by Holly Webb
Ms Shaw smiled at her. “Did you want Mr Lessing, Lily?”
Lily looked surprised – she hadn’t expected Ms Shaw to know her name. Perhaps that was a good sign?
“Um, yes,” she murmured nervously. “I was just wondering – um. I wanted to know…” she faltered. How on earth could she ask why she hadn’t been shortlisted too? It would sound so conceited.
She stared at her feet, so as not to have to look at Mr Lessing, who always seemed to be laughing at her, and said as calmly as she could, “I was wondering if there was any way I could change your mind about the shortlist.” Being calm suddenly stopped working and Lily looked up pleadingly. “I-I just really want this audition!”
Mr Lessing was looking thoughtful, which was good – at least he wasn’t furious with her. He exchanged a glance with Ms Shaw.
“This is – unexpected, Lily,” he said slowly.
“I know. I’m sorry,” Lily muttered, wondering if this was the kind of thing you could get thrown out of stage school for.
“I have to tell you, Ms Shaw did notice you when she was watching the class. She was very impressed and thought you would be excellent auditioning for Beth March.”
Lily glanced up delightedly and caught Ms Shaw’s eye. She was looking amused but she wiped the smile off her face at once.
“We considered putting you on the shortlist, but I had to tell Ms Shaw that I just didn’t think you were committed enough for an important audition like this.”
Lily felt the tears burning at the back of her eyes. She was too late! Why hadn’t she decided to make an effort earlier? “Oh. I see,” she said miserably, turning to go.
“Lily.” It was Ms Shaw, calling her back. “Mr Lessing’s right – it is unexpected, a student asking to be given an audition. But I have to say, it shows a certain amount of commitment. The commitment we’re worried that you can’t give us. Don’t you think so?” she asked the drama teacher.
Mr Lessing nodded. “You do agree, Lily, don’t you, that you just haven’t been trying in my classes so far? Oh, the occasional class, you stand out, but most of the time you can hardly be bothered.”
“I’m sorry,” Lily muttered, staring at the floor again.
“So why should I put you forward for a wonderful opportunity like this? Seriously, Lily, tell me.” Mr Lessing’s voice was stern.
Lily dragged her eyes up from the floor. “Because I’ve decided to try,” she said in a very small voice. It was so embarrassing to have to say all of this. “I didn’t want to be here at first, but now I really, really do. I’ll try so hard. Even if I’m not right for this part, I will keep trying in classes, honestly. And I would be good,” she added with a flash of pride.
Ms Shaw had a pleased sort of look on her face but Mr Lessing still looked doubtful. Lily wasn’t expecting the answer she got.
“OK. We’ll put you in. But you’ve made a deal, Lily, and you have to stick to it. I’m going to be watching – just remember that.”
She nodded frantically, hardly able to believe he’d said yes.
“Go on then. We’ll let you know the audition time.” Lily stumbled towards the door, and Mr Lessing called after her, “Don’t forget – I’m expecting a lot from you now!”
Lily shut the studio door behind her, her stomach churning. That counted as possibly the most stressful five minutes of her life. And now, of course, she had to explain it to the others.
Lily walked through the corridors to the Year Seven form room, half hugging herself with delight at the thought of the audition. It was so strange after all these years of refusing to try, but this part just seemed to be calling to her. The other half of her was worrying, though. What on earth was she going to say to Chloe? Whatever she said was going to sound really weird but she had to say something. She went into their form room a little nervously. Everyone was packing stuff away in their lockers while they waited for Miss James but Bethany saw Lily come in.
“Hey! What did you need to talk to Mr Lessing about? Is everything OK?” Her sweet, concerned expression immediately made Lily feel better. She glanced around and saw that Sara and Chloe were looking worried too. Lily took a deep breath.
“I’m fine,” she said slowly. “But I’ve got to tell you something and I think you might be a bit ticked off with me – especially you, Chloe.”
Chloe shook her head, looking confused. “Why? What is it?”
