Starry-Eyed

by Ted Michael

  We settle on who we were pissed at: everyone.

  The school, East Atlantic Bank, the jocks, our parents, the newspaper. And if they think they can silence us they are wrong. They can take away our stage, but they can’t silence our voices. We ARE going to razzle-dazzle this bitch. We are going to plan a guerilla theater performance, LIVE at the next school board meeting.

  I remember from the article that they meet the second and fourth Tuesday of each month. That gives us two weeks. Not a lot of time, but we are up to the task.

  . . . . .

  The first step is to recruit some musicians. Okay, the first step is to obsess about how to get Tresta on board and maybe write a part for her to sing since she still hasn’t texted me back. But the second step (maybe the hundred-and-first step, since the first step is repeated one hundred times) is to recruit some musicians.

  Alex and I settle on the plan via text over the next two days.

  ME: marching band? that would make an entrance.

  ALEX: can’t sing over marching band.

  ME: jazz band?

  ALEX: ew, i hate jazz.

  ME: guitar club?

  ALEX: bingo. let’s go recruit on monday.

  INT.—MR. ORTIZ’S ROOM, MONDAY, AFTER SCHOOL.

  We walk into Mr. Ortiz’s room, the science classroom where Guitar Club is held after school. It is a crazy cacophony of high buzz-sawing guitars and low bass note rumbles. Electric and acoustic and someone banging on a table for percussion (I guess). Mr. Ortiz is nowhere to be found.

  “Who should we ask first?” I ask Alex.

  He shrugs and turns his palms upward. I’m not sure if that means he doesn’t know who to ask or if he can’t hear what I am asking him.

  It is extremely loud. So I jump on a table and start to tap dance. Just a quick few steps. Shuffle, ball change. Shuffle, ball change.

  It gets everyone’s attention.

  The torrent of noise dribbles to a stop like a leaky faucet. Squeak. Plunk. Crunch.

  “Hello, Guitar Club,” I say in my best stage barker voice. “I, as you no doubt know, am Wax O’Donnell.”

  I do this thing where whenever I say my name: I wait for applause. I don’t mean to do it, I just do. You never know. Sometimes there might be applause. This time there is not. I continue.

  “I am here today to talk to you about some terrible news.” I wish I had the newspaper with me. Every good speech needs a prop. “The proposed school district budget includes massive cuts to the arts.”

  “For real?” says a kid named Bo Hertzman. He is a white kid with hipster glasses and dreadlocks pulled back into a black bandana.

  “For super-real,” I say in a solemn tone.

  “Is Mr. Ortiz going to get fired?” asks a kid named Martin, who apparently does not read the news.

  “No,” I offer. “Yes. Maybe. Wait: Do you want him to get fired?”

  “Why would we want Mr. Ortiz to get fired? He rules,” Martin says.

  “Okay, yeah, I mean, if you help us, it probably would help him not get fired.” Alex chimes in.

  “The point here is that we have to stick together!” I announce loudly. “We’re all in this together. Artists. Musicians. Actors. Guitar Club will get canceled like everything else. Theater will be canceled. Orchestra. Jazz Club. All of it. Canceled.”

  Bo stands up. He starts talking loudly and pointing right at me. “You never gave a shit about us for like a minute of your life, Wax. Remember when I played that song I wrote for the talent show? And I introduced it by saying that I was at a point in my life where I was either going to start writing music or kill myself? And then after I was done you said I made the wrong choice?”

  “Well, you kind of did set me up for that,” I mumble.

  “You don’t give a shit about us until you need something from us. I see how it is.”

  I am losing the crowd. Some of them start strumming their instruments again. “Do you see how it is?” I ask, my voice rising into its upper register. “This isn’t about me. This is about something much bigger. None of you will give up a few precious hours of your oh-so-busy lives to help me write a song and save the freaking arts?! What kind of world do you want to live in? That literally is the question here.”

  The only response is silence.

  “Maybe we should go ask the Jazz Club,” I whisper to Alex.

  “Ew, I told you I hate jazz,” Alex says. “Listening to jazz is like watching old people do it.”

  Then a girl named Hannah Senko stands up. “I’ll do it. Music should be used to say something. Like Dylan, you know?”

