Spoon part 1

Prologue

"Jackson! Jackson!" Screaming girls, everywhere. Grabbing at my clothes, pushing through the guards around me, their manicured hands scraping against each other as they battle to get closer to me. The music I've just played is still bouncing off the walls of my head, my ears overwhelmed by the noise. I push past my band mate, who looks even more excited than usual, and crash into my dressing room, slamming the door behind me and locking it. I can still hear the screams and the fists pounding, but it's not quite as loud. I walk over to the full length mirror and stare at my reflection: the loose leather jacket my agent bought me, the jeans I stole from my brother's closet, the leather wristband Jeanette gave me. I look at my body, covered completely, camouflaged to blend in with the male race. Finally, I look up at my face. It's completely covered in sweat, my lips parted. I look at the little details, the things that my agent finds necessary to cover up. My eyebrows, for one thing. The added hairs-fake hairs-so that they don't look like my real, groomed eyebrows. The tiny beauty mark by my left eye, covered in waterproof, completely unnoticeable cover-up. And, of course, the fake lip ring on my upper lip, because it's impossible that one of me could have a whole on it's top lip and the other couldn't-or so we want people who doubt my identity to think. Then I finally meet my eyes-brown, big but narrowed permanently- the one thing about me, other than my bone structure, that my agent agreed didn't need to be hidden from the world.

Chapter 1: Jackson Aepatt/Kristin Smith

I never planned on becoming a world-famous male singer. It all started when I auditioned for the October talent show at my school, wanting to cover the song Uprising by Muse. I went all out, wearing my Halloween costume-I was going as a boy-to the audition. I didn't get in, though I covered that thing crazy well, you wouldn't have known I was girl if my costume hadn't been so unrealistic. Mrs. Acot said my performance was "inappropriate", that I was promoting gender insecurities or something. Whatever. Anyway, turns out she was the only one who felt that way, because this woman, who had just been stopping by the school to pick up her nephew, saw my audition and asked to talk to me in private. She pulled me behind the auditorium and told me the words I should have cowered away from. The words I should have realized were not a good thing. "I can make you a male superstar." Male superstar? What high school girl in her right mind wants to be a male superstar? I did, apparently. Or at least I thought it would be entertaining to try. I didn't realize how big this lady was, didn't know how many superstars she had actually made. But I found out fast enough. First, she made my identity. She went all out, buying me a black wig that I thought made me look like an emo, but she claimed made me look like "a deeply troubled, emotional, edgy rock star." Right. Sure. Anyway, she bought me the wig, a whole new wardrobe, (which would have been awesome if it wasn't all guy clothes,) and this weird SPANX-like thing that covers your chest instead of your stomach. I was concerned that if I wore it for too long, I would end up flat-chested, but she rolled her eyes and said "Don't be unreasonable." I didn't see how that was unreasonable, but whatever. So she hauled me around in my guy-costume to an endless amount of auditions. Just when I was going to tell her that I didn't want to do it anymore, that I didn't really want to be a male superstar anyway, someone called her back. And just like that, I was signed to this huge record company. And they were going to make me into a superstar.

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