Little Miss Helena? Pfft. Right...

Welcome To The Black Parade.

Once the concert was over, we could barely breath. We had been jumping and screaming and laughing and singing all through the show, PLUS 4 encores. We were exhausted. But not enough to keep us from squealing our way over to the signing tent.

When we got to the tent, this huge guy stepped in front of us and asked if we had the passes. Apparently, he’d asked about everyone that came to the tent, because the huge line already made next to him stopped all conversation and nonchalantly tuned in.

I was confused, but reached into by back pocket and pulled out my pass.

Lauren and Lacey did the same, all three of us showing him the passes. When he nodded silently, the entire line went nuts. There were cheers of congratulations, groans of “Lucky bitches,” and a whole bunch of “Why couldn’t /I/ get one of those? ”

We laughed, ignoring the rude remarks, and followed the huge dude as he led us to the front of the line. Thankfully, the girl in front was a nice teenybopper (no matter how much I loathe them, they ARE pretty nice) and she let us in front of her with a smile and a wave.

We waved back tentatively, already knowing what she was, and faced forward again. We looked at each other, and screamed collectively. This caused the rest of the line to scream too, and soon the whole place was full of “MCR MCR MCR ”

Finally, they stepped out, causing the screaming to go to earbleeding levels. We laughed, and Gerard waved Lacey forward.

“Uhm, uhm, uhm, hi ” she managed to gasp out, wearing the biggest grin I’d ever seen in my life.

The band laughed. The whole line sighed and fanned themselves at hearing Gerard’s and Frankie’s laugh. It was like music to our ears.

While Lacey was handing over her pass and they were signing it and talking to her, I looked around. Lots of flyers for smaller bands, ads for lessons, etcetera... Then I saw it. A flyer, taped right on the front of their signing desk, read in bold print “HELENA WANTED.”

I flailed at Lauren, making frantic motions towards it and hyperventilating.

She saw and started breathing funny too.

I flailed my arms at it more frantically and nudged her forward, since she was in front of me. She rushed ahead and, hiding behind Lacey carefully, plucked it off the desk and ran back to me with it. Both of our hands shaking, we each held a sign and leaned into it, reading. “Re-enactment of Helena ON STAGE, other dances needed too, one dancer, will stay on tour for summer. Between 13-19 years of age, must be tall-ish, and willing to dance and sit on a bus for months.”

We laughed breathlessly at the last part, and when Gerard waved Lauren forward, she dragged me with her. I grabbed Lacey’s arm so she would stay, and shoved the flyer at her. While she was reading and panting crazily, Lauren shakily passed her pass (hehe) over and the guys started signing it.

When Lacey handed it back to me, lost for words, I handed the flyer to the closest bandmate, who happened to be Bob, and cleared my throat shakily.

“Uhm, I was wondering, about this...” I spoke in my high-ish pitched (yet not in an annoying way) voice, trying not to stutter stupidly and shoving my hands in my back pocket to keep from playing with my hair nervously, a habit I needed to break, since I was constantly touching my hair.

“U-us too,” Lauren said, waving at her and Lacey, who was still recovering and gawking at her pass absentmindedly.

The guys looked us all up and down, then talked with each other.

I raised my eyebrows at my friends in confusion, wondering if the guys were just going to figure it out by just a quick glance. Lacey and Lauren just being them, they practically read my mind and shrugged, waiting patiently and shakily for them to finish.

The guys finally stopped talking and turned back to us.

“Ok,” Ray started, sounding uncomfortable, “We’ve thought it over, and we want you,” he finished, pointing to- my heart stopped and I couldn’t breathe- me.

Trying to keep myself from fainting, I managed to stutter out, “B-but, what about my friends?” I waved at them, trying to make a point.

“Sorry,” Gerard started, actually LOOKING like he really was sorry, “but they don’t really fit the description. I really am sorry,” he finished, looking at my friends sympathetically and smiling.

“N-no,” Lacey finally said, “That’s fine ” she smiled at me reassuringly when she saw that I looked half horrified, and half unsure.

“Yeah Totally I mean, what are the odds?” Lauren reassured, backing up Lacey.

Still a bit unsure, I placed my pass in Mikey’s waiting hand, and while they were passing it around signing it, I spoke up, “So... What do I do?” I laughed, realizing how stupid I must sound.

“Well, we WERE going to try out a few people...” Bob said, signing the pass and passing it off to Frank.

“But you fit the description perfectly. Pretty much, we would take you even if you couldn’t dance. Or sing,” he finished with a smile, passing the pass to Gerard.

Gee signed it absentmindedly, pausing to hand me a piece of paper with a picture on it.

I took it from him and looked at it, and my jaw practically hit the floor. It looked like someone had drawn me Perfectly It had all my features; my dark, naturally rose-red hair, my big, multicolored eyes, my small nose, even my freckles were delicately placed all along my nose and across my cheeks, faint on my pale skin from not getting a lot sun lately. And I was just as oddly tall as I was now, already five-foot-nine when I was only thirteen. And in the picture I was wearing Helena’s dress, detailed so much as to see the button that held the corner of the skirt up to reveal a shock of red silk beneath, and I could even see the light glitter along the fabric of the waist. My hair was partially pinned up like hers in the picture, and her bouquet of roses was falling from my hands to the floor as I stepped forward, looking the polar opposite of what I felt now: in the picture I looked sorrowful, knowing I was practically attending my own funeral.

