Rule of Three (16 page)

“Nope. No ribbons, Joe. Although I could have won the You’re-the-Only-Person-Here-Under-Fifty ribbon.” Mom and Dad laughed. Alex went to check her hair in the bathroom mirror for the hundredth time since I’d walked in the door.

“I’m not kidding, you guys. You’ve never seen such fancy cakes in your life. There was a candy-cane cake, a cake called Red Velvet, and a daffodil cake. Every ingredient in the whole entire cake was yellow, and it was decorated with tons of real daffodils.”

“That sounds pretty,” said Mom. “I’m sorry I missed that.”

“But your castle was so great,” Joey said. “How come you didn’t win anything? Too many I-Hate-My-Sister cupcakes?”

I glanced toward the bathroom, hoping Alex hadn’t heard. “No-wa,” I said, making my “no” sound like it had two syllables. “I’m not kidding, these people are so way good, like professionals. When they saw my castle, since it’s made of cupcakes, I had to enter in the Sculpture Cake division. They had cakes like a pyramid, a dog in his doghouse, a stack of books, and a snowman cake. There was even a cake that looked like a big giant bloodshot eyeball.”

“Did you know Shakespeare invented the word
eyeball
?” Dad asked.

“But I bet he didn’t invent eyeball
cake,
” said Joey.

“He also invented the word
unhair,
” said Mom, grinning.

“As in, ‘Un-hair me, you villain!’” I waved my arm around in a fake sword-fight.

Joey flipped to the back of the big dictionary. “It’s in here. It’s a real word. ‘To deprive of hair.’”

“I can use it in a sentence. My
unhaired
sisters look really weird,” I teased.

“I heard that,” said Alex, still tugging on her hair as she came back into the room.

“So what cake won the contest?” said Joey.

“The Seattle Space Needle cake won first prize. I think maybe they cheated, though. Because how do you get a big round UFO-shaped cake to balance on top of little skinny legs? They had to use wires or pipe cleaners or something, and that’s against the rules.”

“No fair,” said Joey. “I think you should have won the Most Blue Sprinkles on a Cake Ever Award.”

Alex lifted up her flip-flop and showed off the bottom, which was dotted with blue sprinkles!

“Oops,” I said.

“Well, there’s always next year,” said Dad.

“And you still have the play,” said Joey.

“And I still have my hair,” I joked. Everybody (minus Alex) laughed.

THE SHOW MUST GO ON

Starring Alex

Me
:
(Riding in car on the way to the play.)
I can’t believe it’s opening day.

Stevie
: I know. I’m so excited. Seems like we’ve been practicing forever.
Me-may-mah-mo-moo.
(Does voice warm-up.)

Me
: No, I mean, I can’t believe I have to go out there, like this.
(Tugs on short hair.)
I asked Mr. Cannon yesterday if he thought we could postpone the first show, since it’s only a Sunday matinee.

Dad
:
(From front seat.)
What did he say?

Me
: He said short hair was not really a good enough reason to cancel the show.

Dad
:
(Coughs. Clears throat.)

Mom
:
(Muffles a laugh.)
I think Mr. Cannon’s right, honey.

Me
: They might as well just call me Princess Baldo instead of Winnifred.

Joey
: Princess Baldo! Good one.

Stevie
: I don’t see why you’re so upset. Who’s gonna know? You’ll be wearing a wig.

Joey
: Yeah, you can’t even see the moth balls.

Stevie
: Moth
holes.

Dad
: Your sisters are right. That’s what makes a play exciting. You never know what’s going to happen, and you just have to improvise.

Me
: It’s not just the wig. . . . I don’t know. There’s just something about everything that’s happened. It’s like bad luck. Like the play is cursed or something.

Joey
: Ooh! Ooh! It’s like that curse Dad told us about. You know, the Macbeth curse!

Me
:
(Groaning.)
Joey! Don’t say “
Macbeth!”

Joey
: It doesn’t matter in the car. It’s only if somebody says “Macbeth” in the theater before the play, right, Dad?

Stevie
:
(Teasing.)
But what if the play’s
Macbeth
?

Me
:
(Growling, putting hands over ears.)
Stop saying “
MACBETH
,” everybody!

Joey
:
(Practically bouncing up and down.)
And if you do say “Macbeth,” you have to go outside the building, spin around three times, spit, then curse, and knock on the door till they let you back in. That’s so cool!

Mom
: Alex, it’s just an old superstition. Dad was just telling Joey for fun.

Me
:
(Glancing over at Stevie.)
I just don’t feel right. Something isn’t right. It’s like I shouldn’t even go onstage or something. I don’t know. I have a bad feeling.

