‘Time’s up!’ Janet announces from outside, before flinging the door open. ‘Ready, girls?’
No. No, absolutely not. Did we come to a conclusion? What did we decide?
We file out into the corridor, with the camera still filming us from behind.
‘You’ll tell her, right?’ Jodie says.
Tell her what?
Jodie sees my panicked expression.
‘Ask her, I mean. What she thinks. Remember?’
OK. We said we’d ask her. My mouth is dry. Rose didn’t want to be in the band, she said so. I’m just going to ask her if it would really be OK to do this bit without her. She can always say no. In fact, I half wish she would, so we all know where we stand, and then we can just go home and forget about it. And I wish there wasn’t a camera in my face, and that I could hear more than the sound of my blood pumping in my head.
‘Shall we go?’ Janet asks.
‘I just have to talk to Rose quickly,’ I explain.
She nods. ‘Sure,’ she says. ‘She’s right over there.’
Rose is waiting at the end of the corridor, with Rob. The colour is back in her cheeks now, just a little. As we walk towards her, Jodie squeezes my arm good luck. I feel sick. But I’m just talking about the TV show. It’s not as if we’re breaking up the band or anything.
Jodie and Nell fall back. I go forward. I suppose it has to be me.
‘So?’ Rose asks.
‘Er, hi.’ The hostility radiating off Rose – which I still totally don’t deserve, by the way – isn’t helping. ‘We were just wondering . . .’ My voice will hardly come out. My throat isn’t working, with all the stress. ‘We were wondering if you really meant it. About not joining us? Because if the three of us went ahead and got through then you could come back in the band afterwards and . . .’
‘Afterwards?’
‘Yes.’
‘When you’re not on TV any more?’ she checks, coldly.
‘Well, yes . . . and . . .’
‘Sure.’
‘What?’
‘Sure.’
‘Really? I mean, do you really not mind if we—?’
She looks at me haughtily. It’s not often that I remember how much taller than me she is, but now is one of those times.
‘I’m out of the band, don’t worry. Say hi to Linus for me.’
‘But—’
Standing there, I watch the blood run out of her cheeks again. Her eyes look searchingly into mine, and then . . . nothing. A rigid, blank stare. She moves past me, down the corridor, and I watch her disappear round a corner.
What have I done? I call out her name.
‘Rose!’
Janet steps forward and puts her hand on my arm.
‘Let her go,’ she says gently. ‘It must be hard for her.’
Janet’s right. Rose needs a hug. But who will give it to her if I can’t?
Wait.
Did we just dump Rose from the band? Did I just dump her? I can’t believe I did that. It’s not what I meant at all.
‘Rose!’
But she’s gone.
Broken
There were other things I didn’t think about. The look on Sebastian Rules’s face when we told him our decision, for a start. The other judges were pleased, but Sebastian’s sneer stayed imprinted on my mind for a long time. Another was the fact that we had to share a car with Rose for an hour and a half on the way home, and she didn’t say a single word to us all the way.
It was Jodie who reminded me of the worst thing of all: what if we win? I have to say, the possibility hadn’t crossed my mind, but what if we actually win and our act goes on a billion screens and makes us famous? It would be just the three of us, without Rose. How could she come back in the band then?
*
On Monday, Rose is not at school. She officially ‘has the flu’. I call her granny, Aurora, who says she’s in bed.
‘Is she OK?’ I ask. ‘Can I come round?’
Aurora hesitates.
‘She asked not to see you, Sasha. Not for a couple of days. I’m sure she’ll be fine.’
She’s never done this before. Not even when she had real flu. Not being able to see her is shocking.
‘I don’t get it!’ I complain to Mum, as we’re preparing supper. ‘She’s my best friend. It’s all about singing in public and she never wanted to sing in public in the first place. We had to make her. Why is she taking it so badly?’
Mum stirs the soup in silence.
‘Why, Mum?’
‘Do you really need me to answer?’
I sigh. ‘She could always have said no,’ I point out. ‘We gave her the option.’
‘Uh huh,’ Mum says.
