Beautiful Monster 2 (12 page)

I watched the message sen
d, and then slipped the phone back into my pocket and pulled out my sides. I knew enough to know that as soon as I walked into the room, they would choose what part I would read for, based on how I looked, my demeanor and my personality. These were things that you couldn’t control. Casting directors had already made fifty percent of the choice before you even opened your mouth.

When my name was called, I took a deep breath and smiled at the casting assistant. I heard a few whispers from behind me, and I knew that they knew who I was.
But all that mattered right now was my performance in the room.

“Amy, hello,” said Ranger’s producer, Samuel, as soon as I walked in the room.

I recognized him, but not many others on the panel as he went down the line quickly, introducing them. At the end, though, Drago gave me a smile and I nodded to him.

“Are you ready to begin?”

“Yes.” This time I went straight to the spot marked on the floor, and planted my toes on it. Last time, I had no idea where to stand or look. Already, I felt ahead of the game.

“So Amy…” Samuel glanced at me and then shuffled through the papers. “I’d like you to read for Cassandra Winters, if that’s ok.”

“Sure.”

I found the sides in the pile and put the rest back in my pocket. From what I could glean, Cassandra was some sort of
a ranger herself, but it was hard to guess when you only had two pages of what could be one hundred pages of scripts. So I just straightened the papers and looked at the reader.

“Whenever
you’re ready,” Samuel said.

I closed my eyes, blanking ou
t my mind, or at least trying to. But to my alarm, I couldn’t. The fear at the white mist was still there, and my anger at Liam was still fresh in my head. I knew that I was being illogical about both things, but I couldn’t help the emotions that flooded through me. When I launched into my first line, it came out harsher and rougher than I meant it to. It was filled with all the things I was feeling.

I panicked, trying to make a quick choice.

Make strong choices, even if they are wrong. Make them strong
. Liam’s voice echoed through my head, and so I continued the script the way I started it. If I did it the way I rehearsed, all wide-eyed and innocent, it would contradict with what I had started. So my reading for Cassandra came out rough, angry and intense.

There was a silence when we came to the end of the sides, and the main panel leaned into whisper to each other. Drago, on the end, leaned into the huddle as well, but made eye contact with me. Just before they broke apart, he gave me a smile.

“Amy, we have some additional sides for Cassandra. Can you read those as well?”

“Oh, um, sure
.”

I stepped forward to take them, trying to glance at them even as I took a few steps backwards. Just as I predicted, they weren’t big on letting me take a moment to read them.
Luckily, being on stage all summer had taught me how to think on the spot. There was certainly no time to figure stuff out when one of the main girls slipped and twisted her ankle on stage, or a flat came down about three inches from my head like it had one night. The show must always go on.

“I’m ready.”

Cassandra must be some sort of visiting undercover officer, and from what I could tell, she was sweet on the main character. However, it didn’t tell me anything about her background, or her story arc. It was interesting to learn more about it, and I wondered if her story continued beyond these few pages.

Before I knew it, it was over and they were thanking me, promising they would be in touch when they likely wouldn’t. That was just the way it went, false promises and niceties.

“And I think you’re our last audition before lunch,” Drago said, standing up with the familiar unsteadiness of the limp I had gotten used to all summer. “I’ll walk you out, Amy.”

“Great, thanks.” I kept my face neutral until we were into the hallway
. The rest of the panel were gathering their things. But as soon as I was alone with him, I couldn’t contain my curiosity. “Well?”

“It was super good,” he promised me as we ambled down the hallway.

I shook my head. “You’re just saying that.”

“Then so was the panel,” he replied. “They really liked you. We’ve been seeing terrible people all morning, and not one of them has been asked to read a second side. You did really
good, Amy. But then, of course, you did.”

“Thanks
.” I gave him a hug as we neared the front doors. “And thanks for making time to be here.”

“Anytime
.” He squeezed me tightly. “I’ll text you when I’m done tonight and we can go out for food?”

“For sure
.” I wiggled my eyebrows at him, as I pushed the door open. “I’ve got something special in mind.”

I had forgotten about the paparazzi outside, and Drago and I were nearly blinded by the camera flashes as we fully pushed the door open. I held up my hand to shield my eyes, not that it did any good.

“I should go,” I said, giving him a rueful smile.

He nodded.
“See ya around. I’m sure you’ll be hearing from them soon.”

“Yep
.” I headed out the door, lowering my head to keep my face covered.

I now understood why stars wore sunglasses all the time. I didn’t particularly want to go back to school and go to rehearsal. I wanted to stay glued to my phone, especially now that Drago had given me hope. But I highly doubted they would even be making a choice that day, when I knew they had auditions all afternoon.
So instead, I grabbed a sandwich from the nearby deli for lunch and texted Liam that I was on my way back. Neither of them had responded to my invite for
Sites,
which annoyed me, but I assumed they would tell me when I got there.

When I got to school, however, it appeared the chaos had followed me. Under no circumstances had I wanted to go into the Red
Theater alone again, the white mist still on my mind. As I approached the theater, I saw that there was no way I would be alone in there. The theater was bedlam, with actors, costume designers, tech people and department heads running to and fro. I managed to find Connor in the crowd and I poked his arm.

“What’s happening? I thought we were just doing a dress rehearsal for the leads?”

“Liam has decided he wants a full run-through.”

“
Uh…” was the only word that would come out of my mouth. Liam never wanted a full run-through this early. Last year, he focused on individual scenes again and again. But this year, every opportunity we got seemed to be a full run-through. “Is he crazy?”

Connor
managed a smirk at that. “He is the love of your life, Amy. You tell me.”

“Oh, I know the answer to that one,” I responded, leaving my book bag on a chair and going towards the stage.

The theater felt much different than when I was alone in it this morning. The energy was positive and busy, not dark and eerie. I decided not to mention what I saw until
Sites
aired tomorrow. I wanted to see what they had captured with their cameras.

“Why the
run-through?” I asked Liam as he stood on the stage, waving his arms at the set people and directing them to various places.

“Amy
.” His smile was tight and I assumed he wasn’t over our fight this morning. “Can you just get into costume?”

“I barely know which costume I need for what act yet, Liam,” I replied. “And my audition went great, thanks. Why are we running through so early?”

“I’ll tell you later.” He barely looked at me. “Please get into costume. We’ll be rehearsing until at least dusk.”

“Ok,
ok.” I gave him a look that expressed how unimpressed I was, but he didn’t seem to react.

Just as I was about to ask another question, Nina appeared from nowh
ere, gently tugging on his arm. “Liam, can you help?”

I didn’t bother to stay to hear the rest of the conversation. I turned on my heel, going backstage to the costume room. I couldn’t even say hello to my boyfriend without her hanging around, and it was getting on my last nerve.

If there was one thing I would admit that Liam was right about, it was the length of rehearsal. We stumbled through two run-throughs and were nearing dinner time when Liam called for everyone in the party scene to meet him in the west wing.

“Finally,” I said to Sarah
, as we went towards the wing. “An explanation.”

She didn’t say anything and her face was pale, contorted with pain. I took her arm as she stumbled slightly.

“Hey, you ok?”

She nodded, her jaw tightening and I wondered if she was about to be sick again. Dusk was nearing and I assumed we would be continuing on with just the supernatural creatures. In my opinion, Liam was obsessing over the scene. It was perfect now and the show was still months away. I expressed those thoughts in
Sarah’s ear, but she merely shrugged. Dropping her elbow, I moved farther into the crowd. Fine, if Sarah didn’t want to talk to me, I might as well bury myself away.

“Alright, everyone, listen up,” Liam said, dropping his voice as we all gathered around. “We’re moving the show up.”

“What?” I knew I wasn’t the only one who was shocked at this.

All around me, others were shifting and whispering
, “Why?”

“Because last night, Nina and I met with the De Ritter
Shields,” he said. “I was concerned for Nina’s heath and I wanted some human relief. They informed me she is ill because we are so close to her date of siring.” He met my eyes, but I looked away. He could have told me that, rather than let me yell at him all day. “Selene was created as a vampire in December. December 31
^st
to be exact. So she will be at her weakest then. On the anniversary of their siring, apparently vampires experience weakness, human emotions, all sorts of strange things.”

“How have we never
known this before?” Connor asked, his arms around Isabelle.

I glanced to Sarah, who was making a point of keeping her eyes straight ahead.

“Because it’s a secret the Shields like to keep, an advantage they have while hunting us. The only reason they told me is to avenge Porsche, and if any of us disclose it outside this room, there’ll be hell to pay. So forget it,” Liam replied. “But I have decided that it’s our best chance to take Selene down. So December 31
^st
will be our closing night.”

“Closing night?” I said, shocked.

“Closing night. The show will open on the 27
^th
, and close on the 31
^st
.”

“But you can’t do that,” I blurted out.

Liam gave me a glare. “I’m the headmaster, Amy. I can direct the school as I please. I will come up with some excuse for moving the show and inform the rest of the cast tomorrow. But for now, be aware that’s the reason. Everything that we are working towards will hopefully come to a close before the new year.”