032

Opening the shop's glass doors that were accompanied by a chime ringing out Jack could only look up at the old-fashioned way of telling the owner or otherwise employee that some customer was entering.

And just like it served its purpose there was an older man with already short ashen hair looking at the both of them.

"Welcome.", he said loudly for them to hear but surprisingly with slightly narrowed eyes that indicated caution. His look told a lot of the experience he had and maybe some of it was not exactly the good kind.

Jack didn't mind any of it and just waved at the owner while already browsing through all the guitars hanging on the wall on the right.

"Hello." Eve on the other hand nodded and responded to the man with a polite greeting. Though she mostly looked around at the interior of the shop.

It was packed and crammed with various musical instruments and therefore may look small but that was just an illusion since it was just that filled with things. The atmosphere was rather quiet and had a feeling of coziness to it.

Jack also already had his eyes on a pair of guitars. And the first one he grabbed was a golden yellow electric that was labeled with a clear Gibson logo.

'At least one brand I can actually recognize among all of these...' He held the guitar and looked at its shape and configuration closely. It was a beautiful guitar with a shape that resembled an acoustic.

It was also a brand that he did like in his previous life. Though the pointy cutaway was a little bit bothering him when he slid down the neck with his hand when test-holding the guitar. But not really by that much so he went ahead and read the tag at the end of the neck.

'Les Paul LP-295 Goldtop' was the name of the guitar. He didn't know it was actually the exact same name but it did ring a small bell in his head.

When he checked the tag Eve made big eyes. "Wow, that's...expensive."

She clearly commented on the price tag that was coming with the guitar. It was a whopping $5,000,- exactly.

"That's normal if you want a decent guitar. Well, at least for professionals that don't care about the price." Jack chuckled at her words and also browsed a few other ones with his eyes. There were a bunch of more expensive ones that didn't cut it for his tastes.

Some of the older arrow-shaped electrics even went close to 10 grand. That on the other hand was already probably overkill, to say the least. Though Jack could see some benefits of why they were priced like that.

Or should he say that those weird snorkel autographs on them would answer it clearly by themselves? Yep, those were signed guitars from some artists.

Not sure though Jack recognized any of them so he just kept it to the normal unsigned ones.

"Geez, renting them from the school sounds a lot more appealing now." Eve sighed lightly to my reply.

"It's still art. The ones deciding the prices know we are easily swayed. And you should know that art supplies are a lot worse in that regard when you think about the really good stuff."

"I know, it's just crazy. That's why I like to experiment with new but cheaper stuff as well." Eve just nodded since she was in fact agreeing completely. Especially since her future profession would be a drawing artist.

And that together with her sister running a tat parlor, she just knew how true it hit about how expensive some of the quality things can be. Matter of factly it was also one of the reasons why most of it is pushed toward the customer.

"Can I help you guys?" Now the owner of the shop joined them after he saw Jack put the guitar back to its original place and also browse a few other instruments.

Especially when Jack started tapping on some drums with his fingers to test their sound was the point where the old man was irked to move into action.

"Yeah, you actually can. I would like to test a few of the modulators if I could, please." Jack nodded and wanted to test them because literally none of those branded ones were any he ever heard of.

So testing was a necessary thing to be done.

"Alright, I will get a guitar ready." The man wanted to walk away but Jack stopped him from moving away.

"I will play the Les Paul Goldtop." Jack said to stop him from bringing him som weird instrument and watched the reaction of the man. And just like he thought his reaction was of slight hesitation with a deep frown. "You can also put it on my tab since I already decided to buy it. If that is what concerns you..."

"Are you sure you can afford it, kid?" That question alone let Jack widen his eyes slightly. He didn't expect the man now to come out of his shell and directly accuse him of being unable to afford it.

Eve on the side looked between the two of them and darted back and forth from him to the man and watched them staring at each other for a short moment. She herself wanted to ask if Jack was really sure about it but the way he looked at the man right now was kinda scaring her from asking.

So the next thing Jack did was pull out his wallet and hand the guy his debit card. "Just swipe the amount and you will know."

The man looked at him and snorted shortly before taking the card and going over to his counter and charging the card 5 grand. If the kid was broke the bank would deny the transaction. So he amused him.

