Damsel Distressed (21 page)

The room goes quiet. I feel like I've just ripped off a blanket of invisibility and they're all seeing me for the first time.

“Oh, thank God,” Antonique says. “I was trying to say that I don't know the show like Imogen does. I certainly don't know the songs. Grant wasn't talking about me. He was talking about Imogen. And I think Grant is absolutely right. You can do this.” Antonique looks at me with her soft, dark eyes, and the whole room is waiting for me to make my case.

“Look, I don't want to do this. Don't be confused. I'd much rather be sitting in my little black box in the back, pressing buttons and pretending I'm on the bridge of the Enterprise. But I don't know. It might work.”

I look at Grant, who nods at me, and I take a second to study his face. His shoulders are back, and his chest is puffed out with pride. I look down and see that our fingers are still woven together between us.

“I'm not, like, a great singer or anything. I don't really know when the last time was that I sang, out loud, for people. It's been since I was a kid, but I can carry a tune and…” My eyes start to dart back and forth from face to face. Without meaning to, I start counting them and then I remember how many seats Gild said we have to fill and my palms are slick and my heartbeat is cranking out a rhythm that would put the drumline to shame. I feel my throat close and I just want to swallow, and without finishing my sentence, I sit down.

No one moves. They all just sit there and look at me with wide eyes and downturned brows. They nibble at their lips and fingertips, and a few freshmen chorus girls actually have their hands folded together in a shape like praying.

I lift my chin and look at Grant. “What was I thinking?” I whisper. “I can't do this. I have to run sound, and I can't seriously do this.”

“Gen, you can.” He sits down beside me and continues to talk as if we're the only people in the room. As if there aren't about a billion eyeballs watching us like some primetime reality show. “Seriously, think about it. Antonique can run sound. You've said yourself that she's brilliant at it.” Two rows in front of us, I see Antonique's head bow with humble pride. “And like it or not, you know the part. It's you or nothing. Please, Gen. Just sing through a song once with the accompaniment, and if you can't do it, you can't do it. Please?”

My heart is bruising my ribs from the inside, but it keeps beating, which is more than I expected.

I laugh, hoping to diffuse the tension, and bring the blood rushing back to my head and limbs.

I turn to face the rest of my row, mostly Brice, even though I know everyone else is still listening.

“Guys, I-I don't even know. I mean, the costumes. The costumes would never ever…I—”

Brice chimes in beside me and states without flourish, “Gen, I can make those costumes work. A few seam rippers, and I can take 'em right out. I'd never let you hit the stage looking a mess. You know that I can do it. And so can you.”

Antonique turns in her seat, looks me straight in the eye, and says, “You can do it, Imogen, and you've taught me so much. I can run all the sound cues. I really can.”

I want to run. I want to melt into this auditorium chair and disappear into the fabric.

I'm not scared of the music or the lines.

I'm scared of the embarrassment.

I'm going to totally embarrass myself.

Grant stands again and says to the group, “Look, it's a decision for all of us to make if Gen's willing. Those who'd rather have Imogen play Winnifred than cancel the show, raise your hand.”

First Grant's, then Antonique's, followed by Brice's, and soon, the rest of the auditorium.

Mrs. Gild hops down off the stage and walks up the aisle toward me. As she approaches, her voice gets softer and she addresses only me. “Well, Miss Keegan. I suppose it's all up to you. I would, of course, like to hear you at the piano, but assuming you'll agree, I guess I'm asking—we're all asking—if you'll do this for us so that we can have our closing night. If you'll at least try. It's only one show.”

The softness of her voice and her gentle hands on my arms almost make me want to cry, but the eyeballs boring holes through me stops the urge. I speak.

“Okay.”

I'm hit with an instantaneous need for a Prozac and about five million candy bars.

Mrs. Gild offers me her arm. She gives a nod to the accompanist sitting on the front row, and he goes to sit at the piano. “Everyone, there's lots to do, so…”

She tries to usher everyone off, but she loses steam. She knows there isn't a single chance in all of the universe that the kids aren't going to watch this unfold.

I feel like I'm in a funeral march down the aisle. I'm either about to be the nail in the coffin of this dying show or be its final breath of life.

We get to the piano, and Gild whispers, “Can you do this, honey? You don't have to if you can't.”

Strangely, I think maybe I can.

I take a deep breath and look at everyone washed in bright white light. Their faces are painted with excitement and nervousness and hope, and I feel myself ache with doubt.

Suddenly, the house lights switch off.

After a second of confusion, we all look back and see that Grant has gone to the controls and lowered the auditorium lights. When I look back to the rest of the cast in the seats, I see them, but only vaguely. Their shapes are cast in blue shadow, and I can't make out their expressions.

I feel my heart slow behind my ribs.

I clear my throat and turn to the pianist and give the slightest nod. He sets off on Princess Winnifred's first number, and miraculously, surprisingly, and adequately, I sing.

I'm no superstar. But I'm better than nothing.

The kids in the audience jump up in squeals of applause as I finish the first verse. There's no time to hear me sing anything else.

I turn to Mrs. Gild, and her face spreads into a smile. She looks happy and relieved. She looks proud. She reaches out and grabs me, pulling me into a giant hug.

I breathe in her scent—like perfume and powder.

Half-a-second later, she pulls away and snaps back into work mode.

