Jia quickly picked her bag and brought two coats, one for herself and one more for Mina, she noticed Mina did not carry a coat. It was freezing outside. Mina never felt cold. This always puzzled Jia. But anyway, grabbed her a coat and handed her one. Mina took it and thanking her and held hers on her arm whereas Jia wore hers.
What Jia did not know was that Mina never felt cold. Her body could handle extreme temperatures. That was one of her 'powers'!
Both of them went out of the mansion and they saw Arnold waiting with an 8-seater SUV and both of them got into the back seat of the car. Arnold smiled at them through the rear-view mirror and greeted them and asked them, "Good morning, Ms. Adams and Ms. Pierman. Where are we off to first?". Jia answered smiling, "Arnold, take us to school first and hurry please. We gotta be there by 7.30 and it is already 7.20. Do you think we can make it in time for the first bell?"
Arnold started the car as he answered Jia, "Of course Miss. We will be there before 2 minutes. Do not worry." Despite Jia being haughty with everyone else, she was never rude or crass with her mansion staff or servants. She treated them all with respect and everyone adored her.
As promised, Arnold dropped them at Birmingham high at exactly at 7.28 and informed them that he will be back there to pick them up at 2 and in case they were running late or their classes ended early, he asked them to drop him a text and drove away.
Jia had her business economics at the first hour and Mina sociology. They ran to their first classes and that day; they did not have common classes so decided to meet at 12 for lunch.
As Mina was occupied since morning, last night's events had drifted off from her mind. As she sat in the class, concentrating on the lecture, her mind started wandering towards last night's events and she started worrying about what would happen this new moon and how would she escape school that day and most importantly, how would she explain her absence to Jia mainly!
To be honest, she was also excited as she wanted to see what power would manifest within her and if it would happen this new moon. So far, she had got 4 different powers. It would happen after she had the dream a full moon night, one month before her birthday every year since she started receiving those dreams from when she turned 13, four years ago.
She had an inclination that she would receive one more this new moon because she would turn 17 next month.
As she was thinking all this, the school bell rang bringing her attention back to class. The 1st hour was up and then she had two more classes before she would meet Jia for lunch at 12. She next attended History and Philosophy and it was finally 12! She felt the classes were very exhausting today probably because of lack of sleep.
She arrived at the school lunch hall and there she saw Jia was already at their lunch table with two trays of food for both of them and typing away something on her laptop. Looking like those heiresses in business magazines.
Mina sat at their table and exclaimed, "Uff! I am already exhausted babe!", Jia ceased her typing and looked at Mina with concern, "We have two more classes before our school day ends. Post that you need to report at the TV tower at 2.30 and register for your audition. Do you want to not attend the next two classes?", before Mina could answer, Jia asked, "What role are you auditioning for? Have you brought a change of clothes?", Mina answered, "No, why? There is no need. These are enough. I mean both your mother and sister said I look really cute.", and winked at her.
"Are you wearing that for the audition? It is cute and all that for school and not at an audition! We are going to the mall shopping for a good dress for your audition now!", said Jia firmly. Mina tried to refuse and Jia sternly refused her refusal. After all she was the future boss lady. How could one argue with her? Mina finally gave up. They decided to finish their lunch and as they were eating, they messaged Arnold to come to the school to picked them up.
Arnold was waiting for them outside school. They got into the car and asked him to take them to the nearby mall. This luxury mall had all brand stores. Jia took Mina to her favorite store on the 3rd floor of the mall which was famous for custom made dresses.
Mina was in awe looking at the collection at the store. Jia picked a few simple knee length dresses for Mina as she knew Mina's style well and asked Mina to choose any that she liked out of the lot. Mina skimmed through all the dresses that were placed in front of her and all were gorgeous. But she always was partial towards the color blue. She looked really good in blue too as it complimented her blue eyes.
She loved a simple elegant sleeveless frock in pale blue. The frock was not frilly instead plain but had a lovely texture which was like liquid highlighting her petite figure making her look like a beautiful doll. It had shimmery outer layer which complimented the whole dress well. She tried on the dress, and she instantly loved it.
She came out of the dressing room wearing it and Jia exclaimed, "WOW! You look awesome! We are finalising this dress. You don't have to change back to your previous dress. Keep this on. We will ask for a bag to put your old clothes in and I am also buying you these 3 dresses. It your advance birthday gift. I am not taking no for an answer." Saying this she paid for the dresses with her credit card and next pulled Mina to a unisex salon in the same mall for getting her hair and makeup done.
They asked for a nude make up and asked the stylist to arrange Mina's hair in a simple open style with loose wavy hair. At the end, she looked pretty and as usual she refused jewellery. They went to look for shoes to match her dress next. They chose a simple open toe white wedges which Mina absolutely loved, and she was the happiest with this as she was a crazy shoes collector!
By the time they were done with everything, they were hungry again. They went to a starbucks outlet in the mall and grabbed a to-the-go sandwich and cappuccino each; and called Arnold to meet them at the mall's exit and it was nearly 2PM by them.
Arnold took them to the TV tower where Mina had her audition. They were there by 2.15 PM and there were already 10 girls there! They went to register and the lady at the registration looked at both in awe and gave them each a form for registration and Jia glared at her and told her, "It is only her who is registering, and I am her assistant-cum-manager. I don't need a form. Thanks" As usual the attitude was back now that Jia was talking to someone she did not know.
Mina shushed her and took the form from the lady and filled it out and handed it back to the lady. The lady gave her a token with number 10 on it. That means she was the 10th candidate who would go in.
At exactly 2.30, the audition volunteers explained them all the rules for the audition. They were –
1. They would each get a scene to enact
2. It could be of any character, animal or even a non living thing
3. They had to bring in their creativity and show them their acting prowess
4. They would be given 5 minutes each to impress the judges
5. They couldn't look into any script when they enacted the scene
6. They were free to recreate the scene the way they wished
7. No prompts were allowed
8. They weren't supposed to bring in any gadgets
9. They would be filmed during their audition to check their screen presence
10. They would not be given any feedback immediately after the audition but they would have to wait till the next day when they would be conveyed the results via a call/text
Mina hearing them got nervous all of a sudden. There were butterflies in her stomach. Jia understanding Mina's emotions, held her hand to assure her that she could do it.
Mina was given her scene and reading the word, she instantly started trembling!