by Daryl Banner
“It’s really that bad here?”
“This campus is the pillow on the bed between two bitchy ex-lovers: the rich neighborhood full of snobs to the north, and the have-nots and gunshots to the south. Campus security is a joke, but it does exist. Remember, safety in numbers! So, we’ll leave in thirty. Hey, where’s your roomie?” she asks suddenly, craning her neck to get a look.
“Not here yet, I guess.” What the hell kind of crime-ridden so-called normal college did my father send me to down here in Texas? “School starts the day after tomorrow, so she might come in tonight, or—”
“Or not at all,” she points out. “Sometimes, there’s a last minute transfer or change of plans. My friend Lena had a room all to herself last semester.”
“Don’t get my hopes up.”
My phone buzzes. I look down to see my mother’s headshot staring up at me, all glamorous and ready to blink at the flashing cameras. I slap the screen to my chest, unwilling to chance whether or not Victoria knows who she is. I’m not ready for a firestorm to be caused by anyone figuring out whose daughter I am.
“Mommy and Daddy?”
“Something like that,” I admit, still chokeholding my phone into submission.
“You were spared the company of my parents by about five minutes. No one wants to see a black woman and a tiny Chinese man arguing.”
“Oh, you’re half-Chinese?”
The phone keeps vibrating against my chest. I continue to politely suffocate it.
“He’s my stepdad, but I call him Dad since they married when I was two. My bio dad took off.” The phone stops buzzing. She notices and offers me a wistful smile. “Looks like you’re safe for now. See you in thirty, Des.”
She disappears into her room. A green voicemail notification pops up on the screen of my phone. I swipe it out of existence and, inspired suddenly, I text Randy, my one and only friend that I kept in touch with from that creatively stifling elitist academy. He’s a deliriously gay playwright my age, who I desperately wish I could’ve brought to Texas with me. He might be the only regret I have about leaving that cruel, snobby school. I text him, asking how he’s doing and why I haven’t heard from him. Then, I stare at the screen and excitedly wait for him to answer.
I’m still waiting half an hour later when Victoria knocks on my door to go.
The walk is far less scary than she made it out to be. From the dorms, the School of Theatre is just a stroll past a large courtyard and fountain, through a tunnel over which the Art building squats, beside the University Center itself, and around the tall, glass-windowed School of Music where I imagine the corpse of my mystery roommate to be buried.
The School of Theatre is a giant red block of a building with a three-story tower jutting out from its rear like the tail of a threatened scorpion. The front is a row of glass teeth, punctuated at either end by double doors that read: Theatre, Dancing, Excellence.
As we approach the doors, for some reason I can hear the bottles of my parents’ champagne popping off at some ritzy cast party in my mind, mocking me. I hear mother’s cold words to me all over again, the ones she said when I first came home after quitting Rigby & Claudio’s: “You’re simply not ready for the stage, doll. You’ll find your spotlight someday.” I hear my father’s: “A good actor listens before she speaks. A better actor only listens.” Whatever the hell that means.
When Victoria doesn’t lead us through the front glass doors, I make an observation. “The lights are all out. Do we have to wait for a member of faculty?”
“Oh. No, honey. This isn’t a faculty-organized thing. The seniors do it at the start of every year. There will be booze. I’m fairly sure that some faculty know about it, but they pretend not to. Only certain underclassmen are allowed to attend.”
“Which underclassmen?”
She gives me a knowing smirk. “The ones that matter.”
The side door is propped open, a pool of light touching it from the parking lot. There’s a guy leaning against the wall amidst a cloud of smoke generated from that cancer stick in his fingers. Shaggy haired, skeletal, and looking like he lives under a sheet of cardboard on Bleecker street, he regards me with heavy-lidded eyes and a nod. I’m about to greet him when Victoria steers me into the side door and whispers, “That’s Arnie. He’s a prop rat, hates life, and I’m pretty sure he’s stoned out of his mind twenty-five hours a day.”
