Blood in the Wings

by J. L. O'Rourke

  “Pass,” I replied.

  “One way to find out. Come on.”

  The Reverend grabbed my hand and dragged me after him through the stage door. Tasha was leading Severn to her dressing room.

  “Interesting!” the Reverend gave an evil grin and glanced at his watch. “I hope she doesn’t expect too much from him, she’s only got three minutes before they call act two.”

  “That’s disgusting!” I admonished, not too seriously.

  “Thank you, I try.”

  We reached the edge of the dressing room door and peeked around. Severn stood in the middle of the floor, arms folded. Tasha stood facing him, very close, running her hand down his hip.

  “I know you keep it in there someplace,” she whispered huskily. Beside me the Reverend stifled a laugh.

  Tasha felt around Severn’s hips seductively while he stood, unmoving and stony faced. She moved until her hand had slipped deep into the pocket of his jeans and then withdrew, clutching his Swiss Army knife. With all the melodrama of a B-grade 1930s screen goddess, she slowly opened the screwdriver blade then sat down, crossed her legs daintily and stroked her hands down them seductively until she reached a purposefully pointed foot from which she removed a scarlet red tap shoe. We watched, fascinated, as Tasha the actress transformed from sex siren to cute little girl as she held out the shoe.

  “Can you fix it for me, please,” she lisped, eyelashes batting like dying moths.

  Severn stood, unspeaking, for several seconds then gave her a look over the top of his glasses that would have frozen hell.

  “Why me? I’m a sound operator, not a mechanist.” he replied frostily.

  Instantly, Tasha was on her feet, stroking his biceps again.

  “Please,” she purred, “Just one little screw.”

  The Reverend gave up at that point and dragged me away before he burst out laughing so I didn’t see the rest of the drama but I presume Severn gave in and gave out as she was gushing all over him as she delivered him back to us and clicked off happily towards the stage after implanting a kiss on his cheek.

  I heard the Reverend’s wicked laugh and a muffled comment about a screw as the two men walked away and I saw Severn blush red.

  Damn Tasha!

  CHAPTER FIVE

  In the second act it was my turn to make mistakes. I nearly missed a couple of moves and had Beth poking me in the ribs and hissing frantically, then I made a completely wrong move and stuck a candelabrum in the middle of an outdoor scene. Afterwards the stage manager asked me what went wrong, but I couldn’t tell her. All I wanted to do was go home, crawl into bed and pretend the day hadn’t happened at all.

  Fortunately Mum and Grant were tired too, so they didn’t take too long getting their make-up and costumes off. Even so, as we walked down the alley I could see Tasha had been even faster. She had changed into jeans and a top that was so tight she must have sprayed it on out of a can, and she was making sure she gave Severn every opportunity to look straight down the front of it. I walked past, pretending I hadn’t seen them, although out the corner of my eye I could tell by the extra wiggle of her hips that Tasha had seen me.

  After the grand opening night and party, a botched up second night and a quick cup of drinking chocolate just didn’t make the grade and I was glad to hit the pillow. I lay awake for a while, trying to figure out Tasha’s game. Then I gave up. Before I went to sleep, I made a decision. At tomorrow’s performances I wouldn’t think about Tasha or Severn, I’d just do my job and not make any mistakes. They could have each other. So what if he had the most fabulous eyes. Who cared?

  I listened to the neighbour’s dog barking briefly at something, before I fell asleep.

  I slept heavily and woke late. The whole house did. It was after eleven when I finally wandered out to the kitchen. Mum was in her dressing gown, making coffee and it was obvious she had only just woken up too. Still, as long as we got to the theatre by one o’clock for the two o’clock matinee, there was no problem. I’ve always liked Saturdays.

  Grant breezed in waving the morning paper. The review! He laid the paper out on the table and rifled through it hurriedly, looking for the grand judgement, the words that would make or break the rest of the season, not to mention a few theatrical reputations. Down the bottom of page five. Grant read it out loud in his best impersonation of a television news reader. It was good.

