by Jen Klein
A wooden sign at the entrance to the amphitheater says it seats 2,200 people. Standing at the top of all those seats, I believe that number. Wide concrete stairs lead down between the rows and rows of curved aluminum benches. Way below, the stage is more like a slice of Appalachian nature than a location for dramatic performances. There’s no floor—it’s just dirt—and the whole area is surrounded by rhododendrons and sugar maples and stone retaining walls. It looks like a huge picnic area on the Blue Ridge Parkway…if you wanted to eat a sandwich while 2,200 people watched, that is.
A group is gathered on the audience benches closest to the stage. I start down the stairs, walking slowly so I can get a good look, but I don’t see Tuck…or even Ella or Milo. Instead, they’re a bunch of strangers who will be my coworkers for the summer. Who I need to fit in with.
As I get closer, one thing becomes painfully apparent: it’s not going to be easy.
One guy is sitting off by himself, thwacking at the strings of a little wooden instrument shaped like a trapezoid. Another seems to be asleep with his bare feet (ew!) perched on the back of the seat in front of him. Two girls are facing each other, playing some sort of hand-clapping game I vaguely recognize from my childhood. A whole crowd of older teens (college students, maybe?) stand around in a circle, laughing and talking. As I get closer, one of them—a blond in a miniskirt—suddenly screams “Trust fall!” and flings herself backward into the circle. Lucky for her, the others have catlike reflexes and, en masse, catch her before her head can crack open on the aluminum seating.
Apparently, I gasp aloud, because from behind me I hear a voice say, “That’s just Gretchen.” It’s Ella. She’s scowling at me. “And BTW, WTF?”
“Huh?”
She rolls her eyes. “By the way, what the—”
“Yeah, I know what it means. Why are you saying it?”
“Where were you?”
“Oh. Downtown.” Whoops. Ella did pull strings to get me here, after all. I’m sure she doesn’t want me showing up late and mucking up her good theatrical name. “Don’t worry, I’m always on time.”
“Not worried. I just thought we’d drive up together.” She rustles through her own packet of papers. “But you walked, so that’s cool.”
Except it doesn’t sound like it’s cool….
“I’m sorry,” I tell her.
But Ella only repeats herself. “It’s cool.”
To make things even more awkward, that’s when Milo plops down on my other side, handing me a cold can of soda. “To help with the altitude.” He opens his own and then leans forward to wave at Ella. “Hi.”
He sounds friendly enough, but Ella only nods.
Nothing else is said and no other gestures are made, yet somehow the tension deepens, and I get it: whatever Milo is or isn’t to Ella, he’s still her property. Just like this entire theater is her property. And I’m here as Ella’s guest, so I need to watch my manners.
I hand the soda back to Milo. “I’m good. Thanks.” I ignore the flash of confusion that crosses his face before I turn away, shutting him out.
I also ignore my own flash of guilt. After all, the guy was nice to me all morning.
A new influx of “company members” (I’m starting to learn the language here) tromps down the concrete stairs. I crane my head to see if Tuck is in their midst, but no such luck. The reason I’m here is still nowhere to be seen.
There’s a series of clicks from beside me. Milo has unsheathed his camera and is taking shots of our coworkers’ arrivals. I remember what he said when he first showed up at the coffee shop, that he’d taken the photo of Toga Tuck on the Olympus website. “Are you the photographer too?” I ask him.
“Yep. They keep me around because I’m cheap.” He pulls the camera away from his face long enough to give me a quick smile. “Actually, I’m free.” He nudges Ella. “You. You’re not an intern anymore, are you?”
“Nope. A/T.” I don’t have to turn my head to catalog her frosty look. “I’ve grown since last summer. I’m not interested in the same things.”
Surely her double meaning is as obvious to Milo as it is to me, but he doesn’t let on. “A promotion, awesome!” He sounds like he really means it. “You deserve it.”
“Thanks.” There’s a pause before Ella asks the question that she has to ask in order to be remotely polite. “Are you an A/T again?”
It occurs to me that had I also been remotely polite, I would have asked the same question when Milo and I were walking to the theater.
