Only in the Movies

by William Bell

  “What?” I asked, waiting for the punchline.

  “What happens when you’re standing in a hole and you keep digging?”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  A COVERED FLAGSTONE SIDEWALK connected the academic block to the big glass doors of York’s Nelson Makeba Building, where drama classes were held in the two studios built for them and performances were put on in either the Carnaby Theatre or the Carnaby Auditorium, depending on the size of the production. I had a key to the service door at the back because I worked on the sets. The key was functional when the security system was disabled for the school day, from 8 a.m. until 6 p.m.

  Vanni and I slipped into the backstage area of the theatre a few minutes after Alba and Chad’s rehearsal was scheduled to begin. For the balcony scene, Panofsky had designed a simple set. Following his directions, I had constructed a stand-alone balcony—really a rectangular platform on a scaffold—that could be wheeled into place in front of a canvas backdrop. The wheels were then locked to keep the structure secure. Eventually the backdrop would be painted and lit to resemble the wall of the Capulet mansion. More canvas sheathed the framing that held up the balcony. The backdrop had an opening to form the door to Juliet’s “bedroom,” in reality a staircase with a small landing on top. This gave Juliet a place to stand until she stepped through the double doors onto the balcony. The staircase also had lockable wheels. On either side of the backdrop and a pace downstage was a “leg” made of framed canvas screen. The legs would also be painted and, when properly illuminated with stage lights, would become the tall shrubbery in the Capulet garden.

  As Vanni and I crept into the wings stage left, we heard Alba speaking. The rehearsal had begun.

  “… and Juliet is the sun! Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon …”

  Vanni whispered, “Romeo’s lines sound strange in Alba’s voice.”

  “They’re taking each other’s parts, remember,” I replied.

  “As long as they don’t mix them up during the performance.”

  I peeked around the leg. Alba looked casually beautiful in roomy woollen slacks and a bulky knit cardigan over a plain blouse, her hair loose on her shoulders. She stood on the taped X marking her spot, downstage left from the balcony and next to the leg. She would be able to hear me easily. Chad was up on the balcony, hands on the railing, leaning out, pretending to peer into the night.

  Alba continued:

  The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars

  As daylight doth a lamp; her eyes in heaven

  Would through the airy region stream so bright

  That birds would sing and think it were not night.

  “She’s really good, isn’t she?” I said to Vanni.

  And she was. Even after only a few lines it was obvious that Alba had gallons of talent. In her mouth the words came alive. She gave every phrase an emotional charge that convinced you she was Romeo, deeply in love with Juliet.

  See how she leans her cheek upon her hand!

  O, that I were a glove upon that hand,

  That I might touch that cheek!

  Then came Chad’s voice, like a muddy boot stomping a bed of flowers: “Aye me! ”

  “She speaks,” Alba said. I thought of a mad scientist in a monster movie who can’t quite believe that the creature he sewed together out of stolen body parts is really alive. “O, speak again, bright angel—”

  And that’s when I laughed.

  It wasn’t my fault. I was watching Chad up there on the balcony. When Alba said “bright angel,” he was picking his nose. He was pretending to scratch it, and he probably thought Alba wouldn’t notice in the dim light, but his baby finger was knuckle deep.

  I felt a sharp punch on my shoulder from behind. “Stop it!” Vanni hissed.

  “What did you say?” Chad called from above, breaking character. “I don’t remember that part.”

  Alba covered quickly. “Give me a second, Chad. I forgot my next line.”

  Vanni practically leapt into the wings behind a “tormentor” curtain just as Alba stuck her head around the leg.

  “Oh, good, you’re here,” she said in a low voice. “Why did you laugh?”

  “Sorry. Er, no reason, really.”

  “Well, you turned up. That’s the main thing. Are you ready?”

  “Um, sure,” I replied, automatically glancing at the two shoes visible below the tormentor. I quickly looked away.

  “Let me get through the scene first,” Alba said, all business. “I’ll cough when I want you to feed me my lines. And,” she added, giving me a dazzling, knee-weakening smile, “thanks for coming.”

