“I don’t know. She thinks someone did,” Zara says, keeping her voice low.
“No one’s going to hear us,” Eli says with certainty. “The employees just want to shelve things.”
“What about the customers?” Zara asks, eyeing a clutch of hipsters with slouchy hats.
“Nope.” Eli inches her voice louder to prove her point. “Too busy with their own problems. That’s one of the good things about living here. Nobody cares.”
“That’s good?” Zara asks.
“Look,” Eli says, not able to deal with this particular brand of innocence right now. “Sometimes caring gets in the way. My parents cared so much that they couldn’t let me pick out my own shoes when I was sixteen. They love me. But they think that means getting to have a say in everything. Like dating. Let me give you a hint: girls were not their first choice.”
Zara looks sorry for her, and Eli doesn’t want that.
“They got used to it,” she says. “And even if they hadn’t, I would date whoever I want.” Well — that last part’s not really true, because if it was, she’d be with Zara by now, standing four steps closer, hands in a borderline inappropriate place. Eli forces herself back to the original topic. “We can shout about two deaths in a cursed theater, and it won’t be the weirdest conversation I’ve heard in Manhattan this week. It won’t even rank.”
“Really?” Zara’s eyes go luminous with interest. “I want to know the other things you heard.”
Either that husky glory is Zara’s flirting voice or Eli has completely lost her grip. It’s true that Zara has been standing closer than she used to, sometimes so close that Eli can feel every micromovement of her body. And yes, there’s been a certain amount of hand touching. But girls touch each other all the time. Girls have intense friendships that have nothing to do with wanting to tear each other’s clothes off.
“Tell me about Enna,” Eli says, hoping that last thought didn’t leave a mark on her voice.
Zara gives Eli the facts about the dressing room, shares her grainy cell-phone photos, and explains the Gertrude line. Eli stacks it on top of what she knows about Roscoe. Two deaths. An accident and an overdose.
“They found alcohol in Enna’s system,” Eli says. “Drugs, too.”
“Yeah,” Zara says. “I know.”
“So you don’t think she just drank the drinks and popped the pills and then got a little . . . dramatic with the walls?”
“Enna told me she didn’t drink anymore,” Zara says. “Or do drugs.”
“A fact that nobody has ever lied about in all of history,” Eli deadpans. Her thoughts swerve in a new direction. She starts to walk, because all of a sudden she can’t stand still. Book spines flash as she goes up one narrow aisle and down another. “What about that article you gave me?” she asks. “Kestrel’s theory? The curse?”
“You believe in that?” Zara asks.
“When you call something a curse, it takes on a life of its own,” Eli says. “Broken bones, accidents, backstage fights, these happen at theaters. Besides, it can go both ways, right? What if someone is using the curse, the idea of it, to cover up normal murders?” Eli looks back at Zara, who doesn’t even bother to hide her disbelief: it explodes from her expression. “It sounds like something theater people would do,” Eli adds. “Smoke and glitter to distract from the nitty-gritty of a set change. It’s like when the stage door was left open. The police called Roscoe’s death an accident, but what if they hadn’t? That door changes the story. If it’s locked, Roscoe could only have been pushed by someone in the theater. If it’s unlocked, it could have been anyone in Midtown.”
Without meaning to, Eli has led them straight to the theater section. Next to Ibsen and Chekhov is a shrine to Echo and Ariston. There are face-out copies of five different translations.
Eli picks one up and ruffles the pages. “No escaping it, I guess.”
“It’s still safe to be at the Aurelia, right?” Zara asks quickly, looking at Eli like she’s qualified to give this answer. To save her from leaving. Eli doesn’t say anything right away, and when Zara grimaces, Eli has to push down the desire to reach out and smooth away that pained look.
“Of course,” Eli says extra softly to make up for the too-long pause. “We’ll keep each other safe.”
Zara gives her one of those wild stares, like she did at the read-through. The one that gave Eli hope. She puts down the copy of Echo and Ariston and heads out of the bookstore into the holiday-drunk night.
