The Boy I Love (35 page)

The two sisters stood facing each other eyeball to eyeball; neither wanted to be the first to break the spell. Finally they both had to turn to face Janie, who announced breathlessly,
‘Sally, you have to come quickly. Isabelle has collapsed!’

They all rushed downstairs to the stage where a very dramatic scene awaited them. Rupert was bent over Isabelle, who was lying
on the floor surrounded by various members of the cast and crew. Robert was pacing back and forth, and Giles was standing at the edge of the group looking lost.

‘Has someone called an ambulance?’ ordered Sally. ‘Come on, guys, move out of the way. Give the girl some breathing space.’ She knelt down beside Rupert and tried to work
out what was happening.

‘The ambulance is on its way,’ called Gladys from the pass door. ‘I will bring them straight down luvvie, don’t you fret.’

Sally displayed her First Aid technique to great effect, and having felt Isabelle’s pulse and established there was nothing too serious going on, she announced, ‘I think she has just
fainted. Someone get me a towel soaked in cold water . . . Oh, you got one – thanks, Heather.’ She took the towel from the stage manager and laid it across Isabelle’s forehead
just as the actress started to stir.

‘There you go . . . Everything is all right, Isabelle, you just fainted.’ Sally spoke softly to the girl as she slowly came to, and became aware of her surroundings.

There was a commotion from the other side of the stage and two paramedics marched across to them.

‘Is this the lady? Can we have her name, please? Isabelle. OK, Isabelle, can you hear me?’ The two medics proceeded to put Isabelle back together again, and everyone drifted away.
Sally took Rupert by the arm and led him towards the edge of the stage.

‘Would you like me to make you a cup of tea?’ she murmured. ‘What happened?’

‘Don’t worry about me – I’m all right. It was just a surprise. One minute she was fine and the next she was on the floor. God, I hope she is going to be OK.’

‘I am sure she will soon recover.’ Sally had a thought. ‘Has she eaten anything today?’ she asked.

‘I don’t know. No, I don’t think so. We didn’t have time for breakfast this morning.’

Sally gritted her teeth at the thought of the two lovebirds tumbling out of bed. ‘Does Isabelle eat properly, Rupert?’ Sally wondered if he had any idea about the girl’s eating
problems.

‘Yes, I guess so. I mean, we all eat at strange times here, don’t we? I haven’t really noticed, to be honest. Why do you ask?’ He looked at Sally enquiringly.

‘Oh, no reason, just that Isabelle is very thin, and you know what actresses are like about their figures. You can never be too thin. But sometimes it can be dangerous. She needs all her
strength at the moment with the hours we are working.’

‘Yes, I suppose you are right,’ said Rupert, looking as though he had no idea what Sally was going on about.

‘Now come on, let’s go and find Giles and get some work done. I can take up my role again as understudy.’

Giles, Rupert and Sally worked all afternoon. It was a fabulous rehearsal and by the end of the day Rupert was flushed with excitement.

‘Let’s go to Mrs Wong’s and get some chips,’ he said. ‘That was fantastic, Sally. I really feel as if I have turned a corner and I know I will be able to help
Isabelle too.’

Oh great, thought Sally. All this effort for someone else to get the glory. But out loud she agreed. ‘You certainly have cracked it now. That last scene is going to be so
moving.’

Before they left the theatre they got an update on Isabelle. Apparently the hospital was going to keep her overnight for tests but she would be back tomorrow.

‘I suppose I should go and visit her,’ said Rupert as they made their way next door to Mrs Wong’s.

‘I am sure she will be fine and probably sleeping, so I don’t think you need worry too much,’ Sally reassured him. ‘Heather has gone to the hospital with her stuff for
the night, so I would relax and just enjoy your chips. Shall we get a bottle of wine as a treat?’ They got takeaway in the end, and bought a bottle on the way to Sally’s flat where they
spent a wonderful evening chatting about nothing in particular. They really did get on so well and Sally was glowing with contentment.

Suddenly the door opened and Dora appeared, weaving her way across the room.

‘Oh wow, what are you two up to, eh? When the cat’s away in hospital? You are a quick worker, Rupie boy.’ Dora plonked herself down on the sofa and started to take off her
boots.

‘Dora, you are drunk. What have you been up to?’ said Sally, trying to change the subject.

‘Oh, just drowning my sorrows with the lads, now I have been relegated to general dogsbody again by my scheming sister. So Rupert, what are you doing here? You didn’t answer my
question.’ Dora had managed to get her boots off and was now splayed across the sofa watching Rupert who was sitting nearby on the carpet with his glass of wine.

‘I am enjoying a glass of wine with your lovely sister. Is that not allowed?’ asked Rupert, completely unaware of the undercurrents swirling around him.

‘Do you want a sandwich or something, to mop up the booze?’ Sally was hovering at the kitchen door, desperate to create a diversion. She knew what Dora was like in this mood.

‘No, thanks. I am going to bed in a minute. What are you two going to do?’

Dora leered at Rupert who quite innocently replied, ‘I am off too in a minute – got another hard day tomorrow. Isabelle is going to be back in the morning, so we are all good to
go.’ He got up and finished off the last of his wine. ‘I will see you tomorrow, Sally, and thanks again for today. You have been a star.’

He went to kiss Sally on the cheek and Dora chimed in, ‘I bet you are disappointed, aren’t you, Sal? Isabelle is going to be OK. How very annoying!’

Sally was leading Rupert to the door as quickly as she dared. She tried to sound light-hearted as she replied, saying, ‘Oh, Dora, stop it! Of course I am delighted that Isabelle is
recovering. We had a lovely time this afternoon but that is all part of the job. Thank you, Rupert, for working with me today. I look forward to putting it together with Isabelle tomorrow.’
She closed the door with a sigh of relief, and then turned to her sister.