The side door empties into a small lounging area, which is entirely unoccupied. We continue to follow the light down a hallway and into what I take to be a rehearsal space, which looks like half a basketball court minus the baskets. Across the room, a pair of double doors empty into the wings of the stage.
“Wow, this is new,” she murmurs, our footsteps slapping against the hard floor as we go. “Party must be in the main auditorium.”
“Are we going to get in trouble for this?”
She answers my question with a shrug, then bursts with energy at the sight of a girlfriend, cutting across the stage to greet her and leaving me entirely on my own. The darkened wings of the stage, framed by long red curtains that hang down from the heavens, are littered with racks of unhung lights, coiled cable, and a big machine on wheels that looks like some sound system from the 90’s. Onstage, there are clusters of students chatting and laughing, only a spray of bleak white light coloring them. In the audience seating, there’s a row or two with a handful of other people kicking back and chatting. Somewhere in the aisle—though it’s hard to see with the bright light in my face—there appears to be a shirtless guy dancing, egged on by whooping friends nearby. Victoria claimed this little theatrical shindig started at eight, but from the looks of it, it started much sooner.
“You’re a new one.”
I turn toward the loose, gruff voice. Standing next to me is a short bald man with a beard and sparkling eyes. His body is stout and muscular with a belly that pulls at his green, plaid shirt. His beard, red and trimmed, sits like a rug against his pale, freckled skin.
“Hi,” I return with a smile.
“Have a beer.” He offers a second cup to me I didn’t realize he was holding. I accept it, but don’t dare take a sip. “You look too old to be a freshman.”
Quite the charmer. “Thanks.”
“Freddie,” he says, extending his free hand. I shake it and regret it immediately, his hand being wet as frog skin. “You’re an actress, obviously.”
He didn’t even ask for my name. “Obviously,” I agree, looking around for someone to rescue me.
“I’m directing a play in the black box. Goes up in November. You should totally audition for it.”
“Should I?” Where the hell did Victoria run off to?
“You’d be perfect for, like, all the parts. Every one. Even the dudes. You’re amazing.”
I step back and realize I’m a step from falling off the stage. Close call. That would be a lovely way to meet everyone: with broken limbs and a concussion.
“How old are you? Twenty-two? Twenty-three?” he asks, his words slurring.
“I’m an actress,” I answer. “I’m all the ages.”
Freddie laughs a little too hard at that. “Holy fuck, you’re funny, too!”
Out of the shadows, Victoria appears at my side, her eyes flashing brightly. “Dessie!”
Saved. “Hey there, Victoria! You, um … wanted to show me something?” I urge her, hoping she picks up what I’m putting down.
She’s smart as a whip and does. “Totally. Excuse us, Freddie.” She pulls me to the steps leading down to the seats while Freddie gives a sad, wordless moan of a goodbye.
“You ditched me,” I hiss at her.
“Sorry, hadn’t seen Marcella all summer. The bitch thinks she can take the role of Emily. She should go for the stage manager. We’re sorta stage sisters,” she explains, “doomed to audition for all the same parts.”
“Stage manager? That’s a tech position.”
“No, no. The acting part. The ‘Stage Manager’ role in the pla
y Our Town. That’s the first fall production. Catch up, Dessie!” She stretches out her arms. “Erik! Other Eric! Ellis! Stanley!” She embraces each of her friends one by one, who stand in a cluster at the end of the fifth row. “This is my hall mate Dessie,” she says for a modest introduction, then adds, “She’s from New York,” in a cocky aside.
“Hi,” I murmur, then lift the cup that Freddie had given me. “Anyone like some roofied beer?”
“Have you tried it?” Victoria asks excitedly.
“I’d rather not. As I implied, it’s probably roofied, and it smells like cat pee.”
The one she just called “Other Eric”, slender and olive-skinned, gently takes the cup from my hand. “It’s homebrewed cat pee.” With a shy smile, he adds, “It’s my homebrewed cat pee.”
