by Karen Grey
“Is everything okay?” I straighten, abandoning Rufus. I haven’t heard from my mom in a while. Or my brothers.
“Oh, yeah. This is all good stuff.” Deb gives Pam a sly look. “Well, we think so.”
I take a moment to decide how to play this before heading to the fridge. “I’m starving. And thirsty.” One hundred percent of my attention is on its contents, which’ll drive them crazy. “Do we have any leftovers?”
Deb sighs dramatically. “Get out of there. I’ll heat up some pasta if you listen to your damn messages.”
When she reaches around me to grab something from the fridge, I pretend to ignore her. “I really need something to drink. Hmm. Water or beer, which should it be?”
“Gah! You are so impossible!” Deb shoves a Tupperware container at Pam and hip-checks me out of the way. Before I know it, I’m seated at the table with a bowl of pasta, a glass of water and a beer in front of me. Deb’s finger hovers over the play button of the answering machine. “Are you ready now?”
“Jeez, yeah, but you gotta get a life,” I tease. “Do I need something to write with?”
“Not for the first listen.” Pam cocks a finger gun at me. “You can take notes the second time around.”
“‘If music be the food of love, play on.’” I take a big gulp of water. Deb’s face looks like it’s going to explode. “I’m listening, I promise.”
She blows out an exasperated, “Pfft,” and then presses the button.
BEEP.
Hey Will, it’s Jay Fowler. Great job on the dairy spot, man. Listen, I had a call today. Some guys who are shooting a little film in Boston saw it, and they want to bring you in. Here’s the thing. They’re only in town for a couple days for casting so you’d have to come in tomorrow. And you should read the script first. Call me as soon as you get this and I’ll messenger it over to you tonight. Oh, and the shoot dates are… June twentieth to the thirtieth. A good chunk of work. And the money’s decent. So call me.
I take a long pull from my beer. “Well, that’s cool. I guess. But I can’t do it. All’s Well will be running part of that time, and the kids’ show will be in rehearsals.”
Deb sighs. “Yeah, yeah—but hang on, there’s another message.”
BEEP.
Um, hi Will. This is Kate. Kate Bishop? From the, uh, juggler incident and the fake drink?
“She is so adorable,” Pam whispers to Deb, who shushes her.
Um, so, I’m just calling because I saw you in the commercial. I don’t usually watch TV in the morning but I was at my friend Alice’s early Saturday before running and, anyway, she said it’s on TV a lot and I thought it was really funny, so… congratulations? Yeah. So. Okay. I just wanted to say that, and that it was good to see you again. Well. It’s not like I really saw you because you were on TV, but that was fun. So, okay. I’m gonna go now. Bye!”
Deb grabs my wrist before I can rewind the tape. “Wait, there’s more.”
Kate’s voice continues, listing her home number, her work number and her pager number.
“Is that it?”
“Yes!” Deb claps her hands and bounces in her seat. “Isn’t it awesome?”
I take a sip of beer and fork up some pasta. “I guess.”
Truthfully, it’s kinda kismet that Kate called me right before I showed up at her office. No wonder she was confused. I’m looking forward to seeing her this weekend, but there’s no way I’m sharing that intel with my yenta roommates, or they’ll have us married in a week. I chew, aiming my eyes straight ahead, maintaining a blank expression on my face.
Deb scoots closer to Pam. “Okay. Which thing should we talk about first?”
Pam snags a piece of sausage from my plate. “Work thing first. You know that’s what’s most important to him.”
“I know, but that’s the problem. He hasn’t dated since Callie moved to L.A. Our boy is never going to leave the nest if he doesn’t stretch his wings.”
“You can’t say things like that,” Pam warns. “You’ll freak him out, and then he won’t even consider asking her out. We have to convince him that it’s okay to just go on a date with her.”
“You think I can’t hear you or something?” I mumble with my mouth full.
Deb ignores me. “I know what you’re saying, but the date thing is simpler. The work thing is going to take some real convincing.”