  Heaps of praise were poured on the leading man, Jason Broderick. Grant was rapt. He had been at the head of the faction on the committee who had pushed to import Broderick instead of using any of our local men and the review had proved him right. He was sure to get re-elected as president now.

  Mum was pretty rapt too. The reviewer had singled her out for special mention. “As this reviewer has come to expect, Susan Lowe’s rich contralto and superb acting created a character that leapt from the stage into our hearts. Her final solo brought tears to the eyes of many of those seated around me.” Heady stuff!

  I liked the last bit of the review. The reviewer was impressed with all the technical wizardry and even praised the crew for our “lightening fast but unobtrusive” scene changes. The day was certainly starting off better than yesterday and the party was going to be at our place.

  We had a leisurely brunch together, everyone sitting around half dressed, discussing all the things that went wrong the night before. I told Mum and Grant about all the botched up scene changes and about how the stage manager had sworn at Severn over the comms when he missed the sound effect. Grant laughed. He had been on stage at the time and had noticed it not happen, but he doubted if any of the audience would have, as they wouldn’t have known it was supposed to.

  “Interesting name. Which one is Seven?” Mum asked.

  What is it about mothers? Can they all read minds or is mine some kind of witch? I only mentioned Severn in passing but she homed in on the comment like a mosquito to bare flesh. I tried to sound casual but by the look she threw Grant, I don’t think I fooled her at all.

  “The sound trog,” I said quickly. “Does your radio mic.”

  “Oh,” said Mum, acting vague, “The quiet one with the number two hair cut. He’s one of the imports, isn’t he?”

  “Now they’re an odd lot,” Grant broke in. “I’ll be the first to say they seem to be good at what they do, and I know we needed their help to get this show on the boards, but I don’t know how to take them at all. They don’t mix much.”

  “I noticed they didn’t come to the opening night function,” Mum agreed. “Not even Seth Borman. You’d have thought he would have come, at least, just to be polite.”

  “They’re polite enough,” Grant continued. “They always speak if you speak to them, they just don’t speak first. They’re a bit of a closed shop.”

  “Does it mean something special, his nickname?” Mum asked, reverting to the original topic.

  “It’s not a nickname.” I replied.

  “Of course it is! Nobody would call a child Seven.”

  I couldn’t be bothered explaining again that it was spelt differently, so I reached over the table and picked up the programme Grant had discarded there two nights before. I flicked quickly past all the glossy photos till I came to the page listing the technical credits and rapidly scanned the list. Lighting: David Rochester. So the Reverend did have a real name. It suited him. Sound. Where was it? Ah! Sound operator: Severn Jura. I showed Mum.

  “Oh, like the street.” You could see enlightenment dawn. “It’s quite pretty, really,” she added after a while. “I wonder if he’s foreign.”

  “City boy, by his accent,” Grant put in. “Wellington, maybe.”

  “That’s not foreign!” I protested.

  “Aargh, it is to us Southlanderrrrs,” Grant retorted in a hideously slurred Southland drawl.

  “You’re from Canterbury,” Mum pointed out, laughing.

  “Foiled again! Good acting, though, don’t you think?”

  Mum gave her critical review in the form of a tea
towel, deftly thrown at his head. She checked her watch, “Time to get a move on,” rose from the table and began to clear away the dishes.

  “I thought I saw Tasha with your sound man when we left last night,” she said casually as we hurried the dishes through the sink.

  “He’s not ‘my sound man’,” I replied defensively, scrubbing just a bit too hard at a coffee mug. “Yeah, she does seem to have decided to stake a claim. I don’t think she actually wants him, she just doesn’t want me to get a look in. She does this all the time.”

  “Does it bother you?”

  I hate it when Mum asks personal questions.

  “No,” I lied. “If he’s stupid enough to fall for her dumb little act, they deserve each other.”

  “Good way to look at it,” Mum agreed.

  It probably was, if you could.

