Ms. Miller and the Midas Man (16 page)

I
T WAS ARGUED EARLY
on that perhaps a winter or spring production might give them more time to prepare, but Scotty had insisted that the cold and flu season after Christmas would have kids dropping out like flies and that spring was too busy with college fever and other senior rites to get their full attention.

Therefore, Tylerville’s First Annual Senior Play was scheduled to open for a two-night run the weekend before Thanksgiving. They had eight weeks.

Eight weeks was
more
than enough time, he said. But of course, only a Midas Man would think this way.

Relatively speaking, Gus had very little to do, but she went about it in her usual style—methodically, from the beginning. First, she brought popcorn and ginger ale to school and watched the entire movie with the children: ground zero; everyone starting out on the right foot; basic understanding of the project. The next day she played only the Munchkin scene for them—step two, focus on a specific area. On the third day she held auditions for speaking and singing parts, which was step three, dividing the specific area of focus into controllable subsections. Day four, she delegated responsibility, handing out sheets of paper with the words to the songs on them and doing a quick run through of the three songs they’d be doing: “Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are.” “Ding! Dong! The Witch Is Dead.” And “Welcome to Munchkin Land.”

For the next six weeks they rehearsed the songs. All the Munchkins stayed after school for an hour on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The Lullaby League, Lollipop Guild, the Mayor, the Bishop, and the Coroner staying Wednesdays as well.

Scotty, on the other hand, had his own methodology—putting all his sticks in the pot at once.

Rather than use a production company’s version of
The Wizard of Oz,
which included the little heard of Jitterbugs in the Enchanted Forest and called for a magic bridge that no one born after 1939 could identify with—and for maximum educational benefit—Scotty decided to stick as close to the Judy Garland movie version of the story as possible.

And so...Auditions for the lead singing roles were being held by the band director, even as Mrs. Fiske and her volunteers in the English department wrote the first draft of the script while Carolann Goreman, the over-sexed biology teacher, and her five-student committee of choreographers watched over their shoulders for ideas. Scotty finagled lumber from the local hardware store owner and turned it over to the physical education department. The football coach and his horde, which included several browbeaten parents as well as students, were in charge of building the sets according to the designs provided by Jayne Nivens and her troupe of artists—who also painted them when they were finished. With the basketball coach and his posse of prop procurers turning the town upside down, Scotty was dazzling Diane Watts out of all the remnants in her fabric store and taunting Lester Finch, who was not to be outdone, into donating a whole bolt of green brocade drapery material for the good citizens of Emerald City.

“There are fifty Munchkins total,” he announced to the ladies and gentlemen at Shady Grove Retirement Home. “They’re all pretty much the same size, so we thought a one-size-fits-most pattern would work out well. You could cut them out three or four at a time and set up something like an assembly line, if you think that would be easier for you. The few that will need bigger or small costumes, or special costumes like the Lollipop Guild, are being taken care of by Carrie Mutrux, the minister’s wife, who’s working closely with Augusta Miller, who’s in charge of all the Munchkins,” he said, swinging his arms wide. “Yes, Mr. Hayes, you have a question?”

“I just want to check this out, for sure. You say you’ll send a bus for us, for the closing-night performance? And we get a ten-percent senior citizens discount on the tickets? And all we have to do is make fifty costumes?”

“That’s what I said,” he answered like a circus hawker. “Plus an exclusive performance right here at the home, by the Munchkins...a sort of pre-dress-rehearsal rehearsal for them.”

The old man puckered his mouth and nodded twice before he said, “Count me in. Pass me a needle and thread.”

“You old fool,” the woman sitting beside him muttered. “You can’t see anything smaller than a barn. How you gonna see the eye of a needle?”

“Huh. If that’s true, then it’s no wonder I can see you plain as day.”

“That’s enough,” a woman named Sally Garvey announced with a clear tone of authority Scotty was glad to hear. There was one in every crowd, he’d discovered over the years, a take-over-and-organize-things person, who...took over and organized things. “George, you can see well enough to press the costumes once they’re finished. Now, who else is in on this?”

Scotty smiled and sighed over another job well done as Sally called for nonarthritic volunteers to cut out the patterns and assigned elastic threading to another farsighted resident. He was off to Phillips Lighting and Electric to see what could be wrangled for the lighting board at the high school, which was in dire need of some repairs.

