the water-stained ceiling, and back to the ground, viewing the string of threads being pulled slowly from the cheap carpet of the closet they shoved us in because we weren't their precious band kids. instead, we were the orchestra, or more simply put, the orch-dorks. we weren't good enough to be band geeks, obviously. so they trashed our closet, our small taste of your-not-good-enough, making us feel even worse. i looked anywhere except back. anywhere except the window i had turned my chair away from. the window out of the office, where i had been put in solitary confinement, because i was far below them, i was the beginner. completely cut off from them, in an even smaller section of an already small barrack, used as a closet-and a jail. i shifted in my seat, thinking. slowly i turned back to them, the good students, the prodigies, the class. to them i was only the new kid, the kid who wasn't good enough. i watched as they played, what was so good about them? i turned back around, fighting the tears as i once again brushed my hand across the papers, pulling out a simple song, full of quarter notes and rests and crescendos and fortissimos and allegros. i began playing, first slow and mournful, then speeding up into a small piece of happiness, watching my tempo carefully, but my thoughts drifted. i thought about what my English teacher said, about how after you're so good, you can blur the lines. i looked back at the paper, the lines suddenly blurring, fading shimmering out of focus. my tempo picked up, the rests fading away as i blurred the lines. i picked it up, letting the music sooth me, my anger, my oain, until the bell dinged and i sighed, setiing down my violin. "you are all dismissed." the teahcer said. "except for you, julie." i gulped, walking up to him. "do you think you can play the highschool pieces with us?" he asked. "yes." i choked out. "good." he said, and waved me off. i smiled my pride swelling as i realized i had kicked down the wall between me, and the other kids who were truly "good enough."