“Oh.” My face flushes at once. “I’m s-sorry, Other Eric. I just panicked. That bushy orange-bearded guy gave me a drink and started the whole director’s couch thing on me and I just—”
“Freddie.” Other Eric shrugs. “He’s not a bad guy. He’s just Irish.”
“I bet this auditorium is, like, nothing compared to what you’re used to in New York,” says a girl from the floor, her jet black hair choppy and erratic, and her eyes bleeding dark eyeliner like tears.
“Actually, the theaters in New York are pretty small,” I admit. This one’s surprisingly big and almost two-tiered, an aisle dividing the back six rows of the house from the front. I guess everything is bigger in Texas; they have more space to play with than cramped-up, built-on-top-of-itself New York City.
“Smaller ones are easier to fill,” notes Other Eric. “We never sell out the house.”
Victoria grips my arm suddenly. “She studied at Rigby & Claudio’s. This chick’s been places!”
“So, you’re here for the grad program?” asks the girl from the floor.
“No. I’m a sophomore. I left that school after one year. It … It wasn’t a right fit for me.” Inspired by all the attention, I let my mouth run off. “An arts school in New York really … isn’t all that. I learned nothing I didn’t already know. All the students think they know everything.” I can’t shut up. “The professors are failed actors, bitter and blaming their failures on you. Half the time, it was me schooling them.” The resentment pours out of me like soured wine. “Claudio Vergas … is a prick.” I feel shivers up my arms, just saying that one harsh word. “And Rigby? You’d be lucky to even see him once a semester. Don’t get me started on the fools who run the dance department.”
“Please,” Victoria urges me, “get started on the fools who run the dance department.” That inspires a laugh from the others.
“It’s all so pretentious!” I go on. I’ve craved this release. My parents wouldn’t listen. I need to get this out so badly. “They make you pay so much money just to fund their own shoddy off-off-off Broadway productions—and they’re never hits. They had a whole play once where the entire set was constructed from just … chairs. Chairs stacked together to form a bed, to form a wall, to form … a bigger chair.”
“That sounds kinda cool,” murmurs goth girl from the floor.
“It wasn’t,” I assure her. “Then, during a grueling five-hour rehearsal of this weird, modernized, full-of-itself, leather-daddy rendition of Romeo & Juliet last spring, I found myself realizing—”
Then, my words catch in my throat at the sight in front of me.
From backstage emerges a man whose face catches the stage light so potently, his creamy skin glows.
I hear my own breathing in my ears, nothing else.
My heart stutters.
His killer face is carved from stone, sharp and dusted with a hint of five o’clock shadow. Even from the seats, his fuck-me eyes glisten like chips of glass.
I swallow hard.
I want to tangle my fingers in his messy brown hair, which casts a shadow down his forehead.
Then, there’s his body. Damn. His magnificent, big body. I have seen countless stunning male actors, but instantly forget all of them in the presence of him.
And I’m still trying to finish my damn sentence. “And … And I found myself realizing …”
He wears his heather-grey tee like it was hand-stitched to fit his every delicious contour, from his strong broad shoulders to his thick biceps—I can already picture him lifting me with just one arm.
“And …” I’m still trying to make words. “And I found myself …”
His jeans, light blue and torn at the knees, hang low on his hips, the sight of which guts me and sends me down a path of naughty thoughts.
“And …”
“Go on,” Victoria encourages me.
He’s standing now at the table with the beer, and the firmness of his ass is a one-man show all on its own. I want to grab it or tear his pants into shreds. He’s turning me into a damn animal.
I am never like this. I’m so ashamed of myself.
“And I found myself,” I finish. Maybe that was the sentence I was looking for all along. “You know what? I think I will try that beer.”
“Drank it,” says Eric apologetically, wiggling the empty cup.
“I planned to get one that wasn’t roofied,” I joke distractedly. “I’ll … I’ll be right back.”