In the silence that follows, I imagine if it had been the three of them, asking me if I wanted to stay or go. If you have any pride at all, there is only one answer to that question. Now, too late, I realise it wasn’t really an option at all.
Two days later, we get the official news from Ivan Jenks: we’re in the final nine. We’ll be filming on national TV in March: three live finals on consecutive days at the start of the holidays, showcasing three acts each. The public will vote and the winner from each night will go into a grand final on the fourth and final show. The performances will also be streamed live to over five million phones and computers in the UK (the billion comes later, when the ad goes out worldwide). Meanwhile, we’re going to be interviewed by a presenter called Andy Grey for the backstory bit of our slot, but we mustn’t tell anyone about the decision to drop Rose, because they want to ‘preserve the drama’.
I don’t want to preserve the drama at all. I hate the drama. My best friend isn’t talking to me. I want the drama to go away. However, it turns out that we all agreed to do whatever the producers say when we signed all those release forms on the audition day. So outside of home, the drama gets preserved.
Rose ‘recovers’ from the flu and comes back to class, but still looks under the weather. At school we are heroes. The Head asks us to sing ‘Sunglasses’ at a special school assembly. Rose plays her guitar, as before, but at a very slight distance from the rest of us. I really don’t feel like dancing. However, everyone sings along and loads of people promise they’ll vote for us. In our class, nobody seems to notice that Rose still isn’t talking to me.
The Killer Act homepage shows nine videos now, under the banner LIVE SHOW PERFORMERS!!! They include us, the street dance group, two rock bands (Jodie fancies all the members), an eleven-year-old opera singer, a boy band, two female soloists, and a ukulele orchestra called Me and Uke. We watch them all, and they’re all fantastic. Our video is still the original ‘Sunglasses’ with the four of us, and me in my pyjamas. Totally preserving the drama.
One day in February, Andy Grey arrives after school with a cameraman to film our backstory slot. Andy will be the presenter on the live finals, and it’s a chance to get to know him. We feel as if we already do: he presented children’s programmes when we were growing up and I’d swear he was the guy who taught me to count. I still remember him standing cheerfully in front of a screen of bouncing cartoon bubbles, singing ‘My ARMS and my LEGS make FOUR’.
Andy still looks like a big teenager himself, with black hair, white teeth, a wide smile, and a gentle West Country burr to his voice that makes us feel at home. We kind of are anyway, because they decided to film us in Jodie’s bedroom, which was the tidiest.
Jodie, Nell and I sit on Jodie’s bed for an hour, under a shelf full of riding cups and rosettes, talking to Andy about how much we’ve always loved to sing together. I keep waiting for the moment when Andy will mention Rose, and ask what it was like to lose her, but that doesn’t happen. Maybe they’re going to try and pretend she was never part of the band. But how could they do that? There she is, on our original video, and on our band page.
That page hasn’t changed at all. We don’t know what to say on it now. Jodie emails someone at Interface for advice, but they never get back to her.
&
nbsp; Meanwhile, we get several invitations a week to do gigs and parties all over Somerset. We can’t do them, because now we’re a trio and people are expecting a quartet. So we say we’re busy rehearsing. The team at Interface have sent us a video – performed with professional dancers – of the song they’d like us to do for our performance. It’s an old number by Nancy Sinatra called ‘These Boots Are Made For Walkin’, and the wardrobe director thinks it will provide a great opportunity to showcase our legs.
We rehearse together, over and over, in Jodie’s room, to get the song right and perfect the routine. The choreography is easy now that it’s the three of us – just as I thought. Jodie and Nell enjoy dancing almost as much as I do. But vocally, we sound scratchy and light. At least, I think we do. Andy told us not to worry. He says it’s amazing what they can do these days with auto-tuners and post-production. But I miss the warm, smoky tones of Rose.
She still won’t talk to me, or see me after school. It’s like a permanent, dull, physical ache. Her spare guitar – the one she keeps in my room – sits there in the corner, reproaching me. Several of my eyeshadow palettes are really hers, and she has a lot of my bracelets and books. I don’t know what to do with her stuff. We’re like some married couple splitting up.
And I still don’t understand it, not really. I get her being angry with me, of course I do, but this is worse than anger – it’s deeper. I’ve apologised by phone, text and email, written her a letter and sent her a card. Still nothing. I don’t know what else to do.
It’s so bad that I can’t sleep. Every time I try, I find those fifteen minutes running through my head. Not the first, golden fifteen, when we wrote the song, but the second, black fifteen, when I talked myself into asking if it was OK if we temporarily dumped her. Which is what I was effectively saying. The shocked looks on Nell and Jodie’s faces. The countdown from Janet outside. All to please Roxanne Wills and a guy with baggy jeans and TV teeth, who I’ve never heard of. The sheer stupidity of it all.
With a week to go, I drag myself out of bed in the middle of the night, wrap a coat around me over my pyjamas, slip into my wellies and let myself out of the cottage as quietly as I can, so as not to wake Mum. I use my phone as torchlight. According to the screen, it’s 12.45 a.m. This may not be my best idea ever, but I simply have to talk to Rose. I walk down the lane and up the path to her house, then round the side till I’m just below her bedroom window.
‘Rose! Rose!’
It’s hard to shout and whisper at the same time, but I do the best I can. Nobody in the house seems to stir, but one of her granny’s dogs comes to the side door and plants her paws on the pane in the middle, staring at me. She’s a rescued greyhound called Leila, who knows me well. I go over quickly, to reassure her it’s me, and she looks a bit surprised, but ambles off back to her bed by the Aga.
‘Rose! Rose!’
Nothing. I search round the house and farmyard for something to catch her attention: gravel, small pebbles . . . anything that I could throw at her window without breaking it. In the dark, though, I can’t find a thing. I send her a text, telling her I’m outside, but I’m convinced she’ll have turned her phone off, or be too fast asleep to hear it.
To my amazement, I hear the sound of creaking wood and rattling glass. Looking up, I see her raising the sash window and staring out, her red-gold hair hanging loosely round her face.
‘What on earth are you doing here?’
‘I had to see you!’
‘You see me at school.’
‘You never talk to me.’
She looks angry, surprised, frustrated. She rolls her eyes.
‘Stay there. I’m coming down.’
Two minutes later, she pulls the bolt on the side door and lets me into the kitchen. Leila raises her head from her dog bed for a moment, then goes back to sleep. Rose stands in her dressing gown and bare feet, hands in pockets, watching me.
‘So?’
‘I need to know,’ I say, searching for the words.
‘Know what?’
‘Why sorry isn’t enough. I’ve said it so many times. I’m sorry, Rose. It’s not the same without you. Please come back.’
‘I can’t.’ She gives me a pointed look.
‘You can,’ I plead. ‘I mean . . . not for the TV thing. Oh God. Linus is crazy, but it’s only for one performance. Two at the most. After that. Please.’
I stand in the middle of the kitchen floor, with my begging face on. Rose doesn’t look quite so cold and distant as before, but she doesn’t ask me to sit down. She doesn’t break into a gentle smile and forgive me. Something has changed. Something is broken.
‘Linus was only pointing out the obvious,’ she says. ‘I don’t fit.’
‘But you do. We don’t have to do the dancing. That’s not why we got together.’
‘It’s not about the dancing,’ she says, shaking her head at me, like she’s talking to a child.
‘We don’t have to do big gigs. Not after this, anyway. Not if you don’t want to.’
She shakes her head. ‘It’s not that, either.’
‘I don’t get it,’ I moan. ‘You’re brilliant, Rose. Better than you know.’
‘No,’ she says, her lip wobbling. ‘You don’t get it, Sash. There were only two people who ever made me feel special. And one of them . . .’ She bites her lip. ‘One of them . . . whatever.’ She can’t talk properly. Tears come. She fights her way through them. ‘And then there was you.’
We stand there, facing each other, in the cold, moonlit room. Our tears are silent. The only sounds are her gran’s old kitchen clock ticking and Leila snoring in her sleep.
‘I’m so sorry.’
