Chapter 11

“We’re here!” I said. “No shit, Sherlock,” said Meg. “Shut up, anus girl,” I said. We liked to be mean to each other. We always called each other names and stuff. “Our car is suppost to be around here somewhere,” said Brian. “Great,” said Amber. “Another Yugo.” Everyone laughed. We quit laughing when a great big streach limo came to pick us up. The window rolled down and a man’s head came poking out. “Hey girls! Hey Brian. I see you made it here fine,” he said. “Well, don’t just stand there, James. Let them in!” I figured James was the choffeur, and he was. We all stepped inside the humongus vehicle. All of us had been in a limo before though, except Amy, because we sold magazines for our jr. high school. That was our prize. A limo ride and Pizza Hut. “Ladies,” said Brian. “I’d like you to meet Mr. Pearlman. Mr. Pearlman, this is Lia, Amber, Amy, Megan, and beside me here is Sara.” “Hello,” we all said. “Hello ladies. How are you all today?” Mr. Pearlman was a heavy set man, short too. He seemed really friendly, especially to us girls. I didn’t like the way he treated his driver though. It was like he was his slave. “Fine,” we all said. “Brian, here, tells me that you all sing real good. Is this true?” “That’s what he says anyway,” I said. “Don’t know if he’s lying though.” Brian and Mr. Pearlman laughed. “I guess were gonna find out.” Nobody said anything else on the way to the, get this, the recording studio! I guess he liked what he heard. When we got there, he asked James, acually he told James, to take us to his partner’s office. He worked in Florida. “Sara, Brian, can you guys stay here a sec?” So we did. What else did he think we’d do? Run away? “Brian, first off, thanks for giving me a chance with these girls. And Sara, thanks for those songs. You guys definalatly gotta sing those. I think you have real good songwriting potential.” “Wow, um, thanks, I guess,” I said. “No, thank you.” We went inside and went up to the tenth floor, the very top. “I’ve got room 22 reserved for you. Just sing a couple of songs that are there. There’s only two. I’ve got them marked with your names on them. I think those parts would work best with you voices,” he told us all. “Brian come with me. Girls, go in there.” We walked into this minature room with five microphones and five sheets of music. All of a sudden, we heard Mr. Pearlman’s voice. “Just start singing when you hear the music. You’ll have to sing em all a few times, so don’t worry if you mess up.” I had always had a secret desire to become a singer. I didn’t think I was good enough. I guess I was. At this point, I thought I might soon become a teen pop idol. Little did I know what would happen to me. We heard this ballad type music. Lia’s part was first. “Once I was a lonely child. Inocent and scared. Then you came along and told me, you would always be there.” Then Amy started singing, “You showed me love, you showed me life. Even through the pain and strife. And even then I knew.” We all started singing, “I needed you, to hold my hand. I needed you, to be the perfect man. I needed you, to show me that you cared. I needed you, to say that you’d always be there. I needed you. Just like I need you right now.” It was only then that I realized that it was the first song that I had ever written. I called it, “I Needed You.” I thought it was kind of cheesy when I wrote it. I guess it wasn’t. We had to sing it a couple of more times, “to get the feel of it” according to Mr. Pearlman. After about an hour, we had finally finished that song. Soon Mr. Pearlman’s voice said, “Ok, girls. That was great now on the next sheet, it has another song. It’s more upbeat. Just try it.” The music started to play. It had a great beat. We all started dancing to it. I knew by the words on the page, I wrote this one. I mostly wrote ballads though. I didn’t like this song very much. I had to start this one. To me it sounded really, really cheesy. I started to sing, “Boy, you are my baby. But it’s time to let you go. I’ve stuck around to long to say, I love you anymore. Just get out of my house, take your money and car. You’ve pushed your luck, way too far.” We continued to sing this song for two hours this time. I was relived when we got done. “Great job, ladies,” said Mr. Pearlman. “Yeah, great job guys,” said Brian. “We’d better be going.” “First we’ve gotta pick a name,” said Mr. Pearlman. “Yeah, that’d be smart.” We went to this little office. There was a round table which we all sat around. “Whose got an idea?” None of us said anything. “Well, I was afraid of this. So, I made up a list of suspectable names.” He handed us all a sheet of paper with a bunch of crappy names. They included: Black Cherries, Potporri, Sparkle, Rayna (which was the last letter of all our names, I thought that was taken), and other shitty names. Only one stood out to me. “I like the name 1500 for them,” said Brian. “But where do you get that?” “It’s like this. They all, except Amy, spent most of their lives in a town of 1500 people, right? And if you add all the hundreds between 100 and 500, see there’s 5 people, each is a hundred value, you get 1500.” “Where’s the calculator?” I asked. “Do you girls think that’s a good name?” asked Mr. Pearlman. This was the only ‘OK’ one. “It’s alright,” I said. “I like it,” said Lia. “Me too,” said Amy. “All in favor say yea,” I said. “Yea,” we all said. “It’s settled then. 1500 (pronounced fifteen hundred, NOT one-thousand five-hundred) is it. Great you can go now.” “Bye Mr. P,” I said. “See ya dude,” said Meg. “Bye,” said Lia, Amy, Amber, and Brian. We left in the same limo. We arrived at the airport, and walking inside I unsuspectidly fainted.

Cont.

Chapter 12