Chapel of Ease

by Alex Bledsoe

  “You’re asking musical theater performers not to gossip?” I said, trying to lighten the mood.

  He looked at me dead serious. “No, I’m asking you not to gossip about this.”

  “All right, sure. Mum’s the word. But—”

  “No ‘buts.’ You just keep it to yourself, and tell me if you see any signs he’s having trouble.”

  We left it at that, finished our drinks in silence, and then Neil departed. I finished my drink, trying to process all he’d said.

  * * *

  As I left the station to walk to my building that night, I got a text from Joaquim asking if he could come over. I said yes, and found him seated with his back against my apartment door, reading a book about ancient astronauts. He got up and kissed me when I came up the stairwell. He was also tired and sweaty from his rehearsal, but the kiss reinvigorated us both.

  “Why don’t you ever take the elevator?” he asked.

  “I do sometimes. But I’m a dancer, and I’m closing in on thirty. I need all the exercise I can get.”

  “I thought you were an actor,” he teased, accenting the final syllable in the word.

  “I am. But an actor who can’t sing and dance gets a lot fewer jobs.”

  We kissed in the hall some more, until the distinctive chihuahua barking told me my neighbor, Mr. Shipp, was about to bring his pocket dog out for its evening constitutional. Mr. Shipp was gay, too, but he had old-fashioned ideas about PDAs, so we stopped before his door opened. He waved to us as he shuffled toward the elevator, and Joaquim and I went inside my apartment.

  I dropped my backpack on the couch and went to make a drink. Joaquim said, “You kissed like a man with a lot on his mind.”

  “No, I promise you, I was thoroughly in the moment.”

  “You were acting like you were in the moment. I’ve dated enough actors, I can tell. It’s something about Ray, isn’t it?”

  Before I could stop myself, I said, “Yeah. He’s not well.”

  “Cancer? AIDS?”

  “I can’t really say. I shouldn’t have said anything at all.”

  “Wow.”

  “Yeah. We’re so close to opening, and the show is really, really good.”

  “I know. That night I saw the run-through of act one, it was great. Has he seen a doctor?”

  “I really can’t talk about it. Keep it to yourself, okay?”

  “Sure. I hope it’s nothing serious.” We sipped our drinks and stared out at the night, listening to the noises, until Joaquim put down his drink and drew me close. Then, for a while, I forgot about Ray, and the show, and the mystery of the chapel of ease.

  7

  So of course, I spent the next weeks, as we honed the show to a crystal clarity and level of emotional honesty few of us had ever experienced onstage, watching Ray for any sign of imminent collapse. There was nothing. He sat in his usual place at the piano, occasionally taking notes and whispering something to Neil. He joked with the band. He smiled a lot, always said hello when he saw me, and generally acted like a guy whose show was about to premiere.

  As the press preview approached, we all grew more excited. Julie and Ryan, who played Byrda and Shad, had begun dating, which lent serious poignancy to their songs. A fiddler and a bodhran drummer joined the core of the band and added discreet fullness, somehow making them sound both ancient and timeless. The few people lucky enough to see the show all the way through, mostly friends of Neil and Ray, couldn’t say enough good things about it.

  Ray and Emily continued to date, and she occasionally sat in on rehearsals. I noticed that she often brought along a book or her iPad, but inevitably ended up watching the show.

  The dreadlocked girl either got better at stalking, or abandoned her quest. I never spotted her again, and Ray didn’t mention her.

  All the omens were good. Great, even. What could go wrong?

  * * *

  The press preview, held on the Tuesday before our Friday opening, went as well as we could possibly have hoped. Word had gotten out, thanks mainly to Neil’s reputation, and we’d invited all our spouses, partners, and families. The little theater was packed, and the energy, even before the curtain rose, made the air buzz with excitement.

  My hand shook as I applied my makeup, this being too low-budget a production to afford makeup people. I closed my eyes and tried to ground and center, using techniques my first acting teacher in high school had taught me. Beside me, Jason hummed his first song to himself, and on the opposite side of the room, his back to us, Ryan actually dozed off, his makeup done. I envied his total lack of nerves.

