by Anne Tenino
“Way to make an entrance, guys.”
“Yeah, sorry. I had to make sure the sixteen windows Gins has to fly through tomorrow were ready to go.”
Ginsberg groaned. “Derrick, get out the ice packs, honey. I’ll need some TLC tomorrow.”
Derrick chuckled. “You don’t fool me. You love it.”
Nate put his hand on the small of Seth’s back. “Everybody, this is Seth. Seth—Carter, Derrick, and you already know Ginsberg.”
Ginsberg lifted a hand in greeting. “Hey, Seth.”
Derrick, on the other hand, mock-scowled. “I hear your grandma is planning to give us some competition.”
“Damn it, is that rumor already making the rounds?” Seth grimaced apologetically as they sat. “I was going to talk to you guys about it once we know what’s happening with the place, but the way things are going, you might never have to worry—”
“Don’t listen to him.” Ginsberg poked Derrick in the ribs. “Giving customers a choice is a good thing. It’ll encourage us to step up our game.”
“Yay, capitalism.” Seth met Nate’s gaze. “I think?”
Nate chuckled. “Absolutely.”
The seat on the other side of Carter was occupied by a twentysomething girl, and judging by the way her gaze was glued to his profile, she wouldn’t be seeing much of the action onstage.
“Isn’t Levi joining you?” Nate asked.
Carter snorted. “Not likely. I want to enjoy the show, thanks.”
“But you and Levi are famous for watching things together. I’ve heard stories—”
“Movies at our house, yeah. Or shows he’s not involved in. But something he’s directed? No way. He telegraphs.”
Seth blinked. “He what?”
Carter smiled. “He’d never do it as an actor, but when he directs, he knows everything—and I mean everything—that happens onstage. So he anticipates what’s coming next. If you watch him, you know when to brace for incoming, because he tenses up, leans back in his seat like this.” Carter pushed himself back, gripping the seat rests, his head half-turned away, jaw clenched. “Spoils the surprise for the rest of the audience. Plus, he huffs.”
“Huffs?”
“Whenever something happens that he doesn’t like—an actor dropping a line, a missed lighting cue—” he grinned at Nate “—an effect that doesn’t go off as planned. He makes this disgusted huffing sound. Trust me. You don’t want to sit next to him at a performance. Nobody does.”
The house lights started to dim, and Seth leaned close to Nate and whispered out of the side of his mouth. “Exactly how many surprises do we have to brace for?”
Nate nudged Seth’s shoulder with his own. “Shock and awe. You’ll see.”
As the house went dark and the curtain rose, Seth patted Nate’s hand. “But you’ll save me, won’t you, Obi-Wan?”
Prompted by a flutter in his belly, Nate laced their fingers together. “Absolutely.”
Seth glanced at him sidelong, but didn’t pull away.
Can’t get more perfect than this.
The first act effects went off without a hitch, and the audience response was exactly what Nate had intended—although this time, he filtered the success through Seth’s reactions. When the Creature disappeared from the table, Seth jerked against his arm, and when it appeared suddenly in the corner of the lab, Seth clasped his other hand around Nate’s, gripping it tight.
Did I think it couldn’t get more perfect? I was wrong.
When Shannon’s character, Justine, was wrongfully hanged at the end of the first act, Seth flinched and then released Nate’s hand, going very still as he stared intently at the stage. Shit. It’s like Adeline’s story. I should have thought about that. Warned him.
When the house lights came up, Nate turned and grasped Seth’s arm. “I’m sorry. I should have realized this might be a trigger for you. I—”
“No. It’s okay. I mean, it’s not okay, obviously, for Adeline, but I’m fine. I hadn’t really thought about the details of her, you know, situation, but that kind of brought it home.”
“Want to go grab a drink in the lobby? I doubt they’ll have anything as tasty as that drink you invented the other night, but we might be able to score a beer or some wine.”
“Definitely could use a drink.” As they stood and made their way to the lobby, Seth shoved his hands in his pockets and glanced back at the stage. “You know, I thought I knew this story. But jeez. I’m gonna have nightmares for a week.”
