If there's one thing every sixteen-almost-seventeen-year-old never wants to see on a gigantic screen in the middle of town, it's their own face. Yet, here we are—in Riverside's center square along with everyone who cares enough to come out on the last Friday night before school starts again to watch the Misfit Theater Company in our first episode of A Call from Midnight.

Riverside's square is literally right beside the river, on mine and Thatcher's side of the town, with a fountain that cycles the sort of stinky river water, and there's a little consignment shop wall next to it for the mayor's people to project our ad-free copy of this episode from Grant O'Reilly. People are starting to walk into the area and set up their fold out chairs for the event. I've never seen a lot of the people before, but many of them that I recognize from school. It's a gorgeous evening, clear-skied and not too humid for an August night. The sky over the river blends between pinks and purples, like a delicious mixed berry sherbet as the time creeps closer to 9:00pm, when they'll start projecting our episode.

Mom's leading me through the crowd towards where the mayor has set up some chairs specially for the four of us misfits near the fountain, which I'm not super thrilled about--again, it's sort of stinky, like maybe the water it's pulling from the river has too many fish in it--but I'm still honored that the town cares this much about our television debut. I'm pretty sure nothing like this was ever done for Grant O'Reilly, but maybe this is the town's way of making up for that?

"There are your friends," Mom says as she takes my hand and pulls me through the maze of chairs and people. She's learned to trust me way more than she used to, but she's still the same protective mama bear at heart. Plus she just watched a documentary about child abductions, so I've just come to accept that she will keep me close in public now. Baby steps.

Once we're closer to the fountain, I can finally see past all the people up chatting before the screening, and I call out, "Patti! Moth!"

They are sitting in their guest of honor seats already, but they turn when they hear my voice and greet me in their own special ways. Patti, wide-eyed and beaming, waves excitedly at me. Moth sort of half-smiles and does some weird peace sign salute at me.

"Where is Thatcher?" Mom asks.

I should know this, he's my boyfriend after all, but I'm not sure. I thought Mom and I were running late to get here, so now I'm a little worried. When I texted him, he said he would meet me here. So where is he?

I shrug. "I'm not sure," I answer.

Patti and Moth stand up when we get closer, both giving me hugs as soon as I'm within arms reach, even though we just saw each other two days ago when we all hung out at Moth's pool.

"Where's Thatcher?" Patti asks after letting go.

"My mom and I were just wondering that. I'm not sure. Let me text him," I say, pulling my phone out of my pocket.

I begin to type—with the help of autocorrect—a message to Thatcher asking him where he is and if he needs me to come and get him, since his dad is still, well, his dad, and when I hit send, I hear his Starship Troopers notification sound—"Bugs! Bugs! We've got bugs!"—go off behind me.

"I'm here, I'm here," he says, panting as he sneaks through the last few people separating us.

It doesn't matter how many times I see him, the sight of Thatcher always makes my heart feel like it's glowing. Especially when he smiles, and his dark brown eyes light up. I take a deep breath to calm my heart.

He takes his phone out and checks it, quickly reading my message. "Nope, I made it on my own, and with just two minutes to spare. Sorry, my dad didn't get home until just now and I couldn't leave my brothers alone at the house. They are officially in the let's set everything on fire and see what happens phase of their adolescence."

Moth squints at him and tilts his head like a puppy. "Is that a phase, though?"

"That's what I'm going with, yeah."

Patti and I both chuckle, and my mom finally bids us adieu, since there's only enough VIP chairs for the four of us, Mrs. Permala, and the mayor, who are both helping to do last minute set up with the projector.

"I'm so nervous to watch this," I admit, looking around at all the people. What if they judge me? What if I did a terrible job?

"No one likes seeing themselves on screen," Thatcher says, wrapping his arm around me. We've been together for about six months now, and we're so comfortable around each other now that it feels like we've been together for years. When I think back on how awkward we used to be together, on how we would pretend we weren't linking arms on purpose, I laugh.

Patti clams up when Thatcher puts his arm around me and sort of side eyes Moth. They didn't really work out, but it never officially ended, it just sort of stopped. The two of them went on a couple of coffee dates, and then the four of us went out on what we all called "double dates." But nothing ever really came of it except a few kisses and now some lingering awkwardness that no one really addresses. The two of them are so different that I think when it came down to actually being alone together, they didn't have much to say. But who knows what goes on in other people's relationships. As long as they are happy and as long as we are all still a troupe of misfits no matter what, I am cool with whatever they are.

