In The Stage Lights

Chapter 2

As we walked into the room my eyes were immediately drawn to the person who was laughing. It was a tall dude with bushy hair. He was standing with Lin who looked over at me and Jonathan.

Lin grinned even bigger somehow and waved us over. As we walked over I glanced around the room and saw a bunch of people talking.

"Cameron! Jonathan! C'mon over! This is Daveed. Daveed, this is Cameron and Jonathan." He nodded at the other guy that had been laughing. I smiled and held my hand out.

"Hey, how's it going?" I ask him.

"It's pretty good." He responded and took my hand shaking it excitedly. Jonathan smiled as well and also put his hand out. Daveed dropped my hand and took his.

They started talking about something that I didn't really care about and I looked around at the other people. I noticed a small table in the back that had a bunch of snacks and drinks on it. I spotted cookies on the table and grinned.

I turned back to Lin about to ask if I could go get some when he smiled and nodded, knowing exactly what I was about to ask. I smiled in thanks at him, gave him a small hug and quickly walked over to the table that was sitting by one of the windows.

I saw some sugar cookies grabbed one and stood there for a minute looking down at all of the people going about their day. As I watched the people I thought about what I was going to do about my apartment.

All of the sudden I felt an arm brush mine as someone reached for a cookie. I jumped about a mile off the ground. I looked around and saw a cute guy smiling apologetically at me.

"Hey, sorry about that." He said.

"Oh no, it was my fault. I was standing in front of the cookies, completely zoned out." I awkwardly laughed.

Neither of us said anything, we just stared at each other for what seemed like forever but was probably only about ten seconds before I heard Lin yell.

"I hear wedding bells!!!" We snapped out of it and he turned back to the cookies biting his lip slightly trying to choose one.

I turned to Lin and gave him a death glare. I walked over eating the rest of my cookie.

"Hey Lin, who am I reading for?" I asked him, Daveed and Jonathan had walked off somewhere, probably talking about baseball.

"Wait, I didn't tell you?" I shake my head and he leads me over to a smaller table by the door that I hadn't noticed. He looks through a small pile of packets before finding the one he had been looking for. 

He held it out for me and on the front page it read: Peggy Schuyler / Maria Reynolds. I looked up at him and smiled knowing I had helped write parts of Say No To This. As I flipped through the packet, two people with curly hair walked in.

"Hey everybody lets pull some chairs up in a circle and do some quick warm ups and introductions before starting shall we?"

Lin whispered to me as we walked over.

"That's Alex Lacamoire, he's our musical director." He nods at the one on the right. "The other is Thomas Kail, our director." I nodded and grabbed a chair that I pulled up between Lin and Jonathan.

"Hey guys! We're going to start with some warm ups and introductions. Alex, do you want to start the warmups?" Thomas says, getting everyone's attention.

"Ok!! Everyone sounds pretty good, everyone feel warmed up?" Alex asks once we finish. We all nodded laughing a little. "Great! Alright, lets do a quick round of introductions. We'll say name, who you are playing, and one fun fact about yourself, hm? I'll go first. So for those of you who don't know I'm Alex, I'm the musical director and uh I am a little deaf so you might need to speak up at points!" He said very excitedly, way too energetic for it only being nine in the morning.

He looks to his right which was Daveed.

"Hey everyone I'm Daveed, I play Lafayette and Jefferson, and uh I went to Brown."

The girl next to him started talking. "Hey there! I'm Phillipa, I'm going to play Eliza and I know how to play the piano!" She grinned and looked over at the next person. I think I'm going to like her

"Hey I'm Anthony, I play Laurens and Philip, and before this I was a preschool teacher."

"Hi! I'm Ariana. I'm in the ensemble and I was on So You Think You Can Dance."

"Hey guys! I think everyone here knows me, but I'm Lin, I play Alexander Hamilton and I love Rent!" He looked over at me and I sighed.

"Hey everyone I'm Cameron, I'm not actually playing anyone, Lin called me about an hour ago and practically begged me to come and just read a part today." I glared at him then looked around as everyone chuckled.  "So yeah I'm reading for Peggy Schuyler and Maria Reynolds and I have German Shepherd named Noor." I finish awkwardly and look to Jonathan to save me.

Jonathan laughed loudly and started to introduce himself as I look around at everyone, trying to remember the people who had already introduced themselves. I noticed the guy that had scared me earlier smiling slightly at me. I smiled back and turned to listen to Jonathan finish introducing himself.

"And I love dogs!" He smiled as the next person started talking.

Lin leaned over and whispered to me. "Someones in love." I looked over at him and just gave him a look.  He laughed slightly and whispered again. "Don't say I didn't say so."

I glare at him again and try to pay attention again.

"And I started ballet when I was four." One of the girls was saying.

"I'm Thayne. I'm in the ensemble and I play Samuel Seabury and I love cookies!" The guy that had scared me said and smiled. A couple more people went but I wasn't able to pay attention, I was too busy thinking about Thayne.

"Alright so that's everyone." I was jolted from my thoughts when Alex started speaking again. "Lets just run through the songs. We'll talk about everything afterwards, but lets try to just run through it and see how it goes. Ok? Ok great lets go." He pointed at someone, who I vaguely remember him saying that his name was Leslie, to start.

I was pretty much finished with the first act after Satisfied, so I doodle on the pages before realizing that this might not be my book and erasing them.

We get a short break after the first act before jumping straight back into the second.  I hear Leslie start singing Say No To This and glance at Lin. Jonathan nudges me excitedly and I smile at him before starting to sing.

I look around as we finish and everyone is staring in shock. I laugh lightly and they start The Room Where It Happens.

After the last song Alex and Thomas gave everyone a couple of pointers and told them when they would meet next for the next run through and what to expect. I think they were going to start choreographing it as well but I wasn't really paying attention.

Everyone started to stand up and put the chairs away so I followed suit while talking to Jonathan. He brought up the fact that he was looking for someplace to live.

"Wait really?" I checked with him as we walked out of the building.

"Yeah, why?" He chuckled.

"My building isn't letting me stay anymore because of Noor. I only have like two weeks to find some place to live that allows pets and that I can afford." I tell him. He thinks for a second then his face breaks into a grin.

"We should move in with each other!" I look skeptically at him. "Yeah! That way we can split the rent, AND I can hang out with a dog all day every day!" He says trying to convince me.

"That sounds like a win-win for you... but that also means that rent'll be less." I contemplate it.

"C'mon It'll be great!" He tries to convince me. I look over at him as we wait for the light to change so we can cross the street.

"Oh alright." I grin and he hugs me excitedly. "Hey, you wanna come say hi to Noor?" I ask him.

"How is that even a question?" He laughs.

A/N: edited :)  fun fact! all of the fun facts are actually true, i'm going to try and keep the story as realistic and true to the actors as possible. please don't be a silent reader! your comments make my day

-Jazz