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Authors: Megan Stine

All the Way (8 page)

BOOK: All the Way
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I mean, I was standing on a stage, trying to sing, and I was being
laughed
at.
That was it. I couldn't hold it in any longer. Tears streamed down my face, and I ran off the stage with Tanya still pounding away at the piano, before the song was even over.
Chapter 7
 
 
 
“Can you see? Are our names up there?” I asked Ariel.
We were standing in the hall outside the auditorium the next afternoon, trying to get a look at the casting list that Mr. Richards had just put up. But there were about twenty people in front of us, all standing there reading the whole casting list and discussing it in detail, instead of moving over when they found out whether they got a part or not.
Finally a few people straggled away, and Ariel and I moved up next to Tyler.
“Oh, hi,” Tyler said, noticing me. He gave me a warm smile, not condescending or leering or anything. Just a normal smile. Wow. It felt like forever since someone had looked at me that way. “Uh . . . did you get a part?”
I peered at the list and ran down the names as fast as I could. Twice. Tyler and Natalie had gotten the two romantic leads, Sky Masterson and Sergeant Sarah Brown. My name was nowhere.
Damn.
“No,” I said. “I totally blew the audition, so I guess I'm not surprised.”
“Yeah, it was rough,” he said sympathetically.
“Damn,” Ariel said. Her name wasn't up there either.
“You can both still be in the chorus,” Tyler said encouragingly. “There's a note at the bottom . . .”
His voice trailed off because he could see that I was already reading it. It basically said if you didn't get a major role, you should come to rehearsal after school today, and you'd either be assigned to the chorus or the stage crew.
Stage crew? What, hauling around pieces of the set so that Natalie Anschell could make me feel like a toad again?
No thanks.
“Oh, come on, Carmen,” Ariel pleaded, seeing the reluctant look on my face. “It's better than nothing! I mean, I'm disappointed, too—I really thought I'd get one of the leads. But if I'm willing to settle for chorus . . .”
She pulled me aside, away from the crowd so that Tyler wouldn't hear.
“And if you want to hang out with
him
, can you think of a better way?” she whispered.
I couldn't argue with that.
“But if I'm in the chorus, I'll have to watch him rehearsing with Natalie every day. I'll feel like a voyeur or something.”
“So lure him away!” Ariel said. “Be, like, the most amazing chorus girl, and maybe he'll fall in love with you instead of her.”
Yeah, maybe. It was worth a shot, anyway. And besides, I'd always wanted to be in the high school musical. How was I going to make the last few weeks of high school spectacular if I didn't at least try?
“We'll be chorus girls together,” Ariel said.
Could I really put up with three solid weeks of being joked about for being a Hot Box girl?
“I don't know.” I shook my head reluctantly.
“Well, whatever,” Ariel said, heading toward the auditorium. “I'm going to do it. I'm not too proud to take whatever part I can get.”
Too proud?
No way.
I hurried to catch up with her, and we walked into the auditorium, where everyone had grouped into two clumps: the Chosen, and the Not Chosen.
“All right, thanks for coming, everyone,” Mr. Richards called out. “And congratulations to the cast. We're going to have a wonderful production this year, and I know you're all ready to work hard, since we were forced into a shorter rehearsal time, thanks to my appendectomy. So we only have three weeks to pull this production together. Leads, I'm going to ask you to sit in the back and start learning your lines while I work with the chorus people.”
Then he started walking straight toward me.
Mr. Richards was a tall, slim, decent-looking man in his thirties. His trademark was a pair of red-rimmed glasses he wore, that he was always pushing up into his wavy black and prematurely gray hair.
He pushed them up now, as he strode up to me and said, “Carmen, can I talk to you in private a minute?”
“Private?” I don't know why, but everything he said made me nervous.
“Let's just step over there.” He motioned to the empty side aisle.
What now?
I wondered. And then suddenly I knew. He was going to tell me that I was the one person who wasn't welcome to join the chorus. My audition had sucked so much, he just couldn't let me anywhere near the stage, and he was sending me home.
I braced myself for the worst.
He walked into the side aisle, then turned to face me with a let's-get-down-to-business expression.
“Carmen, I wanted to tell you first off that I know you have a nice voice,” he said. “Your audition was a mess, but I suspect something else was going on yesterday . . .”
I started to open my mouth to explain, but he shook his head.
“Never mind, it doesn't matter,” he cut me off. “Look, some of the best actresses on Broadway are disasters at auditioning. It's a whole separate talent—some people can do it, some can't. But that's not the point. The point is, I heard you sing, and your voice is fine. You can certainly be in the chorus if you want to.”
He paused for just a moment to let that sink in, but not long enough for me to say anything.
“But what struck me yesterday,” he went on, “is that you have an amazing fashion and costume design sense. Your costume for Miss Adelaide was just perfect. So I was wondering . . . I would consider it a personal favor to me if, instead of joining the chorus, you would agree to run the costume department for the musical.”
“Really?” My eyes opened wide, taking this new idea in. “I mean . . .”
“You wouldn't have to make all the costumes or anything like that,” he added quickly. “We generally go to a theatrical costume rental house for most pieces, and a few parents will pitch in to do some sewing if we need it. But I'd like to put you in charge of pulling the whole thing together. You'd decide what each performer would wear, and you'd scout around for accessories. You know, coordinate the whole thing so it looks good. And then you'd work backstage during the performances, making sure all the costumes and accessories are in place. What do you think?”
I was so surprised, it took me a minute to shift gears. But then I nodded. “Yeah. That sounds great!” I said, feeling really flattered.
A huge smile spread across his face. “Really? That's excellent! It's a burden off my shoulders, I'll tell you, to have someone like you take on such an important role.”
Wow. He really
did
think I was good!
“Um, well, thanks!” I said, not knowing what else to say.
“No—thank
you.
We'll talk tomorrow about the specifics.” He turned back to deal with the rest of the cast. “And you'll need to see the next few rehearsals to get the flavor of the show,” he called over his shoulder.
I stood there beaming for the first time all week. Cool! I was going to run the costume department for
Guys and Dolls.
Which might be even better than being in the musical, since I'd be doing something I was really good at.
Plus I'd get to hang out with Tyler as much as I wanted. I might even figure out how to make him more interested in me than in Natalie Anschell. And with any luck, he might even ask me to the prom . . .
A girl can always dream, anyway.
Chapter 8
 
