It Only Happens Once

“Hello everybody, gather on stage, please” Simon announced as the 120 of us gathered on the enormous stage. It had been a little over a month since I had seen the judges as well as other auditionees who had managed to make their way to bootcamp with me. “I just want to say good luck to all of you and let’s get started.” He began calling out names, and one by one they performed another solo. Eventually my name was called, nerves building until I stood in my place.

“So Janelle, what are you singing for us today?” Simon asked. He looked bored, considering the fact that we had been sitting there for over two hours I guess I wouldn’t blame him, but it made me determined to get his attention.

“I’m singing Bring Me to Life by Evanesence.” I took a comfortable stance, cocking my hip to the side.

“That’s a pretty difficult song, you think you can handle it?” L.A. raised an eyebrow, challenging me. I straightened my posture and looked at him square in the eyes.

“Yeah, I got this” I replied cooly nodding to the sound booth. Bring Me to Life began and I took a deep breath before starting the song. Just like I had practiced, I sang it with all my being, hoping it impressed Simon enough to wake him back up and LA to show him what I was made of. I had sang all the way to the bridge when Simon signaled to cut the music. I thanked them and walked off stage towards Adi, who was sitting patiently in the audience.

“That was great!” Adi whispered to me “You totally got their attention.”

“You think so?” I asked nervously, I felt great on stage but now I wasn’t so sure.

“I know so!” Adi quickly covered her mouth because she had spoken too loudly and people were turning around to glare at us. I chuckled and shook my head.

“Let’s get out of here before we kicked out.”

“Yeah, that’s probably the best idea,” Adi said glaring back at them. We tried looking as casual as possible as we practically sprinted out of the auditorium. We rushed over to the food that had been set up for the contestants and started picking out what we wanted. Sandwiches, wraps, salads, and all things healthy covered the tables. A look of horror crossed Adi’s face. She was never much of the healthy type.

“What the hell is this?!” She yelled, a little too loudly.

“It’s called being healthy Adi, maybe you should try it sometime” she rolled her eyes at me and grabbed the greasiest sandwich she could find. I grabbed a wrap and an apple before walking back to the auditorium to watch the last group of contestants sing.
After about an hour, the judges were ready to make their first cuts at boot camp. I waited with the rest of the auditionees towards the back of the stage as the judges called out our names. They had called everyone up 10 at a time and announced whether they made it to the next level of boot camp or were being sent home.

“Willie Jones, Diamond White, CeCe Frey, Emblem3, Paige Thomas, Carly Rose Sonenclar, Janelle Noble, Vino Alan, Tate Stevens, and Dinah Hansen please step forward.” Britney had called us up, each of us taking a few steps forward towards the judges waiting to hear our fate for the show. I held my breath. All four of the judges looked over their judging sheets one more time before looking up at us and saying “Congratulations, you have made it to day two of boot camp.” I let out a sigh of relief. I followed the rest of my group off stage and made my way to the lobby where I had left Adi to eat when I received a text.

Hey Jay! Went to your room to take a shower. Tell me the good news when you get up here! - Adi

