"Oh wow," said Darren as he and the rest of the band reached the WorldArts Stadium - the stadium they were going to perform in. They were scheduled to perform at the Muzikfest Festival, where musical artistes of all kinds performed to the masses - both the live audience and those watching the live telecast on MTV. Muzikfest was the largest music festival ever held since Woodstock, and tens and thousands of artistes were to take part. Among those in the Muzikfest lineup were Savage Garden, Aqua, Roxette, Daze, Madonna, Solid Harmonie, Spice Girls, Backstreet Boys and others. This Muzikfest would also be a special one because it will have an entry in the Guinness Book Of World Records. Everyone was seen either practising, chatting, getting their gear ready or getting their make-up ready. Darren was in awe as he saw the size of the stadium.
"My god, it's HUGE!" exclaimed Darren as he walked around. Daniel decided to follow him because he was feeling bored. S.O.A.P was doing their soundcheck now and Savage Garden's soundcheck would be in another half-an-hour. The time was 5:30 p.m. The Muzikfest wasn't supposed to start until 7:00 p.m. Anna-Maria and Nicole were seen swapping beauty tips with the girls from All Saints while Ben, Karl and Lee had a quick bite at the McDonalds next door. Darren and Daniel, though, were walking around the venue looking for photo opportunities. Daniel managed to snap a picture of Darren while Darren wasn't looking.
"Hey!", said Darren after he found out that Daniel took his photograph. Daniel laughed and ran back to the stadium's backstage. There, they met Anna-Maria, Nicole, Ben, Karl and Lee chatting excitedly about the Muzikfest. Joining them was the people from Aqua - Lene, René, Søren and Claus. They didn't notice Darren and Daniel until Daniel playfully tickled Lene. Lene laughed like a little baby and pleaded Daniel to stop. When Daniel stopped, Lene poked him on his hips. Daniel whimpered and walked away holding his now-hurting hip. Everyone laughed at Daniel and continued chatting.
Time flew by and soon it was 6:00 p.m. Savage Garden and company went to the stage and soundchecked everything. After a while, their soundcheck ended and they swapped places with Aqua. As they passed by, Daniel saw Lene and gave a shy smile. Lene noticed it and gave him a smile back.
What a lovely girl, thought Daniel. She's the prettiest person I've ever seen. Even Michelle wasn't this beautiful.......
Little did he know what Lene was thinking.
What a hunk, thought Lene as she walked by. Great smile, great personality, great looks.......sigh.......
7:00 p.m. arrived. The artistes performed accordingly. Seen at the stage floor were flowers, teddy bears and love letters. Screams from teenagers filled the stadium. Streamers were thrown all over the place, together with confetti and some balloons. Everyone had a great time, including Savage Garden and Aqua. Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and this huge Muzikfest ended at 1:30 a.m. sharp. No one, though, seemed a little bit sleepy. After the stadium was empty, Darren, Daniel, Lene, Anna-Maria, Shaznay from All Saints, René, Marie from Roxette and some other people went on stage to collect as many gifts as possible. They successfully cleared up the stage floor in less than an hour.
"Look at what I found, Darren! A stuffed Chewie doll!" said Anna-Maria to Darren as she ran up to him. Darren was surprised and gave Anna-Maria a hug as he claimed possession of the Chewbacca toy. He was seen jumping around like a little kid while playing with his doll. The rest of the band just sighed. Daniel, though, was not there. Apparently he found a few roses lying about and gave them to Lene when he met her. Daniel said that it was just a token of friendship but Darren became suspicious. After a while, Darren felt tired. He and Daniel went to their hotel, boarded their room and slept in their own separate beds. They didn't wake up until 10:00 a.m. the next day.
"Hey you two! Get up! As it is, we're already late for breakfast! Come on!" said Anna-Maria as she called them up and gave them a surprise wake-up call. Darren looked at the time and woke Daniel up. He was slightly confused when he heard Daniel mumble in his sleep.
