by Tucker Shaw
Mood: I never knew what tired meant before. not to mention starving to death! darla’s a food nazi.
Fortune: Your life is happening now.
ok, these people work way harder than I ever imagined. I mean, I watched Popstars. I watched Making the Band. I’ve seen every Diary and Behind the Music they’ve ever made. but I had NO IDEA that preparing for a tour was this much work! I thought yesterday was just an especially difficult day, but apparently every day is. here’s what we did today:
8 AM—alarm goes off.
8:30 AM—breakfast in the van with the other dancers. all we got was a nonfat yogurt and a piece of fruit because I found out later that someone (I think it was darcy’s mom darla) thought we all looked fat yesterday and found out we went to mas macho taco last night so she ordered yogurt and fruit and that’s it. maybe I’m fatter than the other dancers. I mean sure some of them are freaks of nature with 0% body fat but I’m not, like, FAT. am I? now I’m paranoid. great.
8:45 AM—van drops us off at gym. weight training. (thank god I got to skip this today. instead I spent the whole time at the gym talking with this Woman in Black who had to put me on the payroll and give me all these forms to send home and everything. good thing I remembered my social security number. I get like $2,000 a week after taxes! I’m LOADED. but I’m not spending it. they’re direct depositing it and I’m not taking ANY out. EVER!! I swear.
9:45 AM—van dropped us off at this photo studio where we had to pose in the background for the cover of some magazine Darcy’s gonna be on. which means so am I!! so are all the backups, i’m PSYCHED, tito’s gonna give me so much crap tho. I thought we were gonna be waiting around all day, sitting there, bored, like they always are on all those Fashion TV behind-the-scenes shows. but we were in and out of there in less than 1 hour. I guess Eileen Wang had called and said that’s all darcy could spare. darcy looked amazing even without all that much makeup and stuff on. and her chin zit went away. Was that just last Saturday? Jeez …
11 AM—van dropped us off at rehearsal studio (luckily it wasn’t that two-way mirror one). an hour of warm-up. a half-hour review of what we did yesterday. everyone’s really good. even darcy. I mean yeah she’s a little stiff like she can be on tv and stuff but she’s so focused and works so hard. it’s totally obvious that I’m waaaay behind. but no one’s complaining about that or saying anything, at least not to my face. I mean they’re not going out of their way or anything but at least no one’s like all over my case. and no, I haven’t figured out who’s doing who or anything like that, not yet.
12:30 PM—lunch. they brought a tray of turkey cold cuts and skinless chicken breasts into the studio. plus like a ton of cut-up vegetables and some pasta salad. I really wanted southern deep-fried chicken and maybe some ice cream. but hey, whatever. I wasn’t gonna complain. oh and Gatorade. I had like three. they gave us 15 minutes to chill out. Today the dancers talked more to one another. everyone else was gossiping about the other tours they’d been on and everything. it seems like everyone knows everyone else on the backup dancer circuit, except me of course. so all I did was stuff my face.
I realized some of the girls were staring at me, watching me eat my second bowl of pasta salad. Which I don’t even think is all that much for a full day of dancing. Still, of course my first thought was: They think I’m eating too much. They must think I’m fat. Maybe I am fat? How could I not have noticed? (Channel Tito: Girl, you are not fat. Please.)
1:15 PM—breathing exercises, and the first time since getting here that I really chatted with Darcy. she sat next to me. “Hey K.K.!” for a second I was like “omigod DARCY BARNES is sitting next to me!!” but then I was like, be professional, be professional. stay cool. she told me all about how she’s really into yoga (“I just loved that movie where Madonna was a yoga teacher”) and how learning how to breathe right can totally make all the difference in fitness and everything. she was like “especially for me, as a singer” and I was like “I sing too!” and she kind of looked at me funny. she goes “but anyway breathing is all about posture and spirituality and stuff. it’s so eastern. I love eastern stuff. my friend jesse got me into it. you’re going to love it!” and I really wanted to be like “jesse?? what do you mean jesse?? Jesse Nixon? are you going out with him or what??” I mean it’s like everyone would want to know that, right? Not just cause I have a crush on him. but i played it cool, being just like “awesome! I’m really into eastern stuff too!” and she was like “i’m coloring my hair later. my hair chick Shaundree’s coming over to lighten it. want to do yours too?” I was like “sure!” mostly cause I didn’t know what else to say. I was freaking just a little. I noticed two of the other dancers, both guys, looking at me and whispering. they turned away when I caught their eyes, had I just done something wrong?
darcy was right, too. the breathing exercises were awesome. I had so much energy afterward.
