Fame Comes With A Price (In Editing Process)

I'm Too Close To Breaking

The gloomy, hypnotic light of the backstage area was cutting into Jenna's eyes, making them sting everytime she blinked. They had fifteen minutes until they came on stage. The crowd was humming in anticipation and excitment. The stage crew were rushing around, making last minute adjustments. Whakaio was at the edge of the stage, with his headphones on, nodding his head ever so slightly to the music coming from them. Matt, Jake and Cam were engaged in a quiet conversation. Everybody was in the zone, doing pre show rituals to calm their nerves. But Jenna couldn't concentrate. The noises around her had merged into one, constant, ear splitting buzz, like white noise on a TV. She couldn't arrange her thoughts, her head hurt, she felt slippy with sweat, the skin on her back was already starting to tingle unpleasantly, daring her to move too quickly. Everything was blurred. The clarity in her vision had gone and everything was fuzzy. She felt sick, Nothing felt right, the lights were to bright, the room was too crowded, the air was to humid. Everything smelled like sweat and theatrical smoke.

The walls started spinning and she stumbled back against a wall, willing herself to concentrate. As she looked down, a pair of Nike Airs came into her vision. She looked up and saw Whak's face, only it was faces. Her vision kept focusing and unfocusing, making it seem like there was twenty Whak's looking down at her. ' Jenna, are you Ok?' , his voice echoed around her head, bareley audible. Like she was in a big empty building and everything echoed. It hurt, the echoes hurt her, they were searing into her brain, stabbing into her ears.

' I-I'm fine, I just... I just need some air,' Jenna mumbled as she pushed past Whak and stumbled through the corridoors, fighting to make it to the exit door on the side. The coridoor seemed to stretch and expand, twist and turn, throwing Jenna from side to side. When she reached the door she flung it open and stepped outside gasping for air. It was raining outside but Jenna didn't care as she sank to the ground. Deep breaths, She told herself and she inhaled and exhaled the cooling air. After a few minutes of deep breathing, Jenna felt her dizzyness disappear and she felt her senses sharpen. Jenna was slightly concerned at what had happened. She had never felt so sick or dizzy before the show. Maybe i just overheated, Thought Jenna to herself as she stood up slowly and let the cold night air cool her sweaty face.

Turning slowly back towards the door, Jenna began making her way back when she was stopped in her tracks by a small sob. Confused, Jenna looked around the tiny alleyway and her eyes fell on a tiny figure, stooped over, facing away from her. This is where the sound must have come from. How long was she here for? Jenna must have not noticed that she was in someone else's presence and the figure didn't seem to notice her either. She felt slight concern for the hunched up figure and made her way over warily.

' Hey, are you Ok there?' Asked Jenna. This must have startled him/her as the person lept up as if they were electrecuted, 

' Yeah, Um.... I'm fine'  She could tell by the voice and height that it was a female, around her age and stangeley enough, had a very American accent. 

As the girl turned around, Jenna saw that she had dark brown hair, almost black in the light and a very pretty face. As her eyes adjusted, she saw that the female had the most beautiful brown eyes she had ever seen, as she stared into them for a second, she noticed how they were an identical colour to the eyes of a person she had fallen in love with, who had been her best freind, and who had fucked her over. Gasping in shock and realisation, Jenna stumbled back from Tay Jardine. Tay Jardine, who she had not spoken to for the best part of three months, was standing in front of her, in an alleyway, oposite the club her band was meant to be playing in, in Berlin, when she was meant to be in America.

What the fuck.

In a millisecond, all the walls, and gaurds and barricades that Jenna had put up to try and forget about this girl had crumbled down at the sight of her. She felt anger, sadness, happiness, longing, love, shock, confusion but the two emotions that stood out for her most was hurt. Hurt and Betrayal. Regardless, Jenna felt a magnetic pull towards Tay, the un-fightable urge to rush to her and wrap her arms around her and cry into her neck and tell her about everything that was going wrong in her life and have her comfort her and push her hair back and look deep into her eyes and tell her everything would be alright.

But Jenna's resistance had strengthened and she would not give in. Not after what Tay had put her through. Those days were over as far as she was concerned.

' Tay.' Jenna's voice held a tone that she hoped Tay would initiate as surprise, ' What the hell are you doing here?' her voice turned from surprised to a cold and cynical tone. 

It almost broke Jenna's heart to see the look of hurt come accross Tay's face at her reaction, but she kept up her emotionless facade. Tay deserves to feel hurt for once.

' We need to talk, Jenna', Tay said quietly, ' Please,' her voice broke ever so slightly on the last word. Jenna was relieved that it was dark and she was a few paces away, so that Tay couldn't see her eyes begin to fill up with tears. 

 ' Talk then.' Jenna replied, fighting to keep her voice steady.