“So why did you come?”
She gave me a long look. Then she said, “To keep an eye on Phil.”
“Oh,” I said, as if I knew what she was talking about.
“We’re having an affair,” she added.
“Oh,” I said again.
“It’s a stupid thing to do.” She shrugged. “But sometimes it is absolutely necessary to be stupid, you know?”
I didn’t know what to say to that.
“Stupid to care so much about some damned man. A cow.ard and a liar, like all of them. But what else is there to do? Everything wears off after five years or so. Then it is time to love again, you know?”
I must have given something off, because Maria smiled a little and said, “Is Edmund your first?”
“Oh, we’re not—” I started. Then I said, “Yes,” because he was.
“So my daughter has competition. Well, you could do worse. He is a handsome rogue.” She shook her head. “The two of you. Men.”
Part of me wanted to straighten her out about me. But a smarter part thought, I’m just about to find out stuff I want to know. So I tried to look like I was The Other Woman.
Maria smiled a little. “Your mother. How does she feel about this?”
“She’s okay with it so far,” I said.
“Well. That is intelligent, I think. When a girl reaches your age a parent cannot really impose her will anymore.”
“How does your husband feel about Vivian and Edmund?” I asked.
“Furious. But do not worry. There is nothing he can do, and he knows it.” She sighed. “We make life interesting for him, my daughter and I. But without us, he would have no life at all, and he knows this.”
“Do you think he knows about you and Phil?”
“Of course he knows. I am not some child to keep my love life secret from my husband,” Maria said.
All of a sudden I was feeling very sorry for Mr. Brandstedt. I sat silently for a while, feeling sad for him and miserable for myself and wishing I could do something about any of it.
“Well, thanks for talking to me, Maria,” I said finally. “I think I’ll go back to the party.”
Maria took out another cigarette.
When I got back to the basement, Edmund and Vivian were gone.
“Where’s Edmund?” I asked Drew.
“Not sure,” he said. “He was talking with Phil. Then he took off with Vivian.”
“You just let him leave? I’m supposed to keep an eye on him. You’re supposed to help me.”
“He didn’t ask my permission…. But if you want my opin.ion, they didn’t go far.”
“Thanks a lot,” I said, and went over to Bobby.
“Bobby, do you know where Edmund and Vivian are?” I said when he and Stacy came up for air.
“I do not know, and I do not care,” Bobby said.
I saw Phil with his empty glass hanging from his fingers. Gillinger was turned away, talking to Bill Meisinger.
“Hey, Phil, have you seen my cousin?” I asked.
“I gave him the key to my guesthouse,” he said. “I never use it. And he and Vivian looked desperate.”
“Oh. Thanks,” I said, and felt my heart break.
I wanted to get out of there, to go home, to go anywhere. And I really, really didn’t want to cry, which was just what I was going to do. Damn it, what were all these people do.ing here when I needed privacy, a lot of privacy?
I got out of the basement and made my way to the far cor.ner of the yard and sat down with my back against a tree. I put my face on my knees and I wept.
After a while I heard quiet steps. Steps were the last thing I wanted to hear.
“Miri?”
“Leave me alone, Drew,” I said.
“Take you home?” he asked.
“Yeah. I want to get out of here.”
He held out his hand, but I got up on my own.
“Let’s go this way,” he said, and he led me to the front yard by the side of the house opposite the driveway. It was just a narrow dark little corridor with nobody there except a couple kissing. I couldn’t even see who they were. Which meant they couldn’t see me. Which was perfect.
Drew and I walked across the front yard with our heads down like we were talking. We turned up the street to his car. He opened the door for me and we got in.
“I’m sorry I was obtuse back there in the cellar,” Drew said.
I shook my head. “Forget it.”
Drew concentrated on his driving. Neither of us said any.thing else until he pulled into my driveway. Then we had one of those awkward moments when he came around to open the door for me and I got out without waiting for him.
“Oh,” he said.
