by Jen Klein
I’m on the way out when I nearly run into our stage manager, Nikki, heading for the counter. She’s carrying a small paperback with a cover that shows lots of flames and skin and palm trees. Nikki and I make eye contact, and she instinctively moves to shield the book, but it’s too late. I’ve seen it and she knows it. She stops in front of me, blocking my path. “I’m not going to ask about your books. You don’t tell about mine.”
“Of course! I would never—” I pause, looking at her. “I just assumed you read, like, military strategy or something.”
Her eyebrows rise. “You think I’m in the army?”
“Maybe. You’re so badass and all….” That might actually be the stupidest thing I’ve ever said. Is there a Conversation for Dumdums?
Nikki laughs…thank goodness. “Dude, I spend every day and night making sure a bunch of hormonal people stand in the right places and say the right words. When I get back to my apartment at one in the morning, all I want is to be away from it all for five minutes.” I look more closely at the book she’s holding. The background is a tropical island at night, awash in flames. In the foreground, a bare-chested man with flowing hair holds a buxom beauty who is either fainting or sleeping or really enjoying herself. I’m sure that, at the very least, it’s entertaining. “I know.” Nikki brandishes the book. “It’s awful and it’s not feminist. But it’s escapism, and damn if I’m not allowed to escape a little bit.”
“Damn, indeed.” If I can’t figure out what the hell I’m doing about Tuck, escaping doesn’t exactly sound like the worst thing in the world. “Can I borrow it when you’re done?”
“No way.” Nikki winks at me. “Buy your own book.”
•••
I swing by the apartment to pick up Ella so she doesn’t have to walk to the theater. When we arrive at the wooden deck behind the stage, there’s a big poster sheet tacked onto the corkboard next to the sign-in spot. Milo’s name is written across the top in red marker and decorated with gold glitter. Below his name are messages and cartoon figures and signatures. The board’s narrow shelf holds several markers.
It was Paul’s birthday last week, so I know what we’re supposed to do.
Ella turns to me. “I’ll look like a poor sport if I don’t.” I remain silent as she writes the bare minimum on Milo’s birthday poster: HBD, Ella.
Ella slaps her marker down on the shelf and waits for me to sign. I scribble a simple happy birthday, followed by my name. Part of me wishes I could write something else. Something more. Something to acknowledge that even though Milo cheated on Ella last summer, he also spent the first part of this summer being nice to me.
But I don’t.
And Ella approves.
•••
I’m still feeling guilty about the generic birthday greeting when Milo accosts me in line at the food counter. “Hey, what’s going on?” He nudges me with an elbow, and I squelch the urge to nudge him back. Instead, I yank away, putting distance between our bodies. It’s necessary because the Appalachian air is sticky hot and I’m wearing a short tank dress and he’s in a sleeveless tee. The last thing I need is for my arm to be pressed against his, with everyone’s warm skin and hard muscles all over each other.
Not that I’m the one with the hard muscles.
I am not.
When I don’t answer him, Milo steps in front of me, peering down into my face. “Rainie?”
I jerk my gaze away—it would be too easy to get lost in those brown eyes—and mumble an answer. “I’m just trying to get a sandwich.”
In my peripheral vision, I see Milo’s arms folding across his chest and then unfolding. His hands—warm, dry—land on my shoulders and gently spin me around. I allow it, and a minute later I’m in the relatively cool shade of a sugar maple on the deserted path to the parking lot, looking up at him.
“Are you mad at me?” Milo asks.
“Yes,” I tell him, even though it’s a lie. Even though the person I’m really mad at is me. “I don’t like cheaters.”
“Cheaters? What are you—” He stops, and his forehead creases in a frown. “Is this about Ella?”
“Yes. Unless you cheat on everyone, in which case it’s about them too.” My hands fly to my hips as I channel theater-girl drama. “It’s crappy to cheat on anyone, anytime, for any reason.”
