“I know.”
“I’m sorry I suggested you were putting on an act for the play. That didn’t come out right. I know it’s more than that. I guess I was hoping—”
“It’s okay. I’m sorry I got mad.”
He shakes off my apology. “I don’t want to push you.”
Push me, I want to say, please, please, push me, and I’ll fall into you.
But it’s like Livia said—it has to be my choice to touch even though I’m afraid.
An hour before our first dress rehearsal, Livia and I sit in one of the tiny dressing rooms trying to figure out how to meet the “Nadia Hair Challenge.” Livia got a picture of a Ghanaian queen with her hair in huge twists supporting gold talismans. It looks regal but challenging. Mine is of a girl with so many twists and braids, her head looks like a maze.
“I don’t think you can do that by yourself,” Livia says.
I run out of hair for my current braid, and it slips from my hand before I can pin it down. “I don’t think I have enough hair anyway.”
Mandy swoops in, her face flushed.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
She crouches beside my chair and meets my eyes in the mirror.
“I need a pep talk.”
“What’s going on?”
“It’s Drew. We had another fight.”
“Oh, no,” says Livia, but Mandy shakes off her sympathy.
“It’s nothing new. He’s just begging me to dump him. I gave him an acting note from Nadia, and he called me a bitch, which he knows I hate, and I smacked him, which—not my proudest moment, I know—but then he said, ‘Walk away before I do something we’ll both regret,’ and I said, ‘What, like hit me? Dump me? Because I’m this close to dumping you,’ and he said, ‘Just walk away. I’m too mad.’”
“So much drama,” says Livia.
“Right? I have to break up with him.”
“I’m so sorry, Mandy,” I say. I pet her shoulder, far from her neckline, but she meets my eyes in the mirror and smiles.
“Don’t be sorry. It’s for the best, right?”
“Well, yeah.”
“Yeah.” But she’s making a doubtful face in the mirror. “I just keep thinking, if we could figure out how to not fight, or how to fight nicer, everything could be okay.”
She sighs and stands with her hands on her hips. “How goes it with Peter?”
“It doesn’t,” I say, and start another braid. “I guess it’s a little better. We sort of made up. I don’t get why I can’t let it go.” I shake my head. “Peter thinks I’m holding on to my fear to be better at playing Ophelia.”
Mandy looks at me in the mirror again. “That’s dumb.”
“I know. She’s like the opposite of me—she lets go of everything.”
“Except—”
“What?”
“Well, I don’t think you’re holding on to it to be better at playing Ophelia. And I don’t think it’s an act. Don’t misunderstand.”
“But?”
“But I do think you’re holding on to something. You’re holding on so, so tight.”
I look to Livia, who’s been focused on her hair in the mirror. She keeps working with her hair pick, but she nods. “It’s in your face, Caddie. Relax your face for a second.”
I can’t see what she means right away, but I take a breath, try to let all the tension go. My eyebrows are pinched, and I spread my fingers along them, try to make them relax. My eyes—there’s the feel of a sigh at the corners; I have to blink them to keep them from tightening again. Another breath. And my mouth, I open it wide and gasp. It’s like I’m drowning. All of a sudden I can’t get enough air. I put my hands on the dressing table to hold myself steady, to push away that feeling of falling. I drop my head, hear myself make a whimpering sigh.
“Oh, God,” I say. I can’t look at them.
“It’s okay,” Livia says, and I feel her hand at my back before she touches me, not my skin, but she presses her palm to my shoulder blade. “It’s going to be okay.”
I gasp again.
“Here, let it go. Breathe.”
I breathe out and take a shuddering breath in, trying to release the tension in my chest, shoulders, face. “I feel like I’m going to break apart into little pieces.”
“You won’t,” Livia says. “You can’t.”
“It’s okay, Caddie,” says Mandy, my oldest friend. “We’re here with you. You’re not going anywhere.”
