"Everything changes, if I could …turn back the years, if you could learn to forgive me, then I could learn to feel."
Jesse looked at Alex expectantly, a confident grin already on his face. She sat across the room in an uncomfortable-looking chair that they had borrowed from the band room; arms crossed, she leaned back and eyed him critically.
"Not bad," she remarked flippantly.
"'Not bad?'" Jesse repeated incredulously. He threw his hands up in the air and rolled his eyes. "What was wrong this time?"
Alex tilted her head, regarding him with a thoughtful expression. "Look, there isn't anything wrong with it in terms of technicality. You're hitting all the notes right, following the rhythms correctly… but something's missing." She frowned, tugging at the ends of her hair. "Do you know what I mean?"
"Um, no," he shook his head.
"It's like… hm," she mused. "You sing wonderfully, hotshot, but you aren't any different from any other performer. There's no passion when you sing." She pierced him with a stare. "Talent is nothing if you don't know how to harness it properly."
"You would know, I guess."
"Yes," Alex nodded, "I would know."
Jesse frowned. "So, any advice?"
Her eyes went wide, the purple slivers flashing. "You're kidding me."
"What?"
"Jesse St. James, performer extraordinaire, asking for advice from the dancer fallen from grace?"
"Oh, shut up," he grumbled, crossing his arms across his chest.
She laughed, a lighthearted sound in the small enclosed room. "Just let me take in this moment…" Alex smiled, sighing happily.
"I'll leave," Jesse threatened lackadaisically.
She held up her hands with a smirk. "All right, all right. Well, let's see here…" she turned introspective. "What about your Regionals performance?"
It was Jesse's turn to be surprised. "What about it?"
"That was very passion-driven," Alex commented, staring out the window and missing his look of astonishment. "If you could just get that kind of energy back, this song would go straight to 'wow.'"
"Are we talking about the same thing?"
Alex twisted her head to face him, frowning. "Your Regionals performance. Bohemian Rhapsody, right? Although," she rolled her eyes playfully, "it might have been called the Jesse St. James plus backup show for all anyone could tell."
Jesse couldn't keep the shock off his face. "When did you see that?"
"Uh, it's on the internet. Not so hard to search for Vocal Adrenaline, you know, if one has basic computer skills."
"Wait, back up," Jesse shook his head, staring back at Alex's confused face, "You actually bothered to look up my performances?"
She laughed nervously. "I might have. Okay," she replied to the searching look in his eyes, "I wanted to know where all that beat-all confidence came from. And after watching Regionals, I found out. Like I said, you single-handedly won your club that trophy. It's not a compliment," Alex added with a frown as she spotted his smug expression. "Spending all that time in the limelight has definitely messed with your ego."
"In your opinion," Jesse replied with a smirk.
Alex shook her head. "Just because no one will say it to your face doesn't mean that they aren't thinking it in their head. Your arrogance is an overwhelming force, hotshot."
He shrugged. "So you say. Anyway," he rushed on, ignoring her argument-ready appearance, "what do you suggest?"
"Get that passion back," she said bluntly. "How did you manage to throw out such an emotionally charged performance then?"
Jesse hesitated, shifting a bit uneasily. Alex raised her eyebrow; he wouldn't quite meet her gaze. She sat back and crossed her legs, allowing the silence to stretch on uncomfortably. Finally he sighed.
"I was showing off, in a way. We were competing against New Directions – Rachel's glee club," he explained. "I had left her just a short time before…"
"And you needed to add insult to injury, is that it?" Alex remarked scathingly.
He had the good sense to look chastised. "Something like that."
"Big man."
"I never said," Jesse shot back defensively, "that I enjoyed the look on her face when they lost."
"Did you?"
"No, I did not."
"Not even a little?"
He responded with a glare.
