I looked at the last update date for this story, and I was appalled to find that it was the day before Christmas Eve. And tomorrow's Single's Awarness Day.
*cringes*
I'M SORRY!!!!!!!
I went back through the story in the New Year and changed a word here and there to make it flow better, but then got a huge and annoying bout of writer's block. In my absence I started a Twlight parody which has been called genius, so if you're a Twilight fan please go read and review! Anyway, here is chapter eight or nine, I can't remember. Has it been that long? Gah...
'SmallLean' isn't mine, it's by 100 Monkey's. That's Monroe Jackson Rathbone's band. If you want to know more, Google them - they have amazing music and amazing hair.
Please read and review if you like this chapter!
Riot at Camp Rock
"Hey, Shane? Please can you do me a favour?"
"Sure, what is it?" I had hung back after dance because I had remembered that Mitchie and Caitlyn's original idea was "To make you the best musician in your new hometown". And, since I was doing so well at all my other subjects (yes, even Music Theory!), I had decided that trying my hand at learning another instrument couldn't hurt.
"I was wondering… Mitchie said you can play drums?" Shane grinned, catching on in a second.
"Of course I can show you some stuff, I haven't forgotten Caitlyn begging me to give you extra tuition, even though you don't need it. Just don't hold me responsible if you drag a drum kit home after the summer and your parents don't like the noise!"
"Thanks," I grinned also, then a thought struck me. "You know, Shane Gray the jerk would have told me to get lost."
"I know." Shane looked thoughtful, possibly remembering, as I was, the press coverage of the infamous skinny latte incident. "So, how are you liking Camp Rock so far?"
"It's unbelievable." I replied honestly. "I've been here…Not even three weeks? It feels like forever, and it feels as though I've only been here three seconds. I never thought I could do all this performance stuff before, though."
"You never know unless you try." Shane agreed. "When are you free?"
"Um… No idea."
"Okay, I'll find a time I can do and get back to you."
"Jools, I have good news!" Mitchie announced, bursting into our cabin, smiling big.
"You've finally told Shane you love him!" I exclaimed, springing up from my bed and hugging her. It had become a joke between me and Caitlyn as to who could annoy Mitchie more about her refusing to tell Shane how she felt about him. Talk about turning into Max Ride… Can we say lack of communication?
"No, I haven't, but I'm going to talk to him on the lake today. I wanted to tell you that Brown has given us permission to go into town this weekend and get you a guitar. Jason offered to come, as he knows your style of playing best."
"Yeah, he can come if he wants," I said vaguely, more interested in the fact I was going to get my very own musical instrument in just a few days time. Then I could stop borrowing Mitchie's and get round to putting chords to some lyrics I had thought of at Parents' Weekend. I could hardly wait…..
I won't go into details of buying my guitar. Mainly because I can't remember most of it, I was more concerned with the actual lovely instrument I had wanted since I had first laid eyes on it, seconds after stumbling through the shop door. That sounded very cheesy, didn't it? My guitar, my imprint, my sole reason for living, the Edward to my Bella, my… Okay, I'll stop now.
I was now the proud owner of a brand new jet black Cort acoustic with white edges and, so far, no dents. The best part was that it only cost a hundred and thirty dollars, so I could buy a case, tuner and spare strings. For all you out there who have no idea and less interest of how a guitar works, I won't go into details. It was made of wood and it was my new best friend. I was hardly away from it (A/N: PM me if you have a name… I was thinking Jackson…), spending most of my free time in the practice rooms, scribbling song ideas and daydreaming.
One afternoon, a few days after I had bought my darling new instrument, Mickey decided to drop by and disturb my peace and quiet.
"Juliet!" I looked up.
"Since when have you been allowed to call me Juliet?" I demanded, scowling, but reminded of a past conversation.
"Since just now."
"Whatever. . . Michaela."
"Okay, I guessed I asked for that," Mickey came further into the practice room and sat on the grand piano stood in the corner, probably killing it. "What are you working on?"
"I'm trying to get a few chords to some lyrics that have been in my head for a while." I replied, pulling a face.
"Cool, need a hand?" It wouldn't be too bad, actually.
"Yeah, alright. Here are some of the words." I handed him a piece of paper covered with my messy handwriting.
'Jesse Camp, Jesse Camp used to be a TV star.