"Should we take our seats?" Patti asks.

"Let's do it," Moth replies. "I, for one, am stoked to see this. I've never been the center of attention before, and I have that one scene with Grant's character that got pretty intense."

"Do you think Layla and Greg are here? Or do you think they're still too upset with us for getting roles while they just got to be extras?" I ask.

After all of that was announced, Layla refused to speak to me, let alone even look at me, not even in math class where we sat beside each other. Greg Sussek and Taylor Valentina followed her lead. Apparently they iced Gina out too, and Gina ended up dropping theater for the 4th quarter without saying anything to me. It was a pretty weird end to the school year.

"Who cares," Patti says, and I smile at her. She's always been so competitive with Layla, it's nice to see her not worrying about her. But then she shrugs and says, "We won," and I know she hasn't moved too far past her competitiveness with Layla after all.

Apparently all the equipment is up and running, because Mrs. Permala greets each of us, her rainbow bangles clinging as she shakes each of our hands, and then takes her seat on the other side of Patti just in time for the mayor to step in front of the microphone and call the screening to order.

"Good evening everyone," he addresses the crowd. He's a guy with graying hair who looks like he tried to look like an ordinary Riversidian but missed the mark with his pressed jeans and tucked in J Crew button down. Still, he brought everyone together for this, so I appreciate the effort, even if it will thoroughly embarrass me.

"I want to thank you all for coming out to screen the newest cinematic achievement of Riversidian actors out of Renee Permala's theater program. Let's give her a round of applause."

The crowd comes through, and Mrs. Permala stands up from her seat to turn around and wave to everyone.

Once Mrs. Permala sits back down, the mayor continues, "We also have our four young actors here tonight to watch the episode for the first time with us. Please give a round of applause for Timothy Boone, Thatcher Gorsky, Janie Myers, and Patricia Weiner."

Thatcher takes my hand as we all stand up to meet the crowd. There has to be at least seventy people here, including Layla and her crew who are sitting only a few yards away from us, and I suddenly feel sick to my stomach.

Seriously, what if they hate my performance?

It's so much different when you are in a theater class, just doing something for school. The expectations are so much lower, because for most people, it's just a class, it's just for fun. But when you've been selected specifically by a celebrity to perform in his TV show, there's some expectation that you deserved it. What if I didn't though?

I squeeze Thatcher's hand and he squeezes mine twice in response. That's one of the little couple things we've developed over these past six months. Whenever I feel unconfident or scared or anxious, I squeeze his hand, and he squeezes mine back to assure me everything is OK. It's how I got through at least half of the filming for A Call from Midnight.
The applause begins to subside and that's our cue to sit back down. As soon as I'm facing away from the audience, I let out a long sigh.

"Dude... you OK?" Moth asks as Thatcher rubs my back.

"I'm so, so nervous," I whisper, since the mayor has gone on to talk about the episode and get it ready to play. "What if I suck?"

"We were all there," Patti says, leaning forward to see me around Moth. "If you had sucked, I would have told you so you could fix it then. We are a team, a troupe. We all look out for each other."

Moth smiles and places his hand on her knee. Patti gives him a knowing sort of look, and now I'm really confused about what's going on there; but hey, at least they distract me while the screening is actually beginning.

The opening scene starts on the consignment shop's exterior wall, and my stomach just about drops out of my body and onto the ground: I'm the first person on screen.

I was cast as the friend who the others are worried about and looking for, so for the opening scene, I burst out of a door and into a dark, damp alleyway. I'm hurrying like someone is chasing me, so I'm knocking over boxes and running into heaps of trash and dumpsters as I keep turning back to make sure no one is following me. I'm actually pleasantly surprised by how genuinely terrified I look in the scene, I'm really selling the whole someone-is-chasing-me thing. I smile, even though my heart is racing for my character. Between the ominous background music and the editing to show someone from the knees down opening the door and following me, it's actually really intense.

Finally, my character trips and falls, lying on her back. In the scene it looks like I really hit the ground hard, but when we filmed it, they set out a thick mat for me to land on, which helped the many, many takes of that fall not hurt as much. I still ended up with a bruise on my hip from landing on my side so many times, though. I can't stop smiling at how realistic this all looks.

