Starry-Eyed

by Ted Michael

  Ferguson attended the American Musical and Dramatic Academy and made his Broadway debut at twenty-one as Chip in On the Town. He later originated the role of Leaf Coneybear in The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Drama League “Distinguished Performance” nominee) and has worked extensively with the New York Public Theater in The Merchant of Venice, A Winter’s Tale, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Drama League “Distinguished Performance” nominee). Other theater credits include world premieres of Christopher Shinn’s Where Do We Live and Michael John LaChiusa’s Little Fish and Leo Bloom in The Producers at the Hollywood Bowl.

  Ferguson is an advocate and supporter of the Human Rights Campaign and, in 2011, was honored with the HRC’s Media Award for establishing a positive, increased awareness of LGBT issues in the media. Most recently, he co-founded Tie the Knot (www.tietheknot.org), a nonprofit organization featuring bow ties designed by Ferguson, with sales going toward organizations fighting for marriage equality.

  MC WAX

  Josh Berk

  INT.—A VERY UNCOOL SUBARU, 11:22 P.M.

  TRESTA: You know, Javon used to rap for me.

  My blood suddenly turns very, very cold. There most definitely should be a law about girls mentioning their ex-boyfriends. It would be a simple law: DON’T DO IT. Especially in situations such as these. Parked car sorts of situations. Especially if their ex-boyfriend is Javon freaking Harris.

  I don’t hate Javon Harris. That’s not the problem. I love Javon Harris. Everybody does. That’s the problem.

  I’m in a lot of plays, so I sometimes imagine life as a script. Let’s take it from the top. The full conversation goes like this:

  ME: Come on, Tresta, just a little kiss. . . .

  TRESTA: I don’t know. I’m kind of not in the mood.

  ME: Well maybe there’s something I can do to get you in the mood.

  (Awkward pause. Tresta puts her finger to her lips as if deep in thought.)

  TRESTA: You know, Javon used to rap for me.

  Well, shit. A whole host of thoughts run through my head, but that is the first and most eloquent. Well, shit.

  First of all, know this about me: I am white. Very white. I will get a raging sunburn just from standing near an old person’s birthday cake. I have red hair and red eyebrows and a love of musical theater. I live in a suburban home with a big green yard and two Subarus in the driveway. (My parents are both teachers. They have to own Subarus. I suspect it’s in their contract.)

  When me and Tresta are hanging out, I sometimes forget that I’m white and she is not. But when she mentions say, rap, or say her ex-boyfriend Javon freaking Harris, I become quite aware. You know Javon Harris. He is in a big horror film that comes out next month. Everyone knows he is on his way to becoming a real movie star. Probably a rap star too. Tresta dated him before he graduated and moved to California last summer.

  I try to make a joke out of it. “I could sing you something from Phantom,” I say. I gesture widely and start to warm up my throat. La-la-la-laaaaa.

  “Uh, no,” she says, cutting me off.

  “Into the Woods?” I ask.

  “Believe it or not,” she says. “Sondheim does not get me hot.”

  “Liar!” I say. “Blasphemer!”

  She laughs. She does like Sondheim. I know that she does. And I know that she likes that I like Sondheim. We have that theater thing going on. It’s probably the only reason I’ve gotten this far with her.

  Maybe it’s not captain of the football team, but I did win a Joey award last year. Best Male Performance in a High School Musical. It’s not a Tony, but it’s a pretty big deal. Every school across four counties here in my corner of Pennsylvania competes. Something like twenty high schools are eligible, counting the Catholic schools, which never win. The award show is shown live on local TV. There’s a red carpet and everything. So when you win, people notice.

  Girls notice.

  Tresta was nominated too. She was a great Motormouth Maybelle in her school’s Hairspray. She goes to Robeson High downtown in the gritty city. I, on the other hand go to Woodland out in the wasteland of suburbia. The school district covers a huge county, so there are tons of high schools, as different as night and day from one another. Tresta was nominated, but she did not win a Joey because there is a county-wide law (possibly state or federal law) that Ann Nekin from Westlawn has to win everything. Cosette? Please. Les Miz is so overdone. So even though Tresta did not get to take home the trophy, she did meet me at the after-party. And we’ve been hanging out ever since. So in a way, she did win.

  I decide to start fake-rapping in the dorkiest white-guy way possible, moving my arms in choppy robotic dance moves. “My name is Wax. Making out with me is as inevitable as income tax.” (My name really is Wax. Well, okay, it’s actually “Max.” But when I was a little kid I wrote my M’s upside down all the time. People thought I was dyslexic. They also thought my name was Wax. It stuck. Haha.)

  Tresta snorts. “Javon’s rhymes did not typically use the word ‘inevitable,’” she says. “And they weren’t typically about paying one’s taxes.”

  Hopes of getting a little backseat action are disappearing. The night went pretty well. I took her out to Hard Wok Cafe for sushi, which she loves. (I’m lukewarm on sushi, but a huge fan of bad puns.) Then we went for coffee and then a walk in the park. Now we’re here. Parked near the park on a very quiet and very lovely and very private road north of where I live, where the suburbs give way to full-on forest. I still have to drive Tresta all the way downtown. And even on a Friday I have be to home by midnight or this Subaru turns into a pumpkin.

  “So uh, what were Javon’s oh so awesome rhymes about?” I ask.

  “Oh you know.” She touches her finger to her lips again. “Mostly about stuff he wanted to do with me.”

  Hmm, I think to myself. What rhymes with “caress those torpedoes”? . . . “We messed our tuxedoes”? I, um, may not be a great rapper. Time to change the subject.

  “Hello, Tresta Evans,” I say, sticking out my hand as if for a formal handshake. “I am not sure if we have met. My name is Wax O’Donnell.” I repeat my last name in a loud stage whisper. “O’Donnell.”

  “What does that mean?” she asks.

  “It means if you’re hanging out with a guy named Wax O’Donnell, you shouldn’t be surprised that he’s not a tremendous rapper.” I slap the steering wheel with both hands.

  “Too bad for you,” she says. “It really gets me in the mood. Maybe I’ll ask Javon—I hear he’s back in town. . . .”

  I have no idea what to do next. So I turn on the engine and drive. The radio comes on loud. The whole time to Hard Wok we had been singing along. Now we just listen in silence.

  After a very unenjoyable drive, I pull up to her house. There is nowhere to park so she’s like, “Just double-park for a minute. It’s fine.”

  Then she gives me a dry kiss on the cheek. She doesn’t even take off her seat belt first! What a letdown. It was like a kick-ass show with a rotten third act. Instead of a fabulous finale you had the flattest, most off-key piece of crap ever.

  Tresta takes off the seat belt, gets out of the car, and starts to walk up the cracked pavement to her house.

  “Uh, see you later, I guess?” I call out of the car.

  “Aw, it’s sweet that you think that,” she says over her shoulder.

  “What the hell?” I say.

  “Relax, Wax,” she says, stopping and turning back to me. A stray strand of her hair gets stuck in her mouth as she whips her head around. She crinkles her nose and spits it out. For some reason I could never explain, this is the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. “Just kidding,” she says. “I’ll text you later, okay?”

  “Okay” I say, still feeling like a sad, rain-soaked kitten. “Text me later.”

  . . . . .

  I take the long way home. I’m feeling awful. It’s so ridiculous because before I started doing theater, before I started winning awards and finding my true Wax-ness ons
tage, I would have never even dreamed of getting close to a girl like Tresta. To any girl. And now I actually get to go out on dates with such girls!? I’ve come so far. Why does it feel like it’s not far enough?

  The dashboard clock blinks from 11:58 to 11:59 right as I pull into the driveway—just before my midnight curfew. I sprint up the walk, fly in the door, bound up the steps, and dive into bed.

  I fall asleep, having myriad confusing dreams of torpedoes and hip-hop stars, of sushi rolls and questionable neighborhoods.

  One thing my dream doesn’t have any of, is music.

  . . . . .

  I wake up to a sound I can’t quite place. It is faint, like the rustling of leaves. Then it gets louder, more urgent. Then it says “ahem.”

