“Alisha, if you don’t hurry up, we’re going to be late to the concert!” a girl yelled through the bedroom door.
“I’m coming, Margo,” the girl in the bedroom yelled. “Just let me find my cell phone.”
Alisha Westbrook, Margo Gardner, and Lilly Cardenas were on their way to a Burnt Abbey concert. The boy band was slowly gaining notoriety for attempting to imitate many of the boy bands from the 1990s with their inspirational lyrics and soft music performed on acoustic instruments. The band had yet to attain mega rock star status.
“Remind me again why I’m going to this concert,” Lilly said to Margo as Alisha came downstairs with her cell phone. They were each wearing dark clothes, with Margo wearing a frilly long black dress and a pair of short boots while Lilly wore a skimpy medium-length dark gray dress and a pair of short boots. Alisha was wearing a skimpy medium-length pale blue dress and a pair of knee-high embroidered boots.
“Because you can’t always be staying at home surfing the net and watching cat videos on a Friday night,” said Alisha. “Just because there’s something wrong with you doesn’t mean that you have to isolate yourself from the world.”
“Yeah,” Margo agreed. “Besides, you like vintage rock bands.”
“Not bands from the 90s,” said Lilly defensively.
“But Burnt Abbey is different from those old boy bands,” said Alisha. “You do know that at their concerts, they use electrical effects at their shows?”
“But they don’t usually do that unless they’re big-time rock stars, which they’re not,” said Lilly.
“Not right now, they’re not now they’re not,” said Alisha, “but who knows what’s going to happen after tonight. I mean, our city is the last stop of the spring tour, but if we’re lucky, we might be able to catch them at this year’s Rah-Rah-Palooza.”
“I hope so,” said Lilly as Alisha locked up her house and they rushed to the bus stop to catch the shuttle to the concert. Lilly sat in the back of the bus staring into space as Alisha and Margo discussed the antics of Casey Thomas, Charlie Kirkland, Robbie Copeland, David Tyson, and Logan Stuart (the members of the band). Lilly wasn’t exactly interested in this group at all, but she knew that unless she wanted to be bugged to death by Alisha and Margo, she would have to put up with them for the entire evening.
“Such a shame that Charlie had to break up with that actress,” said Margo to Alisha. They were discussing the recent breakup between Charlie Kirkland and an actress named Tina Carroll. Tina was the star of an unpopular TV show called “Beast of Beauty”. Many of the band’s female fans were already applauding the breakup, seeing as none of them liked Tina to begin with.
“I’m not sure about that,” said Alisha, “but what I do know is that now that Charlie’s single once again, many of these girls will be clamoring for his attention.”
“And what of the other guys?” said Margo. “Isn’t anyone clamoring for their attention as well?”
“They each have huge fan clubs that exploded all over the internet,” said Lilly. “I mean, we’ve already had to put up with One Direction, but do we really need this?” The other girls stared at her, but she kept on talking. “Last year, we didn’t even have to deal with this stuff, but now, it’s like everywhere I turn, it’s “Burnt Abbey” this and “Burnt Abbey” that. I even had to stop accessing some of my favorite websites just because all everyone on those sites wanted to talk about was Burnt Abbey. It’s gotten out of hand and I want it to stop.”
“And why?” said Margo.
“It’s just like the Harry Potter phenomenon of the last decade,” said Lilly. “I remember when everyone and their brother was trying to get me to read the books because they themselves liked the books. There is a good reason why I don’t participate in following any fads. I don’t do stuff like that because I know that as soon as the next big thing comes up, everyone’s forgotten about that one fad and are quickly replacing their old stuff with new stuff. I can’t tell you how many people I know were getting rid of their Pokemon cards and selling their Dragonsaurs toys just because they wanted to read those Harry Potter books. Thank god that that nightmare is finally over and we can move onto something else.”
Alisha and Margo nodded, then quickly resumed their chat about the band. Lilly shook her head, knowing that the moment that Burnt Abbey’s fifteen minutes of fame ran its course and another boy band shows up, the hordes of girls living in Hillside Lake, California would forget about that band and go flocking to the next band.
But she was wrong.
*****
“Testing, testing, one, two, three,” said Casey Thomas as he, Charlie Kirkland, Robbie Copeland, David Tyson, and Logan Stuart began testing the sound of their microphone and instruments. The band was beginning to warm up as the audience poured into the stadium. Excited chatter filled the air. Most of the teenagers who gathered had heard of the band before, thanks to Facebook, but there were a few who have yet to know about the band.
One of those people was Lilly Cardenas.
She, Alisha, and Margo were walking into the stadium and taking their seats, which was in the third row from the floor seats. Alisha frowned, saying to herself, “I could have sworn that we were going to get some better seats this year.”
“We’ve got third row seats,” said Margo. “Can’t you get excited about that?”
