An Enexpected Assignment: Part 01
One afternoon in March, I was sitting in my Business Pathways Class at Waiakea High School in Hilo, Hawaii writing a note to one of my friends. (author's note: The Business Pathways class was a class designed to teach students about the different businesses and the way they work through guest speakers, excercises, and internships. It was the of the School-to-Work program, which prepared students to enter the work field.) I looked up as Miss Nishimura, the School-to-Work coordinator for my class, entered the room. She walked over to me and sat down in the empty seat to my right.
"I was looking at the list that we made at the beginning of the semester of fields that you would like to enter for your internship and in the future," she said, "And I noticed that you had said that you wanted to do something that dealt with music for your career shadowing. I was able to get in contact with someone in the industry and arranged for you to shadow a music group tomorrow, which is Satuday. Will you be able to make it?"
"Oh, cool," I said, "Um..yeah. I can make it."
"It's at ten o'clock tomorrow morning until whatever time you want to leave," said Miss Nishimura, "At the Naniloa Hotel. I'll meet you in the lobby and take you up to the room where you're going to meet the people you'll be shadowing."
"Okay," I said, "Thanks."
That night, when I got home, I told my parents where I was going to be going the next day.
"Do you want me to take you?" my mom asked.
"No," I said, "I can take myself."
"Are you sure?" asked Mom.
"Yes, I'm sure," I said.
"Okay," Mom said. She looked uncertain. My parents had always been the over-protective type anyway.The next day, I got up at seven o'clock, which was strange for me since I usually got up at about noon on Saturdays. After breakfast, I got ready to go. I changed into jeans and a tee shirt, my normal "uniform" and pulled my longish dark brown hair into a ponytail.
"I'm going!" I called to my parents, as I headed downstairs.
"Bye!" Dad called.
"Be careful!" called Mom. It never failed. Everytime I took the car out myself, she had to tell me to be careful.
I got into the car and tossed my backpack onto the seat next to me. It took me about fifteen minutes to get to the Hawaii Naniloa Hotel, which was on the other side of town practically, and then another ten minutes to find parking. It was a good thing I had left the house almost forty five minutes early. I walked to the lobby, concentrating on remembering where I had parked the car. (It had always been a problem for me.) Miss Nishimura was waiting in the lobby when I arrived there.
"Hi," she said.
"Hi," I replied.
"The person you'll be meeting is Mrs. Carter," said Miss Nishimura, as we went up to the third floor in the elevator.
"Okay," I said, trying to get the slightly nervous feeling to go away.
When we got to the room, Miss Nishimura handed me a Shadow Packet, which held the evaluation form that the person we shadowed had to fill out, a letter explaining what the Shadow Program was, and some other papers.
"If you need to get in contact with me," she said, "The number is on the evaluation form and you have it too, right?"
"Um...yeah," I said. Miss Nishimura had given me her cell phone number the day before just in case I couldn't make it after all.
"Okay," she said, "Good luck." With that, she turned and headed back down the hall.
Why would a local group have a hotel suite? I thought to myself as I stood outside the room. The only groups I could think of that were in Hilo were the BackStreet Boys (my favorite group, who were going to be doing a concert) and a local group. Finally, I knocked on the door. A minute later, a pretty blonde woman opened it.
"Hi," I said, "I'm here to meet Mrs. Carter."
"You must be Jennifer," the woman said with a smile, "Come in."
I followed her into the suite and saw another woman sitting in the living room. She had dark red hair and was only a little taller than I was.
"I'm Mrs. Carter," the first woman told me, "But you can call me Jane. This is Mrs. McLean."
"Denise," the other woman said.
"Nice to meet both of you," I said. I couldn't believe that I was going to be shadowing both Nick Carter and A.J. McLean's mothers! I handed Jane the Shadow Packet.
"Okay," she said, putting the packet onto the table, "So according to Miss Nishimura, you're interested in music management."
"Kind of," I said, "I'm not positive if that's what I want to do yet."
"So do you want to shadow us and see the business end of everything or would you like to shadow our sons and see the music performance end?" asked Jane.
"I don't know," I said, "It doesn't really matter."
"How about you shadow us in the morning, until maybe about one, and then you can go down and watch our sons rehearse," Denise suggested.
"Sound great," I said.
During the time I shadowed Jane and Denise, I helped them set up interviews and appearances and just general stuff like that. After lunch, at about one o'clock, Jane took me down to the Crown Room. As we approached, I could hear people shouting.
"Nick screwed up!"
"Can we start over?"
"Brian, I didn't screw up, Howie screwed up!"
"You guys! Shut up!"
Jane and I entered the Crown Room and saw the five guys standing in the middle of the open floor, arguing. Aaron Carter (Nick's younger brother) was sitting on the side playing a game on his Game Boy.
"Nick!" Jane called. Nick turned and came running over. He looked at me and our eyes locked.
"Yeah, Mom?" Nick asked, not taking his eyes off of me.
"This is Jennifer," said Jane, "Jennifer, this is my son, Nick."
"Hi," I said, not believing that I was actually talking to Nick Carter.
"Nice to meet you," Nick said, giving me this adorable smile.
"Could you introduce her to everyone and take care of her?" Jane asked her son.
"Sure," he replied, "I'll take real good care of her."
"That's what I'm worried about," joked Jane, "Just be good."
She left to go back up to the suite. Nick took me over to meet the other guys.
"Our choreographer, Fatima, isn't here today," said Nick, "So you're not going to get a chance to meet her, but this is Brian, Kevin, Howie, and A.J."
"Nice to meet you," I said to the other guys.
"Hi," they replied.
The guys had to return to rehearsal, so I went over to where Aaron was.
"Hi," he said, looking up from his game for just a minute.
"Hi," I said.
I watched the guys for a while and then asked Aaron if he could perform a couple of songs for me. He jumped at the chance to perform and did three songs. Then Nick suggested that he do a song with the guys. It was so cool. I wished that I had thought to bring a video camera, but all I had with me was my 35mm. I took a ton of pictures of everything and everyone.At about six, I had to leave. I had been talking to Nick when my mom paged me.
"I have to go," I said, putting my cell phone back into my bag.
"Aw," he said, "Okay. Can I walk you to your car?"
"Sure," I said.
I said bye to the other guys and Aaron and Nick and I walked towards the parking lot and to my car.
"Tell your mom I said thank you," I said to Nick, "I had a great time."
"Okay," he said.
When we got to my car, Nick looked at me.
"Can I ask you something?" he asked.
"Sure," I said.
"You know how you said you don't have a boyfriend?" Nick began.
"Yeah," I said, "What about it?" I expected him to make some sort of comment about it.
"Well," said Nick, looking down, "Do you want to go out with me?"
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