‘I know,’ Rose says sadly. ‘And I know you didn’t mean it.’ She moves forward to give me a quick hug, then pushes me back. ‘It’s good this way. I need to work out . . . some things.’
‘What things?’
‘What I want. Who I am. I meant it when I said I didn’t want to jiggle or sing those tunes. I was kind of hiding in the band. This is good. Really.’
This is SO. NOT. GOOD.
This is terrible. I feel awful. I’m crying buckets. NOT. GOOD. SERIOUSLY.
‘You’d better get some sleep,’ she adds. ‘You’ll need it for later.’
What she actually means is goodbye.
There is, however, just one tiny chink of hope. The day before we’re due to leave, a plain white envelope is posted through our letterbox, with ‘S’ written on the front. I open it and a piece of coloured paper flutters out. It’s an odd shape – a bit like a leaf that’s been partly eaten by a caterpillar. That’s all there is.
I show it to Mum.
‘What do you think this is?’
Mum holds it up to the light and turns it in her hands for a while.
‘I couldn’t be sure, but I’d have said it was a cut-out of a leotard. Does that mean anything?’
It feels like a thin ray of sunlight in a darkened cave.
Most people would have sent me an email. Only Rose would think of posting a seminal leotard.
Through The Camera’s Eye
The Manic Pixie Dream Girls have been chosen to perform in the first of the three live finals. Then we’ll stay to watch the other shows, with all the other finalists. This time, our mums travel with us. Mum shuts the café so she can be there. With the agreement of Mrs Richards, the Head, we skip the last two days of term to rehearse in a cold, empty studio in South London with the other eight acts. At night, we stay in a hotel overlooking a massive rubbish tip by the river.
As Jodie puts it, staring out at the piles of moonlit steaming rubbish: welcome to the world of Killer Act Live.
It’s great to hang out with the other acts, though. We’re all equally nervous, all equally obsessed with music, and we quickly form a bond – a bit like soldiers going into battle, some people say. The shared experience seems to pull us all together. It’s helpful for us as a group because in rehearsal, our voices still sound thin and reedy.
When Jodie pumps up the volume to make up for it, she goes all American again. Nell’s practically a whisper. I’m flat every other note. People say it’s the cold, and we’ll be better on the night. I’m not so sure.
We’ll look good, though. At least there’s that. The show has a professional stylist, who’s brought a whole warehouse full of clothes for us to look through. If it was all of us together, we’d be having the time of our lives.
With the stylist’s help, Nell chooses a taffeta party dress with a corset top and tiny skirt; Jodie picks denim shorts and a T-shirt with a diamante skull on it; and I’m in a waistcoat made out of a Union Jack, a bright red mini-kilt and long red socks. We’ve each been given a pair of vintage high-heeled boots. Mine look Victorian. They have a row of tiny buttons up the front, which a wardrobe girl kneels in front of me to do up, carefully, one by one.
I wonder if Rose will be watching tomorrow. I bet she will, although she’ll never admit it. If she doesn’t watch us on TV with her gran, she can always do it on her phone. If she knows how. Actually, it would have been funny if we’d won the whole thing together and she’d ended up advertising Interface. She’s the only person our age I know who hardly uses it.
The judges aren’t there on the first day, but they arrive for the dress rehearsal on the morning of our show. We’re waiting in a queue for lunch when I see Roxanne Wills dash past us. She’s surrounded by security, but through the burly guards I spot her five-inch heels, a tiny skirt to show off her perfectly toned legs, and miles of spiky jewellery. I rush to catch her up before she disappears into the corridor where the judges’ dressing rooms are.
‘Roxanne! Roxanne!’
She looks round, confused.
‘Oh, hi. Did you want something . . . ?’
Roxanne has been one of my idols for such a long time. Right now, she’s the only person I can trust.
‘I wondered what you thought about—’
‘Hey!’ calls a security guard. ‘The lady’s in a hurry. Step back, please.’
‘No, wait, it’s fine,’ she says to him. She gives me a flash of her starry smile. ‘I’ve got a couple of seconds. What did you want?’
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