Nate rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah, about that . . .”
“You’re telling me the second act isn’t gonna help me sleep better?”
“I seriously doubt it.”
“Better make that drink a double.”
During intermission, they chatted with Carter, Ginsberg, and Derrick while they sipped beer from tiny plastic cups—although Seth might have downed his first one in two gulps (not that Nate was watching the way his Adam’s apple nudged the edge of his golden stubble). Talk about shock and awe.
Ah, hell—I’m rolling with it. So when they took their seats for the second act, Nate threaded their fingers together and rested their clasped hands on his knee. A smile spread over Seth’s face as the curtain rose, and he gave Nate’s hand a squeeze before turning to the stage.
As the climax of the play grew nearer—and with it, one of the more startling effects—Nate found himself watching Seth almost as much as the actors. But then he got involved too—Levi had done a great job staging this show, and the actors were turning in stellar performances, amateurs or not.
When Victor destroyed the Creature’s prospective mate (and Shannon’s Justine died a second time), Seth shivered. So naturally Nate had to put an arm around him. For comfort purposes only, of course. Whose comfort would that be, exactly?
With Seth warm against him, despite the armrest cutting into his side, Nate forced himself to focus on the stage. Elle, as Elizabeth, paced across the bedroom—the very scene Nate had first witnessed when he’d answered Levi’s distress call.
She pushed aside the heavy velvet drapes, and Darla’s moonlight special bathed her in an eerie glow. A muffled thump sounded, and she whirled, her hand flying to her mouth. She crept toward the door, but halfway there, she noticed a tiny mound of dust on the floor. She frowned—the dust hadn’t been there when she’d passed by on her way to the window.
A trickle of dust drifted down to settle on the mound, and she followed the line of it—past her waist, her shoulders, the top of her head, all the way to the ceiling.
Bam!
A giant fist crashed through the ceiling, and the audience—Seth included—jumped, half of them shrieking along with Elizabeth as the Creature dropped through the hole to land in a crouch in front of her.
He rose slowly as she backed away, until he towered over her—Jack had gotten the set proportions exactly right, forcing the perspective of the walls so the Creature looked even larger and Elizabeth more fragile.
Elizabeth began to scream, the Creature blocking her body from the audience’s view. Her scream rose to a crescendo—and then cut off.
A beat. Two. Three. Then the Creature dropped his arms to his sides, and Elizabeth crumpled to the floor, her blue eyes wide and sightless in death.
Blackout.
Following the latest family meeting disaster, Seth had spent most of the day talking himself out of arson.
Tonight was about Nate and this play, though. Seth didn’t feel like dragging his pretentious, overbearing, sordid relatives into the spotlight again. Fortunately once the play started, he forgot all about them.
When the monster had come through the ceiling, Seth had jumped and screeched along with half the audience. The moment resonated with him, with the need that he had to do something over the top. The show was over, they’d applauded, and he was following Nate out of their row of seats when it hit him.
Nate could drop Frankenstein through Grandma’s ceiling.
Well, not Frankenste
in, but maybe . . . Fennimore? The ghost of Fennimore Larson.
Oh, that had a nice ring to it.
“Seth?” Nate was looking at him quizzically. They were standing still in the middle of the exiting crowd, people swarming past them like rocks in a river. “Anything wrong?”
“I just— I thought of something.” The idea burned so brightly he could feel it in his grin. “So.” He hooked his arm through Nate’s and started them forward again, sauntering along. “You like doing that stunt stuff, huh?”
“Please. This is stage magic, not ‘stunt stuff.’”
So cute, the way he got a tiny bit indignant. “Okay,” Seth said agreeably.
“What did you think of Ty’s big entrance in Elle’s death scene?”
Also cute, the way he wanted Seth’s opinion. “It was a stunner, that’s for sure, but you know what? You telegraph too. I mean, fantastic effect, but the way you tensed up right before? I knew something was coming.”