Jesse Camp, Jesse Camp is now a homeless guy living out of his car.
you might see him around on the street
he sure looks the same to me
but he's no longer on the MTV
he's in the cubicle next to me'
Those, my friends, were the manuscripts to a future hit song. Well, they weren't all the lyrics, and I was having trouble with the music, but I think they weren't bad for a novice.
"These are good." Mickey sounded impressed, hopping off the piano and sitting next to me.
"Don't look so surprised!" I laughed for a moment then grew serious. "Are they really?"
"Yep."
"Thank you. I can't make the music work, though – and I need more text." Mickey thought about it, then grabbed a pencil and scribbled some stuff down, strumming my guitar as he went.
"How about that?" I read through his addition to the song, and smiled.
"I think we could have a song on our hands…"
**~+~**Two Long Hours Later**~+~**
"We defiantly have a song on our hands." I announced, beaming.
"Hell yeah," Mickey agreed, looking at the neatly-written version of the music and lyrics I'd written out when the scribbles and crossings-outs had become too confusing.
The song had a rocky underside, and a talkative way of singing, with a hard beat from drums and a gentle piano tune over the top.
It rocked.
"Do you want to show this to Mitchie and Caitlyn?" asked Mickey, waving the music in the air. A frown creased my forehead, and a knot appeared in my stomach. I wasn't sure if I was ready to play my own music to the general public just yet. "It's alright if you don't," he assured me. "You want to go grab some dinner?" I looked at my watch and my eyes widened in surprise when I saw the time,
"Yes – how did it get so late so quickly?!"
Mickey shrugged. "Time flies when you're writing hits."
"Are you sure we've come to the right place? This is a mob, not a civilized dining space."
"Well, the sign above the door says 'Music Mess Hall of Fame', so I'm going to assume so…" I tailed off, slightly bewildered by what really was an angry mob.
"Jools, Mickey!" Caitlyn disentangled herself from the crowd that was occupying every inch of the mess hall and also spilling out the doors. Most of them seemed to be shouting, waving their fists in the air.
"Hey, Caitlyn," I had to raise my voice to be heard above the noise. "What's going on? Has the kitchen run out of Nachos or something?" Caitlyn shook her head and I realised she looked incredibly sad and incredibly infuriated at the same time.
"No, it's much worse than that. Camp Rock is closing down."
What?!
"No. Way." Mickey's face was the picture of pure disbelief. "No. They can't close down Camp Rock. It's not possible."
"Why?" I asked. Shock was still my primary emotion, but I was slowly seeing scarlet. How could they do this? "It doesn't make sense for camp to close right in the middle of the summer. Brown wouldn't let it."
"Let's go and see him now." Mickey suggested. "He might be able to tell us something."
"All Dee's telling us is that there's been a problem with something 'official'." Caitlyn told us. "Mitchie and Shane had to see Brown anyway; I'll take you to them."
Five minutes later, there were seven livid teenagers all talking at the camp director. Well, Jason was probably actually twenty-something, but hey, he had the mental age of a five year old most of the time…
"Why is Camp Rock closing down?"
"Who said it could?"
"How long have you known about this?"
"What about Final Jam?"
"What's going to happen now?"
"Can't you stop it?"
"Why?"
Brown held up a hand to stem the questions. "Camp Rock is closing down because the record company that sponsors it – your record company-" Brown indicated Connect Three, who had joined the argument a split second after hearing the news, "Has decided that we are not only too expensive to run, we aren't producing enough talent."
"Our record company is the worst in the universe. They're trying to save money by booting out artists, but they're kicking out the wrong ones! They think Mitchie can't perform, but they're jumping to sign singers who can't sing to save their life!" Nate pointed out.
"And they don't even pay for camp, the campers do – you know how much they charge just for admission to Final Jam!" Mitchie agreed, waving her hands in the air to emphasize her words.
"You can't close down Camp Rock." I repeated Mickey's earlier words with urgency, only just realising what the consequences would be. If Camp Rock shut, where would I go? Mum and Dave were still in California, I couldn't interrupt their honeymoon. And, I realised only now, that I would be at a loss as to what to do. The last three weeks had been so jam packed full of guitar practice and singing and laughter that I wasn't sure what a normal life, with school and chores and homework, was actually like.
