Don't Stop The Music

- nineteen part two -

CHAPTER XIX (2)

- the performance -

"Hello, everyone," Liam heard Jason say from behind the curtain: a little uncertain, but otherwise remarkably collected for such short notice. "Thanks for waiting. I'd like to introduce the performance Musical Theatre club will be doing tonight..."

Esther arrived a couple of seconds into the introduction. She looked a little annoyed and a little distracted, Liam noticed, until she noticed the cast gathered in the backstage area milling around, drilling each other last-minute on their lines and snapped out of it. "Liam, Mackenzie, get ready," she said, grabbing the script from under the stool she was sitting on. "You're on as soon as he walks off the stage."

Liam nodded, humming his harmonies underneath his breath impatiently. All of this stress about CC had gotten the rest of the cast into a subdued kind of mood; he could feel the atmosphere drop slightly. He was on first, so he couldn't afford to get sucked into that spiral; he needed to be in the zone, ready.

He could feel that rush rising now, his feet already feeling the choreography that had been drilled into him over the past three months. He couldn't stand waiting: out there was where he wanted to be, on the stage, reliving that thrill he'd got the first time he'd performed on that stage, auditioning for CC; and then again with Fives, under the ground in a bicycle shed, on a bandstand in the park...

"Stop moving around so much, Liam; you're putting me off," Mackenzie said, a little haughtily.

"Gotta get in the zone," Liam said, keeping his voice low. "Get my head in the game."

She rolled her eyes. "This is hardly the time for quoting High School Musical."

"To be honest, I can't think of a better time. Don't want it to be like that practise session all over again."

She grinned. "That was mostly your fault."

"What? You tripped me."

"Trust me; I was doing everyone a favour."

"I can't believe you just said that."

Esther shushed them. "Can we not do this right now, guys? I kinda can't hear."

Mackenzie sighed patiently, pulling her blonde hair out of its ponytail and retying it up for the fiftieth time. "Just don't screw it up."

"You don't screw it up."

She poked her tongue out at him, and then grinned. "For the record, I'd much rather do this with you than Jesse." She pulled a face and held up her hands. "Sweaty palms. That guy's like a –"

She stopped talking abruptly, gripping Liam's shoulder so hard he winced in pain.

"What the heck is up with you?" he hissed, but she shushed him and pointed onto the stage, where a short familiar figure was making its way onto the platform. He heard Jason trail off, then mutter: "Oh – CC, you made it..."

The other performers must have heard, because they'd soon gathered round the gap in the curtain to look, crushing him slightly against Mackenzie. In the glare of the spotlight CC looked off; slightly out of it, like he'd just woken up from a nap. Jason handed him the mic and he just sort of stared at it for a second like he had no idea how to use it.

"Hey, CC, you alright?" Jason said, too quiet for the audience to hear, but if you leaned forwards you could just about catch the words from backstage.

CC's response was quieter. "I...don't really know what to say."

Jason grinned and clapped him on the back. "It doesn't matter. The important thing is that you showed up."