2:00 PM—rehearsal. all the chitchat stopped, the flicker of friendliness stopped, and it was down to serious, game-faced business, things started out ok and i’ve got two numbers down solid already, but I was having a really hard time with this one sequence that ties the two together. there are no breaks in the 2-plus-hour show … we’re dancing hard the whole entire time. I blew it like four times in a row when Rashid called for a break. we all had powerbars and chilled out for 10 minutes. I’d just closed my eyes for some breathing exercises when I suddenly heard this supershrill woman’s voice above me going “K.K.? K.K.?” At first I was like, am I imagining that voice? I was surprised the mirrors weren’t cracking, this voice could shatter glass. anyway I opened my eyes and there was darla barnes. WAY scary. she goes: “so, you’re K.K., right?” I sat up and was like “yeah” and she goes “I hope you like your new nickname. everyone gets one. Except Darcy of course. I mean, she is the one and only star of the show, so she doesn’t need a nickname, everyone knows her name.” then darla looked down at my powerbar or whatever it was and goes “is that one of the low-carb ones?” and I go “I don’t know” and darla goes “here, give it to me. I’ll get you one of the low-carb ones. it’s more appropriate for your, um, fitness level.” she walked off with my powerbar and never came back, not even with a lo-carb bar.
it’s official. they all think I’m fat. So I guess I’m fat.
anyway after that we danced for like another 4½ hours. well everyone else danced for another 2½ hours, then I stayed after with Rashid for some extra help. I have so much to catch up on. I pretty much know about half the show, but I still have to think about every single step. I have to get THERE pretty soon, where it’s not my brain that remembers routines, but my legs. speaking of my legs, they are like jello. actually my brain is like jello. I’m a big ol’ jiggling bowl of jello.
9:30 PM—Salmon and vegetables. One cup of couscous apiece. SEND EMERGENCY PHISH FOOD NOW.
10:00 PM—darcy grabbed me in mid-bite, halfway through my third stalk of asparagus, squeaking c’mon! Shaundree is here to do our hair!” I was like “Great!” and we went running up the stairs. (don’t worry, I shoved the last of my salmon into my mouth before leaving that table. I wasn’t giving up any food for anyone, not even darcy.) anyway we bolted to her bedroom, where there were two temporary beauty parlor chairs set up … so we could both get treatments at the same time, darcy spent the whole time flipping through magazines looking for her name and picture. every time she found herself, she’d squeak and show everyone, then complain about the picture (“Lordy I look horrifying don’t I?”), then fold down the page and put it on the counter in front of her. if a magazine didn’t have any Darcy in it, she’d toss it to me, like her rejects or something, but she was so nice. the whole time she was telling me about how much she misses East Texas, how much she misses her bedroom. Especially her stuffed animal collection. “I have over three thousand Beanie Babies!” I hadn’t even heard about beanie babies in forever, and I was thinking are you kidding me? then I started thinking maybe she was kidding, so I started to crack up. onl
y, she wasn’t laughing. So I blended my laugh into a “that’s so awesome!! I only have a couple of beanies!” she goes, “well I can hook you up! I have some duplicates! you can totally have some next time we go home!” before I could say “We?” she goes, “what’s your favorite show? mine is Sex and the City! I have all the DVDs! I swear, I AM Carrie Bradshaw. I mean, it’s just weird how much alike we are! I wonder if the writers ever use my life as inspiration! Do you think my hair looks better than hers?” luckily right then Shaundree’s assistant dunked my head under the water and I couldn’t answer or even hear another word.