I stepped past him.
“I’m going back to the party, I guess. I’ll try to keep an eye on him for you.” Drew shrugged.
“He’s fine,” I said and then headed for the front door. “Thanks for getting me out of there.”
“Miri—” he said to my back.
“Yeah?” I said without turning around.
“Miri, is there anything I can do?”
“No. Not unless you can send a certain English lout back to where he came from.” I didn’t mean it. But then again, part of me did. Conflicted, Dad would have said.
Drew pretended to laugh and said, “I’ll work on it.”
It was awkward hanging on to my doorknob. “You’re a good friend, Drew. Good night.”
“Miri,” Drew said again.
“Yeah, Drew?” I said.
“…nothin’. Good night.”
“Yeah,” I said. “See you.”
I went into the house and locked the door behind me. For some reason I thought about the fact that I’d never heard Drew say “nothin’” before.
Chapter Nineteen
Edmund didn’t come back until almost dawn. I heard Viv.ian’s car pull up and drive away, and he came into the house by the front door and went straight to his room. I didn’t see him until that afternoon.
Mom was in the backyard weeding the flowers. I was star.ing at the TV without watching it.
“How was the party?” I asked as chipper as I could.
“Grand and glorious,” Edmund said. He sounded really tired. “Phil Hormel is a true friend.”
“Nice of Vivian to bring you back. I kind of thought she’d keep you.”
“She would an she could,” Edmund said. “And if I would let her. But I mind what ye said to me, faithful spirit. I’ll not trust her too far.”
“Well.” I shrugged. “I guess it doesn’t really matter very much. Sorry I was so snarky about it at first.”
“Snarky! Ha, ha. Excellent word,” Edmund said.
I got up.
“Mom’s in the back. I need to ask her something,” I said, and left him standing in the living room.
Mom was down on her knees by the tulips. There was a pile of small green dead things with their roots covered with dirt lying beside her.
“Edmund’s back.”
“I know,” Mom said.
I watched her work. She had a metal-tipped thing like a sort of fork in her hand and she was gouging the earth around the weeds like she was a surgeon.
Out came the weed, a long-rooted monster. She tossed it onto the pile.
“Mom,” I said. “Why are men such jerks?”
She brushed her hair away from her face and looked up at me.
“Honey, if I knew that, I’d write the book on it and every woman in the world would buy two copies. One for herself and one for her daughter.”
She went back to digging, ferociously.
“Whew. I haven’t had a chance to do this for a long time,” she said. “Pulling double shifts doesn’t leave a lot of time for pulling weeds.”
“It’s looking great.”
“There’s one thing I do know,” Mom said. “A guy—a lot of guys—try to find out what they can get away with. What the woman will put up with. It’s important for us to know what w
e will and won’t accept.”
“What about guys?” I said, thinking of Mr. Brandstedt. “Do they have to figure out what they’ll accept?”
“Same thing, I guess. I’ve never been a guy so I can’t be sure.”
Then I said, “What if you love the guy?”
“All the more reason to know what you’ll accept.”
I got down beside my mom. “Dad went away,” I said.
“Yep,” she agreed. “And I’m putting up with that. And I’m still hoping he’ll come back. But if he’d had another woman instead of wandering off, I’d have taken this and stuck it in his...eye.”
She stabbed her weeding stick into the ground.
“Mom, were you ever in a situation where you loved somebody and he didn’t love you?”
“Sure,” she said.
“What did you do?”
“The question is, what are you going to do?”
What was I willing to put up with from Edmund because I loved him? Particularly when we weren’t together and he was with some other girl?
“Does Edmund know how you feel?” she asked.
Did Edmund know? Let’s see. Mom knew. And Drew knew. And Maria knew. And if Maria knew then Vivian did. And Bobby probably—okay, maybe the immediate world knew. But Edmund, I was sure, looked at me and saw a fairy, or a sprite, or a cuz—anything but a girl who loved him.
