Cassidy Knight flopped down onto her family's living room couch and flipped on the television set. It was the fourth day of Spring Break 1999, and Cassidy had stayed home for the entire time. She began flipping the TV channels with the remote control. The mid-afternoon programming was mostly boring infomercials and talkshows. Cassidy stopped on TLC as she watched an Asian designer guy hang soccerballs for a bedroom ceiling. She continued to watch and discovered the show to be Trading Spaces, a designing show where two sets of neighbors stay in each other's homes and redecorate a room. As she waited through the commercials the telephone rang. Cassidy ran into the kitchen to answer it.

"Hello?" She asked to person on the other side.

"Hey Cassidy, it's Hannah," the person answered. Hannah was Cassidy's best friend. They grew up living across the street from each other. They also were in a band together along with three other friends.

"What's up?" Cassidy asked as she went back to the living room on the cordless phone. She sat back down as the show came back on.

"Nothing much, just watching TV," Hannah told her. "How 'bout you?"

"Same thing," Cassidy said.

"What you watchin'?" Hannah asked.

"This show on TLC," Cassidy answered.

"Seriously? You're watching Trading Spaces?" Hannah asked, "So am I."

"Yeah, I never seen it before, but it looks cool."

"I've watched it several times before," Hannah shared. "I actually kinda wanna be on it."

"Hey, I'll trade with you," Cassidy said. "I totally would wanna have my bedroom redecorated."

"We'd have to measure it to make sure it fits the size requirements," Hannah said. "I went online and printed out the application which included the rules."

"What kinda rules are there?" Cassidy asked.

"Just a sec, I'll get them," Cassidy heard Hannah set the phone down and shuffle through papers. "Okay got them. Rule one, participants must live near one another, preferably right next door. I assume across the street would also work. Rule two, you must own the property or have written permission from the owner."

"So we'll obviously have to ask our parents," Cassidy said. "I'm sure my parents wouldn't mind too much. How about yours?"

"I already had asked them about that. Dad doesn't care, and mom only would agree to it if we had the living room done. Okay next rule is that each home must have a team of two people and all participants must be at least 16 years old."

"I just made it in the age department," Cassidy said. Her 16th birthday was just the week before."

"I would need to find a team member because neither of my parents want to do it and the twins are too young," Hannah shared. She had twin brother and sister who were just 12 years old.

"Maybe one of the girls would do it," Cassidy pondered. "Of course Mari wouldn't be able to 'cause she's only 15."

"So that leaves Denise or Lucky," Hannah said. "Who will you have if neither of your parents want to be on the show?"

"I could probably talk Robbie into it," Cassidy said. Robbie was her older brother. "What's next?"

"The room must be at least 14 feet by 14 feet. That leaves my bedroom out, which is why I'm okay with the living room being done."

"My room might be big enough," Cassidy said. "It will have to be measured."

"The last rules are that there must already be furniture in the room, the participants must all be able to take the same two days out of their schedule, and along with the application photos also need to be submitted showing all angles of the room, pictures of participants and the exterior of the house."

"So we'll need to take some photos," Cassidy said. "We could use your new digital camera."

"Yeah, that's what I used to take photos of our living room and the house exterior," Hannah shared. "I also already filled out my half of the application, except for the partner parts."

"Can you come over now?" Cassidy asked. "There's enough time before dinner for us to measure and take photos and stuff."

"We don't even know if you have permission," Hannah reminded. Cassidy heard the garage door whirl open and saw her parent's car going up the driveway.

"Well, They just got home so I can ask now," Cassidy told her.

"Wait until I get there," Hannah told her. "Two may do better convincing."

"Okay, I'll see you soon," Cassidy said before clicking the phone off. She turned off the television and went into the kitchen to hang up the phone. As she was doing that, her parents came through the door.

"Hi hun, who was that on the phone?" her mother Mary asked when she saw Cassidy hanging up the phone.

"Hannah," Cassidy answered. "She coming over for a little while if that's okay."

"That's fine," she answered as the doorbell rang.

"It's open!" Cassidy shouted from the kitchen. She heard the door open and Hannah called out a greeting. "We're in the kitchen." Hannah entered the room a moment later.

"Hello Hannah," Cassidy's dad Richard greeted the girl. "What are those papers?" She held in her hand the application printout as well as her digital camera.

"Actually, we were going to talk to you about that," Cassidy told her parents. "Would you like to sit down?" They all sat down around the kitchen table.

"Okay, Cassidy and I were discussing possibly being on this redecorating show called Trading Spaces," Hannah addressed the parents, handing over the application for them to look at. They sat in silence while they looked over the papers.

"Hannah, do you have permission from your parents?" Mary asked.

"Yes, they agreed to have our living room done," Hannah told her. "I don't have a partner yet, but will ask Lucky or Denise."

"Cassidy, who will you have as a partner?" Mary asked. "Your father and I won't be able to take off work."

"I was thinking maybe Robbie," Cassidy shared. "And the room maybe could be my own."

"If the room is big enough, you have permission," Mary said. The girls jumped up in excitement and thanked Cassidy's parents.

"Cassidy, you must have full agreement with your brother," Richard added. "No forcing him."

