Cashmere taught me to do makeup the way she does it, but I’m not sure I did it right. I tell myself that I’m gonna do positive thinking. If I set myself up for failure it will happen!

I am repeating positive mantras I have read from fortune cookies and calenders when I sit in a very boring room to audition for a role as a backup singer in a play about another singer’s rise to fame.

The irony of it all.

I’m so wound up in myself that I almost don’t hear my name being called until the assistant gets my attention. He points at my sticker, a number on it to identify me, #47, and I shoot up from the waiting room couch. I’m about to leave but I turn around and get my guitar.

The other women in the room smirk and giggle, and they know, they know it is my first time here.

I am choking.

I am choking on nothing as I stand in front of a panel of four judges, all of them with notepads. They seem bored before I even start, and I then it sinks in that I am #47. 46 other people came before me. They’re probably ready to leave.

I’ll give them a reason to stay.

“What’s your name dear,” the first judge asks.

“Annabelle Lee,” I reply.

“Oh my god, that accent,” the second judge coos. “Where are you from?”

“Edelweiss. Just one state over.”

“Okay Miss Edelweiss, what are you singing for us today?”

“I’m singing Endless Possibilities.”

I start strumming my guitar, and just like Cashmere in her salon, I am a different me. The Annabelle on stage isn’t unsure of anything. She knows which chords to play and when, how to stay in key. Life will never make sense a hundreded percent of the time, but it does whenever I’m in front of a crowd.

This is my escape

I’m running through this world

And I’m not looking back!

The judge who loves my accent is tapping along to the beat, and the other three are smiling. I know I’ve got this performance in the bag.

But how will I know when

I get there?

And how will I know

When to leave?

The song is a lot different to play on acoustic than electric. I had to to edit out a few parts, and sadly take out the awesome guitar solo in the middle, but I wanted to choose this song so badly. The lyrics just seemed so right.

I see it, I see it, and now it’s all within my reach,

Endless possibility

I see it, I see it now, it’s always been inside of me,

And now I feel so free, endless possibility

I finish the song and the judges clap. I see a few notes written down and I don’t feel so nervous anymore. I’m told that after they see a few more people at the list they’ll make their decisions on roles.

I go back to the waiting room with all the women who smirked and laughed knowing that I will be the one looking down at them on stage a few months from now.

An hour later I am told that I do not get a role for any of the back up singers, and I am not an understudy, but that they “wish me the best”. Outside of the audition hall I try to hold back tears and clutch my phone close to my chest.

One of the judges from earlier passes by and stops to talk to me.

“Oh it’s you! You were wonderful,” she gushes. “I’m so sorry you get a part.”

“What did I do wrong? I thought I could sing at least decent.”

The judge looks around quickly and makes sure we’re alone. She motions for me to get close and speaks low.

“The director of the play wanted his daughter in it,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

I grit my teeth and my vision goes blurry as I start to cry. This stranger I have never met, with her nice perfume and fancy shawl holds me as I sob into her arms.

“This isn’t the first time darling and it won’t be the last. I’m so sorry,” she said.

“It ain’t gotta be like this. It don’t have to be,” I beg. “Isn’t there something you can do?”

She closed her eyes, sighs and then tsks. She reaches into her purse, takes out a card, and gave it to me.

“Tell him that Charlotte sent you. Don’t do anything you don’t want to do or aren’t prepared to have come bite you in the ass twenty years later,” she commands me. “Never tell a soul in the play’s production about this and if I ask for a favor later, you owe me.”

I nod, soak in ever word she tells me like it’s a new gospel. She walks off, heels click-clacking down the hall and I’m no longer crying.

I think about wanting to be her on my way home.

Once I get off the metro it’s already dark. I think about Charlie, and how he said he’d become famous before I did. I decided to give him a call and tell him I just got a golden ticket to the chocolate factory.

He doesn’t pick up until I call the second time, and when he does it’s loud in the background. There’s lots of shouting and music, and he takes a while to find a quiet spot to talk to me.

“Charlie, what are you doing? Where are you?”

“I’m at a party,” he laughed.

“Where at?”

“A friend brought me! It’s at some guy called uh… Kafe? Koiwe? Some DJ guy?”

I scream my head off and Charlie protests from the other side of line.

“Woman! Don’t do that!”

“How did you meet DJ KayFe? Is he as handsome as everyone says he is? Can I come?”

“How you gonna get to Las Estrellas when you out in Austere,” he asked.

He said Los Estrellas the way someone would say ‘laws and stars’. When I correct him he tells me I can’t know how to say the name of the town, because I don’t live there.

“Anyway, what you call me about Anne?”

My business card to the possibility of more auditions seems like nothing compared to Charlie rubbing shoulders with a DJ that sells out every show.

“Nothing. Just wanted to check in on you.”

I enter my apartment building and get into the old elevator that rattles the higher it goes. I listen to Charlie tell me about all he’s been up to while he’s been in Las Estrellas.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

We left Edelweiss at the same time, and yet somehow he seems so much closer to stardom than me.

The call dropped because I was in the elevator too long, but I didn’t call him back. I’m embarrassed. I shouldn’t be. I got out of the elevator, put the key into my lock and entered my empty apartment.

I was so proud of myself when I was able to get my own apartment.

I then realized I probably would be unable to put furniture in my apartment with how much rent took up and how much I made. I take off my shoes in my bedroom and collapse onto my “bed” which is just a pile of blankets.

I fall asleep while texting Nick again.