Music Star by Bethan Rees (best detective novels of all time TXT) 📕

Halloween came not long after I'd handed in our Music Star application paperwork. We had a Halloween Party at school on Halloween night, hosted by Mrs Daniels.
We were excited by that, too.

The girls came round mine to get ready.
'How about we all dress up as rock star cats? We could base the cat costume on the one on Club Penguin!' I knew about the costume because Claire goes on Club Penguin. I suggested that. The girls agreed.

We dressed up and prepared for the disco.

Disco time came. Alex said I looked hot. Mrs Daniels admired our outfits. She loved the ears.
Mrs Daniels was dressed up as... guess... Holo from Spice and Wolf

!

'YOU like Spice and Wolf

too?'
'Yeah. I've not watched it in a while. I admired Holo.'

A while later, Mrs Daniels came to the stage.
'I'm going to call out two random acts that have signed up to Music Star - one boy act and one girl act.
'The boy act is...' Mrs Daniels rumaged in a bowl. 'Skater Boy from The Energy!'
Yes, we'd let Alex into The Energy. We needed a male voice. He was by far the best out of our audition.
After rummaging through another bowl, Miss pulled out another name.
'The female act - I mean people - are the four girls from The Energy; Ever, Tanya, Sarah and Olivia!'
We were asked to come to the front and sing an edited version of Ghosts Just Wanna Dance

from Club Penguin. Miss edited a few words to make it sound more normal.

'Night falls on a spooky scene,
Deck the icy halls of black and green,
As the shadows rise here on Midnight Isle,
From the darkness there's a distant scream,
Whoa, that sounds like it's getting closer!
Drums are getting louder,
Bass is getting lower,
When the shadows spin,
You'll be joinin' in,
But first you gotta find the key
Who knows what is behind that door?
Creeping up on the floor
We're not here to freak you out,
We just came to shake it down,
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, flip up your hands,
The ghosts just wanna dance
Only want to haunt your igloo,
Give you chills and party with you,
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, flip up your hands,
The ghosts just wanna dance,
The ghosts just wanna dance,
The ghosts just wanna dance...

'

(CREDIT TO DISNEY - B.Rees

)

Everyone cheered. Mrs Daniels was smiling.
She knew she'd picked the right ones.

A while later, Christmas was coming. We'd now broke up for Christmas holidays. I'd invited the band over for a sleepover (Alex didn't mind).

One day, we'd woke up, looked out of the window... and it had snowed! Snow was everywhere. The pond in Central Park had frozen over. Someone had put string lights on the posts around the pond. The someone was skating on the pond. Spotting us, she waved.
It was Mrs Daniels!
'Hey, guys - do you want to go ice skating on the pond in Central Park?' I asked the others.
'YEAH!' We cried.
'BE QUIET! SOMEONE'S TRYING TO SLEEP HERE!' Claire yelled from the room next door.
'SHUT UP, CLAIRE!' I yelled back.

We got up, had breakfast, brushed our teeth and wrapped up warm. I got my ice skates from my wardrobe and the others got theirs from their bags.

We ran to the pond, took off our wellies and laced up our ice skates. Mrs Daniels had her iPod on her amplifier, looked after by her husband. More people from school joined us. A few people fell over, but we were all pretty good!
'Hey, Gary!' Mrs Daniels called. 'Put on that song... you know - Cool in the Cold

! Yeah, that one!'

We all sang another edited version of a Club Penguin song.

'Have you noticed that everybody's being super nice?
The city's glowing with a special glimmer on the ice (yeahhh)
The party is heating up
Coming on and join the club
There's always room for just one more
Look around and it's obvious

Cool cool cool, out in the cold
And it's fun fun fun, covered in snow
Everyone's here it's that time of the year
Oh, ohh, ohh it's cool in the cold (ohh, ohh, ohh)
It's cool in the cold (ohh, ohh, ohh)

'

(CREDIT TO DISNEY! - B.Rees

)



A journalist came over to Mr Daniels.
'Are you running this?' The journalist asked.
'No,' Mr Daniels replied. 'But, my wife Stacey is!' He pointed to Mrs Daniels.
The journalist interviewed Mrs Daniels.
'Are these your pupils then? They're really talented!'
'Well, some of them are participating in Music Star. I just hope they'll do well! I have faith in them.'

