When all seems perfect and contentment sets in, that’s when to be most on guard that disaster is waiting to leap from its dark hiding place and eat you.
—Phineas Flynn
INTERIOR. LYLE’S MESSY GARAGE—MIDDAY
Lyle, wild-haired and intense, stares at his computer monitor as the five members of Lemonade Mouth, plus Naomi Fishmeier, watch over his shoulder.
CHARLIE (V.O.)
Over the next few days the online video clip of our appearance on American Pop Sensation went viral, peaking on the favorites charts for a whole week.
REVERSE ON: The computer monitor. The camera closes in on the glowing screen as we see and hear a few seconds of the clip: Stella calling into the microphone. The furious faces of the judges. The defiant audience members rising to their feet, applauding, cheering. Chaos in the studio.
CHARLIE (V.O.) (CONT’D)
(over the ongoing audio from the clip)
In the first twenty-four hours alone it was watched and shared more than two hundred thousand times. Let me say that again: the video clip got two hundred thousand views in just one day.
REVERSE ON: The seven dumbfounded faces still watching the clip.
CHARLIE (V.O.) (CONT’D)
We were only doing what we thought was right, but I guess we must have hit some kind of a nerve out there, because there were lots of comments from all over. Not all of them supported us, but most did.
REVERSE ON: The monitor again. We pan down to the comments area. As the words fill the screen, the monitor image fades so that behind the words we can also see a series of commenters, each one speaking the words aloud as we read them. (Note to whoever directs this: I’m thinking we could use big-name actors for this part. Good idea, right? It’d be a chance to put some A-list stars in cameo roles. Just a thought.)
COMMENTER #1: RUMPLED MOTHER HOLDING A BABY
It’s about time somebody stuck it to Franco. Nice job, guys!
COMMENTER #2: CUTE TEEN GIRL
OMG! Way to go, Lemon Head! Those judges had it coming!
COMMENTER #3: MIDDLE-AGED DUDE IN A SUIT
I laughed out loud the first time I saw this. Didja catch the look on Franco’s face? Classic.
COMMENTER #4: HEAVYSET BOY WITH A BACKPACK
Thank you, Lemonade Mouth! You said exactly what I’ve been thinking for a long time!
COMMENTER #5: GRUMPY OLD MAN
Who do these snot-nosed kids think they are? And that name! Lemonade Mouth? Really? What kind of twisted person makes up a crazy name like that?
COMMENTER #6: KNOW-IT-ALL GIRL
Fake, fake, fake. Is it me or is it not totally obvious this was a publicity stunt staged by the show to get higher ratings??? Come on, people!!!! What are you, gullible?
COMMENTER #7: LITTLE KID WITH BRACES
Lemonade Mouth for president!
CHARLIE (V.O.)
And on and on …
DISSOLVE INTO: A television set. The late-night talk show host CHET ANDERS (late forties, shaved head, dapper) is doing the opening monologue of his nightly show.
CHARLIE (V.O.) (CONT’D)
(over Chet’s voice and the audience’s reactions)
For a few days, not only was Lemonade Mouth all over the blogosphere, but the story got picked up in other places too. We even got mentioned on After Midnight with Chet Anders, a late-night talk show that was available on cable outlets across most of the country.
CHET
(relaxed, a pro at this)
Oh, so anyone happen to catch American Pop Sensation last night? Those kids who turned down the golden ticket because they didn’t like how Franco and the other judges made fun of the other contestants?
Audience laughter, applause.
CHET (CONT’D)
Well, uh, as I understand it, Franco’s agent still isn’t taking calls after the testy incident. When asked if he’s planning to take the kids’ advice about being a little nicer, Franco reportedly responded, “Shut up, stupid. You’re ugly and you bother me.”
(deadpan)
Which for him is gentle, so I guess that means he’s taking it under consideration.
Howls of laughter from the audience. A gap-toothed grin from Chet.
INTERIOR. EARL DECKER’S STRETCH LIMOUSINE—NIGHT
CLOSE-UP ON: Mr. Decker’s face. He’s happily checking his messages as highway lights speed past the window behind him.
CHARLIE (V.O.)
As for Mr. Decker’s reaction to what we did, well, he was a little hard to read. Even back then there was talk that maybe he’d known ahead of time that something like that could happen, so I asked him.
MR. DECKER
(looking up from his messages)
Did I know exactly how it would play out? Well, no, Charlie, of course not, but I had a feeling you kids might stir up some press, and, well … you sure did.
CHARLIE (OFF-SCREEN)
So … you’re not mad at us?
MR. DECKER
(a half-smile)
What can I say? You took a chance and veered off the traditional map a little and it worked out … this time.