“I stayed behind because I wanted to ask Mr Lessing and Ms Shaw to change their minds and let me audition too,” Lily gabbled – it wasn’t surprising that it took the others a little while to work out what she was saying.
“You did what?” Chloe said, sounding a bit dazed by the idea.
“You’re not cross?” Lily asked anxiously.
“No, I’m just – I don’t know – amazed! I can’t believe you did that!” Chloe’s blue eyes were huger than ever as she stared at Lily as if she was some strange performing animal. She seemed to be expecting Lily to laugh and say she was just making it up.
“I know. I can’t believe it either.” Lily shook her head at her own daring. “You’ll laugh but I had this really funny feeling about this part. I couldn’t just leave it.”
Sara leaned forwards. “But Lily, what did they say? I mean, I don’t really know Ms Shaw, and Mr Lessing, he’s nice and everything, but I can’t see him just turning around and changing his mind. He’s not like that.”
Lily shuddered, remembering. “He didn’t. He went all strict and asked what made me think they should do something like that for me. It was scary.” She didn’t want to tell the others what Mr Lessing had said about her not trying. Not yet anyway – it would mean she would have to explain about her mum and not really wanting to be at Shine. Lily just wasn’t ready to talk about something so important and difficult, although she thought maybe she would tell them all eventually.
“So – what happened?” Chloe asked. “What did you say?”
Lily shrugged, wishing she could think of something more convincing. “I just begged,” she said slowly. “Ms Shaw said she’d noticed me in the class anyway, so I guess they just changed their minds.”
Bethany was looking at her sceptically but didn’t say anything. Lily flashed her a grateful glance. I will tell you, I promise, she thought, feeling mean. Just not now.
“Well, however you did it, I think it’s brilliant,” Chloe said cheerfully. “The audition will be much more fun with you there than it would with just Emily and Lauren.”
Lily grinned at her, feeling so relieved. She’d thought that Chloe’s feelings might be hurt but she hadn’t counted on her friend’s sunny nature.
“Hey!” Chloe squeaked excitedly. “We might even end up both being cast! You as Beth and me as Amy. That would be fab!”
Lily had been focusing so much on getting the audition and then telling the others, that she hadn’t really thought about what her parents’ reaction would be. It hit her as she was waiting for her train. What was her mum going to say? Oh well, at least she had some time to think about it – her mum was away filming and wouldn’t be back until the next day. It would just be her and Dad. Lily couldn’t wait for him to get home. OK, so it would be embarrassing to admit that they’d been right all along and she did want an acting career – but he was going to be so proud of her!
Lily’s dad had deliberately got home earlier than usual from the office because of her mum being away. Usually he was at work till all hours.
He greeted her conspiratorially as she walked in the door, waving a sheaf of papers. “All the local takeaway menus, Lily! Your mum’s not here to lecture us about a healthy diet and the whole ‘carbs are poison’ thing, so what do you fancy? Pizza? Chinese?”
Lily’s stomach rumbled on cue. “Don’t mind as long as we can have ice cream as well,” she bargained. “We have to, Dad – I’m celebrating!”
“Celebrating what?” Her dad grinned wryly. “Surviving another day at the nightmare school from hell?”
Lily shuff
led her feet. Had she been that bad about going to Shine? It seemed hard to believe now.
“Er, no…” How could she put this? “I’ve, um, got an audition.” She fluttered her eyelashes at her dad. Was he going to rub it in?
“Seriously?” he asked, looking shocked. “You’re not pulling my leg?”
“Uh-uh.”
“Lily! That’s brilliant! What’s it for? I thought you swore to me you were never going to move a muscle in acting classes unless you were forced to! How’ve you ended up with an audition?”
“I was trying not to try – if you see what I mean,” Lily admitted. “But – oh, the classes are really good sometimes. They give us fun stuff to do. And all my mates are really into it. I told you about Sara, didn’t I?”