11:00 PM—my hair is now tiger striped, it’s a little freaky. Shaundree says it’ll mellow out and look good in a couple of days, anyway Darcy was like good night and we went back to our rooms to crash. except tonight darla knocked on my door like two minutes after I took my top off. I threw on this robe darcy gave me after we got our hair done. (she was all “go take a bath and put this on, then we’ll be doing the same exact thing! fun, huh?” I was like, ok cool! but then I cheated and took a shower instead. don’t worry I had my hair in a shower cap so I didn’t mess up the stripes. ugh.) anyway I let darla in. she was in a tracksuit, sunglasses so dark I couldn’t tell where she was looking, and her hair was huge. she was carrying a really big purse and she smelled like peaches. she looks me up and down (at least it looked like she was) and she goes, “hmm. is that one of darcy’s robes? you can leave it outside your door tomorrow morning, and i’ll make sure it gets washed and returned to darcy’s closet.” I was like I’m. ok. I’m just thinking ok, whatever she wants, this is the boss. I was definitely intimidated. then she goes, “by the way I just wanted to let you know our tour got pushed UP a week. we’ll be starting a little early. our first show is June 20 in St, Louis. so we’re going to need you in the gym pretty much 24/7 between now and then. I’m afraid that means you’ll be working one-on-one with rashid when the other dancers take Sunday off. I’m sorry about that. unfortunately that’s what happens when dancers show up so many weeks late for rehearsals. But I want you to know just how glad everyone is that you’re here, and we’re going to need you to pay extra close attention to your, urn, fitness. oh by the way we’ll just pro-rate your rent and expenses this month and take it out of your pay.” it wasn’t until then that I realized what was in darla’s handbag because it barked. or more like yipped. “Shhh! Punkin!” oh god. she carries a dog in her purse. at least, that’s what it sounded like. I couldn’t see anything. she kept going, “we’ll also deduct your private lessons with rashid. remember, our dancing really matters. if you want to slack off and be sloppy, you should just go dance for Pashmina or some other girl who wants to be as famous as my baby girl but never could be.” She left, and I sank onto my bed. So THAT’S who’s paying for this whole thing. Me. There’s nothing free about this ride. I wonder how much rent is on this place? I know how much private dance lessons are … will I have enough to save for evan?
I realized then and there that I would make it a goal to have as little contact with Darla Barnes as possible for the rest of my life.
SlipKnotRules933111: sis
KellyKelSoCal321: he
SlipKnotRules933111: did u get the tickets?
KellyKelSoCal321 : for what
SlipKnotRules933111: I thought you said we were going to see cradle of filth this weekend
KellyKelSoCal321: oh yeah! oh yeah! dude I haven’t had time all day. I’m sorry, dude I have bad news I don’t get Sunday off. they moved the tour date up so I have to do a one-on-one session with Rashid and it starts at 8 am on Sunday and i’m so tired already I’m gonna be totally exhausted. I don’t know what time I’ll even get off on Saturday night.
SlipKnotRules933111: so we could see something else, what, don’t they have shows like all night in LA?
KellyKelSoCal321: I don’t know dude. i haven’t been out at all. i’m sorry. I know I said we’d do a show but I don’t know. how is it there.
SlipKnotRules933111 : carl didn’t come home last night and mom’s been in her room all day.
KellyKelSoCal321: oh man.
SlipKnotRules933111: so i’m just staying in my room. whatever.
KellyKelSoCal321: what about the twins
SlipKnotRules933111: what about them
KellyKelSoCal321: where are they?
SlipKnotRules933111: I don’t know, probably asleep, who cares.
KellyKelSoCal321: oh man. well I guess carl would never think of leaving his precious little blondies alone. lol.
SlipKnotRules933111: this place sucks
KellyKelSoCal321: dude come up on Saturday we’ll figure something out
SlipKnotRules933111: no it’s cool you’ve got your thing going on I’ll be cool
KellyKelSoCal321: HEY ! ! ! ! don’t be like that!
KellyKelSoCal321: HEY!!!!
KellyKelSoCal321: HEY JACKASS!!
SlipKnotRules933111: downloading …
and then he signed off. jerk.
actually, maybe I’m the jerk. I wish I could IM tito, but his parents have grounded him from all web activities other than email since they caught him in an “adult” chat room.
THURSDAY JUNE 5
D-ZONEf 12:19 AM
Outfit: official It’s Darcy!! concert tee (white on pink), long sleeves
Hair: never blonder
Mood: desperate to CHILL OUT and watch bad tv. need a friend, bad.
Fortune: If you can’t say anything nice, keep it to yourself.
i’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. thank god for my laptop. I got this email at like 11:20 tonight.