  I am not sure what Dylan Moscowitz from the stage crew has to do with anything, but I nod in agreement. Alex is not so sure.

  “We’re not looking for like, peace, love, and hand-holding,” he says. “We’re looking to stir things up. We need some energy!”

  “You think I don’t have any energy?” Hannah mumbles. I try hard not to laugh, because she’s like . . . well, picture a stoned and very sleepy bulldog yawning and being like, “You think I don’t have any energy?”

  Then she jumps up and throws her acoustic guitar into its case. She grabs an electric instead and cranks the volume up and starts wailing!

  She starts shaking her hair, and it turns her head into a ball of fire. The music is amazing! I get chills and I don’t get chills easily.

  “Ladies and gentlemen: We have our guitarist,” Alex says. “The rest of you can pluck yourselves.”

  . . . . .

  So I spend my after-school hours every day now in Hannah Senko’s wood-paneled basement. The song is coming together okay. She has these little battery-powered amps that you can wear on your belt which blast at surprisingly loud volume. Alex and I plug our microphones into ours, and she plugs in her guitar. The song is a little weird but sort of awesome.

  It turns out that Hannah wasn’t talking about Dylan Moscowitz from stage crew, but rather Bob Dylan, the songwriter. She played us some of his old songs—I like “Positively 4th Street” best because it is so freaking bitter. Fits my mood. I like how it accuses some unnamed “you” of all sorts of shit.

  We keep the same structure but pen some lyrics all our own.

  ALEX: You say the money’s gone.

  ME: You say your hands are tied.

  BOTH: We say it’s all a con—a big fat lieeee.

  ALEX: I’m talking to you, Walter Peters.

  ME: Save our theaters, Mr. Peters!

  BOTH: Save our theaters!

  It’s a happy coincidence that the school board president is named Walt Peters so we pretty much ride that rhyme as far as we can. I’m not saying we’re Dylan (either one), but it is catchy. And at least I can carry a tune.

  We practice it over and over again. Theater kids can work harder than anyone. Putting on a show is no small feat. It takes hours. Days. Months. Blood and sweat and jazz hands. We’ve learned discipline. Devotion. We’ve learned to work hard. No: We have to work hard. It’s what we do.

  Hannah works hard too. She never seems to tire of playing the song day after day as the big show approaches. I mean: school board meeting. It is hard not to think of it as a show. My stomach gets the same amped up feeling it does leading up to opening night. It never seems like it’s going to come together, but somehow it always does.

  Which is why just a few days before the big show, I am shocked when Alex says, “No offense you guys. Obviously we’re great. But the song is, I don’t know . . . lacking something?”

  “Lacking what?” Hannah looks genuinely shocked, her big eyes growing wider.

  “I don’t know,” Alex says. “I can’t put my finger on it. It’s just like, something that isn’t there, you know?”

  We sit quietly for a minute. The truth hurts the most when it’s most true. The song is lacking something.

  “I know what it needs,” I say. And I do. Suddenly it’s clear, a blazing spotlight in my brain. “And no offense, Alex. But what it needs is star power. Hollywood star power.�
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  “You have an idea as to how to land a Hollywood star to help us perform at the school board meeting?” Hannah says.

  “Yup,” I say. “Yup, I do.”

  And I swear to you that this has nothing with a desire to talk to Tresta even though it has been DAYS since our date and she still hasn’t texted me back. It only has to do with my altruistic desire to save our theater.

  “The person we need,” I say, “is Javon Harris.”

  “You know him?” Hannah asks.

  “I, uh, I know someone who knows him, uh, pretty well . . . ”

  “Well, call him up—”

  “Who is it that you know that is BFF with Javon freaking Harris and why have you never told me about this?” Alex interrupts, looking shocked.

  “Dude. It’s Tresta.”

  “Who is Tresta?” Hannah asks.

  “I thought you said you guys were done,” Alex says.

  “She hasn’t texted me back in a while. But desperate times call for desperate measures. Let’s go.”

  . . . . .

  The three of us pile into Alex’s Audi and drive purposefully downtown. I am not quite sure why Hannah is with us, other than we are like a band now and thus have to do everything together.