Eli loves it: the whole bright season. In her family, Christmas isn’t really a day. It’s six weeks of presents and food stretching from Thanksgiving to Three Kings Day. Leopold stormed all over the best part of the year with his production schedule and didn’t even apologize, like nothing could possibly be as important as his play. At least Eli has a little tree in her apartment and she has lights everywhere and it feels like Christmas. She glances at Zara. “Does this Christmas stuff bother you?”
“I’m used to it,” Zara says, but it feels like an automatic answer. Then she slows her pace and presses her lips together, really thinking about it. “I guess it still makes me feel . . . lonely. That’s not the right word. There are millions of people around. But that’s how it feels.”
Eli looked up the dates for Chanukah a while ago. Now she stops in the middle of Union Square, right there on the bench-lined walkway, and even though the timing is less than ideal, she reaches into the silky lining of her deep coat pockets. One hand stays down there. The other pulls out a little box wrapped in silver paper. It looks like a tiny moon, sitting between them.
Zara takes it, looking straight down at the box. Like it will disappear if she looks away.
She pulls up the tape, eases the box open. Eli is nervous — she has no idea what Zara will think. If she’ll act like it’s strange that Eli got her a present in the first place. Zara lifts out a leather cord with a key hanging on the end. Eli found the key at a secondhand store in a cut-glass bowl. She probably could have stolen one from the Aurelia’s prop storage, but it wasn’t worth risking Barrett’s creepiness. Besides, she likes that she had to go out into the world and find it. She likes the way it looks sitting in Zara’s palm. Weathered, like it had to travel a long way before it found her.
“For your imaginary locks,” Eli says.
Zara stares up at Eli. Like she might disappear if Zara stops looking. “No one’s ever gotten me something like this.”
“Well, good,” Eli says. “Because you’re about to get seven more somethings exactly like it.” She has the rest of the keys in her bag. She’s been carrying them around for days, clinking as she walks, a reminder of the feelings she can’t seem to get rid of.
She hands them all over, because she just can’t wait.
Zara sits down on a bench to string the keys. She ties the cord around her neck. Eli wants to ask if she can help, but she keeps her words and her hands and her feelings to herself. If this is something Zara wants, she’ll have to make the first move. Possibly all the moves. Eli just stopped feeling alone for the first time since Roscoe died. She needs a friend, not another hopeless love story.
“What do we do now?” Zara asks, looking up at her, eyes gone golden in the streetlights. The eight keys slide into each other and tug the necklace down, chiming softly. It settles against the soft valley of skin at the opened top button of Zara’s pale-blue sweater.
Eli swallows hard. “We keep our eyes open.”
Zara expects Leopold’s office to feel like Leopold does — intense and claustrophobic — but it’s a blank room in the administrative portion of the building, one floor up from the studios. Zara takes a quick inventory. A long metal desk, a few skeletal chairs, an assortment of show posters. Macbeth, West Side Story, Arsenic and Old Lace.
The stage manager sent an e-mail telling Zara that she was called for a private meeting with the director — which sounded strange until Zara remembered that she agreed to it. She can’t remember why. Probably because Leopold was
touching her knee and saying yes to whatever he asked for was the quickest way to make him stop.
She gets up and paces, reaching for the keys around her neck. She hasn’t taken them off since Eli gave them to her. Not to sleep. Not even to shower. She had stood bare-skinned this morning, warming up slowly. Thoughts of Roscoe and Enna dissolved into the steam, replaced by much more welcome thoughts of Eli. She had touched the keys, playing her fingers back and forth between the circles, tugging at the teeth. Then one of her hands followed the path of the water — down, down.
Zara can’t think about that now.
Not in Leopold’s office.
Even though Leopold is missing. Maybe he’s caught in a vision. Not for the first time, Zara wonders what he sees. Has he changed his mind about her? Will her Echo ever be good enough? Back when he was just a voice in her ear, she asked about the visions. Now she knows better. Zara Evans doesn’t get to ask Leopold Henneman questions.
