Autumn awoke to a knock on her bedroom door. She groggily looked at the clock. 7am. Oh yeah. She had turned her alarm clock off since there would be no school today.
"Are you awake, Autumn?" her mother asked, her voice sounding odd.
"I am now," Autumn replied with a sigh. "What's up, mom?"
Her mother came into the room holding the mp3 player Autumn had left on the table, with a pair of headphones in her ears.
"Autumn, is what I'm listening to the music you and Heidi have been making?" her mother asked in an awed voice.
"Well, it's what Heidi has been making, and I have been singing," Autumn corrected her with a whimsical smile.
"This is...amazing," her mother whispered, a faraway look in her eyes. "I've never heard anything so soul riveting."
"That's what I've been telling you," Autumn told her with a wry grin. "Heidi hasn't just been arranging a bunch of garage band material. She is literally a musical genius. I'd like to point out that one of those guitar tracks is actually me playing."
Her mom sat on the edge of her bed, just listening to the music, her eyes entranced. Autumn wasn't surprised to see tears on her mother's face—many of Heidi's songs had elicited a similar reaction from her. They were so powerfully transcendent that they literally overwhelmed the senses.
"Okay, we're going guitar shopping today," her mother announced after almost fifteen minutes of silently listening to Heidi's songs.
"Really?" Autumn sat bolt upright in bed, her eyes shining with excitement.
"I'm so sorry I didn't take you more seriously before," her mother apologized, wiping the remnants of her tears away. "I had no idea. It would be an act of criminal neglect for me not to get you a guitar at this point. And I want to hear that lovely voice of yours around the house, young lady."
Autumn beamed at her mother as she jumped out of bed and hurriedly began getting ready for the day.