Heartache and Other Natural Shocks (34 page)

“Let It Be”

What do I remember of the days before the show?

I remember the hospital. When I wake up in the hospital chair and see my mother’s face peering down at me, I’m not surprised because nothing surprises me. She found my note and spoke to Dad. She’s so sorry. She says she really wanted Dad back even after she knew about Monique, because love isn’t a switch you can turn on and off. Dr. Katzenberg, she explains, is a kind man, but he wants more than she can give right now. I can’t look at her. She should have told me the truth a long time ago. Now it’s just
“Words, words, words,”
as Hamlet says. They land around me like bullets in the sand, making soft popping sounds somewhere in the part of my brain that’s still listening.

Does she say, like Gertrude:
“O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain!”
?

Shall I reply, like Hamlet:
“O, throw away the worser part of it, / And live the purer with the other half!”
?

When Clarissa arrives at the hospital, Mom takes me home. I sleep in the pink room for a long time, day into night into day, and I have strange dreams crunched together like
cars in a highway pileup. I cannot remember any of them, but each time I wake up, I see Hamlet sitting on the end of my bed, waiting and fingering the scabbard of his sword.

Sometime on Monday, Bobby runs into my room and says that Dad’s coming next weekend. He thinks this will cheer me up. He tells me not to worry about Geoff because someone on his hockey team had a broken arm, and then it was in a sling, and now it’s all better.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, Mom lets me stay home from school. She and Clarissa talk all the time now. I never imagined the two of them could be friends, but they have more in common than I would’ve guessed. Meanwhile, I visit Geoff briefly each day. His eye looks like a rotten plum. He walks stiffly and pops painkillers like candies, but he assures everyone that he’s improving by the hour. Maybe he is, and maybe he’s not. I run lines with him, but we make a mess of it. The painkillers make him groggy, and I can’t concentrate on anything. My thoughts keep drifting to Dad and Monique, the two of them standing in the front hall. The scene loops through my head like a scratchy Super 8 film. I can practically hear the clicking of metal sprockets as Monique’s hand snakes around Dad’s waist, over and over and over.

At night, I lie in bed and revisit events of the past two years: Dad’s canceled visits to Toronto, his week in New York that he said was for business, the many late nights at the store. Lies upon lies. Did my mother think, like the ghost in
Hamlet
:

The words of the play haunt me. Hamlet wraps his black cloak around my shoulders. He keeps me company, whispering soliloquies in my ear. Our worlds blur, one no more real than the other.

At Geoff’s place, Clarissa makes pots of chamomile tea. Geoff and I sip, but we have no appetite. Michael van Meers shows up with chocolates. Mr. Gabor drops by and tells Geoff that Benjamin is standing in at rehearsals, but Geoff insists that he will perform; he’s just saving his strength for opening night. As for me, I don’t say much anymore. Everything will unfold as it must. As Hamlet says before the duel,
“If it be / now, ’tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be / now; if it be not now, yet it will come. The / readiness is all.”
I finally understand that speech. It’s not that Hamlet is surrendering; it’s that he finally has the courage to meet his destiny.

Wednesday is opening night, the night we have all been waiting for. At five-thirty, Clarissa and Geoff pick me up in Baby
Blue. Clarissa grips the steering wheel, white-knuckled. Geoff’s ribs are taped up, and he claims it makes all the difference. Curtain is at seven. Clarissa will sit in the audience with my mother and Bobby. In the school parking lot, she kisses Geoff on the cheek and says, “Darling, I’d tell you to break a leg, but I think you’ve damaged enough bones already.”

I carry Geoff’s bag into the school. He has dubbed me his “personal valet.” The gym change rooms are being used as group dressing rooms, but Mr. Gabor has arranged for Geoff to be alone in a classroom down the hall, away from all the flurry and commotion. The cast, except for Ian, drops by with hugs and best wishes. Benjamin pumps Geoff’s hand. “I am immensely relieved to see you,” he says, grinning. “Even at your very worst, you’re a thousand times better than I am.” They joke around, but as soon as Benjamin leaves, Geoff’s shoulders sag and he pops a pill.

