“Annie made it,” Jenna blurts, turning pale under her freckles. “I was afraid I’d trip when we got our costumes, so I wanted to practicefirst.”
I step between them. “First off, Jenna? Daniel Craig slept on park benches and J. Lo couch surfed at our age, so that’s a compliment.” She finds a nervous smile before I turn back to Carly. “Second, Jenna has conditional acceptance to Stanford, and your fast track is toReal Housewives, but that’s no reason to bejealous.”
Our school’s queen bee edges forward in her seat. “I don’t know why you’re even rehearsing, Annie. Being a dumb teenager who’ll never be what her daddy wants must be super relatable. I bet every night the great Jax Jamieson wishes he hadn’t fucked that groupie and ended up withyou.”
I could beat Carly over the head with this spoon. Not hard enough to do permanent damage—assuming there are cells inside to damage—but hard enough to mess up her perfect waves. Maybe hard enough the made-up minions on either side of her would lift their overtweezed brows insurprise.
But I won’t let her see her words get under myskin.
“Girls, I hope you’ve been practicing while I’ve been gone.” Miss Norelli strides through the auditorium doors, returning from checking on a burnt-out stagelight.
Our drama director shuffles up the aisle, her black sheath dress hugging her full figure, and takes a seat a few rows behind Carly and theothers.
She pushes her purple glasses up her nose expectantly, eyes narrowed on thestage.
When the music starts again, I will myself to focus on my performance. To be a mermaid far away from the catty comments of bitchy schoolgirls who wouldn’t have the first idea what to do with themselves if they ran out of people totorture.
But when I see Carly unscrew the top of my water and tip a tiny brown bottle to pour something inside, my voicewavers.
“Stop! Annie, I thought we had this section,” Miss Norelli calls from her seat a few rowsback.
Frustration flows through me. “We do. Wedid.”
“Why don’t we try it with the understudy?” Carly smiles as if the idea just popped into herhead.
“Good idea.” Norelli folds her arms, and I swallow the anger as I trade places with Carly, who holds out her handexpectantly.
I shove the spoon into her hand before flipping her off. “Wash it when you’redone.”
I step out of my garbage bag and retrieve my water bottle, sniffing it before shoving the thing back in mybag.
“That part never should’ve been yours,” Lana, one of Carly’s minions, whispers. “The only reason Norelli picked you is because your dad’s a rock star. There’s no way you got histalent.”
“Carly’s still the understudy,” Tara, the other minion, points out. “A lot can happen in fiveweeks.”
“Shut it, Flotsam and Jetsam.” They should’ve been Ursula’s eels, not Ariel’ssisters.
Watching Carly perform, I wish she sucked, but she’s actuallygood.
“That’s enough rehearsal today,” Miss Norelli says when Carly finishes. “Annie, amoment.”
I get up and cross to herseat.
“Where’s the girl from auditions? The fearless one, the focusedone.”
I shake my head. “She’s here. Iswear.”
She sighs. “We’re running out oftime.”
It was my decision to audition for the lead in the school musical and cross our school’s reigning queen, but what even Carly doesn’t know—what she can’t know—is how much I need thisrole.
This year, everything is going to change for me. I feel it the way you feel spring in the air before anythingblooms.
I cling to that conviction as I head to the front of the auditorium to pack up mythings.
“Hey,princess.”
I glance up to see Kellan Albright, a senior, standing over me. With his perfect dirty-blond hair and bright-white smile, he’s athletic and has a decent voice. It’s a curse for the rest of us because he landed the male lead and begged out of almost half of rehearsals forsports.