Mr. Owens rolls his eyes, an expression you don’t normally see on an adult’s face.
I notice Victor and Kelli are still dancing. At this moment, I’d give my entire collection of Harry Potter books (Ron Weasley and all) to be up in that booth instead of here on this stage.
“Let’s begin the read-through,” Mr. Owens says, trilling his Rs.
Thankfully, Juliet doesn’t appear until the third scene, so I have a little time to convince my brain that no, this won’t, in fact, kill me. No one is familiar with the lines, so all eyes are on the scripts in our hands. And since Shakespeare’s beautiful language is like speaking in Pig Latin, where you have to pause and consider before each word, no one’s really reading with any kind of emotion. Actually, that’s not true. Darby reads her role as Tybalt with the exact amount of derision I might expect from both him and her. But everyone else is pretty flat.
As we get closer to my first line, my throat is filling with thick dread, and there’s a slight tremor to my hands that makes the pages of my script tremble.
Meggie, playing the nurse, calls out, “What, Juliet!”
My stomach is like the fiery core of the Earth, heavy and hot. There’s a gagging feeling in my throat from the heat of it. I know my line. It’s four small words. But there’s no way to fit them through my throat, so they have to scrape the sides painfully on their way out, sounding like rusty hinges. “How now! Who calls?”
Everyone’s eyes look up from their scripts and right at me. Meggie and Darby exchange a look before Meggie asks, “What?”
Beside me, Thomas coughs to cover a laugh. Darby eyes me like a hungry hawk spotting a lost bunny.
Mr. Owens sits forward in his chair. “Try again, Juliet.”
I peek up at the booth. Victor, Kelli, and Max are giving me three thumbs up. I clear some of the fire from my throat and say the line again, clearly this time, if not loudly, “How now! Who calls?” In the booth, I’m receiving a standing ovation.
My voice grows increasingly confident with each scene we read, and since I already know the play, I can sneak peeks at the booth. Every time I look up, the gang up there does something to make me smile. I’m feeling okay about the whole thing, until Romeo dies. As Thomas is saying his last few words, I glance up at the booth to find Victor’s tiny butt pressed up to the glass.
I can’t contain the laugh that sneaks out. Unfortunately, in trying to contain it, I end up snorting. Everyone looks up. Right at me.
I bury my face in the script, mumbling, “Sorry.” My insides are roiling with laughter, and my eyes water from holding it in.
Mr. Owens scrubs his face with a handkerchief. He would have a hankie.
Darby taps one boot like the rat-a-tat-tat from a machine gun.
The theater erupts again with music.
“Maximo,” Owens shouts, turning in his seat to face the booth. Thankfully, Victor has already holstered his butt, so Owens doesn’t see.
“Sorry, sir.”
Owens stands and shakes a finger at Max. “See that it doesn’t happen again, young man, or I’ll find a new tech captain.”
Darby snickers, and it’s my turn to shoot a look of daggers at her. I don’t think I scared her, though. Not if the smooth smile she tosses back at me is any indication.
“Go, get thee hence, for I will not away.” I say my next line suddenly (and loudly) like I’m trying to be heard over the sound of a jet engine. It’s the first line I’ve said with any kind of volume since The Lonely Electron debacle. Thomas chuckles beside me. He’s shaking his head a bit, and I get a closeup view of those dimples.
“Yes,” Owens says, lowering himself to his seat. He wipes his neck with his handkerchief. “Back to the play.”
Thomas winks at me, and I’m not really sure what to do with that. My face contorts into a confused, smirky look that I’m sure is super attractive. This acting thing is going to be more difficult than I had imagined, and I had imagined it would be about as difficult as silently ripping off my fingernails, one by one.
Scene Two
[The library]
In English on Friday, Mrs. Jonah raps her knuckles on her desk to get our attention. “Today, people,” she announces, “you’re going to begin working with your critique partners on your latest writing piece.” The latest piece is an essay, expanding our thoughts on the Would You Rather prompt from the other day. I wrote a thousand words about why I’d rather change the past than plan my future. About midway through the essay, I realized I’d chosen wrong. The idea of erasing Charlotte was worse than thinking I could play Juliet. I’d rather just plan a future where I know I’ll never be in the position to lose someone like her again. I figure a future as an agoraphobic cat lady would be safe—provided I don’t actually own any cats.