"Oh my darling.....mmmm.....", mumbled Daniel as Darren shook him awake. After a while, he got up and realized that Lene wasn't there. Daniel got out from bed and got himself ready. After a while, everyone went down for breakfast. Darren was even more confused than before when he noticed that Daniel wasn't paying attention to his food. Whenever he tried to feed himself, he would always miss his mouth and let the food drop to the floor. Darren and Nicole tried to get Daniel to pay attention but Daniel still was in a dreamy state.
"Hey Daniel! Wake up!" said Ben as Karl shook Daniel. Daniel finally 'woke up' and noticed his food all over the place. He quickly finished whatever was left on his plate, then went back to his room. Darren and the others looked at each other for a moment and then gave an 'oh-well' look. They continued eating.
Meanwhile, Lene was sitting alone in her room. She took out a piece of paper and a pencil. On that paper, she drew little hearts and wrote the name 'Daniel' on one of the hearts. She then took that piece of paper and constructed a little Origami swan. On a part of the swan was written the words 'I Love Daniel' in red. She placed the swan on her bedside table and lay down on her bed. She started dreaming of a wide garden with flowers blooming all over the place. She was dressed in a gown that a fairy-tale princess would usually wear. In the distance was Daniel, dressed up in a knight’s armor. Beautiful music was being played as Daniel and Lene approached each other. When they were close to reaching each other, Lene could hear someone shouting to her.
"Hey, Lene! Wake up! It’s breakfast time!" shouted René to Lene’s ear. Lene woke up in a daze and tried to remember where she was. She jumped out from her bed, took a bath and then joined the others for breakfast. Just as she was leaving, she caught a glimpse of Daniel and his friends entering the restaurant. She gave a shy smile and quickly looked away. Daniel noticed her and gave an even shyer smile back. Darren noticed that Daniel was blushing but decided not to tell him.
Daniel was relaxing all by himself in his room. The rest of the band went to the nearby shopping centres to grab some stuff for themselves. They initially asked Daniel to come along but he declined the offer. Everyone was surprised. Usually Daniel would be jumping up and down asking everyone else to go shopping with him but now he himself isn’t interested. They decided that Daniel was just plain tired and left him alone. They also invited Aqua to come along - Savage Garden and Aqua have now become good friends - and everyone except Lene decided to come along. Lene made up an excuse about clearing up her room and having to write some postcards to friends. René, Søren and Claus just sighed and left her on her own. Lene went up to her room and just sat on her bed with nothing to do. She was checking out the TV set when she received a phone call.
"Hello?"
"Hi, is Lene there?"
"Speaking, who’s this?"
"Oh hi Lene! Daniel here!"
"Which Daniel? Daniel Savage Garden or Daniel Silverchair?"
"Guess....Truly Madly Deeply...."
"Oh, that Daniel! Hi there! What’s up?"
"The sky......heh heh heh!"
"Seriously.....what are you doing at the moment?"
"Oh nothing.....just resting......what about you?"
"Just checking out the TV channels....hey, aren’t you supposed to be out shopping with your pals?"
"Nah......didn’t want to! Anyway, Lene, do you have plans for tonight?"
"Not really......why?"
"Oh nothing.....just thought we could talk, that’s all....."
"Hmm....why don’t you come to my room after dinner? I’m all alone, y’know...."
"OK then....see ya tonight! Ta ta!"
"Bye!"
Both Daniel and Lene were reluctant to put down the phone. They finally decided to replace the handset after a few minutes. Daniel sat down on one of the chairs and grabbed a pen and a sheet of paper off the hotel room’s notepad. He held the pen and jotted down a message to Darren.
"Dear Darren,
Went to check the place out. Will have dinner on my own. Don’t expect me before midnight. I have the spare keycard. Don’t worry about me! I’ll be just fine. Bye!
Daniel"
He folded the paper up into four and wrote "To Darren" on the front. He then watched a movie on TV before joining the rest for lunch. He met Lene and winked at her. She got the message and gave Daniel the ‘thumbs-up’. He went over to the buffet spread and grabbed some morsels of food. He then went to his table and noticed that Aqua was sitting right next to them. Lene shot a glance at Daniel as Daniel ate his slice of salmon. She then looked at her band members and then at her food. She finished her food and went up to her room.