  She sits in the back and jabbers enthusiastically about how awesome it would be to have Javon Harris show up at our school board meeting. Alex agrees. It would make a dramatic third act to this melodrama, the surprise happy ending every good show needs.

  I am getting psyched too, listening to her talk. Though of course it is the longest of shots. For all I know, Tresta was kidding when she said he was back in town. He could be in Los Angeles, sunning himself on the beach or napping on a pile of money. For all I know, Tresta isn’t even talking to me anymore and we won’t even get to ask him.

  “You guys stay in the car,” I say as Alex circles the block trying to find a parking spot. “This probably won’t be long anyway.”

  I walk up to the door, take a deep breath, and knock. No response. I hear some shuffling behind the door. Is she ignoring me?

  Then the door opens!

  “What on earth are you doing, Wax O’Donnell?” Tresta says. She is wearing hot pink yoga pants, a boy band T-shirt, and a bandana tied tight around her head. I think it’s safe to say she wasn’t expecting guests. She’s smiling though, a huge, toothy smile.

  “Tresta!” I sing.

  “Make it quick,” she says. “I’m grounded. My mom is at the store. If she comes back and seems your skinny ass on the step, I won’t see the sun for a year.”

  “You’re grounded? Why?”

  “Somebody got me home past curfew.”

  “We were in before twelve!”

  “Yeah, well, my curfew is eleven. My mom is strict as hell.”

  “You never told me to bring you home by eleven,” I say. She smiles. Oh, the smile. I am confused for a minute. Then I do the math. “Aw, you knew you’d be home after curfew, but you didn’t want to stop hanging out with me. You broke curfew for me!”

  She smiles again. “Yeah, and a lot of good it did me too. Mom took my phone. That’s why I haven’t texted you or anybody. It’s been hell. She grounded my ass. And you heard they’re cutting art and music and theater?”

  “Yeah, I heard. That’s actually why I’m here. And I mean, also just to see those beautiful eyes.”

  She smiles again. I smile. We’re just standing there smiling.

  Then I hear a quick double-honk. Alex gives me a hand gesture telling me to hurry up. They are just a few feet away, close enough to hear and, unfortunately, talk to us.

  “Who is in the car?” Tresta says.

  “Alex. I told you about him before.”

  “And who else?”

  “Oh, that’s Hannah. She plays guitar,” I say. Hannah waves.

  “I don’t text you back and all of a sudden you’re hanging out with some other girl? Don’t tell me she’s with Alex. I know he’s your gay friend.”

  “I’m so much more than the gay friend,” Alex says with a wave. “Seriously.”

  “I just play guitar,” Hannah says, leaning out the window.

  “Yeah, well that better be all you do.”

  Hannah rolls her eyes. I like this!

  “So why all you all here again?” Tresta says.

  “Here’s the thing,” I say. “We’re going to protest at the school board meeting on Tuesday. Guerilla theater! Hannah is going to play guitar, and we were going to ask you to sing. . . .” (I am hoping here that Alex and Hannah would just roll with it.) “But since you’re grounded, we’re wondering if maybe you could see if maybe Javon was in town. He’s a graduate of this theater program too. Maybe he could . . .”

  “Shit!” Tresta says. “I think I just saw my mom’s car up the street. She must be looking for parking. I gotta get inside! Text Javon, tell him I gave you the number!”

  She shouts out Javon’s number and slams the door. Gone again.

  I keep repeating the number out loud, over and over, so I won’t forget it. A little voice in my head is like “Hey, why does she still have his number memorized?” I try to drown that voice out. I don’t want to forget the number.

  . . . . .

  I scramble into the car and duck down so Tresta’s mom can’t see me. I hunch low in the passenger seat like a felon fleeing the police. All the while I’m saying the number over and over again, staring up at the ceiling. I feel the car pull away from the curb. I am trying to make a plan—what do we say when we text Javon? Then I hear Alex start to talk.

  “Hi, Javon Harris,” Alex is saying into his phone in a singsong voice.

  “Dude!” I say. Alex shushes me.

  “You don’t know me but I’m a friend of Tresta’s. Friend-of-a-friend really. Anyway, she gave me your number. Don’t worry, I won’t share it with TMZ or anything. . . . I’m just calling to see if you happen to still be back in your old hometown this Tuesday. We’re doing a protest to save the theater department and would just love you to come. Call or text me back. Okay, thanks. Love you. Bye.”