“Didn’t you already take one?” I ask.

“I need another,” Geoff mumbles. He does voice warm-ups and runs lines, but his timing is sluggish, and his words are garbled. Is it the pills, or is it nerves? “Hey,” he says brightly, “why don’t you help me with my makeup. If I do it myself, I’ll look like a clown.”

I sit facing him, our knees touching. His eye has turned ghastly shades of purple, ocher and mustard. I dab on the creamy pancake as gently as I can, but Geoff winces with each touch.

“Sorry,” I say.

“It’s okay,” Geoff says. “Stage makeup is a wonderful thing. It covers all sins and hides all scars. Soon I will be without fault or blemish.” He smiles dreamily. I look into his eyes—the same hazel eyes as his father, except Geoff’s eyes are glazed with a medicated dullness, and behind them is a skulking pain. I see it now.

“What?” Geoff asks.

“Are you going to be okay out there?” I ask.

“Of course,” Geoff scoffs. “Are you kidding? I could do Hamlet in my sleep.”

I stare at Geoff. His fingers are gripping the edge of his chair, and his arms are locked against his ribs like steel bars. His torso is a block of stone. The emperor is wearing no clothes.

I try to make my voice sound calm. “So, how bad does it feel when you fence?” I ask.

Geoff hesitates. “I don’t know. I haven’t actually tried that yet.”

“You haven’t tried? Not even once?” Geoff shakes his head. I lean back and my hands twitch in my lap. “But, Geoff, you have to fight against Ian—”

“Did Clarissa put you up to this?” Geoff snaps.

“No,” I say.

Geoff glares at me. “I’m not afraid of Ian,” he says. “What more can he possibly do to me?”

But we both know what Ian can do. I glance at Hamlet’s sword lying on the desk.

Geoff lurches out of his chair. “You think I can’t do it?” he spits out. He glowers at me.
“Give us the foils. Come on,”
he says roughly, calling out Hamlet’s lines. “I’ll prove it to you.
I’ll play this bout
.” He grabs his weapon and wrenches the sword out of its scabbard. Pain crackles across his face.

“Don’t,” I say.

But Geoff won’t surrender. He’s like a warrior king in the final throes of battle. He hoists his sword above his head, and with a hoarse cry, he lunges forward. But even this single thrust is too much. He buckles and cracks, like a felled tree. He drops the sword and grabs his ribs, bleating like a wounded animal. I reach for him. What was he thinking? Was he hoping for a miracle? Did he really believe he could step onto the stage and become a legend like Sarah Bernhardt?

Geoff sinks into his chair. He covers his face with his hands and weeps. He butts his head into my shoulder. I ache for him, but I have no tears. I think about Ian, and my chest burns. Where is he now? Primping in the mirror? Flirting with the makeup girls backstage, while everyone knows what he did, but no one says anything?

Geoff picks up the sword and stares at it. My watch reads 6:08. “I should go find Mr. Gabor,” I say. “Benjamin will need to get changed soon.”

Geoff looks at me with a withering smile. “Benjamin is no Hamlet,” he says. He pushes the sword from his lap to mine. “Take it,” he says. “You do it, Jules.”

We stare at each other. I feel a lump in my throat. I know what it costs him to give this up. He nods at me. “You know the lines. And you know how to fight.” He squeezes my hand.

I do know
Hamlet
. It’s in my blood. And I’m not afraid. I’m not even surprised. It’s almost as if this were preordained. As if everything in my life has been converging on this one terrible event.

“Revenge should have no bounds,”
Hamlet whispers Claudius’s line.

I look up, and there he is. The dark prince. He beckons me. I glide my fingers along the length of the sword. I feel the chill of the blade across the tops of my legs. I curl my fingers around the grip.
“There’s a divinity that shapes our ends,”
Hamlet says. And yes, I know what I have to do.

