Freshman Year & Other Unnatural Disasters

by Meredith Zeitlin

  She doesn’t go away. Instead she sneers, “Seriously, two freshmen with lead parts this year … what was Zinner thinking? Well, I’m sure you’re super excited about yours.” Then she looks at Ned and they both snort with laughter in a very obnoxious way.

  “Yeah, thanks, that’s really nice of you. Um … I don’t actually know who—”

  “You don’t? Oh, no wonder you don’t seem excited yet!” Julie practically shrieks. “Well, Ned, why don’t you tell Kelsey about her role—after all, you two have a big scene together, right?”

  “Yes, a pivotal one,” Ned says pompously. “My character’s dramatic arc in Act One centers in part around—” He shuts up when he sees Julie glaring at him. He clears his throat. “Lazar Wolf is the butcher who asks for Tevye’s eldest daughter’s hand.”

  Julie starts cracking up. So do several drama groupies who have stepped away from the cast list to eavesdrop on Almighty Ned.

  I’m still lost.

  “I didn’t know there were women butchers in … um, olden times. Was that in the movie?” I inquire.

  “No, it’s much better than that,” Julie chokes out. “They must’ve run out of guys, or maybe they just saw something really special in you, because Lazar Wolf is”—she gasps for air—“the fat old butcher. A male butcher. A big, fat, old man. And you’re playing him. Hahahahaha!”

  Hahahahaha!

  Wait. What?

  26

  Julie is still crying with laughter as she drags Ned off. The groupies follow them, bowing and scraping. Meanwhile, I am rooted to the spot, aghast at the news.

  How could this have happened? I can’t play a man! Certainly not an old fat butcher! Is this because I sang so low at the audition? Did they think I was actually a guy?

  There is no way I am being in this play. No. Way. I mean, why?! Is God punishing me because I made three mistakes during my bat mitzvah service two years ago? Surely I can tell Mr. Zinner that I made a huge error auditioning in the first place and that I want out, right?

  I storm out of school without waiting for any of my friends. By the time I get home, I’m still not sure if I should write a heartfelt resignation letter to Mr. Zinner or suck it up and try to get excited about the fact that I did sort of get a lead part. I hang up my bag and am about to holler up the stairs to see if anyone is around when the front door opens and my sister and my mom come in. Travis is munching away on a humungous ice cream cone.

  “Mom, what are you doing home from work so early?” I ask suspiciously.

  She bursts into tears and I think, Oh my God, what’s wrong with her? Is she sick? Does Travis have a tumor or something? I grasp the edge of the counter and whisper, “Mom, what’s going on?”

  She takes a deep breath and looks down at my sister and says through the remaining tears, “Well, Travis. Tell your sister the news!”

  “I’m playing Annie in the fourth-grade play,” Travis announces haughtily. “That’s the star, FYI.”

  “Wait, what? I thought someone was dying!”

  “Travis is playing Annie!” Mom exclaims. “Isn’t that so exciting? I always said you girls take after me, even if you look just like your father. He ruined both of you with that nose … Oh, Kelsey, did you have your audition yet? How did that go?”

  I seriously cannot believe this is happening.

  Would now be the best time to tell them that I, too, am about to be a big star? Yeah … I think not. I half listen to my mother gush over her favorite child while imagining what my life is going to be like as the next Willow Smith’s pathetic, butcher-portraying older sister.

  I call Em as soon as I can escape and tell her about the afternoon’s events. She gets all excited about the Travis part for some reason. I mean, I guess it’s very nice that Trav is going to star in her school play, but I kind of want Em to be more “That sucks that you got cast as an elderly, obese male butcher” and less “Travis is going to be Annie? That’s so cute!”

  Sometimes I think Em’s only real flaw is that she’s an only child.

  The more I think about it, the more ridiculous this whole thing is. But why should I resign? I got a lead part—exactly what I wanted! Sure, it wasn’t exactly the role I would’ve chosen … but so what? I said I was going to make my mark this year, and this is what I’ve got to work with.

  No one ever said it would be easy.