“The one who’s going to be in Mary Poppins? Yes, yes, you did.” Her dad was nodding eagerly. It struck Lily that her dad probably knew more about Sara’s great part than Sara’s dad did, which seemed awful.
“Well, her parents said no! She was really gutted – you can’t imagine. But Ms Purcell sorted it for her. Anyway, it just made me think about everything.” Lily looked up at her dad and quickly down again, twisting her fingers. “I decided you were right. You and Mum.” It was even more of a wrench to admit that.
Suddenly she squeaked as her dad swept her up in a huge hug. “You can have as much ice cream as you want, Lily, my love! I’m so proud of you. You needed to find it out for yourself, but wow, I’m glad you did. You’d have been wasted doing anything else. You know that, don’t you?”
“Maybe,” Lily agreed cautiously, not wanting to commit herself to too much.
Her dad suddenly sobered up. “But listen, if this audition doesn’t go well, promise me you won’t take it to heart like the other time, OK? You know how many knock-backs your mum’s had?”
Lily nodded.
“There’s too many to count.” Her dad chuckled. “But it’s just something you have to deal with.”
“I’ve got a good feeling about this one,” Lily said. “But, yeah. I will try not to pin my hopes on it. It’ll be hard though,” she added, frowning. “It just seems so right.”
“Hey, you haven’t even told me what it’s for yet!” Lily’s dad did the comedy face-slap thing that he’d always used to make her giggle as a little girl.
“It’s a TV series of Little Women. You remember, that book I loved reading at school? It’s a really big budget thing apparently. Ms Shaw – she’s our agent – she was ever so excited about it.”
Lily’s dad nodded excitedly. “Yes, I’ve heard about it. It’s going to be a real ‘classic serial’ sort of thing – the kind they want the whole family to watch together. They’ll probably show it on Sunday evenings. The writer’s one of our clients.”
“The writer?” Lily looked confused. “It’s already written!”
Her dad grinned. “Yes, but they’ll adapt it loads – you know that, Lily. Mostly when something’s written as a book there isn’t enough dialogue for film or TV.”
“I suppose. I hope they don’t spoil it though,” Lily said anxiously. She didn’t want her favourite book changed too much!
“Don’t worry, Bill, our client, he’s very good. Very subtle. You won’t be able to spot where the original ends and he starts! So are you up for one of the sisters?”
“Mmm, Amy or Beth. But Ms Shaw thought I’d be really good for Beth. I look right, anyway – if I was playing Amy I’d have to go blond! My friend Chloe’s going for the audition too, and she’d be really good as Amy, I think. She’s got red hair though, so she’d have to wear a wig. At least, I think so. I’m pretty sure the book says she’s blond. I’ve always thought of her as having blond hair and Beth as dark like me.”
“Your mum’s going to be over the moon,” Lily’s dad commented as he riffled through the takeaway menus again. “Now, which of these do you reckon?”
Over the moon turned out to be an understatement. Lily’s mum was ecstatic. She got home really late on Thursday night, after Lily was in bed. Lily’s dad wanted to give her the chance to break the news so he didn’t say anything, which meant that when Lily trailed sleepily down to breakfast on Friday morning, her mum was opening the post with no idea of the shock she was about to get.
Lily gave her mum a kiss, grabbed the cereal box and sat down. She had just about worked out that the familiar-looking logo on the envelope her mum was opening meant it was from school, and was dozily wondering why school was sending letters home (she really wasn’t a morning person), when her mother yelped and sat bolt upright. That woke her up.
“What’s the matter?” she gasped, grabbing at the bottle of milk she’d just seriously overpoured on to the cereal.
“You! You’ve got an audition! Lily!” Her mother was still scanning the letter, trying to take it all in.
“Oh, that. Yes.” Lily nodded. Thank goodness – she’d thought for a second she might have been expelled.
“‘Oh, that’! Lily! How can you just say ‘Oh, that’!? This is amazing news! Why didn’t you tell me?” Her mother was clutching the letter as if it was a winning lottery ticket.