Pam sighs. “You might be right.”
Deb shrugs. “I’m always right. The sooner you two figure that out, the happier we’ll all be.” She turns to me. “Here’s what you’re going to do.”
I hold up a hand, and miraculously Deb holds her tongue. “I hate to admit it, but you’re right. About Kate, anyway. We have already made plans for Saturday.”
Deb grabs Pam with one hand and splays the other across her heart. “Really?”
“Yes, really. But I can’t do the film. I’m not going to back out of commitments I’ve already made at the theater.”
“But you don’t know there will be a conflict,” Pam points out. “Just let them know your performance schedule when you audition. Maybe they’ll be willing to work around it. And you don’t even get paid for coaching the kids. Let somebody else do it for a change. Randall was saying he wanted more teaching experience on his résumé.”
I point my fork at the machine. “I’m not calling Jay. Or I guess I should call him and say I can’t do it.”
Deb gets up to pace her way into full-on bossy mode. “Will.”
“Deb,” I counter, matching her tone. “I’m on the board. I have to take on extra projects.”
“You’re already doing the fight choreography for both shows on top of playing Bertram and Mercutio.” Deb’s voice rises an octave over the course of this sentence.
Pam kicks me under the table. Gently. Sort of. “Just call him and see what he says.”
I swallow a sigh. They’re right. As is often the case. I just hate all this change. I was happy with things the way they were.
Then again, at yesterday’s All’s Well rehearsal, Dave had challenged me to take more risks playing Bertram. Maybe I need to shake things up on other fronts, too.
“I might not even get it,” I point out.
Deb scoops up my empty plate and carries it to the sink. “Well, you definitely won’t if you don’t call Jay and get that script and work on the audition. Call him.”
Feeling bullied, but knowing they want the best for me, I throw up my hands. “All right, I’ll call him. Give me the phone.”
Deb hands it to me, her smile triumphant. She grabs Rufus from Pam’s lap and kisses him. “See, I told you he’d listen to reason.”
“Can I have a little privacy?” I ask.
“No,” Deb says, as if it were obvious. “We don’t trust you.”
“You are so…”
Deb flutters her eyelashes. “Lovable?”
“Not the first adjective that comes to mind.”
Jay answers so fast he must’ve been sitting by the phone. I explain my schedule conflicts, but he doesn’t think it’ll be a problem. Moments later, I have the details on the audition and some bike messenger is on the way to our house with a script. That’s a first. Makes me feel kind of important.
I hang up, finish my beer and get up to put the dishes in the dishwasher. “I’ve got to take a shower, and then I have to read the script and work on the audition. Are you going to supervise all that as well?”
Deb kisses me on the cheek. “No. We trust you with that.”
Pam’s staring at the answering machine. “Maybe we should get one of those fax machines. Then Will could get these scripts, like, instantly.”
Deb shakes her head. “If everybody gets a fax machine, the bike messengers won’t have anything to do.” Her eyes flick to the kitchen clock. “Oh my god, it’s almost time for MacGyver! Let’s go, Rufie!”
In the wake of their exit, I’m buzzing like I just received a standing O. Maybe a bit of change won’t be such a bad thing, after all.
/> CHAPTER NINE
BEEP. SATURDAY, 8:38 a.m.
Hey, Will, it’s Kate. Just letting you know I got your message and I’ll see you at the Coffee Connection in Harvard Square this afternoon. I can’t wait to find out what our surprise destination will be.
WILL
After we park our bikes, Kate jogs ahead of me on the path that circles Walden Pond, brushing a hand along a branch bursting with bright green leaves. “I can’t believe I’ve never been here! I mean, I read Walden in high school but I didn’t think of it being an actual place you could visit.”
