It was meant to be. Or at least it would be, once I helped push things in that direction.
“Jordan is a really great guy,” I told her. “I mean, how many guys would let you use their phone and then offer to drive you home after you just accused them of being a carjacker?”
“Sounds like you like him,” Kate said.
“No,” I answered too quickly. “I mean, I’m still not over Brendan. I can’t start a new relationship yet … but he might be perfect for you.”
“Me?”
“Sure. He’s good-looking, nice, and I could tell by the way he read his Romeo lines that he’s sensitive. I bet he doesn’t even watch football on TV.”
There was silence on the line. I knew Kate was weighing my words.
“I could introduce you,” I said. “If you decide to try out for the play, we could all read lines together. Do you want me to ask him if it’s okay for you to come over to his house tomorrow?”
Another moment of silence, and then Kate’s voice came over the line sounding tentative. “He is kinda cute.”
“He’s way cute, Kate.”
“Okay.” She let out a hopeful sigh. “Ask him.”
Jordan hadn’t given me his phone number, but my caller ID at home still had it recorded from when he’d called me about the mall. While I got ready for work I called and casually mentioned that Kate wanted to be in the play and did he mind if she came with me to run lines?
He didn’t. Then we talked about school. He asked me about people he’d met, and I gave him my unbiased opinion. Especially about Lauren Riverdale.
“Total man-stealing floozy,” I said when he brought up her name. “Plus, she thinks she has fashion sense when she couldn’t match a pair of shoes if they didn’t come in the box together. I mean, maroon shirt and red heels? I just don’t think so.”
Jordan laughed at me.
“What?” I asked.
“Which condemns her more in your mind—that she stole Brendan or that she mixes up her colors?”
I hadn’t mentioned Brendan’s name. The phone felt suddenly heavy in my hands. “How did you know about him?”
“You’re not the only one I’ve talked to today,” he said. “That’s the nice thing about small towns. Everyone knows everything about everyone else. Hey, did you really eat paste in the second grade?”
“It was Elmer’s glue, and it was a dare, all right?”
He laughed again.
“What else do you know about me?”
“I heard details on several of your embarrassing moments. The soccer game in eighth grade when you accidentally took off your shorts has passed into legend status.”
Okay, this is why people need to move to new towns every few years—so these types of stories don’t follow them around for the rest of their lives. “Did you find out anything about my friend Kate?” I asked.
“Kate? No. I didn’t ask. Why?”
“She’s really nice. I think you’ll like her.”
There was a pause on the line. “What do you mean? Are you trying to set me up with her?”
“No. No. Heaven’s no.” All of those no’s because he sounded like he didn’t want to be set up, and there is no quicker way to get a guy to dislike a girl than to try and push him into liking her. Guys are like cats that way. They want to think they’re in charge of their lives, and it’s better just to humor them. “I’m only letting you know there are nice people in Three Forks—you know, as opposed to those people who ratted on me for eating glue.”
Then because I knew Jordan now needed an extra incentive to look at Kate, I laid down some guy bait for him. “Besides, I wouldn’t try to set up Kate. She’s really particular about the guys she goes out with. It’s not enough for a guy to be good-looking or popular—she’s only interested if he’s intelligent and loaded with class.”
This is acting, not lying, so I will not be sent to hell for saying these sorts of things.
The conversation moved on, and I wasn’t certain how much of the bait Jordan had taken. Tomorrow would tell.
Finally I hung up the phone and hurried to work. I came in ten minutes late. Mr. Cranston, my boss, grunted his displeasure at my arrival. I felt extra bad about this, since I’d already told him that when play rehearsals started I could only come in on Saturdays and Fridays after school. Mrs. Shale gave us Fridays off, so we had one day out of the week to accomplish anything we needed to do, like, say, homework.
Mr. Cranston had grunted a lot about my drama schedule and mumbled about how this forced other employees to work more areas in order to cover for me. Sorry, fellow Wal-Marters, blame the untidy cat toy aisle on me.
