Spellcrossed (35 page)

“She reminds me of you,” Rowan commented as we shared a hurried dinner.

“Funny, talented, helpful…”

“Skeptical, bossy, opinionated…”

I tossed my half-eaten breadstick at him and exclaimed, “Finally!”

“Finally?” he repeated, neatly snagging the breadstick in mid-flight.

“A joke. You’ve seemed so…preoccupied this week.”

I waited for an explanation, but he merely returned the breadstick to my plate.

“Look, if you’re uncomfortable being directed by me—”

“No.” He poked an asparagus spear and said, “Your mother’s coming up next weekend to see
The Secret Garden
.”

“I’ll tell her to leave the spoon at home.”

“I’m more concerned about her meeting Jack.”

I sighed. “She can’t. Not then, anyway. The last thing Daddy needs before Hell Week is that kind of drama. She’s coming up the next weekend for
Into the Woods
. Maybe by then…”

“Why not wait, Maggie? Until the season’s over. You have enough to deal with without telling Jack you’re his daughter and engineering this meeting.”

“But—”

“All we have to do is keep him out of her way for two weekends. Have Bernie go on as the Narrator the night she’s here. Print up programs that list his name instead of Jack’s. Let’s save the drama for the stage.”

While I hated the continued subterfuge, I knew it would save Daddy a lot of stress during
Into the Woods
. And it would give us more time to get to know each other, which would make the revelation that I was his daughter easier for both of us. Maybe by the time
Into the Woods
closed, he’d have worked out what he wanted to do next. Knowing he had his life in order would impress Mom far more than seeing him in yet another musical.

“It’s a deal.”

Rowan’s relief surprised me; obviously, he’d been a lot more worried than he’d let on.

“So she’s arriving Friday?”

“Saturday. There’s some retirement party at Chris’ law firm Friday evening.”

“Then Jack and I will go to the cottage before the matinee—”

“We’ll have to ask Janet to keep him under wraps. Chris wants the four of us to have dinner Saturday. Don’t worry, I told Mom you’d make dinner here because we wouldn’t have enough time to go out between shows.
And don’t yell at me for not telling you sooner. I didn’t want you to start obsessing.”

“I do not yell,” Rowan replied. “Or obsess.”

He spent the next fifteen minutes interrogating me about my mother’s favorite foods. When I pointed out that this qualified as obsessing, he flashed a rueful smile. “It’s just…it’s our first meal together. I want everything to be perfect.”

“All you have to do is wave your magic wand and we’d eat sawdust and think it was great.”

“That would be cheating. I want her to see me, not my magic.”

“Beguile her with mushroom pomponnettes instead of faery glamour?”

“I want her to accept me as a man. As a human.”

Touched by his serious expression, I reached across the table and squeezed his hand.

“She will.”

On Sunday, the other shoe dropped with God-like vengeance.

A storm knocked out the power around lunchtime. Bernie dealt with the hassle of canceling the matinee. Alex soldiered on with music rehearsals in Janet’s candlelit parlor. Lee hooked up the generator to light the Smokehouse. After turning my script with staging notes over to Reinhard, I raced to the hotel.

Fortunately, most of our paying guests had checked out that morning. Frannie handed out flashlights to those who remained. Our backup generator churned out enough juice to power the emergency lights in the common areas and the coolers in the kitchen. We served up sandwiches and beer that evening, and cast members and tourists alike joked about our adventure.

After two days of staging scenes in the soggy meadow, the adventure had palled and the cast had begun sniping at each other. I soothed and cajoled. The staff churned
out Fae power to ease the tension, focus tired minds, and boost confidence.

Much to my surprise, my father used his charm for the same purpose. He flashed that gap-toothed grin. He made silly jokes. He complimented cast members on their comic timing, their singing, their death scenes. And he seemed utterly sincere. Even when he shifted the charm to someone new, the person he’d just abandoned regarded him with an affectionate smile.

For the first time I understood why he had been so successful onstage and off. He made each person feel like the center of his world. He’d done it to me after the Ms. Pac-Man debacle just by asking me about my day and encouraging me to talk about rehearsals. I wondered if his behavior stemmed from genuine concern or a need for approval or simply a desire to avoid unpleasantness.

Frankly, I was too grateful about the results to care. Cloud Nine might be a little gray, but at least it was no longer scudding over the horizon.

The power came back on Wednesday morning. With that hurdle behind us, I set my sights on the next one: helping Jess find the strength and humor in the Baker’s Wife.

“If she’s so strong, why does she sleep with the Prince? Just because she quarreled with the Baker…”

“Her defenses are down. She lets herself be swept off her feet. She realizes it’s a mistake, but it helps her understand who she is and what she wants—and to appreciate the life she has.”

“And then she gets crushed by a tree.”

“Well…yes.”

“Is that supposed to be God’s punishment?”