  “What do you want, Dad?” I mumble, shielding my eyes from the bright light.

  “Oh, did I wake you?” he asks, snapping the newspaper again. They still love their newspaper, the O’Donnells’ do. Newspapers, coffee with Splenda, crossword puzzles, NPR. They start their day white and only get whiter as the day goes on.

  “You know you woke me,” I grumble, trying to hide in my bed.

  “Listen,” he says, standing there in the doorway. He folds the paper and scratches his stubbly chin. His is not a face prone to smiling and the current expression is no exception. “We have to talk about something.”

  “I was home by 11:59!” I say reflexively, pulling the pillow off my face.

  “Oh, believe me, I know that. This isn’t about that. This is . . . well it’s kind of bad.” He folds the newspaper tightly into itself and throws it at me like a Frisbee. I do not catch it. I try, but it deflects off my hands, and takes flight in a birdlike arc, then thuds on the floor.

  Dad smirks. How bad I am at sports is alternatingly hilarious and maddening to him. You wouldn’t know it from looking at him now, with his mountainous slope of a belly, but he was apparently quite a jock back in the day. He’s a sports-guy. He’d rather I do the high jump than sing the high C.

  I look over at the newspaper lying on the floor. There is a headline screaming about football and a huge photo of a guy from Tresta’s school celebrating a touchdown. I assume Dad’s comment wasn’t about that. Dad’s face is looking very serious.

  I flip the paper over to get a look at the nonfootball headline. It is bad.

  COUNTY SCHOOL BUDGET PASSED 4–3. MAJOR CUTS.

  “Holy crap,” I say. “Are you guys losing your jobs?”

  “No. You’re losing your theater.”

  My eyes race through the article. There is a lot of boring stuff about credit swaps and budgetary whatnots. Some shady dealings by East Atlantic Bank I don’t quite understand . . . and then there is this, in simple black and white.

  Major cuts are coming to the many of the district’s

  noncore classes. Extracurricular programs,

  including theater, music, and other clubs will be

  on permanent hiatus.

  “Um, hiatus doesn’t sound so bad, right?” I say hopefully.

  “It’s the permanent part you have to worry about,” Dad says. “They say hiatus to try to deflect the heat. But this budget is brutal. It’s not coming back anytime soon.”

  “What the hell? What happened to softening the blow?”

  “That’s the administrators’ job. My job is to tell it like it is. And I’m telling you. Theater is done.”

  Do I detect a bit of happiness in his voice? He never understood. How could I expect him to know what it would feel like to lose it? The backstage shenanigans. The onstage glory. The feel of the lights, the sound of the applause. The one place I ever felt truly alive and truly great and truly me . . . gone.

  “Where’s Mom?” I ask.

  “I’m here.” She sticks her head in from the hallway. She is rushing, like always. Mom is the busiest woman in the world.

  “Mom. You see this budget story?”

  “I know, dear,” she says, already gone. “It’s really such a shame. We’ll talk about it later.”

  “This sucks so bad. I notice they aren’t cutting football.”

  “You don’t want to make it a fight between sports and arts in this town,” Dad says. “Not in any town.”

  “No, not a fight,” I say. “That’s not fair. Unless it’s a dance-fight. Or maybe a sing-off?” I’m being sarcastic because the alternative is to get really angry. I feel my face turning hot.

  “Sports mean a lot to people,” Dad says.

  “So does theater!” I yell. “So does music! So does art!”

  He clears his throat. “Well, sure, but for some kids—sports are the only reason they keep their grades up and stay in school.”

  “For some kids, theater is the only reason they stay alive!” I snap.

  “Now you’re being melodramatic.”

  “I’m not! It’s true!” Without a creative outlet, without a place to fit in, without a spotlight in which to bask . . . well, what would the point of life be? How do I explain to him what it feels like to get lost in a song? How in that first moment when I stepped on a stage, something clicked. Maybe it didn’t make everything perfect, but it was a hell of a lot better. That is life. My life anyway.

  Dad keeps talking, but I stop listening to him. I stop listening and begin singing loudly in my head, the words to a musical I’ve been working on. It’s called Shut Up! That is also the reprise.

