Drama Girls: A Lesbian Romance

by Mia Archer

  I thought about everything Sarah taught me leading up to this moment. Take something from real life and use it.

  With her onstage staring at me there was a heck of a lot I could use. It wasn’t much of a stretch to act out the part of a confused young girl who didn’t know what she wanted.

  I took a deep breath. It was time to do this even if the thought terrified me.

  “Why Mr. Farnsworth,” I said.

  There were giggles from around the room. Why were they giggling? Then it hit me.

  Oh. Right. She wasn’t very well going to be Mr. Farnsworth. What should she be? Well she was single, unattached, looking for a lady.

  “Sorry,” I muttered, then louder. “Why Ms. Farsnworth!”

  This time it was different from the first time around. I’d been nervous then. I’d been painfully aware of everyone sitting in the audience watching us and judging us.

  And it’s not like they were a normal audience. It was an audience of drama kids. Students who’d been doing this acting thing for years in some cases.

  Having them watching and judging me was even more terrifying than in drama class, but all that nervousness fell away as I looked at Sarah and we became the only two people in the room.

  “You know you shouldn’t say such things.”

  I decided to improvise just a little. I walked in front of the couch and planted my hands on my hips. Wagged a finger in her face and she went cross-eyed.

  There were some laughs from the audience. Laughs were good. This was supposed to be a comedy after all.

  Sarah stood there staring at my finger for a long moment, then she looked to me. It was like she’d lost it. My finger had hypnotized her. I needed to do something.

  “Why if that’s the best you have Ms. Farnsworth why should I even bother with you?”

  Sarah blinked. Seemed to finally realize where she was and that she was screwing up her line reading. There was another laugh, this time louder.

  I wondered if they were laughing at my made up line or if they were laughing at the way Sarah was losing it. She shook her head and cleared her throat. And like the master I knew she was she used it just like she’d taught me to use it.

  Her hands reached out and grabbed mine. Pulled them against her chest. I blushed and looked away, and it wasn’t all acting. I couldn’t believe she did that. My legs went a little wobbly touching her like that even if it was all part of the show.

  “How can I resist saying such things when I have such a radiant beauty standing before me?” Sarah said.

  I blushed, and it had everything to do with who was telling me I was radiantly beautiful and nothing to do with any acting ability. I turned away from her. Looked out over the audience.

  Not at the audience. Over them. To some distant spot that only I could see.

  “But Ms. Farnsworth,” I said, concentrating on that spot in the distance.

  I guess I wasn’t the only one using a bit of reality to sell this. I felt arms wrapping around me from behind.

  I closed my eyes and took in a deep breath. Oh I’d dreamed of a moment like this since the first time I saw her. I knew it was wrong but when she wrapped her arms around me and pulled me close I didn’t care if it was wrong.

  How could something that felt this good really be wrong? Would the good Lord really do that?

  If Pastor Dave was to be believed then yes, he would. It was all a temptation meant to pull me away from what was good.

  I wasn’t doing much thinking about Pastor Dave right about now though. I thought about the next line. I’d read through the play often enough that I didn’t even need to think about it. I delivered it from memory.

  “Why Ms. Farnsworth,” I said, not having to act at all to sound breathless this time around. “When you say things like that it almost makes me hope that… but no.”

  It almost made me hope that she was actually interested in me. That I wasn’t imagining things when I thought she looked at me with a hunger in her eyes.

  I was beyond caring if it was wrong. With her arms wrapped around me it felt right. That’s all I cared about.

  That and the audition. We were supposed to be auditioning, after all, even if a lot of this felt a lot more real than any silly audition.

  “Please Violet,” Sarah stage whispered, the feel of her breath on my ear pure magic. “You shouldn’t tempt me so!”

  I’m not sure what came over me. Maybe it was the temptation of feeling her so close. Maybe it was that I felt safe to let loose just a little because I was safely acting out a role.

  I took a chance. Whirled around. Pushed on her chest and she fell down on the couch. In an instant I was on her, wondering what the hell I was thinking.

  I guess I wasn’t the only one wondering what the hell I was thinking. There was a collective gasp from everyone in the audience, and meanwhile here I was with my lips just inches away from hers.

  Sarah looked surprised. Like really surprised. Her chest rose and fell and her eyes searched mine.

  Again I didn’t need to think about the line. We’d been going over this play so much that I had it down after glancing at the page on the way down onto the couch.

  “Something tells me you enjoy the temptation Ms. Farnsworth,” I whispered.

  Mine wasn’t a stage whisper. I hoped that wouldn’t hurt the audition, but at the same time it’s not like I was doing much thinking about the actual audition.

  No, I was more concerned with the feel of Sarah against me. With the way her body moved ever so slightly under my touch. With the smell of her breath so close to mine.

  I started to shiver. I closed my eyes and leaned in closer. So close. We were moments away from a kiss. From the kiss. The first kiss I’d ever had that would actually mean something and it was all play acting in front of a crowd.

  “Amazing! Absolutely amazing!”

