CHAPTER 1

The year was 2008. I was fifteen, still a mere child. Yet somehow, I had wound up on Broadway. It all started on a normal day in Boca Raton, Florida.
I was on my way to school, when my mom chased the bus and stopped me.
"Ariana, hun, wait!"
"What mom?"
"Look at this flyer!"
She thrusted a vibrantly colored poster into my hands that read:
"Become a star! Audition for Thirteen: The Musical today!"
"Mom you know I could never pull off a production on BROADWAY. OF ALL PLACES, they just HAD to pick Broadway. I'd love to but you know they'd never let me in. Not in a million years!"
"But hun, this is the last day for au-"
I shrugged my shoulders and ran back onto the bus. Would I LOVE to be in showbiz? UHM DUH. But how could I ever go up against kids who had been in theater and vocal training since they could crawl!? I'd never even MET a vocal coach, let alone go to training sessions! What was I going to do?
At school I couldn't stop shaking. Everybody stared at me. I was terrified on EVERY level possible. My teacher gave me the DEATH STARE. I was trying to make the biggest decision of my life, how could I focus on the difference between a quadrilateral and- oh please I don't even know what the other lateral is! If I stayed in Boca, I wouldn't have to face rejection, however, I would totally BLOW my chances of ever being on Broadway. All of a sudden the intercom switched on.
"ARIANA GRANDE-BUTERA REPORT TO THE MAIN OFFICE, NOW."
I raced down the halls, my long black curls flying behind me. I heard locker doors swinging, their rusty padlocks hissing "Hurry Ari, hurry!". Some unknown force seemed to be thrusting me forward, although I felt like I should be in class learning what the heck a lateral was.
I saw my mom standing there holding all my books.
"Come Ari, you'll be back here soon."
She pushed me (not hard, but enough to get me out of that school) out the door and into our beat up soccer mom van. Before I knew it I was at the airport waiting for a flight to... JFK? Where was I going? What would happen when I got to the city. My mom sat there beaming, with the flyer in her hand. Oh no, I know where this is going...