Tonight was the worst night ever. The night of the Independent concert. Let me rephrase that, the night that was supposed to be the Independent concert. It was a disaster! I never got to the concert! Never got to meet and marry The Clay! Never even made it out of town! Let me start from the beginning. Maya and I started preparing ourselves around noon. By 5 PM, I still wasn't ready. I couldn't find my shoes. Then I found them, but they didn't match my socks. Then the socks didn't match each other. Then Maya's dog ran off with one of them. Then my dress mysteriously disappeared. I eventually found it under Maya's bed and she claimed she had no idea how it got under there. It was tucked safely between the dress I wanted to wear to a Nick Carter concert last year (but couldn't find) and a shirt that said "I Love Clay". Hmmmm. Maybe that's for a birthday present. Is my birthday coming up? I can't remember. I'm too distraught.

I also misplaced the poster I had made to bring along with to the concert. It said "Down with Kelly". I was gonna display it loud and clear at the show, but I couldn’t find it. I searched the entire house before finally finding it in Maya’s closet, next to the poster I made for a BSB concert that said "Go away, Willa Ford!" I had wondered what happened to that! It had disappeared on concert day. Hmmm. I’m starting to wonder.

I was going to display it loud and clear at the show, but I couldn't find it anywhere. I searched the entire house before finally finding it in Maya's closet, next to the poster I made for a Backstreet Boys concert that said "Down with Willa Ford!" I had wondered what happened to that! It disappeared the day of the concert. Hmmmm... I'm beginning to wonder about Maya.

So we left her house around 6 PM. That gave us only one hour to get to the arena, buy souvenirs, and find our seats. Maya sped down the highway going 95 while we belted along to 'The Way'. After the sixth repeat of the song, she demanded I turn it off. I demanded I wouldn't. I persisted and she finally agreed that I could play it one last time. So I did. I was so into the song that I didn't realize the car had started to smoke. I vaguely remember Maya muttering something about the car slowing down and it wouldn't speed back up. Whatever. I was too caught up in the song. I was psyching myself up for my favorite part of the song, when he goes "oh girl". AUGH! That kills me!! Anyway, just seconds before he was about to say it, the radio shorted out. I screamed. Maya screamed as the car let out a big puff of smoke and slowed to a stop. She yanked the wheel to the right and we drifted over to the curb. She tried starting the car back up to no avail.

We got out of the car and popped the hood. Neither one of us knows beans about cars so we just stared into the smoking engine until the fumes sent us into coughing fits.

We waited by the side of the car for someone to drive by. The highway was empty and not a single car passed for 30 minutes.

"We'll never make it to the concert." Maya whined. She had fought the whole week about not wanting to go to the concert, but standing outside the car, I swear I saw a tear leave her eye.

"I told you we should have left on time!" I cried.

I fell to my knees and screamed out Clay's name.

"CLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYY!!!!!!!"

As if on cue, thunder boomed and rain started to pour. I began to cry and called out his name again.

"CLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYY!!!!!!!"

Maya dragged me off my knees. "Knock it off."

"But Clay." My tiny voice squeaked. "We've gotta get to Clay."

"We're not gonna make it there! The concert started 10 minutes ago."

"We'll make it! We've got to make it!!"

"How?! Not a single car has come down this road! Nobody is coming to pick us up! I left my cell phone at home! And you don't even have a cell phone! We're gonna have to walk home! By the time we get there, the show will be over and Clay will be heading back home!"

"Um... actually, he'll be heading to Nebraska. "

"Shut up!" She smacked me with her corsage. Don't ask why she had one. Even I didn't have a corsage and I'm the nutty one.

By this time, we were soaked through and through. We slowly started walking home in silence. After a couple of miles, I felt the overwhelming urge to sing through my tears. I started softly. "And Solitaire's the only game in town."

Maya glared at me, but I kept on singing. "And by herself it's easy to pretend she'll never love again."

Maya glared some more.

"While life goes on around her everywhere..."

I let a moment of silence linger between us before I continued. "She's playing Solitaire."

"Shut up! It was just a concert!!"

"She's playing Soooooooolitaaaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiiire."

Suddenly Simon Cowell stepped out from behind a streetlight. I almost didn't recognize his face in the dark, but his accent was unmistakable. "That was awful with a capital 'A'."

He climbed into his Mercedes and sped off.

"Thanks for the lift, jack hole!!"

I turned to Maya to recount the nerve of that guy, but she was gone. I heard a loud screech and looked down the road to see her clinging to the back of his car. Her shoes fell off as he sped around the corner, her still clinging for life.

I let out a string of foul language. Language foul enough to turn Clayton to stone. With a fresh batch of tears falling I continued on towards home.

After awhile, I came upon a set of trees I didn't remember ever existing before. I tramped my way through the woods. The swaying sound of the branches was drowned out by my heart's pining. A loud roaring sound shook me out of my daydreams. I looked up to see a helicopter floating above the trees. A figure was hanging from a rope ladder, yelling something at me. As the figure descended further towards me, I realized it was Ryan Seacrest. He called me his dashing beauty and urged me to take his hand. "I will lift you to safety!"

"No!"

After a few thrown rocks and several curse words later, he lifted back up into the helicopter and flew off.

I came out the other end of the mysterious woods and continued my path along the side of an unfamiliar road. After a few minutes of silence, a black limousine pulled up next to me. The big jolly driver stuck his head out the window and asked if I needed a lift. I didn't utter a word as I climbed into the passenger seat.

"Hi! My name is Stan!"

I forced a smile.

"What's your name?" He asked.

I forced another smile.

The tinted window separating the front from the back was closed. I asked him who he was driving. "Oh, just a couple of people passing through town."

Sadness overtook me again and I began to softly sing a Barry Manilow tune. "I can't smile without you. I can't laugh and I can't sing."

Stan joined in. "I'm finding it hard to do anything."

The window rolled down half an inch and I heard a female voice with a Texan accent yell out "Knock off the Manilow, Stan!" A beautiful, beautiful male voice laughed loudly in response. As the window rolled back up, I heard that same beautiful voice say something about North Carolina barbecue. Before I could further question who was in the back seat, the driver pulled up to my house. I got out and hurried up the driveway. As the limo drove off, I turned back to check out the license plate. It said "ClaynKelly." Dang it!!!