Lene turned on the radio. Turn Back Time was currently being played. She playfully sang along to it as if she was in a karaoke parlour. When the song ended, she went to the bathroom to freshen up. She could hear To The Moon & Back blaring out from the radio speakers. Hearing that, she received visions of Daniel in her mind. Daniel at the concert, Daniel with Darren, Daniel during lunch, Daniel, Daniel, Daniel....the only thing she could say was...
"Sigh...." said Daniel when he saw Lene’s picture in a magazine Lee bought for him. In that picture, Lene was wearing a yellow version of the dress she wore in Aqua’s video for Barbie Girl. That very same video was now playing in his mind - only instead of René, Daniel was the video’s ‘Ken’. He started humming the Barbie Girl tune when Darren entered the room.
"Hey Jonesy! You’re a Savage Boy, NOT a Barbie Girl!" chuckled Darren when he heard Daniel humming the chorus. Daniel looked up and saw Darren on the floor laughing out loud. He smirked and threw an orange at Darren. Fortunately for Darren, the flying friut just barely missed him. Darren went inside the room’s bathroom and washed himself up. Daniel looked at the clock. It was 6:30 p.m. Daniel decided that this was a good time to leave. He took out the message from his pocket and placed it on Darren’s bed. He then opened the door and went off.
Darren came out from the bathroom and was shocked to see that Daniel wasn’t there. He looked everywhere until he noticed the note on his bed. He opened it and rolled his eyes after reading it. Geez, that Daniel....thought Darren as he put the note away. He changed into a dinner suit and went down with the rest of the band for dinner an hour later. He told everyone where Daniel went and told the others not to worry. In reality, Darren himself was worried. What has come over Daniel nowadays?
Lene was walking around in a huge shopping mall looking for something to buy. She spotted a jewellery store nearby and went inside to check it out. She saw a pair of rings with half an heart on each of them sitting on the display. She noticed some writing on each of the hearts and wanted to know what it read.
"Can I have a look?" she asked the shopkeeper. The shopkeeper nodded and took out the two rings from the display and gave it to her. She put the two hearts together and read the writing that appeared. It was a small poem about friendship. She loved it so much, she bought both the rings. Lene then went around the shopping mall looking for more stuff to buy. She found a restaurant upstairs and decided to have dinner there. At the restaurant, she thought she saw Daniel taking some food, but shook her head in disbelief. That can’t be him, thought Lene, he’s probably having dinner with his band members at the hotel. She bought a beef burger and sat down to eat.
Daniel, though, was wandering about at the very same shopping mall looking for something to drink. He was very thirsty and was looking for a place to have dinner. He found a restaurant on the top floor and sat down to eat. He placed a plate of noodles and a can of Sprite on his tray and after paying, he sat down and enjoyed his dinner. He looked at the table across him and saw Lene sitting by herself eating on a burger. He decided to go over and join her. Lene was pleasantly surprised to see that Daniel indeed was there. She allowed Daniel to come along and join her table. They chatted over dinner. Both Lene and Daniel talked about life, music, food and had a huge debate over whether Meg Ryan looked a lot like Marilyn Monroe. Time went fast and soon it was 11:00 p.m. The mall was going to close so Daniel and Lene quickly finished their dinner and drinks and exited from the mall.
"Daniel, since you and I have nothing to do, why don’t you come to my room tonight and watch a midnight movie with me?" asked Lene in a very soft voice. Daniel agreed and followed Lene to her room. Even though the sun had set a long time ago, the hotel was still as bright as ever. Lights was shining all over the place. Both Lene and Daniel made their way up to Lene’s hotel room and entered it. Due to room shortage, Lene was given a room with a huge double-bed instead of a single one, so now Lene had a huge bed to roll about in with no one to share it with. To her right were René, Søren and Claus’s rooms. A few blocks after her room were Savage Garden’s and Daze’s rooms. She enjoyed going over to her band members’ rooms and have a small chat with them over fruits and coffee. Today was just plain different.
