The Fat Lady Sings (2 page)

Of course while I'm saying this my stomach is doing somersaults, because I'm about to read for Dolly freaking Levi, who is basically my idol, my mentor, and my inner child all at once.

I'll bet Dolly Levi wouldn't be nervous if she were the fattest girl in the senior class and auditioning for her dream role. But I am.
The stage lights are on so I'm completely blinded when I try to flash a knowing smile to Mr. Parkinson, a smile that says, "Now that the amateurs have finished, we can settle down to some real acting." I have a sneaking feeling that it comes off looking like a maniacal grin, though.

"OK, Agatha, would you read Dolly, please. Roger, you stay up there and read Horace again."

And the dream begins. Roger is Horace to my Dolly and all is right with the world. I flirt and flounce and Roger smiles and even touches my arm, just below the elbow, which makes me lose my place in the script for a second. Not that I need the script. I know Dolly by heart. I have since I was ten.

Roger and I have chemistry,
I'm thinking as we near the end of the scene.
We actually have chemistry.
He responds to a talented actress, of course. Now he has something to play off of, not like when he was reading with Cynthia, who had all the emotional connection of a brick wall.

I drop my script to my side and look right into his eyes, and I think it throws him for a second, but then he goes with it. He steps into me and returns the stare and it's electric. I know everyone in the theatre can feel it, and I know that I'm in for more of the same, because this is the most riveting audition ever. I can actually hear Cameron gasp as Roger reaches up and strokes my cheek, and for just a minute I think he's going to kiss me, even though he's not supposed to yet, but we are both completely lost in the characters and Roger has this look in his eyes like he's discovered real acting for the first time and then, just when I think I might drown in those blue eyes, Mr. Parkinson says, "OK, thanks, Agatha. Nice reading. You can go. Roger, I'm going to need you for just a few more minutes if you don't mind."

And instantly the spell is broken and Roger is just Roger, not looking at me or even acknowledging my existence, and I'm just the fat girl wobbling down the stairs back out into the dimness of the auditorium. But theatre's like that.

Cameron meets me in the hall
outside the theatre -- he's standing there under the posters of
Godspell
and
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
and
Picnic
with his arms crossed and a wicked grin on his face like something out of a gay version of the Abercrombie catalogue. "Hellooo Dolly," he says with a grin.

I'm not so sure, but I put on my best Carol Channing voice and say, "Cornelius Hackl, how are you?"

"Ah, he'd never cast a gay Cornelius. It was fun, though. But you're a shoo-in."

"I'm not so sure," I say. "He didn't read me for very long."

"He didn't need to. You were fantastic. For a minute there, I thought Roger Morton was actually in love with you."

"And is that so very hard to believe?" I snap.

"Well, no," says Cameron, suddenly dropping his pose and sounding contrite. "I'm sorry. It's just that -- "

"Don't worry about it," I say, throwing an arm around him. "It's just been a long day, a stressful audition, and too much Cynthia Pirelli."

"Amen to that. So -- movie night tonight?"

"Might as well. I won't be able to concentrate on homework. What's playing?"

"Sunset Boulevard."

"Sounds suitably dark," I say, and I give Cameron a peck on the cheek and head for the parking lot.

It's funny how simple that is, to give Cameron, a gay guy, a kiss on the cheek. How completely lacking in hidden meaning that gesture is. We're just friends, no biggie. But if Roger Morton gave me a kiss on the cheek the Earth might very well stop spinning on its axis.

Piedmont Day is almost exactly
equidistant between Mom's and Dad's houses, about two miles either way -- so unless the weather sucks or someone offers me a ride, I usually walk home. Cameron has to make up a math quiz and Elliot and Suzanne are still at the auditions, so today I hoof it.

Walking home isn't exactly a thrill, especially when the rest of school drives right by me and of course their first view is me from behind -- which is NOT my good side, and a backpack with about fifty pounds of books isn't exactly slimming. Usually I do my best to disappear, but it's not easy when you're my size. You try being inconspicuous when you're the only person on the sidewalk and you're a double-wide.