  27

  Rehearsals for Fiddler start the next Monday afternoon, with something called a “table read.” I sort of thought it would be fancier than just sitting around a table and reading, but apparently not. During the entire thing this junior guy in the chorus (who apparently coveted my supporting role and has to be the Innkeeper/Russian Soldier/Bottle Dancer instead, har har) keeps shooting me the dirtiest looks ever. Which makes me feel elated and terrified at the same time. I also learn that in rehearsals we all just wear our regular clothes and stuff, so I’m even more cheered up—I mean, is it really any more ridiculous to believe that I’m a butcher than it is for Em to be portraying a forty-year-old mother of six living in a shtetl?

  It only takes a week to discover that rehearsals, contrary to what I had envisioned, are incredibly tedious and boring. Cassidy always talked about theater like it was this exclusive, fabulous thing where everyone is very serious and intense and creative—I imagined a lot of crying, yelling, waving scripts around, and having big dramatic breakthroughs. Then afterward everyone would hug each other for support or something like in Glee.

  It turns out that instead it’s mostly just a bunch of sitting around. Well, the upperclassmen definitely hug about a thousand times a day as though they may never see each other again, which is pretty weird. Also, Ned does wave his script around while muttering his lines incessantly. I’m surprised Julie isn’t there, too, just so she can hold his script for him when he isn’t waving it.

  I mostly sit in the audience with Em and the other freshmen in the chorus, doing homework or eating and gossiping about school stuff. There was one interesting moment on the third day, though, when Ned went up to JoJo and announced, “I think it would be really beneficial to your process if we spent some time improvising as father and daughter. I’m a Method actor, like Brando. Have you seen On the Waterfront?”

  JoJo started cracking up. Ned got really pissed and stormed backstage; now he won’t talk to any of the freshmen at all. Of course, he never talked to most of us in the first place—he only deigned to acknowledge JoJo because she’s a lead.

  Sometimes the whole cast spends the afternoon watching Mr. Zinner and his assistant stomp around on the stage pretending to be us and whispering to each other, “Would a circle be more authentic here? Should they hold hands? Let’s try holding hands and moving in a grapevine step.”

  At first that’s pretty hilarious as far as entertainment goes, but it gets old after about two days. Especially since, when the cast does get to go onstage, we just stand in our places forever while Zinner and Co. run around in the audience seeing how we look from different angles.

  Meanwhile, Mr. Mackler has yet to come to a rehearsal and teach us any music. On the first day Mr. Zinner announced, “Speaking the lyrics before singing them will help us really understand them. Be the words. Feel your roots in the words.”

  I don’t know about anyone else, but I think since this is a musical we might want to learn some of the songs.

  In the middle of the third week, Jill, the junior playing Tevye’s wife, Golde, flops down in the seat next to me. “Hey, Kelsey,” she says. “Want some Swedish Fish?”

  “Sure, thanks!” It’s pretty awesome for a junior to actually be friendly to me. I like Jill a lot; she’s had a lead in the play—as a female, mind you—since she was a freshman, and I get the feeling the kids who were upperclassmen then gave her a hard time about it. Despite all the rumors about her being stuck-up and a show-off, she’s super sweet.

  Cassidy worships her, of course. Jill has an amazing voice and wants to study theater in college. She also tells us lots of good insi
der gossip about the drama department—like that Mr. Zinner is having a torrid affair with Mr. Mackler and everyone knows about it, even though Mr. Zinner is always talking about all the women he supposedly “Knocks senseless with recitations of Shakespearean sonnets—something you boys might want to try” (insert creepy wiggly eyebrows here). Gross.

  I swallow the Swedish Fish, then ask, “Want me to run your lines with you?”

  “Ugh, I can’t even look at them anymore. Who cares about whether my daughter marries a tailor or not? I’m sorry, but I hate this show. I know it’s a classic, but … it’s so boring!”

  “Yeah, I said the same thing when they announced it. Why did they pick it in the first place?”

  “Oh, as a showcase for Ned. They always do that for whoever the favorite senior who does drama is. He told Zinner he thought playing Tevye would look really good on his résumé,” Jill explains.