"Wait here and let me change," said Lene as she entered the bathroom. Daniel sat on the edge of the bed and waited. He looked around Lene’s room and noticed a paper swan with his name on the bedside table. He opened it up and saw little hearts with ‘Daniel’ written all over it. He grabbed a pen and wrote ‘Lene’ under one of the hearts. He carefully folded the paper back into a swan and wrote ‘I Love Lene’ at the side. He hid the swan inside one of the drawers and sat on one of the chairs. He heard the bathroom door open. Out came Lene dressed in a silk nightgown. Her hair was let down and her make-up was washed off her face. She made her way to the double-bed and snuggled into the covers.
"Come on here, Daniel," cooed Lene at Daniel’s direction, "I need something to keep me warm......and this blanket’s not warm enough." Daniel went over to Lene’s bed and made himself cozy right next to Lene. Lene grabbed Daniel’s shirt and started to pull it off. Daniel just closed his eyes and let everything take course. Lene then leaned on Daniel’s unshirted chest, flipped the channels to a midnight movie and turned off the lights. As the stars shone in the sky, something was about to happen to both of them, for midnight movies wasn’t the only thing on the two 25-year-olds’ agendas that night...........
Lene woke up the next day at around 7:30 a.m. She found Daniel’s arms wrapped around her holding her tight. She carefully removed Daniel’s grip and made her way to the bathroom to freshen up. She then kissed Daniel awake. Daniel woke up in a daze but got his senses back a few minutes later. He noticed that he had nothing much on so he looked for a pair of trousers and a T-shirt and put them on. He looked at his hand and saw a ring with half an heart on his ring finger. He then looked at Lene’s hand and saw the same ring on her ring finger. At first he couldn’t remember what he was doing in Lene’s room but when Daniel saw the ring, memories of last night flashed into his mind.
"Good morning dear," said Lene as Daniel woke up. "Hope you had a good sleep last night!" Daniel nodded slighty and made his way to the bathroom. He then remembered that he had left Darren alone in their room. He told Lene about the situation and asked her to let him go for a while. Lene let Daniel out for a while and patiently waited for his return. Meanwhile, Daniel ran over to his room – which wasn’t far away – hoping that Darren wasn’t mad at him for being so late. Luckily for him, Darren wasn’t mad, but he was slightly worried.
"WHERE were you last night, Jonesy?" asked Darren as Daniel entered the room. "Every one of us were waiting for your return last night and now I see that you came only today! You got us extremely worried, y’know....PLEASE don’t scare us like that again!" Daniel didn’t say anything but he just went to change. While Darren wasn’t looking, he left the room and made his way to Lene’s room. Lene was dressed in jeans and a baby-tee and she looked very cute indeed. Both Lene and Daniel went hand-in-hand down to the restaurant for breakfast. As they approached the restaurant door, Lene and Daniel went their own separate ways and made their way to where their band members were sitting. Darren noticed that Lene was acting as if she was struck by Cupid’s arrow, while René noticed that Daniel was getting a bit weird nowadays. Both of them were puzzled by Lene’s and Daniel’s sudden change of behaviour. Just WHAT had come over them?
After breakfast, Darren, Nicole, Ben, René, Søren and Sieber from Daze decided to go shopping together. Darren bumped into René while browsing around and was very happy to see him. He decided to ask René something.
"Hiya René!"
"Hi, Darren! Whazzup?"
"Nothing.....hey René, can I ask you something?"
"Oh sure, shoot! What is it you wanted to ask me?"
"Well, I was just wondering, just what happened to your lead singer? She seems a little weird today...."
"Lene? Well, I don’t really know.......in fact, I was going to ask you the same thing about Daniel!"
"Really? Well, guess what? Daniel left me a note yesterday saying he would be out for a while and he returned only an hour ago!"
"Oh? That’s weird.....I walked past Lene’s room late last night and did you know what I heard?"
"What is it? Tell me!"
