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Audition

Wednesday

"CLASS!" The usually mild-mannered Mr McHale yelled, finally. It was already fifteen minutes into the class, but everyone had been paying zero attention to anything.

Darren and Julia rolled their eyes in exact sync, but as she was sitting on his lap and her face was right in front of his, no one except them saw it.

"Thank you. Ms Albain, get off Mr Criss's lap. Mr Walker, Ms Lopez's desk is not a seat. Mr Holden, your assigned seat is not next to Ms Stepien and we both know it. Ms Albain."

"Can't move, Mr McHale."

"Mr Criss, let go of Ms Albain."

The whole class sniggered.

"Television has been around your whole lives..."

Julia tuned out immediately. Walker was hosting a party, and so Lauren had to go, this time... Strange, but Joe had been ridiculously protective of Lauren for the last week or so... She heard that Nick Gage had hit on Lauren... And Meredith... God, that kid was a beacon for trouble... He'd pissed off everyone.

"Mr Criss! I can see! Ms Albain, switch places with Ms Smith."

Julia reluctantly picked up her books and walked to Teia's seat. Happily, Teia had been sitting next to Jaime. She scribbled find out what you can abt nick kid and passed it over.

Jaime flipped it open, read it, and wrote something down before pushing it back over. Julia flipped it open to read let me talk to ari and u owe me 1.

"Ms Albain! Passing notes? Principal's office. You too, Mr Criss, Ms Beatty."

Julia tried not to look too pleased with herself.

"Jaime!"

"Hi, Pat!" Jaime gave the assistant principal a hug.

"You lovely munchkins want to go in and see Bob? Another teacher being a bit dull, hm?" Pat twinkled and Julia smiled.

"You don't know the half of it!"

"Oh, you lot keep me young."

Mr Joles barely gave them a second glance.

"Free pass, just tell Mr McHale I did something."

"Thank you," Jaime said happily.

"Why are you acting like Meredith?"

Jaime shushed Darren and winked at them before pulling up a chair next to Pat's desk.

Darren tugged Julia down the hall and into a cupboard.

"Dare, we did this one at the start of term. How about -"

"I know we did this one. What's up with Lauren?"

Julia immediately tensed up. Lauren literally had everything else, this was completely unfair.

"Joey asked me to ask you."

"What's Joey give a shit?"

Darren shrugged and said, "I don't know. He's like so nice." His voice went higher. "Joey's the best one out of all of us. He's everyone's favourite, absolutely. We all love Joey because he's so talented, and such a great athlete-" Julia pressed her hand to her mouth to try and stop herself bursting out laughing.

"And he's just so sweet and caring. Wow, what a babe. I'd date, am I right ladies?"

Julia shoved Darren's shoulder weakly, but couldn't speak through her giggles.

Darren heard the bell somehow and picked Julia up. "Let's go watch Joey kick some quality musical ass," still in the stupid voice, before kicking the door open and carrying her off to the theatre.

Auditions for the school musical - Mamma Mia.

The posters had been everywhere. Matt called, "Thank you all so much for coming! I'm Matt Lang, and I'm going to be directing! We've got the cast and band figured out now, so if you auditioned, thanks for coming. A.J. Holmes and Clark Baxtresser are going to music direct, Angela Kiessel and Ruby Summers are stage managing, June Saito is going to design some awesome costumes. Corey Lubowich is doing the set, Sarah Petty is going to do lights, Katie Spellman is choreographing. Yonit Olshan is going to be the assistant costume designer, Lana McKinnon is doing wigs, hair and makeup, Mark Swiderski is doing sound design, Russ Walko will do puppets. And finally, Craig Kidwell is doing technical directing and Amy Plouff is scenic painting. Sorry if you didn't get cast and we'll announce the band and cast tomorrow."

A large group of people grumbled and moved toward the door.

"OK, now we're doing acting auditions for the parts of Donna, Sophie, Sam, Harry, Bill, Sky, Rosie, Tanya, Pepper, Petros, Ali, Lisa, Gregoris and Father Alex. You have to sing a song from the musical and read for Donna or Sam. We'll have callbacks tomorrow. First up, we have Nico Ager."

Nico's audition was good, but not excellent.

"Julia Albain?"

Darren whispered, "Good luck, babe," as she walked up. She sang Take A Chance On Me, which was exactly how she felt, and read for Donna.

"Thanks, Julia. Chris Allen?"

Darren grinned as she sat back down. "Babe, the song was great. You're definitely gonna get Rosie."

"Jaime Lyn Beatty?"

Jaime sang Does Your Mother Know.

"Jeff Blim."

"Tyler Brunsman."

"Jamie Burns."

"Richard Campbell."

"Britney Coleman."

"Brant Cox."

"Darren Criss."

Darren kissed Julia on the cheek and went up. He sang Our Last Summer.

"Denise Donovan?"

Darren came and sat back down next to her and she snuggled into him.

It was a long audition process, but the alternative was going to class, so everyone stuck around. Many names were called out, and many auditions were auditioned.

"Lauren Lopez."

Lauren sang The Winner Takes It All. Perfectly.

Julia snuggled in tighter to Darren's side. It was very warm... and comfy... sort of sleepy - Darren nudged her in the side and she gave him a despising look. "It's Joey's audition! Aren't you soooooooooo ready?" He held the 'so' for a long time and went higher until he was at the top of his range and Julia put her face back on his chest.

Joey sang When All Is Said And Done. He was really good.

Julia went back to sleep.

She didn't wake up until she was back in Darren's car and he started to drive her home.

The cast list would be up tomorrow.

As she had done for the last week and a half, Lauren Lopez cried herself to sleep.

As he had done for the last week and a half, Joe Walker thought about who had knocked his girlfriend up, because it sure as hell wasn't him.

As she'd done for the last two years, Julia Albain snuck her next-door neighbour, Darren Criss, through the window and into her bed.