"Come on in guys" he said as the five walked in and I sat there and covered my head in my hands. This was unbelievable here I was, I got the greatest opportunity to be a dancer and performing but NEVER did it cross my mind that I would be sitting there with my husband and my other 4 friends right there meeting me as one of the dancers.
Lance, Justin, JC, and Chris were talking with the choreographer for a moment while Joey approached me.
"Jen? Is that you?" He asked.
"Yea, why does it have to be you five. I can't believe this." I said finally lifting my head up. Joey helped me up from the floor and we walked to a doorway in the back of the room where I could hide momentarily.
"What are you doing here?" He asked.
"Well like 3 weeks ago I started dancing again. Oh incase you didn't know I've danced for like 14 years, anyways. My teacher told us about this and I thought it would be something fun to do, just temporarily since I don't have to be around Tristan all the time now. Lance obviously didn't see me yet which is good."
"Why?" He asked.
"Well I didn't exactly have plans for you five to be here. I mean since when are you having dancers?"
"We wanted to try something new out this tour."
"Hey Joey what are you doing back here?" Chris said as he walked to the door. "Jen, what are you doing here?"
"Shh... Be quiet. Lance has no idea I did this. And to think I thought the worse thing that could come from this would be getting stuck on the backstreet boys tour or something."
"Well no, we wanted to get dancers this tour because we've got more of a stage to fill up this year. I'm sure he'll be happy for you, I mean how ironic is this?" He joked.
"Hey guys come up here." JC shouted from the front of the room.
"Just a second, can you guys come back he for a second, or just Lance or whatever." Joey asked.
The three came back quickly.
"What?" Lance asked.
"How many girls are up there?"
"Umm 4. Wait shouldn't there be 5?" He asked.
"Well we've got number 5, but who would be the most ironic person for you to have here today?"
"I don't know, who?"
Joey grabbed my hand and pulled me out from behind the doorway.
"Ta da" I said popping out.
"Jen, what are you doing here?" He asked.
"Looks like I'm one of your dancers." I said innocently.
"Why didn't you tell me you were auditioning?"
"Well because I wasn't sure I'd make it and I thought what if it was like for backstreet or something, I just wanted to wait and see what happened and well here I am."
"This is great honey. You know what that means? We can be together this tour instead of missing the like 3 months apart. And you get to bring Tristan along too."
"So you're cool with this then?"
"Of course, I'm glad. Well I know who my partner is on stage."
"Listen we gotta go talk to the others up front for awhile." Justin chimed in.
We all walked up there Lance walked with his arm around me the whole way back.
"Oh good, you met one of the dancers already." Darren.
"Well actually she's my wife." Lance said.
"Huh? Oh yea I never even realized who you were. I remember seeing you on TRL awhile ago when you 2 got engaged, and when I've worked with the guys before I've heard your name mentioned a few times. And you two have a kid right?"
"Yea, he's growing up pretty fast. He's already 1." I said.
"Well you obviously know we didn't have biast judging here today. I'm really glad this works out this well for you two. You've really got great talent, what's your name by the way?"
"Oh thank you so much. I'm Jen."
"Well Jen, we're glad to have you aboard. Now the rest of you girls take a moment to introduce yourself to everyone. How about you number 14 and then we'll go around the room and we'll come back to you Jen."
"All right well my name is Terri, I'm 18, originally from PA but I' moved down to Florida this past year to go to college. I've danced since I was 6 but my real passion is singing and I hope to go somewhere with that eventually."
"My name is Sandra. I'm 25 and I've got a major in drama and the arts and I currently am involved in several things at Unniversal."
"Ok, I'm Mandy , I'm 20. I'm originally from California but I moved down here just 2 years ago with my family and I'm studying to become a lawyer.
"Hi, I'm Steph. I'm 23 and I'm a travel agent. I'm married to my high school sweetheart, Barry and I love dancing in my spare time."
"Ok I guess it's my turn. Well I'm Jen, originally from Maryland but I moved down here almost 2 years ago. I've danced since age 3. I've been married for about a year and a half to my man right here. We have a little boy named Tristan who recently turned 1 and I just love doing whatever and having a great time. When I go back to school I plan to major in Business and minor in dance."
"All right good, well it's still early in the day how about we go through some of the numbers you'll be doing. The first one we already worked with during the audition so that's our best place to start. Let's go through "bye bye bye" once again together then I want the 5 of you girls to do it once, then the guys, then all together again. So everybody up here on the floor." Darren said as we all hit center stage and ran through the dance together then he had just me and the other four go through it which I thought was going to be kinda embarassing considering the audience but I just ignored them and had a blast. Once we had that covered well enough he sat us all down again.
"Ok this has been a busy first day and now basically everyday. Is that going to be ok with all of you?" He asked giving people the opportunity to back out now.
"Yea I'm sorry but I won't be able too. I didn't realize this audition would be so time consuming." Sandra said.
"All right well then we need to get a replacement."
"Excuse me" I said raising my hand like a third grader "I have a really good friend of mine who is an excellent dancer. We've danced practically our whole lives together, if you're interested." I suggested.
"Works for me, if you think she's willing to put her time into it and can really work at this pace. How old is she by the way?"
"She's 18 and I know she'd love to do it and give 110% effort."
"Ok, well could you make arrangements with her tonight and tell her about rehearsal tomorrow morning at 11 am?"
"Sure thing."
"Jen, who are you talking about?" JC asked.
"Alana, is that ok with you guys?"
"Yea" Justin, Lance, Joey, and JC agreed.
"Oh not her. She'll bug us to death about her 'true love' whoever it is that week."
"Chris, give her a chance, you two are still friends. Plus remember she'd gladly kick your ass anyday. So it's settled Alana will be here tomorrow."
"Great" Darren said. "Now one aspect we're going to have to go over with you girls is creativity, helping your peers, and incorporating your own style into this dancing. So this may seem like a rough assignment tonight but you're considered professionals now. I want you to go home and take 3 songs for you to perform solo and I know that you haven't really worked much with the more ballet/lyrical dancing in this audition but I want 1 piece to be slow. Also you need to bring ready 1 act to teach to the others and be prepared to present tomorrow. I've got great confidence you can all pull this off. That's all."
Everyone picked up their water bottles and bags and left immediately. I hung around awhile waiting for Lance and the guys to finish up there little meeting with Darren. I was just going to get Lance to just drive home in my car to save himself an extra step. During that time I was able to start contemplating some songs I might wanna work with and some moves. I couldn't think with them talking so I went to an adjoining dance room with a mirror and wooden floors, identical to the main room just half the size. I filed through my CDs that I brought along to listen in the car on the way here.