So, my name should be changed to Jenny Fail. This is the most spectacular mess-up yet. And to think I nearly lost my Bestest Galpal for something that I couldn’t even manage to get through without passing out. EPIC disazzo. But one that we are keeping to ourselves. Maya and Delia have been sworn to silence, and everyone agrees that what went on at Teen Factor X for Jenny ‘Failure’ Q stays at Teen Factor X. I am totally humiliated but relieved that it goes no further.*
Life can move on again with all of the alterations that the latest fail-fest has added to it, but I’m feeling really strange about the whole event. It’s like too much spice in a muffin, or too much salt on your chips. Sometimes I get a horror flashback. It can come out of nowhere. It’s like I’m reliving the audition room beginning to spin and me beginning to wobble and then the blank before I wake to see so many eyes staring down at me. The shame makes me cringe more than the memory of when I fell over and showed my (big) pants. Strangely, I am also relieved that I didn’t make it through because I don’t think I was ready.† But the knock-back has left me with no self-confidence whatsoever and I feel hollow.
The big thing for the Quinns is that Dermot is going to be on TV. Mum and Dad are so excited and proud and I am vaguely sorry that I couldn’t add to that by being chosen too, even if I am also now v v glad that I was not.
It’s half-term holidays and Dad decides to throw a celebratory barbeque, even though the weather is quite nippy. Ten Guitars are the special guests. It means there are a lot of wrapped-up-warmly guys in the garden giving tips over the flames and burning food, both of which they seem to like to do. I doubt any of them really knows all that much about cooking with fire. I eat too much houmous and I know I REEK of garlic so I’m feeling v v self-conscious as a result. It seems I don’t need a worst enemy as long as I am still breathing‡ myself!
Then we go indoors and Ten Guitars play some tunes. They’re really, really good, I think. I am boiling due to the adjacent presence of Stevie Bolton. I’d say I look like a lobster with orange frizzy hair, but I am grinning away and enjoying the performance.
Of course, I think SLB looks coolest and is the best guitar player in the group but I’m also chuffed that my brother seems to be the leader and the one who came up with the whole idea. Then Stevie Lee winks at me and I swallow air so quickly I get hiccoughs. Très undignified. I also hope I wasn’t staring at him or dribbling and that maybe that’s why he winked, like telling someone they have a bogey in their nostril or some of their lunch still on their face.
I wish I had the guts to do a song but I don’t. And right now I am only able to make ‘hic’ noises anyhow. I may never sing in public ever again. I’ll hide at the back of the school choir. When Ten Guitars finish we all clap and then I make my way to the kitchen for emergency chocolate. Mum is telling one of the Oakdale mums her due date and I am reminded that life is about to change for us Quinns. I discover that the two Kit Kats that were there this morning are gone, but instead of being annoyed I start to feel hopeful that Baby Quinn might have something in common with me after all.
