"OK. Show us what you've got." Christina (the director) told me.
The music started playing. I took a big breath in and started singing and dancing. The song was 'The Best Damn Thing' by Avril Lavigne. I really wanted the part. The song finished. Christina was amazed.
"Wow. I never knew someone as young as you who could sing that well." She cried in delight.
The Auditions went beautifully. I got all the parts I wanted.
Later that week, in the first rehearsal, the cast learnt that the performance would be having a famous pop band come to perform with us. We were all delighted. We couldn't wait to find out who they were.
We practiced hard. We practiced all week and all the next week and the week after that. After about five weeks of practicing, Christina decided to bring the band in to meet us all. She didn't tell us though.
"There will be a new song in the mix today. When you hear it I would like you all to come and sit in the auditorium." Christina told us.
The cast all agreed.
So we all rehearsed. When we heard the song, we all ran down to the auditorium. The song was '4ever' by the Veronicas. As they walked down on to the stage, we all just screamed. When they walked my heart skipped a beat. After the song, we all had a chance to meet them. There were about 50 of us and 2 of them, plus we already knew their names. We all got their autographs. It was fun. Before we knew it, we only had 5 minutes left in the rehearsal.
There were so many rehearsals. We rehearsed 6 days a week, before and after school, all day Saturday and half of Sunday. So we practiced and practiced and practiced. By the end of two weeks we knew the order of each song and all the lyrics.
One Saturday we were practicing and the Veronicas were there. We were all having fun. We were dancing to 'Big Girls Don't Cry" by Fergie. I was on one side of the stage alone and every one else was on the other side of the stage, when this man walked in the side door.
"Get away from that guy now!" Christina yelled at me. Then she turned to the man. "What do you want, George?"
"You know what I want, Christina."
Then he grabbed my arm. I didn't have a chance to run. I tried to pull away, but his grip was strong, he wasn't going to let go. I screamed. He pulled me into his body. Even though I was pulling away, it didn't take much to pull me in. He put his hand over my mouth. It smelt like he had just had a cigarette. It stunk and I didn't like it. I gagged. I slowly pulled my mouth apart and then I bit him. I bit him really hard. He yelped and took his hand away from my mouth. He shook his hand. I had bit him so hard that you could see the teeth marks on it. He still had a strong grip on me. He put the bitten hand in his pocket and Whispered to me; "You're going to pay for that".
"George! No!" Christina yelled. "George, please don't."
"Christina you don't have any say in this, so just shut up!"
I could tell he was seriously stressed out. I tried again to wriggle out of his grip, but some time during the argument, he had put his arm around my chest. Every time I moved his grip got tighter and tighter. I moved again and his grip got so tight, I couldn't breathe.
"Please let go a little bit. I can't breathe." I managed to gasp.
I felt dizzy and I collapsed. I fell though his grip. I don't think he was expecting that to happen. As I landed on the ground, I took a deep breath. I began to crawl away. THUD! A foot landed on my back. I screamed as I went back on to the floor. He pulled his hand out of his pocket. In it he had a gun.
"George, put it down. There is NO need to bring anyone here into this. It's our problem not theirs."
I had no idea what was going on. CLICK. The gun was loaded. At that point I could feel the gun pointing down at me. It wasn't touching me, but I had a really bad gut feeling that it was. I started to freak out. I mean, I was already freaking out, but this guy had a gun pointing at me, so I was really freaking out by this stage.
"I will let her go, if the girls come out."
"Which girls George? There's Sophie, Dania, Jasmine. There's plenty to choose from."
"Don't play stupid with me. You know who I mean and so do they!"
At that moment in time I knew whom he was talking about and so did everyone else in the place. I zoned out of the conversation that was going on and concentrated on my breathing.
"In, out. In, out." I kept repeating to myself. "Stay calm you'll be OK."
I could feel a cough coming up. I tried to hold it back. I held my breath until my body was screaming for air. I had to let go. I started to cough and splutter.