Mrs. Jonah is counting out stacks of papers for us to pass down the rows. “Here are the rubrics I will use to grade the pieces, but I encourage you all to come up with your own set of criteria for critique as well.”
There’s bustling and chatter as everyone pulls desks together or moves to the quiet corners to work with their partners. Darby and I remain in our seats—a stalemate as to who will move first.
“Darby? Becca? My desk, please.” Mrs. Jonah waves us over to her desk.
Darby stomps up the aisle. I follow in her wake, careful to avoid all backpacks.
“Why don’t you girls use one of the group study rooms in the library today? Perhaps it would help if you worked together without an audience.” She’s looking at Darby when she says this, and her expression is complex, like she’s both daring Darby and offering her a peace treaty all at once.
Darby leaves with a huff.
“Um, thanks, I guess,” I tell Mrs. Jonah. She sighs, watching Darby, who’s already in the hall, before nodding at me.
I scramble to catch up with Darby. We both look straight ahead as we walk past the sunny window of rockers where Darby read to the preschoolers. Once the door to the study room closes behind us, she flops in a chair and puts her head on the desk. The room is small and warm, with beige walls, a large wooden library table and chairs, and dark green industrial carpeting. I wrinkle my nose. It smells like dust and sweat in here.
I shift my weight, foot to foot, unsure what I’m supposed to do.
“You scare the crap out of me,” I say, wishing I had better control over my inner monologue. Darby looks up, one brow arched. “Seriously. I don’t know what—” I cut myself off, because her expression looks a little murderous.
I wish my voice were louder, but it sounds like a breeze through pine needles. “I didn’t ask to be Juliet.”
“Then why did you come to callbacks?”
I grab a lock of hair and twist it. “You’ll think I’m nuts.”
Darby sits up, a wicked smile twisting her face. “Oh, I already think much worse.”
“There are lots of reasons, each one crazier than the next, but the craziest by far is this: I want my friend to be proud of me.”
“Max?”
I shake my head. “Charlotte.”
“The cancer girl?”
I clench my teeth. “Charlotte.”
“Right, but the dead one?”
I step closer, my insides starting to bubble, like a slow boil. “Are you being obtuse on purpose?”
“Are we in geometry all of a sudden? I don’t even know what that means.” Darby holds her hands up, surrendering. “But whatever, we all have our motivations.”
Without another word, she opens her notebook and starts reading Mrs. Jonah’s rubric.
“We all have our—are you kidding me?” That slow boil in my stomach is starting to roll. “I just said I’m in this mess for a dead girl’s approval. My mom has a shrink on speed dial in case I can’t deal with my grief. I’ve never been on a stage before in my life. I’m terrified of people, not just crowds of people, individual people—even the nice ones like Max. And you’re going to sit there and tell me we all have motivations? What’s yours?”
Darby’s
face is painted with an expression of surprise. “Holy shit. That’s a lot of words all at once. Did you think of them all yourself? Or are they from another one of your brother’s little scripts? Maybe it’s from the new musical Whiny Girls?”
“Oh, I get it. Your motivation is to be a bitch.”
“Maybe.” The word fires out of her like an arrow from a taut bow.
We’ve both leaned forward, hands pressed on the table between us. Mine are there to keep them from trembling. I think perhaps hers are pressed so firmly to keep from strangling me. I exhale a shaky breath and collapse into the seat across from her.
“Dammit,” Darby says, pushing herself up from her chair. My legs tense, ready to jump up again and flee. “Juliet should have been mine. I’ve been working my ass off for two years for that jackass, Owens. But you—all you had to do was stand on that stage—and he fell in love with you. Do you know how crazy that makes me?”
“Crazier than a girl who’s obsessed with a dead girl?”