Dismissal time at Piedmont Day looks like a visit from the Vice President -- black SUVs with tinted windows all over the place. Today I'm leaving at five, so the sports teams have all just let out and I hear an engine revving behind me and sense a car creeping up next to me. I stare straight ahead, which doesn't usually work, but I do it anyway. I'm just not in the mood. The car is driving next to me for maybe thirty seconds when I hear the wolf whistle.

Now if there is anyone on the face of the Earth who knows the difference between an ironic wolf whistle and a genuine wolf whistle, it's me, and this one is dripping with sarcasm. I should just let it go, but what with Cynthia Pirelli and auditions and everything, I can't, so I muster my biggest, fakest smile, turn to them and pull down the neck of my T-shirt enough to give them a nice view of some cleavage.

"You better believe it, boys," I say, jiggling for the benefit of some quartet of jocks I've never seen before and will probably never see again.

They peel out with a squeal of tires and shrieks of laughter, but I know they enjoyed the view. Or I hope they did.

I hate those moments -- when you think you're all cool and too good to be bothered by some cretins, but underneath it feels like they just ripped your heart out and emptied a saltshaker into the hole in your chest.

Cameron started movie nights at his house
last year when his parents got Netflix. It started out as fun way to watch classic movies, because all that ever plays at our pathetic excuse for a local multiplex is mediocre rom-coms starring the anorexic starlet of the month and slasher flicks so full of fake blood they're probably diving up the price of corn syrup. So we went through
Citizen Kane
and
Casablanca
and a few Hitchcocks, and then Elliot broke up with his girlfriend and movie night went from classic Hollywood education to teenage angst and emotional crisis.

There was Cameron coming out -- to us, not to his parents, of course -- (
Rocky Horror Picture Show
), me failing a math exam (
A Beautiful Mind
), Elliot losing the student council election (
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
), Suzanne's parents separating (
Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf
), and a few dozen other crash and burn moments punctuated by the greatest Hollywood has to offer. Turns out, some good friends and MGM work a lot better than the suicide hotline.

Dad and Karl won't let me go
to Cameron's on a school night, even if I give them the old "But Cameron's gay -- he'll be a good influence," or tell them we're watching a Judy Garland film. But this week I'm with Mom, so it'll be no problem.

One thing you should probably know about my mom -- she took the whole "my husband dumped me in the late stages of my pregnancy to be with the male gynecologist" thing pretty hard. I mean, who wouldn't, right? I guess Dad thought he was doing the right thing by not leading her on or whatever, but he probably should have at least waited until after the birth. Then again, I'd abandon my family in a second if it meant I could be with Roger Morton. Anyway, my mom's pre-partum depression gave way to pretty serious post-partum depression which she never really got over, even though she medicates nightly with multiple doses of Jim Beam.

She's nice during the day -- like when we go shopping together on Saturday afternoons sometimes (OK, twice) -- and she holds down a job as a cashier at Target, but by the time dinner rolls around she's more interested in the bottle than in me. So on the one hand, my mom's an alcoholic who ignores me in favor of reality TV, the local beer joint, and the occasional drunken hook-up; but on the other hand, I can do pretty much whatever I want on a school night. Always look on the bright side, right?

So I grab a frozen dinner while mom is zombied out in front of
Inside Edition,
then get my bike out of the garage and head to Cameron's.

That's right, the fat kid on a bike. Shocked? I know what you were thinking -- fat and lazy, right? Nope. I'm a drama jock; we're a rare breed, but we do exist. I do plays and play a varsity sport. I know, surprise, right? And no, I'm not a sumo wrestler. I play field hockey. And I don't just play for fun and to get out of gym class -- I'm good. I've started on varsity for two seasons now, and we were undefeated last fall.

Something about having a stick in my hand brings out the animal in me. Miss O'Brien, who in addition to being the college counselor is also our field hockey coach, is always lecturing us about being more aggressive. "Except you, Agatha," she says, "you're aggressive enough." Damn right.

So I play field hockey, I work out twice a week in the off season, and I was at every dance rehearsal for
West Side Story
this summer. Nobody who makes it through three straight hours of "America" on a Saturday afternoon in June when the air conditioner is broken is lazy. Crazy maybe, but not lazy! Plus, since Dad won't buy me a car, I ride my bike to Cameron's and the mall, and walk to school, because there is no way I'd let those goons see my fat ass on a bike.