That’s not how it works.
She checks the little square of glass in the door. No one’s coming down the hall from either direction. She takes the seat behind Leopold’s desk — where he sits when he’s alone, thinking about the play. There’s a buzz in Zara’s skin. A blankness in her brain.
Zara knows this is a major trespass. But Leopold is always the one telling her to push the boundaries. To be less polite. To follow her instincts. She wants to prove that she’s safe here. She pulls the loose metal handle of a desk drawer. The whole tray slides out eagerly.
There is a gun inside.
Zara moves back quickly. She doesn’t take her eyes off the gun. It looks heavy, the metal as dark as the moment before sleep.
Zara slows down her breathing and pulls the rest of the handles until the desk bristles with open drawers. Most hold paperwork, office supplies. The deep filing drawer at the bottom is filled with knives.
Zara picks one up. It’s strangely light. She puts a finger to the blade, expecting pain, and feels only plastic. Zara presses the blade slowly against the skin of her arm. The shiny plastic clicks slightly and disappears — not into her arm but back into the hilt of the weapon.
It’s a prop.
It can’t be for Echo and Ariston, though. Wrong time period. Leopold must be looking at props for his next production.
Zara flips open the calendar on top of Leopold’s desk to see what show he’s doing next. December is crowded with Echo and Ariston — tech, gala, previews. When they open on the twenty-ninth, Leopold can leave the Aurelia and start rehearsing a new show. January stares up at Zara, perfectly white, completely blank.
So do the months after it.
Zara hears someone coming down the hallway. She flips back the calendar and quietly slides back the drawers.
Leopold strides in, snow still clinging to him from the bitter world outside. “My dear.” He gives her a hug, which lasts longer than she expects, and she melts into it a little bit. Leopold gives off a sense of calm that Zara hasn’t felt in weeks. There’s been an anxious buzz around the director for too long, like a swarm of flies.
This is a moment of relief she didn’t even know she needed.
Leopold sits down at his desk. Zara hopes he can’t feel her imprint on his chair. Her warmth, lingering.
“I think it’s time that we talked openly about the challenges of this production,” Leopold says. “Two of our company have died, swiftly and unexpectedly.” Zara sighs, and tension drops from a hundred small places in her body where she’s been holding it tight. She’s thankful that Leopold mentioned Roscoe and Enna. The silence around the deaths has started to feel like a bruise. A tender spot that no one wants to touch.
“I’m not blind to how difficult things are at the moment,” Leopold says. “And if you ever need someone to talk to, please remember that I am here. Come straight to me if you need anything.”
Zara nods, but she can’t help thinking:
She didn’t go straight to him.
She went straight to Eli.
Leopold stands up and paces, even though the room is tiny. “Despite these difficulties, you and I still have a love story to tell.”
“What about Adrian?” Zara asks. His absence feels strange all of a sudden. It’s true that he breezes in and out of rehearsals, that Zara barely sees him except when they’re face-to-face in a scene, because the whole production schedule has been designed around his movie star needs. But if they’re talking about Echo and Ariston in love, shouldn’t he be here now?
Leopold gives her a knowing head tilt. “Adrian Ward is here for his pretty face and his ability to pull in ticket sales.”
Zara blinks, startled. She didn’t think Leopold would be so blunt about it.
What does he say about Zara when she’s not in the room?
Leopold stops right in front of her, demanding Zara’s full attention, but the all-knowing director is gone. His expression is stripped of the usual charm. Leopold looks almost — nervous. “I want you to know that I am sorry if there have been moments when I’ve made things difficult for you, if I’ve been less than perfect in my role.”
“No,” Zara says. The words rush out of her without any real thought. “You’re just doing your job.”
