If I Stay {Fillie}

How to Get Famous Overnight

Lights. Camera. Action.

Shut up, Millie. This isn't a movie. This is real life.

She blinked. Narrowed her eyes. The lights were so bright it hurt.

And then, they were gone.

The chittering crowd outside let out an earsplitting cheer, knowing the show was starting, and Millie felt her heart begin to race like a rabbit's.

She was standing in a niche in the stage, which would rise up when the music started, carrying her with it. Lilia and Finn had told her it was for dramatic effect.

Millie had given her five songs to the band. They'd looked at her like she was insane, but all they needed was a nod from Finn, and everything was put in order.

The audience was expecting Jacob Sartorius. But they were getting Millie Bobby Brown.

"And now, please welcome your opener, Millie Bobby Brown!" the announcer shouted, sounding a little too cheerful. Millie had a feeling he was attempting to rile people up because he felt bad for her.

And it sort of worked. Not really. The screaming ceased among half of the people in the arena, and questions such as:

"Millie Bobby Brown? Who's that?
"I thought Jacob Sartorius was opening?"
"Who the hell is that?"

-were voiced aloud after the words were spoken.

The announcer continued, "Millie has been working with Finn Wolfhard for about a year, practicing vocals and vibrato to achieve her dream of becoming a singer. Tonight is the first time she will sing in front of an audience! Give her some love!"

The audience clapped loudly and whooped for her, a little less confused now. They'd bought the phony story, apparently.

Millie thought about how Sadie and Noah were feeling right now after hearing the announcement. She was certain they were shocked beyond words and thinking, it has to be a different Millie Bobby Brown.

The music began at that moment. Just the Way You Are by Bruno Mars, the same song she had sung in the bathroom just a couple hours earlier.

She tried her best to calm her breathing for the next ten seconds.

And then she was rising up and up, onto the main stage. The sounds of cheering and screaming became even more magnified as her head broke the surface.

And she was terrified.

But she did it.

"Ooh, her eyes, her eyes, make the stars look like they're not shining," she sang timidly, her pretty voice ricocheting off of the walls in an echoey ringing that sounded foreign to her ears. "Her hair, her hair, falls perfectly without her trying. She's so beautiful, and I tell her every day."

The crowd seemed surprised, but cheered her on enthusiastically as if they were actually enjoying what she was doing. And that was all the drive she needed.

Feeling as though she might collapse, Millie took a mental deep breath and focused on steadying herself.

Her voice stopped shaking. She let loose, like she'd promised herself she was going to before this day had even begun.

Because these people believed she could.

She felt herself laugh in happiness and unbelief as she sang, causing a chain reaction of whoops in the crowd.

Millie remembered what Grace VanderWaal had done at the Washington D.C. concert, when she had gone to the front row of people and touched their outstretched hands.