But what surprised the man was that the transaction went through smoothly without fault. Suddenly the old gentleman felt embarrassed when he looked back at Jack and could see his smirk.

"Damn it, kid. Alright then. I will place some of the better modulators suited to the guitar." The man scratched his head and gave Jack his card back. But back in his mind he also went straight back to being a business owner.

"Yeah, I'm waiting. Also, here is the address for you to deliver the instruments I'm going to buy. I hope you do have a delivery service, yes?" Now Jack was the one trying to make it hard for the guy even if he knew this shrewd old man was already trying to lighten him up by as much money as he could.

"Sure..." The man answered and the thing was that Jack already exceeded the price needed for delivery with the guitar alone. It was a policy of this shop that not many kept track of beforehand or used in the end.

With that done, Jack went ahead and started trying out a few pedals and ended up buying a whole bunch of them that seemed to be remotely like what he wanted.

But before leaving the shop he still went ahead and performed a few good solo riffs from songs that were not even written yet like Nirvana's Blew and Rape Me or some fun easy ones like Trigun's theme.

Interestingly enough Eve reacted very surprised at first and nearly went crazy fangirlish with a loud shrill quick squeak that she immediately suppressed by holding her hands in front of her mouth.

A clear blush surfaced on her face for reacting like that. Though she still kept looking at Jack and continued vibing to his solo that reverberated through the amps.

She definitely recognized that last one and it made him smirk. Jack knew now that Eve was not only into comics but also anime. That is at least his take on this. Also, looks like Trigun is a thing here as well.

Jack then went ahead and ended his little season with the iconic stairway to heaven riff that was so forbidden that you shall not play it in shops. Like never.

Seriously though it was just played to hell and back again. And the guys are probably just tired of it. Especially if you screw everything up when playing it.

So thinking about it, could you consider this cultural phenomenon as one of the first memes? Who knows.

That one nearly got the old guy to act. But somehow he reconsidered that action and stayed at his place and let him continue performing the 'forbidden riff'.

"What is it, George? Not going to stop me?" Jack asked the owner. And by now they also had introduced themselves.

"As if. It's already your guitar that you are using. And besides, you are pretty damn good." The guy smirked now after learning a little bit more about Jack. He could get behind the young man having that much skill as well as cash.

Though he now thought about him being some rich brat with all the stuff he brought.

"Want my autograph or something?" Jack smirked now with a sly expression.

"Hahaha...." The old man laughed loudly in amusement at that cheeky proposal but he soon stopped and thought for a second.

And his next action was another thing that surprised Jack positivity. The old man actually placed a rather old-looking guitar that resembled the Goldtop one he had brought and placed it in front of him from somewhere out at the back.

Then he pointed a permanent marker at him to use.

"Go ahead, I'll be damned if I come out a fool again. I better have some small artist's autograph in my collection than end up losing the opportunity in getting a free autograph from a top star.

Jack only shook his head but still went ahead and signed the surface with his full name in his curvy readable signature.

With all that said and done, they finally came to the finish line after writing down everything he brought. In the end, Jack's card was swiped again and there was no problem with the cash transfer either.

George just watched it with a shaking head. Well, at least his worry was a foregone matter by now and he made a huge profit by just indulging Jack.

"Alright, thanks for waiting for me, Eve. Now we can get something to chow." Jack now said to his friend after having done his little shopping spree.

Eve only looked at him with a weird look.

"What?" He now asked her. "It didn't take that long, right?"

"Not that. But I'm too curious to remain silent. So how did you just end up spending so much money?" She asked him now. And it looks like she was tolerant about wasting time while shopping - probably a woman thing.

"Remember me talking about my book? It's done and apparently so good that the publisher went ahead and gave me a certain deposit." Jack lied straight at her face. Well, it was not really a lie when he later would publish the first book anyway. It was also near its finish line.

"That was quick..." She narrowed her eyes.

"I didn't just start writing yesterday or anything, you know?" Which was another lie but she didn't need to know that either. "So, are you hungry now or are you going to keep playing detective?"

Eve just sighed in defeat at that. Somehow she felt suspicious about it but there was basically no evidence she could use to support her intuition. She also wondered why she felt like that.

"Fine." But she just smiled and nodded at the end.