by Susan Rohrer
As they finished the carol, a smattering of diners applauded. She had to admit it. That always felt good. Shep segued into a holiday medley. Hope gave his shoulders an appreciative squeeze.
Myrna clicked off the microphone, and turned to Shep. “Thanks, Baby Doll.”
Continuing to play, Shep grinned widely. “You two just make me sound good.”
As they stepped off the stage, Hope took Myrna’s arm and led her aside, into the ladies’ locker room. Calling it a locker room might have been overstating the case. It was more like an employees’ restroom with some tall metal cabinets set inside.
Hope opened her locker. She could only pray that the pseudo-lemony scent of industrial-strength bathroom disinfectant hadn’t completely permeated the dress she’d brought. “You got this for an hour or so?”
A knowing twinkle lit in Myrna’s eyes. “Sure. You tell Mr. Fancy Pants Broadway Director that if he don’t hire you, he’s got me to reckon with.”
“Should set me apart.” Hope untied her apron. There was always something about putting on the right clothes that helped Hope start to feel less like a waitress and more like the character.
Myrna reached for Hope’s uniform. “Lemme hang all this.”
That was Myrna. Always eager to help. In a flash, Hope’s uniform was stowed. She slipped the soft red chemise over her head, then pulled her hair down from its chignon. She fluffed it loosely around her shoulders and checked her lipstick in the mirror. What a great opportunity this was. It was amazing that her agent had even gotten her the call.
Myrna took a step back. “Look at you, Girl. Mmm!”
“You think?” Hope kicked off her comfy-soled waitress shoes and replaced them with a stylish little pair of black flats. The transformation complete, she headed for the door.
Myrna followed. She squeezed Hope’s arm as they walked back through to the restaurant’s service floor. “Shoulders back, Baby. He won’t even know what hit him once you step up!”
Café regular “Goldie” Goldstone grumbled to Hope as she passed. “Are we completely forgetting about my double mocha decaf latte with whipped?” The man was as gaudily attired as he was cynical. A greased comb-over failed to cover the bald spot at his crown.
Myrna stepped to Goldie’s side. “Now, you tell me why you can’t stomach one morning with me making it for you.” Myrna motioned to Hope. “Go on, break a leg, Honey. I’ll take care of Goldie.”
Sourly scanning his paper, Goldie retorted to Myrna, loud enough for Hope to hear. “And exactly what makes her think this will be different from the last hundred-fifty failed auditions?”
Myrna patted Goldie on his high-maintenance back. “Christmas is coming, Goldie. Have a little faith.”
Relieved, Hope blew Myrna a grateful kiss and sailed out of the door.
Charity drank in the passing scenery. The train glided along the tracks to New York smoothly, much more so than she’d anticipated. Sometimes, it didn’t seem like the train itself was moving at all, only the ever-changing landscape.
Daniel sat engrossed, studying the map of Manhattan the travel agent had provided. He wanted to make sure he knew exactly where they were going, she supposed. Already, he’d found where the train would let them off at Penn Station. He’d also located the address of Aunt Hope’s apartment, just a mile’s walk away. Charity was glad they’d be able to get around the city on foot. Trains were one thing. Cars and subways, she could do without.
Charity watched Daniel as he jotted down directions from the map. He really was taking the responsibility of escorting her to the city seriously. He also seemed to be enjoying it, at least so far. Never had they spent so much time together, not by themselves.
For a while, Charity tried to think of what she might say to him, but in time she relaxed into quiet fascination at their surroundings. It wasn’t just the change from the gently rolling hills of Pennsylvania to the looming skyscrapers of Manhattan that set Charity’s mind to thinking. It was the people and the way that, the closer they got to Penn Station, the more crowded and moody their train car became.
With every passing stop, Charity observed each person, young and old, who boarded. Trips to the market on the outskirts of town had done little to prepare her for so many different walks of life. Actually, though she did her best to be discreet, she couldn’t help but notice the stares that she, herself, drew. Reflexively, she straightened the ribbons of her kapp.