So now you're thinking "glutton," and honestly, I like ice cream and pizza as much as the next person, but not any more than the next person, and a lot less than Cameron and Elliot, who can each eat enough to feed a small Albanian village and still look like an ad for famine relief. So call me big-boned or well-endowed or voluptuous or any of those other euphemisms -- even call me fat. I embrace "fat." I am fat.

Just don't call me overweight -- because if I'm "overweight," then that means there is some ideal weight that I should be, and I'm not buying that one. I exercise, I eat reasonably healthy food, and I'm fat. So when somebody tells me "you should lose weight," I want to say, "you should become Asian." It's who I am, OK? Deal with it.

Cameron lives in the same neighborhood
as Dad and Karl -- in fact, I have to take the long way around to avoid their house, just in case Karl is out front working on his flowers. Cameron's house has a garage apartment that he's converted into a screening room/editing suite -- did I mention he wants to be a filmmaker? He's already applied to USC for next year.

When I make my entrance, Elliot and Suzanne are already there, Elliot slouched on the couch like he owns the place and Suzanne with her head behind the TV fiddling with some wires.

"Technical difficulties," says Elliot, nodding towards Suzanne.

Suzanne has this reputation for never going outside in the daytime and some of the kids at school call her a vampire (she is a little goth, but hey, anybody who works backstage as much as she does accumulates some black clothes, OK), but she can fix anything. She's the one who set up all of Elliot's equipment in the first place.

"Hi, Suzanne," I say.

"How was the audition?" she asks. "I was working on the sound board so I missed it." She says all this without removing her head from behind the TV.

"She was magnificent," says Elliot, before I can open my mouth. "Stupendous. I give her five stars."

"Yeah," I say, plopping down on the couch, "but how many stars will Parkinson give me?"

"Roger liked it," says Elliot, nonchalantly.

"Are you kidding," I say. "You better not be messing with me." I grab Elliot's arm and twist it behind his back. "Are you messing with me?"

"I don't think she wants you to mess with her," says Suzanne, her smile finally appearing from the darkness.

"I'm not messing with you," screams Elliot. "Let go!"

So I let go. "What did he say?" I ask, trying without success to will my heart into not racing.

"He said he'd never connected with anybody on stage like that before."

"Are you serious!" I say. "Oh my God." I hug a pillow to my chest and have this blinding vision of Roger leaning over to kiss me.

"He didn't say he loved you, OK. He just said it was a good audition. I knew I shouldn't have said anything."

"Of course you should have," I say, completely ignoring the "he doesn't love you" part of what Elliot said. "What else did he tell you?" I ask, as Cameron comes in with a giant bowl of popcorn.

"He told me Cynthia Pirelli looked really hot," says Elliot.

There's an awkward silence and then I smack him with the pillow as hard as I can (which is pretty hard) and try to swallow the tears that are suddenly burning to get out.

"Now why would you say a thing like that?" says Cameron, throwing a handful of popcorn at Elliot.

"Sorry," says Elliot, suddenly contrite. He reaches out towards me, but I pull away. "I just don't want you to get any illusions about Roger Morton. And I wanted you to know it was a great audition and he thought so, too."

"I don't have any illusions about Roger," I spit at Elliot. But of course I do.

"How did your singing audition go?" asks Suzanne, who is as good at changing the subject as she is at changing the wiring on Elliot's video system.

"You know how they say it isn't over until the fat lady sings?" I say.

"Yeah."

"Well, the way I sang they probably wished it was over."

"But Parkinson has heard you sing before," says Cameron. "He cast you in
Godspell."

"Yeah, but not with any solos," I say. "Anyhow, how do you think Carol Channing's singing audition went?"

"She wasn't exactly a crooner," says Elliot, his eyes searching mine for forgiveness. "Dolly's a Rex Harrison part anyway -- it doesn't need a good singer."

And Cameron immediately starts in on his impression of Rex Harrison singing "Why Can't a Woman Be More Like a Man," which is pretty hilarious when sung by a gay male. We all burst out laughing and I wink at Elliot and we both know that everything's OK.