(a pause, smile suddenly vanishes)
But we can’t push our luck again, guys. From now on, we stick to the map.
Dissolve to …
EXTERIOR. OLIVIA’S BACKYARD—LATE AFTERNOON
Lemonade Mouth, plus Lyle and Naomi, having an epic water fight in Mo’s backyard with hoses blasting and huge plastic water guns firing away. Everybody’s soaked and laughing.
CHARLIE (V.O.)
Those were crazy days for us. It all seems kind of dreamlike now. It might seem hard to believe but while all this stuff was going on, to us it felt as if it was happening sort of in the background. We were regular kids, right? That didn’t change. That never changed.
Rajeev and Mo’s little sister, Madhu, sneak like ninjas around the side of the house carrying a huge bucket of water balloons. They crouch behind a bush and peek commando-style over it, waiting for just the right moment to attack. The moment comes. They start hurling the balloons, dousing Mo and Wen—a nice barrage. Mo shrieks. But Stella has the hose and is quick to fire back. Soon Rajeev and Madhu are surrounded and dripping wet, with everybody cheering and whooping.
Dissolve to …
EXTERIOR. RECORDING STUDIO—DAY
Lemonade Mouth stands around a microphone at Z-Division Studios, all five of them with headphones on. They’re adding a group vocal track—the humming part of their song “No Words Can Say It.”
CHARLIE (V.O.)
(over the music)
We completed the recordings for Mr. Decker. One last session of finishing touches, and after that it felt like we had time on our hands again. You know, time for normal things like summer jobs, hanging out at home, stuff like that.
Music continues over a montage of shots:
A. Stella answering the phone in the lobby of her mom’s lab, with Rajeev flipping through a magazine beside her.
B. Olivia helping out with her grandmother’s printing business, both of them stuffing envelopes at the kitchen table.
C. Charlie helping Mo’s dad pack a shelf with rice sacks at Banerjee Grocery while, nearby, Mo talks with a customer.
D. Wen and Olivia writing music together in Olivia’s backyard.
E. Stella walking hand-in-hand on the beach with Rajeev with the sun setting and waves rolling gently over their bare feet.
F. Wen in the wiener suit on a busy street corner. He’s playing his trumpet while Stella, grinning beside him, attacks her uke with some killer riffs. Charlie, hair flying, slaps an all-out merengue odyssey on a garbage can. They’re jamming out and having an amazing time. Rajeev is there too, popping and sliding and flipping like a mad dog to the music. (I’m telling you, he could dance like nobody else, as if he could defy space and time and gravity. The kid was unbelievable to watch.)
INTERIOR. STELLA’S FAMILY’S STUFFY LIVING ROOM—EARLY EVENING
Lemonade Mouth are back at a computer monitor again, only this is a different day and a different place. On the screen is Earl Decker, puffing on his cigar as he listens to Stella talking, asking him questions. Her words are indistinct to us as Charlie narrates:
CHARLIE (V.O.)
In retrospect everything was happening incredibly fast, but at the time it seemed to us like things were taking forever. We had the Too Shy to Cry shows to look forward to at the end of August, but most of us couldn’t wait that long to play another gig—a real gig, wherever it was going to be. Mr. Decker kept telling us we needed to wait it out.
MR. DECKER
(Zen-like, a rock guru giving sage advice from the screen)
Patience, kids. It takes time for the tide to shift. The winds of opportunity are about to fill your sails, but first there’s work still to do in preparing the ship for the voyage.
REVERSE ON: The five faces taking this in, foreheads wrinkling.
CHARLIE (V.O.)
Mr. Decker had a way with words. In a parallel universe, maybe he could have been a sailor.
Dissolve to …
EXTERIOR. A QUIET BEACH—EARLY MORNING, THREE YEARS FROM NOW
Dressed in his favorite lambswool parka and Hawaiian shorts, Charlie, older and more mature, is looking pensive as he walks barefoot in the sand. Beside him, the ocean drifts in and out in gentle waves. Other than Charlie, the beach is empty. (Note to whoever directs this: I’m thinking this is kind of a documentary-style part here, where a future me is strolling along the edge of the water, hands in my pockets, talking to the camera.)
CHARLIE
But as for me, even with all the excitement, underneath it I was going through a personal crisis. I guess it started with the realization of my own stupid jealousy when it came to Mo and Rajeev, and the total disaster it might have caused for Lemonade Mouth. For me it was an important reminder that Lemonade Mouth was a delicate balance, just like everything else in the Universe—and my own balance seemed to be out of whack. My whole life was changing, and I realized that something was missing, something I needed to find even though I didn’t know exactly what it was. I can’t explain it better than that.
