Almost Final Curtain (9 page)

“You shouldn’t judge before you try it.”

Oh no, she used the
tone
. Mom had already made up her mind. I was going, like it or not. “Uh,” I said. “I might have rehearsals, remember?”

“Do you really think there’s a part for you in
My Fair Lady
?”

That was it, then—even my own mother thought I was too weird to play Eliza Doolittle.

As if noticing my crushed expression, Mom quickly added, “Honestly, I don’t know what that Mr. Martinez is thinking. Surely, there are plays with better roles for women. And the theme of that thing—that a woman will transform herself into some rich, white man’s ideal for love—it’s offensive.”

I could see the letter she would be writing to the PTA or school board already. “He’s making the music edgy,” I pointed out. “Maybe he’s going to play up the ironic.”

“I can only hope so.”

I was shocked by the number of cars in the parking lot. It looked like everyone in the entire school was going to be trying out. I shook my head. Mom was right. There was no way I was going to get a part in this play.

 

 

After I’d waved good-bye to Mom and headed into school, I felt a tug on my sleeve. I turned, expecting Bea, but instead saw a kid I didn’t know. Her heart-shaped face was pale, and she had dark rings under her wide, un-makeup-enhanced eyes. The hair was the giveaway. She was one of the honor guards—an Igor. “What do you want?” I said, pulling my lucky shirt from her grasp.

“A message from the prince,” she said, her voice wispy with that weird awe they all seemed to have for vampires.

“No time,” I told her, hurrying my steps. “Anyway, tell Dad I’m not sorry about that betrothal thing. This whole arranged-marriage stuff is weird. It should be abolished or something; this is the twenty-first century, you know.”

The girl’s lip quivered like she wanted to say more, but luckily I spotted Taylor talking to Lane. I shouted a hello to them, and the Igor did what Igors do—she faded into the crowd, so as not to be seen by regular people.

Taylor waved frantically at me, pointing to something that looked like a raffle ticket in her hand. “Numbers!” she was saying when I got close enough. “Just to get into the auditorium! I’m so screwed. What are the odds of a black Eliza?”

“I’m telling you, Taylor,” Lane said, as if this was an argument they’d had already. “It totally could work. Instead of East End, you’re a Somali immigrant, see—”

“I
am
a Somali immigrant,” she pointed out. “Or at least my family is.”

“Exactly,” he said. “And I, as Professor Higgins—”

“Assimilates her into upper-class white culture?” I was beginning to see Mom’s point. “Are you sure Martinez is going to go there? Do you know how pissed off people will be?”

“Isn’t that kind of what the play is saying anyway? Give up your accent and pass as noble class?” Lane asked. I thought he’d made an interesting choice for an audition outfit. He wore a black vest over a bright, white T-shirt. I was surprised at the muscles he sported. They weren’t huge guns or anything, but I didn’t remember his arms being so defined before. His hair was almost working too. It looked like he might have tried to tame it with some gel or something.

Like me, Taylor had a specific outfit she always wore. Her
hijab
was canary yellow, and she wore a similarly bright red, long-sleeved silk shirt.

She pointed at my shirt. “Mime stripes!”

It was true. My lucky audition shirt did resemble those black and white striped shirts that mimes wore in movies and on TV. I’d never actually seen a mime anywhere else, so I had no idea if that was just some kind of weird Hollywood thing or what. The truth was, it was really kind of silly looking, but I landed the role of Medea wearing this hideous thing ... and again got cast as one of the sisters in
The Madwoman of Chaillot
. That kind of clinched it. It was my lucky shirt.

Plus, it was one of the few shirts I owned that hugged my figure and showed off what few attributes I had topside, as it were. Even though skintight, muffin-top-revealing clothes were the rage, I tended toward things that fit loose and comfy. I think my audition shirt had the element of surprise.

Lane seemed to be checking me out too. “I think it’s nice,” he said in a way that made heat rise to my cheeks. But, in typical Lane fashion, he added drily, “For Marcel Marceau.”

Taylor snickered behind her hand, and I just shook my head and tried to hide my initial reaction to his attention with a snarky, “Touché.”