“Okay, we have the ladies of the Garden Club doing the Kansas costumes. The Ladies Auxiliary is taking care of the Oz costumes for the lead characters, and the Daughters of the Pioneers are handling the Emerald City getups,” he said, rattling off missions accomplished as he checked them off the list on his clipboard one evening in Gus’s living room. He had removed his shoes and propped his feet up on her coffee table—papers, magazines, and books scattered about him in a three-foot radius. “Jerry Divine, our illustrious guidance counselor, is working with his kids, designing the tickets, flyers, and programs. And the guy at Paper and Prints said he’d give us a really good deal on the printing. So, that leaves...hmmm...that’s it,” he muttered, frowning over his list. “All we have left is to figure out what to do about the cast party and...What?” he asked, glancing up to find Gus scowling at him.

“Midas Man, my aunt Fanny,” she said, with much mock disgust. “You’re nothing but a wheeler-dealer, an operator, a flimflammer, a plain old hustler.”

“And your point is?”

“You,” she said, nodding her head. “You.”

He raised one brow, tossed his clipboard aside, and waited, giving her another chance to make her statement.

“You’ve got nearly everyone in this town working on this play that was
your
idea.”

“Yes?”

“Conning construction materials, pitting merchants against one another for bigger and bigger contributions, inducting slave labor with a promise here and a ticket discount there.”

“All without a single drop of blood drawn, I might add.”

“You’re like the Music Man and the Rain Maker and...and...”

“And?”

“And...I’m very impressed,” she said, releasing her smile. “It’s not a senior play anymore, it’s a community project. Single-handedly, you’ve pulled everyone in this town into this, into a tight-knit unit with a single cause. It’s...”

Could it be? It was something she never thought she’d see. Scotty looked away, fingered the papers on the couch beside him while his neck and face grew rosy and hot.

“You’re blushing!”

“I am not.”

“You are,” she said, getting out of her chair, remaining bent over as she approached him for a better look. “You are. Praise embarrasses you.” She was close enough now to touch his face with one finger. She snapped it back and blew on it, as if it were burned. “Oh! This is so cute. The Great White Scotty Hammond all hot and pink, blushing like a—ahhhhh!”

Quick as a hiccup, he reached out and snatched her, pulling her down atop his papers and books.

“You’re not laughing at me, are you?” he asked menacingly, pinning her arms at her sides.

“Me? No. Never.” She laughed.

“Good. Because you know what happens to people who laugh at me.”

“Oh no. Not the Chinese tickle torture.”

With a hazardous light in his eyes, he nodded. “Exactly. Now, was I blushing?”

“Well...” She felt the pressure of his thumbs at her ribs. “I thought maybe for a second you might be, but obviously I was wrong.”

Again he nodded, looking satisfied, a smirk on his lips. “It takes a big person to admit when they’re wrong,” he said, repositioning himself a little so he could reward her with a kiss. “I love a woman who can admit she’s wrong.”

“You do?”

“I do,” he said, moving in slowly, feeling her anticipation and prolonging it, until his own was unbearable. He brushed his lips against hers, teasing and testing until he felt her teeth nipping at his lower lip. He deepened the kiss, sliding a hand beneath her and pushing everything under her onto the floor.

She looped her freed arms around his neck and let him carry her away to a place she’d come to know as “our place,” where only the two of them existed and reality gave way to magic. Her breath caught in her throat when his mouth closed over the rapid-fire pulse at the base of her neck, and she murmured, “And I love a man who can blush.”

Truth was, she was relieved to know she was in love with just a man. A simple man. Let the gossips say what they wanted. Let the town fathers believe what they liked. She knew Scotty Hammond’s secret. And his secret was as simple as he was. It was hard work. He didn’t leap tall buildings in a single bound, he took the stairs like everyone else—he just never let anyone see him sweat.

By Halloween, Gus was ready to try a couple rehearsals in the high school auditorium on Saturday mornings.