We sit like that for what feels like hours, me trying to breathe without squeezing my lungs in a vise, and the two of them waiting, Livia’s hand a constant pressure at my back.
Footsteps make Mandy shift beside me.
“Is she . . . ?” It’s a girl’s voice, April.
“She’s okay,” Mandy says. “She’s just nervous.”
“I came to see if you need help with the hair.”
“We’ve got it,” Mandy says. “Thank you.”
There’s a pause, and I can feel April looking at me with my head practically between my legs. “Caddie,” she says. “You’re really good as Ophelia. It’s normal to get nerves, but you don’t have anything to worry about.”
The surprise allows me to pull it together. I lift my head. Already it’s easier to breathe. “Thank you, April.” My voice sounds shaky, but it’s a voice. “That’s nice of you.”
“I’m not saying it to be nice,” she says. And she’s gone.
The three of us hold still for a few seconds, testing the waters, and when I catch sight of them in the mirror, they both look concerned. Mandy’s still crouched beside me looking ready to spring and catch me. Livia’s hair is half out and half still in braids, a lopsided ‘fro. We all look completely bonkers, and at the same time we all bust out laughing.
Once we can keep straight faces again, I thank them, and Mandy swipes a pair of gloves for herself from the costume room—“If people see me, they’ll think I caught your fashion trend”—and has my hair done in less than ten minutes. She goes for a curling iron to do the loose ends, but I say, “Thanks, I can do those myself if there’s time. I have to make a phone call.”
“You’ve got less than half an hour till Nadia calls places, and you’ve still got to get dressed.”
“This won’t take long.”
I grab my phone and jog through the downstairs halls, where a lot of the actors are already in costume. I pass Oscar and Hank going over the bit where they poison Laertes’s sword. Hank is making a thing out of spreading the poison down the tip. “Caddie,” Oscar calls out as I pass, “can you help us get my sword wet?”
Normally Oscar’s talk makes me anxious, but I’m full of abandon. Without slowing down I yell, “Sure can’t, but I know where you can stick it!”
Hank’s laugh bellows out and bounces after me. Mandy would be proud.
Most of the space below the theater is completely underground—no hope of getting a signal—but there’s an exit at the back that leads to a small parking lot and the woods.
I’m afraid the door will lock behind me, so I kick off one of my sneakers and leave it as a doorstop. I must look ridiculous, hobbling with one sock foot in my jeans with my old-timey hair, but feeling ridiculous helps. A little crazy is right for this scene.
Dad doesn’t usually pick up when I call, but I’ll catch him off guard, calling when I’d normally be at rehearsal. He’ll think there’s some emergency. As it rings, over and over, I practice what I want to say: “You’re making me feel crazy. I know you’ve said you’re coming, but you never even pick up the phone when I call, so what am I supposed to think? I’ve been holding on to this idea that you might come back. I’ve been doing crazy things to make myself believe it, and I realize how stupid that is, that you’re not coming back to live with us, but it’s more than that. I’m not sure you’re my dad anymore. Please show up and be my dad.”
Even as I’m rehearsing to scold him for failing to pick up the phone, I’m still surprised when he doesn’t pick up. It still hu
rts.
After the beep, I should leave my message, but it’s not the same talking to a machine. I consider hanging up without speaking. Consider dialing and redialing until he has to pick up and react to what I say.
After an awkwardly long silence, I say the only words left: “Are you still coming?”
I hold nothing back for dress rehearsals. They say a bad dress rehearsal means a good performance, but I don’t buy it. It’s just that dress rehearsals tend to go badly, and people have to tell themselves something to get up the courage to go back on stage.
It’s strange to act with Peter when I feel like I’m losing him, but then again, we never see Ophelia and Hamlet happy together—they’re at the end of love.
I feel it during final dress.
“I never gave you aught.”
“You know right well you did . . .”
