“Heck yeah!” Diego said.
“Heck yeah is right!” Mike said. “Miss Duffy?”
“Curtain goes up at four,” Mia said. “That gives you twenty-five minutes for costumes and makeup. Starting now, everybody. Let’s do this thing.”
We got to our feet, shuffled toward the stairs that led down to the changing rooms, but before we reached them—thump-squeal—the door to the house swung upon, and Coach Fig came jogging toward us down the aisle.
Right away we could tell that something was wrong.
I mean, he wasn’t wearing his headset.
In one bound, the coach jumped onstage, pivoted to face us. There was a moment of silence, a Sixth-Grade Player intake of breath.
Had Mrs. Winklebottom found out about the script? Had some parent decided a ghost was an inappropriate director?
Was he here to cancel the show?
Coach Fig spoke: “The wedding is off!”
Madeline asked, “What wedding?”
Mike looked pained for real. “Oh, Coach, I’m so sorry. What happened? Was it the pineapple?”
“It was. The groom’s aunt breaks all out in hives if she’s even in a room with the stuff, the bride’s mother said you have to have it or it’s not fruit salad, and the groom accused the bride of trying to poison half his family, and then”—Fig shook his head, reliving the bad memory—“things got ugly.”
“How very Shakespearean,” said Mike.
Fig shrugged. “I wouldn’t know about that. What I do know is I’ve spent months of my life planning this wedding, and now I’ve got surplus food, surplus flowers, a surplus DJ, and surplus cake coming my way on Saturday.”
Mike removed the green-glowing tablet thingy from his pocket. “I’ll drop you a text, Coach. Could be I have an idea to help with that.”
Even though Fig was nodding, I don’t think he heard. “If you’ll excuse me,” he said, “I have some calls to make,” and, as efficiently as he’d entered, he dropped from the stage and retreated up the aisle.
“A-a-a-and exit,” said Mia as the coach opened the door to the lobby. “Okay, we’re down to twenty minutes, people. Move fast.”
“Miss Duffy? If you’ll permit me?” Mike said.
“What now?” Mia turned on him, waved the clipboard.
“This won’t take long,” Mike said, and I wondered if everyone heard it too, the sadness in his voice.
Something was going to happen. I could tell. In my head flashed memories of Mike—meeting him on the bench, my audition, the time he sprouted wings and flew, the afternoon we learned to thrust and parry and fall down.
“If I may just say, it’s been a pleasure,” Mike said. “What I sincerely hope is that all of you continue to value drama, theater, artistic expression in all its forms, continue to let them inspire you and enlarge your understanding of the beautiful world we inhabit for so short a time. As for what’s next, here are a few words to live by: The show must go on.”
Clive, quick on the uptake, asked, “Yo, Mike, you going somewhere?”
Mia said, “Oh no, you are not. We don’t have time.”
Mike shook off the sadness, returned to business as usual. I guessed we’d all been wrong. What a relief.
“Speaking of holy spirits,” he said, not that anyone had been. “I believe Justin has something to say.”
Sure enough, Justin’s voice rang out from the speakers above: “We got a little problem.”
“No time for problems, Justin,” Mia said.
“And the problem is?” Mike asked.
“Mics aren’t working. Can’t say why.”
“I think maybe I can clear this up,” Mike said. “Noah—you’ve got a lavalier, I think?”
Mike held out his hand to take it, fixed me in his gaze, blinked, and just like that I knew he was saying goodbye for real. No! I shook my head. Not now! We need you! I need you!
He grinned his crooked grin. “ ‘To be, or not to be?’ ” he spoke into the mic. “How are the levels now, o holy spirit? Any better?”
No answer.
And so Mike began to recite:
“You are old, Father William,” the young man said,
“And your hair has become very white;
And yet you incessantly stand on your head—
Do you think, at your age, it is right?”
“Oh, wow—how do you…,” I started to say, but—thump-squeak—for the second time that afternoon, the lobby door swung open. It wasn’t Fig but my father who walked in, a puzzled expression on his face, one eyebrow raised.
Also, he was pale… as if he’d seen a—
“Let’s meet our next guest,” said Clive.
“Dad? What are you doing here?”
Dad did not answer immediately.
“Professor McNichol?” Marley said. “Are you okay, sir?”
My dad sat down in an aisle seat, shook his head, blinked. “Uh… may I ask? Who was that doing the sound check? He almost sounded like my—”
Mia interrupted. “Oh, fine. We’ll start fifteen minutes late. Everybody, call your parents, and keep in mind it’s not my fault. Mike?” She looked around.
We all looked around.
From the booth, the holy spirit spoke. “Sounds good, Mike! Don’t know what the trouble was, but I guess it’s all cleared up. Ready when you are. Mike? Where’d he go?”
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
A ghost is not allowed to be seen by anyone who knew him when he was alive.
It was one of the ghostly rules Mike had told me, like how ghosts are called up by a thing called incantation, and how, before they appear the first time, there has to be cold wind.
Now Mike had disappeared a nanosecond before my dad came into the aud.
All at once, I knew the answer to the gin-joint question, and I knew who Mike Einstein was, besides world-famous Broadway director.
Maybe you’re way ahead of me.
And if you are, go ahead and add “detecting” to the list of talents I lack.
Dad’s color came back, and his eyes regained focus. “I’m fine,” he insisted. “A little burp in the space-time continuum is all. Now, where is this director you’ve been telling me about? I would like to meet him.”
Eddie said, “He’s gone.”
Emma said, “I told you he was unreliable.”
Madeline said, “Once I had a gerbil that disappeared.”
Mia waved her clipboard. “Someone run out and get Fig—Coach Newton, I mean. He’ll have to help us. We need someone to get us through tonight and the performance tomorrow—if only to cue Diego from the wings.”
“Hey, what are you saying?” Diego said.
Everyone looked at Diego. He wasn’t wearing a beret that day, and his scarf was black.
“Not Fig,” Fuli said. “He’ll shut us down—go straight to Mrs. Winklebottom when he sees the script.”
“And the ketchup,” Brianna said.
I had a bright idea and looked at Dad. “What about Mom? She knows her Shakespeare.”
Dad was looking lost again. “I’m not sure I understand. Are you saying your director’s gone?”
“Keep up, Dad,” I said.
“Your mom has that paper on Emily Dickinson tomorrow,” Dad said. “She’s up to her eyeballs in hope and feathers.”
“What about Miss Magnus?” Marley asked.
“Vacation,” I said.
Out of ideas, we looked at one another. Had we come this far only to fail for lack of a grown-up?
“Uh, well…,” Dad cleared his throat. “If it’s just a matter of someone getting you through tonight and tomorrow, I could, uh… possibly do that.”
“You hate theater,” I said.
“As I’ve told your mother more than once, ‘hate’ is too strong a word,” Dad said. “Besides, I know the play.”
This was true. He had proved it at a dozen Family Dinners.
Clive punched me in the arm, looked at my dad. “You rock, Professor McNichol,” he said.
“Don’t listen to Mr. Pigeon Liver here. Plattsfield-Winklebottom Memorial Sixth-Grade Players, may I introduce our new director!”
Dad took a breath, straightened his shoulders, stood up. “Is there a stage manager?” he asked.
Mia waved her clipboard. “Me, Professor McNichol. Curtain in ten, everybody, so hustle up. The scene is Elsinore.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
If a messy final dress is good luck for the performance, our Hamlet was headed for greatness. Still, we did get through it, and around two hours after the curtain rose, I knelt by Fuli’s ketchup-covered corpse and said in a loud, clear voice, “ ‘Go, bid the soldiers shoot.’ ”
At that point, Mike had built in a pause—five, four, three, two, one—so the audience could take in the tragic scene. Then the curtain fell, the dead bodies jumped up, and we all went out to face the audience and take our bows.
Up till now, it had always been Mike in the front row, and Mike’s response was always the same. He leaped to his feet, clapped his hands, and shouted: “Riotous applause! Standing O! A triumph!”
Unfortunately, my father did not know the drill, and, instead of applauding, he stared.
Maybe he was affected by the tragedy, I thought. Or maybe it’s Sixth-Grade Player PTSD. Whatever it was, the actual performance was twenty-one hours away, and none of us could quit now.
At last Dad rallied, rose from his squeaky seat, tried to smile. “My, my. That was certainly something. Uh… I have a few notes.”
After which he proceeded to detail every little mistake.
Clive, for example, had forgotten to remove the crown before Claudius bowed his head to pray. The crown fell to the floor, rolled offstage, dropped into the audience, and kept rolling. Since we lacked a spare crown, Mia had been forced to come down out of the wings and crawl on hands and knees to retrieve it.
Likewise, a strand of Ophelia’s blond wig had gotten caught on the spade of Gravedigger One, who swung it a little too enthusiastically, tossing the wig into the cheap seats, where as far as any of us knew, it remained.
Yes, I know. I am Gravedigger One.
Then there had been the big duel at the end. Laertes and Hamlet had tangoed away in perfect time, just the way Mike had taught them, till Gertrude stepped backward onto a plastic packet, which exploded in a burst of ketchup all over Claudius’s royal-blue tights.
“Does someone in your household have time to do laundry tonight?” Dad had asked Clive.
“I’ll do it myself, Professor McNichol,” Clive said.
“Good man,” said my dad. “And, overall, everyone, perhaps a little more care tomorrow? With head gear and wigs in particular.”
Mia checked her watch. “All right, people. Call is for five p.m. tomorrow. Seven o’clock curtain. See you then. Oh, and, people? In memory of Mike: The show will go on!”
“In memory of Mike,” Clive said sorrowfully.
“RIP,” said Diego.
“I can’t help thinking,” Madeline said, “that he will be back.”
And maybe she was right. With Elsinore in place onstage, the ghost light had moved to the wings. Now, as if responding to a cue, the bulb lit—ready to keep Mike company.
Downstairs in the dressing room we wiped off our makeup, hung up our costumes, said little, did not joke around.
“Good luck with the ketchup stains,” I told Clive on our way out.
“Anyway, it’ll be over in twenty-four hours,” he said, “one way or another.”
“That sounds like we’re gonna die, Clive, and we’re not. Not literally at least.”
“Unless Mrs. Winklebottom kills us,” Clive said.
Outside, a thin coat of frozen mist, aka ice, clung to the windows and windshield of the car. Dad tossed me the scraper to take care of my side. He used a credit card on his.
In the car, Dad turned on the heater, which blew cold air, and turned the key in the ignition. “Well, that was something, wasn’t it?” he said.
I had so much to say, I couldn’t answer. It was like the words got stuck. Maybe it was okay to put this conversation off a little longer. Looked at one way, hadn’t my family been putting it off for my entire life?
“Noah? You okay?” Dad turned the car out of the school lot.
“Fine,” I said. Then, not wanting to sound all teen-rebel rude, I added, “Fine, Dad. Maybe melancholy is all.”
“I think the show will be all right, don’t you?” Dad asked—hopefully. “Really, it’s amazing how much you kids have accomplished. If there are a few, uh… miscues tomorrow, the audience will be forgiving.”
“You’re trying to convince yourself, right?” I said.
“Right,” he said.
“Can I ask one thing?” It was one thing among a bunch, and probably the least important. “Why were you so early to pick me up?”
Dad frowned, trying to remember. “Oh yes. Funny, but that seems like a long time ago. I came early because I got a text from the Plattsfield-Winklebottom Memorial Sixth-Grade Players, which—come to think of it—is strange on its own. Do the players have their own wireless account?”
“Not that I ever heard of. What did the text say?” I asked.
“ ‘Rehearsal canceled due to cold weather’—something like that. ‘Parents should hasten to retrieve children.’ ”
“Hasten?”
We were pulling into the garage by this time. Dad turned off the wipers, turned off the ignition, stuffed the keys in his pocket. “Yeah, strange all around. I’ll show you the text when we get inside.”
“I don’t think you’re going to find it, Dad.”
We got out of the car and made our way into the mudroom, where I dropped my backpack. We wiped our feet, hung up our coats.
In the kitchen, Dad sat down at the table. “I think I’ll just take one more look at the script,” he said. “What was it we were talking about?”