“I prefer to think of it as dramatic irony, but if God’s punishment works for you…”

“No. It just seems so unfair. She makes one mistake…”

“‘People make mistakes,’” I quoted from “No One is
Alone.” “Because she lingers with the Prince, she’s under that tree when it falls. Because the Baker’s father steals the magic beans, the Witch is cursed by her mother. And in revenge, the Witch lays a curse on the Baker’s family. Act One is all about spells and magic and making choices. Act Two is about the consequences of those choices. Untangling the spells. Relying on ourselves instead of magic.”

I might have been describing the history of the Crossroads Theatre—and my family. Rowan’s fascination with humans led him to break his clan’s rules about approaching them. Because he seduced an innocent Mackenzie girl, he was cursed by her mother and abandoned by his clan. In a vain effort to lift that spell, he worked another to call the Mackenzie descendants to the Crossroads. My father answered that call. And one fateful night, he stumbled on Rowan’s clan and fell under the spell of their glamour.

Maybe this was the summer we untangled the spells and our lives.

Observing Jess’ frown, I tried to get back on track.

“Her mistake makes her human—and vulnerable. And her loss forces the Baker to step up to the plate. Same thing happens with Jack and Little Red and Cinderella. They lose their lodestones and have to grow up. Like we all do. We learn to make our own choices, find our own paths. And if we’re lucky, we find people along the way who can help us.”

Mom. Rowan. Nancy. Helen. Everybody on the staff. They all guided me, no matter how many twists and turns the path took.

“The stronger you are, the harder your loss will hit the Baker—and the audience.”

“I don’t feel very strong. Especially around Brian.”

“He’s overcompensating.”

“Because he doesn’t trust me.”

I hesitated. “Because he’s scared. So he’s trying to control the situation.”

“Like the Baker.”

Like me that first season.

Jess studied her script. She was one of those people whose appearance suggested that her primary goal was to slip through life unnoticed. Medium height, average weight, ordinary features, indefinite age somewhere between twenty-five and thirty-five.

And then she raised her head and I was struck anew by her thoughtful expression and the intelligence of those brown eyes. She was a quiet pool that seems unremarkable at first glance, but whose depths you discover on closer inspection.

Like Nancy.

“I know someone like Brian,” Jess said. “Scared underneath and trying really hard to hide it.”

Hard to say whether that “someone” was a parent or a lover or a friend—or what effect this summer would have on their relationship. But I finally understood why Jess had come here. And even if the choices that lay ahead were tough, I knew she had the strength to make them.

“Brian’s a good guy,” I finally said. “And a good actor. Talk to him. Work your scenes. If you need me to step in, I will. But I think you can handle this without me.”

Our Act Two run-through got off to a rocky start, but the solid performances of Debra and Rowan helped steady the others. The cast was close to mastering the rapid-fire lyrics of “Your Fault” and the intricate dance steps in the finale. And both Jess and Kanesha were beginning to bring out their characters’ inner strengths.

I skipped Friday’s performance of
The Secret Garden
to spend the evening with Rowan. He had to scurry down the back stairs from the kitchen now and then to smooth over the usual rough spots with his magic, but it was still nice to have some quiet time together.

When he returned from ensuring that Act Two was off to a good start, he refilled our wineglasses, lifted my feet
off the sofa, and settled them across his lap. By the time he finished the foot massage, I had devolved into a state of boneless bliss.

But I couldn’t help asking, “The show will be okay, right?”

“The show will be fine.”

“Debra’s great. Much better than I was when I played the role at Southford. I was good at the big moments, but I went for the cheap laughs.”

“Well, that was before you came to the Crossroads.”

“And you took me under your beneficent wing?” I raised my hands and salaamed as best I could from my reclining position. “I am not worthy, O great one.”

“I’m not great,” he assured me solemnly. “Just very, very good.”

I stuck out my tongue. “Do you suppose she’s a Mackenzie? Debra, I mean.”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t?”

“It’s not like they have a particular scent, Maggie. Or a plaid aura.”

“I thought you always knew.”

“Of course I knew. They were only ones who came here. But I don’t have a blood tie to the Mackenzies. Except to the staff, of course. If you’re really curious about Debra…”

“The important thing is that she found something here she needed.”

“Yes. A job.”

“More than a job. She’s mellowed since the beginning of the season.”

“Maybe.”

I pushed myself into a sitting position. “Are the Mackenzies supposed to have a monopoly on the Crossroads? Professionals and community theatre actors might need help, too, you know.”

“The Mackenzies don’t want a career in theatre.”

“Neither do most of the others. Debra’s the only one
who’s actually making a living at acting. The other ‘professionals’ are doing what I did: bouncing from one non-Equity job to the next and holding down a crappy job between gigs to pay the bills. Sure, some are hoping for their big break. But most just love the theatre too much to give it up.”

“If they can’t make a living at it, aren’t we doing them a disservice by encouraging them to believe that they can?”