#week7.

DANI:

WORD COUNT: 819

Failure.

It was a tough pill to swallow for Dani, the girl always tried to live up to any and all expectations. From a young age, the strive to be perfect and entertaining pumped through her blood, her mother putting her in whatever talent show her little heart desired. Her mother had always been her biggest fan, making signs for her little shows she did all around town when she was only eleven years old. Maybe the fear of letting her mother down ate her up, maybe it was because her brain worked differently than others, but whatever it was drained her.

Getting accepted into that performing arts high school was a blessing and a curse, it was something she wanted and worked her ass off to get, considering that needed scholarship with how little money the Harper family had. She remembered getting in, seeing her mother’s face light up, it was something that she could never put into words. But with happiness came complications for Dani, while she knew she was talented, so was everyone else. That need to be the best pushing her to become different, soon her sweet and determined attitude shifted to this harsh and competitive bitch that made people’s lives hell. She wanted to be the best so she acted like she was by putting anyone in her way back into their place, below her. Going to every party, making her name in the school, she was slowly losing sight of who she was. That light in her mother’s eyes faded day by day, especially on the nights she didn’t call to let her mother back home know that she was okay because she was too busy doing lines and taking shots.

But reality soon caught up to her, after graduating, she began to go on audition after audition. Singing for record producers, labels, talent scouts, anyone who would listen to her really. But there was an on going problem, she didn’t /look/ the part. A woman with curves back when she was eighteen wasn’t what people wanted. They wanted stick skinny, wholesome, pop stars and frankly the girl was far from any of those things. It tore her apart, and working doubles at Hooters killed her mentally and physically. Image was everything, and soon enough she became obsessed with it. Drug use was common, not remembering the nights when she woke up somewhere she didn’t even know to a naked body beside her. She was out of control, but during the darkness she came into this business. That tape of her and her friend with one of their costumers went viral, and now she slowly finding her old self.

Almost complete.

As she shut her car door behind her, Dani slid her sunglasses off the bridge of her nose, looking at the recording studio in front of her. Butterflies filled her tummy seeing one again, memories of her past and how she was so scared began to flash through her mind, but that didn’t matter now. She paid for this session, a cool 3,000 dollars to have it all to herself. In the distance she saw two friends from New York, a small squeal leaving her as she ran over, wrapping her arms around both of them. The two individuals, one guy and one girl, were from her performing arts school. When she saw they’d recently moved out here, having snagged a job performing jingles for big companies, the timing felt right. They used to have jam sessions all the time in New York, and she couldn’t help but have that wide grin on her face, “C’mon, I’m so fucking excited.”

Sliding the headphones on over her ears, she stared at the microphone as she thought over the song they worked through. It took a good two hours, melodies and lyric revisions from what she had, but there was an electric current of excitement coursing through her now. Mentally humming along as she looked over the lyrics on the stand in front of her, the song was one she’d written about someone that all three of them knew, her ex boyfriend from high school who seemingly put her through hell and back. It was slow, sensual, very Dani-esque, but the lyrics were heart felt. Maybe she’d send this out, maybe she’d hold onto it for herself, but either way as the instrumental they recorded started playing in her ear, she’d never felt more alive.

She felt like she did when she was little and stepping on stage in front of a crowd of what felt like 1,000′s, but was only maybe 25. She felt....like her whole self.

Breathing in through her nose, she nodded as she closed her eyes and finally letting the sound that comforted her fall from her lips, the first line of the song starting.