Struggles of a Fangirl

Struggle #42

A few days after the whole BET awards fiasco, Walter was outraged by all the harsh headlines criticizing MB's performance and their award loss. Ray is completely stressed, thinking that it's all his fault because he fell on stage. I feel completely guilty. I should have be on twitter, encouraging TM and other fan bases to vote for MB. And it was my heel that hurt Rays foot, even though London was the one who pushed me. The boys have been feeling a bit down and it pains me that I can't do anything to help them. They still have plenty of energy on stage for their fans, but afterwards their smiles disappear and are replaced with solemn expressions.

"Alright...here's what we need to do." Walter says, pacing the floors back and forth in the studio. "We need to come out with a new music video. I mean a club banger that will have the 106 and park countdown going crazy."

"Yeah but are we gonna release a new song or are we gonna make a video for a song off the album?" Keisha asks him.

"Nah, the new songs aren't finished yet and we need something quick." Walter replies.

We're all crowded into the sound booth, listening to some new beats that MB's producer came up with. I'm sitting on a bean bag next to the couch, reading my summer book since I've fallen so far behind in my reading these past couple weeks. MB is crowded around their producer, bobbing their heads to the bass vibrating the room. I continue flipping through my book, my eyes feeling heavy because of the early time of day.

"PRETTY GIRL!" Walter shouts, making me snap my head up in surprise. We all look at him in bewilderment as his eyes light up excitedly. "We're making a video to pretty girl. We can get Lil Twist and Jacob Latimore up in here, we can have some real life footage of the fans from the meet and greets and stuff. It's gonna be too live!"

Prodigy's face lights up excitedly, "We're making a video to Pretty Girl? That's my favorite track off the album." He says, his eyes flicking over to me and winking. I giggle at how happy he is right now. His smile basically lights up the whole room.

Keisha nods her head, "That sounds dope and all but we gotta talk to the other managers and figure out a budget for the video before anything else."

"I got this. I'll call them up right now and work something out." Walter tugs his phone out his pocket and quickly begins pressing buttons. He puts the phone up to his ear and rushes out the sound booth with Keisha and the producer hot on his heels.

Ray laughs, "I haven't seen him this excited since the tour started. He always gets like this when he has big plans or ideas up his sleeves."

"Maybe a music video is what we need. The tour is almost over and we need to go out with a bang. It will be fun and the fans will be hype about it." Prince adds on from before cramming more wheat thins into his mouth. I scrunch my nose up I'm disgust, how can he eat those dry things? They taste like I'm munching on hay.

We talk a little longer before the producer comes back in and let's the boys listen to some more beats. Myles leaves the chair and walks over to us, casually sitting down on Renee's lap. ""Did y'all hear what happened?" Myles asks, a glint of mischief in his eyes.

Yannie glances up from the magazine she was flipping through, "About what?"

Myles glances over at London quickly, we look over at her too. She's laying on the floor with her headphones jammed into her ears. Her head being propped up by her tote bag and her hoodie draped over her like a blanket. Her eyes are close but her stiff posture shows she isn't asleep. We look back at Myles and he smirks. He loves to gossip like a little girl, not to mention he's nosey too.

"About London and Prince," Myles whispers to us. "He locked his self in the bathroom the other night and called her up, of course me and Ray were being nosey and pressed our ears against the door to eavesdrop. I guess he's wants to take a break from this little "flirtationship" they have going on."

My ears perk up at the interesting news. So prince was serious, he wasn't just toying with me when he said he was worried about him and London working out after all. Renee scoffs, "it's about time he gets his head out the clouds. What did he ever see in that bimbo anyway?" She asks.

"Who knows. She's so self centered and he's so down to earth." Yannie replies, shaking her head like she doesn't understand.

"You know what they say," Joya shrugs her shoulders. "Opposites attract."

"I guess not anymore." I say, unable to keep my chuckle in. It's funny how the tables have turned so quickly. London was the one who told me Prince and I could never work, now she's the one who he wants to space from. Man, karma works fast.

Myles laughs, "He was in there bickering with her for at least an hour. There were these long pauses so I know she must have been blowing up his ear. I told y'all she was a bird from the get go." He proceeds to make squawking noises and we start dying. MB glances over at us confused and we try to hold in our laughter. The door opens and Walter and Keisha come back in as we proceed to calm our laughing.

"Alright so here's what we gonna do. Our budget for the video is 70 thousand dollars so after y'all hear a few more tracks for the new album, we gonna head over to the venue so y'all can prepare for today's performance while I call up some video producers so we can start brain storming. I got some good ideas about this." Walter tells us.

Joya raises her hand like we're in school, "Are we gonna have to design more clothes?"

"Depends on the concept of the video." Keisha replies.

"What's the concept this time?" Roc asks, slouching in his seat looking tired.

Walter shrugs, "I don't know yet, but best believe it's gonna be your dopest video so far."

The rest of the day is pretty busy. From the studio we head straight to the venue for a quick sound check before getting ready for today's sold out show in Georgia. The crowd cheers loudly as Myles introduces the boys one by one, I swear their voices alone is what's shaking this whole place. Walter is chatting away on the phone like his life depends on it. And right now it probably does. If MB doesnt make a big comeback then the fans are slowly going to lose interest. I mean the concerts are cool and everything but we need something new and exciting to keep the fans entertained. We don't want them to end up like B5. No offense, I love them and everything but they eventually disappeared and people forgot about them.

"Kacey, bring this to the dressing room please." An assistant tells me, handing me the boys newly ironed clothes for their next costume change. I nod and turn back down the long hallway to the dressing rooms. As I round the corner, I bump into someone and we both fall to the ground. The stack of clothes in my arms scattering across the floor. "I'm so sorry." I quickly say. Then I realize it's London.