For our date, she’s in jean shorts and a checkered cotton shirt with her hair up in a ponytail—a welcome change from the severe suits she wears to work, I’m sure—and her manner reflects it. On the way here, she kicked her legs out to the side as she rode through a puddle and hooted with laughter when she got wet. Now, she’s whooping as she hurls rocks into the pond, clapping when one makes a big splash. She’s as radiant as the day itself, which is as good as it gets in Massachusetts. Fluffy clouds float in a mellow blue sky above trees filled with blooms of pink and purple, mirrored in the clear surface of the famous pond.
I toss a few rocks in myself before taking her hand. “Come and check out his house.”
She peers in the doorway of the tiny cabin. “Is this really where he lived?”
“It’s a replica, but it’s supposed to feel authentic.”
When I follow her inside, energy ricochets between us in the small space. To redirect my desire to pull her in close, I run a finger over the rough wooden wall. I could see myself living here.
She stoops to peer out the window. “I couldn’t live without a refrigerator, but I like it. It’s cozy.”
“Seriously? That surprises me, I have to say.”
“That I need a refrigerator?”
“That you like it. I mean, this is the antithesis of the yuppie world you’re a part of.”
She straightens, her brow furrowed. “Man, you have one heck of a chip on your shoulder about that stuff.”
The cabin walls seem to close in slightly, so I focus on the window. If I’m going to spend time with her, I need to find a way to deal with our differences without getting so wound up. “You’re right. I’m sorry. It’s just that my dad made a lot of mistakes with money, and the rest of the family paid for those mistakes. I don’t ever want to be like him.”
She tips her head, her assessing gaze peeling away layers of protection. “I don’t think you’re in danger of repeating those mistakes. Whatever they were.” With a shrug, she walks out the door and back toward the water. After a beat I follow, stopping a few feet away, watching as a soft breeze ruffles her hair.
“It’s so quiet here,” she says softly. “Do you come here alot?”
“I used to come out here all the time when I was in college. It was a great way to let off steam, get out of the city. It was like being a kid again, when you’d leave the house in the morning on your bike and not come home till it was dark.”
“We did that too when I was little, but for us, it was a boat. We had a sailboat and a little skiff we’d run around in.”
She sits on a bench near the water, stretching her long legs out in front of her. When I sit next to her, my hand itches to skim over a well-defined thigh. I picture her piloting a little sailboat, ponytail flying in the wind. “Where did you grow up?”
Every once in a while I hear a lengthening of vowels, hinting that she might be from the south. She definitely doesn’t have a Massachusetts accent. Of course, I don’t either anymore. It was browbeaten out of me in speech classes.
She leans back, face tipped to the sky, eyes closed. “Virginia. In between Richmond and D.C. I grew up right on the Potomac River. You’re from here, right?”
I mirror her position and let my gaze follow the drifting clouds. “Yeah, pretty much. Western Mass, really. A little town in the Berkshires. My parents’ car broke down there on a road trip, and they basically never left. Well, my mom didn’t. She raised three boys on her own after we lost my dad.”
Her hand finds my forearm and squeezes gently before releasing it. “I’m sorry.”
I wave my hand in the air. It wants to find hers, but something holds me back. “It all happened a long time ago. And my mom worked in the school system. She’s a high school librarian. So all the teachers looked out for us.”
Things had sucked for a while, but Mom had done a pretty good job with us, all things considered. Money had always been tight, but that had prepared me quite well for the life of an actor. At least my dad gave me that.
“What was your favorite subject? Besides drama, I guess.”
“Actually, I didn’t take drama in high school.”
She shifts, turning toward me slightly. “How did you get into acting, then?”
I sit up, elbows on knees, gaze back on the water. “Well, I played sports—basketball pretty seriously, baseball, a little hockey. But then my junior year, I started getting in trouble—nothing big, just some fights. My mom decided I needed a change of pace. Her best friend is the drama teacher, and they were desperate for guys to be in the fall play. I said no way. But my mom said it was either that or clean the bathroom every week at home, so the choice was pretty easy. My younger brother got roped in, too.”
She faces me fully, elbow on the back of the bench, cheek resting on her hand, and Romeo’s words echo in my mind: Oh, that I were a glove upon that hand, that I might touch that cheek.