Picks up a pebble and tosses it into the waves.
CHARLIE (CONT’D)
I didn’t understand it myself at the time, but I felt it, believe me.
Dissolve to …
EXTERIOR. SLEEPY SUBURBAN STREET NEAR STELLA’S HOUSE—PRESENT DAY
A long shot of the road. Lemonade Mouth gets smaller on the screen as they run laughing down the street, away from the camera. The sun is setting and the kids’ shadows stretch long behind them.
CHARLIE (V.O.)
Not to say that it wasn’t a happy time, or that I didn’t get caught up in the thrill of the moment just like everybody else. I did. In fact, maybe that was the problem. Looking back, sometimes you see the past in a different light. For a short while things seemed to be going so crazy good for us that it was like we were living in a dream. And maybe that explains why we made the mistakes we did. Maybe our recent taste of success somehow ended up throwing our judgment out of whack. Who can say? The fact is, even though none of us knew it yet, things were about to take an unexpected turn. The universal balance was about to shift, and Lemonade Mouth was on the verge of screwing up big-time. 
Dear Ted,
Got your letter. Let me get this out of the way so we can both move on, okay? No, I still haven’t told Brenda about the note from Mom yet. She’s stressed enough already, I can tell. In fact, I’ve been thinking maybe I’ll hold off on telling her until things calm down. It’s not just her either. Every time I think about Mom it makes me upset. Plus, my life is already going nuts, as you know, so adding even more chaos doesn’t seem like the best idea—not for Brenda or for me. Please understand. My mother made her decision long ago. Why should I let her shake up my world just because she decides all of a sudden to parachute back into my life after all these years?
That’s it. I’m done with that subject now. I love you, but I’m asking you to please stop pushing me about this.
Moving on from the bizarre to the surreal …
Yes, the American Pop Sensation thing was a total fluke. Even now I find it hard to believe it actually happened. And no, we didn’t plan any of that ahead of time. Before we went into the studio my only goal was to stop myself from barfing on national television. I barely made it, and afterward my hands shook for almost an hour. I’ve been doing what you suggested, trying to pretend that the people just aren’t there, but it’s not working. (I can almost hear your next suggestion, but no, I don’t want to quit doing this because I love making music with my friends, and, besides, I don’t want to let everybody down. I’ll figure this out somehow, Dad. I have to.)
Anyway, I’m glad to hear that the other inmates are treating you like a celebrity now. As long as you’re enjoying that, I’m happy for you.
You asked for an update on Daisy: she’s the same—a complete mystery to me. This morning she dug a giant hole in the middle of the yard, dropped one of Brenda’s orthopedic shoes into it and then hissed whenever Brenda or I came near it. I never had a cat like that before. Good thing she’s cute, because I think she might also be certifiably bonkers.
That’s it for now. Wen just stopped by with a new riff he wants us to work on.
Love,
Olivia
P.S.
Wen just left. You might not know it, but you and he are quite a team. He keeps pushing too. Again and again he’s been asking me what’s the matter. I don’t know how he picks up on it so easily. I don’t want to be a burden on anyone, so I’ve been doing my best to act like everything’s normal—or at least as normal as anything could be right now. Which is why I still didn’t tell him about Mom’s letter. I haven’t told anybody but you.
Daddy, please understand what I said about this. I’m trying to balance a lot of things at once here. I’m doing my best.
Dear Ted,
I want to scream. I feel like jumping up and down and pounding my fists against the walls but I won’t because it’d only make Brenda come check on me. I don’t want to talk to her right now. I don’t want to talk to anyone. I’m just sitting here on my bed fuming.
So I caved in and took your advice about talking with Brenda. But guess what? It turned out you were wrong—it didn’t make things better at all. Just like I thought it would, it made things worse.
Much, much worse.
Let me set the scene for you: Brenda was washing the dishes when I walked in and showed her the letter. She took a minute to read it silently. When she was finished she didn’t say a word; she just handed it right back without looking at me. The weirdest thing was that she didn’t even seem surprised. She’d just found out that her long-lost daughter had reappeared out of nowhere after more than a decade, and yet she didn’t even bat an eye.
“So … what do you think?” I asked her quietly.
“Oh, honey,” she said after another long silence, “you don’t want to get involved in this.”
My mouth went dry. All at once it hit me that Brenda didn’t seem surprised because she wasn’t surprised. “You … already knew about her, didn’t you?” I asked, still trying to take it in. “You knew she was in Massachusetts.”
Brenda nodded. Her hands were gripping the counter now, and she had this empty expression. She still wouldn’t look at me. “She wrote me two months ago,” she said. “Olivia, your mother’s got … problems. Real problems. Health issues, among other things.”