"Whatever," She snaps at me, taking the vest off her head and throwing it back to me. I roll my eyes at her and stand up too.

"Why do I even bother trying to be nice to you?" I mutter to myself more than her. I proceed to pick up the clothes I dropped. "You did try to kill me."

London puts her hands on her hips and glares at me, "So is this your way of trying to get back at me?" She snaps, her tone harsh.

"What are you talking about?"

"Princeton brought up my mom when we were talking the other day. He said that maybe I should work on my relationship with her before I try to get into a romantic relationship with someone else." Her voice drips with anger, fury spread across her face as her green eyes darken. "I never mentioned my family to him, and there's only one person here who knows about it and thats you."

I stare at her at a lost for words. I swallow the nervous lump forming in my throat, "I was just trying to get him to understand you. You know, maybe if you didnt act like a stuck up brat then I wouldn't have to explain to him your emotional damage!" My voice come out strong and foreceful as I snap back at London. My fingers clench the clothes in my hands as we stare eachother down.

"Emotional damage? You don't know anything about me and I didn't need you to explain who I am to anyone. That's my business and if you know what's good for you you'll stop meddaling in my life." London steps closer to me, angry heat radiates off her body. "You always put yourself in these sitautions Kacey, and then you make it seem like I'm in the wrong. Well news flash, you're always sticking your big ass nose where it doesn't belong."

I scoff at her, "I just---"

"Shut up!" London yells in my face, "You're always making up exscuses for yourself and I'm sick of being the bad guy here but if you wanna go down that road then fine, we'll go down that road. So don't get scared now because I warned you multiple times not to mess with me, yet you still test my patience. Well now I have no more patience for you. You think you everyone loves you so much? That won't last much longer." She talks so quickly that it takes me a moment to follow what she's saying. She smacks the clothes out of my hand so that they fall on the floor again and step over them on her way down the hall.

As I clean up all the clothes, my mind races and I my heart beat pounds in my ears. If London exposes me then I'm dead. Everyone is going to hate me, I'll never be able to show my face again without receiving the evil eye. My legs shake like jell-o as I stagger down the hallway to the dressing room. I stumble through the door and put the clothes on the costume rack, not even noticing Jacob Latimore tugging on his shirt in front of the mirror.

He whirls around and looks at me curiously. "Kacey, are you ok?"

"Yeah I'm fine." I say, wiping the brimming tears from my eyes.

Jacob rushes over to me, pulling down the rest of his shirt over his torso as he does so. "No you're not, you're crying. What happened?"

"Nothing." I wine, pulling away from him.

"Fine dont talk to me, but I'm going to get Joya." He tells me before quickly rushing out the room and down the hall. No later than two minutes, I hear feet shuffling down the hall towards the room. Jacob comes in and points at me, Joya and the girls follow inside. They crowd around me, tugging on my arms lightly. "Kacey what's wrong?"

I shake my head in response, blinking fast to keep the tears inside. I don't want to speak because if I do, I'll definitely break down in a teary, snotty mess. I don't know how much more drama I can handle and I'm scared of Prince hating me. I have to tell him as soon as possible. Way before London does.

Around 11 something that night, Walter h us video chatting with a famous video producer to come up with a video concept. We're lounged around the boys tour bus because Walter wanted everyone to brain storm ideas. Ray is so tired that he's just babbling out anything that pops into his head. So far he's mentioned a space ship, costume party, high school prom and something involving Roc dressed as a bunny. Thankfully, Yannie has covered his face with a pillow to shut him up.

"We'll Walter said he wants to add some footage of the fans. So why not keep it real and just show us having a little backyard party? I'm talking red cups, girls in bathing suits, Twerk contests, the whole turn up scene!" Roc suggest.

The video producer raises an eyebrow, "You know...I'm actually feelin that. The video is for pretty girl right? Lets just swarm y'all with a bunch of girls, and have four main girls for your love interest. Plus we need a fifth girl for Jacob Latimore's girl. So we're gonna have to start auditions like tomorrow."

"Man why can't we just use the girls we got right here? I mean whats the point of doing extra auditions when you got five pretty girls right here?" Ray mumbles from underneath the pillow that Yannie is still mashing over his face.

"True dat," Jacob adds in from where he's sitting on the ground with Joya resting against him.

Walter turns to look at us, "See I knew something intelligent would come out of Rays mouth eventually."

We laugh as Ray sucks his teeth. "Wait," London says, "Are you saying you're putting us in the video?"

Walter looks at the laptop screen again, "What do you think man? Should we use the ladies we have or introduce new faces. I mean the fans are already familiar with them, I think they would be excited to see them."

"I think it's a good idea and it saves us some time." The producer replies.

"So," Walter says, "Do you want to be in the video?"

Everyone turns to look at us and London nearly explodes from her seat. "YES, YES! I mean I dunno about them but I sure do."

"Of course we wanna be in the video." Renee says like its obvious.

Walter and Keisha laugh, "Then I guess it's final. We have our leading ladies."

I look over at London who is basically glowing with happiness. Then I look at Prince who doesnt know that the only reason London is so happy is because she sees it as her entrance to fame. I look at Prod who's staring at me, probably wondering why I'm not as ecstatic as the other girls. It's probably because everything that I've been trying to hold back is slowly forcing its way out from behind the wall I've built up.

I'm slowly cracking.

**
Sorry for errors :P

COMMENT COMMENT COMMENT: Do you have any sympathy for London?