Showstopper (7 page)

She really wasn't getting this. “Nana, I love you, but could you please leave? Now. I'm sorry,” I added quickly. “I don't mean to be fresh. But I'm pretty sure Marianne Elliot never had to deal with her nana doing laundry while she was auditioning actors.”

“Who is Marianne Elliott, dear? Is she in your class at school?”

“No, she's a major theatrical director. She directed
War Horse
on Broadway. . . .” I shook my head. “But that's not the point. Nana, can you please wait until after auditions to finish the laundry?”

“I'm sorry, honey. But if I don't get started on the whites now, I won't have time for the fine washables later.” She closed the washing machine door and turned a dial on the control panel. “But here's the good news: I'm using the double-rinse cycle, so I won't be interrupting you again for at least fifty-five whole minutes.”

“Great,” I grumbled, watching her climb the stairs.

“Hey, stop that washer!”

I turned to see Susan making her way over from the far side of the basement. At least, I thought it was Susan; I couldn't see her face behind the enormous pile of old sheets she was carrying. Maxie was right beside her, lugging the bath mats.

“Stop the machine,” Susan commanded again, her voice muffled through all that pima cotton.

“Why?”

“These old sheets are perfect for togas,” said Maxie. “And Susan told me her idea for using the bath mats to make a Cyclops costume. Brilliant.”

“But they're all gross and smelly,” said Susan. “We can't use them unless we run them through the wash.”

“Can't it wait?”

In response, my sister shoved the bundle of linens into my face. The stink of mildew told me she was right. The
sooner we cleaned those sheets, the better.

I hit the stop button, opened the washer door, and watched as Susan and Maxie stuffed their haul of castoff bed linens and bathroom rugs in with the regular load. It was a tight fit.
Very
tight. We had to lean against the door to get it to click closed again.

“Maybe we should add more soap,” Maxie suggested.

I opened the little compartment where the detergent went and poured in two more capfuls. Then I turned the dial to on and heard the
zzzzhhhsshhh
ing sound of churning water.

“That oughta do it,” said Susan.

Oh, it did it, all right. . . .

It did it big-time!

CHAPTER

5

For the audition dance sequence, I chose sixteen counts of Travis's “Seize the Day” solo from our first show. Since Travis was such a superior dancer, Mackenzie altered the combination slightly to accommodate the fact that Brady had no dance experience.

First she walked everyone through the combination.

Pivot step, step ball change, kick, leap, step ball change.

After a couple of walk-throughs, Kenzie added the music, courtesy of my iPod speakers, which I'd propped on a shelf between Mom's long-forgotten Crock-Pot and Dad's high-school baseball trophies.

“Seize the Day” from
Newsies
filled the basement as my cast ran through the high-energy steps. I was enjoying their dancing so much, I was caught off guard when Brady stopped mid pas de bourrée and frowned.

“Um, Anya . . . I think there's a problem.”

“With that last turn, you mean?” I gave him an encouraging smile. “Don't worry. You'll get it. You just have to shift your weight from—”

“No,
that's
not the problem.” Brady pointed to the far side of the basement. “
That
is.”

I turned in the direction he was pointing, as did everyone else, and my eyes nearly popped out of my head. The washer was overflowing! Water and soapsuds were gushing out around the edges of the door, and the whole machine was shaking and rocking and bouncing in place.

Talk about irony. . . . It actually looked like it was
dancing!

“What do we do?” cried Susan.

“I don't know!”

But Austin had already sprinted across the basement to turn off the machine and switch the water line lever to off.

With a loud chug and a long hiss, the machine went still.

I stared in horror at the deluge of water and soap bubbles spreading across the floor. Travis's sneakers were already soaked through. Kids were hopping around, trying to avoid the flood by sidestepping or leaping over it, but since there was no longer a single dry inch of basement floor, they only succeeded in splashing through the giant puddle. It was like some nightmare version of that old Gene Kelly dance number
“Singin' in the Rain.”

Susan was shaking her head in dismay. “Guess we should have used the extra-heavy cycle setting,” she muttered.

I glared at her. “Ya think?”

Taking our cue from the rest of the cast, we splashed through the puddle and dashed up the steps.

Upstairs, I explained everything to Nana and Papa:
Too many sheets . . . exploding washer . . . flooded basement
. They kept looking over my shoulder as actor after actor came squishing through the kitchen in sopping sneakers and squeaky flip-flops. I finished with a guilty shrug. “I'm really sorry.”

“Oh, Anya,” said Nana with a sigh. “I wish you had asked for my help.”

“So do I,” I admitted, feeling horrible. I couldn't believe Susan and I had destroyed not only our perfect rehearsal space, but Mom's top-of-the-line, energy-efficient front loader as well. And we'd made a lot of extra work for my grandparents.

“So, um”—I gave Nana a hopeful smile—“maybe we shouldn't mention this to Mom and Dad when they call. We don't want to worry them.”

“Yeah,” said Susan. “We don't want their second honeymoon to be a
washout
.”

Papa, who'd always gotten a kick out of Susan's sense of humor, laughed. Then he picked up the phone to call the plumber.

But Nana still looked very disappointed in me. And that made my heart hurt.