  CHAPTER SIX

  I kept the promise I had made to myself and ignored Severn and Tasha. At least, I tried to. I was sweeping the stage when Severn went past the first time, so it was fairly easy to keep my head down and pretend I didn’t see him.

  After the second time, ignoring him became easier. I walked into the scenery dock to put away the broom and he was hunched over the props table, using their space to lay out the radio mics. I decided to be civil.

  “Hi,” I began.

  There was no answer.

  I tried again. “Hi.”

  Still no reply.

  “Stuff you then,” I muttered in disgust and began to walk away. That got a response.

  “Sorry,” he looked up. “I’m a bit busy.” His head went down again.

  Well, that certainly showed how interesting he found my company! I left him to it and went out into the sunshine. A few of the actors were sneaking last minute cigarettes in the alley. I chatted to a couple of them for a while then wandered back inside. Severn had gone.

  At interval the Reverend was propping up the fire escape by himself. He bounced forwards happily as I approached, thrusting a king-sized block of Black Forest chocolate my direction. I broke off a chunk and handed it back with thanks.

  “Been jilted?” I asked around a mouthful of chocolate and cherries.

  The Reverend tilted his head to one side and looked vague for a few seconds before grinning widely with recognition.

  “Oh, Severn! Yes, I suppose you could put it that way. He’s not getting a break. He’s having problems with one of the shotgun mics, so he’s down in the orchestra pit trying to reset it. I don’t think I’d want to be the musician who knocked the thing sideways. Severn is not a happy camper.”

  “He’s certainly not a very chatty one.”

  “Ah, no. Probably not, given the mood he is in today. Don’t worry, it’s not your problem, Here, have some more chocolate.”

  “Why?” I asked around a mouthful.

  “Why? You need an excuse to eat chocolate?”

  “No! Not why the chocolate, why is Severn moody? “What’s up with him?”

  “Let’s just call it a domestic problem.” The Reverend made himself comfortable against the fire escape and began to explain. “I don’t want to say too much, so I’ll just tell you that it’s between Severn and Seth. Because of the way we are, we’re living on top of each other all the time and sometimes that causes problems. Seth is responsible for Severn being here at all, so it’s Seth Severn blames when he gets fed up and wants out.”

  “So why doesn’t he just leave?”

  The Reverend paused a long time before answering.

  “He can’t,” he said finally.

  “Why not?” It seemed like a pretty stupid answer to me.

  The Reverend sighed. “You don’t want to know. Just don’t ask, okay?”

  If the first answer was stupid, this was a complete cop-out. Still, even if I didn’t know much about them, I do know when I’m being told to butt out. So I did, walking into the scenery dock and into a battleground.

  I didn’t realise it was an argument at first. It looked too one-sided for that. Severn was standing, head bowed, shoulders hunched, hands stuffed deeply into his pockets, doing a very good impersonation of a kicked puppy. In front of him, hands on hips and in full flight was the stage manager, and forming the apex to the triangle was the musical director, arms folded, looking every inch the school teacher she was when she wasn’t being a musical director. I moved quietly to one side and made myself invisible behind a piece of fake fencing. I wanted to hear this.

  Coming in to it in the middle made it a bit hard to catch what it was all about, but I gathered it had to do with the shotgun mic that had been pushed sideways by a musician. Shotgun mics are long, skinny, sensitive things that are placed at the front of the stage and up in the flys to pick up sound from the stage, so it’s pretty crucial that they are in the right place. I could understand why Severn was annoyed with a musician who moved one just because he wanted a bit of extra elbow room to play his violin. The stage manager understood this too. What she wasn’t pleased with, though, was the threat of violence Severn had made against the offending musician, which the guy had taken seriously, especially considering the cold, determined way Severn had delivered it.

  The M.D. kept butting in, reminding Severn that he wasn’t a local and generally insinuating that the imported crew had the manners of a pack of water rats. Severn didn’t react until she started on the “young boys should respect their elders” bit.

  At that, a slow grin began to creep across his face. His posture straightened. He pulled his right hand from out of his pocket, rubbed his unshaven chin, tilted his head towards the M.D. and raised one eyebrow in an expression that managed to include contempt, disbelief and boredom in almost equal parts.

