And This Is Laura

by Ellen Conford

  When we were home, Jill and I watched Dennis like hawks. Fortunately, she was able to get in right after school on Tuesday and Wednesday and she could look out on the yard from her bedroom window. At night it was no problem, because we just made sure we knew where he was in the house. If he wasn’t underfoot, he was usually watching television.

  Friday afternoon we had the dress rehearsal. We were to do the play exactly as we were going to present it that night. There were three changes of costume we had to make. For one midnight scene we had to be in pajamas and nightshirts, for the last scene we had to be in shorts and T-shirts dyed to match (our basketball team uniforms) and the rest of the time we wore regular jeans or skirts and shirts. We had a big room right next to the stage entrance to change in, with a sheet pinned over the glass in the door so no one could see in.

  A couple of the costume changes between scenes had to be made really fast, which made me very anxious about getting back onstage in time for my cues, but the clothes were really so simple that it was easier than I thought it would be.

  On the other hand, I was not very good at dress rehearsal.

  I missed a couple of lines and that shook me up so that I began to think of how awful it would be if I forgot my lines during the performance. Once I began to think about that, I was too scared to remember how well I’d been doing with Jill’s coaching and forgot almost everything she’d told me. Mr. Kane tried to maintain a cheerful air, insisting we’d all be fine and the play would be a smash.

  He kept repeating that old saying about how a bad dress rehearsal means a good performance. But every once in a while I caught him with a wistful expression on his face and I was sure he was thinking, If only Jean were here.

  We’d sent her a big bunch of flowers from the whole club. Steve was back in school, and the parents were okay except for some bruises and cracked ribs. Jean was going to be laid up at least another week.

  I got home at five. We were supposed to be back in school by seven. Beth’s parents had invited us over after the play for coffee and cake. Dennis could meet Roger and her parents would meet mine.

  Dennis and Douglas were playing blackjack for money at one corner of the dining room table, so Dennis was obviously still okay.

  I reported the Traubs’ invitation to my mother after she asked me how the rehearsal had gone, and she said that would be nice. Douglas said, “I don’t have to go, do I?”

  “You don’t want to?” asked my mother.

  “Nah. What for?”

  “What for indeed?” she repeated. “I guess we can manage without you.”

  I couldn’t eat a thing at dinner. I was absolutely certain that if I put one morsel of food in my mouth I’d throw up. All the butterflies in the world were holding their annual convention in my stomach.

  “At least have some toast and tea,” my mother urged. “You’ll feel much worse if you don’t eat at all.”

  “I couldn’t feel worse.”

  “You’ll be more alert and you’ll give a better performance if you have a little something in you,” she insisted.

  “It’s true,” Jill agreed.

  “I won’t give a good performance no matter what I eat.”

  “Oh, yes you will,” said Jill. “You’ll be nervous till you speak your first couple of lines and then you’ll be great. You’ll forget all about your stage fright.”

  “I’ll be lucky if I don’t forget my first couple of lines,” I groaned.

  “You have to have a little toast,” my mother kept on.

  “All right, all right!” I cried. “Stop nagging me. I’ll have a piece of toast.”

  My father patted my hand and smiled his encouragement.

  Dennis said, “You’re going to be the star of the play, right, Laura? And I can stay up late, right? Very late? And wear my bow tie. And my pith helmet.”

  “Dear, I know you don’t believe this now, but by next week you’ll look back on this and wonder what you were so worried about.” My mother put two pieces of buttered toast in front of me.

  “You’re assuming,” I croaked, “that I live through tonight.”

  “I guarantee it,” she grinned. “Did I ever tell you about The Sons of Diego Cortez?”

  My father glanced toward the ceiling, closed his eyes and murmured, “Good heavens.”

  “Everyone knew,” she began, “that we were making the biggest bomb since Slaves of the Invisible Monster. The script was by the producer’s fourteen-year-old son, with additional dialogue by a chimpanzee who enjoyed playing with a typewriter.”

