by Cynthia Hand
There’s a moment in the middle of our scene together where she slaps me in the face. And then I slap her back. And then she slaps me. And then I really slap her. It’s stage slapping, or it’s supposed to be. It’s not supposed to hurt, but—
“I got carried away,” I admit. “Think of it like Method acting, right? We’re deep inside our characters. We’re living the moment.”
She gives me a look. “I’m not Method. I do a little thing called acting.”
“Oh, right. Sorry, Mr. Olivier,” I quip.
She rolls her neck from side to side. “So,” she says, not for the first time today. “Do you think the world is ready for a black Anne Sullivan?”
She asks a version of this question almost every time we perform together, like when she was Hodel in Fiddler on the Roof, or when she was Emily in Our Town, and especially when she was Maria in The Sound of Music.
“They’re going to be blown away by black Anne Sullivan. The judges in the last round were obviously impressed.”
“And you’re the best Helen Keller since Patty Duke. We’re kicking butt,” Nyla says.
“We’re going to win this thing,” I agree, more to myself than to her. We have to.
“And you’re going to get that scholarship,” she adds. “And go to College of Idaho.”
I blow out a shaky breath. “Right.”
“We won this last year,” she reminds me. “We’ll do it again. Easy peasy.”
Last year we were hanging out in this exact same hallway, only that time we were dressed as nuns. We performed a scene from Doubt, and Nyla played tough old Sister Aloysius Beauvier, and I was Sister James, the young and naive one. It was awesome. I’m hoping this year the judges think we’re even more awesome. Because this year my entire future is on the line.
No pressure.
“What do you want to do after?” Nyla asks. “We won’t get the results until the closing ceremony, which is after dinner, so we’ve got like five hours to kill. Do you want to see a movie?”
“I don’t know.” Truthfully I can’t think much past the way the next few hours could decide my whole future.
NO PRESSURE.
“I should get that Big Jud burger again,” Nyla muses.
My stomach turns over at the thought of the giant hamburger.
“You’re not going to puke, are you?” Nyla asks, eyeing me warily.
I take some deep breaths. “Have I ever yakked before a performance?”
“No.”
“Well, I’m not about to start now.”
A door down the hall opens and a judge sticks his head out. “Cass McMurtrey and Nyla Henderson?”
We jump up. “That’s us.”
“You’re doing The Miracle Worker?”
“Yes, sir,” I say.
“All right, come on in.”
Nyla and I do our lucky fist bump. Then we follow the judge into the room, where they’ve already set up our makeshift set. A line of three judges is seated at a table.
I smile. The thing is: I’m always pretty good under pressure.
“Let’s work some miracles,” Nyla whispers as we take our places.
After that (and we did indeed kick butt) Mama Jo wants to take everyone to the mall, but Nyla and I decide to stay behind.
“I still can’t believe Bastian didn’t get to compete,” Ny says as we watch the bus carrying the other girls pull out of the parking lot. Ronnie waves to us out the window, and we wave back. “That’s the worst.”
“And poor Alice,” I muse. Because Alice should totally be on that bus.
“I saw them rehearse their scene during lunch last week. It was hilarious. It actually worried me a little,” Nyla says.
And now we don’t have to worry about competing with Alice and Bastian. This should be a good thing, but it feels wrong. “What is the deal with Bastian’s dad, I wonder?”
“I don’t know,” Nyla answers. “What I do know is that I need something to seriously get my mind off this competition. I’m thinking IMAX.” The Edwards theater here has one of those giant screens, which we don’t have in Idaho Falls. But since last year with Mom, that horrible night at the movies when I almost lost her, even the smell of popcorn puts me on edge.
“Actually,” I say slowly, “I want to walk somewhere. If that’s okay.”
“Ooh, a mystery,” Nyla says, raising her eyebrows. “Even better. Count me in.”
We stroll across the BSU campus.