I walked to the employee break room, put my purse in my locker, and then went out onto the floor in a good mood despite Mr. Cranston’s grumblings. Somehow talking to Jordan made taking a few grumbles seem worth it.
My plan for getting Jordan and Kate together on Tuesday was simple. An hour into our after-school practice, Nicki would ring my cell phone and tell me Wal-Mart had called me to work an extra shift. Someone had called in sick, and they desperately needed me to cover, yadda yadda yadda. I’d drive away and let destiny take over.
Nothing simpler, even if it did mean I had to agree to let Nicki borrow my new jean jacket and have first dibs on the shower for a week.
In drama class that day, Mrs. Shale announced that tryouts for Romeo and Juliet would be held on Thursday. She made it sound like she was doing us all a favor, and said that after much discussion with Principal Poure, they’d decided that despite the financial sacrifice it would cause the school, the arts were an important part of our curriculum.
Yeah. Like she hadn’t already reserved a front-row seat in the auditorium for Christopher Hunter.
After drama class I wandered over to Mrs. Shale’s desk while I waited for Kate and Jordan to show up. “You don’t mind if I hang out for a couple of minutes, do you?” I asked her. “Jordan, Kate, and I are meeting here, then going over to Jordan’s house to run lines.” This was sort of name-dropping, but I figured I ought to remind Mrs. Shale I was important, just in case she had any inkling of giving Mary the role of Juliet.
“Jordan is coming here? Now?” She ran one hand across her hair and wiped away invisible specks of lint from her shirt.
“Yeah, we figure the more we go over the lines, the easier it will be to memorize them.”
“Oh yes, of course.” Mrs. Shale stood up and straightened papers on her desk. “That’s so important when studying a role.” She slid a stack of notebooks into her top desk drawer. “Especially in trying out for something as deeply layered as Shakespeare. Shakespeare is real acting. It’s sophisticated. Elite.” She picked up stray pencils and shoved them into an organizer on top of her desk. “You have to have talent to pull off Shakespeare.” She swiped her hand across the rest of the desk, sending paper clips, staples, and scraps of paper into her top drawer, which she then shut with a muffled thud. “Will Jordan be trying out for Romeo?”
“Yeah, I guess.” Although now that I thought about it, I realized he hadn’t said what role he wanted. “He’s worried about the language in the play. Shakespeare is hard to memorize. And then you have to figure out the right way to project a character.”
“He doesn’t like Shakespeare?” Mrs. Shale momentarily stopped straightening her desk and looked at me.
“Well, he didn’t say he didn’t like Shakespeare.” What he’d said was more along the lines of “no one will come to watch it,” but Mrs. Shale would not appreciate this prediction. “Jordan was just concerned because it would be difficult to act.”
“Ohhh.” Mrs. Shale drew out the word as though deeply troubled by this revelation.
“But he definitely wants to be in the play,” I added. “He’s really excited to try his hand at acting.”
There is a fine line between diplomacy and lying, and at moments like these I like to consider myself a good diplomat.
“Well then—” Mrs. Shale started to say something
else but stopped abruptly as Jordan entered the room. She stifled a little gasp, which thankfully he was too far away to hear, then stood and glided across the room. “You must be Jordan.” She extended her hand to him. “I’m Chris Shale, the drama coach. I hear you’ll be trying out for our play.”
“Yeah. Hi. Glad to meet you.” He shook her hand, then glanced at me to see what I made of the situation. I shrugged as though it were perfectly normal for a teacher to shake a student’s hand that way.
“We were just discussing Romeo and Juliet,” she said, reluctantly letting go of his hand. “Some of the students are concerned because the language is so archaic. They feel it might be hard to portray the characters well. What do you think?”
He shrugged. “It didn’t make a lot of sense to me when I read it.”
“Exactly,” Mrs. Shale shook her head vigorously. “Well put. I’m going to look for a modernized version of the play for that very reason. We wouldn’t want the audience to think it didn’t make sense.”
And Kate thinks I live a charmed life.