There's another cut to the legs walking toward me, the hammer just hanging down at the guy's side, and then the scene cuts back to me.

"This is where I scream, remember that?" I whisper to Thatcher. My voice was hoarse for a whole two days after we filmed this, because they made me do a few takes with different pitches and different reactions. I'm curious to see which shot they chose.

My character then looks straight into the camera and screams, and the shot zooms into my mouth for a transition to a black screen for the title of the show to pop up.

"Ew," I say. "Thank goodness I didn't have anything stuck in my teeth."

Moth and Thatcher laugh, but Patti reaches over to tell me to shush. Thatcher leans down to whisper in my ear, "Are you feeling less nervous now?"

I nod, smiling still from the scene.

"I'm really proud of you."

My heart glows again, and now I'm smiling because of him. I turn my head to face him and give him a little kiss, who cares that we are sitting in front of tons of people. I love this boy.

At this point in the episode, we see Vick Midnight and his crew in their office, talking about a case they just closed, when Patti, Moth, and Thatcher all burst into their office, demanding to speak to Vick Midnight.

Grant replies, "That's me."

Patti then goes on to explain that my character, Amanda, is missing and gives him all the details on me. He says they will get right on it, and then Moth's character says, "We aren't leaving."

"What?" Vick Midnight responds gruffly, because that's his character.

"We are a group," Thatcher says, "and we never give up on each other. We are investigating with you."

The episode really takes off from there, and I cannot stop smiling the entire time. My friends are so amazing, and the little cut scenes where the audience can see me where I'm being held captive as Amanda are actually pretty fear-inducing. A lot of it was the directing, but we look like professionals up there.

There's a scene where Patti's character Connie is screaming in the street out of frustration, and she just breaks down and cries, crumpling on the pavement like she literally can't stand that Amanda is still missing. I tear up watching Patti, she is so raw.

Then there's the scene where Moth's character Tommy confronts Vick Midnight about not finding me yet, and there are tears in his eyes while he tells Vick to try harder. Real tears.

Finally, there's the scene where Vick finally finds the lair this guy has been keeping Amanda in and Thatcher's character Matthew frantically tries to free me while Vick is fighting off the bad guy. His hands shake and he truly looks panicked, and I'm yelling through the tape over my mouth.

It feels a little too intense for a town to play on the side of a building in the center square, which is maybe why no previous mayors have done this to celebrate Grant O'Reilly, but it's kind of amazing how even I am tricked by our performances into having bodily reactions to the episode. My heart pounds when the scenes get intense, my eyes well up when the scenes are emotional, and my palms sweat when they are in dangerous situations.

Finally, the TV friends are all back together, thanking Vick for his help in rescuing me, and before I can even really process the pride and excitement I feel seeing the episode, it's over.

The crowd behind us hoots and hollers for us over a wave of applause, but the four of us are all stuck frozen in our seats.

"Phew," Thatcher sighs. "That was intense."

"That was amazing," Patti corrects him.

"No, we were amazing," I correct her.

Moth's mouth is stuck open, so I nudge him for a response. He smiles, wide-eyed like Patti, and takes a moment to look at each of us. "Guys... I don't think this will be the last time we're on screen."

"I have the same feeling," Patti says, her eyes matching his in wideness.

"Until then we should probably turn around and greet our new fans," Thatcher jokes, but we do it, because he's right. Just maybe not about them all being our fans. Layla is in the audience after all.

We all turn to face the crowd, at which point Mrs. Permala takes Patti's hand and insists the five of us take a bow, despite the fact Mrs. Permala was not in the show. She put up with all of us last year though, so she's earned it.

My heart swells with pride for what my friends and I have just accomplished, and it hits me: this is my all-time high. This is why I love being with the misfits, because I keep thinking that I've reached an all-time high and then we do something that sets the bar even higher. First it was our performance and getting selected by Grant O'Reilly, then it was the cafeteria applauding us, then it was going to Hollywood and filming the show, then it was actually having fun with my friends over the summer, and now this.

I cannot wait for school to start and for our next adventure in the Riverside High School Theater Department, because with these three, there is literally nothing that can stop us. We can only go up from here, I know it.