“No,” Milo tells her. “Supporting.”
Ella frowns. “Who’d you get?”
“Achilles.” Milo sounds almost apologetic. “I guess they figured I’ve been here my whole life, maybe they can toss me a couple of lines and a heroic death.”
Ella’s frown deepens. “Do you even want those lines? I thought you were a photographer or something.”
Milo only shrugs. I’m about to ask him about his photography when there’s a blond blur in my peripheral vision. It’s Tuck loping down the cement stairs. He’s every bit as radiant as he was at school. Maybe even more so, because now the sun blazes his hair into golden fire and his T-shirt is bright, bright white against his tan skin.
He already looks like a Greek god.
I straighten on the aluminum bench, tossing my hair back from my face. I might be a sweaty mess, but with any luck, maybe it isn’t obvious upon first glance. I watch as Tuck descends the last few steps to reach the group of people closest to the stage. He sits down next to the trust-fall girl, Gretchen. She beams at him and tilts her face up to his. It’s the classic “kiss me” move, but surely that’s not what she’s doing because—
Nope. It’s exactly what she’s doing. Because now Tuck is kissing her. Passionately. Lengthily. Meaningfully.
I am a block of ice, but apparently Ella is not, because, beside me, she sucks in a great gasp of air. I don’t look at her. I can’t.
I am frozen.
“Move,” I tell Ella, who is standing between me and the bathroom exit.
“No.” She shakes her head vehemently. “You’re not leaving.”
“You are not the boss of me,” I retort, because apparently I’ve lost maturity along with my dignity. “This is not what I signed up for.”
“Uh, yes, it is. You literally signed a literal contract to work here for the summer.”
“Not in blood!” I decide to try appealing to her sense of compassion. “You know why I came. I can’t stay if Tuck is with that Gretchen girl. It’s humiliating.”
Ella’s frown softens. “Look, you have no idea how long those two will last. It’s a new thing. It’s not like they’re married.”
“So I’m supposed to—what? Sit around and wait for them to break up? That sounds like fun.”
“Or you could try actually having fun.” Ella’s scowl is back. “This is a great place, you know. Your life doesn’t have to be about chasing some stupid boy.”
Now, that’s just rude.
“I’m not chasing. I thought he was a sign.” I make a move, but Ella shifts her weight, still blocking me. “Let me go!”
“No.” Ella folds her arms. “Typical Rainie, bailing out on me like always.”
“But it has nothing to do with you!” After all, it’s not like it’s Ella’s theater. “So there’s one less person standing around in crowd scenes, big deal.”
“I went out on a limb for you. I thought you would be here—actually be here. You can’t just leave.”
“I have to.” My eyes brim over with tears, and I start to wipe them away but change my mind. Perhaps the sight of my sorrow will convince Ella. “It’s too hard to stay.”
Ella stares at me for a long beat, then raises her hands, taking a step away from the door. “Okay, fine. Go for it.” I’m about to thank her, but Ella keeps talking, her words clipped and hard. “But you should know that I’ll tell Tuck why you came and why you left, so enjoy that when our senior year starts.”
My mo
uth drops open. “What?”
“You think it’s humiliating now.” Ella shrugs. “Wait until all of Dobbs High knows how you chased a boy into the mountains and then ran home. Funny story. Everyone will get a kick out of it.”
Rage boils up my chest and neck into my face, staining my cheeks. “That is the shittiest—”
“No, you’re the shittiest.” Ella glares at me. “If you walk away, that is.”
I shake my head, trapped. “You need to get a life.”
“You came here to get a life.” Ella opens the door. “You should get on that.” She steps out of the bathroom.
“You’re blackmailing me!” I yell after her as the door starts to swing shut. Ella only raises her hands in a dramatic shrug, continuing on toward the theater entrance. The door closes and I stand there, alone in the bathroom, staring at it. What is Ella talking about, “bailing out”? I bail out on things, not people.
But this time, it looks like I’m not allowed to do either.
When I rejoin my coworkers—this time sitting on the other side of Milo, away from Ella—a gorgeous twentysomething with nearly black skin and a mane of red-gold hair is speaking from the middle of the stage. “Nikki Bray,” Milo tells me. “Production stage manager.”