Jordan, who didn’t realize the U-turn his opinion had just caused, only smiled. “Great.”
“Whatever script I decide on, it will be something first-rate. All of our productions here are of the highest quality because the arts are essential to living a well-balanced life. In fact, in the banquet of life, art is the dessert, don’t you think?”
Jordan nodded politely. “Sure.”
Mrs. Shale smiled, letting her hand roll in front of her like she was about to warm up an orchestra. “We as actors provide the frosting on the cake.”
Before Mrs. Shale could launch into further dessert metaphors, or say something that would make Jordan realize she knew who he was, I took hold of his arm and tugged him toward the door. “We really should go look for Kate now, but we’ll see you later, Mrs. Shale.”
Jordan followed me, and as we walked out the door Mrs. Shale called after us, “I look forward to seeing you perform on Thursday!” I knew she wasn’t referring to me.
We walked a few steps down the hallway, then stopped to wait for Kate.
Jordan looked over his shoulder at the door. “She’s certainly enthusiastic.”
“Yeah.” I didn’t know what else to say. I dug through my purse until I found my car keys so my hands had something to do.
He saw my keys and shook his head. “You don’t have to worry about driving. We can take my car.”
“I have to drive,” I said. “Otherwise you’ll have to bring me back to the school parking lot to pick up my car.”
“I don’t mind,” he said.
“That doesn’t make any sense.” And besides, that would interfere with my plan of pretending to go to work. I would need my car in order to leave him and Kate alone together.
Jordan lowered his voice. “You can’t take your car, because I don’t want my mom to see it.”
“Why not?”
Jordan lowered his voice even more and leaned closer to me. “Do you remember that agreement we made where you’ll let me borrow your car? This is part of the arrangement. My parents can’t know you have a car exactly like mine.”
I waited for him to say more, but he didn’t. I waited for what he’d already said to make sense. That didn’t happen either. I tilted my head at him. “What exactly are you planning to do with my car anyway?”
“You might also remember that part of the bargain is I don’t tell you why I want to borrow your car.”
I fingered my key chain, but didn’t drop it back in my purse. “Oh, come on. You can trust me. What are you going to do?”
His gaze locked on mine, debating. I blinked my lashes back at him, trying to look innocent and trustworthy. He opened his mouth to speak, but I never got to hear his secret. Kate walked up to us, breathless, her backpack slung over her shoulders. “Hi guys. I finally made it.” She smiled over at Jordan hesitantly, and I realized I hadn’t introduced them.
“Jordan this is Kate. Kate this is Jordan.” Destiny, this is your cue to step in and take over.
We all went in Jordan’s car—which I still thought was ridiculous but which I couldn’t argue about, since it involved our secret agreement and Kate was with us now. When Nicki called me in an hour, I’d just have to pretend she had called for some other reason. She’d say, “Hey, work phoned to tell you that you need to come in,” and I’d say, “It’s in my closet on the top shelf,” and hang up. Then while we ran lines I’d try to think of plan B in the get-Kate-and-Jordan-together strategy.
Jordan drove to a neighborhood where custom-built houses sat on one-acre lots. His was a one-story brick with ornately carved double doors and a stack of boxes sitting just inside the garage.
His mom greeted us when we came in. She wasn’t what I expected. I had imagined some silicon-laden bleached blonde with diamonds dangling from her earlobes. Someone very Hollywood. Instead, she looked liked she might have been one of my mom’s friends. She wore jeans and a T-shirt and not a whole lot of makeup. Still, she was pretty. Slim, brunette, and young enough to make it hard to believe she was Jordan’s mom. But the look in her eye left no room for question. She gave us the mother-checking-out-her-offspring’s-friends look. She seemed to approve because she smiled and told us how nice it was that we’d come over to help Jordan with his homework.
I noticed in the introductions that she went by Ms. Hunter. At another time I might not have thought anything about a woman still using her ex-husband’s last name. As it was, it seemed like a sign that Jordan was right. Maybe she couldn’t let go of the name, because she didn’t want to let go of Jordan’s dad.