“What health issues?”
“Well, for one thing, her kidneys aren’t working right anymore because she hasn’t been taking care of herself, but that’s nothing new. She’s never taken much care of herself, as far as I can tell. At least she’s with people now. She’s living in a halfway house.”
For a few seconds I couldn’t say anything else. I just stood there staring. Finally I managed to ask, “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I was trying to keep you safe.”
“Safe? From my own mother?”
Brenda closed her eyes. “Listen, I … I know she’s my daughter, and I’ll always love her, but believe me when I tell you that Jess isn’t like you and never was. You have a selfless heart and a bright future. I know it sounds unkind, but things might have worked out for the best when she left. There, I’ve said it. Now you can go ahead and think of me as a bad person, but one thing I’ve learned is that life isn’t always simple.”
“But, Brenda, you could have told me all of this! You could have said something two months ago!”
“I could have,” she said. “But the truth is, your mother asked me not to. She told me she wanted to write you but she wasn’t ready just yet. She begged me to give her a little more time, so I did.” At last Brenda looked at me. “Olivia, before you go and get yourself too involved with Jess, you should know that you’ll be opening up a world of trouble and grief for yourself.”
I didn’t answer. What could I say?
She eyed me like she was trying to read my mind. “But you’re not going to take my advice and stay away, are you? You’re going to go and see her.” She sighed. “I can’t say I blame you. It’s only natural for a girl to want to know her mother.”
I took a step back. And then another. She was talking as if I’d already decided what to do. To me it felt like the whole room was rocking. All I wanted was to get out of there. I backed away and ran to my room, slamming the door. That’s where I still am. I’m furious, but I don’t know who to be furious at. Brenda? My mother? You? I don’t know. There are way too many moving parts here. It’s too much to wrap my mind around.
My entire life is exploding and the only thing I understand is that I don’t understand anything. 
After the American Pop Sensation thing, we had a small cult following all over the country. It wasn’t huge or anything, but for the first time we had a fan base that went beyond the borders of Rhode Island. And yet, just like after the lemonade machine incident at the end of the recent school year, once again most of the media attention focused on the controversy instead of our music, with headlines like, “The Lemon That Roared” and “Rhode Island Kids Stand Up To ‘Cruel’ APS Judges.” I kept remembering how Mrs. Reznik was always reminding us that it’s the music that matters above all else. True, our performance got rave reviews in a few small music magazines and blogs. A handful of independent college radio stations even started playing our songs. But for the most part, people thought of us as a novelty story for the slower-news summer months.
I have to admit, as exciting as things were getting, that part was kind of a disappointment.
We were all at Bruno’s Pizza Planet one afternoon, for example, listening to Mo read an article from the Cleveland Chronicle. It didn’t even say that we were a band. It only referred to us as “five high school students with a penchant for civility.”
“Typical!” Stella said when Mo finished. “What did they think we were doing up there in the first place, loitering? Didn’t they notice our instruments? Didn’t they hear our song? Why didn’t they write that?”
When we mentioned this to Mr. Decker he didn’t think it was a big deal. “Don’t worry,” he told us. “Any press is good press.”
I tried to believe it, but it wasn’t easy.
Now, there’s been a lot of heated speculation about this next part, about how and why the events that followed could ever have happened in the first place. The thing to keep in mind is that we were all brand-new at this, and there was a lot of other distracting stuff happening in our lives. Even though my dad was working like a dog, his wiener business was struggling. Turns out my father was great with people, but he might have overestimated their willingness to eat wieners for lunch every day. So now he was asking for a lot more of my help. Mo was doing extra hours at her family’s store, Stella was off in her own little world with Rajeev, and Charlie was on some weird mission he’d devised for himself, spending all his free hours trying things he didn’t normally do, like baking cookies, rollerblading or building gigantic castles out of sand and shells. “There’s something missing, Wen,” he told me as he filmed a video of a cloud drifting across the sky, “something I have to figure out. How am I going to find what I need if I don’t look for it?”
Typical Charlie. I would have laughed if I didn’t think he was serious.
As for Olivia, I knew something was up with her even though she was still refusing to admit it. I felt this weird distance between us, and it was beginning to bug me. If she was mad at me, why didn’t she just say so and tell my why? Why did she have to keep herself so bottled up? I know it sounds selfish, but I didn’t understand, and I was starting to lose my patience.
So yeah, maybe we should all have seen the trouble coming, but I think we were each a little blinded by other things and ended up getting swept away in the moment. And anyhow, it wasn’t like any of us had a crystal ball.