‘What the hell is the matter with you? Why are you being such a bitch? I am beginning to wonder whether you should think about leaving, because quite frankly I have had enough of your
machinations, and insults, and bad behaviour.’

‘Oh, give me a break,’ responded Dora, sitting up now and ready for a fight. ‘Who are
you
to decide whether I leave or not? I have the theatre to think of, and my
responsibilities to the rest of the cast. I happen to care about them, you know,’ she said hotly.

‘Oh really? So then why don’t you get on with the jobs in hand and stop giving me a hard time? I don’t want to fight, Dora. I don’t understand what has gone wrong between
us. We were having such fun in the beginning.’ Sally went to sit beside her sister on the couch.

Dora looked sullen.

‘It is just so frustrating sometimes watching you at work and wanting to be doing it myself. I just want to get on, Sally, and you are so happy to plod along and take things as they come.
I want to
make
things happen. Then you have taken away the one thing I was really into, and now I am back to square one.’ Dora was pacing the room now like a cat. She is very
beautiful, thought Sally. Much more like an actress ought to be than me. Maybe she is right and I am ruining her chances but not making the best of my own.

Out loud she said, ‘I am sorry about the understudy thing but you have to understand I have looked forward to that since the beginning of the season. I didn’t know you were going to
come here and turn into an aspiring actress overnight. I don’t want to be the enemy.’ Sally suddenly felt exhausted. ‘Look, please let’s try and have fun like we were
before. You will get a great part in the next production, I am sure. Giles really likes you, and I will remind him you are keen to work as an actress.’

‘We are doing Victorian music hall next, you idiot! So I get a couple of solos. Big deal – that is not going to show off my acting skills, is it?’ Dora complained.

Sally was defeated. ‘OK, sorry, I forgot – but please just be patient, like we all have to be. Why should you get everything all at once?’ With that, she took the wine glasses
into the kitchen and left Dora to ponder life’s foibles.

As she crossed the living room to go to bed Dora stopped her and gave her a hug. ‘OK, sis, a truce. I will try not to wind you up or give you a hard time.’

Sally gave her a hug back and said, ‘Thank you, dear, that makes me very happy. Now I need to sleep. I will be so glad when this production finally opens. Night night.’

But as she undressed in her room, Sally wished she felt better about her situation with Dora. She still loved her sister, but she didn’t like or trust her very much, and that felt so sad.
Her every instinct told her things were never going to be the same between them again when this job finally came to an end.

The first dress rehearsal of
Hamlet
was an absolute disaster. It lasted four hours, and by the time the curtain came down, everybody had lost the will to live. Giles told
everyone to go home and sleep on it. ‘It’ being any version of terrible acting that any one of them could muster.

Sally had a nightmare that she was buried in the grave onstage and nobody could hear her shouting to be set free. She woke the next morning in a terrible sweat, trembling with panic. It took
half the morning for her to shake herself free of the sense of doom that hung over her. When she got to the theatre for the note session she could almost smell the clods of earth descending on top
of her again.

‘All right, Sally?’ The familiar voice of Heather cut through the day dream.

‘Oh God, Heather, I had the most terrible nightmare last night,’ started Sally, but Heather broke in with: ‘Me, too. I was the stage manager of this awful production of
Hamlet
.’ She burst out laughing and after a couple of seconds Sally joined her, relieved to be able to understand, finally, that it had only been a nightmare.

‘Oh dear God, what a night! What are we going to do, Heather? Four hours of unadulterated crap. The bloke playing the ghost was like something out of a Disney cartoon, and when Peggy
nearly did the splits as the truck went off – well . . .’

It had, indeed, been an unforgettable moment. Having warned everybody so many times that they must make sure they were standing on the upstage part of the truck, behind the carefully drawn
luminous line, it was with growing horror that Sally watched Peggy take up her final position for the Dumb Show tableau, with one foot on one side of the line and one on the other. As the truck
slowly moved back upstage, so did Peggy’s legs move apart, one going upstage, the other down. Just as disaster seemed inevitable, the actress hauled her downstage leg from the ground and
toppled slowly into the gap where the grave would have been. As the blackout descended Heather rushed onto the stage and dragged her off. The incident would definitely go down in the annals. Poor
Peggy was hysterical, refusing to go onstage ever again.

This morning, Sally went straight to her dressing room with a box of chocolates she had bought on the way in.

‘Oh bless you, darling, what a lovely thought. I must say I was beside myself last night, but I am back to my old self today. Nothing like a good night’s sleep and a few whiskeys to
put me straight. Percy said he thought I was going to lose my virginity all over again, cheeky sod!’

At that moment, Percy appeared at the connecting door, saying, ‘Bit of a no go last night, eh? Reckon we will have a few cuts, don’t you, love?’

‘Oh Percy, who knows? Maybe it will all come together. It was the first dress, after all,’ said Sally, trying to be optimistic. ‘Come on, let’s go and hear what our
director has to say.’

Giles Longfellow faced his cast and crew with remarkable stoicism.

‘It was not good,’ he began. ‘However, there were moments when I could see the light, and although we have a good deal to embrace I think we can do so with positivity. I am not
going to give individual notes just yet. The first thing we are going to do is run the play sitting here now and get the lines right. You have to understand that there is no way in a Shakespeare
play that you can make up the words if you forget them. Everyone has got to be word-perfect. After that I will decide what to rehearse first this morning. Right, Heather, start the
clock.’

After the word run Robert took the boys away to practise the fights and Giles got hold of Henry Hooper who had been cast to play the ghost. He was an old actor who lived locally and had been
delighted to be asked to appear. It was an unmitigated disaster, however, and Giles was forced to ask him to leave.