“Doesn’t matter,” I said. “Weird day, huh?”
“Weird day,” he agreed. “Oh, and I have a question too. Whose idea was the ketchup?”
CHAPTER FORTY
(SCENE: 1950s-style kitchen showing little sign of updating. Flurrying snow visible through window over the sink. NOAH and MOM are eating breakfast at a Formica table. DAD, dressed in clothes from the day before, unshaven, bleary-eyed, also seated at the table, writing in a notebook. Several books on Shakespeare and theater are stacked beside him. DAD pours coffee from a carafe into his mug, ladles three spoons of sugar from a sugar bowl. MOM and NOAH watch.)
MOM: I think you’re taking this a little too seriously, dear.
DAD (doesn’t break concentration at first, then realizes he’s being watched): No, no, I don’t think so. It’s one of the greatest plays ever written, you know. Possibly the greatest.
MOM: I’m more of a Tempest girl myself, but that aside, you don’t have to do much. Show up. Rally the players with a pep talk. Look over the props. Look over the costumes. Keep the set from falling down.
NOAH: Cue Diego.
MOM: Cue Diego, of course.
NOAH: Basically, Dad, you’re backup for Mia.
MOM: What matters now is whatever Mike, the ghost, did.
NOAH (surprised, looks at MOM): You know he’s a ghost—was a ghost?
MOM (grins, shrugs): It’s all the talk at Sal’s.
NOAH: And at Sal’s… do people believe it?
MOM (takes sip of coffee, shrugs): I’m not sure about belief. But everyone loves a good story, even your father. Earth to Larry McNichol? Dear?
DAD (once again, after a beat, becomes aware of the silence and that both MOM and NOAH are looking at him): What? Excuse me, but I’m rather busy. I just want to be sure I understand Ophelia’s motivation in her scene with Hamlet. Is it love? Or mere infatuation?
MOM: Love. Otherwise her drowning is meaningless. Please feel free to come to me with further questions… anytime after my talk on Miss Dickinson, that is. (She checks the time on the stovetop clock.) Okay, you two. It’s a workday if
anyone remembers. And I’m due to provide astute analysis of frost images in Emily Dickinson’s late poems in fifty-nine minutes and counting. Are you driving, dear?
DAD (without looking up): I’m taking a snow day.
MOM and NOAH (chorus): What?
DAD: Hasn’t anyone else looked out the window?
MOM: It’s only a flurry! The college is open. Don’t you have to teach a class…?
DAD: My TA can teach it. She needs the experience. I have a lot to get through to get ready for tonight.
MOM (raises eyebrows, looks at NOAH, shakes her head): I seem to remember someone saying that art, theater in particular, is trivial in the face of the challenges we humans face today. I seem to remember someone saying only technology can save us, that “all else is folly.”
NOAH: Shakespeare?
DAD: Tolstoy. (He checks clock.) Look at the time. Noah, get your coat; you’ll be late. There’s a rule—I looked it up last night—that if you’re not in school on the day of an extracurricular, like the Sixth-Grade Play, for example, you can’t participate. Whatever happens, we can’t risk that.
NOAH (sighs): ’Tis true, ’tis pity, and pity ’tis, ’tis true.
DAD: Act two.
MOM (rolls eyes, stands up): Never mind, dear. I’ll take him. I’ve been working on this talk for six months. I have to give it in (consults clock) fifty-four minutes, but I see that you are much too busy.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Mom and I got in the car. I buckled my seat belt.
“Dad’s lost it,” I announced.
Mom looked over her shoulder, backed out of the garage. “But in a good cause,” she said.
“If he tries to change anything, he’ll mess it up. I mean, the dress rehearsal was a mess, but we got through it, and Diego hardly dropped a line.” I had jumped into the car so quickly, I hadn’t stowed my backpack. It was in my lap. Now I hugged it to me, shifted in my seat.
“I feel your fear,” Mom said. “But if Mike has you on firm enough footing, you guys will roll forward like a juggernaut, secure in your own momentum, no force powerful enough to divert you from your course.”
Noah McNichol and the Backstage Ghost Page 13