  “You’re welcome. And, Alba,” I said as she was turning away.

  “Yes?”

  “You’re really good, really convincing when you act.”

  “Thanks. But I wish I had your gift for words. I’m only good at saying someone else’s.”

  She returned to her X on the stage. “Sorry,” she said to Chad, projecting her voice once again. “I’m ready now. Let’s take it from ‘Aye me.’”

  “Aye me,” Chad repeated, the way you’d say “Get out of my way.”

  I felt Vanni step up behind me as Alba picked up the scene and repeated her lines: “She speaks. O, speak again, bright angel! …”

  “When do we make our contribution to this farce?” Vanni whispered.

  “I don’t know. She said she’d cough when she’s ready.”

  We stood behind the leg, listening. Soon Chad thundered the famous lines:

  O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo?

  Deny thy father and refuse thy name!

  Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,

  And I’ll no longer be a Capulet.

  He delivered the lines as if he was at a baseball game, yelling down the bleachers for a hot dog. Behind me I heard Vanni struggling to control her laughter. At this point in the scene, Chad/Juliet had most of the lines, and he plowed through them with determination, as if slogging through deep snow. Panofsky must have had a reason, besides Chad’s good looks, for choosing him over the half-dozen other guys who had auditioned for the part, but if Chad had even a molecule of talent, he certainly wasn’t showing it.

  And then I realized why he sounded so awkward and unconvincing. He was embarrassed speaking a girl’s lines, especially in a romantic scene. Alba was brilliant, even though she was—for today, at least—Romeo. The poetry was moving and emotional. Chad felt foolish, so he didn’t try. Which meant Alba was the true professional.

  “O, wilt thou leave me so unsatisfied? ” Alba/Romeo asked plaintively.

  “Come on up here, baby, and I’ll give you all the satisfaction you need,” Chad laughed. “You’ll be so satisfied you’ll never look at another man for the rest of your—”

  But Alba cut in, remaining in character, and dragged Chad back into the scene. They went on. Vanni shuffled her feet restlessly.

  Then Chad/Juliet intoned, “Good night, good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow, that I shall say good night till it be morrow.”

  “Get ready,” Vanni whispered at my back as Alba/Romeo wound up the scene.

  “Okay!” came Chad’s voice from the other side of the leg. “We’re done. Now I can get off this stupid bal—”

  “Chad, would you mind staying up there for a moment?” Alba said sweetly.

  And she coughed.

  I felt Vanni’s hand on my shoulder and her breath light on my ear as she spoke softly.

  “Chad, it was easy for me to say my lines today …”

  Vanni paused. I spoke through the unpainted canvas to Alba, then heard her repeat, “Chad, it was easy for me to say my lines today.”

  Then the voice at my ear: “Because I meant every word.”

  The sentence went from me, to Alba, to Chad.

  “You meant every word?” he asked. “I don’t get it.”

  Then, “I feel the same about you as Juliet does about Romeo,” Vanni whispered.

  “I feel the s
ame about you as Juliet does about Romeo,” I said to the canvas as if the words came from my own heart.

  “I feel the same about you as Juliet does about Romeo.” It all sounded sweeter somehow, coming from Alba.

  “But you were saying Romeo’s lines,” Chad replied.

  “What a bonehead!” from Vanni.

  “What a bonehead!” from me.

  Alba said, “What a—” and stopped herself with another cough.

  “Ow!” I blurted when Vanni twisted my ear.

  “But it doesn’t matter, Chad, don’t you see?” Vanni slipped back into form and the murmured relay system took up again. “Whatever love Romeo feels for Juliet, or Juliet for Romeo, is equalled by my feelings for you.”

  “Oh,” Chad said in wonder after a second or two. “You mean it?”

  “And whenever I say Shakespeare’s words, no matter whose part I’m playing, it’s as if I’m singing a love song I wrote myself—for you. Chad, do you understand? I … I’m in love with you!”

  “Wow! Holy Jeeze,” Chad replied. Then, after a beat. “Can I come down now?”