  “But you were very good,” my father said loyally.

  “Thank you, darling.” She turned back to me. “I was utterly dreadful. Appalling. My lines consisted of gems like ‘Hey, gringo, you lookin’ for Cortez?’ The whole movie was on that exalted level. We went through the film with a sense of impending doom, and by the time it was over we were all so depressed we nearly made a mass suicide pact. The day the movie opened we hid, which wasn’t necessary because nobody took any notice of the film at all. We got one review and the movie played for two days somewhere and disappeared into oblivion.”

  “What did the review say?” Jill asked. “Did it mention you?”

  “No, thank God. It was one line long. It said, ‘The Sons of Diego Cortez: It would have been a mercy had they died in infancy.’ ”

  Douglas groaned. “That’s lousy, all right.”

  “But I lived through it,” my mother emphasized. “We all did. And I’m laughing about it now. And your play isn’t a turkey. And you won’t be half as awful as I was in that. You couldn’t be.”

  “At least everyone was awful in your movie,” I said. “That’s a lot better than being the only one who stinks.”

  I managed to get down—and keep down—a piece of toast and a cup of tea. Jill suggested that I go up and rest awhile. Since Douglas had begun to play the piano and Dennis was explaining to my mother that he couldn’t wipe up the milk with her paper towels because Bounty was the quicker picker-upper and she ought to take it from Rosie, I decided that some time alone in my room might be a very good idea.

  I stretched out on my bed.

  Calm, Laura, calm, I told myself. Relax. Everything’s going to be fine. Relax, toes. Relax, feet. I wiggled my toes and willed them to relax. I was going to work the tension out of my whole body, starting with my feet and moving all the way up to my head. I had read somewhere that that was as good as a tranquilizer.

  But some place between my toes and my knees I lost track of my relaxing exercise, and my room faded away as if swallowed up by fog. The next thing I saw was a big door with a glass window in it, very much like the door of the room we were using next to the stage to change in. As the fog swirled away a huge silver star appeared on the window. It gleamed and shot rays of light out from its five points, almost as if it were an enormous diamond.

  A girl with dark hair was walking toward it, her back to me. She looked up at the star and opened the door to go into the room. She turned around to face me—although of course, I wasn’t actually there—and stood in the doorway, a big, contented smile on her face.

  And now that I could see her face—

  I was back in my room. A great feeling of serenity came over me, dissolving the tenseness of just a few moments ago. I’d recognized the girl in the doorway.

  She was me.

  Suddenly I was sure everything was going to be all right. I was sure that the vision meant that I could relax now, because I was going to do well in the play.

  I didn’t think it necessarily meant I would be a star, but that it was just sort of a sign that nothing would go wrong.

  I got up from my bed and went over to my mirror to brush my hair. It would be time to leave for school pretty soon.

  I was ready.

  12

  “ARE THERE A lot of people out there?” Beth asked.

  Rita, who’d peeked through the edge of the curtain from the wings, just nodded. She looked too scared to trust her voice
.

  Even Beth was a little pale.

  I was nervous too, but not the same way as before. Now I felt a sort of scary anticipation, wishing that we would get started and dreading it at the same time. But I didn’t feel paralyzed with fear, and I wasn’t convinced that I’d forget all my lines and ruin the play. I just had a normal, average case of stage fright.

  “Places everybody,” said Mr. Kane.

  Someone—Rita, I think—gave a little shriek of terror and we scrambled onstage to take our places for the first act.

  There was a brief wait—though it certainly didn’t seem brief as I stood there, trembling—while the principal gave us the standard introduction. Then Mr. Kane whispered, “Curtain,” and the audience applauded as the curtain was raised and Act One began.

  I was the first person in the play to speak. Not only that, I had to walk across the stage to answer a telephone. My knees shook as the phone rang. I couldn’t see too well past the footlights, not individual faces or anything, but I could see that there was a whole auditorium full of people gazing at me.