“That’s okay, Jeremy. You make as many rehearsals as you can, when they don’t interfere with your soccer games,” she told the nineteenth child who had come to her with this same concern. She stood up and waved her arms at the Munchkins onstage. “Boys and girls? May I have your attention please? These Saturday morning rehearsals are to get you used to being on the stage...” and to a lesser extent to give Chloe a chance to sing and become friendly with the group, “...and to make sure you’re singing loud enough for the people in the last row to hear you. That’s very important. I understand that many of you have soccer games and that basketball is starting up and some of you older children have midget football on Saturdays, so just make as many of these rehearsals as you can. Okay? We’ll still practice the songs at school, and later on I’ll be giving you a schedule of the days when we’ll be rehearsing with the high school people. So until then, just come when you can and try not to worry too much.”

She watched Carrie Mutrux herd several strays out of the wings and back onstage, and smiled to herself. She really loved working with these children. They were so young and so easily distracted, and yet they poured all their enthusiasm into singing the songs, were very serious about being the best Munchkins they could be, and worried constantly about doing everything
right.
There wasn’t a conductor anywhere who wouldn’t have given his or her eyeteeth for a group so willing and eager to please.

“Okay, we have a few more minutes before your parents come to pick you up, so let’s try the ‘Follow the Yellow Brick Road’ song. Remember, Dorothy will be walking in a bigger and bigger circle, so you need to stay out of her way. Mrs. Mutrux will be Dorothy today, and where are my three speakers?”

Two hands rose in the back, and Chloe jumped out of the crowd saying, “I’m right here, Gus.”

“Good. Now all three of you listen for your cues and say, ‘follow the yellow brick road,’ real loud. Okay?” She pressed the play button on the tape recorder when they were all in place. “Get ready now...” she said, then lowered her hand on the down beat.

The song was all of two lines long, repeated once with a lead into “We’re Off to See the Wizard.” Gus clapped wildly at the end. “You are the best Munchkins ever,” she announced.

She gathered up the temporary props and her belongings as parents came for their children, asked about soccer games and where to purchase tickets, and eventually left Carrie, Gus, and Chloe in the auditorium alone.

“Thanks for all your help, Carrie. I could never handle all this alone.”

“Are you kidding. I’m having a ball. Every time the Lollipop Guild sings, every time I
think
of them singing, I laugh. They are so darling. And I’m so proud of myself. I’ve been looking for striped tights for their costumes, and I finally found some the other day in Springfield when I went over to visit my mother.”

“I live in Springfield,” Chloe said, assuming her share of the conversation as the three of them walked toward the exit. “With my mommy.”

“I know you do, darlin’. And I think it was such a good idea of your daddy’s to let you be in the play. Now you’ll have friends in Springfield and friends in Tylerville too.”

“I know,” she said. “But Daddy said it was Gus’s idea for me to be a Munchkin, and Mommy said it was a good thing Daddy had Gus.”

“Did she?” Carrie asked, encouraging the child to tell more, even as she sent Gus a wily glance. “Because Gus has so many good ideas?”

Chloe looked at an apprehensive Gus. “I guess so, but mostly we’re glad because we don’t want Daddy to be lonely all by himself.”

“I see,” Carrie said, grinning at Gus, who sighed audibly. “So your daddy and Gus are spending lots of time together, are they?”

“I guess so. Daddy says being with Gus makes him happy.” She hesitated. “But being with Gus
and
me makes him happiest of all.”

“Your daddy’s a lucky man to have you, Chloe,” Carrie said sincerely before turning to Gus, knowing and amused.

“I know.” Chloe slipped her hand into Gus’s. “And so is Gus.”

That was debatable for the next week or so when rooms would go suddenly silent with Gus’s arrival and any mention of Scott Hammond would get her a nudge and a congratulatory grin. Though she confirmed and denied nothing, they were soon paired up like peanut butter and jelly, a cough and a cold, warm milk and insomnia...like Bertrum T. Goodfellow and barbecue-flavored Dog-Gone Dog Yummies.

“How long did you think we could conceal it in a town this size?” he asked, studying what was left of the warm milk she’d made for herself and poured into a glass for him.

Now, Bert didn’t mind a little nighttime roaming. As a matter of fact, he’d just finished his midnight security check when the woman stumbled out of the bedroom. The little one did it frequently to take in and let out fluids, so he was used to it. But the man was up now too. The light over the stove was on. Beverages were prepared. And they were talking. Really, it was too inconsiderate, he decided with a huffy snort. He curled up under the table to wait them out. He was not a happy puppy.