“You’d better go get a number,” Taylor reminded me. “Or you won’t get out of here until after midnight.”

It took me a while to find out where the line ended. Wouldn’t you know it? There was Matthew Thompson wearing his letter jacket and dragging his knuckles. “Check you,” he said loudly. “You forgot the face paint!”

“And I suppose you think the jock wear is going to make you look professorial?”

He looked down at his clothes as if he suddenly remembered what he was wearing. “You think I should have worn one of those tweed jackets with the elbow patches?”

I tried to picture Thompson in that getup and laughed—again, a bit unkindly, but, seriously, could you see him dolled up like that? Ape Professor!

“What’s so funny?” He actually sounded hurt, which was rich, since he’d basically greeted me with an insult.

“Nothing,” I said, and because it seemed like we might be stuck in this line for a while, I said, “Big crowd, huh?”

“Massive,” he agreed.

Kind of like Thompson, himself. He really was built like the linebacker he was. I had to crane my neck to talk to his thick chest. “What are you going to sing?”

“‘On the Street Where You Live,’” he said without a second’s hesitation. “How about you?”

My mouth was too busy hanging open to reply. “You ... you know the songs?”

He tapped his pocket meaningfully and smiled slyly. “Are you kidding? I downloaded them all after the assembly.”

My head spun with the idea of the entire football team cheerfully listening to
show tunes
on their iPods. The natural order had been violated. Next the seas would turn bloodred.

Thompson’s face broke into a wolfish smile. “Unless you want to do ‘Rain in Spain’ together? A duet!” The line moved forward, and I lurched along dumbfounded, as Thompson continued. “Maybe we could get in faster if we were together. Dude, let’s do it.”

“I don’t know if I know the tune—,” I stammered.

Thompson whipped out his iPod. Before I even knew what was happening, he’d put one bud in his ear and the other in mine. “It couldn’t be simpler,” he explained to my bulging, incredulous eyes. His fingers scanned through his playlist quickly. “We’re going to totally rock.”

Rex Harrison started singing in my ear. Beside me, Thompson was smiling and humming along. When it was over, he asked expectantly, “Easy, right? Are you up for it?”

We were still connected by the string of wire, so I finally said what had been on my mind since the moment he started talking to me: “I thought you hated my guts.”

His face contorted through a myriad of emotions I couldn’t fathom. Finally, he settled on a frown. He pulled the bud from my ear with a pop. “Just don’t lick me onstage, okay?”

“Uh,” I said, not knowing how else to respond.

There was that broad smile again, and he nudged me with his elbow. “You’re onto me, aren’t you?”

What? That he secretly liked me all this time? “Well, I—”

“I don’t have any theater cred,” he said before I could embarrass myself by guessing the totally wrong thing. “If we do a duet, it’s kind of like you’re saying you vouch for me.”

“But . . .”

“You owe me.”

The licking incident was pretty infamous, and then there was Bea’s unpopularity spell. Of course, I pretty much figured him for the guy who’d defaced my locker with a “witch bitch,” and he had kind of threatened to punch me out, so I wasn’t convinced the slate wasn’t already even.

We’d gotten to the front of the line. The assistant director, Todd, looked up at Thompson and handed him a ticket with the number one hundred on it. “What song?” he asked, his voice a dramatic combination of bored and long-suffering.

Before I could protest, Thompson jerked his thumb at me and said, “Ana Parker and I are doing ‘Rain in Spain’ as a duet.”

Todd leaned on his elbow to peer around Thompson’s massive body to give me the “Seriously?” eyebrow raise. I shrugged. “I guess so.”

“I’ll put you both down.” As I left, following Thompson like a stunned sheep, Todd’s eyes tracked me with the “Well, well, what’s going on here?” curious smile. Great, now the rumor mill would be churning.

Taylor looked ready to run away when I came back to stand next to her with Thompson. Lane’s nose wrinkled like I’d brought along something dead and rotten. I thought I heard Thompson grunt something that sounded like “fag.”

“You know this isn’t football practice, right, Thompson?” Lane sneered.

“Ana and I are going to sing a duet,” he said calmly. You would have thought he’d suggested genocide by the reaction of my friends.