"All right, all right," she held up her hands in surrender. "Too personal. Got it. Back to the original statement of fact… how to regain that emotion. Hm," she mused. Alex stood and moved to the window, propping her elbow against the wall and gazing at the outside. "Surely you can draw on personal experience where this song is concerned."
"Why would that be?"
She glanced over her shoulder. "It's a song about forgiveness, in a way. Pained forgiveness, but nonetheless. As a star performer, you've had to climb over everyone and everything to reach the top. You can't possibly say that you have no regrets in all your – what, nineteen years?"
Jesse grinned wryly. "You'd be surprised."
"No regrets, though? None at all?"
The grin faded into a scowl. "Approaching the boundaries line, Sheppard."
Alex inclined her head slightly. "Apologies. I'm only here to help, remember."
"No need to remind me." He took a deep breath and rolled his shoulders. "Right. Emotion. Emotionally charged, was that the phrase you used? Right…"
She looked amused. "It's not that hard, is it?"
"In Vocal Adrenaline, we were more soulless automatons than anything else," he explained distractedly, rolling the lyrics through his mind. "Which, according to you, won't get me very far in the world of performance."
"Too true."
Jesse exhaled. "I am the mess you chose, the closet you can not close, the devil in you, I suppose, 'Cause the wounds never heal…"
Alex nodded in appreciation and closed her eyes as he continued to belt out the song. The notes had much more depth and meaning behind them this time around, and it made her smile just a bit to know that Jesse was actually putting some effort into improving his talents. She wasn't sure what experience he was drawing on, but it was working.
"Better?"
She slowly opened her eyes, meeting his gaze with a slight grin. Obviously she wouldn't go into detail about the level of improvement, because that would certainly inflate his ego – something she was trying so desperately to avoid.
"Much."
Hey Shelby,
Just thought I'd check in, see how you were doing. And Beth, of course. What about Mr. Schue? I still can't wrap my head around that one, to be honest with you. It's good that you have him to help with Beth, though. Do you go to watch Vocal Adrenaline at all? I know Sectionals are coming up, and it'll probably come faster than most of them expect. Without you and me, I'd like to know how they're progressing and what songs they've chosen for this year.
So, you asked about UCLA at the end of our last call. Not much to tell beyond what you already know, at least in regards to classes and such. I'm not much into Play Reading and Analysis – it's just dialogue! No spontaneous musical numbers at all. But we're covering some plays that aren't as mainstream, and it helps that we won't be doing Shakespeare. I guess by now they're figured that we covered enough of him in high school, or maybe they're just waiting for more advanced classes for that. Either way
"I just don't see why she has to be the one to be helping you, Jesse."
Jesse looked up from his email, meeting Sam's resentful expression with a sigh. "We've been through this, Sam. Alex has performance experience, and you don't. Simple as that. It's nothing personal, you know, and you've been listening to me loads this week."
She tossed her hair and crossed her arms, glaring around the room sulkily. It was Wednesday night, and Jesse and his roommates (with the addition of Sam and Tiffany, the latter of whom was unsurprisingly wrapped around Cory on the sofa) were hanging out in their dorm room. It was the night before the auditions for the fall musical, which had prompted the young performer to stay in rather than heading to one of the on-campus activities. Sam had stopped by about an hour beforehand and simply never left. He detected the jealousy in her voice when she spoke of Alex, but what he had said was true. Nursing was a great major, but it wouldn't help in the performing arts department.
Matt glanced up from one of his many thick textbooks. "What time is your audition, Jess?"
"Two."
"And you will hear back on Friday afternoon?" Jamal asked, clearly more involved in the passing details than Jesse gave him credit for.
Jesse nodded. "I can't believe it's such a long wait. All the auditions I've had before usually announce the parts within a few hours."
"Yeah," Tiffany joined in the conversation, "but I doubt you've been up against a couple hundred people before. That's a lot more auditions to get through." She leaned her head against Cory's shoulder. "Sharon's auditioning tomorrow afternoon too. Just for the experience, though," she added in her smooth accent. "She says that she isn't expecting a role this year."