One day the five of us gathered in Stella’s living room for yet another video link with Mr. Decker. He told us he had some big news. Chet Anders, the television talk-show host, had called him. His show, which aired late at night and was known for its edgy, anything-goes attitude, had been featuring the clip of our appearance on APS, playing it over and over again for comic value, and it was getting such a great reception from viewers that Chet had invited us to be guests for an interview on the show.
“And that’s not the only big news,” Mr. Decker told us as the monitor filled with his cigar smoke. “Zephyr Stick, the lip balm company, wants to sponsor you. They like the band’s attitude and the image you can project for them, so they want to feature you in an upcoming ad campaign. I’m telling you, this is big. It’ll go a long way toward solidifying Lemonade Mouth’s national presence. It’ll also set you up for even more sponsorships going forward.”
I glanced around. Everybody looked stunned.
“The best part is that you kids won’t have to do anything for this. The company already saw the band photos we took a few weeks ago, and they’ve picked one they want to use. It’s all upside, guys. A no-brainer.”
Stella’s boot tapped as she brushed back a strand of her pink hair. “Wait, let me get this straight. They want to use us in an ad for lip balm? Is that really such a good idea?”
I was wondering the same thing.
“Um, this is only a question,” Charlie asked, looking just as uncertain, “but, like, whenever anyone thinks of Lemonade Mouth, do we really want them associating us with chapped lips?”
Mr. Decker chuckled and took another puff on his cigar. “Guys, guys … you gotta be more forward-thinking than that. This is the music business—the real world. I didn’t make the rules, but we have to play by them if we want to get ahead. A sponsorship means money for building the band’s future. And don’t worry. This ad is going to be young. It’ll be hip. It’ll be fresh.” He leaned back in his chair. “You kids are going to love it. Trust me.”
After the video link ended, the five of us had a long, tense discussion. On the one hand, this was starting to feel suspiciously like compromising on our ideals, and Stella wasn’t the only one who felt uneasy about that.
“We’re a band,” Mo mused aloud. “We make music. Shouldn’t that be what we’re all about?”
I admit, I might have been the one who pushed hardest for us to go ahead with the deal despite the uncertainty in my gut. “Sure,” I said, “but you heard what Mr. Decker told us about the industry and our future. What if this is our one and only chance to make it big?” I could see it on everyone’s faces that they were worried about the same thing.
It wasn’t an easy decision. In the end I think the argument that tipped the scales was that this was what Earl Decker advised us to do. This was a guy who knew the music business inside and out and had guided countless other bands to stardom. If we weren’t going to follow the instincts of the legendary Earl Decker, whose instincts were we supposed to follow?
As Olivia likes to say, nothing ever happens without a reason. It’s easy to look back now and second-guess what we did, but believe me, things can be clearer in hindsight than they were at the moment they occurred. Don’t forget that this was a whole new world for us and we were still learning. We were like toddlers playing with a bowl of spaghetti: we didn’t know what we were doing, so in a way, it shouldn’t be surprising that we ended up making a mess of things—a mess that soon landed all over us. 
Now and then everybody does things they later regret. We’re only human, so it’s unavoidable that each and every one of us is going to screw up once in a while. Sometimes we’ll recognize our lapses in judgment right away. Sometimes not. Rarely in life, though, do the results of our bad decisions appear before us in the form of a forty-eight-foot-wide full-color image posted against the morning sky for all to see, making the mistake so obvious that it cannot be ignored or denied.
This was one of those rare times.
It was early on a Wednesday morning. My mom called me from the highway, waking me from a much-needed restful sleep. She was driving into Providence to meet a Brown University research student but had suddenly felt an urgent need to grab her cell and shake up my world.
“You’re not going to believe this!” her voice buzzed through the phone. Still mush-headed, I rubbed my bleary eyes and took in the numbers on the clock: 8:53 a.m. I feel there is a sacred rule that people should not be disturbed when trying to sleep in on their day off, but my mother continued, undaunted. “I was taking the ramp onto Route 114 when I looked up, and who do you think was looking back at me?”
I kept silent. I had no idea.
“You, Stella! It was you and your friends! The Zephyr Stick ad, it’s already up! It’s giant!”
Two or three full heartbeats passed before the full meaning of this made its way into my sleepy brain.
Moments later, completely awake, I stood in my socks beside my beloved new SISTA SLASH: FAMINE RELIEF NOW! poster (from Earl—he also said he’d work with a connection to set us all up with free tickets to Sista’s upcoming Take Charge megaconcert. Life was sweet!) and sent a group message to my friends. Forty minutes after that, we all met in town. I was thrilled to see Rajeev tagging along with Mo. He wanted to see the sign as much as the rest of us did. It was warm that morning, and I noticed everybody was holding a familiar green and yellow Mel’s cup. I wasn’t the only one who’d stopped at Bruno’s to pick up a lemonade.
