Chapter 11 - "Sorry I'm not home right now...." Michaela's Story
April 20th, 2000 - Tulsa, Oklahoma

"Grub!" I called, following Tweedle-Tay into the house. "We're home!" Tweedle-Tay and I had finally finished the 25 minute walk back to our house from the mall. My feet felt as though they were burning. It was probably because of my three-inch heels. We walked into the lounge room, where Grubbery was sitting reading Romeo and Juliet. It must have had something to do with his English homework.
Grubbery looked up from the play. "You're home?" he asked, sounding more than a little pissed off. "What took you so long? I've been home for nearly an hour now."
I sat down on the lounge and took off my shoes. "The parents were following us," Tweedle-Tay explained. "We went to Woodland Hills."
I began to massage my feet. "They couldn't find us there. There were too many people," I added.
Grubbery looked worried. "They were following you?"
I nodded. "We didn't want to lead them straight to the house, so wee ran to the mall. Then we had to walk back here. That kind of thing takes up time you know."
"We didn't stay there for long," Tweedle-Tay added. "Just long enough to catch our breath. We didn't mean to worry you."
"Yeah...." Grubbery said softly. He composed himself. "But I expected you to be home sooner.... They know that it was us now?"
I nodded. "I'm going to call ABC this afternoon."
"Maybe you should call them now," Tweedle-Tay suggested. "We don't have a lot of time."
"I guess you're right," I agreed. I walked over to the phone and picked up the cordless. Everything was so.... empty, I guess. Everything that we'd been working towards in the past couple of weeks had all gone to waste. Our parents knew that God wasn't punishing them now. The only thing we could hope for now was that the final, most important, part of the plan would fall through. I sat back down on the couch.
Suddenly Grubbery's empty eyes came to life. "That reminds me!" he said, pointing to the phone. "We got a call, about half an hour ago. It was some girl called Alisha, who wanted to speak to someone called TJ."
"Alisha!" Tweedle-Tay said excitedly.
"I knew your girlfriend's name was Alisha so I thought....." Grubbery trailed off.
"Alisha thinks Tay's name is TJ," I explained.
"Michaela, would you give me the phone?" Tweedle-Tay asked excitedly. "I have to call Alisha!"
I shook my head. "I have to call ABC," I said. "We don't have any time to waste. You said so yourself." I turned the phone on and began to dial the number of the Chicago branch of ABC. There was no way I was going to let Alisha come in and ruin our plan. Tweedle-Tay and I had been getting along really well in the past few days. I didn't want Alisha ruining that.
A man answered the phone. "Hello, ABC studios. How may I help you?"
I explained our situation to him and he put me right through to the woman we wanted to speak to herself. I told her our story, from Tweedle- Tay's and Grubbery's fame, to the attic, to the coma, the incest and the abuse. She was *very* interested, to put it mildly, and said that she would have us flown to Chicago on Saturday so that we could be filmed on Monday. I thanked her. At least one part of the revenge plan was going to work out okay. When I got off the phone I filled in Tweedle-Tay and Grubbery on the details. They were very pleased indeed.
"It's going to be 100% legitimate," I told them. "All about us and our parents and the abuse."
"Good," Grubbery said. "We don't want it to be too tacky."
"Of course," I said carefully, "There are a few little things they want us to do. Not too much though."
"Like what?" Tweedle-Tay asked.
"Like they want us to do a couple of musical numbers...." I said, trailing off nervously.
Surprisingly, Tweedle-Tay and Grubbery were enthusiastic. "We can do MMMPop in three-part harmony," Grubbery said eagerly.
"And we can do Baby Girl, too," Tweedle-Tay added, obviously proud of his new 'masterpiece'.
There was something about this that concerned me though. "Three-part harmony?" I asked nervously. "You're not going to call Neuton back, are you?"
"No," Tweedle-Tay said, as though the entire thing were obvious.
"You can sing the third part," Grubbery added.
"I'm going to sing lead of course," Tweedle-Tay went on. "Because that's what everyone would expect. You can sing Grubbery's part and Grubbery can sing Neuton's part."
"But your voice is lower than mine," Grubbery argued.
Tweedle-Tay shook his head. "Well, I have to sing lead, and Michaela can't sing that low."
"Michaela can't sing at all," I contributed. They didn't notice.
"Maybe if we were singing Lucy....." Tweedle-Tay continued.
"Well, why don't we?" Grubbery asked, annoyed. "It would make a nice change. We never got to sing Lucy live when we were famous!"
"Maybe that's because it was a crap song!" Tweedle-Tay argued.
Okay. This was getting bad. "Uh, guys?" I asked nervously. They turned to face me. "I think we're forgetting something rather important here....."
"And that would be?" Grubbery asked.
"Well, I don't want to sing. I'm not a singer," I explained.
"Oh," Grubbery was speechless.
Tweedle-Tay shook his head. "That is bullshit Michaela." He turned to Grubbery. "She's talking shit. Michaela was in a band in LA, *and* she did voice for her performances in music." He turned back to me. "You just don't want to sing our songs, do you?"
I shrugged. "Well, not on national television."
Grubbery looked annoyed. "Well that's too bad. You'll look stupid if you don't sing with us."
Tweedle-Tay smiled. "And the harmonies won't work without three voice."
"Please Michaela....." Grubbery made his face look angelic.
I couldn't be bothered arguing with him. "Okay....." I agreed. I had no life. It wasn't as though I had anything to lose. Only dignity, respect....
Tweedle-Tay's face lit up. "I know!" he said excitedly. "We can invite Alisha! She can be part of the studio audience!"
"But she doesn't know who you are....." I warned.
"Oh well," Tweedle-Tay said, caught up in his excitement. "I can tell her on Monday." He picked up the phone and began to dial.
Alisha was coming..... I was going to be singing Manson songs on national television. Oh well, it was important to look on the bright side. Our parents were going to get what was coming to them.