  After a soft knock on the door, Ray peeked in. “Hey, guys. Fired up?”

  “All except Ryan,” Jason said.

  “No, I’m awake,” Ryan said woozily. “Look, I’m blinking and everything.”

  “Well, I just wanted to tell y’all, no matter what happens tonight, no matter whether it goes good or bad, y’all have been great. I’ve been involved in my share of shows, and I ain’t never enjoyed getting one ready as much as I have this one. I know you guys will do your best, and can’t nobody ask any more than that.”

  We expressed our thanks, and he slipped back out. In the mirror, I looked at my face and saw myself, just for an instant, with Tufa-black hair and a soul-deep sadness. The instant passed, but I wondered if that meant I’d truly, fully connected with Crawford at last. If so, it wasn’t a moment too soon.

  I adjusted the microphone against my cheek for the final time. The houselights went out, the recorded music ended, and Ellie’s voice crackled through the earpiece, “Places for act one, everyone. Places for act one.” I rushed to my spot for the show’s first number, which was also my first number.

  We took our places in the wings, waiting for Ellie’s announcement to go on. The instrumental bluegrass music that played over the house PA only energized me more. I looked at Cassandra and winked for luck; she tossed her hair and blew me a kiss. The noise of the crowd shuffling itself was louder than I expected, no doubt due to the theater’s small space.

  And then we were on.

  We were so nervous, our collective sweat threatened to make the floor too slick to dance, but somehow that funneled into our enthusiasm, and we fucking tore the place down. Everything worked, everything, and when Julie did her climactic song, we heard sniffles from this professionally blasé crowd, and we knew we’d aced it. Whatever the reviews, whether anyone came to see it or not, we knew we’d done ourselves, and Ray, proud. We got a standing ovation.

  Backstage it was all hugs and tears, with the kind of relieved camaraderie the movies showed only after the team has won the big game. We took lots of selfies and peppered social media with them. Then we cleaned up and went to meet the new fans.

  Critics surrounded Ray and Neil, looking for quotes and expressing their appreciation. Emily stood beaming beside Ray, their arms linked. I watched Delilah the lingerie model pay her respects, and the look Emily gave her could’ve melted concrete.

  Some of the critics approached me and the rest of the cast as well, and we were careful to give only positive, general statements. None of us wanted our misstep to be the source of scandal in press that promised to be stellar.

  Even snarky Joaquim had tears in his eyes when he hugged me and said, “I knew it would be good, but not good good. Holy shit, Matt. Holy shit.”

  “So you liked it?”

  “If you’d told me even a week ago that songs with fiddle music would have me in tears, I would’ve laughed so hard. But I swear it did.” He kissed me, then said, “I have to go. I have an early call tomorrow. Want to come over after this finishes up?”

  “I’ll text you when we’re done. If you’re still awake, definitely.”

  He kissed me again, then disappeared into the crowd.

  I continued to accept congratulations until a young woman with the same jet-black hair and perfect teeth as Ray came up and shook my hand. The instant we touched, it was like a bubble of silence came down around us. She sa
id, almost too quietly to hear, “I was very impressed. You did a wonderful job.”

  She even had Ray’s Southern lilt. I said, “Thank you. Are you from where your accent is from?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I’m guessing you must be a friend of Ray’s.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “You kind of look like him, and he told us that his people all resembled each other.”

  She did not smile. She was a little younger than me, maybe twenty-five or -six, and carried herself with easy, straight-backed confidence. Not the confidence of the beautiful, although she was that; instead, it was the cool assurance of someone who knew that, in any situation, she could probably kick ass and take names. She said, “So he told you about us?”

  I suddenly felt the way I did when talking to reporters: like I was navigating a verbal minefield, and had to be careful not to give away the wrong crucial bit of information. “He explained his background and how it influenced the show.”

  “Well. You certainly captured what it’s like to live in the mountains,” she said, and at last managed a little smile. “Except for the hair. It should be black.”

