Free No Biz Like Show Biz by Nancy Krulik Page A

book. The trouble was, Katie hadn’t read the book yet. Because of Katie, Nellie had looked like a fool in front of everybody!
    As far as Katie was concerned, wishes brought nothing but trouble.
    “Let’s stop talking about singing, okay?” she finally told her friends. “And let’s get started baking.”
    Mrs. Carew came in just then and started handing out baking trays and utensils.
    “Mrs. Carew, will you let us eat some of the cookies, too?” George asked Katie’s mom.
    Katie laughed. George had never met a sweet he didn’t want to eat.
    “Sure,” Katie’s mother told him. “How else will we know if they’re good?”
    “Cool,” George said, tying on his apron. “Let’s get started.”

Chapter 3
    “Sorry I can’t stay to help clean up,” Suzanne said as she put on her coat and began walking out of the kitchen. The cookies were cooling on the counter.
    “Hey, that’s not fair,” Kevin said.
    “I have to work on my song for tomorrow’s auditions,” Suzanne explained. “And then I have to practice my turns for modeling class. I’m supposed to do that ten minutes every day.”
    George rolled his eyes. “Oh, give me a break. How hard can it be to turn?” He stood up on his toes and spun around quickly.
    Crash! Clang! George bumped into the kitchen counter. A pile of baking tins fell to the floor.
    “ That hard,” Suzanne told him smugly. “See you all tomorrow.”
    “She always has to leave right when it’s time to clean up,” Jeremy complained.
    Miriam Chan turned on the water in the sink and began to wash out a mixing bowl. Then suddenly she began singing a Bayside Boys song as she scraped the batter away. “I dream of you when I’m awake. I hope that doesn’t sound too fake . . .”

    “Wow, you have a great voice!” Katie exclaimed. She smiled broadly. The Bayside Boys were her favorite band, and “Dreams” was one of their best songs.
    Miriam blushed. “I didn’t even realize I was singing out loud,” she said, looking very embarrassed. “I like to sing when I do chores. It’s something my mom taught me to do. It makes the work go faster.”
    “Miriam, you should totally try out for the solo in the holiday show,” Katie suggested.
    “Yeah. You’d be so much better than Suzanne,” George told her. He lifted his head up and pretended to sing like Suzanne. “Moo! Moo!”
    “Arooo!” Katie’s chocolate-brown-and-white cocker spaniel, Pepper, howled and buried his ears in his paws.
    “Oh, I could never sing in front of people,” Miriam said. She pulled nervously at her straight black hair.
    “Sure you could,” Emma W. told her. “You just sang in front of us.”
    “That’s different,” Miriam explained, blushing. “I could never get up on a stage and sing.”
    “Why not?” George asked her. “It’s just singing in a different place.”
    “All those people staring at me . . .” Miriam made a face.
    “My big brother, Ian, had a part in the middle school play last month,” Kevin said. “He was really nervous. But my dad told him to imagine all the people in the audience in their underwear. Then he wasn’t scared anymore.”
    George started laughing. “Imagine Mrs. Jerk man in her underwear. Oooo.”
    Katie, Jeremy, and Kevin all started to giggle, imagining Mrs. Derkman, who had been their strict third-grade teacher—and also happened to be Katie’s next-door neighbor—in her underwear.
    Miriam laughed a little, too.
    “See,” Kevin told her. “It works.”
    “I guess,” Miriam said slowly. “But I can’t just get up and audition. I haven’t rehearsed anything. And the tryouts are tomorrow!”
    “You could practice at my house right now,” Kevin suggested. “We have the music for lots of songs in our piano bench. My mom could play the piano while you sing.”
    “I don’t know,” Miriam said nervously.
    “We’ll go to Kevin’s with you,” Katie assured her. “We’ll be your practice audience.”
    “Just don’t imagine me in my