Darby looks so pissed that I can feel the muscles of my face pulling away from her, preparing to be slapped. But instead, she does this strangled laugh thing—one loud syllable between us.
“Exactly,” she says, her voice a barely contained Rottweiler on a short leash. “Now, please, let’s just do our work.”
I nod. “Okay. Anything you say, Your Highness.”
Darby flops into her seat. “I hate that nickname, but at least I earned it.”
Darby shoves her open notebook at me. “Now be useful and critique this. I need grades to get out of here.”
I exchange my own notebook for hers. “For The School of the Arts?”
Her lip curls. “How do you—”
“Victor said something about it.” I’m instantly sorry for mentioning Victor and make a mental note to tell him to hide—perhaps he should just move far away. I stick my nose in her notebook, determined not to look at her. “I’ll do my best. I’m pretty experienced at, you know, reading.”
Darby snorts. “I’ll say.”
We’re quiet as we read. I want to make notes on Darby’s draft, but I’m terrified to actually write on it. Instead, I scribble my thoughts all over the rubric. When we’re done, I notice that Darby did not suffer from the same fear. She’s written all over my paper in hot pink ink.
“You started off strong,” she says, pointing to a relatively clean area of my draft. “But you fell apart in the middle, like you just lost all your conviction.”
I nod. “Mm-hmm.”
“Changing the past wasn’t as easy as you thought, eh?”
The class bell rings. “I’ll figure it out,” I tell her, reaching for my notebook.
She pulls it back, out of reach. “Just like you’ll figure out this whole acting thing?” She sits back in her seat, daring me with her steely gaze to take my own notebook. “Never pegged you as a hard worker. Figured you were more of a quitter.”
I stand like my seat has been electrified. “Excuse me?”
She shrugs. “Unlike you, I’m observant. I’ve been watching you for years, nose stuck in a book, oblivious to everyone around you, coasting through school without applying any effort. I bet even your little friend last year didn’t expect much from you—not really. Bet she was happy just to sit around with you and do nothing.”
My stomach feels like a rock. She slides my notebook across the table, but her fingers linger. “There’re no free passes with me.”
I snatch the book off the table and leave without a response—not because that makes for a dramatic scene ending. I’m not that cool. There’s nothing to say, because she’s right.
Scene Three
[A Hallway at Sandstone High]
When I get to my locker, Max is waiting for me. His gaze runs over me from top to bottom, like a paramedic assessing a trauma patient.
“How’d it go?” He pushes himself off my locker as I reach for the combination lock. I don’t immediately spin the dial. My hand freezes, and I stare at it like I can make it move with my mind. “That well, eh?”
I take a breath to clear my head and then unlock my locker. “Would you rather try at something and fail in a big, spectacular way or do the same thing every day?”
Max blinks, stepping backward as I open my locker door. “Um…”
“Don’t think. Just answer.” I drop my backpack at my feet.
“It’s kind of a tough question.”
“Answer.” I’m not even sure why I’m asking, but it feels like every molecule in my body is holding its breath while waiting for him to answer.
He runs a hand through his choppy hair, tugging the longish fringes in the front away from his face. “I’ll go with failure.”
“Really?”
He shrugs. “I’m kind of an expert at it actually. I screw up lots of things. My mom says I have to break something before I can understand it.”
I dig in my locker for nothing in particular, afraid that he’ll see the tears that I can feel prickling at the corners of my eyes. Of course he’s not afraid of failure. He’s probably also totally fine with change. I bet he loves surprises. And my money is on his middle name being Spontaneous. Maximo Spontaneous Herrera.
“My turn now.” Max shifts so his back is leaning against the locker next to mine. “Would you rather have telekinesis or super strength?”
“Telekinesis is the one where I can move stuff with just brain waves, right?” Victor asks, poking his head around the corner. “Hey, Becca.”
I wave and finish loading my bag as Max answers. “Right.”
“That’d be cool, but give me the big, rippling muscles, please.” He flexes his arms and neck muscles in a way that makes him look like he’s wrestling with a pickle jar. Despite myself, I smile.
Max chuckles. “Idiot.”