To: kaykay4real
From: Tito_T
Date: Thursday June 5
Time: 11:19 PM
Subject: Daytime hotties
What is going on! I am totally chilling at home watching daytime TV. Port Charles is soooo good! Passions sucks. And I’ve been totally featuring Regis and Kelly lately. Pretty sad, isn’t it. Anyway, enough about me. What is up with you!!! I need to know everything about everyone you’ve met. Here’s what I would like to know: Name, Age, Sign, Hair, Personal Style, Body Type (details if they’re hot!), General Description, Why We Care, and Other. OK? Got it? I want FULL FRONTAL DETAILS. Get it? Especially DARLA.
Adios,
Moi
PS—And is Darcy dating anyone?
Another one of tito’s games. he was probably going to line up my chart with theirs or something. I love him. ok …
To: Tito_T
From: kaykay4real
Date: Thursday June 5
Time: 12:19 AM
Subject: The It’s Darcy!! players ok dude you asked for it you got it. I don’t know everyone’s ages or signs . oh and you can forget appropriate punctuation or any of that crap. sue me.
Name: Darcy Barnes
Age: 18
General Info: She’s darcy barnes. What else do u need to know?
Sign: you already know that she’s a Sag. even though sometimes she gets confused and says she’s an Aries.
Hair: blond, even blonder than me, and I’m pretty damn blond lately.
Personal Style: believe it or not, off- stage she’s a total jock. I’ve yet to see her in anything other than sweats or workout clothes, although even when she’s in full sweats she somehow manages to get her belly button exposed, front and center. so far I’ve counted four different belly button rings. I wonder how many she has to choose from. I bet she has jewelry designers sending her belly button rings every day. ps the weirdest thing in the world is when she’s just standing there listening to rashid or something, she’s always playing with her belly button, you know, like how some people twirl their hair or how like evan always has his hand down his pants when he’s watching tv or whatever, she just fingers her belly button all the time. ew I said finger. gross huh.
Body Type: a lot stronger than I expected. kinda like a skier or surfer or something. muscley legs. abs. she’s more like an athlete than a sexpot. didn’t you tell me once that s
he did gymnastics all the time growing up and stuff? are the boobs real? I don’t know for sure. I’m bad at that stuff. but if they weren’t, would that make getting a nipple pierce less painful? one of these days maybe I’ll ask.
Why We Care: um, she’s the star.
Other: I don’t know how else to say this but today darcy barnes asked me if I was a virgin. I was like “WHY??” and she was like “because I AM! do you think that’s good for my career?” tito you would have GAGGED. so anyway you heard it here first. she claims to be a virgin. and believe it or not. I believe it. (maybe it’s her beanie baby collection that’s got me believing.) do we even know any other virgins? (I wonder if this factors into her belief that she’s so scarily like Carrie Bradshaw …)
Name: Darla Barnes
Age: she really wants to be 36, but so does my mom. I’d say she’s closing in on 50 fast.
General Info: you probably know more about her than I do, tito. She’s darcy’s mom and manager and all that. She’s always there. But she’s not that hip, not like Britney’s mom, who seems kind of cool. Darla’s more like a beauty-pageant mom.
Sign: I bet she’s a scorpio, huh?
Hair: helmet head. think Sally Field in Steel Magnolias. dark hair with tons of products in it, mostly aerosol based. I think she might have had an eye job because it just seems all too tight around there.
Personal Style: pants suits with cardigans tied across her shoulders. like how oprah does sometimes. always smells like peaches. (or is it mangoes?)
Body Type: sort of like Susan Lucci. big on top with teeny little legs. spends most of her time sitting down or pacing. (and lately talking a lot about how untalented she thinks Pashmina is. ha ha.)
Why We Care: something tells me that she’s the one who’s really in charge around here. and if she’s NOT, if I’ve got that wrong, then she definitely WANTS to be in charge. she seems to be everywhere, all the time, and she seems to know everyone and everything. she makes me totally nervous. everyone kisses up to her all the time. I always suck in my gut around her because I think she thinks I’m fat. actually I know she thinks I’m fat. she practically said so when she offered everyone else a coke the other day then handed me a diet coke. she has this really ugly little dog that looks like a rat with bows in its ears and stuff. it slobbers all over and sounds like it’s heaving. she carries it in her purse and talks baby talk to it and acts like she doesn’t notice when it takes a crap on the floor. it’s called PUNKIN. not “pumpkin” but PUNKIN. Hey, could I make this up?