Dad
: It’s called opening-day jitters. I used to have to go backstage and huff and puff into a paper bag just to calm myself down. And Mom used to sing “Mary Had a Little Lamb” to steady her nerves.

Mom
:
(Shrugging.)
Whatever works.

Stevie
: Alex has stage fright? And I don’t?

Me
:
(Clutching stomach.)
I think I’m going to be sick. Can somebody open a window, please?

Stevie and Joey
:
(Move over to one side, away from me.)

Me
: You don’t know, Stevie. You weren’t there for dress rehearsal yesterday. A bunch of stuff went wrong. And I messed up “Happily Ever After.”

Dad
: You know, they say if you have a bad dress rehearsal, that means good luck for opening day.

Joey
: Does that work for plays besides
Macbeth
?

Me
:
(Sinking back into seat.)
That does it. I’m cursed for sure.

During intermission, I came out into the
audience to say hi to Livvie and her parents, then ran over to find Mom, Dad, and Joey.

Everybody started talking at once. Dad was giving me tips, Mom was telling me how great my voice sounded on my solo parts, and Joey and I were cracking up over all the crazy stuff that happened in Act One.

Just then, Scott Towel came up behind me. “Hey, Steven,” he said, tapping me on the back. “You gotta do something. Quick. It’s a disaster.” He pointed in the direction of the stage.

“It’s the curse!” said Joey.

“It’s not that bad,” I told him. “I know a lot of stuff went wrong, but at least the audience was laughing.”

“No, I mean Alex. You know how she messed up the first act?”

“Hey, I tried to save her that time she went blank and her voice locked up.”

“Well, now she locked
herself
up in the dressing room backstage, and she said she’s not coming out.”

“We have a dressing room? And it locks?”

“OK, the props closet or whatever. Behind the stage. It’s like she has stage fright or something. It’s not like her,” Scott Towel said.

“She’s probably still upset about her hair disaster. She’ll get over it.”

“No. I mean it. She’s
really
not coming out.”

“She can’t not come out. The play starts again in less than fifteen minutes.”

“Exactly. You got to go talk to her.”

“Like I told her, it’s just opening day jitters,” said Dad. “I better go see if there’s anything I can do.”

“No. It’s OK, Dad. Let me.” I had a feeling I knew what was freaking her out. And it wasn’t the short hair. Or stage fright. Or some stupid curse.

TALE OF TWO SISTERS

Starring Alex

Me
:
(Sitting on top of a guitar case in the supply closet. Suddenly, hears a knock at the door.)
Scott?

Stevie
: Hey. It’s me. Stevie.

Me
:
(Goes over and puts ear to door.)

Stevie
: C’mon, Alex. You gotta come out of there.

Me
:
(No, I don’t.)

Stevie
: Alex, just open the door. I have something I want to give you.

Me
:
(No way am I opening this door.)

Stevie
: I know you can hear me, Alex. Alex? Look, I’ve talked to your door at home plenty of times. I’m pretty good at it even. So if you think I’m going away, I’m not.
(Sound of Stevie sliding to floor.)

Me
:
(Silence. A minute goes by. Say something!)
Are you still there?

Stevie
: I’m right here, Alex.

Me
:
(More silence.)

Stevie
: Can’t you just talk to me? What’s wrong? Is it that you think you messed up the play? It’s not that bad. Really. It’s just a matinee, mostly for little kids. People thought it was funny. Honest.

Me
: Not just the play. I messed up a lot of things. You. Us.

Stevie
:
(Silence.)

Me
: All I could think about was wanting the part so bad, and now I got it, but I feel miserable, and I’m not even doing a good job and then you step in and save me
again,
and you did a better job than me, and I’m supposed to be the actor.

Stevie
: Alex . . .

Me
: I should never have gotten the part, Stevie.

Stevie
: What do you mean? Of course you should have.

Me
: No, you don’t understand. I did a terrible thing. I was mean, and selfish — I just wanted the part so bad, that’s all I could see, and now, every time I think about what I did, it makes me want to throw up.

Stevie
: You mean about what you said to Mr. Cannon?

Me
: I’m sorry, Stevie. I really let you down. And I let myself down, too. It shouldn’t have freaked me out that you wanted to be in the play. I should have been happy that we
both
could be in the play
together.

Stevie
:
(Silence.)

Me
: So now you know why I can’t go back out there. How can I look anybody in the face? Mom or Dad or Joey or the audience . . . And now I have raccoon eyes again from crying and I feel like I’m going to throw up every time I try to sing. Not to mention, I hate my hair!

Stevie
: Well, I, for one, wouldn’t mind seeing those raccoon eyes.

Me
: I’m sorry, Stevie. I’m so, so, sorry. Can you ever —