  Mr. Thompson’s voice cut through the darkness and the temptation and I looked up and realized that every eye in the room was on us.

  I mean I guess it should be normal to think that every eye in the room would be on us. We were up on stage auditioning, after all.

  But there’d been a few people working on homework earlier. Doing stuff that didn’t involve staring into their confiscated phones.

  Not now. We had the room’s undivided attention. Including Mr. Thompson who was on his feet clapping like Tinkerbell’s life depended on it.

  “Absolutely amazing! This is what I’m talking about when I say you need to put some life into your performances! Where did you come from Chloe?”

  And then it all hit me. Everything I’d done. It was like Mr. Thompson calling me by my name broke the spell that had taken me when I lost myself in the role.

  I wasn’t Violet. That wasn’t Farnsworth under me, mister or miss. That was Sarah, and she still looked more than a little shell shocked by everything that happened.

  And why shouldn’t she look shell shocked? I’d just taken the opportunity of an audition to practically molest her up here onstage. With a bunch of people watching.

  Panic started to seize at my chest. A bunch of people watching. Sure the drama crowd and the people who went to my youth group weren’t exactly the same crowd, but what if word got out about this and someone said something that got back to Pastor Dave or someone else at the church?

  I didn’t know what I’d do if that happened. I pulled off of Sarah and sat on the couch in a daze. I hardly even heard Mr. Thompson as he turned and lectured the rest of the room on our command performance.

  Something touched my hand. Wrapped around it. Gave it a squeeze.

  I looked up. There was Sarah. Smiling at me uncertainly. I’m not sure why she had anything to feel uncertain about. I’m the one who just molested her onstage. Gave into my urges.

  Maybe that’s what they were talking about in youth group when they warned about giving into temptation.

  Because that had been very tempting.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  I tho
ught about it. I wasn’t okay, but with her holding my hand I was getting pretty close to okay.

  “Yeah, I think I’m going to be all right,” I said. “I guess I got a little carried away there.”

  Sarah gave my hand a squeeze. “You got more than carried away, but it was good. I think people are going to be talking about that audition for years to come!”

  I smiled, but inside I felt acid rising in my stomach. People would be talking about that audition for years to come. Which had me worrying that people were going to be talking about that audition after we were done.

  There was nothing to do about it now though. I stood and walked off the stage, and oddly enough Sarah stood with me and kept her hold on my hand.

  That was nice, at least. That helped calm me down. Having Sarah around made everything feel like it might just be okay.

  Besides, the damage was done. So what if I kept holding her hand? It’s not like it’d give people anything more to talk about after the stunt I just pulled up onstage.

  12

  Sarah

  “Sarah? Chloe? Could I see you up in my office for a moment?”

  My first thought was to wonder what I’d done wrong. Not that it was like Mr. Thompson to call anyone back to his office. Like ever.

  The only time I’d ever seen him come close to disciplining a kid in drama club was the time he found some of the tech kids playing with a nail gun.

  He’d turned several different shades of red that day. The joke had been on them though. Their punishment was they didn’t get to use nail guns anymore and had to do everything the old fashioned way by pounding nails into the fake walls.

  So hearing him call our names out had butterflies dancing in my stomach. It was near the end of class and usually we just used this free time to hang out and chat.

  Chloe and I had been doing a lot more hanging out and chatting lately. I liked hanging out and chatting with her. It turns out that on top of being cute she was also incredibly easy to talk to.

  “Any idea what’s going on?” she asked.

  “None at all,” I replied.

  It’d been fun taking her under my wing. Showing her the ropes. There’d been some upperclassmen who did the same for me when I was getting started, but it had never extended to a budding romance.

  Even if I wasn’t sure I could call what was happening between us a budding romance. We’d hold hands sometimes and there were times when she smiled and looked at me like I was the only thing in the world.

  Still. There were other times when she’d realize what we were doing and pull away. It shredded me when that happened, but I could tell that she was working through some stuff and I figured it’d be best not to push her too far.

  “Has he ever called someone into his office like this before?” Chloe asked.

  She sounded nervous. I wished I could say something that would make her feel better about all of this, but the truth was I was feeling just as nervous about it as she was.

  This was uncharted territory for me.

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “At least not at drama club meetings, but this is drama class so who knows?”

  I shrugged. Like I said. Uncharted territory. I didn’t know what to make of this. I didn’t like that I didn’t know what was about to happen.

  Mr. Thompson looked up and his face split into a huge grin when he saw the two of us. There were even two chairs he’d pulled from the mini theater and sat across from his desk in his tiny office.

  I wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or a bad sign that he’d pulled a couple of chairs in. That meant whatever he wanted to talk to us about was planned. That meant whatever he was going to discuss with us wasn’t some spur of the moment thing he’d noticed while we were sitting back and chatting with each other.

  I racked my brain trying to think of what I could’ve done to draw his anger. It’s not like I misbehaved. At least it’s not like I misbehaved all that often.