The billboard stood next to the entrance of the highway on Wampanoag Road, not far from the Bernbaum Associates Dental building. There the six of us stood speechless, taking in the humongous image. The shot was impressive, to say the least. They’d used one of the photographs from Boston, and it must have been taken toward the end of our photo session, because we were all looking comfortable with the camera as we leaned against a brick wall. Wen had even taken off his black jacket and was holding it over his shoulder like some kind of high-powered supermodel. We weren’t frowning, exactly, but our expressions were intense. Above our heads were giant blue words:
“Holy crap,” Rajeev said under his breath.
I couldn’t have put it better.
We practically glowed up there. Mo looked mysterious and exotic, leaning her head on Charlie’s broad shoulder, while Wen and I were like stylish super-spies. Olivia was the centerpiece, staring straight at the camera like she had a secret she wasn’t going to tell. I don’t think I’d ever imagined us looking so perfect, like flawless specimens of teenage health and coolness. But I think that’s a big part of why, as I gaped at the sign, my fist was clenching my Mel’s cup and my blood was starting to boil. We looked too perfect.
So perfect, in fact, that it wasn’t really us up there.
The image had been altered.
Olivia’s thighs were too skinny, like Barbie-doll legs. They must have been airbrushed. I’d been slimmed way down too, and there was something weird going on with my lips. They were puffy and pursed in a way that wasn’t at all like the real me. Wen’s slight acne, which I distinctly remembered he’d had during the photo shoot (the result of too many overheated hours in the wiener outfit), had been digitally cleared, and Mo’s brown eyes were now a striking green. Even Charlie’s uncontrollable mop had been altered. On the billboard his hair looked tidy—even (dare I say it?) trendy.
All of these changes were subtle, but then again, they weren’t. Not if you were familiar with what we really looked like.
“I don’t believe it,” I said, unable to hold back. “This is outrageous! They’ve changed us to look like perfect little spokesmannequins! They’ve turned us into plastic dolls!”
“Uh … I don’t know, Stella,” Wen said. “I think I look kind of hot.”
I rolled my eyes. “Wen, don’t take this the wrong way, but that’s not you up there. It’s not any of us. We don’t look like that. Sure, it might be a common practice in the advertising industry, but what kind of message does changing our appearance send?”
I looked around at the blank faces.
“Don’t you see?” I asked, trying to keep my voice calm but failing miserably. “They’re using us to promote a twisted image of life just like a zillion other ads do, a world of skeletal cover girls and synthetic faces! It makes people believe they need these products because it preys on everybody’s insecurities, making real people feel like failures just because they don’t look like this warped, unrealistic ideal. Come on, guys!” I said, jabbing my finger toward the freakish glowing kids that weren’t really us. “Look at our faces! Look at Olivia’s legs! No wonder there are so many kids with self-image issues and eating disorders! Normal, healthy people don’t look like that!”
Mo’s answer was quiet and reasonable, as if she was worried I might bite someone. “Stella, the ad is already out there. I’m sure it’s in magazines all over the country. It’s done.”
“But it’s another form of oppression! A clear case of manipulation on a grand scale!”
There was a long quiet moment after that. Rajeev shifted his weight beside me, and I could hear Olivia breathing. In the distance, a dog barked.
I was sure I knew what my friends were thinking. I could imagine them saying to themselves, Oh no, here we go again. Look out! Stella’s about to unleash another of her wild ideas! Here comes more trouble! And it’s true that I was burning up over this. I wanted to tear that sign down. I wanted to make my feelings known to the world somehow. But I also felt that this time my friends were right to be frustrated with me. Sure, we’d all agreed to this together, but deep down I felt like I should have been the one to say no. I should never have allowed this deal to happen in the first place, but I guess I’d let my guard down and this was the result. And now it was too late to fix it. We were powerless to fight back. How do you take on a multibillion-dollar industry?
I couldn’t ask my friends to fight a battle we couldn’t win.
I gazed again at my altered face. My alien lips. My perfect, sculpted eyebrows. A distorted version of my own eyes stared back at me, taunting me. I was furious, but I also knew that if nobody else felt this way, then it didn’t matter. From everyone’s silence, I suspected I was alone.
But I was wrong.
For the record, it wasn’t me who spoke up next, stirring up our collective emotions and setting off the hurricane of events that followed. It was Charlie.