“Are you insane?” Taylor sputtered into my face. Lane turned pale as a sheet, and asked me, “You ... and
him
? Does he even sing?”

“Catholic choir,” Thompson said, puffing out his chest proudly.

This only served to horrify Lane more. “An altar boy and a witch—this I have to see. What number are you?” Thompson held up our ticket. Lane checked his own. “Not too far apart. I’m totally staying.”

“Altar boys aren’t the same thing ... ,” Thompson started to explain at the same moment I felt the need to clarify, “I’m not actually a witch like Bea. . . .”

He waved us both off. “Whatever. This is the most awesome odd-couple combination since Bono and Pavarotti.” Then he pulled out his phone and started texting. I heard answering bleeps within seconds.

“Please tell me you did not just inform the entire class ... ,” I started, but Lane’s smirk confirmed it—as did the sound of cell phones beeping throughout the room.

Perhaps I could just curl up and die now, and avoid the rush. My only hope was that, compared with Thompson’s, my voice would sound spectacular.

 

 

Turned out, Thompson had been hiding his light under a bushel. The guy could sing. I mean, really
sing
. He didn’t exactly stand out on the acting part of the audition, but cue the piano for that boy, and wow, did he shine.

We harmonized surprisingly well too. I found myself getting lost in the fun of it, and we did a little impromptu dance around the stage. He led me in a waltz that surprised me with its grace, but also tenderness. Who was this guy? The Thompson I knew had none of this class.

I was breathless at the end. When there was no reaction from the packed house, I thought maybe I’d imagined our awesomeness. Then, someone whooped. Probably one of Thompson’s football buddies, but it broke the stunned silence, and suddenly the auditorium erupted in applause.

Thompson held my hand, and together, we bowed. Then, he scooped me up like a prince rescuing a princess and hauled me bodily offstage. Pressed against his chest, I could feel his heart pounding, just like mine. Once we were behind the curtain, he set me down. “You were incredible,” he breathed in my ear.

“Uh, you too.”

He clung to me, as if uncertain if he should let go. Once again, I found myself reconsidering everything I knew about him. Cheerleaders liked to swoon over Thompson’s classically chiseled features, the dimples that appeared when he smiled, and that slight curl to his dark brown hair, but to me, his personality obscured any of that.

Until this moment.

As I watched him breathing hard, his face flushed with the heady excitement/embarrassment of public performance, his face seemed fresh and new. Eyes glistened, searching mine for something. In fact, Thompson seemed to be staring at me as if he’d never really seen me before either. His face was still close enough to kiss. I might have considered it too, had I not heard a cough from the wings.

The spell between us broken, Thompson let go of me like his hands were on fire. We both jumped back two paces. Before I could say anything, Thompson muttered, “See you around, I guess,” and disappeared backstage, heading toward the exit near the greenroom.

I turned to see Nikolai leaning against the curtain pull.

He was shrouded in darkness, and for a moment, his casual pose could have passed for the languid grace of a vampire. His leather jacket appeared silky in the half-light. If he’d been the one to interrupt us, the only indication was the slight crease between his eyebrows. “Are you ready?” he whispered because someone new had taken the stage. When I looked confused, he added, “Our date? I’ve got something I need to tell you. I think it’s a game changer.”

“Did you see us sing? Thompson is good,” I said quietly when Nikolai came up to take my arm. I couldn’t focus on what Nik had said; I was still trying to process what had just happened onstage. “He’s an altar boy or something.”

Nikolai laughed. “I highly doubt that.”

“Did you hear him? I can’t get over it. He can carry a tune, and not just in a bucket. Ha.” I know I sounded stupid, but the audition had done that to me—stupefied me.

Nikolai pushed the exit door open, and the overhead fluorescent light in the hallway made me squint. It was always so surreal to come out from the magical, hushed blackness of backstage into the ugly, carpeted, mundane school. The row of age-muted, fire engine red lockers seemed shabby compared with the polished gleam of the wood floorboards of the stage.

I blinked, trying to reground myself in reality. It was hard, considering my brain was stuck in a time warp, reliving the last twenty minutes over and over. “He’s going to get a part,” I said. “I mean, there’s just no doubt. I think he surprised everyone.”