“This play must be perfect, above anything else I have done,” Leopold says. “I’m sure you understand that feeling.” Zara does. This is her one chance to be Echo. Every other thought she’s had recently scatters like leaves before a strong wind. “So how do you and I tell the world’s greatest love story when you have never been in love?”
Zara feels the storm hit.
She doesn’t answer — what answer can she give? That she was afraid he would notice? That she has fallen in love, but Meg told her to forget it because Leopold wouldn’t approve?
Zara made a promise. No distractions. She can’t tell him that she’s already broken it. That she plans to keep breaking it.
“I’ve never been in love,” Zara says woodenly. “It’s true.”
Leopold smiles, clearly pleased that he was right. The delight rises off him in waves. “You have nothing to draw on, which puts a stranglehold on your performance.” He sets a hand on her shoulder, and it’s heavy there, keeping her in place. “We will have to do something to help you find those feelings.” He draws a circle around her with his steps. “I want you to close your eyes.”
Zara does as she’s told.
He’s here to direct her. She’s here to act.
But she won’t tell him about Eli. There’s nothing to tell. They haven’t kissed. They’ve barely touched.
“Imagine that you are perfectly in love.” Zara’s mind stays blank. She’s afraid to even think of Eli. “Imagine that you have known another body stacked on top of yours. Bearing down. Heat. Pressure. Imagine that you have no breath, and the words fight to come out of you.”
Leopold moves behind her. His breath is warm, stirring the fine hair at the base of her neck. “Imagine that you are holding nothing back.” She can feel his fingertips creeping onto her waist. His lips close to her ear.
She can feel a tremble, and it’s fear, but she’s not sure where it’s coming from.
How much she wants Eli?
How little she wants Leopold to find out?
The little fact that she just lied to him, and she’s afraid he can tell?
His hands on her waist?
Zara breathes and tells herself a story. She is safe. She is calm. She is in love. Nothing can touch her.
Leopold steps away and claps, a private little applause session. Zara opens her eyes to see him smiling broadly. “Zara. This is great work you’ve done here. Can you feel it?”
It’s a good thing that she’s gotten so much practice lately, because the lie slips out, unrehearsed. “Yes.”
She tells herself that she can handle this — she can like Eli this much and keep it to herself. She can deal with the pressure of being a professional actress. She can banish her strange fears. She can be the perfect Echo. She can keep Leopold happy.
She tells herself that everything is going to be fine. Better than fine.
Beautiful.
The cue-to-cue is killing Adrian. Standing onstage for hours, not even acting, while the designers run around and make tiny changes? It’s a waste of his time.
“Hold!” the stage manager yells, and the actors freeze. Zara’s hands are stuck to his chest.
The designers run around while the actors stay in place. “Why does it take so long for them to fix every single thing?” Adrian asks.
Zara’s eyes flick around. Talking is against the rules. (But the rules are different for Adrian, and everybody knows it.) “This is the only time the designers have to make their ideas work,” Zara whispers. “We had six weeks.” She looks up at the lighting booth and then back at Adrian.
He nods like he gets it, but secretly he can’t figure out why Zara would side with the crew.
Down in the orchestra pit, Leopold is talking to Barrett, the oil slick of a props guy. “That can’t possibly be the right sword.” Adrian waits for Leopold to rip into him, but Barrett just rolls his eyes and spends twenty minutes finding another rapier.
“See, he gives that guy special treatment,” Adrian whispers to the top of Zara’s head. “I mean, have you ever seen Barrett do something right? He’s terrible with the props. Plus I heard him talking about one of his hookups in the dressing room the other day. It was bad, Z. Really bad. A page out of the creeper manual.”
Zara makes a yes-Barrett-is-disgusting face.
Leopold turns away from the props master, and Adrian tries to catch his attention from across the room. But the director just keeps moving, looking for someone other than him.
Lately, Adrian has been feeling a little overlooked. (And that’s not a feeling he’s used to.) He shows up, does his scenes, leaves. He’s not really part of what’s happening at the Aurelia.
Echo After Echo Page 12