  WAX: (singing) Shut up! Shut up! SHUT UP!!!

  Dad does not shut up. Eventually I tell him I have to go to the bathroom. I text Tresta from the john. I sit there a long time but she does not respond. I feel incredibly mopey.

  Then I text Alex, a theater-friend. A good friend. I text and he calls me right back. Not texts: calls. Clue #1 that this is serious.

  “Oh my God,” he says. “You have got to be kidding me with this. I’m like beyond outraged.”

  “So you saw it then?”

  “No,” he says. “I’m just outraged for no apparent reason.”

  To be honest, it wouldn’t be the first time. Outrage is Alex’s primary mode of being. I am glad he is already in the loop and I don’t have to break the bad news.

  “Without theater I’ll die, Wax,” he says. “You might think I’m kidding, but I’m being perfectly serious.”

  “Oh, I know,” I say. “This is as serious as a heart attack.”

  “I’d rather have like a million heart attacks all at once than have them cut the theater program!”

  “I’m with you, brother. I’m with you.”

  “So what are we going to do about it?”

  This is one of the many things I love about Alex. I am resignation. He’s all action.

  “Get off the toilet,” he says. “I’m coming over.”

  . . . . .

  Alex bounds into the kitchen without bothering to knock, blowing in like a strong breeze through an open window. I am sitting at the kitchen table, drinking coffee and sort of checking my phone every two seconds.

  Tresta has not yet texted me back. Should I text her again?

  “Want to get some coffee?” Alex says without seeming like he needed any. He is full of energy, almost vibrating in his shoes. He runs his hand through his hair, which appears to be messily tousled but I know to be painstakingly arranged. He looks like a headshot magically sprung to life. I’m not ashamed to admit it: he’s a good-looking dude. They call me gay all the time, probably because I’m in theater, probably because I hang out with Alex all the time. I usually tell them to ask their moms if I’m gay.

  I hold up my mug to indicate that I already have a full cup. “Can’t ever have too much coffee,” he says.

  “No. I think you can.”

  “You can. I’m coffee-proof. My addiction is strong.”

  “Your addiction to that guy who works at Bertrand’s is strong,” I say.

  “Maybe. May-be.”

  So we hop in Alex’s car—an immaculate silver Audi—and drive to Bertrand’s, the hipster coffee shop on the west end of town. You
have to pass like twelve perfectly good Dunkin’ Donuts to get there, but I know better than to say anything. As we drive, we talk about our plight and before we even get in the door at Bertrand’s, have the beginnings of a plan.

  INT—BERTRAND’S COFFEE

  (As Wax and Alex enter, Alex speaks loudly.)

  ALEX: So then I say to the curator: I don’t care if he is a little person, no one should drink that much Chardonnay. . . .

  Alex has the habit of saying something loud and fascinating in case someone is listening. No one is. It is just girls working the counter so he quiets down. “I like the idea of going to the school board meeting but we can’t just go wait in line and give some speech,” he says. “They’ve just been waiting to kill theater. It’s their political agenda. And this was their chance. Their minds are set.”

  “I don’t think it’s really about politics,” I say as we wait for our overpriced and bitter drinks. “I read that whole article. Okay, most of it. It was bank bullshit. The school district got ripped off by East Atlantic Bank. Shady investments, that kind of thing.”

  “Ew, East Atlantic Bank sucks. I hate their commercials too.”

  “They’re the worst and now the school district is broke.”

  “Well, we have to do something big. It has to be epic. Not just a speech at the school board meeting,” Alex says, his voice getting loud again. “Yes! A performance! You’re thinking just what I’m thinking, Wax: We razzle-dazzle this bitch up?”

  “Well, not in so many words, but okay . . .”

  We proceed to formulate our plan. We talk about the specifics, me offering as much as I can about the political and economic side. I had just read only the one article and half listened to my dad talk about it, so it isn’t all that much. The school board got screwed by the bank and can’t raise taxes because of some law. So they have no choice but to start cutting every “noncore” thing they can think of. Forgetting of course that theater is the core of many of us.