  Vanni dashed behind the tormentor just as Alba came round the leg.

  “You’d better go!” Alba gushed. “I think it worked. Oh, thank you, Jake!”

  “That’s okay.”

  “I think I can take it from here,” she said. “Wish me luck!”

  I felt her hand in the small of my back as she shoved me toward the wings. I hope he trips on my stairs on his way down from my balcony and breaks his neck! I muttered. With unwanted images of Chad and Alba embracing and kissing behind my back, I grabbed Vanni by the arm.

  “Come on,” I said. “I need a coffee.”

  “Come on,” she repeated, mimicking Alba’s voice. “I need a coffee.”

  “Oh, shut up,” I snapped.

  “Oh, shut up.”

  We barged through the stage door and out into the rain, Vanni’s laughter banging around inside my head, with my own inner voice shouting, “Fool! Idiot! Loser!”

  Now what was I supposed to do?

  Over the next couple of weeks, as late autumn faded into early winter, I asked myself that question a thousand times. I was like those idiots in the jokes and clichés. I had painted myself into a corner, sawed off the tree limb I was sitting on, shot myself in the foot, given myself enough rope to hang myself. The girl I loved had taken herself away from me, and I had helped her do it.

  Alba and Chad became an item. One was hardly ever seen without the other. They held hands in the halls, nuzzled in the cafeteria, ogled each other across classrooms. Their enactment of the excerpt from Romeo and Juliet was a huge success. As a member of the stage crew, I had to be there for all three shows. Alba put in brilliant performances, and I had to admit Chad was good too. It was more than symbolic that during each production, Alba stood on the balcony I had built while Chad spoke words of love to her from the “garden” formed by the legs I had framed.

  Vanni had been wrong about one thing. I hadn’t kidded myself that Alba would eventually see the error she had made in falling for Chad and realize she had loved me all along. Alba had never loved me. So why had I helped her? Because I was a pathetic loser who allowed himself to be used? I knew that was how it looked to Vanni. I was painfully aware I had made myself ridiculous.

  But what else could I have done? I loved Alba; I wanted her to be happy. And that, for her, meant being with someone else. Wasn’t love supposed to be generous and giving? Unselfish? Vanni had said that love was the opposite, but I didn’t agree. When I saw Alba and Chad together I shrivelled up inside, but my feelings for her didn’t change to hate. I didn’t believe that hate was the dark side of love. Love has no dark side. It just is.

  On some days I hoped my feelings would fade away to friendship and that the pain would go with it; other days I held onto my hopeless love, afraid it would dissolve as time passed. Like the kid who adored Mangan’s sister, I wanted to preserve it, as if it was a precious object you kept hidden in a dark cupboard, something you could take out sometimes and cradle in your hands. It’s a wonder I didn’t go crazy holding such contradictions in my head. I was confused, mixed up, turning in circles. I didn’t know up from down.

  But one thing was clear.

  It hurt.

  ACT FOUR

  CHAPTER ONE

  ONE OF MY FAVOURITE PLACES in the school was the library reading room. It was on the north side of the building, and its floor-to-ceiling windows looked out across flower beds and shrubs and grass to the greenbelt that followed the river, although at this time of year the lawns and gardens were hidden under a thin layer of snow and the belt was white. If a relaxed, restful atmosphere was what you were after, this was the place to be. The For Quiet Study Only signs weren’t strictly enforced as long as conversations were carried on at very low volume.

  Vanni, Instant and I were seated in comfortable chairs around a low table, working in the quiet background buzz. The library was crowded, and almost all the seats were taken. Vanni was composing a poem, Instant was reading a book called Music and Your Brain and I was struggling to keep my mind off Alba and jot down ideas for a project. So far all I had were three cartoons that had nothing to do with anything and a silly scene for a nonexistent screenplay based on Hamlet. Sometimes I wondered why I liked to make fun of famous tragedies.

  “Vanni,” I said, “what are you going to do for the Big Project?”