  “Yeah, I’m sure playing a forty-five-year-old milkman in a high school show is really going to impress the bigwigs on Broadway.” Jill covers her mouth, laughing. I continue, “But then, Ned is seriously so deluded that he probably thinks it will.”

  “True. So, I got the inside scoop that we’re going to actually be allowed to move onstage today.”

  “Seriously? Does Zinner really think we’re ready for such an enormous challenge?”

  “Apparently. We’re doing the opening number, so get psyched.”

  Lo and behold, Jill is right—the whole cast is finally summoned to do some alleged choreography. Despite Mr. Zinner’s helpfully pounding out the rhythm to the opening number on the side of the stage, we’re a mess. I’m just speculating here, but it’s probably because we’re speaking the words to a song that’s written in four overlapping parts.

  “NO, NO, NO, NO!” Mr. Zinner screams encouragingly. “Actors, listen to me! You are Jewish peasants, not elephants! You have pride, you have tradition, you have love for your people! Stop that clomping! Women, let me see the love for your children! Hold them to your bosoms! Men, show me your faith in your God! Tradition! Tradition! Traditiiiiioooooonnnnnn!”

  At least three people crack up at the word bosoms before Mr. Zinner has a fit and cancels the rest of the day’s rehearsal.

  I may have been one of those people.

  The rest of the week, Mr. Zinner calms down enough to block the other big numbers. (Blocking, I am informed, is the theater word for telling people where to stand onstage, when to enter, move around, etc.) We’re still pretty terrible, but Zinner deems us worthy of moving on anyway. That means the in-between scenes have to be dealt with. I’m only in about three of them, so I still have to do a lot of sitting around, which bites.

  I turn to Em and JoJo and ask, “Why do we have to be here at all? Couldn’t we just come in on the days we’re doing something?”

  Before either one can answer, Cassidy says loudly, “I wish all the actors in this play knew how to be supportive of the cast as a whole and not just worry about their individual scenes. I guess we can’t all be professionals.”

  Interesting, I think. By the way, we aren’t professionals.

  I roll my eyes at Em, who gives me a look that I know means, Why don’t you and Cass talk this out and make up so we can all go back to the way things were before?

  Fat chance. I love Em, but forget it. I know she wants all of us to be able to hang out again—instead of alternating between the three of them and the three of us—but Cass is the one who keeps making things worse. At this point, she doesn’t even seem like someone I’d want to be friends with.

  Now it’s day one of week four rehearsals, and I’m in the front row of the audience doing an outline for biology class while intermittently looking over my lines, which I haven’t said out loud since the table read. JoJo is in the number that’s getting rehearsed onstage—something to do with brooms and an old matchmaker. I can barely tear my eyes away from the action, let me tell you.

  I hear the doors at the back of the theater open and turn to look. Oh, God. It’s the cute guy from the newspaper office. Why is he here?

  I try to hide behind my script as I watch the most interesting thing that’s happened all week. He goes over and says something to Mr. Zinner, who nods feverishly in response. Then the guy collects Ned and Jill and a few other people with big parts in the show and they head out of the auditorium.

  Huh. I guess he’s interviewing them for the paper or something. I wonder what the headline will be? Maybe: “SPRING MUSICAL GUARANTEED TO BE TOTAL ARTISTIC FAILURE!” or “STUDENT ACTORS DIE OF ENNUI BEFORE SHOW EVEN OPENS!”

  I turn back to the stage, where Mr. Zinner is now making JoJo and the other girls who play the daughters watch as he acts out all their parts himself. This includes dancing around on tiptoe, lovingly cradling a broom and then pretending to be a scary witch of some sort. He’s actually not half bad. I’m starting to think it would make a lot more sense if we scrapped Fiddler altogether and just helped Mr. Zinner put on a one-man show.

  I’m halfway through texting this idea to JoJo when there’s a tap on my shoulder. I turn around. It’s the paper guy. He’s grinning—what a surprise.

  “Hey, I thought that was you,” he says, leaning against the back of my seat. “Are you actually in this play, or just filing a complaint about it?”

