Back Alright

YEAR: 1999.
SETTING: 6th grade locker hall.

CAST OF CHARACTERS:
    Fran--11, artsy middle schooler, wearing flared jeans and a Limited Too cat t-shirt
   Alice--11, jubillant best friend, wearing leggings (potentially a horrendous yellow) and a different Limited Too cat t-shirt. Perhaps one that even says "Cool Cat" on it.

SYNOPSIS:
    Act One--Fran has just told Alice that her aunt got her two tickets to see The Backstreet Boys. This launches Alice into a frenzy of excitement...until Fran says she is inviting her next-door-neighbor to take the other ticket. Internally, Alice crumbles into a pile of 90s concert confetti. Fran explains! Neighbor and she have been friends longer! (A mere technicality! thinks Alice.) Neighbor is the biggest BSB fan ever. Everyone knows that! (But you're not, Fran! You, in fact, don't even really like them. Give me your ticket. Alice attempts to Jedi-mind her friend.) Neighbor's already been told. And there's no arguing with that. While probably realizing somewhere in the back of even her dinko junior high mind there are far worse problems, Alice cannot help but gulp the tear stings away.

DRAMATURGICAL REFERENCE:
     On concert night I sat on pins and needles waiting for my mother to come home and report there had been some last minute tickets available at the box office. She's a trooper for trying, but no dice. And I was so unbearably sad. I drank a Mott's apple juice. I imagined all the girls in my class singing along to "I Want It That Way." I sound like an entitled child (and I was when we're considering, you know, India), but it is so rare that I ever truly wanted things as a kid. Like, really really wanted things. Maybe I felt hurt by my friend, maybe I was predestined for this MFA in theatre by prioritizing all other wants and needs against a live performance, maybe it was hard because I "worked" for those tickets that never came. I lived at the radio--handset ready for callers, maybe the music legitimately spoke to me. My mom told me "next time" but I knew there wouldn't be one. Boy bands are a fad. I felt it in my gut.

EPILOGUE:
     Where will you be in exactly two weeks? Oh, me? I'll be AT THE BACKSTREET BOYS CONCERT IN PHOENIX! BOUGHT THE TICKETS LAST NIGHT. IT TOOK FOURTEEN YEARS, BUT I WILL BE JAMMING ALONG WITH NICK, BRIAN, AJ, HOWIE, AND KEVIN SEPTEMBER 5TH. AM I EVERYTHING YOU NEED, YOU BETTER ROCK YOUR BODY NOW!