I try to make Hamlet remember his love, and I understand something new. Ophelia has to wear her mask because others are watching, but if they weren’t, she would drop the act and fight for Hamlet. Right now, I’d give anything to be able to drop the script and hash it out with Peter.
“I did love you once.” The line is more real to me than it’s ever been, and I’m afraid it is real, afraid it’s Peter saying it instead of Hamlet.
I reach for him—it’s in the blocking now for me to take his arm, to try to pull him back to me, and it’s safe with his long sleeves. “Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so.” I let my hand slide down his arm toward his hand. What if I guide his hand to my face as Ophelia? Maybe the play will end differently. Maybe they’ll make up, elope, run away from stupid Denmark, go somewhere warm.
But before Peter hand touches my cheek, he yanks away. Maybe I’ve conditioned Peter to avoid my touch.
The show opens tomorrow, and then we have three performances together. During those performances, Peter will make eye contact with me, hold me close, let me see his feelings. So much of the intimacy between us has been on stage. Lately, that’s the only place we’re connecting. Once the play is over, that connection might be gone for good.
When I get out of rehearsal, I have a text message from Dad:
Course I’m still coming. Wouldn’t miss it for the world.
The OCD part of my brain tries to explain it. You almost made Peter touch you at rehearsal, but you didn’t, and that’s why Dad says he’s coming.
I want to cancel out that thought, think don’t touch, but that’s not healthy. I don’t want to believe I have any control over whether or not Dad shows up.
Instead, I concentrate on my breath, think a mantra like Dr. Rice suggested. I let go of control. I let go of responsibility for anyone but myself.
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
..................................................................
38.
Thursday afternoon we get out of class for one last rehearsal, stolen minutes to tweak scenes and adjust to the set. Some people still need to run lines.
Peter finds me in the middle of the auditorium looking through my Ophelia journal, and he stands over me without speaking. There’s the picture of me on the edge of the diving board, at the edge of Peter, of falling in love. My face in the picture is eager, and terrified.
Falling in love can’t break bones, but falling out of it—that has the potential to break so much more.
“Are we okay?” I ask.
He shrugs. “Sometimes it’s hard to tell what’s real with you.” He answers the question I don’t ask. “Like last night, you almost touched me.”
“I tried to.”
“But you were playing Ophelia. Would that even count, by your rules?”
“I don’t know what my rules are anymore.”
He’s quiet, then changes the subject. “You’re going to do great tonight. I have complete faith in you.”
I smile at him. He’s smiling back, and I want to close the distance between us, relax this rubber-band feeling that’s always tugging between him and me.
“Wow.” He breathes out the word. “I know I said I would always be your friend, but . . .”
“But what?”
He breathes out again and turns away toward the stage. “You make it hard to keep things . . . friendly.”
“I felt that too.”
Nadia calls for Peter. “Hop onstage, pronto!”
“You have to go.”
“I have to go.”
It’s like Nadia’s repetition exercise. He’s lingering and I want to say wait, but another thought creeps in.
Dad won’t come. If you break the rules now, it’s over.
“My dad’s coming tonight.”
“Oh?”
“I’m more nervous about that than about the judges.”
He nods. “I don’t blame you.”
Nadia’s not looking at us—a papered wall on the set has started peeling, and she’s chatting with one of the techies about it.
“I can’t tell what makes me more nervous . . . thinking he might not show up, or thinking he will—that he’ll sit in the audience and hate the whole thing and not get it.”
Peter tilts his head. “Won’t he be proud anyway?”
I shake my head slowly.
“I’m not sure.”
“That makes me sad,” Peter says. “Dads are supposed to support you. It’s, like, part of the job description.”
“I know.”
“Peter!” Nadia’s tiny, but she’s got some serious pipes. “Caddie will be there when you get back. In fact, you’re going to be on stage with her in a mere half an hour. Don’t make me come get you!”
“Sorry,” I whisper.
He shakes his head. “No, I’m glad we’re talking.”
“Me too.”