I turn and walk up the steps to the stage. With each footstep, my nerves grow tighter and tighter. I don’t think I can do this. Seeing him at the table with his beer, I strongly consider changing my mind. This is so insanely out of character for me, I feel like a different person with each of my slow and slower footsteps, dragging my feet through a swamp of molasses. My thighs threaten to drop me to the stage floor in an embarrassing heap of limbs.
My sister does this so easily. She approaches the hottest guys like they should be lucky to share oxygen in her vicinity.
But this is my turn. She’s not here. I am.
One step at a time.
One breath at a time.
You’re just walking into an audition, except it’s ten billion times worse, and the casting director is the hottest guy you have ever seen. Suddenly, all I can hear are my own breaths, in and out. Then come my footsteps as I cross the stage, each slap of shoe against wood rattling my brain.
I draw so close, I bump into the table. He doesn’t seem to notice, turned away slightly and seeming to be trapped in a web of dark, bothersome thoughts. A tortured artist, I decide with a smirk. He’s a man of many mysteries. That’s okay. I’m mysterious, too.
Then I inhale, and that might be the greatest mistake of all. He smells amazing. The hint of some unnamed, mannish cologne invades my senses, its spicy subtleness intoxicating me. He smells clean and oddly comforting, like the way someone else’s home might smell—safe, inviting, yet unfamiliar.
I have to speak. I have to say something to get his attention. I can’t just be the ghost girl who lurks. I draw breath to say something, anything—and then nothing comes.
He has a cup of beer in his big, strong hand. He studies it pensively. This is your moment. No one else is around. You even have the perfect excuse: you’re new and you’re meeting people. Introduce yourself.
No better gift than right now; it’s why they call it the present.
“Hi,” I offer, using my sweetest audition voice.
He doesn’t even flinch. After too long a moment, he takes a sip of his beer, then stares into it like he’s disgusted with his own reflection. God, he looks so hot when he makes that face, scowling at absolutely nothing.
I try again. “I’m Dessie.” A beer is in my hand and I don’t even remember getting it. Its contents shake because my hands do. “I—I’m a transfer here. Second year. Are you an actor? You look like an actor.”
Still nothing. He even turns his head upstage, looking off as if something far more interesting than me caught his attention. Y’know, like a fly.
That’s when I notice the seriously sexy, dark tattoo running up the base of his thick neck, making me wonder what else he’s hiding under that tight shirt.
Then, the asshole walks away.
I watch, completely taken aback by his rudeness. It was clear as hell who I was talking to, wasn’t it? He had every opportunity to just simply tell me he wasn’t interested in getting to know me. Except, isn’t that the point of this damn Theatre mixer thing? To … mix?
“Prick,” I mutter at his back, drawing the attention of a couple girls at the other end of the table, but not from the guy to which the word was directed. I hope they didn’t hear me.
Or maybe I do. I suddenly, immediately, wholly don’t care about anything. I’ve been used to this my whole life. Cece gets told “yes” every day. My peers at Rigby & Claudio’s got all the praise while I sat back and wondered what the hell was wrong with me. I’m the outcast, the failure, the family joke.
I’m the guppy.
I abandon the stage, departing through the wing and the rehearsal room. In a matter of seconds, the School of Theatre is behind me and I’m tramping down the dark pathways back to my dorm, alone.
I don’t even know his name.
Yet there he stands in all his perfect glory.
“Hi,” I mutter stupidly.
He sees me. His eyes zero in and the world zeros out. Nothing exists but me, him, and the breath between us.
“Can you help me?” I ask him, drawing close, too close, far closer than I thought I’d dare. “I think I’m lost. I know the School of Theatre, and the School of Music, but I can’t seem to find the—”
“School of Sex?” he finishes for me, and his voice is like silk against my skin. I suppress a moan just from hearing it.
“Yeah.” I feel so confident and beautiful. “I need your help … in finding … the School of Sex.”
He licks his lips and nods knowingly. His eyes pierce me. The subtle light of whatever room we’re in barely colors his gruff, unshaven face, leaving so much of him in the mysterious dark.