Milo shakes his head. “You have no idea what you’re—”
“I thought you were different.” There’s no reason for me to let him speak. “Obviously you are not. You’re a villain.” Milo’s mouth drops open, but by now I’m too far gone to stop. “I’m sure you have a justification all thought out, but it doesn’t matter. I don’t care. At the end of any story, the villain is still a bad guy.”
With that, I whirl and storm toward the backstage. There. I’ve done my duty as Ella’s friend, I’ve done my duty to all of womanhood…and I’ve successfully removed temptation from my life.
Because—let’s be honest—if Tuck wasn’t in the picture, Milo would be very, very tempting.
Final dress rehearsal. We practice in the morning and early afternoon—I avoid Milo’s eyes the whole time—and then we’re sent home with instructions to rest and “come back at your normal call time.” For Ella and me and the rest of the actor-techs, that means arriving at six-thirty for an eight o’clock show. Now that rehearsals are about to be over, we are going to have every single day free for the rest of the summer. And Monday nights too.
It’s not a terrible schedule.
Ella and I arrive together, but we split off in separate directions when we reach the theater. She made ramen noodles at home, but I’m starving and want something from the backstage kitchen counter. I find myself next to Hugh Hadley, who flashes me a yellowed grin. “You ready for tomorrow night?”
“I have to be, right?”
It’s an offhanded remark, but it makes Hugh roar with laughter. “That’s the spirit!” he tells me before taking his burger and wandering away.
I pay the white-aproned boy behind the counter. He gives me a paper plate that holds a sandwich, two dill-pickle spears, and a handful of greasy potato chips. I start to head to the benches at the other end of the deck—they overlook the shaded woodsy paths leading down to the forest behind the theater—when I realize Ella and Milo are standing there. They’re deep in a conversation that seems…
Intimate.
As I watch, Milo takes a step closer to Ella. He leans over so he can whisper something in her ear. My eyebrows slant down in a frown as Ella smiles up at him. He pulls her into a hug, and as my insides inscrutably tighten, I whirl and head for the locker room, dropping my plate into a trash can as I go.
I’ve lost my appetite.
•••
By the time we’re into the nest scene, my jaws have been clenched for so long that my teeth ache. Forget cheating, forget villains…what’s going on between Ella and Milo?
I mean, sure, it’s her right to hug whoever she wants. To do whatever she wants with whoever she wants. But why is she doing it with him?
More importantly, why do I give a flying crap?
As the chorus members mill about, pretending to have conversations while Helen and Pollux hatch from their eggs, Ella meanders over. “Hey, do you want a smoothie after work? I bought frozen fruit today, and supposedly Annette has a blender somewhere.”
“No.” The word comes out hard and sharp, like a stick breaking. Ella opens her mouth to speak, but I cut her off. “I mean, unless you’re going to force me to, in which case, sure. I’ll have a smoothie. I guess you can let me know what flavor I like.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
Why the hell were you and your hated ex-boyfriend all over each other?
But what I say is this: “You know, your friendly little blackmail? I’m over it.”
Behind us, Helen’s egg rocks back and forth. It bonks into Pollux’s egg, which also starts rocking.
“Okay…” Ella stares at me. “So what are you going
to do about it?”
“Tell Tuck the truth.” The option didn’t occur to me until the moment I said the sentence, but now that I have, it seems like a good idea. My voice scales up. “You won’t have any more power over me.” Nearby, Paul turns to look at us. I bring it down a notch. “Then I can leave whenever I want.”
“Good,” says Ella. “You do that. Is there anything else?”
I want her to tell me the truth about what the hell she was doing backstage with Milo, but before I can decide whether to ask her, both of those two damn eggs crack open so the most beautiful woman in the world can be born alongside her ugly brother. Ella and I walk off in different directions.
Stupid, stupid mythology.
•••
The rest of final dress rehearsal goes really well, which apparently is a problem because there’s some dumb theater adage about “bad final dress, good opening night.” At least, that’s what Paul tells me when I ask why he doesn’t look happy. “I’m telling you, tomorrow’s going to be awful. Tonight’s the good night. Live on that.”