Nikki is telling us a list of rules about the two weeks of rehearsals that will be followed by two months of performances. To me—trying not to look at Tuck and Gretchen cuddled together—it might as well be two millennia followed by two eons.
Finally, Nikki introduces the longtime director of Zeus!, Del Shelby. He’s tiny and wrinkled and pale, but his shirt and jeans and boots are all black. So is his giant cowboy hat. He looks like a vampire who accidentally wandered into an old western movie.
Del Shelby welcomes us to the thirty-ninth year of Zeus!, which is apparently also the thirty-ninth year that the “brilliant master thespian” Hugh Hadley has played the title role. From the first row of seats, a bearded gentleman with silver hair gives a wave to the group. “Looking forward to thirty-nine more!” he calls out to a round of applause.
Milo nudges me. “Started as an actor-tech,” he murmurs. “Dare to dream.”
Ella shoots Milo a dirty look, which changes to one of compassion when it slides to me. I narrow my eyes at her. She doesn’t get to act like she’s my friend when she’s in the middle of blackmailing me.
Onstage, Del talks about the history of the theater, and then Nikki has more things to say about showing up on time, and finally everyone is excused until tomorrow: the first official day of rehearsals. I shove my packet into my backpack and am about to make a break for it when Milo reaches past me to tap Ella’s shoulder.
“Hey, you guys coming to McKay’s tonight?”
She shrugs. “Is there a thing?”
“First night before rehearsal. Always a thing.”
“Then maybe.” Ella glances at me. “Last summer, I had to live with Uncle Rob. He wasn’t so hot on me going to things.”
I bid a hasty farewell to Milo—which Ella also does because she clearly doesn’t like him—and escape up the concrete steps, Ella right behind me. We cross the parking lot and make it all the way down the long street before I’m able to get words out between my clenched teeth. “I really don’t want to be near you right now.”
Ella nods, placid. “And yet I’m your only friend here, so you’re kind of stuck with me.”
I disagree with her definition of “friend,” but still—she’s kind of got me there. We cross the street and walk another two blocks before I pull Ella to a halt. “There’s no foreseeable way that Gretchen is also an actor-technician, is there?”
“Sorry.” Ella shakes her head. “Helen of Troy.”
“What.”
Ella’s look of sympathy deepens. “Also known as Paris of Troy’s lover.”
“No, really. You have got to be kidding me.” The summer of following through and falling in love has turned into the summer of absolute suck. I’m a failure. Tuck wasn’t asking for me to come here. He was speaking…I don’t know, metaphorically or theatrically or some crap.
I’m worse than a failure. I’m an idiot.
We’re making our way up Crestline Drive when Ella breaks the silence again. “Do you want to be cheered up?”
“No.” But by the time we’ve trudged up the stairs and are on our splintered wooden deck, I’ve changed my mind. “Fine. Cheer me up.” I add the word “blackmailer” only in my head.
“They won’t last.” Ella unlocks the apartment door and I follow her inside. We plop down on opposite ends of the living room sofa. “Gretchen doesn’t do Forever Love. She doesn’t even do One-Whole-Season Love. They’ll break up by the end of the summer, and Tuck will be back at school for senior year, totally single. In the meantime, you’ll get to know each other.”
“You mean while I’m actor-teching and he’s sucking face with Gretchen?”
“No, backstage. Between scenes. Before the show. At the parties. That’s how it works.” Ella tucks her legs up under her splash-patterned wrap dress and gazes at me. “I know you’re pissed, but I’m telling you, it’s good here. We all end up…kinda on the same team.”
Yeah, maybe if you know how to play the game in the first place.
“Trust me, if you two started off as a couple, there’s no way you’d end the summer together.” Ella cocks her head so her chin-length hair swings against her face. “Summer stock theater is not a hotbed of long-term relationships.”
“Milo’s parents met at a theater in Roanoke.” I don’t know why I say it; I guess I’m trying to defend my adherence to my own pain. Ella’s face hardens and I hasten to explain. “I ran into him downtown and we walked to Olympus together.”