“You weren’t here!” Lily protested, looking to her dad for backup.
“Darling, you should have phoned my mobile. Dave, why didn’t you phone me?” She glared at Lily’s dad jokingly. “Honestly! Tell me everything!” She leant forward eagerly.
Somehow it was much harder to talk to her mum about it all. Lily had rattled on to her dad for ages over their pizza the night before, but all the arguments she and her mum had had about her not doing auditions over the years made it hard to open up now.
She shrugged awkwardly. “There’s not much to tell yet. There are four of us from our year going for it and some older girls too. Mr Lessing saw us all yesterday and he said that the production company are sending over scripts for the audition, hopefully today. Which is good ’cause then we have the weekend to look over them. And the audition will be one day next week, after school probably.”
“But Lily, what happened to make you change your mind?” Her mum’s voice was almost pleading. “All those other auditions – why did you say no to those but not this one?”
How could she say it? Because you were trying to force me! Lily gazed mulishly at her cereal and her mother sighed.
“Well, if you were going to pick one thing to audition for, Lily, you’ve certainly picked well. This series is going to be amazing – it’s already got a fantastic cast lined up and there’s a lot of buzz about it. It’ll be a wonderful opportunity for you, working with some of these people.” She beamed delightedly. It was as though she’d managed to put Lily’s strange attitude completely out of her mind.
“Slow down, Mum, I haven’t even done the audition yet!” Lily said grumpily. Her mother seemed to be taking over, as usual.
“Exactly,” her father put in. “Don’t jump the gun, Marina. There’ll be hundreds of girls going for these parts. I know you’ll audition brilliantly, Lily, but you can never tell who they’ll choose.”
“Oh, nonsense!” Lily’s mother waved this away impatiently. “Of course Lily will get it. She’s got the talent and the background. This is a very prestigious series, darling. It’s going to be fantastic to start your career with this – it’ll get you really well known.”
“But Mum—” Lily was starting to get panicky already. Her excitement about the audition was ebbing away and being replaced by a numb feeling.
“Now, who do I know who’s involved with this one?” her mother murmured, ignoring Lily’s worried face. She gathered up her post decisively. “Don’t worry, Lily. I’ll make sure you’re perfectly prepared for the audition. We can work on the script together this weekend. Isn’t it lucky my filming’s finished?” She floated out of the room humming happily to herself, leaving Lily and her dad staring across the table at each other in dismay.
Lily couldn’t help worrying all the way to school. It was really nice that her parents were proud and excited about the audit
ion – she couldn’t imagine having parents like Sara’s, who didn’t seem to be at all interested! – but her mum was too excited somehow. She seemed to be taking the audition as a personal challenge, when Lily didn’t really want it to be anything to do with her!
Am I being mean? Lily wondered to herself, getting off the train and trailing up the platform. It would just be nice to do this audition as herself and not as her mother’s daughter. That was the problem with her mum – she would keep on treating Lily almost like she was a part of her.
Lily brightened up as she walked through the school doors. What could her mum do? It wasn’t as if her mum really had anything to do with the audition – the school was arranging it. And some of her own excitement, which had been banished by her mum’s enthusiasm, started to creep back.
The audition script would probably arrive today and Lily couldn’t wait to see it. She just hoped her dad was right about the scriptwriter and the book wasn’t changed a lot. She’d been rereading it in bed the last couple of nights and she loved it so much. She had lots of questions too, like would there be any filming in America and would they have to do American accents? It was an American story, after all. She giggled at the thought of Sam’s gangster accent in the drama class. She couldn’t imagine the sweet March sisters talking like that!
Luckily there was an acting class that afternoon, and Chloe and Lily were determined to get there early. They’d dragged Sara and Bethany out of the ballet studio at warp speed, and bullied them into changing back into school uniform way faster than usual. Sara practically broke her neck running up the stairs with her shoes only half on.