Her foot knocks mine lightly. “So, you quit all those sports and became a drama geek?”
Swallowing the poetry, I laugh. “Well, no. I kept playing basketball. But there was something about performing onstage that made it worth all the shit my teammates gave me about doing it. So, I kept doing plays, and I did a summer apprenticeship at a Shakespeare theater. One of the actors in that company was a professor at BU and said I should try out for their acting program. Unbelievably, I not only got in, but they gave me a scholarship.”
“What about your brother?”
“Oh, he hated it.” I laugh, thinking about Paul and how awful he was. “The play was Our Town. Have you ever seen it?”
She shakes her head. “I’ve heard of it, but no.”
“Well, you have to do a lot of mime. You know.” I demonstrate, doing the classic mime move of building a wall with my hands in the air in front of me. “Paul had the role of the paper boy, and he couldn’t do the mime or remember his lines. They had to get some girl to do his part, and he was demoted to a dead guy.”
I shake my head, picturing Paul’s scowl. “He swore he’d never step on a stage again—he’d rather clean bathrooms. Now he’s a plumber and makes a really good living. As he likes to say, ‘Who’s the joke on now?’”
She shifts to sit cross-legged on the bench, her knee now a hairsbreadth from my thigh. “What was your part?”
“I was the milkman. Small role, but I got a lot of laughs. That’s what hooked me. Also, listening to the audience cry. It was an amazing feeling, everybody sobbing together.”
Her brows lift slightly. “That’s… interesting.”
When I turn to face her, my calf presses itself right into hers, but I pour the passion welling up inside into my voice. “To me, that’s what the Greeks were going for or what church should be. A theater is a place where people feel the huge and complicated human emotions together.”
“I guess.” She picks at a spot on her sneaker. “But I’m with your brother. I do not like people looking at me.”
I trail a fingertip along her calf, my heart thudding. “I like looking at you.”
“Stop!” She swats at me, a blush blooming on her cheeks. “I’m sure you’re around beautiful actresses all the time.”
I don’t quite know what to say to that. She isn’t a typical beauty like the girls that play ingenues on stage, but there’s something about her that keeps me coming back for more. Before I can come up with an honest reply, she’s up and scuffing her way down to th
e beach. I follow and take her hand, turning her to face me. That blush is mottled now.
I squeeze her hand. “Hey.”
Her eyes meet mine, her face blank, all emotion wiped clean away.
I take her other hand, too, tugging slightly. “I don’t know how to say this so you’ll get it. I mean, you’re not like some of the girls I work with.”
She forces a smile. “I know I’m nothing special to look at. You don’t have to try and convince me otherwise.”
My thumbs brush back and forth over her knuckles. “It’s not that.” All I can think of at the moment are descriptions of characters from a play I’m reading. “I mean the fantasy descriptions of beauty. ‘Tall, willowy, long golden locks.’ Or ‘petite but curvy with flashing dark hair and eyes.’”
She gestures up and down her body. “Clearly there’s none of that going on here.” When I open my mouth to protest, her hand makes a stop sign. “Listen, you don’t have to—”
Clasping that hand, I step closer. “I’m not saying this right.” The only words I can find are Shakespeare’s. “‘Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven, having some business, do entreat her eyes to twinkle in their spheres till they return. What if her eyes were there, they in her head? The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars as daylight doth a lamp.’”
She rolls her eyes but won’t meet mine. “Translation, please?”
I draw a line from her eye, down her cheek, and across her lower lip. “This face. I can’t stop thinking about it, even though you’re a damn capitalist.”
She huffs out a laugh. The pink on her cheeks goes from rose to crimson.
Closing the space between us, my thumb feather-light along her jawline, I grasp for words. “It’s what your face says, how it expresses the thousand things you feel. When you’re not hiding those feelings. But even then, this mask you put up makes me want to peel it away and get to know the person underneath.”
