VIP: I'm With the Band

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  For my aspiring author little cousin, Haley Ingram

  Friday, February 19

  LOCATION: Home

  “I feel blue if I say ‘I love you’ and you falter.

  Why do you turn and walk away?

  My heart knew the moment that I saw you,

  That I need you like a fish needs water!”

  Zander Welling was singing to me! ME! I stared happily into his big blue eyes. The same eyes that were known to make girls hyperventilate and pass out at his concerts. Wow, that smile of his was mesmerizing, too.

  GAH, was I drooling?

  Drooling would ruin the moment. How often does the gorgeous lead singer of a boy band sing to you while you’re running along a beach together? Wait. What was he doing now? He just stopped singing, ran a hand through his curly brown hair, and said, “Mackenzie, will you—”

  “STOP DAYDREAMING!” My best friend Scarlet poked me hard in the cheek. “You heard the DJ! Perfect Storm ticket giveaway in five!”

  I can’t help it if I daydream about Perfect Storm. A lot. The latest was brought on by the results of the paper fortune teller our other best friend, Iris, made this morning. On my turn I learned:

  I’m marrying Zander Welling! YES!

  We’re having three kids! COOL!

  We’re going to live in Saint Lucia! (FYI: That’s my favorite Caribbean island. It’s also the only one Mom’s taken me to.) EXCELLENT!

  I’m going to be an orthodontist. Wait. WHAT?

  That last part had to be a mistake. Scarlet is the one who is going to be an orthodontist. She wants to invent a way for kids to benefit from braces without actually having to get braces, which sounds good to me. And I don’t even need braces.

  Everyone knows I’m going to be an artist. Not to brag, but my friends and our art teacher, Mr. Capozzi, say I’m the best artist in seventh grade at Brookside Middle School. I’m always doodling in my journal, on the chalkboard wall in my room, or in notebooks during class. Someday I’m going to have my own comic-book series called Mac Attack. I’ve already started working on the first issue. It’s about a girl rock band that fights crime between shows, and the lead singer is named Mac (named after me, Mackenzie). The girls wear matching sparkly silver tank tops and pink-and-green camouflage pants that look cool onstage but are comfy offstage for fighting crime.

  I haven’t shown my first issue to anyone yet. It’s TOP SECRET, but my friends have seen loads of other stuff I’ve drawn, like album art. That’s my other dream—to design album covers, and PS need one for their first full-length disc. Heath Holland, one of the band members, just tweeted that their album is going to drop early next year. This is what I came up with for them:

  Get it? A ship called the PS lost at sea in a massive storm? Look at those rain clouds I drew! Scarlet and Iris say Zander, Heath, and Kyle Beyer (Perfect Storm’s other member) are going to love it when I show it to them. There’s just one small problem:

  I have to meet them first.

  “I feel blue,” I sang out loud, thinking of my awesome Zander daydream again. (True PS fans know the lyrics even though the new song hasn’t been released yet. The guys put a sneak-peek clip online of them singing it.)

  “MAC!” Iris’s brown eyes were as wild as that banshee in the way-too-scary movie we watched the other night at our sleepover. Her strawberry blond hair looked like it had been in an electrical socket—probably because Iris had been pulling her hair out all day over these tickets. “We’re supposed to be listening for the call-in sign,” she said tightly. “Z100 is giving away only one more pair of tickets this afternoon, so stop distracting me!”

  Geez. This ticket business was getting to Iris. She was right, though. My Zander daydreams were for during social studies (the Revolutionary what?) or car rides with Mom when she was on one of those long work calls with a client who was having what she called “an identity crisis.”

  We had to win those Perfect Storm tickets for tomorrow night, because, to quote Scarlet:

  I’D RATHER LOSE MY PHONE FOREVER THAN MISS SEEING PERFECT STORM LIVE!

  Perfect Storm is worth losing your phone for. The guys in the band go together as perfectly as Nutella and frozen bananas.

