I'm so thankful for my family and friends - they're really

Host:
The soundstage was quiet now. The bright lights that had once blazed down on painted sets had been turned off, leaving the cavernous space bathed in soft afterglow — a dim shimmer of memory clinging to the air. A single spotlight still hummed above the center stage, illuminating motes of floating dust, drifting lazily like tiny fragments of yesterday.

The faint echo of laughter lingered, ghostlike — the kind that lives in the walls long after the people have gone home.

Jack sat on the edge of the stage, legs dangling, a cup of cold coffee in one hand, a half-smile ghosting his lips. His grey eyes, tired but alive, followed the curve of the empty audience seats as though they still held invisible faces.

Jeeny stood nearby, her hands in the pockets of her worn jeans, her hair loosely tied, a calm expression on her face. The smell of sawdust, makeup, and faint perfume clung to the air — the scent of endings and beginnings.

Jeeny:
“You ever notice,” she said softly, “that when a set goes quiet, it feels almost sacred? Like it’s waiting for the next story to begin.”

Jack:
He nodded. “Or maybe it’s remembering the last one.”

Jeeny:
She smiled. “Laura Marano once said, ‘I’m so thankful for my family and friends — they’re really supportive. Everyone I work with on Austin & Ally; the cast and crew are like my family now. We have so much fun, and I’m so happy they’re in my life!’”

Jack:
“Ah,” he said, “gratitude. The rarest and most underrated form of rebellion.”

Jeeny:
She laughed quietly. “Rebellion?”

Jack:
“Yeah,” he said, setting his cup down. “Everyone’s obsessed with ambition — what’s next, what’s bigger. Gratitude’s the opposite of that. It’s standing still in a world that keeps running.”

Host:
The spotlight flickered once, then steadied. The room seemed to lean in to listen.

Jeeny:
“You sound like someone who’s forgotten how to have fun,” she teased.

Jack:
“Fun?” he said, smirking. “I don’t think I ever learned how to have it properly.”

Jeeny:
“That’s because you confuse fun with distraction,” she said. “They’re not the same thing.”

Jack:
“Enlighten me.”

Jeeny:
“Fun is what happens when you stop performing. Distraction is what happens when you forget who you are without the performance.”

Host:
Her voice was soft but firm, like a violin note played under control.

Jack:
“So you think gratitude is what keeps people grounded?”

Jeeny:
“I think gratitude is what makes joy possible,” she said. “Look at Laura — she wasn’t talking about success. She was talking about belonging. That’s what people really crave.”

Jack:
“Belonging,” he echoed. “The most complicated word in the language.”

Host:
The air inside the soundstage was cool and still. Somewhere far off, a door creaked — a memory leaving the building.

Jack:
“You know,” he said quietly, “I used to think work was enough. That being surrounded by people was the same as being connected. But it’s not, is it?”

Jeeny:
She shook her head. “Connection isn’t about proximity, Jack. It’s about presence. You can be surrounded by hundreds of people and still feel like you’re shouting into a void.”

Jack:
He gave a faint nod. “And you can be with one person who listens, and it feels like the whole world hears you.”

Jeeny:
“That’s family,” she said softly. “Not blood. Resonance.”

Host:
The spotlight dimmed slightly, its glow warmer now, like candlelight instead of electricity.

Jeeny:
“When I read that quote,” she said, “I thought — how rare it is for someone to pause and actually thank the people who walk beside them. It’s not just sweetness. It’s awareness. Gratitude turns ordinary moments into something you remember forever.”

Jack:
“I guess that’s why it makes people uncomfortable,” he said. “We live in a world that measures worth by independence. Gratitude reminds you that you didn’t get here alone.”

Jeeny:
She smiled. “And that scares people?”

Jack:
“Terrifies them,” he said. “Because admitting dependence feels like admitting weakness.”

Jeeny:
“But it’s not weakness,” she said. “It’s intimacy. It’s letting yourself be held.”

Host:
Her eyes caught the light, glowing faintly — not with tears, but with that rare kind of peace that comes from understanding something and accepting it.

Jack:
“You ever have a group like that?” he asked. “People who made the world bigger just by standing in it with you?”

Jeeny:
“Yeah,” she said. “Once. A theatre troupe I was in when I was seventeen. We rehearsed in a basement that smelled like glue and coffee. We fought, laughed, broke down — but when we performed, we moved as one heartbeat. It was the first time I understood what it meant to belong somewhere without earning it.”

Jack:
He smiled, almost wistfully. “I had something like that too. A band. We never got far — but for a while, we thought we could change the world. Or at least, our corner of it.”

Jeeny:
“What happened?”

Jack:
“Life,” he said simply. “We grew apart. We stopped showing up for each other. Maybe gratitude would’ve kept us together.”

Host:
The rain began outside, faint against the roof — a rhythm that always seems to arrive during moments of truth.

Jeeny:
“You know what gratitude really is?” she said. “It’s memory without the ache. It’s looking back and saying, ‘I’m glad it happened,’ instead of ‘I wish it lasted.’”

Jack:
He looked at her for a long time, and something softened in his eyes — that quiet surrender of cynicism, that small flicker of humility that feels like healing.

Jack:
“I think I’ve spent years trying to rewrite the past,” he said. “Maybe I just need to thank it instead.”

Jeeny:
“That’s the beginning of peace,” she said. “Gratitude isn’t the end of longing. It’s what steadies it.”

Host:
Her words lingered like perfume in the air, light and enduring. The spotlight faded further, until the only illumination was the faint gleam of the exit sign — red, constant, patient.

Jack:
“You know, Laura’s words sound so simple,” he said. “But they’re brave. To say ‘I’m happy,’ without irony — that’s rare. We’re conditioned to disguise contentment as modesty, or to chase more instead of honoring what is.”

Jeeny:
“Maybe joy itself is an act of rebellion,” she said. “In a world obsessed with what’s missing, gratitude is the purest kind of defiance.”

Jack:
He smiled. “So maybe we should be more rebellious.”

Jeeny:
“Exactly,” she said, standing. “Start small. Be thankful for the quiet, for the people who stayed, for the stories that brought you here.”

Host:
She walked to the center of the stage and stood under the dim light, her small figure framed against the emptiness — glowing, alive, unafraid.

Jack joined her. Together they looked out at the rows of empty seats, as if the ghosts of their past selves were still sitting there, waiting for the next line.

Host:
And in that still, golden quiet, Laura Marano’s words echoed through the empty soundstage, warm as laughter, sincere as sunlight:

“I’m so thankful for my family and friends — they’re really supportive. Everyone I work with on ‘Austin & Ally’; the cast and crew are like my family now. We have so much fun, and I’m so happy they’re in my life!”

Because gratitude isn’t just a feeling —
it’s a form of belonging,
a way of telling the world,
“You were worth showing up for.”

Host:
And as the last light dimmed and the echo of old laughter rose again — faint but undeniable —
Jack reached out,
and Jeeny took his hand.

Not as escape,
but as recognition —
two souls remembering that the truest families are not only the ones we are born into,
but the ones we build,
moment by moment,
story by story,
heart by heart.