“You sure you don’t want to go here?” Nyla asks as we weave our way through the sea of Boise State students all bundled up in scarves and fingerless mitts and tall boots. It’s cold, and the sky above us is gray and overcast, but the walk is still nice. The bare trees make a kind of lacy lattice against the horizon. The air smells crisp, like it’s about to snow. The students around us are talking, laughing, chattering. They seem to be enjoying college life.
But nope, I still want to go to C of I.
And I have my own idea about how to get our minds off the competition.
“Come on.” I veer toward the green belt that runs along the Boise River, steering us downtown. In a few minutes we’re standing in front of the redbrick building that’s the Boise Public Library.
“I’m confused,” says Nyla. “You want to go to the library?”
“I want to go to this library,” I clarify. “Or . . . I think I do. Maybe it’s a bad idea.”
“What’s up?” she asks.
“I looked into it: this library has the yearbooks from all the local high schools. So I was thinking, what if we search through the year before I was born?”
“And we’d be searching for what, exactly?”
“My birth mother.”
Nyla’s eyes widen. “You really want to?”
“Yeah. I think I do. Just to try to find out who she is, though. Anyway, you know how you asked me if there was anything on that non-identifying information form that might be useful?”
She nods.
“Well, it does say that Boise was my birth mother’s place of residence at the time of my birth.”
“Uh-huh?”
“And she wrote that she was on the newspaper staff that year, but had to quit. Probably because she got pregnant, right?”
Nyla gasps. “So you want to look at the school newspaper page in the high school yearbooks, because maybe there could be a picture of your biological mother in there.”
“It’s a long shot,” I admit. “But it’s all I’ve got to go on. And we’re here in Boise, so I thought I should take the opportunity to—”
“Let’s do it,” Nyla says, obviously pumped up over the idea. “How can I help?’
In no time we’re sitting at a table near the window with a meaty stack of high school yearbooks between us. I’m shocked by how many high schools there are in this area—more than seven, not even counting the private schools. It’s way more than I expected.
Nyla literally rolls up her sleeves. She puts on her glasses, which always make her look like the world’s most kick-ass librarian. “So what, we just go to the newspaper pages and look for someone who looks like you?”
Something in my throat squeezes. “She had brown hair and blue eyes, average height and weight, I think. And she would have been a sophomore or a junior.” I grab the top yearbook—it’s for Boise High School. It’s red and black and has the words “Expanding Horizons” printed across the front with a rising sun graphic in the background.
“Okay,” Nyla says, grabbing one, too. “I did say I wanted something to take my mind off the competition. This will do nicely.”
My heart is beating fast again as I flip through the yearbook. Most of the pictures are in black and white. I pause on the drama page out of habit, taking note of what plays they performed that year. High schools are still mostly putting on the same shows, I notice. I move on quickly, past the sports, the chess club, and debate club and choir. Past the class photos. The teachers. The staff. Past the pictures of the prom. Finally I find t
he school newspaper page.
“In Search of the Story,” it reads in big letters across the two-page spread. There’s a picture of five students gathered around a table looking at something. Two girls, three boys. And another of twelve students standing in two rows—the official newspaper staff. Seven girls. Five boys.
My eyes roam over both photos, pausing on the girls. The pictures are in black and white, so they all look like they have brown hair, and there’s no way to tell eye color. I look at their faces—lingering on their eyes and eyebrows and chins—but I don’t see anything familiar.
Still, I take out a notebook and write the names of the girls on the newspaper staff: Kristi Henscheid, Melissa Bollinger, Melissa Stockham, Sandra Whit, Sarah Averett, Sonia Rutz, and Amy Yowell. Then I look up each of these girls and inspect all the pictures of them in the yearbook, from their official yearbook photo to any other random photo or group they were in.
It’s harder than it might seem, looking for your own face in a bunch of old photos.
I don’t see it. I don’t find myself anywhere in here.