  I was also pretty sure that the things I did to break the rules were things everyone did. Backrubs for people behind the stage when we were tense between shows. Stuff like that.

  Besides, it had been awhile since I’d done anything like that considering there’d been a whole summer between the last production and this one.

  “Could the two of you have a seat please? And go ahead and close the door behind you.”

  I was starting to sweat. Go ahead and close the door behind us? Well that sounded ominous. Damn it. What was going on here?

  I knew enough to play it cool though. That was one of the first things I’d learned after coming to high school. Teachers would try to sweat something out of you, get you to give something up by doing the whole stern disappointed look.

  It was like talking with cops though. Don’t give anything up unless they make it clear they already know what’s going on.

  “So what seems to be the…”

  “What did we do wrong?” Chloe blurted out.

  I glanced at her with a combination of irritation and sympathy. It was obvious the good girl was having some trouble with the idea that she might be in trouble.

  It was plain on her face. She was breathing heavily. She had a look of pure terror plastered on her face. She still looked cute, but the whole panic thing wasn’t a good look for her.

  Mr. Thompson looked at the two of us. Seemed to register that we both looked a little worried. I liked to think I was better at hiding how I felt than Chloe, all that acting training I’d had over the past couple of years, but I must’ve still looked worried.

  He shook his head and laughed.

  “The two of you aren’t in trouble or anything,” he said.

  I blinked. “We aren’t?”

  That was weird, because everything he’d done so far made it seem like we were in trouble. Though to be fair it was true when I said I didn’t really know what it looked like when someone was in trouble with Mr. Thompson.

  “You’re not,” he said. “I called the two of you in here to talk about the auditions last week and some of the casting decisions I’d made.”

  I tried not to look too disappointed. I’d heard him start a conversation like that with other students and the conversation usually never went good for the students he was talking to.

  He’d just decided to save time and have that conversation during drama class rather than doing it later when the whole drama club was gathered together. It made sense considering he had us here for nearly an hour.

  “It’s okay,” I said. I reached out and gave Chloe’s hand a squeeze. Something Mr. Thompson noted but didn’t comment on. “You can tell us. Neither one of us got a role, right?”

  If anything he looked even more confused. Which only served to confuse me even more. Everything about this was confusing. I didn’t know what to think anymore.

  “Why would I call you in here to tell you I wasn’t giving you a role? I’d just toss the paper up with your names on it and let you find out like everyone else.”

  “But you always…”

  Mr. Thompson shook his head. “I call people in to discuss the roles and sometimes they decide not to take it for whatever reason. Anything you’ve heard about me talking to people about not getting a role is a vicious rumor.”

  “So we got parts?” Chloe asked.

  Mr. Thompson paused for a long moment. Long enough that I actually started to wonder if something was wrong. If maybe he forgot we were even there. He tapped a pencil against a paper that had some names on it, but I didn’t dare crane my head over far enough to see what names were on the page.

  That would be too obvious, and it might annoy him that I was trying to sneak a peak when he obviously wanted to talk to us about the casting decisions he’d made.

  “I’ve made some decisions for Mr. Farnsworth Takes A Bride that I’m afraid are going to be a little controversial. Both for the kids in the drama club and for the town. That’s why I need to talk to the two of you.”

  “But why would we…”

&nbs
p; Mr. Thompson held up a hand and stopped Chloe. His smile wasn’t unkind, but it was stern. He obviously wanted to say his piece and we were to shut up and keep quiet until he had a chance to say it.

  “Would the two of you please just give me a moment to explain myself?”

  His words weren’t unkind. He had a smile on his face, but it was the long-suffering smile of an educator who’d been doing this for years.

  He was probably more long suffering than most of the teachers in this place. After all, he had to deal with drama kids. There was a reason we were called drama kids, and it didn’t always have to do with our favorite club.

  “Sorry,” I muttered.

  Chloe didn’t say anything. Instead she resorted to her default of blushing and looking down. I was going to cure her of that and bring her out of her shell, but not today.

  Mr. Thompson looked between the two of us for a long moment. Probably wondering if we were going to try and interrupt him again. Finally he sighed and smiled.

  “Okay. So as I was saying. Or maybe I didn’t say it. Whatever. I’ve decided to make some changes to Mr. Farnsworth Takes A Bride, and I’m pretty sure not everyone is going to like it.”

  Again he looked between the two of us. Again I kept silent while Chloe blushed. Maybe he was looking for a reaction, but I wasn’t saying anything if he just made such a big production out of us keeping quiet.

  “For starters I’m going to be changing the title to Ms. Farnsworth Takes A Bride,” he said. “And we’re going to be updating it so it takes place in modern times instead of when the play was written.”

  My eyes went wide. Was he serious? If the play was renamed that meant…

  “You’re casting one of us as Mr. Farnsworth?” I asked, then realized how silly what I’d just said sounded. “I mean you’re casting one of us as Ms. Farnsworth?”

  I felt a tingling running along my scalp. I had a pretty good idea who he was casting in what role based on our performance at the auditions, but I couldn’t be sure.