“You know what?” he said. “I hate to admit it, but Stella’s right. I didn’t even notice it at first, but now that I do, I think it’s totally uncool that they changed us.” He gestured toward the billboard. “Sure, we agreed to let them do an ad—but we didn’t say they could do that.”
Everybody stared at the image again. Olivia took a step back. She studied it. After a moment she said, “I agree. What’s up there is wrong. It’s a lie.”
Mo nodded too.
“Okay,” Wen said. “But … um … what are we supposed to do about it?”
The wind picked up, a warm gust like the start of a summer storm. Everybody looked at me.
Devoted followers, I confess that I, your own normally outspoken Sista Stella, had no answer to give. What’s more, I was too overwhelmed even to talk. I could hardly believe what I was hearing, the direction everybody seemed to be going in, even without me urging them on. Waves of emotion were welling up inside me. My band mates, my friends—they got it.
How could I ever have doubted them?
“All right, so we don’t know what we can do about this yet,” Charlie said, “but we’ll think of something, right? The point is, they say they want a revolution, so let’s bring it to them. Are we all in?”
Rajeev took my hand and squeezed it as, one by one, everybody raised their Mel’s cups into the air. Not only was I still unable to speak, but by then I was too choked up to even make a sound. 
This is big. My house is closest, so we all head there to think things through. Maa and Baba have already gone to the store and Madhu’s at an overnight with a friend, so the house is empty. As soon as we step through the front door, Rajeev announces he’s got letters to write. It’s obvious he’s just making an excuse to give us space, and that’s nice of him but not necessary. Everyone tells him he’s welcome to join us, but he disappears anyway. The rest of us sit around the picnic table in the backyard, where I set out cheese sandwiches, little bowls of rice and reheated rogan josh left over from last night’s dinner. The aroma of spice fills the air, even outside.
Our first idea is simple: we talk to Mr. Decker, tell him we don’t want to be a part of this sponsorship deal anymore and ask him to help us figure out how to get out of it. It won’t be an easy conversation, of course, but there’s no other choice. We don’t have a Plan B.
As it happens, Mr. Decker is in Germany with Tommy Bellclanger and the Ringtones—one of Decker and Smythe’s biggest clients—for the kickoff of their giant new European tour. It takes a few calls to his office and some waiting around, but at last we manage a video link to his laptop in the lobby of his hotel.
Mr. Decker is not sympathetic.
“Guys, calm down,” he says, frowning into the screen as we all stand around the computer on Maa’s cramped little desk. “There’s no backing out of this. Zephyr Stick is putting up big money for you. They’re gonna front a lot of the cost for the August tour, where, need I remind you, Lemonade Mouth is scheduled to do ten already-sold-out shows opening for Too Shy to Cry. We don’t want to rock this boat. Your debut album is coming out, and that ad goes a long way toward building your presence. It’s a gift straight from promotions heaven.”
“Yes, Mr. Decker,” Stella says, obviously trying her best to stay composed and tactful despite herself, “but it also sends out a bogus subliminal message that exploits kids and ignores the fact that there are lots of different ways to be beautiful. We never agreed to be part of that. It’s a sham.”
Mr. Decker strokes his scruffy beard. He checks his watch. “Look, you know I admire your spirit, guys. It’s part of what makes your band what it is. But that doesn’t mean any of us can change the way things work. The world spins the way it spins, and you should consider yourselves lucky to be on the side of the people who happen to have their hands on the wheel.”
Over his shoulder we can see a youngish, slick-haired man in an expensive-looking suit. He’s been talking on a cell phone, but now he steps closer and whispers into Mr. Decker’s ear.
“One second,” Mr. Decker says to him in a low voice, and then to us he says, “Listen, I gotta end this. The Lord Mayor of Heidelberg is throwing a meet-and-greet with Tommy and the boys. I’m already late for—”
“But the ad—” I start to interrupt. I can’t believe he’s about to cut us off. There’s so much more we still want to say! Mr. Decker holds up his hand, though, and for an instant I’m almost sure I see irritation flash in his eyes.
“Sorry, out of time, kids,” he says. “Just remember this: there are zillions of unknown bands out there, and out of all of them, yours is getting a measure of recognition across the country. With my help, Lemonade Mouth is about to take the world by storm. Believe me, it’s gonna happen—I have it all planned out. I’ll be back in the office in a couple days and then I’ll fill you in.” He’s reaching toward the keyboard now.
“Mr. Decker, this is important. Wait!”
“Good luck with Chet Anders tomorrow night,” he says as if he doesn’t hear us. “Tell him I said hello.”
And then he’s gone.
The five of us are left gaping at the screen. My neck muscles are tense, and Olivia’s face is turning the color of overboiled beets. Lemonade Mouth has been changed into something we never wanted to be, and it’s clear we can’t rely on Mr. Decker to help us set things right again. 