  I picked up the receiver.

  “Sigma Phi house.” My voice squeaked a little and it didn’t come out loud enough. So I took a deep breath and repeated it, remembering to project, so they could hear me in any part of the auditorium.

  “Sigma Phi house. What can I do for you? Within reason, of course.”

  That got a responsive chuckle from the audience.

  I could make them laugh! I did make them laugh. I was communicating with those people on the other side of the footlights.

  I turned partially around to face them and went on with my lines.

  “Hello? Hello? Is anyone there?” I waited a moment, as I was supposed to. “Is this a crank call? Did you spend a dime just to breathe at me?” I waited another moment. “Is anyone there?” I repeated loudly. I shrugged, looking toward the other girls on stage with me. “Well, it’s been grand talking to you. We must do this again some time.”

  I hung up the phone as the audience laughed. What a strange feeling it was. What an unfamiliar sensation of power and confidence!

  Jill was right. I felt fine now.

  Everything went perfectly. We made our changes in time, the lighting cues came at exactly the right moments, no one forgot her lines. When the final curtain came down, there were loud cheers mixed in with the applause, mostly from kids in school who had come and from the brothers and sisters of cast members.

  We were so exhilarated we jumped around behind the curtain hugging each other and squealing.

  Mr. Kane put a stop to that immediately.

  “Girls! Curtain call!”

  We hastily assembled ourselves into a straight line and clasped hands as we’d practiced. The curtain went up. As the applause continued we bent down in a bow that we were supposed to make all together, but which turned out a bit ragged.

  The applause increased and Mr. Kane said, “Phyllis and Eloise.”

  Beth and I stepped forward two paces in front of the rest of the cast and bowed. I’d never felt so special in my life. All those people were clapping for me. Because they thought I was a good actress. I clutched Beth’s hand tightly, so happy I thought I would burst with it. We stepped back.

  They were still applauding, almost as loudly.

  “Eloise,” hissed Mr. Kane.

  Beth came forward and took a deep bow by herself. I clapped wildly, along with the rest of the audience.

  The curtain was lowered.

  We were all babbling at once now and there was no stopping us.

  “You were wonderful!” Beth said. She hopped around the stage, yanking me along with her. “I knew it! I knew you could do it!”

  “You were the wonderful one,” I said, bouncing around, bumping into people. “And you were great,” I said to Sonia, “and you were great,” I said to Rita Lovett—of all people. I threw my arms out wide. “We were all great!”

  Mr. Kane herded us offstage into the dressing room.

  “You were great, girls,” he said proudly.

  “See, I told you,” I giggled.

  “Everything was perfect. The audience loved you. Congratulations on a fine performance.”

  We cheered and applauded ourselves.

  “Oh, Mr. Kane,” Rita cried, “I never knew doing a play was so neat! When do we do the next one?”

  Mr. Kane’s shoulders sagged. He rubbed his eyebrows with his fingers. For the first time I noticed how exhausted he looked.

  “You’d better change now,” he said weakly, letting himself out the door. “Your parents will be waiting to congratulate you.”

  “I’ll bet,” I told Beth, “he’s going to make a run for the nearest bar.”

  We gathered our costumes together. We were still so excited that we continued to jabber away at each other as we thundered down the hall like stampeding cattle.

  “You were marvelous!” my mother cried, hugging me to her.

  Beth had gone to locate her parents and my family clustered around me, making quite a fuss about my performance.

  “This is the girl,” Jill declared, “who said she couldn’t act.”

  “You really weren’t bad,” Douglas admitted. “I was surprised, no kidding. I really was surprised.”

  “I knew she could do it,” my father said proudly. “Wasn’t bad,” he snorted. He glared at Douglas. “She was excellent.”

  “Oh, come on,” I said, feeling a little embarrassed by all the lavish praise. “I wasn’t that great. But I wasn’t as bad as I thought I’d be. Was I?”

