Read Online Center Stage! (Center Stage! #1) by Caitlyn Duffy - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Caitlyn Duffy
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there.”
Lee slapped the cafeteria table with the palm of his hand. “The field trip tomorrow is off. We have work to do. We need to get a fan club website built, and some posters made, pronto. Who’s in?”
The next day, Lee commandeered a bunch of kids to come over to my house and start what he referred to as my “PR campaign.”
“Pictures. I need pictures of Allison going all the way back to when she was a baby,” Lee ordered my mother. He looked around our living room, presumably for photo albums. “And family movies, if you have any.”
“We’ve got plenty of those,” Dad proudly stated. He traveled off down the hall to pull out the box of digital camcorder tapes from when Todd and I were little, before he had the kind of video camera with a built-in memory card.
“Oh cool, these are totally vintage!” Lee exclaimed when my dad returned with the shoebox full of tapes. “Can I take these home? I’ll transfer them all to DVD for you.”
“Sure,” Dad shrugged. “Just be careful with them; they’re Richard Burch masterpieces, and I don’t have any backup copies.”
“Do you still have the camera that shoots on these? Could I borrow it? I’m a filmmaker,” Lee rambled.
“What do you need all of that stuff for, Lee? The production crew is going to shoot an introduction for me to use on the show,” I reminded him. My dad padded back down the hall to dig the old video camera out of the closet in my parents’ bedroom. He seemed pretty thrilled that a kid my age was taking such an interest in his ancient, amateur moviemaking equipment.
“Your website is going to need a bio, and news agencies will want footage of you to use as B-roll during interviews with you. Trust me on this,” Lee told me.
Lee transformed our patio into a poster production center. I cringed as spilled glitter gently drifted on the wind into our in-ground pool and over to our neighbors’ lawns. Lee’s younger sister, Laura, had accompanied him. She was a veritable hand-lettering wizard. She and one of her eighth-grader friends prepared no fewer than thirty posters on pink poster board. Lee instructed them to leave space at the bottom of each one so that I could add directions on how to vote for me as soon as I knew how the show would structure voting that season.
Kaela sat in one of our deck chairs with her iPad and set up a new Twitter account, a Friendbook fan page, and a very simple website. When she showed me all of her progress, I was thankful but wanted to scream because she’d used my sophomore yearbook picture essentially as a publicity photo. Somehow I’d always known that lousy photo would ruin my life because the day it was taken I’d overslept and forgotten that it was picture day at school. My hair was greasy; I hadn’t had time to put on makeup. “It looks great,” I lied to her.
Nicole came over after her shift at Robek’s, and Dad grilled veggie burgers and tofu dogs for everyone. “It’s very sweet of you to come over in support of Allison like this,” Mom told my friends as we all chowed down.
“This is an enormous opportunity,” Lee informed my mom as if she perhaps was unaware that starring on a television show was a big deal. “Allison’s going to be very famous. I hope you and Mr. Burch are prepared for all of the responsibilities of being showbiz parents.”
All of the activities made me dizzy and seemed presumptuous considering that the show hadn’t even started taping yet. I was going to be embarrassed if, for some reason, the show didn’t materialize, or if I got kicked off in one of the first few weeks. “It’s too bad Taylor Beauforte can’t be here,” Colton mused in between bites of food. “She’s gotta be so excited for you.”
No one knew about my fight with Taylor over the summer except Nicole because I was pretty sure no one kept in touch with her other than me. To all of my other friends, Taylor was a distant memory of a girl we’d known in middle school.
Lee slapped the cafeteria table with the palm of his hand. “The field trip tomorrow is off. We have work to do. We need to get a fan club website built, and some posters made, pronto. Who’s in?”
The next day, Lee commandeered a bunch of kids to come over to my house and start what he referred to as my “PR campaign.”
“Pictures. I need pictures of Allison going all the way back to when she was a baby,” Lee ordered my mother. He looked around our living room, presumably for photo albums. “And family movies, if you have any.”
“We’ve got plenty of those,” Dad proudly stated. He traveled off down the hall to pull out the box of digital camcorder tapes from when Todd and I were little, before he had the kind of video camera with a built-in memory card.
“Oh cool, these are totally vintage!” Lee exclaimed when my dad returned with the shoebox full of tapes. “Can I take these home? I’ll transfer them all to DVD for you.”
“Sure,” Dad shrugged. “Just be careful with them; they’re Richard Burch masterpieces, and I don’t have any backup copies.”
“Do you still have the camera that shoots on these? Could I borrow it? I’m a filmmaker,” Lee rambled.
“What do you need all of that stuff for, Lee? The production crew is going to shoot an introduction for me to use on the show,” I reminded him. My dad padded back down the hall to dig the old video camera out of the closet in my parents’ bedroom. He seemed pretty thrilled that a kid my age was taking such an interest in his ancient, amateur moviemaking equipment.
“Your website is going to need a bio, and news agencies will want footage of you to use as B-roll during interviews with you. Trust me on this,” Lee told me.
Lee transformed our patio into a poster production center. I cringed as spilled glitter gently drifted on the wind into our in-ground pool and over to our neighbors’ lawns. Lee’s younger sister, Laura, had accompanied him. She was a veritable hand-lettering wizard. She and one of her eighth-grader friends prepared no fewer than thirty posters on pink poster board. Lee instructed them to leave space at the bottom of each one so that I could add directions on how to vote for me as soon as I knew how the show would structure voting that season.
Kaela sat in one of our deck chairs with her iPad and set up a new Twitter account, a Friendbook fan page, and a very simple website. When she showed me all of her progress, I was thankful but wanted to scream because she’d used my sophomore yearbook picture essentially as a publicity photo. Somehow I’d always known that lousy photo would ruin my life because the day it was taken I’d overslept and forgotten that it was picture day at school. My hair was greasy; I hadn’t had time to put on makeup. “It looks great,” I lied to her.
Nicole came over after her shift at Robek’s, and Dad grilled veggie burgers and tofu dogs for everyone. “It’s very sweet of you to come over in support of Allison like this,” Mom told my friends as we all chowed down.
“This is an enormous opportunity,” Lee informed my mom as if she perhaps was unaware that starring on a television show was a big deal. “Allison’s going to be very famous. I hope you and Mr. Burch are prepared for all of the responsibilities of being showbiz parents.”
All of the activities made me dizzy and seemed presumptuous considering that the show hadn’t even started taping yet. I was going to be embarrassed if, for some reason, the show didn’t materialize, or if I got kicked off in one of the first few weeks. “It’s too bad Taylor Beauforte can’t be here,” Colton mused in between bites of food. “She’s gotta be so excited for you.”
No one knew about my fight with Taylor over the summer except Nicole because I was pretty sure no one kept in touch with her other than me. To all of my other friends, Taylor was a distant memory of a girl we’d known in middle school.
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