More Than Yesterday

Chapter 2

We walked into the green room at the agency and immediately everyone stared at me. That definitely does not help my nerves, but I just tried to remember what Emmett had always taught me about confidence growing up. So I walked over to the sign in table without looking at anyone, and truth be told, it low key felt pretty damn good.

The woman sitting at the table has shoulder length, dark brown hair. It was pin straight and she wore these dark rimmed glasses that framed her cocoa colored eyes.

"Name?" She spoke with a sharp, swift tone that wasn't exactly comforting.

"Annie Lane," I said trying my best not to sound like I was being punched in the gut.

"Just in time, you're up next. Please, have a seat." She motioned towards the chairs behind me and nodded as she went back to that taxing job of hers, which apparently included scrolling through Instagram and flashing fake smiles at her colleagues as they walked past her table.

I thanked her and then made my way to an open chair along the wall and took a look around. Everyone in this room either looked terrified, awkward, or full of themselves. What felt like seconds later the door flung open and a loud voice called out my name. I looked up and saw a man standing in the door frame with a clipboard in his hand. He wore dark wash jeans, and a loose black shirt underneath a blue and black plaid flannel, sleeves rolled up to his elbows. As he waved his hand to me, motioning to come back, he jerked his head in an attempt to move the hair from in front of his eyes.

I took a quick look at my brother over my shoulder as I walked off to meet with the man at the door and he shot me a cheesy smile and laughed a little to himself as he raised his thumbs as a sign of love and good luck.

I followed him back and he led me down a hallway and through the double doors, and into a wide room with long table of producers and a few young people like myself. One stood out in particular though. Aside from the fact that I think I've seen him before, he had a look on his face as if he'd been up for about 48 hours. Once I got to the center of the room I cleared my throat and fiddled with my script. Just as the man in plaid that walked me in sat down in a chair at the table before me, everyone looked up from their phones and up at me.

"Okay so," he began, "my name is James, I'm the producer of this film. Nesta, this girl over here, will run the lines with you for your audition." He motioned towards a young girl, seemingly about my age, 3 seats down to his left. And to her left sat that sleepy eyed smiler whose name I have yet to learn.

Their eyes felt like daggers, scouring every inch of me for flaws of any kind. I felt the room almost close in on me a little, the air getting slightly thicker. Overly dramatic, yeah I know, get used to it. When the boy with curly hair and sleepy eyes that I noticed before peeled his gaze away from his screen, his expression suddenly seemed awake. He gave me a slight smile, the room opened just a tad, and he continued to look at me for the rest of my audition. I ran a few lines with the person sitting next to him. She was a nice girl with really kind eyes and flowing light-brown hair that hung just below her shoulders.

"Nice job," she said with a smile, "also I love your boots!"

"Aw," I laughed, "thank you so much!"

Glancing down at my black, lace-up army style heel boots at her words, I began to feel glad it was over. I survived.

I made eye contact with a few people and then looked around the room as they whispered amongst themselves and wrote stuff down on their sheets of paper that were scattered across the table.

"Alright," James said, "good work. After the rest of the auditions have concluded, we'll be out to announce those who made the callbacks."

"Perfect," I replied, trying to maintain as much composure as I could. "Thank you for your time!"