  “Really?” he drawled. “Maybe they would, if they were.”

  Tilting his head the other way, he managed with a raised eyebrow to totally wipe off the M.D.. He addressed the S.M.. “Can I go back to my job now?”

  The S.M. nodded.

  “Good,” Severn snapped. Without another word, he turned and walked away. Inwardly I cheered.

  The musical director was still complaining bitterly to the S.M. when I squeezed apologetically between them a few minutes later, carrying the dreaded candelabrum I had made the awful mistake with the day before. The S.M. winked.

  “Ball scene,” she said without malice.

  “Nah,” I risked a joke. “Thought I’d try it in the Chinese Restaurant this time.”

  “Why not?” the S.M. shrugged light-heartedly. “See if Seth can hit it with the street cloth.”

  As I staggered away under its weight, I heard the M.D. start on the S.M. again. She was one hissed off lady.

  “You shouldn’t encourage sloppy behaviour....” I didn’t wait to hear the S.M.’s reply.

  The M.D. was still throwing a hissy fit at the end of the performance. Severn was nowhere to be seen, which was just as well because I don’t think he needed to hear the things she was calling him to the violinist as they left the theatre.

  “What’s his problem?” I heard the violinist whinge dramatically. “It’s only a microphone. Anyone would think it was gold plated the way he carried on. Who does he think he is, anyway?”

  “A lot more experienced at his job than that idiot is at his, for starters,” muttered a voice close to my ear.

  “Oh, come on!” I snapped back. “I know you guys are professionals and you all think us amateurs are pretty second rate, but that guy’s been playing a violin for at least three times longer than Severn and you have been alive!”

  The Reverend gave a high-pitched giggle. “Hmmm, started on a medieval lute, did he?”

  I screwed up my nose at this stupid reply. “Yeah, like if medieval was anything more than 20 years ago, I guess he must have. You’re what? Eighteen? He’s old enough to be my grandfather. He’s old enough to be the stage manager’s grandfather. You talk such shit sometimes!”

  He giggled again then changed the subject to food. Or, more importantly, pizza, which Severn was off dialling
out for. Would I like to join them? Would I what? Give me two minutes to find Mum and tell her I wouldn’t be joining them and then it’s down stairs to the Green Room. Absolutely. But no mushrooms! I should have added no jalapeno peppers either.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The other thing I should have ordered was no dancers! I don’t know which was hotter - the peppers or Tasha.

  She hadn’t even been invited.

  We were all sitting in the Green Room. By all, I mean all the imported crew and myself. Aiden and Meredith, the twins, were sitting at opposite ends of the tatty old couch looking like a set of bookends. Seth was propped between them, arms outstretched over the back of the couch with a hand resting on the shoulder of each twin. It looked like a comfortable and familiar gesture. Olivia was curled up in a huge armchair in the corner, nursing a cup of hot coffee. She had changed from her stage blacks into a one of those flimsy, gypsy style dresses they sell in shops that smell of incense. It was the deepest shade of purple velvet with a front panel of lighter purple lace. Curled up in the chair, with her long, dark hair falling loose, she looked like she could have just stepped out of a medieval castle. Finn sat stiffly to her right on a discarded dining chair. The smallest of them all, the Reverend took up the most space, reclining over a whole couch all by himself.

  I sat on the floor.

  Tasha came in by accident. We all heard her bouncing down the stairs calling out for Jason Broderick as she approached. So the reply was a concerted “No!” before she had got out the question of “was he in here?” It was just my bad luck that Severn arrived right at that moment, carrying a stack of five large pizza boxes.

  “Ooh! Pizza,” she gushed. “They smell sooo divine and I’m sooo hungry.”

  “So stay and join us,” Seth beamed from the couch.

  “If that’s all right with Severn,” she batted her eyelashes in his direction. “After all, they’re his pizzas.”

  Severn’s shoulders lifted in a non-committal shrug. “Whatever.”