Jesse made a noncommittal sound that could have been agreement and turned his gaze back to his laptop. He was expecting a role, or at least strongly hoping for one. It wasn't like he was an amateur. There couldn't be that many more performers at UCLA that were more talented than he was. Jesse hid the secret smile that threatened to creep onto his face.
Either way I'm thankful that we aren't doing Shakespeare this quarter. And the partner dance that I mentioned went really well, even though Alex – I mentioned her too – and I hit a few bumps along the way. We received full marks for the assignment, and our professor commented on the fluidity and connectedness that we presented during the dance.
Speaking of Alex, she and I are getting along much better now. I take back what I said about her being sloppy. She knows what she's doing. She's been helping me with my audition piece for the musical, too. I guess you could say we're friends now. The other people here at the university are great. My roommates are good people, and I have genius Matt to help me with the academics. I'm sort of seeing this girl Samantha-prefers-to-be-called-Sam. We aren't official or anything, at least not yet. She's a little possessive, but I think that's just Sam. Idk. And one of my other roommates, Cory, he has a girlfriend. Her name's Tiffany; she's from England. Really nice girl and she's always over at our dorm. She's rooming with Alex, actually, and another girl who's in the performing arts program with me.
Well, I guess that's all the news I have to report for now. I'll definitely let you know how the audition goes. Be sure to tell me all about Beth! Can't wait to hear from you, Shelby :)
Jesse
He sent off the email with a grin and closed his laptop. Sam took this as her cue to scramble up from the floor and settle in beside him on the cramped armchair, but Jesse slung his arm around her shoulders anyway. It wasn't a bad thing that she wanted to get closer to him. Possessive, as he'd told Shelby, and Sam was just staking a claim on him. He let her have the illusion of control.
"You study too much," Cory said, looking down at Matt on the floor with his textbook. "I thought this was a night of relaxing."
"I've got my first exam of the year on Friday," Matt explained without looking up. "I need to study."
"Who wants to take bets that Matt will ace his exam without any more studying?" grinned Cory, pausing to place a gentle kiss on Tiffany's forehead.
The group chorused back with affirmatives and Jesse saw two tinges of pink appear Matt's face, but he didn't look up from the printed lines.
Sam wiggled closer. "Sing to me."
"Softly," Matt interjected sternly.
Jesse chuckled under his breath and began humming in Sam's ear.
"You'll be great at the auditions, you know," she whispered to him with a smile.
"I know."
The hallway outside the auditorium was packed. People sat on the floor leaning against the wall or paced frantically, some with headphones over their ears. Others hummed bars under their breath and whispered lyrics to themselves. Only a few lounged lazily, having animated conversations with friends as they sipped water. Most of them had made the effort to project a professional appearance, girls in skirts and boys in slacks; Jesse did spot a few pairs of jeans here and there, however.
"Lookin' good, Jess."
Jesse turned to the approving voice with a raised eyebrow already in place when he met soft green eyes. The redhead grinned broadly at him, running her fingers through her hair.
"Sharon," he nodded coolly. Yes, Tiffany had mentioned last night that the brash Californian would be auditioning as well, but he hadn't expected to actually run into her. He admitted to himself that he almost looked down on her for going into an audition without expecting a role. The experience, Tiffany had said. Jesse didn't need experience. He already had plenty of that. What he needed was stardom.
"Seriously," Sharon said, eyes sparkling, "I don't think I've seen you wear anything except black. Not that this is a step too outside the box, but at least it's a start," she gestured to his shirt, teasing smirk still in place.
Jesse glanced down automatically. The white button-up tucked into his dark jeans, fancy enough to pass for a professional audition; the shirt parted two buttons down, a relaxed but classy sort of style. He didn't much like the white, but figured that showing up in black would hinder his chances more than anything. Theoretically, he'd only be critiqued on his vocal talents, but making a good first impression never hurt.