"Okay, okay," Cassidy said before sitting back down. "Could you guys help us fill out part of the application? I noticed it asks for the year the house was built and stuff, and I don't know that stuff."

"Sure, sweetie," Mary told her daughter. They took a moment to fill out that information before Hannah and Cassidy went up to Cassidy's room to measure. Cassidy remembered to grab a tape measure on the way.

"Let's do the long side first," Cassidy said. Hannah held the end to the wall as Cassidy pulled it to the other side and read the measurement. "14 and a half feet, just made it." They wrote down the measurement and then checked the other side. "13 feet, 11 and six eighths inches. Uh, close enough." They just wrote 14 foot even, figuring the producers wouldn't mind that much of a difference. After that they took photos of each corner of the room.

"Now we need to say why we want the room done," Hannah read off the application. They looked around the room for inspiration. It had plain white walls with off white blinds on the windows, a twinsize bed with blue linens, and a dresser with a mirror above it. In one corner sat Cassidy's acoustic guitar on a stand, and on the other side of the room on the floor sat a 20-gallon tank holding Cassidy's baby Ball Python.

"It's boring," they both said at the same time. Hannah wrote that down.

"What else should we say?" Hannah asked. They thought for a moment.

"It, uh, doesn't represent the, the..." Cassidy tried to think of what to add. "Personality! It doesn't represent the personality of its occupant."

"Ooh, that's a good one!" Hannah exclaimed. They continued to answer all the questions until all they had left was the Teammate info. They knew Ronnie was now home because they could hear music coming from his room.

"Let's go ask him now,' Cassidy said. They went across the hall to Robbie's bedroom and knocked on the door.

"Open!" he said from inside. They opened the door and saw him sitting on the bed strumming his guitar. He set the guitar next to him on the bed and waited to hear what they were going to say.

"We sorta have a favor question for you," Cassidy stated.

"Let me guess," Robbie said. "You want me to be on a reality TV show."

"How'd you know?" Cassidy asked in surprise.

"Mom told me when I got home," Robbie answered, grinning wide. "Of course I will."

"Yeah! Thanks bro!" Cassidy exclaimed, giving her brother a hug. They had him fill out the teammate section of the application before heading back down to the living room. Cassidy's dad was on the large oversized chair reading the newspaper.

"We have everything but Hannah's teammate info filled out," Cassidy announced.

"We also took photos of everything we need," Hannah added.

"Wait, we forgot photos of participants!" Cassidy suddenly remembered.

"Oh yeah," Hannah said. They went back upstairs to get a photo of Cassidy and Robbie together. As they were upstairs they phone rang and Mary answered it.

"Girls, Denise is on the phone," She told them when they came back down. Cassidy took the phone.

"Hey girl, what's up?" She asked. "Hannah's here too." Hannah also said hello.

"Should we ask her now?" Hannah asked Cassidy.

"Ask me what?" Denise asked.

"Well, Hannah and I are planning on being on this redecorating show, and Hannah needs a teammate," Cassidy told Denise.

"I don't know," Denise trailed off. "I'm not really into the decorating thing. Have you asked Lucky yet?" They knew Lucky would like the idea, she had already redecorated her own bedroom.

"No, not yet," Cassidy answered.

"I'll do it only if Lucky can't," Denise said. "Because I know Lucky would love to be on a show like that."

"Okay, we'll call and ask her, and let you know if she can't do it," Cassidy told Denise.

"Sounds like a plan," Denise replied. "Bye."

"Bye," Cassidy waited for Denise to hang up before dialing Lucky's number. After ringing twice, it was picked up.

"Hello?" She heard a male's voice, and knew it was Lucky's brother Orion.

"Hi it's Cassidy. Is Lucky there?" Cassidy asked. She heard Orion on the other side yell for Lucky to come down.

"She'll be here in a sec," Orion told Cassidy. A moment later they heard the phone being passed to Lucky.

"Hello Lucky," Cassidy greeted before going straight to the point of the call. "Hannah and I want to know if you would be on Trading Spaces with us." There was silence for a moment before Lucky spoke again.

"Yes! Of course!" She exclaimed loudly, making Cassidy move the phone away from her ear. They continued to tell her the details and had her answer the application questions over the phone before hanging up.

"I'll go home and print out all of these photos, and make a copy of a photo of Lucky and I," Hannah said.

"Make a copy of the application for your own records," Richard added who was also in the room.

"Okay," Hannah said as she left through the door. She then added. "It will be ready to be mailed tomorrow."

"Great," Cassidy said. "Bye Hannah! See you soon!"

"Bye!"

The next day Cassidy and Hannah sat in Hannah's living room watching as the mailman came and picked up the mail being sent out, which included their Trading Spaces application.

"I guess now we just wait and see what happens next," Hannah said. "I read online it could be months before we would get a reply."

"Well, at least then it would be summer vacation and we won't have to worry about school the day of filming,� Cassidy added. Hannah checked the clock on the wall.

"It's about three o'clock, Trading Spaces is about to start," Hannah said as she turned the TV to TLC. They watched together, pondering what it would be like to be on the show themselves.

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