“No, I guess not,” I said.
“You know. There’s another play Shakespeare wrote around 1597. Much Ado About Nothing. I played Beatrice. She was in that kind of situation and she handled it pretty well.”
“What did she do?”
“She never gave the guy a break,” Mom said. “She made fun of him. And she had a mouth on her. You might want to try that.”
“Much Ado About Nothing,” I pondered aloud. “I’ll take a look at it.”
So I went back into the house.
Edmund was curled up on the couch snoring softly. He looked so handsome, so sweet with his mouth open and his head thrown back so I could see his missing molars.
When I caught myself thinking that, I found The Riverside Shakespeare and flipped it open to page 361, then carried the book into my room.
I saw what Mom meant at once. Benedick and Beatrice are crazy about each other and they rag on each other all the time because of it. Because neither of them can admit to the other how much in love they are. Because it’s better than crying.
As luck would have it, I got my first chance to try it just after I finished the play. Edmund woke up when I came back into the living room.
“Ah. Did I fall asleep?” he said.
“If that wasn’t you snoring then there’s a sick pig with a hell of a cold in here.”
Edmund looked stunned. Then he laughed.
“And when did ye learns so much of pigs, cuz? Was it when ye were herding the Gadarene swine?” Then he laughed again and kicked his feet in the air.
“I’m sure that was very funny back in Stratford,” I said.
“Have ye never heard of the Gadarene swine?” Edmund said. “They were the pigs into which Our Lord sent the le.gion of demons so they rushed over a cliff and were killed.”
“See? I knew there was a laugh in there somewhere,” I said.
“And with my good help, ye’ll come to find it in a month or so.”
“And without your help, I’ll find it even sooner.”
Edmund laughed again.
Douglas Rees
Well, if I couldn’t be Juliet, Beatrice wasn’t a bad default. Edmund and I slung zingers at each other all night long. And it was better than crying.
Chapter Twenty
Monday, Drew swung by to pick up Edmund and me, and
there was no Bobby with him.
“Where’s Tybalt?” I asked as I got into the front seat.
“Coming on his own,” Drew said. “That’s what he told me.”
Drew without Bobby. That was new.
“Tybalt without Mercutio,” Edmund mused. “The play is out of balance.”
“Nay, ’tis cool. Bobby’s mad, but I think he’s kind of en.joying acting it. He’ll probably go on to something else be.fore too long.”
But if Bobby was acting, he turned out to be giving it ev.erything he had. He strolled in to rehearsal with one of the girls just before we started. He sauntered past Drew like he didn’t see him. The girl brought him the roll of blue mask.ing tape and he slowly wound some around his right arm. When rehearsal began, he made his first entrance with his head and shoulders forward, ready for a fight.
He gave his first line. Then, he shoved the kid playing one
of the Capulet servants and the poor little guy fell down. “Hey, dude,” the servant said from the floor. “Deal with it,” Bobby said, and went into his sword-fight
stance. The kid got up. Then one of the Montague servants
pushed him down again. The other Capulet servant pushed back. “Dude, what are you doing?” the first Capulet said. Bobby didn’t answer. He just lunged, like he had a sword,
and snaked his leg around and tripped the guy he’d pushed. Then all five boys, the Capulet and Montague servants
and Bobby were shoving each other. It didn’t feel like improv. It felt like a fight. “Cut!” Gillinger roared. “What is this supposed to be?” “Trying to put some energy into the scene,” Bobby said.
“It’s slow. Maybe you’ve noticed.” “Of course it’s slow,” Gillinger said. “You don’t know it
yet. Now apologize.” “Sorry,” Bobby said, to nobody in particular. We went on. Eventually, we got to the party scene where
Romeo and Juliet first see each other. Everybody’s supposed to be masked. Bobby came in, same way as before, walked over to Ed.
mund and pretended to pull off Edmund’s mask. “Capulet bastard,” he said. Then he slapped Edmund. Hard. For a moment Edmund just stood there. Then he threw
a punch that would have dropped Bobby had it connected, but Bobby dodged it and danced around the stage. “What the hell?” Gillinger said. “What the hell are you
doing?” “Subtext,” Bobby said. “Like you taught us in class.” “Stick to the script!” Gillinger snapped.