'WAKE UP! WAKE UP, EVER! IT'S CHRISTMAS!'
'Get off, Claire...'
I woke up. It WAS Christmas!

I went downstairs humming my favorite Christmas song.

'It doesn't often snow at Christmas,
the way it's meant to do...
But I'll still have a glow at Christmas,
because I'll be with you...

'

(CREDIT TO PET SHOP BOYS - My favorite too! B.Rees

)

'Morning, Ever!' Mum said as she came out of her room.
'Morning, Mum! Morning, Dad! Merry Christmas!' I cried back.

We went into the living room, when there was a knock on the door. Six knocks, to be precise.
I opened the door.

'MERRY CHRISTMAS, EVER!'
The brunette haired teen is Sarah, the blondie is Olivia and the ginger one is Tanya. It's obvious who the other two were - Mrs Daniels and Alex.

We all had and gave gifts.
I got from my family:
Breaking Dawn Part 1 on DVD
£50 iTunes voucher
Sony Vegas Pro for my MacBook
A Samsung camera
Sweets
CDs
Money
...and a photo album.
'To record your Music Star memories!' Mum cried. Mrs Daniels thought it was a good idea.

From my friends:
Spice and Wolf

Series 1 DVD from Mrs Daniels
Beautiful Creatures book from Sarah
Life of Pi book from Tanya
Dance Dance Revolution for Wii from Olivia
and a star pendant from Alex.
'For our big performance!' He cried.

We did another performance of Cool in the Cold to Mum, Dad, Claire (who also sung along as a Club Penguin player), Timothy (who was too busy playing with a toy train set) and Mrs Daniels. They cheered afterwards. We took a bow.

What would the audience do after our performance at Music Star?

We came back with many memories from the Christmas holidays and a sudden need to practice.
Music Star was only a few weeks away.
Mrs Daniels made an announcement in assembly.

'Right, Music Star participants. From today, it's HARDCORE Music Star practice! You will be dragged out of your lessons. Other music lessons will be taken by a friend of mine who taught music a while ago, but left for maternity leave. Year 8... prepare yourselves. For those who will want to watch the show, it's on Friday 1st February at 8pm. Watch out for RAVENWOOD HIGH students!'

We practiced all day. The song we're doing is a mix of several Nightcore songs. We love the mix that Mrs Daniels produced for us.

I had to balance everything with clubs and family life. It was hard.
The other participants are working as hard as us.

Two weeks before the performance, I wasn't getting anything right. The notes were either too low, high or flat.
'Oh no!' I cried. 'We're going to fail!'
I'd seen failing performers in reality TV shows. They got BOOED. In cartoons, they threw TOMATOES and BANANA PEELS at the bad ones.

I spoke to Mrs Daniels.
'We're not even going to make it into the top 20!' I cried, sobbing over Mrs Daniels. She hugged me.
'You are going to make it. I know you as an amazing performer. You'll be fine. I felt like this on my audition for Grease a while ago. It was a one-off show, and I was Sandy. I made it. You will too. I want to show you this.' She said, finding something on YouTube. It was her, singing a version of A Thousand Years

by Christina Perri.

'I have died every day waiting for you,
Darling don't be afraid,
I have loved you for a thousand years,
I'll love you for a thousand more...

'

(CREDIT TO CHRISTINA PERRI - B.Rees

)


'You're amazing.' I said.
'Thanks. I did this at the Newbies Concert. Lots of people said I was amazing - and you will be, too.' She said.