Nate raised an eyebrow. “Oh really?” He nudged Seth’s ribs with his elbow. “You still jumped a foot.”
“Hell yeah. Like I said, great trick. So great in fact, that I might have a proposition for you.” He’d meant to go on, but hearing himself, he suddenly wondered if Nate would think he was trying to put sex back on the table. Then he shook his head at himself internally. You need to get over this.
“Yeah? I’m listening.” That spark was already kindling in Nate’s eyes and he didn’t even know where Seth was going. Or did he?
They reached a door that led from the auditorium to a hallway behind the stage, and Seth reluctantly let go of Nate’s arm. “How’d you like to haunt a house?”
Nate’s grin was spectacular. Like Seth had presented him with a beautifully wrapped gift. And he saw where Seth was going immediately. “A house like, say, Sentinel House?”
“Yep.” Seth shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels, then forward onto his toes, sure his grin was matching Nate’s in wattage. “That’s exactly what I mean.”
Nate’s brow wrinkled, probably because his brilliant mind was already spewing forth brilliant ideas. “I can see how it would be fun, but how exactly will it work?”
“Oh, there’s a brilliant idea. Have a plan.” He snapped his fingers, and it apparently conjured up the first few details of one. “Well, I guess if we want word to get out that the house is haunted, we need someone to haunt. A victim. I have just the guy . . .” Haunting Sentinel House was an even better idea than Seth had first imagined. Not only would it show Kirk the extent of his and Grandma’s resolve, it was going to enable him to get even with Lucas.
“Won’t haunting the house—you’ll pardon the expression—scare off potential buyers? We don’t want to make it harder for your grandmother to sell.”
“Pshaw!” He executed an exaggerated forget about it wave. “We’re only haunting it as a stunt, temporarily. We can stop once the message gets pounded through my uncle’s thick skull.”
“And that message is?”
“That if he’s going to refuse to listen to reason? We’ll resort to being unreasonable.”
The grin melted off Nate’s face. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m totally onboard in theory, but we’ve already had one plan backfire on us. The last thing you need is another family shit-storm. Are you sure this’ll give you the desired results?”
Okay, that deserved honest thought. “I think so. We’ll have to run it by Grandma, of course, but if I’m right, this is exactly the kind of thing she wants to do. And really, I’m not sure the first plan backfired so much as didn’t produce all of the desired effects.”
Nate’s question was obvious in his expression, he didn’t need to voice it.
“This would be like . . . showing him the strength of our resolve. Making a spectacle of the house—making it an object of gossip—is what he wants to avoid. So, we do exactly that. Shannon’s article? That was the civilized protest march, next step is a more radical form of civil disobedience.”
As he explained it, Nate’s brow smoothed out, then he began nodding along, and by the time he had finished, Nate was exactly how Seth liked him best—lit up with excitement. Dancing eyes and spectacular grin.
“I’ve got a few ideas already, although I might need Morgan’s help for a couple of them. The game is definitely on.”
Excellent. Now all he had to do was talk Grandma into it. Although he was sure that wouldn’t be difficult.
A haunted house. How cool was that? Nate used to stage one in his mother’s garage from the time he was eight until he’d left for college. Now that he had more advanced skills though—and a sidekick like Morgan—he could take the effects to the next level, all for Seth’s benefit. It had to be subtle though. Nothing too gruesome or outrageous. Something that could skate so close to the edge of possibility that they could push their victim squarely into the I’m a believer camp.
As Nate was mentally cataloging options, Levi caught sight of him and barreled over, movie-star grin lighting his face. He pumped Nate’s hand. “I can’t thank you enough.”
“I didn’t do all that much. You did it—you and your cast and crew. I hope you get the audiences you deserve, because, hell’s bells, man. You all hit it out of the fricking park. Well done.”
“The effects had a lot to do with it. If you—”
“Leonato.”
Nate froze. Nobody called him by his birth name. Nobody except . . .