I should touch Peter. I want to. Now. And if I wait until after the play to find out whether or not Dad’s come, it won’t be as brave.
“This is the most we’ve talked in a while,” he says.
“Right?” I lean toward him slightly.
I would slay a dragon for Peter. I would.
He grins sideways, amused by how blatantly I’m drooling over him, I fear. He holds a hand toward me in parting as if to say, More later.
I take it and press it between mine.
My palm touches his palm, which is dry, but soft and warm. His pulse surprises me, how clear it is. My other palm presses into the back of his hand, the long bones and ridges, the soft grooves in between them. His fingers are longer than mine, the palm wider, and something in that sends a rush of blood to my heart, to my cheeks. My own pulse must be pounding his hand—he’ll have bruises.
I let go.
The space between my hands, where Peter’s was, feels charged, hot and tingly. My own hands radiate, pulse the sensation of me touching Peter into the surrounding air. I could almost believe I’m a superhero. With this energy, I could start fires, freeze lakes, read minds.
Before I can decide that this feeling’s bad, tainted somehow, I press my hands to the sides of my neck, to my cheeks. I grip my forearms and run my hands down their length till I’m holding my own wrists tight. Don’t let go. Don’t let this feeling go and turn into anything bad.
I’ve been staring at Peter, staring into his eyes. And he’s frozen—his mouth slightly open, his hand still extended toward me. For a second I think maybe my touch really did something to him, stole his power, made him weak. But then he breaks into the biggest smile.
His eyes say more—more of this, more than friends—more and more and more and more.
I dare a look at Nadia. She’s still, watching us, hands on her hips. But she’s patient. Me looking away seems to unfreeze Peter. He jogs to the stage.
Most of the actors are watching us, not sure what they’re seeing beyond a brazen defiance of Nadia and a little PDA. Mandy’s in the front row, and she’s twisted her whole body to sit on her knees. She’s tugging her hair, making two super-stressy pigtails. Her mouth is a huge,
I-can’t-believe-you-just-did-that smile.
Nadia keeps her eyes on me as Peter takes the stairs and finds his place. It’s hard to know what she’s thinking when she stares like that, but just when I think she’s mad at me, she purses her lips into a bemused smile and whirls back to the stage.
Watching Peter rehearse is easy. Rehearsing with Peter is easy.
I’m on a cloud, a tingling, floating awareness charged with the spark of that one touch—eager and dangerous and delicious.
As soon as Peter’s out of my sight, though, the cloud takes on water, sinks down, and I’m swimming in stress. It’s an effort to breathe, and I’m certain the pinch in my face has come back with a vengeance.
What have I done? The thought chips away at my nerves. Nadia orders pizza for our dinner break, but my stomach’s in a twist. While people eat, Mandy grabs me by the sleeve and pulls me out the stage door toward the tree line.
The flood lights give us an artificial stage that drops off into dark woods.
“You’re the bravest,” she says.
“No, I’m not. I’m freaking out.”
“That. In there. That was brave.”
It feels good to hear that from her. I smile. “Thanks.”
“Tell me I can’t smoke,” she says.
I shrug. “You can. But you shouldn’t.”
“I’m quitting,” she says. “I’m quitting that, and I’m quitting Drew. Two things that aren’t good for me. If you can do it, so can I.”
She takes her pack from her purse and tosses it into the woods. I almost mention litter, but this isn’t the time.
“Cold turkey?” I say.
She nods like a bobblehead. “Gobble gobble.”
“I’ll be really proud of you if you quit,” I say, “but, Mandy, I’m freaking out.”
“You did it,” she says.
“Yes.”
“Are you okay?”
I walk in a wide arc, shake my hands. “It felt good. It was good. It was the right thing to do.”
“But?”
“You know, I made this deal with myself about touch, that things with my dad would work out. He’d come back, or . . . I don’t know if I even want that now, but, at least he’d still be a part of our lives. He’d stop acting like a jerk.”
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