by Erin Stewart
“Crew,” I decide quickly. I put the headphones back in my bag. “Definitely crew.”
“Cool. Me too.” He points behind us at a small boothlike room with large, round lights facing the stage. “I handle all the lights, so I’m usually trapped up there.”
He looks around me and his smile fades for a millisecond.
“So Piper really didn’t come, huh? Aren’t you two attached at the hip?”
“She’s not doing drama anymore.”
“Bummer,” he says. “She was the only one of the drama queens who ever bothered to learn my name. I think some of them actually think it’s ‘More spotlight!’ ”
I laugh despite myself, which clearly only encourages him.
“So you can smile!” he says triumphantly. “Okay, name that musical: ‘You’re Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile.’ ”
“Annie.”
Asad sits back in his chair with a grin.
“I’m impressed. My repertoire of Broadway lines usually goes unnoticed—and most certainly unappreciated—by the high school masses. We need more people like you around here.”
I sink into my seat.
“People like me?”
Asad keeps talking nonchalantly, like he doesn’t realize I’m waiting for some gut-wrenching definition of exactly what kind of “people” he means.
“You know, people who actually appreciate the theater.”
I allow myself to unclench when I realize his comment had nothing to do with my face.
“Well, sometimes Real Housewives is a repeat,” I say.
Asad smiles.
“I’m glad you’re here, Ava.”
I glance at the empty seats stretching out on the other side of me.
“Well, that makes exactly one of you. Besides Piper, you’re basically the first person in this whole school to talk to me, unless talking about me counts. Which, FYI, it doesn’t.”
“You do give off a pretty intense ‘don’t talk to me’ vibe. Even in the hall with Piper, your eyes are always on the floor.”
I force myself to look at him, suddenly aware that I have, in fact, been staring at my shoes. Asad’s shocking, almost-black irises are so dark I can see myself in them.
“That is so not true.”
He smirks. “Okay, do you remember when I tried to talk to you on your first day?”
“Yeah.”
“You totally ignored me.”
“I thought you were just being nice. Throwing a pity conversation to the new, burned girl.”
Asad rolls his eyes. “I was being nice. And you shut me down.”
Clueless. That’s what I called him. A hastily scribbled description in the corner of a lined page. The flip-flop of my stomach tells me I may not be able to write him off as easily I did in that notebook.
“I’m just saying maybe look up once in a while,” he says. “Who knows what you’re missing.”
I stammer for words. I’d think Asad was a total jerk if he weren’t sitting there with a smile on his face, totally free of malice as he tells me I’m to blame for having only one friend in this whole place.
I’d probably be more offended if that smile didn’t make me feel like this boy with no filter might be number two.
A lanky boy dressed in black strides onto stage barefoot and claps, scattering the actor and actress wannabes to their seats. Asad snaps to attention as the boy in black paces on the stage, his chin cradled in his palm thoughtfully, as if he’s about to deliver a Hamlet-worthy soliloquy.
“If you’re here to get class credit or use this as an extracurricular for your college applications, you’re in the wrong place. No room for impostors here.”
He pauses, surveying the crowd, his impressive height commanding immediate authority on the stage. Judging by his manicured goatee and short ponytail of dark hair gathered at his neck, the boy in black has spent ample time reading How to Look Like a Broadway Director, and I’d bet good money he’s got a picture of Lin-Manuel Miranda on his bedroom wall.
“In the immortal words of Polonius, ‘To thine own self be true.’ So make your choice. Are you in or out?”
Through the hush in the vast auditorium, a rustling draws everyone’s attention to a freshman-looking boy in the back who gathers up his stuff and scurries out the door, followed by every set of eyes in the room.
“For those who remain, this will not be like any other club. Theater is a way of life. Theater is life.”
He turns dramatically, pointing to a girl in the front row.
“You will find yourself on this stage. The lights can reveal you, if you let them.”
Yeah, this was definitely a bad idea. I would flee after that other poor impostor if I weren’t glued to my seat with fear of interrupting this guy’s grand monologue.
“This year, we will be bringing the stage to life with…”
He pauses for dramatic effect, soaking in the anticipation as every head leans forward. I worry Asad may literally fall out of his seat.
“The Wizard of Oz!”
A gasp ripples through the rows, followed by a chorus of chatter.
“Like Dorothy, we will wend our way down the yellow brick road. We will head into the dark forest. We will emerge triumphant—transformed.”
He points a finger again toward the girl in the audience.
“Are you ready for the journey?”
He offers her his hand and in one fluid movement lifts her onto the stage. Row by row, everyone leaves their seats to climb up, too. Asad stands and turns to me.
“You coming?”
I grip my bag tighter against me.
“Wait, we have to do that? Even if we’re crew?” I hope there’s been some serious miscommunication and the backstage folks like us get to slink unseen behind black curtains.