One of the things about Lemonade Mouth that people don’t always seem to realize is that if it hadn’t been for the support of the people around us, our families and friends, the things that happened could never have played out the way they did. For example, we couldn’t have signed with Decker and Smythe in the first place if our parents hadn’t let us. It couldn’t have been an easy decision for them, but in the end every single parent gave us the freedom to see how far this band thing could go, at least for the time being. And we all appreciated that.
But their help didn’t end there.
Some people might be surprised to learn that after that Zephyr Stick ad came out, when we told our families about our feelings and explained our reasons, they took us seriously right away. In fact, they all agreed to meet that same evening for a big gathering in Stella’s living room. All our families were there, plus Lyle, Naomi, Rajeev and Mrs. Reznik. The battle lines had been drawn, it seemed; it was time to gather our allies and plan a strategy.
The thing was, Mo, Charlie, Olivia, Stella and I had come up with a new idea. It was kind of a risky idea, though, and maybe even a little crazy, and it made each of us nervous just to think about it. Which was why we wanted to go over it with everyone. Before we ended up making a huge, stupid mistake, we wanted to know what our friends and families thought.
Everybody listened as we walked them through what had happened with the ad and our conversation with Mr. Decker. We told them the new idea and asked for their opinions.
It would be a lie to say that there weren’t mixed feelings.
“This is serious stuff. You do realize that, don’t you?” Stella’s mother glanced meaningfully toward Charlie, as if she thought he’d be the most likely of us to see reason. I guess it made sense. Out of the five of us he generally was the calmest and tended to keep his head during tense moments. But right then he looked as unsure as the rest of us. “Even if you kids can pull this off,” she continued, “you need to realize that there’ll probably be repercussions.”
Mo’s mother was just as concerned. “Don’t you think you’ve caused enough trouble for yourselves? Monu, you can’t fight every battle that comes your way. When does it stop?”
“But, Maa,” Mo answered, “didn’t you and Baba always teach me to do the right thing even when it isn’t easy? Well, this might not be easy, but we think it’s important.”
Even Mrs. Reznik had her doubts. “I don’t know,” she said. “Your hearts are in the right place, but I wonder if you’re taking on more than you realize here. And doing this would require an awful lot of work in a very short time.”
But we knew that. We all understood.
There were more than twenty people in the room that night, and the whole group talked it over for more than an hour. Believe it or not, the one who spoke up for us first, the person who sort of turned the tide in our direction, was Mo’s dad.
“Here’s what I think,” he said, and right away everyone else went quiet, because until then he hadn’t said a word. “I think I have never been prouder of my daughter and her friends than I am right now. If Lemonade Mouth can do this, I say let them. And I will help in any way I can.” A hush fell over the room. This was Mo’s dad, probably the most conservative person there, a man who seemed to have a hard time saying okay to anything. A yes from him was a big deal.
Mo stared, her lip quivering.
After that it wasn’t long before we had the go-ahead. Lyle, Naomi and Rajeev were with us from the start, of course, and the younger kids in the room—Mo’s sister, Madhu; Stella’s little stepbrothers, Tim and Andy; and my own little brother, George—were practically bouncing off the walls with excitement. What was more, everyone said they were all in this with us. Everybody would pitch in to help.
Which was good news.
We were going to need all the help we could get.
Before our plan had any chance of working, we still needed approval from one last person. It was Stella who called the production office of After Midnight with Chet Anders. We assumed we’d have to leave a message, but somebody answered. Stella explained to the receptionist who she was and that she had an emergency situation to discuss with the producers. To our surprise, after a few phone transfers we found ourselves on the line with none other than Chet himself.
Try to imagine it.
There we were, five kids from Rhode Island, standing around a speakerphone talking with Chet Anders, the subversive underground hero of late-late-night television. And yet as unbelievable as it felt, it happened, and Chet turned out to be a nice guy.
“So I hear you kids are having some issues and need to talk,” he said. “What’s up?”
Mr. Decker had already arranged all the particulars of our upcoming appearance. The plan was that we would do a short interview with Chet and then perform “Let Us Begin.” But now, in a tone that sounded surprisingly levelheaded for Stella, she explained to him what was going on and told him our new plan. Chet listened. As the details came out, we heard him start to chuckle. I knew we had him then. He liked the idea.
By the time we hung up, we had his approval.
There was a part of me that felt almost disappointed when he said yes. If he’d said no, things would have been easier and a lot less risky. In a way, it would have been a relief. Instead, things had just gotten serious. We were going for it.
All I could do now was hope we didn’t screw it up.