It’s the same for the next three yearbooks. A list of girls who are possibly my birth mother. A blur of pictures. And nothing recognizable in any of them.
After a while Nyla takes off her glasses, rubs her eyes, and smiles her I’m-being-supportive-but-this-sucks smile.
“This is a bad idea,” I sigh. “I’m never going to find her like this.” I swallow down a wave of silly-yet-weirdly-crushing disappointment—I knew the yearbooks would be a long shot, but part of me expected to find my birth mother this way. Part of me thought she’d jump out at me, that fate would lead me where I needed to go. The universe and whatnot.
Clearly the universe is busy with someone else’s life.
“I’m proud of you, Cass,” Nyla says out of the blue. “This takes guts.”
I scoff. “But I’m not really getting anything done. And maybe my birth mother didn’t live in Boise—maybe she only came here to give birth. That was a pretty big assumption on my part. Or maybe she went to a private school. Or maybe she wrote that she worked on the school newspaper because she wanted me to think she had a hobby. Because otherwise she’s pretty boring.”
“Maybe,” Nyla agrees thoughtfully. “But it’s worth a try. Hold still.” She lifts the yearbook she’s been going through—Borah High School—and squints from me and then to the page and back again.
“We should go back,” I say. “We should get some dinner. We’ve been here long enough.”
“In a bit,” Nyla says, waving her hand to brush off the suggestion. “We’re more than halfway. Let’s look at them all.”
19
We don’t find my birth mother in the yearbooks, but for a few hours it did get our minds off the impending awards ceremony and the fate of my college dreams.
Which is all I’m thinking about now.
Nyla and I dress up for the ceremony. Last year we were still wearing our nuns’ habits when we won, and it was kind of embarrassing going up there. If you win first place you get to have your picture taken with your drama teacher, and that picture gets framed and put into a glass display case back at our high school, with all the baseball trophies and basketball jerseys, the pride of the school.
“The governor’s here,” Mama Jo whispers to us as we sit next to her in the auditorium where they’re going to announce the winners. “See him?”
“The governor? Of Idaho?” I whisper back.
“No, silly, of Indiana,” Nyla laughs. “Of course of Idaho. There he is.” She cocks her head at the bald man in the suit sitting with the judges on the stage. He looks mildly uncomfortable, or bored, like he’d rather be somewhere else. I don’t blame him.
I ask the obvious question: “Why is the governor of Idaho coming to the state drama awards?”
“Something to do with the scholarship,” Mama Jo says. She smiles. “Good luck, girls. Not that you need it.”
I need it.
We don’t have to wait long. There are only a few categories, and each category has a third, second, and first place. They start with comedy. Then classical. Then musical. Then dramatic, which is us.
We don’t win third. We don’t win second. It’s either all, then, or nothing.
I clutch Nyla’s hand. I want it all.
“And first place in the dramatic category goes to Nyla Henderson and Cass McMurtrey for their stellar depiction of the famous struggle between Helen Keller and her teacher, Anne Sullivan, in The Miracle Worker.”
I let out the breath I was holding. People are clapping. We stand up, and Nyla hugs me, and I hug her back, and we hug Mama Jo and wander up to the stage to collect our golden trophies and take a bow.
They’re not Oscars, but they’re pretty freaking good. And we don’t have to give a speech, which is even better.
“Oh, stay here, girls,” a judge tells us when we move to go back to our seats. He turns to the audience.
“We’d also like to announce a couple of special awards. Now every year, a sponsor has generously provided a scholarship to a deserving senior who performs in a spectacular way at the state competition. It’s called the Excellence in Acting Award, and it is ten thousand dollars, per year, for four years, to be used toward the tuition of the college or university of the recipient’s choice.”
This is it. I’m holding the trophy in one hand and Nyla’s hand in the other, and she is squeezing me tight. I feel dizzy. I feel sick. I really might throw up this time.