"Well, I THOUGHT I heard Daniel singing something to Lene.....something about a universe inside a heart or something like that.....I initially thought it was YOU but then I saw you going to your room from the other direction so the only other possibility was your friend Daniel! I could be wrong though....."
Darren laughed when he heard René’s remark. The very idea of Daniel actually singing was remote, and Darren was having a hard time imagining one of their concerts with Daniel singing. He knew that Daniel would usually lip-synch to whatever he was singing, but Daniel singing something for real? Nah.....
Darren shook his head and started thinking about what René just said. What if whatever René said was true? That René heard Daniel singing to Lene in her room? That Daniel was even IN Lene’s room? He also wondered about Daniel’s choice of song….according to René, Daniel was singing Universe, their fifth Australian single. Suddenly it all made sense to Darren. Oh my…… thought Darren as he walked around the shopping mall store. He went up to his room and found Daniel there. He got Daniel to sit down. Darren then started to speak.....
"Lene, we need to talk," said René, Søren and Claus when they met up with Lene in her hotel room. Lene was busy brushing her hair at that time. She asked the others what was wrong.
"Well, Lene, René here told us that something happened in your room last night and we want to know what happened," explained Søren to Lene. Lene was in a total state of shock. How did they know? How did René know? All was quiet in Lene’s room for a moment. Then Lene herself broke the silence.
"I....I confess, guys....I...."
".....did do it to her. I did do it. I’m so sorry....." confessed Daniel while tears came out from his clear blue eyes. Darren told him not to worry and told him that he wasn’t angry. He got Daniel to calm down and let him explain what really happened. Daniel continued crying for a few minutes then he started to explain everything to Darren.
"Well, to tell the truth, since I met Lene, I had a huge crush on her. Then when we met each other here during the Muzikfest concert, I just fell in love with her. Yesterday she invited me over to her room to watch a movie with her because she was all alone. That’s when I found out that she, well, she loves me too. Our original plan was to watch the midnight movie and then go back but it just grew. And then we just...."
".....made love. We did. Oh my......why am I saying this?" said Lene in the midst of sobbing. She threw her head into her hands and cried for what seemed like ages. René, Søren and Claus tried to comfort her but she just won’t stop crying. She felt SO depressed and guilty of what she had done that when lunch time approached, she refused to go down and eat and promised herself that she won’t take even a single bite out of any type of food for as long as she lived. It took the rest about an hour to finally convince Lene to at least have something to eat. She reluctantly followed the rest to lunch and decided to hide herself. She saw Daniel there as well and tried not to pay any attention to him.
Daniel failed to eat even one morsel of his food. Darren and the rest tried to console him but they failed as well. Darren saw Lene - who was eating as slow as possible - at the table across them and decided to let Anna-Maria and Nicole talk to her. He whispered his idea to both of them and they immediately agreed. After lunch, Anna-Maria and Nicole followed Lene to her room to talk - after much persuasion - while the guys - René, Søren, Claus, Darren, Ben, Lee and Karl - went up to Daniel’s room and had a small discussion. As all eleven of them went up to the eighteenth floor - where all their rooms were at - Darren got a brainwave. He thought about it for quite sometime. What an idea......it may be good, but.....oh my....thought Darren before succumbing into fits of laughter. The others did not seem to notice Darren’s sudden change of behaviour. Darren WAS a little bit weird sometimes, and they considered Darren’s behaviour now as completely normal. Ben, though, was a little bit curious. He wanted to know just what was so funny.
"Hey Darren! What ARE you laughing at? What’s so funny?" asked Ben to Darren. Darren stopped laughing - after some time - and whispered his idea into Ben’s ear. Ben thought about it for a moment and laughed as well. "Some idea, Darren....let’s try it out, OK?" asked Ben. Darren agreed and told Karl, Lee and the rest of the guys about his idea. All of them broke out laughing and decided to try it out. It wasn’t guranteed, though, that it will work, but they were willing to try....