We exchanged a few more pleasantries. She told us to help ourselves to chips and sodas in the kitchen, then excused herself to go to work on unpacking.
We went into the kitchen—cherrywood floor, granite countertops, and a huge bay window that overlooked a pool—and sat around the kitchen table with sodas and a bowl full of Chex Mix. Kate perched stiffly on her chair and looked at her copy of Romeo and Juliet instead of Jordan. You’d think someone who could argue with complete strangers during debate meets would have no trouble starting a conversation with a new kid, but she didn’t even try. I decided to start on our lines and hoped she’d warm up eventually.
I mean even destiny needs something to work with.
Opening my book to Romeo and Juliet’s meeting scene, I leaned toward Jordan. “You have to remember three things when reciting your lines: body language, voice inflection, and timing.”
Kate ran her finger along the list of characters on the first page. “There are only four female parts in this whole play. There are seventeen male parts and only four female ones. What is Mrs. Shale thinking?”
Jordan popped some Chex into his mouth. “She’s not going to find seventeen guys in your school willing to wear tights.”
I set my book on the table, glancing at the dialogue while I opened a Diet Sprite. “She’ll probably just have some of the girls play guy characters.”
Kate fingered the pages of her book and groaned. “So not only do I have to be good enough to convince people I can act, I may have to pull off being a Franciscan friar?”
“Maybe she’ll make you a nun.”
“Figures,” Kate flipped through the pages. “How many lines do Lady Capulet and Lady Montague have?”
Kate apparently doesn’t believe in making things easy for destiny. Either that, or she has no concept as to what is involved in flirting. I would have to point out to her later that talking to, smiling over, or even looking at a guy were necessary components of the event. I turned to Jordan. “Are you ready to start?”
He took a slow sip of soda. “I thought Mrs. Shale said she was going to get an updated version. What’s the point of reading the lines if they’ll all be different?”
“The wording may change but the characters will be the same, so we’ll work on characterizations.” I stood up with the book in one hand and motioned for him to follow me. “First off, Romeo is not sitting
around a table munching snack food. Why don’t you and Kate stand up and do the balcony scene.”
Across the table Kate gasped. “Did you guys know this? Juliet is only thirteen!” She laid the book down on the table. “Thirteen years old, and she gets married. I mean, that is just creepy.”
“Kate, do you want to read with Jordan?”
“Hold on.” Kate flipped through more pages. “I’m checking to see how old Romeo is because if he’s older than eighteen, it’s not only creepy, it’s illegal.”
Jordan stood up, stretched, and opened his book. “I don’t think they had the same laws in sixteenth-century Italy.”
“That’s not the point,” Kate answered.
I really didn’t want to know what her point was. I mean, my whole point at this practice was to get Kate and Jordan together, which meant it wasn’t a good time for her to determine whether Romeo was taking advantage of Juliet’s naïveté.
“Why don’t we read through the scene first,” I told Jordan, “and then you can run through it with Kate.” Assuming she could do Juliet without telling Romeo off.
Jordan held the book with one hand, balancing it on his palm. “But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks?”
“You need to deliver your lines from your diaphragm,” I told him.
“Diaphragm? I thought Juliet was on the balcony and Romeo was on the ground.”
I took a step closer to Jordan and put my hand on his chest underneath his rib cage. “This is your diaphragm. You need to breath deep and open yourself up so everyone can hear you.” I dropped my hand. “Try it again.”
A phone on the table rang, but it wasn’t time for Nicki’s call, and I was paying such close attention to Jordan’s chest—I mean, his use of his diaphragm—that I didn’t think about Kate answering it until I heard her say, “Okay, I’ll let Jessica know.”
Then I hurried back to the table, but it was too late. By the time I got there, Kate had hung up. “Bad news. Nicki says Wal-Mart just called, and they need you to come in right away to cover a shift.”
Fame, Glory, and Other Things on My to Do List Page 6