  “The director thought it would be confusing if we all had the same color.”

  “He’s right. It is, sometimes. So you’ll keep going with the show?”

  “Me, personally?”

  “The theater. Everyone.”

  “Depends on the reviews and ticket sales, I suppose. But as long as they’re both good, then yeah, we’ll keep going.”

  “What if Ray asks you to stop?”

  “Asks us to stop? I don’t understand.”

  “Just thinking out loud. Well, I’d better go congratulate Mr. Parrish. It’s his big night, after all.”

  She faded back into the crowd, and I was immediately accosted by more well-wishers. I tried to watch for her, but it was like she’d vanished, until I saw her across the room, talking to Ray.

  I posed for a couple of selfies with some dancer friends, got hugged far too hard by someone I knew had a crush on me (everything about this show seemed to involve crushes), and accepted a dozen more handshakes before I could slip away. I eased over near Ray and the black-haired girl, close enough to hear their conversation. Just as she had with me, she seemed to project a bubble that held people back while she spoke to him. But as I said, theater people love gossip, and if eavesdropping were an Olympic sport, we’d all have medals.

  “You can’t tell this story,” the girl said. “That’s a secret that’s supposed to stay secret.”

  “I didn’t tell the secret,” Ray said defensively.

  “No, but you drew attention to it. Now people will come looking.”

  “That’s silly. No one can find it, anyway.” As he spoke, his Southern accent, never entirely absent, grew stronger. It would’ve been funny if I hadn’t gotten the sense that this whole conversation was potentially earthshaking.

  “Someone will. Remember that flatlander that sung Rockhouse’s dying dirge? He wasn’t supposed to be able to find that, either, but he did.”

  “He had help.”

  “And somebody contrary might help anyone who comes looking for this.”

  “Well, anyway, it’s done. The show’ll get great reviews, it’ll open, and that’s that.”

  She put her hand on his face, and the sadness grew. “I surely did hope that you wouldn’t do this. I surely did. Now…”

  “Now, nothing. It’s done. And that’s that. You saw it, and heard it, right?”

  “I did.”

  “Wasn’t it great?”

  “Of course it’s great, Ray, but it’s not about that. Look, I agree with you, things have to change. We have to engage with the world now, we can’t keep hiding from it. But I also agree with”—and here she said a name I didn’t quite catch, which started with an M—“that it needs to be on our terms.”

  “How is this not on our terms? I created this. It’s one of our stories, told by one of us.”

  “This is not the place to have this conversation, Rayford.”

  Rayford? I thought. I’d assumed “Ray” was short for Raymond.

  “There’s no point to this conversation at any time,” Ray said. “What’s done is done.”

  She smiled like she’d just heard the worst news ever, but it was news she’d expected. “Yes, it is. That is purely that. Good-bye, Rayford.” With that she turned and once again vanished into the crowd.

  Ray continued to stare after her, ignoring the people who instantly re-swarmed him. I pushed my way through and said in his ear, “You need a break?”

  He turned and I saw tears in his eyes. They hadn’t been there before, despite the emotions of the evening. He nodded, so I took his elbow and guided him to the door that led to the roof. We ran up the stairs like children sneaking out of school, and when we emerged into the open, it was like bursting out of some prison. The city lights seemed to twinkle in celebration of our triumph, and the traffic noise was like a comforting lullaby.

  Ray dug out a joint and lit it. He offered me a drag, and I took one to be polite. He inhaled deeply, as if doing it for both himself and Bill Clinton. He kept glancing up at the buildings around us, almost as if he expected something to come swooping out of the night sky. It was hot and humid, and he sighed as he leaned against the brick wall of the stairwell exit.

  “Hell of a press night,” I said. “They loved it.”

  “They did,” he agreed.

  “Well, everyone except your friend.”

  He smiled, in that same sad way the girl had done earlier. “She’s not my friend. She’s from back home.”

  “In Tennessee?”

  “Yep. Apparently it’s not so long a flight as I thought.”

  “You didn’t know she was coming?”