Edmund dropped his hand to his side, but it was still clenched. “What are you playing at, Bobby?”
“What’s the matter, dude? Don’t they do subtext in En.gland?”
Edmund was furious. He touched his cheek and glared at Bobby. Bobby was still dancing on the balls of his feet, get.ting madder and madder.
“Subtext. It’s what’s really going on in a scene,” Bobby said. “Not just a bunch of words and blocking. You know— acting.”
“Damn it, Ruspoli, I am directing this play,” Gillinger said.
“I wondered who was. When do you plan to start?”
“Ruspoli, outside. Now,” Gillinger spat.
The two of them left the theater. The rest of us stood around wondering what was going on.
“Just like Miss Saigon,” Phil Hormel said. It was all any.body said out loud.
After about twenty years, Bobby and Gillinger came back in. They weren’t walking together. Gillinger strode in and threw himself down on his throne. Bobby followed him, still stalking like he wanted to fight.
“Ruspoli has something he wants to say,” Gillinger an.nounced.
“Sorry, everybody,” Bobby said, center stage. “I overdid it. I know that. But this show, it’s important to me, you know? And now there’s this Ashland thing. I mean, we’ve got make it good, you know? I’m just trying to make it good. Sorry if that wasn’t clear.”
As apologies went, it was more of a brush-off. And I don’t think anyone believed a word of it.
But Gillinger said, “Understood, Ruspoli. Now let’s get back to work.”
Ever wonder what Verona was like with all those Capulets and Montagues running around killing each other? A little tense, maybe. Like you didn’t know what was going to hap.pen next, or who was going to be the target. That was w
hat the rest of that night was like.
And Edmund was still smoldering from the smack Bobby had given him. He wanted to get back at him. He had more sense than to hit him, but he thought of another way.
As soon as Gillinger called break, Edmund grabbed Viv.ian, threw his arms around her and kissed her hard, right in front of Bobby. Actually, it was in front of everybody, in.cluding me. But Bobby was his audience.
When Edmund let her go, she staggered backward and eeped,
“Oh, speak again, bright angel.”
And kissed him back.
And probably that was why the balcony scene was ab.solutely no good at all that night. No, to be fair, Edmund wasn’t bad. I was what was absolutely no good. I kept blow.ing my lines, stumbling over words. And the farther we went, the worse I got. It was like I’d never seen the scene before.
And Gillinger let me know it. “Hoberman, we are too far along at this point for you to be this incompetent,” he said, interrupting me just as Edmund was about to climb up and join me. “Take it from the top.”
And I did, and I was better but still no good. We made it to the end of the scene and Gillinger snarled that it was time to quit, even though we had nearly an hour left.
“For God’s sake, go home and use the extra time to learn your lines,” he said.
We all started to leave. I saw Bobby and Drew talking in the corner. Bobby shook his head at something Drew said, and waved his hand at me and Edmund. Then he went off with Girl of the Week.
“May I give you a ride home?” Drew asked me and Ed.mund.
His formality surprised me. Usually Drew just came over and said, “Need a ride?” or something like that.
But Vivian was already standing in Edmund’s shadow.
“Vivian will bring me home,” Edmund said. “We’ll not be late.”
“But don’t wait up,” Vivian said, smiling.
I was sure they were heading for Phil’s guesthouse.
“Say hello to the roaches for me,” I said in my best Bea.trice.
“We will. For we know they are particular friends of yours,” Edmund said, smiling.
They went off with their arms around each other.
Maria saw me looking after them and smiled a smile that was supposed to say something world-weary in German, I guess.
When we reached his car, Drew opened the door for me.
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