I put my phone back into my pocket and ran towards the elevator. I couldn’t wait to see Adi’s face. She was gonna flip.

~~~~~~~~~~

Baby you light up my world like nobody else,
The wa-

My alarm blasted; it was day two of boot camp. I shot out of bed and ran around my room to get ready for the day. They insisted that we arrive at the auditorium at nine in the morning due to the complexity of the challenge they were going to assign us. As excited as I was, I was just as nervous. This last day of boot camp, if you weren’t familiar with the show, would determine whether or not I made it to the judges’ houses. Honestly, just making it there was my goal. To make it onto the actual show was just a plus, and winning would have been a major bonus. But before I could even get there I had to get through with today. I decided to dress a little nicer, taking Adi’s advice from last night, and wore something a little more presentable than just jeans and a t-shirt. After putting on a little makeup to cover up the evidence that I had barely any sleep, I headed towards the lobby. My anxiety pushed me to use the stairs rather than the elevator, so I bounded down the steps as quickly as I could. I wasn’t paying much attention to my surroundings and ran into another body, nearly falling down the flight of stairs. Luckily, the person had caught me before I face planted onto the ground.

“Whoa there, Miss, are you ok?” he asked me, helping me up slowly.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Sorry for almost running you over. I wasn’t looking where I was going.” I apologized, tucking a strand of my hair behind my ear. I looked up and my heart skipped two beats. “Niall?”

“Oh, Janelle!” he smiled. “What are you doing this early in the morning?”

I smiled back and answered him. “Simon told all of the auditionees to be at the auditorium by 9 am. They said that the challenge today required a lot of time to prepare. What are you doing?”

“Well, the lads and I were at the auditorium to watch the performances, but I left my phone in the room so I came back to get it. C’mon, walk with me.”

“Yeah sure. I won’t be late right?” I asked. There was no way in Hell I was going to be late for any of this.

“Course not, but if you are you can blame it on me. Simon seems to like me.” Niall smiled to himself. I giggled and followed him back up the stairs to his room. It was only a couple floors above mine so it didn’t take too long to reach. When we arrived at his door, he took out his key card, unlocked it and walked in. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to follow him inside so I awkwardly stood in his doorway. Once he realized that I wasn’t by his side he turned to me.

“What are you doing there?” He asked.

“Uh, I wasn’t sure if I should go inside.” I blushed and looked at the ground. Niall chuckled and walked back out with his phone and handed it to me.

“What are you doing?” I asked. I looked up at him with confusion.

“Well, when someone hands you their phone it typically means they want you to put your number in it.” Niall eyed me suspiciously. I just stared at it not fully hearing him. “You have a phone don’t you?”

“Oh, right. Yeah.” I punched my number into his phone and handed it back to him. He waited expectantly. “What?” I asked.

“Don’t you want my number?” He asked, looking hurt. I nodded my head. I refused to open my mouth to speak, too afraid that if I did, a scream would rip out of my throat. Instead, I handed him my phone, and he took it. Our fingers brushed against each other and I caught my breath. It was as if electricity ran through my body at his touch. He lingered there and our eyes met. I couldn’t move, like I was under his spell, but it felt so right. Our moment was cut short when I got a text from Adi.

Where are you! It’s about to start and everyone is here but YOU. GET. YOUR. ASS. OVER. HERE. NOW! - Love you, Adi :)

“Well, she seems on edge don’t y-” I didn’t get the chance to hear the rest of his thought as I was already racing towards the stairs.

“Hey, wait up!” Niall screamed after me. Floor after floor I ran, so grateful that the performing arts center was only down the street. I made it right before the judges got there, out of breath. The judges took their seats and explained our challenge.

“Welcome back ladies and gentlemen. Today’s challenge is duets.” Simon bellowed throughout the room. “You will be paired up with another act and the both of you will have to choose and agree on a song to sing together.” He began to list the acts whom he had paired up. I stood there patiently, hoping I didn’t get one of the arrogant contestants as a partner.

“CeCe Frey and Janelle Noble.” I remembered the name, but I hadn’t officially met her yet. She was in the same group that I was called with after the first round of boot camp. I looked around for her and found her sitting at the front with her legs dangling off of the stage. The others didn’t seem to like her, saying she was mean, arrogant, and, for a lack of better words, a bitch. I hesitantly walked over and sat by her as Simon finished calling out the names.

“Hi, I’m Janelle,” I greeted, sticking my hand out for her to shake. She simply looked at me and gave an irritated smile.

“I know. I saw your audition.” I smiled a little thinking she had liked my audition.

“Than-” I started to say, but she cut me off right away.

“Don’t be flattered. I’m making it a habit to watch the auditions of my lesser opponents.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m here to win and I will go through anyone who gets in my way.” Anger and irritation started to build inside of me. I had found out the hard way why everyone else thought so badly of her. “And don’t waste my time picking a song. I’ve already chosen one.” My eyes went wide. As if she wasn’t irritating enough, she had to be a control freak too. But there wasn’t really anything that I could do, so I nodded my head and followed her out into the lobby. “We’re singing Broadway, Here I Come from the SMASH series.”

I just stared at her, “But I don’t know that song.”

“Well that’s too bad isn’t it? Look up the song, learn it, and come get me when you’re ready. “ She turned on her heel and left me standing on my own. Adi found me in the lobby.

“What’s with the face?” Adi asked.

“Huh, what face?” I looked at her.

“You looked like how you did that one time One Direction had sold out before you got your ticket. It was your ‘I’m extremely pissed’ face.” Adi smirked at me. She knew me too well.

“It’s that CeCe Frey girl. I got paired up with her and she’s a complete bitch.”

“Ouch, what did she do?” I told her about our little scene earlier, her face mirroring mine. “What a bitch!”

“Yes, that’s what I thought! But I don’t care, I just want to get this performance over with.” We went back to the ballroom where I rehearsed. We looked up the song and played it. I liked it a lot, but I already knew that CeCe would be singing the lead. Still, I tried to learn it as fast as I could. After listening to it constantly for 15 minutes, I knew the song by heart. I walked back out into the lobby to find CeCe flirting with one of the Emblem3 boys.

“Hey, I know the song now. Let’s rehearse.” I said. She rolled her eyes and walked to the stage. Just as I suspected, she sang practically the entire song, leaving me to sing just the chorus.

“That was good. When we perform, don’t screw up.” She walked down the steps and went back to flirting with Drew.Great, I thought. I’ll never get to judges houses singing this. I walked to my room to take a quick nap and practiced singing the entire song. After half an hour, the performances began. CeCe and I sat in the back of the auditorium and waited patiently for our turn.

“Janelle and CeCe you’re up.” We trudged our way to the stage. We went through the usual questions and began singing acapella. CeCe started off singing, with me quietly standing next to her. The judges looked at us suspiciously but never questioned our song choice or method. When it came time for me to sing the chorus, I sang with all the energy I could, trying to project my voice, but I knew that it wasn’t impressive enough. The judges looked a little disappointed and started to write a few things down on their judging sheets. I needed to step it up if I wanted to make it through. As CeCe sang the second verse, I did what I learned from singing with Adi: I harmonized. She continued to sing but glared at me to shut up. I continued to harmonize, I wasn’t going to let her ruin this for me. If she was going to threaten me, then I would become a threat. We finished the song and earned ourselves a standing ovation.

“Wow, that was incredible ladies. Janelle, did you rehearse those harmonies? I noticed that CeCe was caught off guard.” Demi looked at CeCe. If I had known any better, I swear I heard her growl, matching the obnoxious cheetah spots on her face.

“Well, I didn’t think that I could really showcase myself with just the chorus, so I improvised.” I smiled back at them avoiding my partner’s glare.

“I think that was a great decision” LA commented, “Thank you girls. We’ll see you again tomorrow for the results.” And with that, we made our way back. Trying to avoid CeCe at all costs, I booked it to Adi’s side.

“Let’s get out of here” she chuckled and walked with me out of the auditorium and back to the hotel to change into something more comfortable.

