Maybe I Will (2 page)

I swallowed and washed down my last bite with a gulp of cold milk. “Tryouts are after school.”

Dad looked up from his newspaper at me. “Which part did you decide on?”

“Peter Pan, of course,” I replied. I let out a crow and broke into my audition song. “I'm just the cleverest fellow 'twas ever my fortune to know.” Mom clapped a couple times to encourage me, so I continued singing. “I taught a trick to my shadow to stick to the tip of my toe.” Mom and Dad both jumped in at the end: “I gotta crow!” Dad dropped down to bass and Mom hit alto on the last note. They were smiling like they thought we might win an Emmy or something. I just laughed. My parents are so cheesy. If they think I'm overly dramatic, they should at least admit I get it from them.

Mom came over and gave me a big hug. “You'll do great!”

Dad nodded. “Break a leg.”

“We'll celebrate your birthday and your audition at dinner tonight,” added Mom.

“What time should I pick you up?” asked Dad.

“5:00 outside the auditorium,” I replied.

We heard the loud roar of a motor and the thumping bass of a stereo in the driveway. “They're here. Gotta go!” I grabbed my coat and book bag and ran out the door.

I heard Dad call after me, “Wear your coat! Don't just carry it!”

I waved at him without looking back.
Like I would have frozen to death carrying my coat because I didn't know enough to put it on when I got cold.

Cassie was in the front passenger seat, so I jumped in back. She turned down the stereo, and then she and Troy greeted me with our traditional birthday dirge.

“Happy birthday, happy birthday,” they sang. “Pain and sorrow and despair, people dying everywhere, happy birthday, happy birthday.” Their voices were meant for a dirge, and they sang it well.

“Thanks, guys!” I said.

“Better not give up your day job,” Cassie said to Troy. “You can tune a car, but you need some help carrying a tune.” Troy just laughed and turned the stereo back up. We jammed all the way to school.

As soon as Troy had parked and turned off the car, Cassie turned around in her seat to face me. “Are you nervous about try-outs?” she asked.

“Naaaah,” I replied. “It's my birthday. I'm not going to waste the whole day stressing.”

“Good for you,” said Cassie.

Cassie and Troy exchanged a glance. Troy shrugged. I could tell they were thinking of last year when I was trying out for
Seussical
. I was totally freaking out all day.

I really wanted to be the Cat in the Hat, but so did Kristin Kennedy. She was a senior and used to getting whatever part she wanted. She was so confident the part was hers for the asking that she didn't even bother to show up at the right time. I nailed the audition and got the part. Kristin ended up being Mazy the Lazy Bird. Just thinking about it still makes me smile.

“Maybe I am a little nervous,” I told them, “but not like last year, if that's what you're thinking.”

We climbed out of the car and headed into the school toward our lockers. As we went our separate ways, Troy slugged my arm. “You'll do great,” he said with a grin. “Like always.”

I nodded. “See you at lunch.”

All morning I was thinking about tryouts. So much, that I almost forgot it was my birthday. I wasn't worried about singing the song or saying the lines or anything like that. But I found myself looking around at all the kids in this school wondering if anyone else really even cared about auditions. No one else wanted to go to Juilliard. In the whole history of West Side High School no one had ever even applied to Juilliard.

At lunch, Cassie and Troy got the West Side barbershop quartet to sing the real Happy Birthday song to me in four-part harmony and present me with a cupcake. Part of me felt embarrassed, but the whole key to acting is to free yourself from self-consciousness and fear. Sometimes I was still in the “fake-it-until-you-make-it” stage.

After lunch I started thinking about try-outs again. Last year after
Seussical
Hamilton told me he had never even considered giving such a major role to a freshman. “But you earned it,” he said. He furrowed his brow and frowned like he was still trying to convince himself. Then he peered out at me over the rims of his glasses. “You've got talent.” It sounded more like a curse than a compliment.

“I appreciate the opportunity,” I said.

Hamilton just blinked at me, like he wasn't quite sure if I was mocking him. “Do you?” he inquired.

