Sitzprobe time—my favorite part of tech. Just watching the band ready their instruments is giving me life. This is our first time singing with live music and not recorded tracks. It can get messy introducing the vocals with the music—tempos go all over the place. But I can tell it will be completely magical to hear the voices and the music coming together with the acoustics of this grand theater.

Actors bounce nervously in their chairs. Elijah is sitting by me. Jamaal might be his Kenickie onstage, but I’m his Kenickie in real life. I’m squeezing honey out of a stolen packet from Starbucks in the hope that it will help my vocal cords.

“I can’t wait for this,” Anna says, hovering over my chair. “You guys have worked so hard, and now the music comes alive.” She flips her hair and waves at someone. “And look at that hot cello player,” she adds.

“I’d rather not,” Elijah says, with a little too much attitude.

“I think I’m in love with Duncan,” Anna whispers. Elijah grips his seat. I want to help him but don’t know how. “We were meant to be together.”

“Are you guys together?” I ask.

“Not yet. But we kissed. And I could just tell.”

“How?” I ask.

“Just a feeling,” she admits.

Elijah rolls his eyes. I give his foot a kick. He clears his throat. “Good for you, girl,” he manages to say.

“You’re sweet,” she says, then heads back to her assistant director perch beside her dad.

Once she’s gone, I say, “They’ve only kissed.”

He shakes his head. “But she’s in love.”

I ask the question that needs to be asked. “Are you in love?”

He laughs. “I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. Duncan doesn’t want to be pansexual, or bisexual, or anything but straight. Says it will hurt his career.”

“Maybe you should move on,” I suggest.

“You haven’t kissed him,” Elijah laments.

“Are we ready?” Mr. Daniels asks over the God mic.

“We are ready!” Meena echoes.

The music director waves her baton, setting the pace, and when “Summer Nights” begins, my heart matches the tempo.

5:39 P.M.

“Fifteen,” Meena warns from the intercom.

“Thanks, fifteen,” we all say back. The boys’ dressing room is packed with guys changing, talking, eating, and looking at phones. Everyone’s got a case of the sillies—symptoms include random outbursts of laughing, waves of euphoria, dancing, singing, and general backstage madness.

We’re about to do our first stumble through and no one feels ready. A stumble through is just like it sounds—we literally stumble our way through the show by throwing on costumes, forgetting props, dropping lines, and not finding our light. It’s a fantastic mess.

“Why aren’t you getting in costume?” Jamaal asks, looking cool in his leather jacket and white shirt.