“Yup. Drama club tradition. Follow me,” he says.
I shake my head.
“I—I think this was a mistake.”
He looks at me for a second and then at the row of people behind us like he’s noticed for the first time that they’re whispering, watching to see if the scar-faced girl will take the stage.
His dark eyes capture mine.
“ ‘Fortune Favors the Brave,’ ” he says.
I think for a second.
“Les Mis? No, wait, Aida. Definitely Aida. Final answer.”
He smiles wide.
“Oh, you so belong here. Face it, these melodramatic thespians are your people.” He holds out his hand, palm up, toward me. “We’ll do it together.”
The assurance in his dark eyes calms my buzzing skin. I slip my hand into his and try to ignore the voices around me as I make my way to the front. When we get to the stage, Asad talks up to the boy in black.
“This is Ava. She’s new.”
When the boy reaches out his hand for me, I make sure to reach only my right hand back, keeping my flipper hidden at my side. He hesitates for a split second when he sees my compression garments, but before I can explain, he grabs me and pulls me forcefully onto the stage.
“Hello, new Ava. Welcome to Oz.”
March 16
I wake to beeping.
And a balloon.
"Get Well Soon."
Someone is sick.
Who?
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
A woman in blue scrubs.
"You're in a hospital."
Why?
I can almost remember.
Something happened. Something bad.
Car accident?
"We've been waiting for you."
Where have I been?
Why is it so hard to breathe?
Something hard blocks my voice.
I'm mute.
Something white covers my face.
I'm m
ummified.
Why can't I move?
Little white footballs where my hands should be.
"You've been in a fire," a nurse says.
Sixty percent of me burned up.
Sixty percent?
What's left?
Cora by my bed
crying
always crying.
Pain
always pain.
Then sleep
beautiful sleep.
You were in a fire.
You've been asleep
for two months.
Reality flits away like a butterfly.
Only pieces appear:
Fire
Smoke
Flesh
Dad pushes me.
The stars save me.
Through the fog, I understand one thing:
Life has changed—
Forever.
12
For the first time since the fire, I wake up excited.
The house is quiet, just like last night after Glenn drove me home from school. Cora had gone to bed while it was still light out, and I never had the chance to tell her I’m officially a member of the Crossroads High drama club.
Another first: I actually want to tell Cora about being back in the theater. I want someone to know I’m shooting for a star, even if it’s a small one.
I find Glenn on the front porch swing, eyes trained on the snowy peaks in the distance, rocking himself slowly heel to toe, heel to toe.
“You’re burning daylight,” he says when I plop next to him. “We’ve already been out and back to the cemetery. Thought it’d be a nice way to commemorate the day.”
I’m about to ask what we’re celebrating when it hits me: March 17. Sara’s birthday.
“I’m so sorry, I forgot—” I start, mentally kicking myself for being so wrapped up in drama club that I completely missed it. Not that I would have gone anyway. I don’t visit cemeteries for the same reason I don’t visit burned-down houses: I already know what I lost.
“I know cemeteries aren’t your thing,” he says. “But just wanted to give you a heads-up. Cora’s taking it pretty hard.”
“Where is she?” I ask.
Glenn nods toward the house.
“Remember last year? Didn’t surface all day.”
“I wasn’t here last year.”
He pauses for a second and stares at the mountains, some memory rolling through his mind. I was still in the hospital at this time last year, lost in a coma, somewhere deep inside myself.
From my hospital bed, I could see the same mountains—the Wasatch Range. The jagged peaks reach so much higher than the foothills around our house in Utah’s farm country, where I grew up memorizing the rise and fall of the land outside my bedroom window. The mountains here are different, but their presence is comforting—a geologic North Star—standing steady and reliable to the east, connecting me to home.
“Do me a favor?” Glenn asks.
“Anything.”
“See how she’s doing in there. I hate for her to be alone, but this morning just about wore me out.”
I leave Glenn on the swing, where he lays his head back, eyes closed, an unshaved jawline darkening his face. I drag myself to Cora’s bedroom door, unsure whether I should disturb her. Cora handles “down days” behind closed doors, her grief locked up tight. A rustling movement when I knock tells me she’s gathering up tissues.
“Come in,” she says. When I open the door, she wears a weary smile. Without makeup, her eyes seem slightly sunken and age spots dot her cheeks. A picture of Sara sits wonky on her nightstand, her pointe shoes next to Cora on the bed.
Cora wipes the corners of her eyes with a balled-up tissue, forces a huge smile, and pats the bed next to her.
“Tell me all about drama club!”
I want to tell her, about The Wizard of Oz and the over-the-top director and the boy who helped me get back onstage, but I can’t make today about me.
Today is not my day.
“You don’t have to do that,” I say.
