Hit Me Baby One More Time

He considered all songs. Emily rolled her eyes and spit on the floor.

She knew if he saw her do this, he would tell on her but this was her way of offsetting any bad luck that was in the air. They were put in charge of this project. Mum was a little tense, and here he was, just waffling and not making up his mind.

"Quick, just pick one! It doesn't matter which year. As long as it's something popular. And she wanted us to be able to interpret it! Since I know most songs, I thought it would be good if you picked one. But today please. You are --", and he cut her off with a "Shssssh".

Emily stared at him in frustration as he smiled at her.

"I will pick one, don't worry. Must get the right song so you are happy, I am happy, she is happy, they are happy - everybody is happy."

She threw the pillow at him. She knew he was right but it didn't make waiting for him to pick one, any less frustrating. She had things to do and here he was, with no care in the world. Such a typical teen!

"We don't have to use the CDs you know. We can always just work with Spotify or YouTube."

"I know... But look at her collection. So many to choose from."

"I'm telling you, you are wasting time. Mum said she was doing it for her 111th post. That's the one right after this post. And this post needs to go up before the day ends. And next one needs to go up on Monday. She was insis--", Emily was cut off again.

"Yes, yes... I know. We'll get it done!"

Emily kept looking at her bedroom door, expecting Mum to walk in at any minute to check on them. And knowing Mum, if they weren't ready, she would start explaining everything again like they were 3 years old. And after that, she would pick her own song because she wouldn't want to waste any time. And Emily wasn't sure if Mum would feel like an oldies which she really didn't want to do.

"So, what shall it be? An old one, or a new one? Maybe one of those old ones that a new movie has used. That could be fun..." He ignored her tapping feet and started whistling as he went through Mum's collection of CDs.

"Or we could pick one that's easy for everybody since it is the first one, and also something easy for us to do. Because you know she wants us to be a part of it", Emily said in the hopes he would get the urgency.

He picked a CD with a wicked grin. She knew he had found the song and just in time. She was just about to pull out her hair. "Let's do this!"

"Yes," he nodded. "Here, play this and we'll inject some fun into steemit."

He turned the corner and it felt as if his heart fell to the floor.

No, his CD player was broken. He had forgotten about that. And now, looking at it, he remembered it had been for some time but they weren't rushed to fix it and here they were, with CD in hand and no way of playing it.

He turned back to look at her. She shrugged and walked to the computer. The computer didn't have a slot for CDs either but thank goodness for the internet. Just about anything could be found on the internet.

"What song is it? We'll just get it off YouTube", Emily said in her older sister voice. He gave her the title and she nodded in approval. Mum would be happy with the choice.

"So, any ideas on how we can make it interesting. She told us to give it some thought. I thought we could throw in a couple of pictures to help figure it out, just in case."

"Editing will not be fun, but watching it could be fun. We'll run it by her."

They played the song and started singing along. They then cooked up ideas on how to present it. They practised doing it then checking to see if it made sense. Would they be able to pull it off. Will the players be able to get the song they were lip-synching to without the audio. Will the contest be a hit or a miss?

"Why does she want to do this again?" he asked.

"Something about giving back to the Steemit community. It's meant to be fun. And there's some SBD to win. You know she's big on fun, and I think she is also trying to get us to do some stuff on our feet. You know how she is about our gadget time," Emily explained.

"Yeah, the second half sounds more like it", he said laughing out loud as they searched for the song on the internet.

The cage in the middle

"So guys, do we have something?" Mum asked as she walked in just as they decided which part of the song they'd use, and thrashed out some ideas.

Emily played the song and Mum's face lit up. She gave them the thumbs up. Excited with Mum's approval of their choice, Emily and her brother started pouring out all the ideas they had thought of. And Mum stopped them at one particular one as her brother wouldn't move past it.

"So you want the cage in the middle? And then the camera starts with the cage and zooms out and you guys do your thing. Is that right?"

"Yes!! It will be so fun! It will be different. Can we Mum?"

He trailed off as he realised Mum wasn't buying the idea. "How about we save the cage idea for another time? We'll keep it in our ideas folder for now. Let's do something a little easier as I have to have this ready in the next 24 hours, maybe less."

He nodded a little bit disappointed, but immediately bounced back and continued with Emily chipping in, explaining how they were going to do the very first video. They also talked about other things they could do as they continued discussing the Steemit Contest. He cleared his throat and put on his Ring Master voice. Emily clapped in glee, happy that everything was coming together and she could get back to some homework.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, step right up!! This is a celebration! Celebrating 100 posts and counting!! On the 111th post, we start a contest to give back to the community which makes Steemit possible. We will record a video of us lip-synching to a popular song. A verse and chorus perhaps. We will drop some clues because we want everybody to win. The twist? There will be no audio. You have to figure out the title of the song."

Emily raised her hand, as she too wanted to do her part. "Emily, what happens once you get the song correct?", he asked, still in his Ring Master voice. She jumped to her feet and pretended to take the microphone from him.

"Drop the title of the song in the comments of the post and your first answer is locked in. Players will need to upvote the post to be eligible to win. If you would like to show us some love, please follow us and if you'd like show other Steemians some love resteem so they too can have some fun." She pretended to pass the microphone back to him. Mum's smile got bigger.

"The first one to get it right, will win 1 SBD. And the rest who get it right, will be placed in our magicrandom name picker for a lucky draw. There will be two more to win 0.5 SBD each."

"There will be a new video posted every Monday and every Thursday. Winners' will be announced at end of the week after payout of the posts."

"So Steemians of all colour, creed and continent, come join us tomorrow, as we present to you, the very first..."

Emily, her brother and Mum looked at each other and together shouted, "LIP-STEEM BATTLE!!". And then they hugged each other and had a good laugh as Emily turned conspicuously to the back, and spat.

Another day another prompt, another Free Write! Well this is more of Weekend FreeWrite where 3 prompts are thrown at you one after another. This is fun multiplied by 3 because you just never know where you will end. Of course, you can still stick to just one prompt. Either way, do check out @mariannewest to find out more.
This is my submission for the 200 Day Party Challenge. I also am starting a contest tomorrow, and because I had to massage everything that the 111st post would be present the contest on a Monday, it was a week of counting days and posts. I think I have managed it and I hope you will join me on the next post to have some fun.
Check out other stories for Day 6 of this contest because today it is really, "take a pick".

’Til we meet again over text, pics, videos, maybe even coffee - Steem On!!

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Animation By @zord189