  Zander Welling is dreamy, and we love his falsetto voice, but he’s also funny and a little quirky (he’s afraid of escalators). Plus, he’s got a big heart. He started the Wishing You Well charity, which grants private concerts for sick kids. Is that generous or what?

  Scarlet says Heath Holland is the cutest because he’s charming and has a killer smile like Thor (who is our favorite Avenger). But Heath’s superpower is pranks. PS’s rebel band member has dropped water balloons on his bandmates; drawn Sharpie mustaches on Mikey G., their super-intimidating bodyguard; and played practical jokes on fans with Nerf water guns.

  Kyle Beyer is… well, Kyle. We don’t know a lot about the Brit because he’s so quiet, but he’s cute, he plays guitar, and he’s in Perfect Storm. What’s not to love?

  Someday Perfect Storm is going to take over the world, but right now a lot of people still don’t know who they are. I feel sorry that those people have a Zanderless existence. They need to turn on Totally TV more often. Scarlet, Iris, and I love that channel because they play way more music videos than MTV. When Perfect Storm’s EP came out, the channel named PS one of their Totally Awesome Bands to Watch. We were hooked from the moment we saw Zander sing the first line of “I Could Love You Forever.” I guess other girls were, too, because the guys’ followers doubled in a week! Now their singles are playing on the Totally TV satellite radio station, and their YouTube channel is getting super popular thanks to some shout-outs from famous bands. According to Heath’s Twitter feed, the guys have already been booked to open at eight concerts this winter. Tomorrow they are doing one for Z100 called Song Slam on Long Island, and that’s what we’re trying to get tickets for.

  Since the nosebleed seats at Nassau Coliseum start at $250, and none of our parents were buying the “I will die if I am not at this show” argument, Iris, Scarlet, and I had turned my bedroom into a Perfect Storm command center to win tickets from the radio station.

  So far it wasn’t going very well.

  Today Z100 was giving away tickets every hour till six PM. We had missed the eleven AM through three PM giveaways, since we were in school. (Mom almost burst into flames when I suggested staying home to have more chances to win.) We ran home right after the last bell rang, but we lost the four and five PM slots. Next up was six o’clock, the final giveaway of the day, and WE WERE NOT GOING TO LOSE AGAIN!

  Iris had had her ear glued to the radio in my room for the last ten minutes. Scarlet had tweeted the band all day, saying we were three broke girls trying to win tickets (to make them feel bad and just give us some). And I was, um, daydreaming about Zander. But as soon as we heard the DJ tell people to call in, we sprang into action.

  “Dial! Dial! Dial!” Scarlet screamed, sounding like Coach Riley does when she yells at us for walking the track in gym instead of running.

  We hit our phones like our lives depended on it. I could tell Iris was nervous because she started to sing off-key, and Scarlet flipped out.

  “No singing!” Scarlet screeched as her finge
rs kept hitting the redial button on her bedazzled cell phone. That girl is lightning fast, which works out well for the school softball team (and hopefully radio contests). Scarlet is the ace first baseman on the team… or is that first base-girl? “Your voice is distracting!” Scarlet can be testy when she is feeling competitive.

  I looked at one of my Zander posters that decorate my bedroom walls like wallpaper. “Can you believe she talks to her best friends like that?” I asked poster-Zander. I talk to my PS posters a lot, which may sound weird, but that’s what happens when you’re an only child and your mom works at a big tour management firm in New York City. She used to go out on the road with some of the biggest bands in the world, but when she had me, she took a job that kept her closer to home. Technically. Mom still works a lot.

  “Mac, are you dialing or talking to Z. again?” Iris’s voice was tense, too. Her fingers pounded angrily on her phone as well, and I winced.

  “Yes, I’m…” I heard the busy signal stop and the phone begin to ring through. “It’s ringing!” The girls jumped up from their command posts—Scarlet on my bed, Iris in my beanbag chair, which was decorated with PS pillows we’d made.

  “I knew your lucky charms would work!” Iris sounded way happier than she had a minute ago.