  “What the hell?” I say.

  Alex has a huge smile on his face. “Well, not like literal love. It’s just a Hollywood thing to say. Everyone knows that.”

  “I can’t believe you just called him,” Hannah says from the back.

  “Ain’t nothing to it but to do it,” Alex says. “Now we just wait.” He drums on the steering wheel with his thumbs. His phone chirps loudly. He ignores both the law and common sense wisdom against reading a text while driving and checks his phone. “Dude!” I jump up and grab the phone.

  I read the text. It does indeed appear to be from Javon! It takes a bit of time to decipher the rapper lingo, but it appears to read upon being translated to regular English: “Tresta is a great girl. I happily accept your invitation. Please instruct me via text message as to what time and location to arrive and you have my word that I shall attend.”

  Alex pulls the car over. The three of us sit in stunned silence until Hannah speaks.

  “I can’t believe that worked.”

  “Me neither,” Alex and I say in unison.

  He grabs the phone back and starts texting furiously.

  In just a few seconds Javon texts back.

  “He’s in,” Alex says. “He’s in.”

  . . . . .

  The day of the big school board meeting is finally here. It’s a Tuesday, hardly a good time for a show. These people know nothing about theatrics. They are about to learn.

  Alex picks me up, and swings by Hannah’s house. She’s pacing on the street out front, her guitar and amps sitting on the curb. As soon as she sees the car, she sprints toward us so fast that her ball of red hair shoots out behind her, waving like a flag in the wind. She leaps in, throwing her guitar and a crate with our microphones and amps in beside her.

  “Slow your roll, Senko,” I say. “We don’t go on for like an hour.”

  “I know. I’m just excited! Weeeee!” She literally
says weeeee. I try not to judge. Preshow jitters do different things to different people.

  “You have everything we need?” Alex asks.

  She points to the guitar and the crate o’ gear. “Now we just hope Javon shows up.”

  After that, no one says anything. We don’t talk about the plan anymore. We don’t practice the song anymore. We just sit quietly, almost meditatively.

  When we finally reach the nondescript school district administrative building on the east side of town, Alex parks the car and says two words.

  “It’s showtime.”

  . . . . .

  We have to be a little sneaky about our presence. These meetings are open to the public, so we have every right to be here. There is a part at the beginning where anyone who wants to can sign up to speak. So we signed up. Only, of course, no one is expecting microphones and rock guitars.

  The plan is for Alex, who really looks the part of the clean-cut-all-American boy when he wants to, to wait in line for his turn to speak. A minute before it’s his turn, he’ll text me. This will alert me, Javon, and Hannah—waiting backstage—to burst out, guitars-a-blazing.

  The only problem is that Javon Harris is nowhere to be seen. We are hanging out in the parking lot, watching people arrive, trying to be relaxed. It’s easy for Alex—he is one of those guys who gets just super cool and icy before a show. He turns his big eyes to me and says, “It’s fine. He said he’ll be here so we have every reason to believe that he’ll be here.”

  I wish I could share his confidence. We wait. I pace. Hannah paces. Alex stays cool.

  “Well, could you at least just text him to see if he’s coming?” I say.

  “Don’t you think I thought of that?” he hisses. His eyes bug out huge for half a second; his face flashes panic. Maybe he’s not as confident as I thought. “I’ve texted him like a million times. No response.”

  “Dude,” I start to say, then I hear a guy yell to some other guy hustling across the parking lot. “Gavel comes down in two minutes. Get in here, Walt!” He laughs. Walt Peters. He opens the door and closes it behind him. It thuds like the end of a sentence.

  Alex follows Walt, and we follow Alex. Alex takes his place in the auditorium while we wait down the hall. I peek into the auditorium. Rows of dark chairs face the stage. On the stage are seven seats—one for each member of the school board. Behind them are more American flags than could possibly be necessary. I watch as the school board members assemble, like an Avengers of evil. I see Walt Peters, that bastard. My heart is pounding in the region of my shoes. Where is Javon? I text Alex: still no javon.