"I need to speak to the label." Shane announced, and pulled a BlackBerry out of his pocket. Even amongst the sadness and blood red fury, I still managed to be surprised at the fact a phone that large could fit into jeans that tight. I guess there are some things we'll just never know….
"Shane, no." Brown interrupted his nephew swiftly, before he had even had time to dial the number. "If we all go yelling at them now, their response will be negative and stupidly childish – they'll just shut camp down quicker." Wise words there Brown, my Yoda.
"That's true," Jason agreed, rubbing his forehead in a way I'd noticed he only did when agitated. "What we need is a comeback, a really good one."
"Yeah, one that totally kicks ass, not just a crappy one like 'Uh-uh. Gir-rrl, puh-lease.'" Caitlyn agreed, snapping her fingers in a Z formation at the same time.
"Nothing like that." Mickey concurred, and we all laughed, needing the reassurance that the whole world was not going down the drain.
"So, anyone got any ideas? 'Cause I think we really need one." Mitchie said, and our faces fell again
"Protest?" Nate suggested. "We could go on strike and refuse to perform or write or go anywhere near the label until they agree to our wishes."
"How about we just ditch the record company altogether?" Shane spat. "We don't need them, anyway."
"What are we going to do without one?" Jason asked, confusion displayed all over his face. "Don't we need a record company to, you know, release records?"
"I think there are bands that have managed it." I said quietly, remembering The Futureheads and McFly, who, to the best of my knowledge, had split from their record company for whatever reason and -
"We could form our own." Jason suggested, eyes lighting up with the thrill of a new idea. But how could that possibly save Camp Rock? Brown was obviously thinking along the same lines as me, and said so.
"I have no idea how that would save camp… But then we might be able to sign our own bands." Nate put in, and I could see where he was coming from. With your own record company, you could have the industry at your fingertips…right?
"We'll discuss this later." Dee said, looking more like a stressed out high school teacher than a music camp director. "Right now I have to go tell the kids to calm down, I wouldn't be surprised if they had set fire to the mess hall by now, the state they were in." Knowing how they felt, I couldn't blame them one bit if they had.
Over the next week, the atmosphere at camp became the worst I had ever known. No one had the heart to sing or dance anymore, as if somehow we didn't have the right. If Camp Rock was over, what was the point in rocking? Mostly I just sat, with Mickey and Eliza and Matt, in the music room Eliza and I had first performed Boulevard of Broken Dreams in, and tried to enjoy our time together while we could. For today was Wednesday, and parents were coming the following Saturday to pick us all up and take us back to our homes in various states in America.
Caitlyn no longer sat me at the dressing table for hours on end, fixing my hair into crazy styles. Shane and Mitchie spent most waking hours out on the lake in a canoe, meal times were dull and subdued – there were no more food fights or busking, no more lessons even.
"Oh, I can't take this anymore!" Eliza announced, standing up suddenly and dislodging Matt and I from our places on the wooden floor – we'd both been leaning on her.
"What can't you take?" Mickey asked, leaning back against the piano and crossing his legs.
"This, this, moping." Eliza clarified, pacing up and down the room. "If these are our last days at camp, we should be celebrating our time here, not acting like they were the worst of our lives!"
"But that's just it," I pointed out. "They were the best of our lives, and we can't even come back next year to repeat the experience; this is the last Camp Rock ever, it won't happen again."
"All the more reason to celebrate." Eliza argued.
"She's right; we do need something fun and crazy to send the year out with a bang – something that would rock even better than Final Jam." Oh, didn't I tell you? Final Jam had been cancelled as well, due to the fact the label organised the judging, trophy and recording contract that had been up for grabs this year.
"We need….A show." Mickey said, and I wacked him over the head with one the fashion magazines Eliza had been forcing me to read (seriously, what is with the obsession over Miley Cyrus? I don't get it). "What was that for?!"
"Final Jam was a show and everything from here was a show, you idiot!"
"Oh, forgive me for trying to lighten the atmosphere." he replied grumpily. "And don't say 'was'. It sounds too final."
"I know." I replied quietly. "It's just so horrible; I don't want camp to end." Eliza put her arm around me comfortingly, and said,
"It won't. We'll think of a way."
A way to save Camp Rock.
Well, hell, the idea had to be good.
Because otherwise Saturday would be the end of the best time of my life.
Like the plot twist? I did, it got rid of my writer's block...