~~~~~~~~~~

We pushed the front doors open right as the valet had brought Adi’s car around. It was a matte black Escalade, with all the bells and whistles. It was her family’s car while they were here. The nice thing about Adi’s family was that as rich as they were, they tried to teach their one daughter good morals and how to work in order to succeed. She tipped the valet and hopped into the front seat.

“Where to sister?” Adi looked over at me.

“Why are you asking me? You’re the one who comes here almost every summer!” I exclaimed.

“Right, well there is this great pizza place that I know. You take over the radio, okay?” She nodded towards the Ipod that was already plugged in. I scrolled through her songs and picked Last Friday Night by Katy Perry. Adi and I did this thing called a “dance party”, which was when we blasted music and danced in our seats as if no one is looking.

Last friday night
Yeah, we danced on table tops
And we took too many shots
Think we kissed but I forgot

Last friday night
Yeah, we maxed out credit cards
And got kicked out of the bar
So we hit the boulevard
Last friday-

“FUCK!!!”

“ADI!!!” The tires screeched as five figures appeared in front of the car. We shot forward as we came to an abrupt stop. Adi was out of the car before I could even get my seatbelt off.

“Oh my gosh! I am so sorry, I didn’t even see you. Are you okay? Did I hit anyone?” Adi was panting, she barely got the words out of her mouth. “I am so sorry, let me make it up to you. Jay and I were just about to go grab some lunch and hang out at my house. Let me treat you.” She was pleading. It was pretty odd considering she never did that.

“Sure, lunch sounds great.” One of the figures said. Though I still couldn’t see their faces his voiced seemed too familiar. As if reading my mind, he took his hood and sunglasses off.

“Niall?” I asked, surprise leaking into my voice.

“Janelle?” Niall’s eyes widened.

“Wait, if Niall’s here,” Adi looked at the others focusing on one in particular. “Harry? Is that you?” She walked over and pulled down on the hood of one of them. She gasped. “Oh God, I almost ran over One Direction! If the Directioners find out I’m dead.”

A smiled tugged at the corner of his mouth. “It’s alright. It isn’t everyday that some hot girl in an SUV runs you over.” Adi blushed bright red.

“Wait, these are the girls you two have been yapping on about?” Liam asked astonished. “So we finally meet the dream girl and the Siren.” Adi and I looked at one another confused, our emotions caught between offended and flattered.

“What?” We asked in unison. It was Harry and Niall’s turn to blush.

“You’ve been talking about us?” Adi smirked and poked Harry in the chest. He was speechless.

“Anyway, what’s for lunch?” Niall spoke for him. With that the guys started towards the car.

“We’re going to get pizza” I replied.

“I’ll drive!” Louis announced.

“NO!” Adi and I screamed.

“Why not?” Louis pouted.

“If you think that I’m going to let you drive this car, you must be nuts.” With that everyone piled in, Louis looking like a child who had just gotten a time out. “So, this is the plan. There is this bomb ass pizza place that we can go to, and after we eat we can head back to the beach house.” Adi explained.

The boys looked at each other, smiles from ear to ear appearing upon their faces.

“BEACH HOUSE!”