He turned around and there she was, in the Chanel-covered flesh: three-time Tony winner, umpteen-time winner of any other directing prize you could name, the woman who’d convinced Nate he’d been conceived from a vial of anonymous frozen sperm. Her hair had gone completely silver since he’d last seen her in person fourteen years ago, but—typical of Iris—the style, reminiscent of a classic Audrey Hepburn pixie cut, was impeccable.
“Iris. What are you doing here?”
Her mouth tightened a fraction, and in the harsh fluorescent light of the hallway, every line on her face was cast into unflattering shadow. “When have I ever missed one of your opening nights?”
Nate was weirdly comforted by Seth’s presence at his side. “You—”
She turned a gracious smile on Levi. “Since Leonato hasn’t done the honors, allow me to introduce myself.” She held out one fine-boned hand. “Iris Bedrosian.” Levi took it with an odd half bow, as if he were greeting royalty. Yeah, my mother has that effect on people. And really, in theater terms, she was royalty.
As she chatted with Levi, congratulating him on the show, tucking her hand in his arm to stroll down the hall to meet the cast, Seth leaned close, pressing against Nate’s side. “So. Your mom, huh?”
“Unfortunately. I can’t believe she’d show up unannounced.”
Seth gave him some side-eye. “Okay, seriously? If she’d announced herself, would you have been here to greet her?”
Fair point. But still . . . “Tonight should be about the cast, about Levi—not a showcase for Iris Bedrosian, slumming it in Bluewater Bay.”
“I think you’re being kinda unfair. She’s not doing any overt spotlight stealing.”
Nate frowned, drawing away from Seth. “I told you what she did. What it meant to me and my father.”
Pulling him into a little nook, Seth lowered his voice. “Yeah, but she came all the way here, to Bluewater Bay, just because you staged a few tricks for a community theater troupe. My mother won’t even pay for her own drinks when she shows up at Ma Cougar’s to harass me. I have to deal with the lecture and pick up her tab.”
“But—”
“Your mom is proud of you. Look, you’ve refused to see her for years, and I can’t imagine she wanted your reunion to be here.” Seth glanced her way. “She came because she wants to be in your life so much she’s willing to risk public humiliation.”
Nate huffed out a breath. “Your mother probably didn’t tell you your father was essentially a turkey baster though.”
“No, although she might ha
ve wished he was sometimes.” Seth stroked Nate’s arm. Nice. “Look, your mom was what, twenty-four, twenty-five, when she got pregnant?”
“Twenty-two, actually.”
“Maybe you could cut her a little slack, then. I mean, I can’t claim every decision I made at that age was brilliant. Jesus, I can’t manage brilliance now. Besides, how do you think she found out about the show?”
“It’s not a secret.”
“It’s not a secret in Bluewater Bay, but she was where? New York?”
“Minneapolis at the moment, I think. The Guthrie.”
“Somehow, I doubt the Bluewater Bay Community Players are big news in the Twin Cities, know what I’m saying?”
“I guess.”
Seth poked him gently in the ribs. “So who did you tell about this gig?”
“Nobody. Just my . . . my father.” Christ, could his parents actually be in contact with one another? True, he’d never asked his father how he felt about the whole thing—not after weathering that first furious confrontation when the truth had finally come out.
“So maybe other interested parties have decided to forgive and forget, yeah?”
Nate shrugged as he watched his mother obviously charming the collective pants off Levi and the rest of the cast. When he was a kid, he’d been the recipient of that charm too—he’d never questioned her devotion to him, had trusted her implicitly until that trust was shattered by the fundamental lie of his paternity. He didn’t know if their relationship could ever get back to that point again—it was like one of the breakaway windows he manufactured by the hundreds: once shattered, it was destroyed for good.
But maybe he could build a different kind of connection. God knows, I’m the master of unconventional relationships.
Seth nudged him again. “Come on. She’s taken the first step. Give it a shot. If it doesn’t work, you can always go back to the way things were before. At least you can try.”
“Yeah. You’re right.” He took Seth’s hand. “But you’re with me, right?”