  “I saw you right away,” Dennis said. “You were the first one. I waved, but you didn’t wave back.”

  “I didn’t see you. Did you like the play?”

  “Yeah. It was scary. You know what time it is? It’s late. Do I have to go to bed now? Are we going right home?”

  “We’re going to Beth’s house first,” my mother said. “Don’t you remember? You’re going to meet her little brother.”

  Beth came charging down the hall, dragging her parents along. Roger lagged behind them, looking sullen.

  Beth’s parents were wearing their coats, so I couldn’t see the rest of their clothes. I glanced hastily at my father and mother to see if they looked respectable. My mother had left the mink at home and my father had not put his Russian astrakhan cap back on yet, so they both seemed presentable enough. Somehow they had managed to convince Dennis that the occasion was not formal enough for his pith helmet, although he was wearing his bow tie.

  “Wasn’t Laura wonderful?” Beth’s mother said warmly.

  “Oh, we thought Beth was superb,” my mother responded. “She has real talent.”

  “And to think,” Mr. Traub said with a grin that displayed his dazzling teeth, “just two days ago, before she was famous, this budding star was setting our table.” He pulled a strand of my hair playfully.

  I glowed.

  “Well, why don’t we get going?” Mrs. Traub suggested.

  “Do you want to follow my car?” Beth’s father asked, “or should I just give you the directions and we’ll meet at the house?”

  My father took the directions and we all trooped out to the parking lot. We planned to drop Jill and Douglas at home and then go on to the Traubs’.

  “They seem like nice people,” my father commented as we slowly joined the line of cars jockeying for position at the exits.

  “He is incredible,” Jill murmured. “I can’t believe he’s somebody’s parent.”

  “You wouldn’t,” my father said, sounding almost jealous, “trade your poor old father in for that flashy new model, would you?”

  “Of course not,” Jill comforted him. “But if he wanted to trade his poor old wife in for me . . .”

  We had cake and cocoa and coffee at the Traubs’. Beth and I huddled in her room reliving the play while our parents lingered over coffee. Roger and Dennis hit it off right away, which surprised me since they weren’t that much alike. However they disappeared into the
den together to watch reruns of “The Untouchables,” which was usually on too late for them to see, so that might have been part of the reason for their compatibility.

  It was a short visit. We left after about an hour and a half with our parents promising to get together again soon.

  “You’ll have to come and see us,” my mother urged.

  I cringed at the thought of the Traubs’ first glimpse of us in our Natural Habitat, but what could you do? Etiquette is etiquette and surely my mother would ask them on a Friday or Saturday night, right after the maid had come to shovel the house.

  “Very nice people,” my father repeated as we drove home.

  “Yes,” my mother agreed. She glanced over at Dennis, who was practically asleep in the back seat. “She’s very sweet. But don’t you think he’s a little—you know—plastic?”

  “Plastic!” I howled. “How can you say that? You don’t even know him! He’s super.”

  “Shh! I’m sorry, I’m sorry. It was just sort of a first impression I got of him. You know him better, so you’re probably right. He probably is super.”

  “He certainly is,” I muttered.

  My parents exchanged one of those knowing glances that usually make me furious. But by now I was too exhausted to argue any further.

  It was silly to argue, anyhow. My whole family was proud of me, Mr. Traub had called me a star, Dennis was perfectly okay, and I was psychic.

  Everything was wonderful.

  13

  I KNOCKED AT my mother’s door. “Come,” she said briskly.

  “Where is everyone?” I asked. “It’s so quiet around here.”

  “I know.” She smiled like a contented cat. “Isn’t it lovely? At this very moment, Linnet is on the threshold of the sealed room, just about to discover the hideous truth about the first Mrs. Glengariff.”

  “What is the hideous truth?”

  “I wish I knew,” she sighed. She leaned back in her chair. “But don’t worry—I’ll come up with something horrible any minute now.”

  “I’m sure you will. But where are all the people who are supposed to be here?”