A Dream Come True

This short story was written by Kristy.

The lights were flashing. The beginning of the song was being played. I could hear people yelling for us.

My first concert.

I glanced over at my bandmates, Alyssa and Katie. They look as nervous as me. This was our dream. And we were living it.

We didn't start out like this, though. We didn't start as a 'talented group' with a manager and a record deal. We started out as 3 teenage girls who happened to be best friends. We all loved singing, and one of us, Katie, had the idea of forming a girl group. I remember that day very vividly...

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

"You know what, Jess?" Katie asked me.

"Huh?" I said, looking up from the magazine I had been reading.

"We should start a girl group! You, me, and Lyssa, when she gets here!"

"Uh huh, sure, whatever," I said, looking back to my magazine.

"JESSYCA! The 3 of us always sing together! It would be SO cool!"

I could tell she was going to keep bugging me if I didn't say yes, so I agreed.

Then it hit me what she had just said. A group! A singing group! Like my all-time dream!

"OH MY GOD! Katie this is gonna be so cool! I can't wait till Lyssa gets here!"

Amazingly, the doorbell rang that second. Katie and I ran to answer the door. Sure enough, it was Alyssa.

"Hey Lyss! Guess what?" I greeted her cheerfully.

"We're starting a girl group! Wanna join?" Katie supplied.

"Sure!" Lyssa answered.

Then we all started jumping up and down screaming. Of course, we WERE 14 at the time. Well, Katie and I were 14 and Alyssa was 13...but I'm not going to get into that. A half hour later, we were trying to think of a name for our group. We had lots of good ideas, but nothing just clicked. I glanced around the family room, trying to get some ideas. Then I saw the fireplace. Bingo!

"I got it!" I yelled.

"What?" they asked.

"Flame!"

"Oh my god, that's perfect!" Katie exclaimed.

"Let's use it!" Lyssa said.

"Ok, so we have a group, we have our name...now all we need is to actually sing!" I said.

"Umm, that might be a good idea," Alyssa said.

"Yeah, it would be," Katie agreed.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

So we went from there. Alyssa and I were the writers of the group, so we wrote most of the songs. We co-wrote some, and for the others either I would write both the lyrics and music, or Lyss would write the lyrics and I would write the music. We taught ourselves how to harmonize. At one point, we had been told we were good, but it wasn't coming together for us yet. We made a demo tape and sent it to a few record companies, but we weren't expecting to get a response. One night, when I was 15, the phone rang. It turned out to be the president of one of the major record companies we had sent a demo to. They wanted to sign us. I started crying, screaming, jumping up and down, and hyperventilating, all at once. I called Katie and Alyssa on three-way, and we screamed together for hours. Our dream was starting to become reality.

We met with the record company executives the next day in San Francisco. They wanted to see us perform before they finalized the deal, so we did a little mini-concert. We did 3 songs, 2 fast and 1 slow. When we were done, we were applauded by everyone in the area. The execs were impressed. They said our singing and harmonies were perfect, our dances (which were choreographed by us since we had no one else to do it) were clean and well-practiced, and that we had good stage presence and audience involvement. We sat down with the paperwork, and an hour later, we had a record deal.

They got us a manager, a professional choreographer, etc. We did little performances at clubs and other places to get people that would buy our album when it came out. A few months after we had been signed, we started recording. It was our first time recording somewhere other than in my room with my less-than-professional stereo equipment, so we were really pysched. We spent 3 long months recording 13 songs. We released a single as soon as we were done recording it. It immediately became very popular. Our album went gold right after it was released. We were on our way.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

About a month ago, we were asked to be the opening act for a major group on a world tour. Of course we accepted, so here we are, almost 3 years after we started the group. This was the first show of the tour, and it was being held in a huge, sold-out arena in New York City. We were doing 5 songs, and were going to be on in a couple of seconds. We heard our cue and ran onstage. I saw all the people, and the most amazing adrenaline rush came over me. I suddenly felt like I could do anything in the world. I started singing our first song, and the nervousness started to fade. It was replaced by pure energy. We finished our first song and the people cheered.

"Hello NYC!" Katie yelled.

The crowd responded with yelling.

"How's everyone doin tonight?" Alyssa yelled. I could tell she was just as into this as me.

The crowd cheered again.

"Well, in case you haven't figured it out, we are Flame!" I paused while the audience cheered for us. "My name is Jessyca Andrews, and I'll be 17 years old in 2 days!"

"I'm Alyssa McAdams, and I'm 16!"

"And my name is Katie Jordan and I'm 17!"

"We're gonna slow things down now and sing a song off our album called 'How Can I Make You Mine'," I said.

We sung each of our songs, and had the best performance of our lives. The rush of being onstage in front of 19,000 people made us act totally crazy - and the audience loved it. When we came backstage after we were done, everyone was telling us we'd had a great performance. As I changed out of my stage clothes, I was thinking to myself. It was amazing how good life could be sometimes. And you know why? This was our dream, and it was a dream come true.

E-mail Me: