Damsel Distressed (20 page)

As soon as he finishes, Grant squeezes the hands he's holding. I'm on his right, and Gild's on his left. As we feel the squeeze, we pass it on to the hand of the person on our other side until the little squeezes of happy energy and trust make it all the way around the circle and they both end up back at Grant.

“Got 'em!” he says as I return the squeeze from the other side into his crossed left hand. “Good show!”

Then we all raise our arms and turn our bodies until we're untangled and we break the chain. I turn to Antonique and put my hands on her shoulders.

“Ready, fish-kick?”

“Circle is so awesome,” Antonique says, with her eyes wide and her smile wider.

“It really,
really
is. Let's go.”

Antonique is totally starstruck by the entire experience. As we shut ourselves in the sound booth, she looks over her notes again and again. She is trembling as we do our final checks.

“Close your eyes,” I tell her.

Antonique is clammy and sweat collects on her brow, but she closes them anyway.

I open the sound closet door and pull out her opening night surprise.

“Okay!”

Her eyes pop open, and she breaks into a huge smile as I position the second, big, giant rolling chair next to mine. A pair of thrones. She beams brightly and sits down beside me as we settle in for some audience watching.

In front of us, the auditorium is packed with parents and siblings and friends. Moms stand up and take pictures of the empty set, and kids hold up their programs and take selfies on their phones. The hum of the audience is one of the most important sounds in the theatre. Backstage, I can imagine the actors standing, waiting, hoping the crowd will be good. Hoping it'll laugh when it's supposed to. Hoping they'll make whomever they brought to see them proud.

In my ear, I hear Grant calling for ready signals.

“Sound: ready,” I say to him, and even though it's silent, I swear I can hear him smile at the sound of my voice.

Antonique reaches over and puts her hand on top of mine. I'm startled, but instead of yanking my hand away, I just give her hand an encouraging squeeze.

“Here we go,” I tell her as I adjust my headset.

The house lights come down, and the audience gets still and we're both silently listening for our cue to go.

“Good show,” I whisper.

“Good show,” she replies.

A deep breath.

Curtains up.

21

O
n Sunday, the morning of our final performance, I wake to the sound of three text messages arriving on my phone at once.

I lean forward to grab my cup of water from my nightstand and swirl some in my mouth. I forgot to close my blinds all the way last night, so I can see the breeze rattling the remaining leaves on the tree in the yard. I give a big yawn before falling back on my pillow to read my texts.

“(1/3) URGENT: All cast and crew of OUAM. We will be having an emergency full company meeting at 11:00 AM in the auditorium. This meeting is mandatory, and you must al-

(2/3)-l be in attendance. There has been a situation, and we need to be in the same room to discuss how we want to proceed. The decision to carry on tonight's perform-

(3/3) -ance or to cancel it needs to be discussed. Please respond to this text, indicating that I can expect you at 11, or I will be calling you 1 by 1. -Gild”

Whoa.

As I'm typing my reply, my phone rings in my hand. Grant.

“Hey.”

“Hey.” His voice sounds deep and fragile, like he just woke up.

I wipe the sleep out of my eyes and try not to think about how poufy and messy and perfect his hair probably looks. “What the hell's going on?”

“I don't know. Mrs. Gild hasn't told me anything else, so I'm in the dark, too.”

“Well, let me finish texting her, and then I'll call you back, okay?”

I hear him yawn on the other end, which makes me yawn, too.

“Don't bother, I've got to get ready. Pick me up at 10:40?” he asks.

“Sure, see you then.”

After disconnecting, I reply to Mrs. Gild's text.

“I'll be there. Hope everything's okay, Mrs. G.”

At 10:58, after endless speculation in the car, Grant and I are no closer to guessing what could possibly be wrong, and we enter the auditorium without a clue.

The house lights are up and the stage lights are off, so the castle stands high above us looking mostly sad and fragile. Almost all of the cast and crew are already assembled, so I make my way down the aisle, finding a spot on the same row as Brice and Jonathan.

“What's going on?” I whisper to Brice.

Jonathan leans forward, speaking over Brice's lap. “She hasn't said a word yet.”

We shrug at each other as Grant files in after me, and I silently take a headcount. Actors are notoriously late; teenage actors are even worse. The fact that we're all here on time is an ominous sign. Well, almost all of us are here. There's one person missing. I begin to look around for who it might be.

“Good morning.” In the most amazing, dramatic fashion, Mrs. Gild emerges from the stage left wing. She's wearing loose grey pants and a long shirt with grey, purple, and blue flowers all over. Her glasses are down on her nose, and she looks tired. “Thank you for coming so early and on such short notice. I'm afraid we have some unfortunate news, and we have very little time to decide what to do about it.”

Mrs. Gild's stark white hair, which is usually soft with curls, either around her face or piled on top of her head, is pulled back, tight and smooth into a tidy bun. She does not look pleased. “Last night, one of our own made some unfortunate choices, and we, as a company, must decide how, or if at all, to pick up the pieces.” She clears her throat and looks down to the stage floor. When she looks up, I wonder if she's going to change her mind about telling us at all. “Our Winnifred, Miss Wells, attended a party last night where alcohol was consumed by minors.”

Her words are carefully curated, and she rarely misspeaks. I'm listening to every syllable, desperate to discover what disaster is about to befall our little show. I scan the room quickly and see that Charity is definitely
not
in the house.

“Unfortunately for her, and for all of us, she was drinking, and at around two-thirty this morning, she and four other Crestwood students were arrested for public intoxication and public indec—” She pauses to clear her throat again. “Also, possession of alcohol by a minor. I don't tell you this as fodder for gossip, but to impress upon you the seriousness of her offense.”

Holy balls. Public indecency. What was she doing, walking—

“Was she walking down the street naked?” Grant leans over to whisper in my ear, completing the thought that was already racing through my head.

“Excuse me. Mr. Thornton, Miss Keegan, I could really use your attention right now.” Mrs. Gild is glaring at the two of us. She's already so mad this morning she doesn't even have the playful glint in her eye she usually can't hide when she's scolding one of her theatre babies. Obviously our whispers weren't quite as quiet as we'd intended.

“We're sorry. Uh, sorry.” Grant mutters our apology, while I drop my eyes.

“So we are in quite a predicament. As you all know, the show is already sold out. Which means that we've already collected payment for all 988 tickets, which, of course, is a great amount of money for our program. Canceling the show is, frankly, a costly embarrassment. Conversely, as you know, Miss Wells did not have an understudy, which puts us in a very stressful position.” She raises an eyebrow before letting a layer of cattiness drip into her tone. “Usually, getting through a mere three performances without our leading lady being arrested isn't quite so difficult.” Her lips are pursing in frustration. She's obviously and rightfully pissed.

“We must decide—right now—what our options are and what we plan to do.”

One of the girls in the ensemble chimes in, “What do you mean ‘what we plan to do'? There's nothing to do. Charity got herself arrested, and now we have to cancel the show.”

“So, is she, like, in jail? Or is there a chance she'll be released this afternoon, and can still make it by curtain so the rest of us don't have to pay for her mistake?” Brice asks with a perfectly timed swivel of his neck.

Mrs. Gild holds up her hands and nods as she takes in the frustration of her kids. She bends down and sits on the edge of the stage, pulling up her knees to sit cross-legged in front of us.

“Unfortunately, even if Miss Wells were available to be here this evening—and she is not—she would not be allowed on school property or be allowed to participate in this school function. I don't think it would be out of line to presume that all of the students in question will be facing a disciplinary hearing when the administrators get into the office tomorrow morning.”

“Well, if she can't do it and no one else can do it, then what is there to discuss? We have to cancel,” remarks one of our spotlight guys.

To the surprise of everyone on our row, Jonathan pipes up. “Unless maybe we can brush up one of the other actresses. Maybe someone can fill in? I mean, do any of you have her parts memorized?” He shakes his head to shift his sandy hair out of his eyes and looks toward the faces of the girls scattered around the auditorium.

One of them shrugs and says, “No. I mean, we know some of the music from hearing it all the time, of course, but her lines? No way. No one has her lines memorized.” The other girls nearby nod in agreement.

Even though it's only one performance, I feel my stomach sink. I really wanted to do the show one more time. This sucks.

“Well,” Mrs. Gild sighs, “I suppose I knew that would be the case, but I thought it was important to meet with you and discuss it first so that we'd all be in agreement. I'm more than a little angry that one member of our team will have caused all of the rest of you to miss out on your final performance. I'm truly sorry.”

Grant nudges me in the side. Hard.

“Ow! What?” I whisper-shout.

He looks at me, with his eyes as wide as jawbreakers, and he nods his head up toward the stage.

“Why are you looking at me like that? What?” I am trying to keep my voice down after being scolded once already by Mrs. Gild.

He leans in close, his breath hot in my ear, and says, “Gen, you totally know the whole script. Every line. Every cue. Not to mention the fact that you've had the whole score memorized since you were a kid. And, on top of that, you can sing.”

Now my eyes are the ones resembling dinner plates.

“You must be out of your freaking mind, Thornton.” I hit him playfully on the leg, but I'm not really playing. “And you better keep your trap shut.” I cross my arms before adding, “And you have no idea if I sing, you've never heard me. I don't sing.”

“Oh, please. Nobody is saying you're headed for a Tony, okay? But you sing. When you're studying and you don't even know you're humming along and you think nobody is listening. But I'm listening.” His face flushes with color, and I look down at my hands as my face starts to warm, too.

He listens.

“Mr. Thornton and Miss Keegan, I sincerely hope that you two are deliberating about some brilliant scheme that will pardon our department from the disgrace of returning all of that ticket money.”

Despite my certainty that Grant would never, ever betray me in such a way, I see him slowly coming to his feet. I grab his jeans pocket and almost rip it completely off trying to tug him back down. He responds by pulling my clawed fingers off of his pants and holding my hand tightly in his. When Grant starts talking, everybody turns to listen.

“Guys, I have an idea. Maybe. Well, I don't know about you, but I really think that we should do the show tonight if we can, and I think I know a way that could work. It might be our only shot.”

Oh my God, Grant. Please don't make me kill you. I don't want to spend the afternoon with naked Charity behind bars. My fingers are turning purple in his grip.

The murmurs of curiosity are rushing across the surface of the room. My insides are trying to claw their way out of my skin. I'll murder him. I swear I'm going to actually murder him.

“There is someone who, from being in the sound booth and being a musical junkie, knows the show, inside and out, who knows all of Charity's lines, all of her songs, and who'd make a great Winnifred.”

I finally rip my fingertips away from him and rub them until the tingling starts to subside.

The cast and crew sits waiting, their collective mouths dangling open in anticipation.

“Antonique, do you really know it all?” Andrew, the Prince, has turned around in his seat and lifted himself up on his knee. The entire company turns from Grant and stares at Antonique with expectant eyes, and she looks like she's just been shot.

Jealousy blossoms within me, and I feel my throat get tight as, once again, I'm overlooked for a title I didn't even want.

Antonique stammers and looks over her shoulder for me as conversations break out all over the auditorium.

“Oh, she'd be such a good Winnifred!”

“She'll look really cute in Charity's dress.”

“What do you say, Antonique, wanna be my stand-in princess?” Andrew smiles crookedly at her, making his most princely face, and I feel my jaw clench together.

She's trying to object, but no one is listening.

Why wouldn't they hope that the cute, fit, angel-faced freshman would have the chops to know the show inside and out? Why would they ever want it to be me?

I look down at my hands as Grant tries to calm all of the chatter. “He meant me,” I say too quietly for anyone to hear.

Grant looks down at my soft words and gives me a small smile. He holds out his hand, and I take it and stand.

“He meant me.” This time, they all hear.