Cora deflates like I’ve poked her with a pin. “I’m sorry. I’ve been in here wallowing, haven’t I?”
“You’re allowed to wallow.”
She picks up Sara’s picture off the dresser.
“It’s just so strange having your child’s birthday without your child. Like this day should somehow not exist anymore. But here it is, the annual reminder of the day I became her mother.”
Cora picks at the edge of her blue paisley comforter. I feel like I should put my arm around her, but I’m afraid I’m the last thing Cora needs today.
The reminder of what she lost.
“You’re still her mother.”
Cora sighs.
“It’s been more than a year, Ava. Twelve months without her and I still wake up sometimes in the morning and forget. And when I remember, it’s like I lose her all over again and—”
She cuts herself off for a second.
“I’m tired of losing her. I’m just—tired.”
She laughs weakly.
“I shouldn’t be telling you this.”
I shake my head. I want to tell her I get it, that I wake up sometimes from a bad dream and make it halfway down the hallway, heading for the warmth and safety of my mom’s bed, before reality hits: I live in a world where my parents don’t exist. Without fail, the weight crushes me every time like it’s the first time.
I want to tell Cora that, but I can’t quite get the words to go. Like if I say it out loud, I’ll never be able to stuff it back in again. Instead, I give her an awkward side hug along with the same empty words people used to offer me: “I’m here if you need anything.”
I reclose her door behind me.
I take out my math textbook on my bed and try to concentrate on the figures on the page rather than on Sara’s dolls, which I swear are staring at me more aggressively than usual. I listen to Mom’s deodorant message, my eyes shut tight, savoring the singsongy way she says “Call me ba-ack.” But even that doesn’t settle me the way it usually does.
After the third time listening to it in my pink/blue room, trying to ignore Barbie’s stink eye, I can’t sit anymore. So I head to the kitchen and line up eggs and oil and a nearly expired Funfetti cake mix Sara and I kept stashed in the back of the pantry for sleepover bake-a-thons, although we’d always end up just eating the batter on spatulas until we got sick.
I make an enormous mess in the process, thanks to my clumsy left hand, but I manage to make a decent cake, and only clatter a mixing bowl on the floor once. When it’s done, I ice the cake with rainbow-chip frosting just like Sara would have, lick a spatula in her honor, and then stick in sixteen candles.
As I plunge the last one into the cake, it hits me.
The candles represent years.
Years lived.
I’ve just made the most depressing cake in the history of baked goods.
I yank out the candles and shove the whole thing into the garbage disposal, letting the blades abolish any evidence of my deluded idea that Funfetti could fix a family.
Unable to take away the hurt, I stand helpless in the hallway in front of Cora’s closed door.
An insurmountable wall of wood and pain between us.
13
“Please tell me you’re kidding,” Piper says as I fill her in on drama club on our way to class Monday morning. “You’re a backstage crewpie?”
I stop at the door to Piper’s math class.
“Crewpie?”
“The curtain dwellers who don’t have the guts to try out.”
“Wow, you really are a drama diva.”
“Was. Was a drama diva. And I’m just saying stage crew is not what we agreed to, and you know it.”
I shift my weight from side to side as other kids file past us into the room.
Nobody says anything, but a few of them smile faintly as they step around Piper’s chair, which she’s parked smack in the middle of the doorway.
“Technically, backstage is still on the stage. I think I’m going to like it.” It’s been me, myself, and I for so long I nearly forgot how good it feels to be part of something bigger, to be part of a crew. “And one of the guys—”
“A boy!” Piper leans forward dramatically, resting her chin on her hands and batting her eyelashes. “I want to hear Every. Last. Detail.”
“No details to tell.” Based on Piper’s overreaction, I decide immediately not to mention Asad’s name. “He was nice. That’s all.”
Piper swats playfully at me.
“Oh, stop. This X-rated talk is making me blush!”
I sling my satchel over my shoulder and start to leave, but Piper grabs my arm.
“For real, I want all the juicy gossip at group tomorrow.”
I sweep my hand toward my face, showcasing my scars.
“This face gets no juice.”
“Well, if there’s a boy involved, then I guess crew is better than resuming your post as dungeon master. It’s not like I’m going to be spiking volleyballs between filling water jugs.” Piper smiles up at me as the bell rings. “Look at us being normal teenagers. I’m on a team again, you’re in love—”
“I’m not in love.”
“Pretty soon we’ll be going to football games and loitering at the mall. Dr. Layne will be so proud.”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” I say. “Besides, it’s new normal, so it hardly even counts.”
“Ava!” she yells after me as I start to walk down the hallway. “My new normal sucked before you got here.”
“News flash: it still sucks,” I say just loud enough so she can hear me over the loud pack of football players walking between us. “But yeah, mine too.”