I looked up, mouth agape and already huge eyes somehow widened, at Gerard, who I knew had to be the artist. “H-how did you draw me? I just met you ”

“I didn’t,” he started, looking excited and handing me my pass. “That’s what I wanted whoever we got to look like.”

I was flabbergasted. How does this even happen?! I mean, no one ever has my hair color! EVER! As a young child I was terrified of the old ladies that would come to me and pinch my cheeks, cooing into my face and telling me they might just have to steal my hair. I shuddered at the memory and focused on Gerard. I looked at him, then Bob, then Mikey, then Ray, then finally Frankie. I cleared my throat, then spoke up, surprised at the clearness of my voice when I felt like it might crack from nervousness. “I-Is this a serious offer?”

The guys all nodded, eyes twinkling at they looked me up and down.

I blushed, suddenly self conscious, and patted my sides nervously. When I felt a faint lump in one of my front pockets, I suddenly remembered. I pulled out my iPod Touch, my prized possession and possibly my very greatest friend, and handed it to Gerard. “Can you sign this too? Its always been my dream to have you guys sign it.” I smiled, then added apologetically, “Sorry its so small.”

Gee laughed and signed it, passing it off to Ray, who signed it and passed it, and so on.

While they were busy signing it, I glanced at my friends, who were all grins. They gave me a thumbs up, and nodded at the guys, reminding me of a question I had.

“So, uhm, where do we go? With the passes, and all.” I felt retarded. But oh well.
Frank laughed, and pointed at a few spare chairs next to the table where they all sat. “You can just wait there, of you don’t mind. We have a lot of signing to do.” He smiled at me, and I almost fell over. My friends came up from behind me and practically dragged me from where I was glued to the chairs, plopping me in the middle chair and settling themselves on either side of me. They smiled at me, and began squealing in excitement. I had almost forgotten that they hadn’t said a word to each other. I smiled, reminded of how great my friends were. When they had first met, at my birthday party that year, they had only heard stories of each other from me, since Lauren went to a different school. And when they had first met, they got along great, babbling and giggling like crazy, making me wonder humorously, Hey, who’s birthday is it again?? Then, oddly, when we were watching a movie at about 3AM and were surrounded by huge balloons we had all blown up for the party then herded into the room and covered each other in, things went weird. Lacey was really hyper, and started beating me, Lauren, and Taylor with the balloons. We had all laughed crazily and started beating each other with them. Then, Lacey and Lauren had started screaming at each other and beating each other with the balloons, totally vicious and serious. At first, Taylor and I had laughed. But then we finally bought ourselves a clue and broke it up. From then on, they weren’t the same with each other, and I avoided having them together as much as possible. I mean, its not like they loathe each other, but they don’t exactly love hanging with one another. But they knew tonight was important for me, so they sucked it up and came. I grinned at them, lost in memories, and they were clueless, babbling about how lucky I was and completely ignoring each other, but in an innocent, non-rude sort of way. If that’s even possible.

From where we were sitting, we watched the huge line dwindle slowly as each fan got something signed. Tickets, shirts, posters. Even clumsy crowdsurf dude got something signed, only he didn’t have an actual object, so he got his face signed. In sharpie. Apparently, he was even more stupid than he looked. And let me tell you, he looked pretty rediculous.

Finally, the line somehow ended. The guys stood and stretched, and we mimicked them, adding fake yawns to make it seem less like we were ready to run around in circles flailing our arms around and screaming.

Ray smiled at us. “Ready?” he asked, nodding at the stage. From here, I could see the little door I had seen my uncle peeping through earlier.

We nodded, grinning like retards.

They laughed, and ushered us forward, walking behind us. From where I was, in the middle of my friends and in front of the guys, Gerard was directly behind me, flanked by Mikey and Frank.

Gee reached forward unnoticed except by me, putting a hand on my shoulder.

I jumped, practically feeling sparks fly from his fingertips through my shoulder, then relaxed when I earned weird looks from my friends, who shrugged and kept walking when I smiled at them. I nodded back at Gee to let him know I was listening.

He whispered to me, his lips so close to my ear I swear I could feel them brush against my skin, “Relax. Its ok.” He paused, then added, “And I’m really glad we found you.”

I almost fainted, but nodded, throwing him a small smile I tried extremely hard to keep from looking as extremely excited as I felt, not wanting to look like an even bigger doofus than I already must have.

We finally got to the stage door, and Mikey stepped forward, holding it open and letting us inside. I knew that once I stepped through that door, nothing would be the same. Realizing this, I quickly stepped in, ready for change.
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Ok, I really like this chaapter. Please, PLEASEEE comment!!! :D