  “Me too,” I said, because it was true. When some girl named Annalise Arnold from Hamilton, New Jersey, won the five o’clock pair instead of us, I knew we had to get in a PS frame of mind, the way Zander does before each show. He’s so into signs that he won’t allow anyone in green backstage! We decided to go all out because we needed Z100 to grant us TWO pairs of tickets instead of just the one, since there were three of us.

  MAC’S TOP FIVE* LUCKY CHARMS USED TO WIN PS TICKETS

  *Five is Zander’s favorite number.

  1. Paint yourself with body art like guys wear at football games. (Iris drew the letters PS on her right arm during the last hour and painted her face red. It was sort of horror-movie creepy and yet cool at the same time.)

  2. We also all changed into red from head to toe the minute we got home from school and painted our nails red. It’s Zander’s favorite color.

  3. Eat only PS’s favorite foods. I ran to 7-Eleven to buy Cheetos, Rice Krispies Treats, red Gatorade (Z.’s fave!), and carrots during one of the breaks.

  4. We also got superstitious and threw out my mom’s asparagus (sorry, Mom!). Z. hates green food, which is why we hid the guacamole and Mom’s gross kale chips and picked all the green M&M’S out of the M&M’S jar in the kitchen (I can’t reveal where they ended up).

  5. Speak with a British accent for two reasons: (a) Everyone sounds cooler with one and (b) Kyle is from London (although he speaks so little in videos that it’s hard to tell if he has an accent).

  We were cheering so loud I almost missed the DJ say, “We’ve got the hundredth caller on the line.”

  “SHHH,” I told the girls. Then I got ready to give my best radio voice, which I’d been practicing in my head (you have a lot of time to think when you’re in your room for hours).

  “Hey there!” the DJ said on the radio and on my phone. “Who am I speaking with?”

  I opened my mouth to answer, and the line went DEAD!

  NOOOOOOOOO!

  I screamed so loud, dogs on my block started barking. “They hung up on me!” I cried as some girl who claimed to be Zander’s future wife screamed on the radio as she won OUR tickets. “I was disconnected!”

  “NO!” Scarlet freaked out. “NO! NO! NO! I’m calling the station. They can’t do that to us! You were the hundredth caller!” Scarlet began redialing. Then I heard her say, all cranky, “customer service representative” to the automated service, getting mad like my mom does when she can’t get a real person on the line.

  Iris and I flopped down on my bed and stared at my ceiling, where a poster of the boys dressed in blue stared back at us sadly. “I can’t believe we’re not going.” Iris’s voice was wobbly.

  “Me either,” I croaked, and then we were both quiet for a bit (aside from Iris’s sniffling) while Scarlet kept yelling “CUSTOMER SERVICE REPRESENTATIVE!” into her phone.

  I noticed half of Iris’s red paint had rubbed off her face and onto my PS pillowcase. I was too depressed to care. “I really thought we were going to win today,” Iris whimpered.

  “I did, too. I already told everyone we were going, even though we didn’t have tickets yet,” I said.

  Scarlet collapsed on the bed next to us. “Z100 said I have no way of proving we were the hundredth caller. Let’s face it. We’re not going to the concert.” She threw her head back, and now the three of us were lying across my bed. We couldn’t even muster up the energy to sing along to “I Need You (Like a Fish Needs Water)” when it came on the radio a few minutes later.

  How would I ever show Zander the album cover I drew if we didn’t meet at the concert?

  I was so miserable that I didn’t hear the knock on my door at first.

  “Mac? Can you open up?”

  It was my mom. It took forever to take the ten steps to the door. When I opened it, Mom looked way happier than we did. And pretty, too, like she always does in her cool-mom jeans and a jacket with necklaces that aren’t the cheap kind from Claire’s. Mom gets mistaken for my babysitter all the time, which I secretly think she loves.

  “Why do you guys lock the bedroom door when no one is home?” she asked us.

  “Banshees,” the three of us said at the same time.

  Seriously, that banshee movie was scary.

  Mom leaned on my door. “You girls look pretty miserable for a Friday.”

  “We didn’t win Song Slam tickets, which means we won’t be seeing Perfect Storm live,” Iris told her, and then she burst into tears. Iris cries over commercials with babies and always at the movies, but this time her crying had meaning.