Daniel leaned over toward Charity. He lowered his voice. “Don’t let them make you feel self-conscious.”
Charity dropped her eyes. How was it that he’d known what she’d been thinking? “No, it’s just... Perhaps without my Mamm’s kapp I would draw less attention.”
Daniel smiled at her admiringly. “It’s not the covering that makes them stare, Charity. You are quite beautiful.”
Charity blushed. Never had she heard such a compliment. How should she respond to him? To accept his words felt prideful, but to discount them seemed unappreciative. Finally, she opted to just change the subject. “New York City must be such an expensive place to live alone. I wonder if my Aunt Hope got married...or has children.”
“Her name is still Bright on the envelope.”
“I hear some don’t take a married name.”
Daniel raised his brow thoughtfully. “Well, if she is married or has a family, getting her to come home could be that much more of a challenge.”
“They could all come.”
“They could,” he supposed. “But would they?”
Charity bolstered her resolve. “She writes every Christmas because something in her still wants to come home. We have to believe that.”
As she emerged from the busy train station with Daniel, Charity’s chest tightened. Car horns blared. Men with shrill whistles hailed taxis. Widespread pedestrian traffic contributed to the cacophony. It was unlike anything she’d ever seen or heard.
A raggedly dressed woman pushed a shopping cart toward them. It was filled to the brim with all kinds of things. The woman passed by, raging at an unseen foe. “You shut up! Shut your hideous mouth. You just talk, talk, talk, and you think for a second anybody’s listening to you?”
Charity slowed. She looked back briefly, but Daniel kept walking them forward. It seemed impossible to take it all in all at once. The sights, the sounds, the smells... Sensory overload, really. She had heard about what life was like in the city, but nothing had prepared her for the reality before her. Neon lights glowed, even though the sun was still shining. Glitzy decorations were in storefront after storefront. There were men dressed as Santa, plastic reindeer, and sparkling Christmas balls the size of hay bales. What she didn’t see was a sign of anything that had any connection with what Christmas was really all about. At least to them.
Daniel checked over at her as they waited at a crosswalk. Again, she offered to carry her own bag. Once again, he declined.
“You all right?” he asked.
Charity turned to him. “Yes. It’s just a lot, much more than I had imagined.
Leanne exited the security door of Hope’s building. Wouldn’t you know it? She was just in time to find Hope’s old boyfriend, Ivan, there ringing the bell.
What was he doing there? Hope had said they were over. She shut the door protectively. “She’s not home, Ivan. You know she works. I gotta go, too.”
“I thought with her audition she might—”
Leanne rolled her eyes. What did he want from her? “So, go to the theater. Maybe you can catch her leavin’. Anyway, I was under the impression that you two were kind of kaputski.”
A lovelorn look crossed Ivan’s face. “Is that what she said?”
Leanne glanced at her watch. How had the entire morning gotten away from her? “Look, I’m already late and Frank gets way cranky about that. Maybe you should take this up with someone who gives a rip.”
She blew by him to descend the stairs. That’s when she saw them. At the bottom of the steps stood a young couple seriously in need
of an extreme makeover. Though they didn’t appear to be much older than she was, the way they were dressed, they might as well have been from another century. Come to think of it, the girl looked a little like one of those people at the airport who was always asking for money.
The guy spoke. “Hello. I’m Daniel. I’m with, uh...Charity, here—”
Leanne threw up her hands as she descended the stairs. She put on her best foreign accent. “No charity. No speak-a de Eng-leesh.”
“Excuse me, Miss,” the young woman said. “Could you please—”
Leanne blew out an exasperated breath. She opened her coat to display her protruding belly. “Sorry, but do I look like I’ve got somethin’ here to donate?”
“No, no, we’re not collecting,” she explained. “My name is Charity. I believe my Aunt Hope lives in this building.” Charity checked the green envelope in her hand. “Yes. This is the address. Do you know Hope Bright?”
Hope shook out her hands. Was it all a dream, or was she really standing in the wings of a bona fide Broadway theater? The musty scent of countless past productions filled her head. And the curtain—that alone was magnificent. Would it be too geeky to touch it? She checked around. Good. No one was watching. She reached to her side and ran the back of her hand across the plush velvet.
How on earth could she be perspiring, as drafty as it was? There was nowhere to put her coat, so she draped it over her arm.
Should she go over the lines once more? No need. She had those words down cold. Lines were not her problem. It was the pounding heart that threatened to jump right out of her chest.
She closed her eyes. Please, help me do my best work.
As the prior auditionee finished, Hope filled her lungs, then slowly exhaled. The casting director’s voice resounded from his seat a few rows back from the stage. “Thank you. All right, next. Hope Bright.”
She smoothed her skirt. “Okay. Five, four, three, two, one.” Counting backwards was supposed to calm her nerves. It didn’t. She threw her shoulders back and strode onto the stage.
Just who was out there past those lights? Hope took a gander at the auditioners as she crossed to the center of the hardwood floor.
The man who appeared to be the director conferred in animated whispers with a woman in an expensive suit. A producer, no doubt. She should wait for their cue.
Hope set her coat down, then took one last glance at the scene in her hands. She ran her fingers through her hair. Finally, the auditioners turned their attention to the stage. “Hi, I’m Hope Bright.”
The director nodded for her to start.
“Oh.” There would be no chitchat, no niceties. Just like her agent had warned, it would be a tough room. She swallowed, fighting a suddenly parched throat. It was like the Sahara in there. She cleared her windpipe and launched into the reading.
“So, that’s how it is. Okay. You know, I told myself a hundred years ago, I was over one-sided relationships and here I am, a fortune in therapy bills later, trying to beg, cajole, plead, whatever it takes to get you to participate in this—”
A pronounced doink sounded from her coat pocket. It couldn’t be, but it was.
A text had just landed.
Mortified, Hope’s jaw slacked. How could she have forgotten to silence the thing? It was a rookie mistake. Rank amateur. All she could do was grab her coat, wrestle the phone out of her pocket and power the thing off so it couldn’t embarrass her again. The phone’s cheesy shutdown ditty didn’t exactly help.
As much as Hope longed to apologize, her training told her otherwise. Simply pick the scene back up, same place, and continue. Stay completely in character:
“—Like I said...I’m trying to do whatever it takes to get you to participate in this... I don’t even know what to call what we’re doing here. Do you? I mean, I can hardly force a collective pronoun to describe us or it or...will you please just stop staring at me and say something?”
As she finished, Hope propped up her flagging spirit. She braved a look at the director, searching his expression for some semblance of understanding. Even pity. Verbal or nonverbal, any hint of encouragement would do.
None came.
There were no words privately exchanged with the designer-clad producer about her. The director simply jotted a quick note, then excused her with the identically toned “thank you” that he’d used to release the actress just before her. Oh, how she’d come to dread those thank yous. They weren’t signs of appreciation. They were a saccharine heave-ho. They meant please leave. Her insides crushing like a paper cup, Hope willed a smile, then hurried off the stage.
Back inside Hope’s apartment, Leanne offered to fix some drinks, then shuffled toward the kitchen. Ivan could at least make himself useful by chatting up Charity and Daniel in the living room. This was way beyond belief. How would she get Frank to believe why she was late if she couldn’t half believe it herself?
She pulled a two-liter bottle out of the fridge and sized up the situation. Charity and Daniel had arrived with small suitcases. That sure didn’t look good. These two intended to stay. If the girl was family, as she claimed to be, Hope would hardly turn her niece away from her one spare room, the same room Hope had promised to her till the baby came.
Leanne poured the drinks and carried them into the living room. It couldn’t hurt to make a good impression. Maybe she could guilt them into staying somewhere else. She handed one glass to Charity and the other to Daniel. “I hope you like Ginger Ale. It’s not real ale, you know. Totally non-alcoholic. Even I can have it.” She glanced at Hope’s wall clock. Ivan wasn’t doing squat to carry the conversation. “We have Root Beer, too. That’s not actually beer, either. Am I still talking?”
Daniel shook his head. “You’re fine.
“Thank you for this,” Charity added.
Leanne froze. “Oops. Ivan, are you thirsty?”
Ivan waved her off congenially. “No, thanks.”
Leanne eased herself down into a seat beside Ivan, across from Charity and Daniel. She caught herself rocking. Why was she rocking? The chair wasn’t a rocker. How ridiculous was that? She told herself to sit still, but her toes kept bobbing. That she couldn’t seem to stop—even when she slept—at least that’s what her mom always told her. A random thought popped into her head. “Hold on. Do you even drink soda?”
“Some do. Some friends of ours even make it. I just haven’t had much.” Charity raised her glass to her lips and took a tentative drink. Her eyes widened. “Oh. Good.”
Leanne rose. “I can get something else.”
Daniel held his tumbler, but he didn’t take the first sip from it. “This is fine. Really.”
Leanne settled back down. Lost for what to do, she wracked her brain for something to say, some bit of jibber-jabber to break up the stupefying silence. Hope’s cat, Smokey, wandered out, waltzing into Leanne’s line of sight. An inspiration struck. “Are you allergic to cats? Because you probably shouldn’t stay here if—”
Charity reached down and stroked Smokey. “Not at all. I like them.”
Wouldn’t you know it? The cat took to Charity right off the bat. She rubbed herself against those thick black tights Charity was wearing. Leanne couldn’t help being disappointed. This was bad.
Daniel set his soda down on a coaster. “Didn’t we catch you on your way out, Leanne? Was there somewhere you needed to go?”
Leanne forced a laugh. “Just lollygagging for two, you know?” She fired an irked glance at Ivan.
Charity set her glass down, too. “So. Are you busy getting ready to be parents?”
Ivan shook his head. “Parents? No, no—”
“What?” A spray of spit shot out of Leanne’s mouth. She wiped it off Ivan’s shoulder. “We’re not...married or... I don’t actually have a, you know, husband.”
Charity looked embarrassed. “Oh, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”
Leanne crossed her arms over her middle. Heat rose up her neck, all the way to her ears. “That’
s such a strange word, coming out of my mouth: husband. I mean, I’m barely seventeen, hardly old enough to, you know...” Oh, sweet slobbering succotash! She was only digging herself into a deeper pit. “Anyway...Ivan is, or I should say he was Hope’s boyfriend.”
Ivan looked at Leanne. “Wait a minute. Stop. What exactly did Hope say to you about us?”
Leanne reared back defensively. “Look-it. Okay, I can’t be held responsible for anything I say in my condition. So just...erase, erase, erase!”
Emerging from the theater, Hope yanked the offending cell phone from her pocket and hit the power button. Probably, the text alert had been from her agent, reminding her to let him know how things had gone.
That would be ironic.
It also could have been Frank. He was a sport about letting her off for auditions, but the shelf life on his patience usually ran out after an hour or so. Then again, the culprit could have been Ivan. She’d figured she hadn’t heard the last of him, and actually, a microscopic part of her wished that were true.
As it turned out, it hadn’t been her agent or Ivan. Not even Frank, bugging her to get back to work. Instead, the message was from Leanne:
Hey Hope. S.O.S.!! No ambulance needed, but get your hind parts home pronto! Emergency!!!
What Leanne’s version of an emergency was, Hope didn’t know, but the number of exclamation points Leanne used set her teeth sideways. She didn’t know Leanne well enough to gauge how dire all that punctuation meant the situation actually was. Maybe they’d run out of toilet paper, or the sink had stopped up again. Maybe the apartment building was half on fire.
She punched in her landline at home. Of course, that was when her battery decided to croak. She kicked herself. Why hadn’t she remembered to recharge the thing?