Apparently Anna-Maria and Nicole had exactly the same idea in their minds. They talked it over and decided to use it on Lene when they reached her room. Lene let them in and asked them why were they here. They told her the reason and expected her to at least be a tiny bit sad. Fortunately for them, Lene wasn’t the least bit sad. She just seemed as normal as possible. All three of them sat down on the room floor and talked. Anna-Maria and Nicole told her that it was no one’s fault for what happened last night. Lene just nodded with everything they said to her. Anna-Maria decided that this was a good time to pop the big question - the idea that she and Nicole had in their minds earlier on. After Nicole finished talking, she cleared her throat - which made Nicole and Lene laugh - and popped the big question:
"Lene, if Daniel came to you and asked you to marry him, would you accept it?"
"Would I? Would I be willing to propose to Lene if I had the chance? Well, to tell the truth, yes….." said Daniel when Darren, Ben and the rest asked him their big question. All was quiet in Darren and Daniel’s room until Søren jumped up and went "HOORAY!!!!" Everyone was in a celebratory mood. This was the answer they were expecting - and Daniel gave that answer. Daniel just laughed at everyone’s antics. Darren managed to get everyone to stop jumping and calm down. He then whispered to Karl and got him to call Anna-Maria, Nicole and Lene over to his room. After that, he whispered something to Daniel and Daniel immediately agreed. He then got everyone else to hide behind the bathroom door while he himself stood at the room door waiting for all three of them to arrive. Anna-Maria and Nicole came first and hid behind the bathroom door with everyone else. Lene arrived a while later. When Lene entered, Daniel got down on his right knee, held Lene’s hand and asked her the question that mattered the most that day........"
"Lene, will you marry me and be my wife?"
Lene was speechless. She didn’t know what to say. Daniel looked at her with an expression that would have made anyone cry. She thought about it for a while, then gave Daniel her answer.
"Yes, Daniel, I will....."
Tears flowed from her eyes. Time stood still as the two lovers held each other’s hands for what seemed like eternity. The only thing they could hear was the chirps of the birds and the beautiful music floating around them. The same music that appeared in Lene’s dream the day before. The same music that would usually be associated with Valentine’s Day. Everyone stood still until Daniel and Lene exchanged rings. Darren turned on the radio and everyone was treated to Truly Madly Deeply. Lene and Daniel sat down on the bed just before everyone else popped out from the bathroom. René and Lee found a bottle of mineral water - which happens to belong to Darren - in the bathroom and popped it open like a bottle of expensive French champangé. Luckily for everyone else, the water didn’t get sprayed all over the place, although it did spill a little. Darren changed the radio channels to a station that plays dance music and got everyone to get up and....
"LET’S PARTY, EVERYONE! Let’s party for Daniel and Lene!" shouted Darren and Ben to everyone else. Everyone in the room - Darren, Daniel, Lene, René, Søren, Claus, Anna-Maria, Nicole, Ben, Lee and Karl - got up and danced through the day. They had a huge feast during dinner and celebrated for the following week. During that time, Darren, Nicole and Claus went to see a popular agency and made plans for Daniel’s and Lene’s special ceremony.
Two months later, Savage Garden, Aqua and everyone else they invited attended Daniel’s and Lene’s grand wedding. The hall was decorated with roses and little shiny stars together with some sheets of music notes. Everyone watched in awe as Lene came in dressed in a beautiful pearl-white gown, with Daniel handsomely dressed up in a smart tuxedo standing right beside her. Everyone was treated to a huge wedding party at the end. The cake was cut, the apple juice - they had to use this instead of champangé because most of the guests don’t drink alcohol - poured and the wedding pictures taken. Anna-Maria was nice enough to send them off to a honeymoon at Phuket, all expenses paid. Both Daniel and Lene left for their honeymoon three weeks later. On the plane, Lene went over to Daniel’s ear and whispered something to him.....
"I finally found what I’ve been looking for, and now you know I’m gonna love you more....."
*
* Finally Found, The Honeyz
THE END
EPILOUGE: Since that day, Lene and Daniel have been christened Tinseltown’s newest musical celebrity couple. A year later, Lene gave birth to twins - a boy and a girl - which she named Darren and Darrenna. Their careers became more successful than ever and they stayed husband and wife for as long as they lived.