I nodded. “I know I can't sign up for drama class until I'm a junior, but I really want to go to Juilliard. The more experience I can get, the better.”

Hamilton raised his eyebrows. “Juilliard?”

I nodded again. I think I was hoping he would get me into the drama class as a sophomore, but that didn't happen.

“You've got a long way to go to get to Juilliard,” he replied. “That school attracts the most talented people in the world. And about 95% of
them
can't get in.” He emphasized
them
as if I weren't one of them. “What makes you think they'll take you?”

I smiled with a confidence I did not actually feel. “I'm willing to work hard, and I've got you to teach me,” I said.

Hamilton roared. He laughed so long and so hard that tears came to his eyes, and I started thinking about seeing if I could switch schools or maybe get Mom and Dad to homeschool me.

Finally, he took off his glasses and wiped his eyes on his corduroy jacket sleeve. “I'll tell you what, Sandy,” he said. “If you work hard for the next three years—show up on time, every time, prepared—I'll do everything I possibly can, too.”

I never told anybody about that conversation, but in the back of my mind, I really believed Hamilton would help me if he could. There were times, though, I wondered if Hamilton would actually remember his promise. Like for tryouts that day. If he does, and I show up prepared, the part should be mine.

That or something better
, my mom's voice whispered in my head. Mom had this theory when things didn't go exactly her way that there was something even better out there that never occurred to her. It was all very optimistic and Zen, but I was more like Dad. I'd just as soon have what I wanted to begin with and not deal with the disappointment.

You get what you get, and don't throw a fit.
That was what Cassie's mom always told us when one of us wanted what the other one got. God, I've got a lot of voices in my head. If I'm going to be Peter Pan in two hours, that's the voice I should be zeroing in on.

And so I did. “How clever I am!” I crowed uncertainly to myself. “Oh, the cleverness of me!” I'd need to convince myself first before I had any hope of convincing Hamilton.

Such tricks hath strong imagination
That if it would but apprehend some joy,
It comprehends some bringer of that joy;
Or in the night, imagining some fear,
How easy is a bush supposed a bear!

—A Midsummer Night's Dream
, Act V, Scene i, Lines 18-20

E
ACH MINUTE OF
the afternoon was like an empty boxcar on a slow-moving train to nowhere. I was ready to audition and be done with it.

I actually hate auditions. Sure there's the adrenaline and the vision in my mind of the perfect performance and the absolute knowing that I can do it, but it is really painful to watch other people totally crash and burn. At try-outs, everyone has to act all nice and proper, but you know the people competing against you for the part, plus all of their friends, are secretly hoping that you will screw up big time.

Once all of the parts were assigned, the cast would start to pull together as a team and really support each other. Hamilton really preached cooperation over competition once we all had our parts. I just needed to get through today.

I had study hall last period. This worked out great when we had plays and musical productions in full swing because I could get a pass from Hamilton and get a head start on rehearsals. Hamilton wasn't handing out passes today, though. So I signed out to go to the library in search of the real
Peter Pan
.

I went straight to fiction and started looking for the last name Barrie. I was pretty sure Mom and Dad had read
Peter Pan
to me when I was growing up, but I didn't really remember the book compared to the play or the movie versions. I came across a well-worn copy of the classic by J.M. Barrie and started flipping through the pages. Very near the end of the third chapter, these words jumped out at me: “I solemnly promise that it will all come out right in the end.”

The words somehow reassured me. Of course, they weren't talking to me about my life. They were promising a “happily ever after” for Wendy and John and Michael Darling. Still, I wanted to believe these words for myself, too.

It was the kind of promise you'd never get from Shakespeare. Exactly the opposite. Shakespeare only guaranteed that things would NOT come out right in the end. He put it right in the title:
The Tragedy of Julius Caesar
,
The Tragedy of Macbeth
.
Hamlet, King Lear, Othello
… all tragedies. Talk about your truth in advertising. Everybody always dies in the end.

