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I left the infirmary while she was still sleeping. Her parents arrived a little late due to heavy traffic. She was scolded before her mum kissed and hugged her.
Mr. Shane couldn't drive me to Marylebone so I basically took the public transit and stopped at the Marylebone Flower Shop before I head to the flat. I took a shower and tried to catch some proper sleep before the bus arrives at one in the afternoon.
We were driven to the studio again. It's a little bit strange to see many unfamiliar faces due to the eliminations that happened last night.
"There will be four categories for this competition. The groups, boys, girls and over 30's. Each category is designated to each judge and the acts will have to prepare a song. You are then given four days to rehearse it with your designated judge/ mentor. Performance night takes place on Saturdays and elimination on Sundays. There will be four judges who will give authoritative opinions in regards to your performance. After the performance night, the voting lines will be opened. Those who will hit the bottom three or the acts who received the least number of text votes must perform a final song for the showdown. The judges will then cast their votes to determine the act who will progress in the competition. I hope everyone catches it and we're expecting a lot from all of you. The live shows will start airing in a couple of weeks and the theme for this week is 'Who are you?'."
With the recent turn of events, I don't know if I can still absorb what's going on around me like juggling the rehearsals, presscons and TV appearances.
I joined Andrew and Lattrel to start the game plan. I let them set the pace and I agreed to anything they say.
They suggested that we should sing and dance to a boy band hit single so to leave an impression of being "the next big boy band" to conquer the UK Charts. Choices are laid out as:
▫️As long as you love me by the Backstreet Boys
▫️Same old brand new you by a1
▫️Liquid Dreams by O-Town, and
▫️Summertime by New Kids on the Block.
We all agreed to settle with NKOTB and began working in our harmony.
It was nearly seven in the evening when we headed down the studio for dinner. I fished out my phone from my pocket to see sweet messages from my mum. I miss her so much. I feel guilty for not calling her more often. She's my biggest fan and my biggest critic too. She went to South Yorkshire today for a medical mission.
I scrolled through my notifications and realised that Ms. Zarene sent me a "thank you" text message and I found myself hitting the call button.
"Hello!" Says the little shaky voice.
"How are you today? Sorry if I didn't replied soon." I asked her.
"Not so much for today. I finished a couple of movies and slept the whole afternoon. Oh, thank you for the six red roses that you sent me again. They are lovely. I'm glad that you finally revealed yourself on the card. But I really appreciate those flowers. Ugh! I should be the one asking about how things get in there the whole day. You must be really tired by now. Shane wouldn't even pick up my calls."
"It's been really tiresome today. We decided to go with an NKOTB hit and so far the harmony is turning up good. We'll be working on our choreography tomorrow. Ironic, but it feels a little odd without you down the hall. It's like we don't really know if we are doing good or not because you're not here to shoot us down."
"Shooting you down? That's ridiculous. But I'm grateful that you appreciate my efforts to "shoot you guys down the drain."
I was going to tell her more stories when she excused herself to hang up because the doctor is making his night rounds.
Honestly, it's really hard specifically for me to realise that she wouldn't be with us for the rest of the week. She's got her own way of judging us and correcting our flaws. It's bizarre to hear comments that we were doing good when we think we could have done something better. Unlike with Ms. Zarene. She would tell us we're not doing good. Go down to it and come up with suggestions. Maybe I'm just scared to be booted out of this competition this early, just when I seem to enjoy everything. I hope she gets better soon. We need her. I need her.