  “I know, I know, the tickets were expensive,” I huffed before Mom could say anything. Iris was crying hard now, and Scarlet, who is usually very Heath-like (i.e., acts tough), was hyperventilating and doing that stop-start crying thing. So of course I started to cry, too. I looked at Mom. SHE WAS LAUGHING AT US! I couldn’t believe my mom was so cruel.

  “Mom!” I cried angrily. “It’s not funny! I love PS more than I love to draw.” She stopped laughing. “Okay, not true, but they are a close second.”

  “I’m laughing because you’re crying over nothing,” Mom said. “If I had gotten home a few minutes earlier, I could have saved you girls a meltdown.” She pulled four tickets from her pocket and held them up like a crane game prize. “Want to take a guess what these are?”

  Scarlet and Iris practically ran me over to get to the door. I held my breath. Could it be?

  My mom held the tickets out of reach. “Stop crying, girls. You’re going to Song Slam!”

  We screamed so loud my mom held her ears. Cody, the husky next door, howled.

  “And these aren’t just any seats,” Mom said. “How does fifth row center PLUS backstage passes work for you three?”

  This time we screamed so loud I thought my windows would shatter.

  MY MOM IS THE COOLEST MOM EVER! I tackled her with a big hug. Scarlet and Iris joined me in making a Mom sandwich.

  “How did you get these?” I asked. “I thought you said no one at work could get them.”

  Her smile was sort of sneaky. “Rumor has it your band is getting so big they might wind up opening for Lemon Ade on her new tour.” My eyes widened. “A bunch of people from my firm are going to check them out. I guess you should get your red T-shirts ready,” Mom said.

  “How do you know about Zander’s birthday request?” I asked. That morning he had tweeted that everyone should wear red to the concert.

  “I know more about PS than you think I do,” she said cryptically.

  You know what? I didn’t care how she knew. All I cared about was that I WAS GOING TO MEET ZANDER WELLING!

  Saturday, February 20, 12:03 AM

  LOCATION: Home

&n
bsp; Who am I kidding? I can’t sleep.

  I’M MEETING ZANDER WELLING TODAY!

  I can’t decide which red shirt I am going to wear: the one I made on Tuesday with HAPPY BIRTHDAY, Z. written on a birthday cake or the one I drew of the band for art class.

  Or maybe I should wear the one I did of their next album cover as designed by moi.

  Decisions, decisions…

  The most important one: What am I going to say to Zander when I meet him?

  My opening line is key because I need those words to make Zander realize I am the only girl for him. Everything I’ve come up with, though, sounds lame (“It’s about time we met!”), dorky (“I need you like a PS fan needs water!”), or stalker/creepy (“I’m a perfect storm of a girl for you, Zander!”).

  You know who wouldn’t have trouble talking to Zander? My comic-book alter ego, Mac of the band Mac Attack. Comic-book Mac oozes confidence, while I leak nerves. If Mac Attack were going to the meet and greet instead of me, it would go something like this:

  Sigh. I wish I was more like her in real life.

  Saturday, February 20, 11:00 PM (Postconcert recap!)

  LOCATION: Home

  OH MY GOD, I STILL CAN’T BELIEVE WHAT HAPPENED TONIGHT!

  Our concert experience started out the usual way—with Iris bugging out—but it ended like a scene from a movie!

  “We’regoingtotouchZanderHeathandKyleandspeaktothem!” All of Iris’s sentences sounded like one long word as we made our way through security at Nassau Coliseum. Iris sounded crazy, but she looked great. Her strawberry blond hair was straightened for the occasion, and her tan face was shimmery thanks to this cool glittery moisturizer she bought during an emergency trip to the mall this morning.

  Scarlet had curled her black locks and used eyeliner to write “PS, We Love You” all over her right cheek and up and down her arms. Her face was flush, but it wasn’t from blush. I think she was stressed. She was breathing into a paper bag as we scanned our tickets at the door and walked to the concession stand.