"When's your audition?"
He looked up. "Two, if we're still running on schedule, that is," he added, glancing about. "There seems to be a line."
"Two?" Sharon glanced down at her watch. "Cutting it a little close, aren't you?"
Jesse shrugged, "Fifteen minutes to spare. I've got plenty of time."
She chuckled. "Some of these people have been waiting for ten minutes already and their auditions aren't for another half hour or so."
"Why so early?" he asked, not bothering to keep the surprise out of his voice. It didn't make sense to show up an hour early when the audition times had clearly been outlined.
Sharon replied with a shrug. "Works off the nerves, I guess."
"Oh, yeah. Nerves. I forgot that some people still got those," Jesse smirked, not bothering to lower his voice and ignoring the consequent onslaught of dirty looks sent in his direction.
"First university audition?"
"Yes, same as you."
She shook her head, hair spilling over her shoulder. "Not my first, actually. A few years ago one of UCLA's productions required some younger performers, so they held open auditions for those in high school but planned on attending college for theatre. I auditioned and I got in. It wasn't much," she added, "just some chorus singing; none of us actually had individual speaking lines or anything. But it was great to be in a production like that so early," Sharon grinned.
Jesse nodded. He'd been to Nationals four times. Productions that elaborate were great, although he'd all but forgotten what it was like to only sing chorus.
They made idle chit-chat to fill the silence, relaxing against the wall while Jesse waited for his name to be called. She asked about his experience in Vocal Adrenaline (apparently it had been a whole-room showing of his Regionals performance) and he politely returned the favor with mundane life questions that he had heard all through move-in week. Sharon didn't seem to mind, though, and managed to slip several flirty responses into the conversation.
"Jesse St. James."
He smirked and pushed off the wall. "That'd be me."
"Good luck, Jesse," Sharon called as he headed down the hall to the widely-set double doors leading onto the stage. He waved a hand over his shoulder, not really looking back.
Like I need any of that.
Jesse started to draw deep, controlled breaths that filled his body. It was time to focus. When he reached the middle of the stage, he plastered on the endearing, wholesome grin that won over so many and threw it out to the directors and producers; his eyes locked with each of theirs charismatically as he spoke a friendly greeting.
"Right, Jesse St. James, you're a first year musical theatre major, yes?" A nod.
"Let's begin."
Alex almost threw the phone across the room when it buzzed near her ear – almost. A name showed up black on the brightly lit screen, too bright in the darkness, and she had to squint to decipher the caller. The bold numbers, separated by mocking colon, that showed above the name made her scream into her pillow, but the constant vibration was persistent. She groaned and pressed the phone against her face.
"Cory Henson, you'd better have a damn good reason for waking me up at two on a Saturday morning."
"Alex."
She blinked, sitting up in bed. Cory sounded scared, at least from what she could tell above the raucous pulse-pounding music in the background.
"What's going on?"
"I'm so glad I reached you. I didn't know who else to call and I know you have a car and oh, shit, I really don't know..." Cory babbled on, the relief clearly evident in his voice and undertones of pleading layering his words.
"Cory!" Alex interrupted his tirade harshly. "Slow down. What's happened?"
"You have to get here, Alex. I don't know what to do."
"What are you talking about?"
"It's Jesse."
Everything Changes, Staind.
A/N: Uh oh.
Yes, I'm back! This story has not been forgotten, not by any means, but laptop issues outside of my control needed fixing before I could continue exploring Jesse's journey – thus the reason I'm two weeks behind. I'm doing my best to play catch up. Hopefully I still have some fans who haven't abandoned this.
Thanks to ChronoNomad, lacesandbows20, and egyouppt for reviewing the last chapter!
Also, check out the Glee season 2 fall preview! Nationals are in NEW YORK! (Whether or not this story stays canon with that… remains to be seen).
Please, please review!