It takes me ten minutes to run from the school to Hawthorne Crescent. I move swiftly, as if in a dream, on long legs, in smooth strides. I never tire. I am fleet-footed, like those long-distance runners of ancient Greece who carry messages into battle. When I reach Ian’s house, I merge into the shadows, cut down the side path and slink into the backyard. I find Ian’s key under the urn. It’s so easy to slip inside. I hear Mr. and Mrs. Slater’s voices upstairs. They must be getting ready for the show. I move silently. I know what I’m after, and I take only what I need.

Ten minutes later, I’m in the girls’ washroom, the one near the math area at the far end of the school. It’s quiet here. No one’s around. I stand in front of the mirror, pale and thin, staring at the ghost of my former self. My face is sallow and older than my years. My chestnut hair tumbles down my back. I think about Mollie, who loves my hair, but she’s so far away and she wouldn’t understand. I brush my hair in steady strokes, and then I take out the scissors.
Snip, snip
. I start at the front, just below the ear. I’m going for a pageboy look. It’s difficult to get it right, especially at the back where I can’t see properly.
Snip, snip
. A ritual offering. Long cords of hair drift down around me, encircling my feet in a feathery halo.

As I cut, I think about Rapunzel, and Ian. “Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair …” Then the witch climbed the golden stair. Rapunzel cried when the witch hacked off her long thick braid, but I shed no tears when I cut my own.

When the job is done, I almost look like a boy. My head feels light and my neck is cold. Hamlet smiles at me from the mirror.
“Come on, sir.”
It seems I am transformed after all.

When I show up in the dressing room, Geoff is aghast. “Jules! Your hair!” But there’s no time for talk. It’s ten minutes to curtain. I quickly change into Hamlet’s clothes. Being tall, thin and flat-chested has its advantages tonight. Geoff’s shirt is big, but once I tuck it under the tunic, it’s fine. The rest of the costume fits perfectly. Geoff smiles sadly to see me in his clothes. “You even look the part,” he says bitterly.

I place my hands on his shoulders. “I might be a changeling prince,” I say, “but you watch, I promise I’m going to make you proud.”

By the time I appear backstage as Hamlet, it’s too late to stop the show. The cast stares at me, appalled.

“Hamlet can’t be a girl!” Ophelia gasps.

“She could easily pass for a prince,” Benjamin insists. “I say, better Jules than me.”

“A cross-dressing prince?” Carla scoffs. “I can’t do the bedroom scene with her!”

“She knows how to fence,” Ian says, appearing from the shadows. “Let Jules do it. It will be a good match.”

I haven’t seen Ian since the night of the party. He’s regal and handsome in his royal blue vest. It picks up the color of his eyes. He’ll cut a striking figure onstage.

“The devil hath power / T’ assume a pleasing shape,”
Hamlet whispers.

I look Ian hard in the eye, and he has the nerve to grin back at me.

“That one may smile and smile and be a villain,”
Hamlet sneers.

Oh, I
will
be Hamlet to his Laertes.

Mr. Gabor peers at me. “Can you do this, Epstein?” he asks. I nod. “All right then,” he says. He speaks Claudius’s line:
“Come, Hamlet, come and take this hand from me.”
He
reaches over to clasp my hand, and this is the only time I feel guilty for what I am about to do.

Mr. Gabor heads upstairs to the lighting booth, and the cast assembles in the wings. In the auditorium, the audience chatters and clatters as they settle into their seats, but backstage, it’s as quiet and holy as a church. Dust motes drift down through the beams of light—little moth-white specks against the velvety black curtains.

Hamlet whispers,
“The readiness is all.”
I am ready. By the time the curtains part, I have slipped into Hamlet’s skin. I’ve taken on his princely voice, his burdened posture, his angry stride.

The houselights darken, and the stage lights flare.

The play begins on the ramparts of Elsinore Castle with the sighting of the ghost of Hamlet’s father, the deceased king. The scene then switches to the royal court of Denmark, where Queen Gertrude and King Claudius discuss Hamlet’s all-consuming grief for his father. Claudius speaks as I make my entrance.
“But now, my cousin Hamlet and my son—”