  “Ha, ha. Very funny,” I reply. “What are you doing here? Taking embarrassing pictures and ruining innocent lives?”

  “Exactly! That’s what we pride ourselves on doing at The Reflector, you know.”

  “Oh, believe me, I know. Hey, there’s good news, though; the caf staff said I’m welcome to pick up a few extra bucks working the lunch line anytime.”

  See? I can laugh at myself. And hey—full sentences today! Go me!

  Paper Guy chuckles. “Nice. Hey, Lexi wrote a great article for the new issue, by the way.” Aha! I knew he remembered her name. Now he’ll probably ask me for her number, right?

  “Oh, yeah—she was really excited about it. She won’t let me read it until it’s published, though, so I haven’t seen it yet. I’m psyched for her.”

  “Well, I shouldn’t do this, buuuut,” he murmurs quietly, looking around like he’s about to do something extremely dangerous and top secret. It’s very cute and silly, and makes me almost not hate him for being so cocky all the time.

  He reaches into his bag, whispering now. “If you want a sneak peek at it, I happen to have a copy of the new edition with me. Can you keep it under your hat?”

  He holds out this month’s Reflector and then snatches it back when I reach for it. “I need you to swear! I’m breaking all kinds of protocol here!”

  “Gee, I don’t know,” I hesitate, playing along. “I mean, are you sure you can trust me with something of this magnitude? I’ve been known to cause trouble for your staff.”

  “Well, there’s something in it I think you’ll want to see, too,” he says, smiling again and handing over the paper. “You’ll have to let me know what you think.” Really? Well, that’s mysterious. I wonder what—

  His phone buzzes and he glances down at it to read the text. “Oh, gotta split. See ya!”

  And then he’s gone. I’m about to dive into the paper to figure out what he was talking about when I’m summoned to the stage. Dammit! I shove the paper in my backpack to look at later.

  We’re halfway through the run-through of the opening number when I realize … I still don’t know Newspaper Guy’s name.

  28

  A couple of excruciatingly long hours later, I walk through my front door, thoroughly exhausted by musical theater, a certain smart-alecky boy who works on the paper, and life in general.

  In a rare turn of events, my sister is actually setting the table. Of course, she is wearing the Annie costume my mother bought her, as she has been for weeks now. You know, the red dress with the little belt? She changes into it the second she gets home from school every day. I’m frankly amazed that my parents put their collective feet down about her wearing it to school
every day. When I told my parents about the play I’m in, did they offer to buy me my own deli-meat slicer? No. Of course not.

  All I can think about is running up to my room to look through The Reflector—what could possibly be in it? The train was too crowded to get it out on the way home, and it’s practically burning a hole in my backpack. But I’m only halfway up the stairs when my mother hollers, “Kelsey Finkelstein! Get down here and help your sister!”

  “Help her how exactly? By handing her forks?” I say, still poised with one foot on the stair above the other.

  “Kelsey, please don’t argue with me. I’m tired and I’m hungry and I’ve had it with your Typical Adolescent Beha—”

  “Ugh, fine!” I stomp back down, hurling my backpack on the floor next to the stairs. I plan to eat as quickly as possible and make my escape.

  Once we sit down at the table, Mom announces, “Girls, I need you to find out about tickets for your plays ASAP.”

  Travis looks up from the spaghetti she is smearing on herself and says, “Mommy, there are no tickets. It’s just during assembly period one day.”

  “Oh,” Mom says, looking miffed. I guess she won’t be allowed to bring in the local news team to assembly period. Bummer. “Well, then you, Kelsey. Find out. Everyone’s coming to your big debut and I want good seats.”

  Wait a second, what? “Uh, who is ‘everyone,’ exactly?”

  “Well, us, of course,” Mom explains. “And Daddy’s partners, their wives and kids. The Goldsteins and the Eakeleys will come. We have to invite the Wurgafts and the Udells from temple—oh, and the Harrises. I’m sure Aunt Eve will want to come. Maybe some of the women from my tennis game … Marv, do you think your cousin Dana would enjoy the show? You know she never gets to the theater anymore …”