"Shut UP" George snapped
I couldn't stop coughing.
"Shut up" George snapped again. "Shut up NOW!"
He pushed the gun into my back. It was a sharp pain but it quickly went. I could feel adrenaline rushing through me. It was probably the only thing keeping me conscious.
"Get up"
I slowly got up. Being very careful not to make any sudden movements. I didn't want George shooting me. As I got up I could feel the gun moving up my back and over my head to my temple. I was so scared. When I was fully standing, he grabbed my face. I was breathing heavily and so was he. His face was close to mine and I could hear everything he was muttering. He held the gun to my head. My arms were squeezed into my sides. The gun was pushing into my head. I held my breath.
"Jessica. Lisa. If you don't come out now I will kill her." George cooed.
George was starting to scare me. I had all these questions running through my head. Things like, who is George? What does he want with me? How does Christina know him? What are they talking about? I was really scared. I thought he was going to kill me.
Then I saw Jess's head pop up from behind the stage.
"Let her go George!" Jess demanded. She was scared I could tell in her voice.
"Where's Lisa?" George asked her.
Jess didn't say anything.
"Where is she?!" George repeated, but his time he yelled. "Don't tempt me Jess I will kill her. You know I will."
What did he mean by, 'you know I will'? Did The Veronicas know George? If so, how?
Jess took a deep breath.
"She's here with me."
Lisa's head popped up slowly. She gave Jess a "how dare you" look
"Get here now!"
The gun was still pushed hard against my head. I was in tears. I was that scared now.
Jess and Lisa looked at each other and then Jess took a step forward.
"Fine. We will. Just let her go now." Lisa said.
"O.K then I will."
I could tell he wasn't going to, because he tightened his grip. I tried to twist out of it but I couldn't.
Two other men arrived. They came crashing through the doors. They both had guns. Christina tried to stop them, but got thrown out of the way. These guys had strength and they weren't afraid to use it.
Jess and Lisa both walked forward, slowly and both staring and George. Jess was in front; she didn't look as if she was scared as Lisa. Lisa kept hiding behind Jess and followed Jess's every footstep. As they got closer, Georges grip tightened. He pushed the gun harder into my head. It started to really hurt. I was too scared to move. I collapsed again, but this time George caught me, as if he was expecting it. The two other men jumped out on to Jess and Lisa. Jess tried to fight back but ended up being knocked out cold. Lisa on the other hand just let herself be pushed to the ground and she didn't fight back. Jess was slumped over one of the guys shoulder. While Lisa was slumped over the other guys shoulder. George hit me over my head with his gun, I think.
The next thing I remembered was waking up in the back of the van. My hands were tied up behind my back, there was tape over my mouth and my legs were tied together. I could feel every bump in the road. It was really uncomfortable and painful. I could feel tingling down both of my arms. I turned my head to the left. There was Lisa laying the same as me. She was awake and looked absolutely terrified. Her whole body was shaking. As I turned to look to my right, we went over a big bump. I came down and hit my head hard on the floor of the van. I felt a crack in my neck. I screamed out in pain. There was one of the guys in the back of the van with us. He pointed his gun at me.
"Shut-up." He said quite plainly.
I nodded my head, so he knew I understood. I finished turning my head to the right and saw Jess was tied the exact same as Lisa and me, but she was still out cold. I looked back at Lisa and she still had this terrified look on her face. We were both really scared.
The guy, who was in the back with us, ripped the tape off of our mouths. It really hurt. Lisa tried her hardest not to scream as the tape came off, but her best wasn't good enough. She screamed. When the tape came off of my mouth I didn't scream. I just flinched when it was off.
"Have any woken up yet?" A scratchy version of George's voice came through.
"Yeah. The unknown has woken up, but Jess is still out. What do you want me to do Boss?"
"Wake her up then Jim."
"How?"