She begins barking orders with a broad smile on her face. “Ladies and gentlemen! We have a lot of work to do! Brice, take whomever you need to help you prepare costumes. Actors, be ready to run lines with Imogen as soon as we finish at the piano. Grant, check with Antonique to make sure she has everything she needs. Cast, we'll all be doing a cue-to-cue with Imogen as soon as she can, and let's try and do a run through at about one. Curtain is only seven hours away, people! Let's all work together and go out with a bang.”

Mrs. Gild is delegating and sending her cast and crew off in a hundred different directions faster than I can breathe. She turns back to me. “Thank you, Miss Keegan. I'm sure this is going to be a night we'll not soon forget.” She gives me a little wink and says, “Let's get you ready to be royalty. We have an opening for a princess.”

22

I
t's six hours to curtain.

The cast and crew scatter, and people I barely speak to (or who barely speak to me) are patting me on the back and telling me “thank you” and “you can do this” and I'm freaking out because it seems that no one really cares much about how good I am at what I'm about to be doing. They just care that I'm good enough to let them have their final hurrah.

“Mrs. Gild, can I step out for a second?” I ask her as she's passing notes to the dozens of people who are clamoring for her attention.

“Sure, hon, but make it quick. I want to be sure we know what's what on the parts with harmony.”

I stop by my seat to grab my bag before shoving through the side doors into the hallway. The air is so cool I'm instantly relieved by the change in temperature.

I pull my phone out of my back pocket and dial my dad's number. When I hear the click and the sound of his voicemail instead of a ring, my heart sinks down to the floor.

I almost hang up, but at the very last second, I decide to speak.

“Hey, Dad. It's me. I—You said you wanted me to call you whether it's up or down, and honestly, I don't know which one this is. But the short version is that the girl lead couldn't do the last show, and so, um, I'm going to fill in for her. I'm freaking out. And I just really wanted to hear you tell me I can do it. But, anyway. I'll probably be too busy to answer if you call back. So just…it's okay.”

I try not to sound mad or disappointed because, truthfully, I'm not. It's just a fact of life right now that he's not here.

He's not a bad dad. He's an amazing dad, and he loves me and I love him and I know that he's doing every single thing he can do and I'm glad he's following his dreams and that he finally wrote his tragic little memoir and that somebody, apparently, gives a crap.

But he's not here.

He's just not here.

“I'll tell you all about it when I can. Be safe. Love you, Dad. Bye.”

I tap the screen and turn at the sound of the auditorium doors opening behind me. Grant walks out and straight to me while I'm digging through my purse for one of my quick-acting anti-anxiety pills.

“You hanging in there?” he asks.

“Not really sure, actually.”

Grant walks to the water fountain and presses the lever for me. I swallow my dose and then wipe off my mouth while staring at him blankly.

“I just want
you
to know that
I
know you can do this,” he says. “I know it, and I know this is going to be scary, but this is good. Don't you think so? Doesn't it feel like one of those things in life you're supposed to do?”

He's reaching, desperate for me to not be mad, but he's right. Somewhere deep down, this doesn't feel like a stretch. Like somewhere along the way, I should have known that a dramatic, turning point moment would have to happen in my life. And maybe this is it. I cling to the hope that this is it.

I look up into his more-green-than-brown eyes and tell him, “Yeah. It kinda does.”

It's five hours to curtain.

My head is pounding. The blocking and notes and information have been pumped into my brain steadily for long enough that it should be oozing from my ears.

“Where's Andrew?” Gild screams to no one in particular. “We need to run the scene before ‘Happily Ever After.'”

“Here I am,” he says, as he jumps up on the stage from the floor like some creepy theatre ninja.

Gild is distracted again, and I'm looking over my notecard and then Andrew is grabbing my hand and pulling me toward the middle of the stage. He moves me into position roughly, and it doesn't seem mean. It just seems like he's accustomed to moving and positioning and controlling everything he wants. Come to think of it, maybe he and Carmella are a pretty good fit.

“We start over here,” he says with an awkward flick of his hand.

I'm standing center stage, looking into Andrew's annoyingly blue eyes.

My brain clicks into focus as he says his lines, and then he's got both of my hands in his, and he's speaking so sincerely that I'm utterly distracted. I never realized he delivered his lines with so much conviction. His hands feel super-strong. Like textbook-tearing strong. I glance at my notecard, crumpled in his grip, before I reply and then I almost reach up and punch him in the side of the head because his hand is gently touching the bottom of my chin.

Oh, crap.

I notice my legs quiver just a little bit—though to be fair, that could because they're screaming obscenities at me for requiring them to stand and move for the past several hours, which is not our normal way. But whatever the reason, I realize that I've forgotten one, little, tiny, minuscule moment that happens in the show: Prince Dauntless kisses Princess Winnifred.

The tiniest kiss. It's seriously supposed to be a peck. I've given my Grandma a bigger kiss than this. But still.

Andrew is going to kiss me.

Well, he's just going to have to kiss my corpse because I am about to die.

He's pulling closer, and then he suddenly breaks character and says, “And then I give you a little kiss before exiting stage left, cool?”

Uhhhh.

“Cool,” I say.

‘Cause the first time in my whole life that a guy kisses me gets planned out, complete with stage directions, every day. No big deal.

Andrew and I just stand there awkwardly while we wait for more instructions. Behind us on stage, set pieces are getting reset and I can hear Brice shouting something at one of his costume girls through the open double doors at the side of the house.

My eyes dart anxiously around the room, and then when I glance at Andrew, I see him just staring at me. I half-expect him to make some horrible comment about how he's so upset he has to kiss me or that he'd rather have his teeth extracted, but he never does.

“So…” He scrounges for something to say. “Are you nervous?”