AN A little story I started over the summer, I haven't gotten farther than this and I dunno if I will, this is actually more of an unfinished preview of Chapter 1. If you read it, please drop a review to tell me what you think - even if you hate it. If I do continue it, then it probably won't be until school gets out in June, maybe not even then. But lemme know, and I'll think about continuing it.

Chapter 1

The audience was on their feet, the sounds of their exuberant calls and clapping echoing throughout the theater. A young girl, standing in the arms of a slightly older boy, smiled radiantly from the stage as they took their final ovation. The curtain slowly closed in front of them, falling to hide them from the world and muffling the sounds from the seats. The curtain thumped onto the floor and the demeanors of both the girl and the boy changed.

“Ugh, I can’t believe you touched me!” The girl exclaimed, pushing away. In response, the boy could only yell to her retreating back as she headed for her dressing room; “Trust me, I didn’t enjoy it for a second!” And he headed towards his own dressing room.

Five minutes later the girl, seventeen-year-old Sarah Carmichael, was slamming through the backstage doors and heading to her dark red, 2005, four-door, ford-truck. Dressed in Green Cargos and a black tank top, she flung her stage bag into the passenger seat and pushed the key into the ignition. Starting up the engine and backing up, she cursed as she was cut off by a black sports car as it careened towards the exit.

“ASS HOLE” She screamed to the sports car, only to be rewarded with the middle finger of Michael Peters coming out of the window as he drove off. Muttering under her breath about insufferable, annoying acting partners and evil agents that force them to work together, she drove out of the theater stage parking lot and headed home.

Why was it that she, big time stage actress, had to be forced to work with a stuck up jerk like Michael Peters anyway? But for some reason crowds loved it. It was pointless, acting since she had been seven, Sarah had really made it big when she was thirteen, and had starred in a play production of “Annie”. Unfortunately, her next play had been Cinderella and she had had the pleasure of her first job working with Peters. Audiences had fallen in love with the pair of them on stage together and, as such, they had been forced to work together for four years, despite the deep hatred they had for each other. God she hated him!

Pulling into the driveway of the house she shared with her dad and younger brother, she shut off the engine and quietly made her way inside. It was only about ten o-clock, but she had a feeling that she would find her dad passed out drunk on the couch. She was right. It was odd, he was a great dad, came to all her opening night shows, showed up for all school functions, loved her dearly, never hit her or her brother, brought them home gifts for nothing, held a good job that supported them, and helped her with homework sometimes, yet he had this awful habit of getting drunk one or two nights a week and always passed out in front of the TV. Her mother was a different story altogether.

She had ditched them when Sarah was about six, her brother two. She took very little and moved halfway across the world. She lived in London now, a big interior designer over there, doing work for the Queen of England, and the French Prime Minister, and all sorts of other rich and famous people.

Sarah had a relatively good relation with both her parents; it was just hard having her family split. She sighed and draped a blanket across her fathers lean figure, turning off the TV and taking the bottle of wine and his glass to the kitchen. Heading to the staircase to make sure her brother was getting ready for bed or already asleep, she stopped to look at a few pictures on the mantle. There was one, from her first opening night. She had started acting just after her mother had left and had been signed onto her first big show about a year and a half later. Her mother had flown out from England to see her, and they looked like a family. She was in her costume, it was about ten minutes before show time, and was sitting on her fathers lap. Her mother sat next to him with a four-year-old Mark sitting and playing with one of the programs. They looked happy, that had always been her favorite picture.

Sighing again she slowly headed up the stairs, satisfied to her brother’s well-being when she peeked into his room to see him asleep, and into her room to get ready for bed. It had been the last showing of the play Beauty and the Beast at the theater and she had a few days off now, then on Saturday the whole group would get together and decide what play to do next, then they would start casting, then rehearsing and preparing set, and in two months they’d have a new show. Unfortunately that meant that she would have to work with Michael Peters even more, the only drawback to being a successful stage actress. Oh well, ‘you can’t get everything’; that had been her mantra since she was ten years old.

“Nugh…” A hand snaked out to turn off the blaring screeching of the alarm clock. Leaning up and allowing the covers to fall off her chest to rest on her stomach, Sarah rubbed a hand over her face and through her bangs. Leaning her head back to stare blankly at the ceiling, she giggled lightly as she heard her dad singing in the shower across the hall. It had been his morning habit for as long as she could remember, take a shower and sing “Goodbye My Coney Island Baby” at the top of his lungs so they could hear it as they woke up.

End Chapter

AN R&R