You could tell Jim was a bit dumb.
"Um. Splash her with freezing water. Yes that'll wake her up."
"That's not very nice though George."
"Does it look like I care?"
"Sorry Boss, but I can't see you."
"Just splash her with freezing water!"
"Righty-oh boss."
It went quiet ad Jim put down the walky-talky. SPLASH! Cold water went everywhere. Jess and I were soaked through. Lisa was a bit wet, but because she was on the other side of the van, she hadn't had much water hit her.
Jess woke up with a scream. She and I were shivering.
"It worked Boss."
"I know. I heard the scream."
"Sorry boss."
"Doesn't matter we're nearly at our destination any way."
After what had felt like hours we eventually got there. We were all terrified. We didn't know what to expect. Jess and I didn't have much recollection of the drive, so we were a bit confused. Lisa knew everything that had happened. She was the most terrified out of us all. She knew at the time what the three men were capable of.
The doors opened with a flash of light. It took my eyes a few seconds for my eyes to adjust. I could see three figures standing outside. Two had nothing in their hands, but the third had tape in his hands. Jim put his arms around me and picked me up. I started to scream and make a fuss. As he walked me over to the door, the guy with tape in his hands ripped off a bit and stuck it over my mouth. I couldn't scream any more, so my scream changed to a sob.
I didn't want to be in the van, I didn't want to be carried into the cottage and there was NO way I wanted my hands and feet tied together.
Jim handed me over to one of the guys outside and went back into the van to grab Jess. I was so scared that I was shaking all over.
"I hope you like the cottage." The guy that had me in his hands whispered to me.
The guy carried me over to the 'cottage'. I screamed and kicked, but I couldn't do much, because the grip was tight. He kicked the door open. It was really bare. In the first room, it had a kitchen, and three chairs in the back with rope near it. There were five rooms off to the side. We were all carried into one room. In the room it had 3 beds, and a bathroom (at least I was able to keep clean). I was dumped on one bed, while the others were dumped on the other two beds. They untied us and left the room, making sure they locked it on the way out. There was a window, but it was all locked up from the inside and the outside. They really didn't want us to leave.
"Is everyone OK?" I asked
Jess and Lisa both nodded.
"We'll be fine." I assured them.
To be honest I didn't trust myself at the time, but I hoped that it had given a little bit of hope to them.
One of the guys came back in; he had three ankle chains in his hand. He clipped one on to my ankle, one on to Jess's ankle and one on to Lisa's ankle. Then he clipped the other end of them on to a metal loop on the floor.
"Sit down!" He commanded us.
None of us did as he had said, so he grabbed the chains and gave them a shake. I lost my balance and tumbled over.
I clambered on to the bed. On the bed there was a big metal chain. He tied the chain around our waists, so we couldn't move from the beds.
Then he left. There was a slam and a lock. We were stuck in the room again.
Outside I heard shouting. I couldn't make out what they were saying. It just sounded like noise from in the room.
Lisa was nearly in tears. Jess was trying to comfort her from her bed. The voices outside were still shouting. I couldn't think straight. I needed to go home. I was terrified. I was feeling all these different emotions all at once. I was scared, angry, upset and plenty more, I just can't remember them. I was so confused. Nothing made sense to me anymore. All of a sudden the door slammed open. Jess, Lisa and I all jumped. George came in with three half full plates of; well I had no idea what it was. Two other guys came in and grabbed a plate of food. One marched over to Lisa. The other stomped over to Jess. George walked over to me.
"One. Two. THREE!" George yelled.
All at once the men opened our mouths and shoved a huge spoonful of the stuff on the plate. They held our mouths shut and forced us to swallow whatever they had just shoved into our mouths.
When they let us open our mouths, we all just coughed and tried to get the awful taste out of our mouths.
"That wasn't so hard, was it girls?" George smiled.
They gave us some water to wash it down with. We all drank it greedily. We had no idea what was about to happen.