It is, of course, utterly ridiculous…and yet when I’m walking to my car and see Tuck across the dark parking lot, those words cross my mind. Without giving myself time to chicken out, I start in his direction. But before I take more than ten steps, Milo is in front of me.
“Rainie, can we talk?” His head is cocked, and his dark brown eyes are looking into mine. Suddenly I’m aware of the muggy North Carolina air. The sound of cicadas at the perimeter of the parking lot. The still-present heat of the sun-warmed pavement rising up through my feet and ankles.
Milo makes me too aware. Of everything.
So I take a step back. I force my gaze to slide off Milo’s angular face, to focus behind him, where Tuck is just getting into his pickup truck. “I have to go.”
Milo turns to see what I’m looking at. His expression changes. It hardens. Becomes unreadable.
“Oh,” he says, but his voice comes from behind me because I’ve already stepped past him. I’m walking—no, running—toward Tuck’s truck. The headlights are on, and as I get closer, the engine rumbles to life. I screech to a halt at the passenger side and rap on the window. Tuck turns to look at me, surprised. It’s only then that I hazard a glance backward into the darkness.
Milo is nowhere to be seen.
But I can’t think about him now.
The inside of Tuck’s truck smells like stale cigarettes. It surprises me enough to say something. “I didn’t know you smoked.”
“I don’t usually.” Tuck looks ashamed. “Except when I’m in a show, then sometimes I do. Do you want one?”
“No.” I stare at him, at his beauty. So perfect, so blatant. Tuck looks like a thousand male models on a thousand fashion websites. Anyone would want him.
“So what’s up?” He cocks his head, and it bumps me back in time to three minutes ago, when Milo did the same thing but my physical reaction was completely different.
Because I had a physical reaction.
I shake away the thought. This boy—the one right in front of me—is why I came here. I have to be right about one stupid thing in my whole stupid life, and that thing is sitting behind the steering wheel, looking across the bench seat at me. So I say it—“I came here because of you”—and get the satisfaction of watching his blue eyes widen in surprise.
“To…the parking lot?”
“No.” I take a deep breath and let it out. “To Olympus. To this show. To the summer.”
I see it in his eyes—WTF?—but the only thing that comes out of his mouth is my name. “Rainie.”
I go for it before making the conscious decision to go for it. “It was your monologue,” I blurt out. “I understood it. I am so scared of the future. Of my future. That what’s supposed to happen won’t happen because I can’t figure out what should happen.”
Tuck is completely still except for the rise and fall of his chest. I’m glad someone in the car is capable of breathing right now.
And then he leans toward me, stopping just over the midpoint of the seat. “What’s supposed to happen?”
“I don’t know.” My heart speeds up. “But everything you said, it changed me. It made me feel like maybe there’s something in front of me. Maybe I have a future even if I don’t know what it is. Maybe I’m not just treading water after all.” Now my words speed up too, matching the desperate thudding of my heart. “What you said made me come here….” I stop because this time I hear the sound of my own voice cracking. I swallow, trying to choke back the terror of what lies ahead. Of my uncertain, cloudy future. “Tell me I wasn’t crazy. Please.”
Because otherwise I’m just a dumb girl who’s looking at the wrong boy.
“Tell me I’m not still crazy.”
We look at each other, and I have no idea what he’s thinking, this blue-eyed boy I don’t know. He goes blurry, and I feel something against my forehead. It’s Tuck’s hair brushing against mine. We’ve leaned far enough toward each other that we’re touching.
Barely.
Tuck slides his hands up my arms to my neck. He cups my face in a way that feels like a scene in a movie. “You’re so brave,” he whispers.
“I’m really not,” I start to tell him, except then he’s kissing me. His mouth—softer than I would have guessed—is against my own. The kiss is so light that it tickles, and I have to tilt forward to stop the sensation. Tuck apparently takes this as encouragement, because he parts his lips, sliding a hand to my waist. I close my eyes and try to match his movements because this is everything I wanted. This is why I came to this strange country, where even the directions are backward….