“Interesting.” Ella unfolds from the sofa, heading toward the bedroom. “Let me know if you want to go to McKay’s tonight with your blackmailing ex–best friend.”
“Who wouldn’t want that?” I yell after her, but she doesn’t respond to my sarcasm.
Although no part of me wants to go hang out with a bunch of people I don’t know—not to mention one person I’m super pissed at—I eventually come to the conclusion that it’s better to get to the Tuck meeting sooner rather than later. He’s going to be surprised to see me, and I’ll have to explain it, and I hate everything about it, and…I just want to get it over with.
That evening, I walk into the bedroom right as Ella is pulling her dress off over her head. “Sorry!” I back out fast.
“Don’t be silly,” Ella calls from the other side of the door. “Come back.” I hesitate but then do as she says. She’s wearing a pale pink bra and a pair of faded-blue boy shorts. “Leave it open. Only girls live here.”
Other than the occasional guy who’s remotely interested me enough to persuade me to remove any clothing, I haven’t changed in front of anyone since we were all forced to do so during ninth-grade PE. Because—why would I?
I open my closet so I’ll have somewhere to look. It’s not like we are actually in a locker room, after all. Here, doors are an option. I scan the random assortment of clothes I packed for a summer that doesn’t exist. What do you wear to see the boy who’s breaking your heart? I turn back to Ella. “Are you wearing a dress?”
“It’s a small-town bar,” Ella replies. “Not the senior prom.”
Uh, she just wore a dress to the first company meeting. Was that the senior prom?
As it turns out, we both go casual. My shorts are denim and my tank is black, and I’ve paired them with some of my favorite Havaianas—the teal ones. Ella, however, is in zebra-print shorts and a gray camo tee. She’s also wearing big, glittery star earrings and scuffed orange cowboy boots with chunky heels that raise her so that she’s only a couple of inches shorter than I am. I would look like a Texan hooker in all that, but somehow Ella manages to pull it off.
I drive us the few blocks to Nine Muses, and we find parking next to a tea store advertising free henna tattoos. Ella and I head toward the main street, where I point out the gr
een awning. “Yeah, I’ve been here before,” she reminds me.
The inside of the building—which is decorated in neon beer signs and old movie posters—is already packed with Zeus! company members of all ages. I recognize some by their faces and some only by the theater T-shirts they’re wearing.
“Damn it.” Ella snaps her fingers. “I forgot about the discount. You get fifteen percent off if you wear the shirt.”
I follow her past the bar and through the booths to a busy side room. Here, Christmas lights line the ceiling, illuminating dozens of people weaving between a pool table, a dartboard, a jukebox, and a scattering of high round tables with stools. Off to the left, a man in a Luck o’ the Irish T-shirt stands behind a bar. Above him hangs a wooden sign that proclaims Bar menu and alcohol-free drinks ONLY.
As we enter, a leggy girl in a halter top and sequined miniskirt leans low over the table to shoot. She completely misses the cue ball, instead jabbing her stick into a stripe and sending it into a side pocket. She straightens with a fist pump—“Do I win?”—and we see that, of course, it’s Gretchen.
Which means that Tuck is right there to catch her by the waist and spin her around into his arms. And kiss her. A lot.
Before I can do anything, Ella’s hand is on my elbow and she’s propelling me to the bar. “A Roy Rogers. Um, two,” she tells the bartender, who is either Irish or just enamored of the clothing. As he starts pouring, I give her a look.
“Roy Rogers? Are we children?”
Ella shrugs. “If your options are a soda with cherry syrup or a soda without cherry syrup, why would you ever choose without?”
She has a point.
The bartender slides the drinks to us, and Ella drops a bill on the counter. She turns to me, raising her glass. “To forgiveness.”
“I’m not ready to forgive you,” I tell her.
“You will be,” she says. “You need a friend here.”
I roll my eyes but allow her to clink her glass against mine. “To the tortured hellscape that is my life.”
“That’s the spirit.” We take sips, and then Ella leads me to an unclaimed table, where we hike ourselves onto stools. She looks at me over the rim of her drink. “You know, this may be a blessing in disguise.”