  “No.” He rubbed his temple and frowned, and I immediately remembered Neil’s warning. But it seemed to pass. “She was the last person I expected to see, honestly.”

  “Kind of flattering that she came all this way.”

  He inhaled deeply again, and let the smoke settle in his lungs for a long time before letting it out. His voice tight, he said, “Distance isn’t so big a barrier as it used to be.”

  “What were you two talking about?”

  He chuckled, but with the cool, calm fatalism of a man before the firing squad. “How much trouble I was in for telling the story of Byrda and Shad to people like you.”

  “Gay actors?” I deadpanned.

  “No, anyone who’s not a Tufa.”

  “But didn’t this happen a long time ago? Like, centuries ago?”

  “Yeah. But time doesn’t work the same for everybody.”

  The way the night breeze blew his hair, and the light played across his face, restoked the fire of my unrequited love. I wanted to hold him, to give him someone strong to hang on to so he didn’t have to be. But instead I just said, “I’m sorry. That must be disappointing.”

  He shrugged. “You ever disappoint your family?”

  “Some of them. When I came out, especially.”

  “Yeah.” He took another long hit off the joint. “Well, the problem with my family is that it’s probably a lot bigger than yours. Everybody from my hometown is related if you go back far enough. That means everybody thinks they have a say in what you do. Sometimes so much of a say that they come all this way just to tell you.”

  “Is she gone, then?”

  Again he looked up. “I think so.” Then he rubbed his temples hard and closed his eyes. “Well, I better get back in there. Neil will get mad at me if I don’t filter off some of the glad-handers.”

  “The reviews should be great. I bet we sell out the run.”

  “Maybe. Guess we’ll see.” Then he took my arm. “Hey, can I ask you a favor?”

  “Sure.”

  “If anything happens to me, make sure you’re there for Emily.”

  “What’s going to happen?” I said, trying to sound jaunty.

  “I don
’t know, it’s just … women who fall in love with Tufa men have a very hard time if we go away. It’s my fault, I should’ve been more careful. And I know how that sounds, believe me, but if something does happen to me, Emily will be … very distraught. And lost. And she’ll say some crazy things. Just be kind to her and don’t make fun of her.”

  “Yeah, I will,” I agreed, taken a bit by surprise.

  He ground out the roach against the board we stood on and strode back toward the entrance, with sagging shoulders as if he’d gotten the worst news in the world. I caught myself looking up as well, but saw only the night sky, a muddy haze of light reflected by the heavy humidity.

  8

  I opened my eyes, and the first thing I saw was my phone on the nightstand. The screen was lit up, which meant I had messages.

  The exertions of the show, the celebratory well-wishing afterwards, the tokes off Ray’s joint, and the half a bottle of wine I’d consumed all conspired to knock me out. Joaquim had surprised me by waiting for me outside my door, although he was asleep when I got there. He’d pinned a note to his chest that said in big letters, NOT HOMELESS. WAITING FOR MATT. DON’T CALL THE COPS. We were both so wiped out that we went to sleep without fooling around. By the time I noticed my phone, it was nearly eleven o’clock in the morning.

  I reached across Joaquim and picked it up. There were dozens of messages and tweets. The most recent one, still displayed, said, “I’m so sorry.”

  My heart sank; were the reviews that bad?

  I turned on the ringer, and almost immediately “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” by Gene Pitney—Emily Valance’s ringtone—blared out at me. Joaquim moaned and pulled my pillow over his head. I got out of bed as I answered. “Hey, Emily.”

  “Where have you been?” she said, her voice both angry and distraught, with the emphasis on the latter.

  “Sleeping. I turned my ringer off. I’m exhausted. Why, what’s wrong?” My first thought was that, if the reviews had been hatchet jobs, we were all out of work.

  “You don’t know?”

  “No, I don’t know. What is it?”

  “Ray’s dead.”

  If this were a movie, it would be one of those shots like in Jaws or Vertigo, when the camera zoomed in as it dollied back, conveying the protagonist’s sudden disorientation. “What? Ray’s what?”