In the back of my mind I understand that Nyla could win this. We’re both seniors. She’s amazing as Annie. But I want to win so bad, and Nyla doesn’t need this money, so I believe—deep down—that the scholarship will go to me.
“This year it was extraordinarily difficult to choose the deserving senior,” the judge continues. “So difficult, in fact, that we were unable to come to a clear decision.”
Um, what?
“So, in the face of this conundrum, the theater department at Boise State decided to step up and offer a second scholarship, of equal value, to a second deserving student.”
Wait, I’m thinking. There are two scholarships now?
Nyla grins. She’s almost laughing. I go weak with relief. It’s happening. The universe unfolds as it—
“So I am pleased to announce that the Boise State scholarship will go to Cass McMurtrey.” The judge gestures to me. Another judge hands me a piece of paper. Applause, applause.
“And the Excellence in Acting Award will go to Nyla Henderson.”
Mama Jo is on her feet, cheering loudly. All the kids from our school are shouting and whistling and clapping.
Me, however, I’m looking at the paper they gave me.
Ten thousand dollars.
Per year.
For four years.
My eyes are blurry. I almost can’t read the last line of the paper. Which says:
To go toward tuition and expenses at Boise State University.
Then Nyla and I have to get our picture taken with the governor. We stand on either side of him and he puts his arms out like he’s got them around both of us, but he avoids touching us. His hands hover a few inches behind our backs, then drop the moment after the photo is taken.
“Congratulations,” he says. Or I think that’s what he says. I’m not really listening at this point.
“So where do you think you’ll be using your scholarship?” he asks Nyla.
“I want to go to the University of Southern California,” she answers, still beaming.
I try to match her smile.
“Fantastic,” says the governor. He turns to me. “And Boise State is going to be lucky to have you, young lady.”
“Thank you,” I manage.
This is when Nyla realizes. “Wait. Hold on. What?”
“I guess I’m going to BSU,” I murmur, and show her the paper.
The governor shakes our hands again and walks away. Nyla reads over the paper slowly, then turns to me. I’ve never seen th
is particular expression on her face before, this epic combination of horror and guilt. She could win an award solely on the basis of this singular expression.
“Oh crap,” she says breathlessly. “Oh shit.”
Yeah. That about sums it up.
I try to put on the it’s-okay face, but I’m not that good of an actor.
But then Mama Jo is touching my shoulder, pulling me away, off the stage, not smiling anymore, not cheering, as somber as I’ve ever seen her. She says something about a phone call. I have to come with her now.
“It’s about your mother,” she says.
Dear X,
This week marks the beginning of the third trimester. It’s the final inning of the least fun game ever, but at least the end’s in sight, right? Lately Melly’s been pushing me to get going on the adoption stuff. She’s supposed to start processing things. We only have a couple months left. So this week, even though I’m not technically in school, I have homework.
Here’s what I’m supposed to do by Friday:
Fill out the non-identifying information form. Yay. That sounds about as fun as a trip to the dentist. (More about dentists later.)
Start going through the potential adoptive parent files. These are the applications for the couples who want babies. Who want you.
In other words, I have to start picking your parents.
No pressure.
At first all the couples seemed exactly the same to me. There are no names attached to these people, just a sea of smiling photographs and the hopeful details they provided about their lives. Their dreams of parenthood laid right out there for me to see. Of course, they are all putting their best foot forward, so to speak. They all use the same kind of language, how much they would like to have a child, the joy that said child is going to bring into their lives, the incredible things they have to offer, the way that they’re so ready to be parents. They all sound like amazing people. And I have to guess about what’s left unsaid.
For instance, consider the following couple—the dad’s a dentist and the mom’s a hygienist. They clearly work in the same office. They own their home. They both grew up in the same town and went to the same high school. They were high school sweethearts, the form says. And they have a dog, a big beautiful golden retriever that there’s a picture of in the file. In the picture, the dog is wearing a sweater and perfectly posing for the camera.