“What?” Victor says, now shadowboxing and bobbing around us as we take off toward the parking lot.
Max replies, “If you have telekinesis you don’t need super strength.” I take this to mean that Max chooses telekinesis, which I agree sounds pretty awesome, but I’d worry that I’d start daydreaming in class and things might start flying around and it’d probably be safer for everyone involved if I had super strength instead. I could carry way more books home from the library without breaking a sweat.
Victor smacks Max’s arm. “But without super strength you won’t look hot at the beach sporting a Speedo.”
“Dude, no one looks hot in a Speedo.”
Victor looks to me for confirmation. I pinch my mouth and nose up to one side and nod. “It’s never a good look.”
He scowls at me, but then his expression flips and he’s grinning again. “My turn?”
Max holds the door for us. “Just keep it clean. Okay, Hulk?”
Victor grabs his chest and gasps. “What are you implying, sir?”
But Max doesn’t answer. He just arches one brow.
“Fine, fine, fine,” Victor says in a sulk. “Would you rather be invisible or fly?”
Max and I answer at the same time.
“Invisible—”
“Fly—”
Huh. That’s three for three. Max and I have about as much in common as Darby and me.
Victor laughs and then hollers, “Shotgun.” Without another word, he’s sprinting through the parking lot toward Max’s truck.
“Man, he really hates the backseat, eh?”
Max’s cheeks are like pennies again. “No,” he grumbles. “He just really hates losing.”
He shouldn’t be so worried. I’m not exactly a tough competitor.
When Max and I reach the truck, Victor looks thoughtful. “Hey, Becca. Would you rather sit at home alone tonight or”—he reaches up to toss an arm over Max’s shoulders—“hang out with the coolest techies in town.”
“No,” I blurt, my insides turning into jellyfish, stingy and squishy and not exactly the stuff you want your internal organs made out of.
Victor’s smile is lopsided. “That’s not how Would You Ra
ther works.”
Max avoids looking at me as he shrugs off Victor’s arm. “Stop bothering her, Vic.”
“Yeah, but it’s not like twenty questions. It’s not yes or no. She has to pick one.” Victor holds the front seat forward for me to climb in back. “So which is it? Alone or cool kids?”
Max snorts. “We aren’t exactly cool kids, man.”
“Pishposh,” Victor scoffs.
Max grins at me as I settle into the backseat. “Case in point. What kind of sixteen-year-old says pishposh?”
“Sixteen-and-a-half.” Victor pushes his bottom lip out like a pouting toddler. “And maybe you should just shut up and let her answer.”
Max’s jaw tenses, and his brows pull down in a Muppet-like V. Victor smiles and bats his lashes at him.
Max sighs, but his lips curve upward. “He’s right,” he says, turning in his seat to face me. “I’m sorry. It would be awesome if you came.”
I twist a lock of hair around my index finger. Max’s grin widens. “You can get to know us better, then, I mean, since we’ll all be working together in the play.”
Maybe it’s because Darby got under my skin, or maybe it’s because I would like a night out of my room, but I nod. “Okay.”
As we drive home I watch Max in the rearview mirror. Maybe I said yes because I’d like to get to know some of the techies.
Maybe it’s because I want to get to know Max.
Scene Four
[Becca’s room]
I text Mom when I get home from school to give her fair warning. I’d hate for her to pass out from surprise when she hears that I’m going to hang out with living, breathing people for the first time in over one hundred fifty thousand pages. The last time I went anywhere fun I was with Charlie and his friends. It was just before they left for college.
Me: Got invited to hang out with people from the play. Is that cool?
Mom: OMG! So cool!
Me: Mom?
Mom: OMG is out?
Me: I wouldn’t know.
Mom: We’ll talk when I get home.
Upstairs I sink into my reading nest, but I don’t read. Instead I stare into my open closet, trying to figure out what I’m supposed to wear tonight. Is this an occasion for dressier clothes? Trendier clothes? Clothes that say I’ve got my crap together? A trickling stream of panic starts to work its way down my spine. I don’t know what else to do, so I call Charlie.
Life After Juliet Page 8
