He's the Woman
Sebastian walked into Illyria one day and noticed that everyone was staring at him. "What's the matter?" he asked Toby, who was walking close by.
"Dude!" Toby exclaimed, "You're going to Hollywood to perform!"
"What?" Sebastian asked in excitement.
"You heard me. Your band is going to Hollywood to perform in Battle of the Bands. Whoever wins gets a contract for a year."
After all this excitement, there had to be catch or two. Numero uno, Olivia came to him that morning in a serious voice, saying, "We need to talk." So they sat on a bench and talked in the middle of the courtyard.
Olivia started, "You know, Sebastian, I thought I really liked you, but it was your sister posing as you that I was interested in. I mean, you're cool, but you're different from Viola."
"So what are you saying?" Sebastian asked. "You want to date Viola?"
"No, I'm saying I don't want to date you. You're not the Sebastian I fell in love with." Olivia said quietly.
Sebastian sighed. "Well, I guess it was good while it lasted. Everyone says we're different even though Viola and I look alike."
After the break-up, they each went their separate ways, not really having the courage to face one another again. But, there was another catch.
"Sebastian!" Viola screamed from across the courtyard. She, Kia, and Yvonne had transferred schools to Illyria. When she came closer she laughed, "I heard you're going to Hollywood. Way to go, bra. Oh, but some girl called my cell phone and asked if Viola was there. So I said, 'Yeah, this is.' Then she told me that she was delighted to have you in the Battle of the Girl Bands. She said there weren't many bands entered and she was happy to have Viola and the Dudes on stage. Oh, and she said she worked for the contest, so she knows what she's talking about."
"Girl band?" Sebastian asked, confused. "Viola? Toby said I was entered in the contest, I didn't think he meant as a girl band! I'm going to go set this straight." He pulled out his cell phone.
"Sebastian, wait! You have a better chance of winning here. If you win this contest, you can become big, and then you could live life like you wanted to."
"Yeah, as Viola and the Dudes! I am not a flipping girl band!" Sebastian said angrily.
"Sebastian," Viola grabbed his arm as he tried to walk away, "You know how hard it is to win the real Battle of the Bands. You should know, since you've entered it for the last 4 years. This could be your big break and you could win, and then reveal that you're a guy."
"Yeah, I think that could work, but how am I going to pull this off?"
"Hello? I dressed up as a boy for 2 weeks to take your place. You can take mine easily."
"I can't sing like a girl, Viola."
"You don't have to; tell them you have a deep voice."
"But what about when I talk about girls in my song?"
"Tell them you prefer girls over boys. They can't judge you for it."
"I don't look like a girl!"
"Then we better go to Paul after school!"
During school, all anyone could talk about was how Sebastian was going to Hollywood. They all asked him to get autographs of the famous stars he would see there, and Sebastian knew that he had to go through with it, to gain popularity for his sake. I mean, ever since he and his sister showed their privates in the big soccer game, they had been pretty much liked by everyone, except Malcolm. But Viola had always been more outgoing and more popular; maybe this was the chance of a lifetime for Sebastian.
After school, Viola met him outside, and they went to Paul's new hair salon. Paul had met a guy named Doug and they fell in love. Now they opened their own hair and beauty salon not too far from where Paul worked before, and they made their own profits.
"Sebastian?" Paul asked as Sebastian and Viola walked through the doors of Paul and Doug's Hair Etc. "Wow, I think I need to sit down."
"Haha," Viola laughed sarcastically, "Sebastian and me—well I guess I should say Viola and I would like your help."
"Oh no," Paul sighed. "Let me guess, Sebastian wants to turn into to you to see if a girl likes him or not."
Sebastian laughed, "No. I need to go to Hollywood under Viola's name to get a record contract for my band when I compete in the girls' version of Battle of the Bands."
"Once again, you don't know how to act, the mannerisms, the…" Paul was interrupted.
"Come on Paul!" Viola said, batting her eyelashes.
"Yeah," Sebastian imitated, batting his eyelashes as well, "Come on Paul!"
"Whoa," Paul blinked, "You guys look scary alike when you do that."
"So you'll do it?" Viola and Sebastian asked at the same time.
"Stop doing that! Yes, I'll do it!"
Doug and Paul spent the rest of the day and the next day trying wigs on Sebastian and fixing makeup on him and shopping for lady's clothing. Then there came a problem about the breasts.
"No way, I'm done with this!" Sebastian exclaimed when they told him he looked flat-chested. "I'm not going to get boobs and then have guys staring at them the whole time."
"Now you know how it feels. Suck it up and get over it! Sometimes when you want something so bad you will sacrifice, like I did! Plus, how are you going to become a famous rock star without winning this contest?" Viola fumed.
So he got over it, with his motivation to become famous. Doug used some kind of fake flesh thing balled up to be used as breasts, and Viola was embarrassed when he measured them up to her. Finally, after the whole boob thing, Sebastian had the feminine body parts and they moved onto his face a little more. After a little make up and an eyebrow plucking, Sebastian looked somewhat like a girl. Now, he was ready to assume his role as Viola Hastings.
Now all he had to do was tell his band members about the girl band thing. Sebastian called them together for a meeting in his garage.
"Okay guys, promise not to freak?" Sebastian prefaced the talk with.
Ham, the fat sophomore that played drums, Kevin, the hot senior that played bass guitar, and Daniel, a shy boy who played guitar with Sebastian, all nodded their heads.
Sebastian told them about Viola's idea to become a girl band. They all nodded until Sebastian was done talking. Then Sebastian asked, "What do you think?"
Ham said, "This could be our big break!" You could see the stars in his eyes. "I think we should do it!"
Daniel said, "I don't know. What if we get caught? I mean, we'll be disqualified and embarrassed. I still have two more years left of high school, I can't take the ridicule."
"It's cool, as long as we don't have to dress up as girls. Besides, if they find out he's a guy, we could be like, 'What? Viola, how could you do this to us?'" Kevin laughed.
So they all agreed on participating and they practiced their song, except Sebastian was trying to do it in a little higher a voice, so it would sound like a girl kind of. Actually, it sounded pretty good, and he was happy to say they might be able to pull it off.
Yvonne walked into Duke's room that day looking for Viola. She pretty much threw up when she saw Andrew on Duke's bed dancing around to a song on the radio.
"What the heck?" Yvonne asked.
"Um, hey, I don't think I've introduced myself yet. My name's Andrew, I'm Duke's friend."
"I'm Yvonne, Viola's friend. Um, why are you in Duke's room?"
"I'm babysitting," he said sarcastically. "Duke gave me the key. He said he's got junk food stashed in here and Monique's got me on a diet."
"You're dating Monique?" Yvonne laughed. "I'm surprised you haven't dumped her yet."
"I'm going to dump her tomorrow. No girl's gonna control Andrew! I mean, I can eat whatever I want, as long as I exercise, I won't get fat."
"Okay then, where are Viola and Duke?"
"Out on a date. Figures. Those two have been mad about each other since the debutant ball."
"Tell Viola I was looking for her, okay?"
"Will do, ma'am. Now excuse me as I chug Mountain Dews and scarf down Oreos and Cheetos."
Yvonne laughed. Andrew was sort of cute, but definitely not her type. Of course he was a jock, sort of like her, but he was definitely crazy and Yvonne was down to earth and calm. Plus, Viola had told her that Duke said that Andrew could be sort of a control freak at times, and Yvonne hated guys that took all the power. She loved being the boss and didn't want any guy to take that away from her.