  The BP was a second-semester half-credit independent assignment that every York student had to complete. You were expected to come up with an idea yourself, get it approved by your teacher and see it through to completion. The only stipulation was that it be something in the arts, and preferably in your major. A low or failing grade would pull down your final average and make college entrance difficult, so everyone took the BP seriously. I had already decided on a screenplay, but that was as far as my imagination had taken me. The Alba fiasco had short-circuited most of my schoolwork.

  “I’m thinking about adapting a play,” she answered without looking up from her page. Vanni used leather-bound notebooks she bought by the dozen from a supplier in New York.

  “What play?”

  “No details yet.”

  “Something existential, I’ll bet.”

  “When there’s news, I’ll issue a press release.”

  “What about you, Instant?”

  He closed his book, held it against his pigeon chest and put his long feet on the last empty chair, ankles crossed. Gazing up at the ceiling as he spoke, he replied, “I was going to do a research paper entitled ‘Why Are Classical Musicians So Boring?’ Then I revised the idea to ‘Why Don’t Classical Musicians Have a Sense of Humour?’”

  Vanni closed her notebook. “You could combine the two. They’re closely related,” she said.

  “Think your father would give me a hand?” Instant asked her.

  “He’d just tell you they’re all snobs and let it go at that.”

  “Speaking of snobs,” Instant whispered, and cocked his head toward the centre of the room.

  Chad Bromley strolled through the reading room, chin high, casting his gaze from side to side like visiting royalty as he negotiated a path through the tables and chairs. He approached our table, then yanked the chair from under Instant’s feet, making them drop to the carpet with a muffled thump. Chad casually sat down, crossed his legs, adjusted the crease in his grey flannel pants and flicked a bit of fluff off one of the tassels on his polished loafer.

  “I wonder if this library has any books on human aggression,” Vanni said to no one in particular.

  Chad gave her a hard look. “Who knows?” he said, and smirked. “Ask Ms. Kahn. Maybe she knows.”

  Vanni held Chad’s insolent stare. “Doorknob,” she said sweetly. “Wingnut.”

  “Hey, Jake,” Instant commented lazily, “I think we’ve got a hardware theme going here.”

  “Dipstick,” Vanni added when the colour rose into Chad’s face.

  �
��Nope,” I said. “Automotive.”

  “Hamburger. Weenie.”

  “Make that culinary,” I said.

  “That the best you can do, Miss Universe?” Chad drawled.

  “You pimple on the arse of a sand flea.”

  “Biological,” Instant pointed out.

  Chad blinked first. He broke off visual conflict with Vanni and opened a John Grisham novel.

  Ignoring Chad, the three of us got back to work, which in my case meant more aimless doodling.

  After a few minutes’ silence, Instant muttered, “Well, I’ll be …” and got to his feet. He slouched over to the window. Shading his eyes with his hand, he peered out. “Hmm,” he said to himself, then returned to his seat. But he kept his attention trained out the window.

  Curious, I asked, “What’s up?”

  “Oh, nothing really,” he replied slowly.

  I glanced at Vanni inquiringly. Her attention remained on her notebook, but her eyebrows rose slightly, which meant “I don’t know.”

  It’s strange how compelling body language can be. Instant sat canted expectantly toward the window, focused intently on something in the distance. Finally Chad raised his eyes from his novel. He looked out across the snow toward the river, squinting against the glare.

  “What are you staring at?” he demanded.

  “That old guy out there, sitting on the bench,” Instant answered.

  “What guy?”

  “It’s a sad story. The poor fella’s crazy.”

  “I don’t see—”

  “He thinks he’s invisible,” Instant said solemnly.

  “There’s nobody there,” Chad snapped. “You mean the bench by the path, right?”

  Instant nodded. “He must be freezing in this weather. See, he knows that if he puts his clothes on—you know, with a heavy coat and hat and some snuggy gloves—he’ll be warm, but people would be able to see him. Strictly speaking, they’d see the clothes, but it’s the same difference. He doesn’t want that.”

  “But there’s nobody—”

  “It’s really tragic what happened to him last time,” Instant interrupted, shaking his head sympathetically.