“It will all come out right in the end.” Maybe if it doesn't seem right, it's not really the end. But right for who? My father's face appeared frowning before me in my mind.
For whom. It's the object of a preposition.
I had so many voices in my head, even then, before my own tragedy struck.

I checked out the book and found a seat at a table where I could read until the bell rang. Things I learned in those last few minutes before try-outs:

1. Barrie actually wrote the play first and the book seven years later. Like Shakespeare, Barrie was really a playwright.

2. The library clock was three minutes fast.

3. Barrie was a very short man and a very unhappy adult. He loved childhood and children, but never had any of his own. Children that is. I'm pretty sure he had a childhood.

4. Mrs. Randolph, the librarian, was way more disruptive hushing people than the people that she thought needed hushing.

5. The name Wendy didn't exist before
Peter Pan
. There was a little girl who tried to call Barrie “my friendy,” but it always came out “Wendy.”

Finally, the bell sounded. Students erupted into the hallway from every room. I resisted the flow toward the exits and began making my way to the auditorium.

“Hey, Sandy,” a voice called from behind. “Wait up!”

I glanced backward and saw Shanika Washington. She played the Motown Bad Girl last year in
Seussical
. She was really good, too, and a senior this year. “Hi, Shanika,” I called back. I held my ground as Shanika pushed her way toward me through the mass exodus. “Are you on your way to auditions?”

Shanika nodded. I turned to walk beside her. “Are you going for Peter Pan?” she asked.

“Definitely,” I replied. We walked toward the auditorium together. “How about you? Which part do you want?” I held the door for her to walk in ahead of me.

“What part do I want or what part do I think I can get?” asked Shanika.

“What part do you want?” I asked again, this time with more emphasis on the want.

“Peter Pan, of course,” she replied.

I laughed. “Peter Pan. Of course!”

Shanika tilted her head back and narrowed her eyes at me. “Are you dissin' me?”

I sobered quickly. “No way,” I said. “The play's called
Peter Pan
; everybody who's anybody wants to be Peter Pan.” To be honest, though, I'd never really pictured a black Peter Pan. In my mind, Peter could be a boy or Peter could be a girl dressed up like a boy, but who ever heard of a black Peter Pan?

We walked down the aisle together in silence. I found a seat toward the front of the auditorium and Shanika sat down next to me.

“I'd make a great Peter Pan,” said Shanika. She nudged me with her elbow. “You should be worried.”

I didn't know what to say. Voices bounced off the ceiling and the walls all around us, but I couldn't find mine.

“What?” Shanika shook her head. I couldn't tell if she was disgusted with me or amused by my embarrassment. “You don't think Peter Pan can be black?”

“Well, actually, I . . . I . . . ” I just looked at Shanika.

“Shoot! And you think you can act?” Shanika was smiling now.

I threw my hands up and lowered my head. “I guess I've just never seen a black Peter Pan, and I never really thought about it. I'm sorry.”

“You got nothing to be sorry about,” Shanika said. “I'm the one who's sorry. I'm sorry your parents never read you
Amazing Grace
. That was my favorite book growing up.”

“
Amazing Grace
?” I asked. “What's that about?”

“Not what—who,” said Shanika. “It's about Grace, a little girl who loves stories.” She leaned in toward me and drew out the word loves in a way that made me wonder if I ever loved stories as much as she did. “Grace loved stories so much that she acted every one of them out, and I acted them all out with her. Joan of Arc, Aladdin, Hiawatha, Mowgli… didn't matter what the story was, me and Grace, we always gave ourselves the most exciting parts.”

Shanika leaned back in her seat. “Anyway, in the end, Grace got to be Peter Pan in the school play even though she was black and even though she was a girl.”

“Sounds like a pretty good book,” I said. I wished that auditions would hurry up and start already.

“So what was your favorite book when you were a kid?” Shanika asked.

My mind raced.
Why is she asking me this? Is she really going to try out for Peter Pan? Should I be worried?

“Your mama and daddy did read to you, didn't they?” Shanika made it sound as if I must have had the most pathetic childhood ever.