“I'm going out front to prune your mother's rosebushes,” she said, slipping on a pair of gardening gloves. “Later on you'll have to help me empty the wet clothes from the washer and wring them out.”

“Okay,” I said. “Susan and I will do that. I promise.” As she headed out the front door, I addressed my cast.

“I think we're going to have to do our singing auditions outside,” I told them.

No one seemed to mind.

A few minutes later we were all seated on the back lawn in the shade of a big elm.

Joey, as it turned out, was a quick study when it came to music. Even though he'd never seen the sheet music before, he played the songs as if he'd been practicing for weeks.

After all the returning cast members had done their singing auditions (no surprises, except, I was happy to note, everyone was a lot more confident on this go-round), it was Brady's turn.
He gave us a rousing rendition of Cyclops's brooding solo, “In the Kingdom of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man Is King.”

Brady's audition was terrifically entertaining; he really got into the giant monster character, and his baritone voice was perfect for the song.

“Wonder what size bath mat he wears,” Susan whispered.

I giggled.

Then Nora performed one of Penelope's songs, the cute and upbeat “So Many Suitors, So Little Time.”

Nora also did a great job. With her height and strong voice projection, it occurred to me she might be exactly right for the role of Penelope.

“Wonderful,” I said when she finished. “You should do the lines from that scene for your acting audition tomorrow. I'd like to see how it all comes together.”

Nora beamed. “Okay. I will.”

“You were both excellent,” said Austin, offering Brady a high five. “Glad you decided to try out. And, Joey, thanks for handling the accompaniment. You did great.”

“Thanks, dude,” said Joey.

“See you all back here tomorrow morning,” said Susan.

“Take your scripts. You can work on your scenes and monologues at home, and we'll meet back here tomorrow to finish the auditions. Ten o'clock. Don't be late.”

“We won't,” said Travis.

“Good luck with the flood,” said Elle.

“See you tomorrow,” said Spencer. “But just to be on the safe side, I think I'll bring my flippers.”

“Hey!” Susan snapped, shooting him a look. “I'll handle the jokes around here, if you don't mind!” Then she grinned. “For the record, I would have gone with snorkel, but good effort.”

Spencer laughed.

When they were gone, Austin, Susan, and I sat down on the porch steps. It seemed like only yesterday the three of us were having our first theater brainstorming session in this very spot. And now here we were, right back where we'd started . . .
both literally and figuratively. Because after today's washing machine disaster, and Nana's concerns about Spin the Bottle, it was pretty clear we would have to come up with a more appropriate place to hold rehearsals.

“It's karma,” I said with a sigh. “I wasn't totally up-front with Mom and Dad, and the universe decided to punish me.”

“Stupid universe,” Susan muttered, dropping her chin in her hands.

“Kind of like the gods messing with Odysseus on his journey,” Austin chuckled.

“You mean because Odysseus wants to get home to Ithaca, and we want to get home to the clubhouse theater?”

“Exactly,” said Austin. “And as a writer, I like the symbolic connection. Life imitating art and all. But that doesn't help us with finding a better venue.”

“Any ideas?” asked Susan.

“Just one,” I said, standing and heading inside.

I returned a few seconds later, my pockets filled with ticket money, and started off down the walk.

Susan and Austin didn't ask me where I was going. They simply got up and followed me.

Because they knew as well as I did we had only one viable option.

The Chappaqua Community Center.

CHAPTER

6

After wandering the administrative hallways of the community center for a full fifteen minutes, we finally found the office of the special events coordinator, a Ms. Napolitano. Unfortunately, Ms. Napolitano happened to be away on vacation this week. She was taking a cruise.

Guess where.

The Greek Isles!

Austin the writer thought this was particularly fitting. Susan just rolled her eyes and blamed Zeus.

The problem was that Ms. Napolitano's temporary replacement, Mrs. Crandall, was not what you would call “well trained” in coordinating special events. Technically, she was a part-time employee whose usual job was to sit at the entrance to the indoor swimming pool, checking membership cards and reminding everyone to shower before
getting in the water. I recognized her from when I took swimming lessons here back in second grade.

Mrs. Crandall was a very nice lady, but she was also a bit of a scatterbrain.

We explained to her that we wanted to rent the auditorium for the next two weeks, and if possible, we'd like to put a tentative hold on it for a third week.

This flustered her. “Are you sure you wouldn't rather just use the pool?” she asked. “I know how to handle that.”

I politely assured her that unless we decided to reimagine
The Odd-yssey
as a water ballet, the pool simply would not do. We needed the auditorium.

It took Mrs. Crandall a while to find the rental forms in the ancient file cabinet, and accessing the events calendar on the computer nearly brought her to tears. Finally she was able to ascertain that the auditorium was, in fact, available for the dates we'd requested. She typed in the name of our organization and blocked off the next two weeks with a yellow highlight. The third week she highlighted in pink, which I supposed meant that it was not paid for yet and could change.

I gave Mrs. Crandall the cash, which she counted (twice). Then she handed over the forms.

“You can fill these out tonight and bring them back on Monday morning,” she explained. “At least, I
think
that will
be all right.”

“Can we see the auditorium?” I asked.