“I wanted front row seats,” said Alisha. “I should have paid for those seats instead of going shopping. Now look at me; I got that book that I’m probably never going to read and not a single seat in the front row for us. I really need to quit buying things that I don’t need. It’s a bad habit, one that needs to be broken or else I’ll be out of a room.”
“I see what you mean,” said Margo. “No more shopping trips for you until you get rid of all of this junk that you have shoved inside your closet.”
“Indeed, you need to stop,” said Lilly. “But that’s not the point. The point is that I could be at home watching College Treasure, but no, I HAD to be out there with you two at some silly concert featuring some useless boy band. I’m never going to hear I’m never going to hear the end of it.”
“Where? From your imaginary friends?” Margo snapped. “Grow up, Lilly; you’re 16 years old, you don’t need them anymore. When are you going to give it up?”
Lilly was about to respond when a sound broke through the tension. Everyone in the audience all turned to stare at the stage, where the popular club emcee Everett Rush jumped up onto the stage, yelling, “Good evening, Hillside Lake! This is your emcee for the evening, Everett Rush down in Club Baitstion which is located just around the corner. I’d like to welcome you all to tonight’s spring concert featuring local favorite, The Burnt Abbey!”
The audience cheered ethusicatically as Rush continued, “Although these boys have been backed by Candice Brenner and completed a statewide tour last summer, they like to keep it close to home. Our town is always the last town on their tour, and for good measure; this town is their hometown. And as such, they’re going to give us a hometown concert…”
“Yeah, yeah, just keep talking,” Lilly muttered to herself as the emcee continued. She really wasn’t happy that her friends talked her into going to this concert, but what choice did she have. It was either going to the concert, or wasting another Friday night parked on the couch watching mind-numbing TV and eating junk food, making herself even fatter than before. Lilly’s parents didn’t seem to mind her staying home and enjoying herself, yet in recent weeks, both mom and dad had decided that it was time for her to stop watching TV and get out of the house.
That was why she was here.
She glanced at the stage, wondering if the emcee would never stop talking. It wasn’t even the opening song and already she was bored. Why did I let them drag me here, she thought to herself. I could be at the theaters watching a movie or at the skating rink. I don’t need a mindless obsession with some boy band. It’s not fair.
Finally, Rush said, “And now for the moment that you’ve all been waiting for…Casey Thomas, Charlie Kirkland, Robbie Copeland, David Tyson, and Logan Stuart of The Burnt Abbey!!!”
This time, the cheering grew even louder as the band came charging out onto the stage; the boys were all wearing black shirts and jeans, with wide red belts, copper neck ties, and pale pink top hats. Lilly shook her head as she stared at their outfits; they could not be seriously considering themselves to be rock musicians with those Gothy clothes! I’ve seen older musicians who dressed better than them, and they’re old!
While Lilly seemed to complain about the band, Margo was reveling in her excitement. She was always open to all kinds of music; she didn’t care about what genre it was, just as long as she was listening to music. She had owned several different iPods and music players because her music collection was so huge.
Alisha was also enjoying herself; she had wanted to see The Burnt Abbey for several months, or since the day that Margo told her about the band from reading a post about them on Facebook. She usually wasn’t too open to teen rock bands, but this group wasn’t too bad. She only wished that Lilly could share in the excitement as well.
“Are you guys ready to rock?” Charlie shouted into the microphone as the crowd cheered. “Ok, here we go!”
The band rushed to their instruments and started playing a song called Firecracker Safari. The girls all cheered and even some of the guys (who also came to the concert) all began to cheer as well. Lilly found herself unable to enjoy the music, especially since the song lyrics were as follows: You’re ready to go, yeah, I’m ready to get it on, let’s get ready to rumble, we’re gonna rock the house tonight…
Lilly wondered to herself what kind of music is this? Do these guys seriously have no taste?
Just then, she heard the next song, which was called Mistakes On A Plate: “I’ve been watching all my sins fly in and take over my life / where are the gods to stop this madness / you say that you can help me out / but you’re really just looking at my / mistakes on a plate
mistakes on a plate, mistakes on a plate / you need to stop looking at my mistakes on a plate / mistakes on a plate, mistakes on a plate / you need to stop looking at my mistakes on a plate…
Well, at least they’re not as bad as that one band that almost everyone likes, Lilly thought to herself, but they’re not that good either. What is it about them that is making them so popular? She was determined to get to the bottom of this mystery.
“Hey, Lilly,” said Alisha. “Enjoying yourself?”
“You should be,” said Margo. “Think of what you would be doing right now if we hadn’t dragged you out of your home.”
“I’d probably be sitting at home reading a good book,” said Lilly.
“Wrong answer,” said Margo. “You would be spending, I mean, wasting yet another Friday night sitting on the couch watching brain-draining reality shows on TV and making yourself even fatter than you already are.”
“Say what?” Lilly cried out.
“Just admit that you’re having a better time with us than by yourself,” said Alisha. “You know you want to.”
“Yeah, right,” Lilly cried out. She knew that she was going to make them both pay for dragging her away from her couch to see some boy band tomorrow.
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