Julie and the Phantoms Imagines

Good enough (Carrie Wilson x reader)

Prompt/summary:  Reader is a dancer for Dirty Candy and is there to comfort Carrie

Word Count: 1,006

Authors note: No one requested this, I just noticed there wasn't any content for my girl :( (also this isn't necessarily romantic, I just wanted to write for her) Legend has it that if you listen to Hold me while you wait by Lewis Capaldi while reading this you start sobbing on the spot, lmk if its true

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Carrie had always made it very clear she was better than us.

I'm assuming so no one would challenge her and take her position as lead singer, but it got kinda old after a while. Every practice all we heard was her telling us what we were doing wrong.

She didn't mean it in a mean way (it took me a long time to figure that one out), she wanted perfection. She wanted to push us to our limits and see when we would break. Then her and the rest of the girls would build us back up again.

Stronger.

She always said that.

"Make your kicks stronger."

"Make yourself look stronger, like a boss."

"Sing the chorus stronger."

That was her way of letting us know we were doing good, in her own language that I only spoke. I guess that's why she made me the 'co-captain' of Dirty Candy.

I was the one people always went to when they had a problem with her.

She's just having a rough week, I would say.

She doesn't want to seem like she's picking favorites, so she holds back on compliments.

She really does appreciate us.

The rest of the group slowly became more knowledgeable about Carrie's tough love mentality. And slowly she began to show more of a softer side to the group.

She always acts so unbothered, I forget sometimes she has other feelings than the ones she uses as a mask.

The night after the performance at the coffee shop she was late to practice.

If there's one thing I know about Carrie Wilson, it's that she hates being late to anything. After 15 minutes and no texts I decided to take over for the day. I lead the choreography and gave each girl notes to take home before wrapping up practice early.

The drive to Carrie's house was filled with racing thoughts and worry.

I hope she's okay.

Her dad's car wasn't in the driveway, and I had been over to her house enough to know she always kept the back door unlocked.

I slowly climbed the stairs to the second story of the house. When I heard sobs echoing through the hallway I ran in to see Carrie on the floor, clothes and sheets of music scattered across the floor around her.

"Carrie?" I said softly.

She turned to look at me and sniffled. I joined her on the floor of her room and wrapped my arms around her.

"Why can't I just be good enough? I wasn't good enough for Julie, for Nick, for my dad. I'm not even good enough to get signed! I've done everything, everything I could to be perfect. It still isn't enough."

Her sobs grew louder as she finally got the thoughts that must've been running through her mind for so long out. I pulled her closer to me.

"Stop it, right now," I said, "You are good enough. They just don't see it, and that's their fault. Not yours. You're going to make it big one day. They're all going to be so sorry they ever doubted Carrie Wilson."

Carrie's grip on me tightened at my words.

"Carrie I promise, you are so good at your job. Chance the Rapper never signed with a record label, and look at where he is. You're going to do just fine. You wanna know how I know?"

Carrie looked at me confused.

"Because you're you. You made this band, you didn't let your dad get you signed with his company, you wanted to do that on your own. You choreographed all our dances until you finally agreed to your dad's choice of choreographer. You write all your music by yourself. You even design all the costumes yourself. You are good enough. You just haven't found the right place yet."

Carrie sniffled and wiped her tears away, "Thank you (Y/n)."

I nodded before pulling her into another hug.

"You know," she said while reaching for a tissue, "I never tell anyone how much I appreciate them. I truly do appreciate you, even if I don't say it much. Thank you so much for always being there for me."

I smiled, "You don't have to thank me."

"No I do. You do so much to help me, you keep the band together."

"Cause I believe in it."

Carrie smiled and rubbed my arm.

I grabbed the tissue from her hand and dabbed at the mascara that had ran down her cheeks.

"I have to get back to work. We need a new song for the pep rally nex tweek, and I have to design a new costume and-"

"No,"  I interrupted her, "You're taking a day off."

"But-"

I put a finger up to her lips dramatically, "Nope. We're going to go do something fun, then when we get back we can work those things together."

Carrie's eyes lit up, "Can we go shopping?"

I laughed, "I'll get my keys."

"Oh! We can go in my car. There's this new line out at Abercrombie and I've been dying to go try some stuff on."

I smiled as she ran into the bathroom to fix her makeup. I picked up the papers off the floor and sat them on her desk, then picked up the clothes and sat them on her bed to go through later.

Carrie emerged with a fresh makeup look 10 minutes later. She grabbed my hand and pulled me towards the front door stopping to get her keys from the kitchen.

I'm so glad she's okay.

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