But the soft and the wet and the motions are gone.
He’s gone.
I open my eyes. Tuck has pulled back and is gazing at me from his side of the seat. “Here’s the truth,” he says. “This thing with Gretchen, it’s not real. It’s temporary.”
I stare at him. “You don’t like her?”
“No, I do.” Tuck’s smile is sad. “But not in a strong way. Not in a deep way. Not like I could like…someone else.”
He means me, right? After all, his tongue was just in my mouth….
“Then why?” I ask him. “Why even bother being with Gretchen? What’s the point?”
“This summer.” Tuck reaches out and grabs my right hand. He squeezes it between his own hands, looking at me earnestly. “This summer is the point. It’s my first professional lead role, and when we’re together offstage, I’m better with her onstage. I’m…” He swallows and his grip around my hand tightens. “I’m scared, Rainie. I need her.”
My heart lurches. Beautiful, confident, rock-solid Tuck Brady is scared? More than the kiss, more than the way he’s looking at me now—that makes me feel good. “So now what?”
“Now we’re here for the summer,” he says. “But you have to know this: you’re the real deal. You’re…” His blue eyes darken, and the corners of his full lips pull upward. “Let’s just say I won’t be sad when we go back to Dobbs.” He pauses and lets go of my hand so he can slide his own back to my face. “But I can’t be with you here.”
“I know,” I tell him, even though I’m not sure I do.
“And, Rainie.” He tugs me closer, until my face is inches from his own. “Thank you.” He kisses me. “For being so brave.” He kisses me again. “But we can’t do this anymore.” He pulls back and looks at me. “This is wrong.”
No. I’m wrong.
He turns toward the front of the car, his movements deliberate. Shutting me out, sending me away. His fingers grip the wheel. “You should go.”
So I go.
It’s humiliating, but I go.
•••
Ella’s waiting on the hood of my car when I return. Maybe she planned to start a fight, or maybe she was going to apologize. I’ll never know, because she takes one look at my tear-streaked face and holds out her hand. “Keys.”
She is silent as she drives us home and as I slam
the car door and stomp up the apartment stairs. However, now that I’ve spent a solid twenty minutes lying facedown on the sofa, she’s apparently over it. There’s a thumping sound as she drops to the floor beside me. When I lift my wet face, there’s a strip of tape stretching from Ella’s forehead to the tip of her nose, pulling it upward like that of a pig. Ella makes a snorting sound and—even though it’s the stupidest thing in the world—I laugh. Because who does that?
She holds up a pint of strawberry ice cream and two spoons. “There’s no chocolate.”
I sit up, wipe my face, and accept one of the spoons. “I didn’t know we had any ice cream.”
“We don’t.” Ella peels off the lid and takes a scoop before handing the container to me. “But Annette does, so I’m pulling the sister card.”
I also didn’t know that such a thing as a sister card existed, but it sounds amazing. I dip a tiny spoonful and let the sweetness melt on my tongue. I’m taking a second scoop when Ella speaks again.
“I never would have told Tuck you followed him here. I just said that to get you to stay.”
I lower my spoon and look at her. “What?”
“I didn’t even think you’d take it seriously, and then when you did…” Ella sighs. “I was kind of offended that you believed me.”
“Why wouldn’t I believe you?”
“Because we were friends.” She looks at me. “We were friends,” she clarifies, accenting the word. “But I thought if you were here for the summer, maybe we would be again.”
I nod, only because I don’t know what else to do. Blackmailing me—or even pretending to—was not cool. But getting me here was.
And so is the strawberry ice cream.
“What happened with Tuck?” Ella asks me, and I tell her. She nods and boils the ten-minute pickup truck exchange down to its essence: “He likes you, but not enough.”
“Pretty much.” I take a second—and larger—spoonful. “What we did, do you count that as cheating?”
“Absolutely.” Ella sees my slump. “You wouldn’t want your boyfriend kissing other girls in his truck, would you?”