 
 
“I'm going to do costumes!” I rushed up to Ariel, totally excited.
“Really? Wow, that's fabulous!” She sounded really happy for me. “You are so talented.”
“It'll be awesome,” I said, feeling like I was finally part of something at Norton, not an outsider anymore. “I'll get to work with Tyler, figuring out how he should look, and I'll pick out the
best
costume for you.”
“Promise?” she said.
“Well . . . if I can,” I backpedaled. “I mean, I have to do what Mr. Richards wants—and I'm sure he wants the leading ladies to look fabulous. But you'll be the best-dressed girl in the chorus, I can say that for sure!”
“Right.” She nodded, accepting her fate.
I was floating, really psyched about having a project to focus on, instead of spending all my time worrying about whether people believed Joey's blog and thought I was a slut.
A few minutes later, I saw Mr. Richards having a private conference on the sidelines with Emily Pendleton, and right afterward she came over to me.
“Hi,” she said. “Looks like we're going to be working together backstage.”
“We are?”
“I guess so,” she said. “Mr. Richards said I have a terrific voice and I'd be great in the chorus, but he also thought I'd be great backstage doing props.” She laughed. “I guess he noticed that I was a little nervous in front of people. I probably wouldn't have even tried out if the chorus teacher hadn't pushed me to do it.”
I smiled, and then frowned a little. Yeah, Emily was a wreck yesterday. I could easily see why Mr. Richards was tactfully suggesting that she'd be better as stage crew than in the chorus.
But did that mean he was just being tactful with me, too? Was he saying that I was too much of a loser to have a chorus part?
“He said we should work together because you're so talented with costume design,” she said, boosting my ego right when I needed it. “Your dress was awesome yesterday, by the way.”
Phew.
I hate to be an ego hound, but I didn't think I could take it if Mr. Richards was just trying to sweet-talk me into doing costumes to get rid of me!
But I knew that wasn't it. I could see it on his face a few minutes ago, and on Emily's right now. They both really liked my style.
“Thanks,” I said. “So what are you going to do, exactly?”
Emily shrugged. “Props, and help you with costumes during the performances. And try not to break anything or get in anyone's way—I'm such a klutz. Do you want to go backstage and check it out?”
“Cool,” I said.
Ariel had disappeared to go work on the chorus parts, so we slipped down the side aisle and in through a door that led to the dark, convoluted backstage area. There were several different rooms back there: dressing rooms, props rooms, a small rehearsal space, and a huge space for storage of scenery flats and all kinds of audio and lighting equipment.
“This is great,” Emily said. “I love it. It's so peaceful and quiet and private.”
I could tell Emily loved being alone, being out of the limelight.
“Look at these big trunks,” I said. “We can store the props and costume accessories in there.”
“There's a closet for the clothes,” she informed me, wandering off to explore more.
I wanted to see every inch of the place, to feel like it was really my space, like I belonged there. So I squeezed through a dark opening between some carts and big pieces of plywood and inched forward to see what was at the end of the pile.
All at once, something touched me on the shoulder and made me jump a mile.
“Ahhh!” I screamed, whirling around.
“Shhhh!” a voice in the darkness said.
A medium-height guy shined a small pen-type flashlight into my eyes and held a navy blue hoodie out to me.
My
navy blue hoodie.
“I think you dropped this,” he said, offering it.
I had been half carrying and half wearing it, draped over one shoulder.
“You're blinding me,” I complained, taking the hoodie and squinting to see who it was in the darkness.
“Sorry.” He flicked the light off so that I could actually see his face.
It was David Ulster, a kid I knew from my economics class first semester. He and I had gotten stuck doing a statistical project together. Of course, we got an A because David is such a geek and a whiz, he whipped up a PowerPoint show for our in-class presentation.
Ariel said I was the first cute girl who'd ever been nice to him, so he pretty much fell in love with me and had been crushing on me ever since.
He was a nice guy, and I wanted a date for the prom. But I'd have to be
really
desperate to go out with someone who had nailed that khakis-and-plaid-shirts look of his.
I wasn't that desperate. Not yet.
Not with Tyler still on my radar screen.
“Hi, David,” I said, not too enthusiastically. I'd been trying all year to not lead him on.
“Hi, Carmen.” He grinned.
“What are you doing here?”
“Mr. Richards asked me to run the sound board and hook up some technical stuff.”
“That's cool,” I said.
“I heard your audition,” he mumbled. “You were awesome.”
“No, I was a mess,” I corrected him.
“Okay, but you sang like you really meant it,” he said. “Natalie sings like she's in love with her own voice.”
That was sweet. And pretty much true.
“Thanks. So are you going to be around for all the rehearsals and stuff?” I asked him.
“I guess so,” he said. “Whatever Mr. Richards wants.”
“Well, I'll see you around,” I said, giving him a warm but carefully orchestrated smile. I had to admit, I was glad to have another friend to hang out with backstage. But I didn't want to send David the wrong message.
I looked around for Emily, but she was gone.
BOOK: All the Way
12.89Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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