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As I rode the city bus to my audition then got off and walked to my destination, I tried to recapture the confident spirit from yesterday morning before breakfast. I’d anticipated walking into that audition with my head held high, shoulders back, heart steady and even. Instead, I almost tiptoed my way down the sidewalk, and my voice shook as I gave the receptionist my name.
Now, sitting in the waiting room, I checked out the competition (holy shit—shewas auditioning?), dreading the calling of my name. Everyone looked like they belonged there. And me? I felt more than ever like I was in a world I was not supposed to be in, a world I did not deserve to be in.
The director’s assistant peeked her head out of the audition room and I sighed in relief when my name wasn’t the one called. The woman next to me stood, followed after the assistant, and closed the door behind her. I say relief but that doesn’t mean that my heart was beating any less frenetically as I stared at the closed door, knowing exactly what was behind it: my one chance, my future, my potential for a new life. My career, my fame, my success.
My. One. Chance.
What the hell had I been thinking? I couldn’t do this. There was no way in the world that I was going to get his part. No way. It was laughable. And I would have laughed right there in that waiting room if I wasn’t busy trying to keep myself from throwing up.
I had to get out of there. This was a mistake. I wasn’t ready. I had to go. Hurriedly, I stood and grabbed my purse. I was out of the waiting room and rushing down the hallway in seconds. I shoved open the front door of the building and I was halfway down the stairs when I saw Ellis and Cade on the sidewalk.
“What are you doing here?” I said, freezing on the stairs and staring in surprise down at them.
They looked up at me in just as much surprise. Ellis recovered first. In a plain white tee and jeans, he crossed his arms, jutting his chin up toward me.
“I think the better question is, ‘What areyoudoing here?’”
“Me?” I said incredulously, pointing to my chest.
“Yes, you,” Cade, wearing sweats and his shirt from the day before, looked over my shoulder. “Shouldn’t you be in there?”
“I was just—”
My train of thought was lost when Jamie came running up in nothing more than his boxers. Bare feet, no shirt, no pants. Just the boxers he’d stripped off before bed the night before.
“Finally found parking in this godforsaken, fucking city!” he shouted at Cade and Ellis. “Let’s get inside and— Oh. Tess, what are you doing here?”
“Why aren’t you wearing clothes?” I asked instead, ignoring his question.
“We were in hurry to get here once we found your note,” Jamie explained, somewhat out of breath.
“But…” I glanced at Ellis and Cade, who somehow both managed to be fully clothed.
“Are you done with your show? Is she done with her show?” Jamie turned to ask Ellis and Cade.
“Audition,” Cade clarified. “And we don’t know. Tessa?”
“Ellis and Cade have clothes on,” I said, pointing to each of them as proof.
“Tessa,” Ellis growled.
“I mean, how long does it take to put pants on? Like, ten or so seconds? And a shirt?” I fidgeted, shifting side to side on the stair above them. “Seven? Eight seconds?”
Jamie added the final, “Tessa.”
That was the “Tessa” that broke the camel’s back. And I was the stupid, scared camel.
“I can’t do it,” I wailed. I sank to the stairs and buried my head in my hands, rocking back and forth as I went into full blown panic mode, complete with plenty of tears and a heavy dose of choked breathing.
“Everything is riding on this,” I cried, voice muffled behind my wet hands. “I mean, my whole future could change with this one audition. I have the chance for a new life, and who knows if I’ll ever get another one like this. If I don’t nail this nothing will change. Nothing at all.”
“So?”
I was probably only about a tenth of the way through my dramatic, emotional, Oscar-worthy speech, but the single word stopped me in my tracks.
“Huh?”
