You Don't Know Me by Sophia Bennett Page A

at you now! Don’t they look hot , ladies and gentlemen?’
    He gets the audience to whoop and applaud. The judges join in from their spotlit table at the front – Roxanne Wills clapping harder than anyone. We chat for about a minute, as we rehearsed. But all I can think about are the lights shining in our faces. I have no idea what we say. Finally, Andy moves us all a bit further backwards asthe lights go down and the screen at the back of the stage lights up with the words ‘Manic Pixie Dream Girls’.
    â€˜Let’s follow their journey from a little bedroom in Castle Bigelow to the heart of London,’ Andy says. ‘Don’t forget, folks, the voting starts after the final act, in just a few minutes. And meanwhile, you can send us your thoughts by tweeting or Interfacing us using the hashtag killeract . I’ll share some of our favourite tweets and FaceFeeds at the end of the show.’
    In the darkness, my heart rate slowly starts to subside. The tape starts with an extract from our original video of ‘Sunglasses’. Then there are pictures of our voting numbers rising and rising. There’s a shot of us arriving at the auditions, and a little clip of us chatting nervously. To my surprise, there are lots of shots of Rose. It’s not as if they’re trying to pretend she was never there. That’s a big relief. What the camera captures, though, is how uncomfortable she looks. I didn’t spot it at the time, but she’s constantly smoothing the skirt of her dress and looking unhappy if anyone stares at her. People stared at all of us, of course, because of our crazy outfits, but the camera only shows them staring at Rose.
    Then we get to the audition. Now, the camera focuses more than ever on Rose. It captures how desperate she was not to lose her guitar, how much she hated ‘jiggling’. It contrasts with how much more confident I am, by comparison, throwing myself into the dance moves. When Rose is shifted to the end of the line, the background music changes tempo, sending a message. The tension builds. Something bad is about to happen.
    And that’s when I see it for the first time. I should have seen it all along, but I didn’t. Nobody will ever believe me,but you have to remember: I’ve known Rose a long time. She’s my friend. All I ever saw was a girl who was better at music than me.
    What I see now, through the camera’s eye, and with the music wailing to a climax in the background, is three skinny girls on one side, moving in time to the music, and a big girl on the other side. A girl who feels uncomfortable, hating to dance. And her so-called friends all ignoring her and having fun.
    Oh no. This is all wrong. All I want to do is stop the tape, but it rolls on.
    Linus leans forward: he wants us to be a trio. Sebastian disagrees, but Roxanne says Linus has a point. Rose can sense what’s coming. Linus singles her out. I look shocked on tape, but Rose does not. It’s as if she knew she was the big girl in the band – the one who didn’t fit.
    But this is crazy! What about how good she was?
    Now we’re inside the room, and Rose is already leaving. Of course – they had to miss out the early part of our conversation because the cameras hadn’t arrived yet. So there’s nothing about us saying we should stick together. Instead, they show Jodie and Nell looking shocked, and me talking them round, saying it will be OK.
    As if I chucked my fat friend so we could go on TV.
    As if I would do that.
    But as I watch the tape it seems clear: I did.
    Outside the room, the camera watches from a distance as I approach Rose and talk to her in a low voice. It follows her dignified walk as she leaves me standing.
    It doesn’t show me calling after her. Instead, the tape cuts to the rest of us reacting as the judges put us through.We stand there, as a trio, shocked and hugging each other.
    And then it stops. I want to