The Darlings Are Forever

by Melissa Kantor

  Her voice steady, Natalya answered the question she knew Morgan had meant rhetorically. “I can’t, actually.”

  Morgan stopped walking but didn’t turn around all the way.

  Instead, she glanced over her shoulder. “What?”

  “I’ve got some people I want to see,” Natalya explained.

  In the look on Morgan’s face, Natalya had her answer: Yes, she had to make a choice.

  It was Morgan or. Morgan or Jordan. Morgan or Colin. Morgan or Jane.

  Morgan or Natalya.

  Morgan wrinkled her perfect forehead. “Seriously?” her voice was incredulous.

  Natalya nodded slowly. “Seriously.”

  And just like that a door slammed shut between them. Morgan rolled her eyes, then faced forward and headed down the corridor to the library, not even bothering to say goodbye. Natalya watched her go. Did Morgan hate her now? Were she, Sloane, and Katrina going to be mean to her for the next four years? Or was she less than a blip on their radar, someone they’d barely remember having hung out with, much less care to punish?

  It was hard to know which was worse, and as she headed toward the cafeteria, Natalya forced herself not to think about it. She had more immediate concerns. She’d told Morgan she had some people she wanted to see.

  The question was, did they want to see her?

  Natalya crossed the threshold of the cafeteria and scanned the room for Jordan, Perry, and Catherine. They were sitting just across the aisle from the door, and almost the second she spotted Jordan, Jordan glanced up and saw Natalya looking at her. Her eyebrows shot up in surprise.

  Natalya pointed at herself, then pointed at the table. For a long beat, Jordan didn’t respond. Natalya held her stare, and finally, Jordan smiled.

  “Guess you missed us, huh?” she called.

  Natalya laughed with happiness and relief. She had missed Jordan and her friends. As she crossed over to sit with them, she knew she was finally making the right choice.

  NORMALLY JANE LOVED the excitement of opening night. Everyone on edge, laughing for no reason, freaking out because they’ve suddenly forgotten their lines, the sizzle and buzz of dozens of people in one space all thinking about that magic moment when the curtain goes up and you’re in free fall in front of an audience. By six o’clock, Fran was walking around in her bra and underwear singing “Give My Regards to Broadway” at the top of her lungs, and almost every girl in the dressing room was joining in.

  Jane was quiet. She slipped into her costume without any help, and headed over to where Wendy and Sharon and some girls she’d never met before were making people up. As Wendy stroked foundation onto her cheek, Jane tried to get into character by conjuring the exercises Mr. Robbins had had them do the first day of rehearsal. But remembering their walks through imaginary forests, amusement parks, and sweet sixteens only reminded her of Mr. Robbins, and thinking of Mr. Robbins only reminded her of what she’d said to him after dress rehearsal.

  And memories of what she’d said to him made her positive she couldn’t walk onto that stage.

  She hadn’t been able to call Natalya or Victoria back. How could she tell them what had happened? Natalya was right. Victoria was right. She thought she knew everything, but really she knew nothing. She had no self-control. There was something seriously wrong with her. No one who knew what she had done would want to be her friend.

  “Okay, can I have my cast, please?” Mr. Robbins called from the entrance to the girls’ dressing rooms, and slowly everyone filed out to the communal space between the boys’ and girls’ rooms. He was wearing a sports jacket and a pair of khakis, and Jane’s throat felt thick as she watched him and thought about how totally she’d misunderstood everything between them.

  He hadn’t said Jane was sexy, he’d said Hippolyta was sexy. And he’d given her that significant look during rehearsal because he was showing Matt how to look like someone in love; he was acting like he was in love. Acting. And he must have seen her walk out onstage before the dress rehearsal by herself, so he’d pulled her aside to be nice. He knew she was the only freshman in the cast, and he was probably worried that she’d gotten through the whole show without making any friends. Which she kind of had.

  Because she’d been so busy trying to get with him.

  The whole thing made perfect sense. Why hadn’t she listened to Natalya? How could she have asked her teacher if he wanted to go out for a drink? Her teacher.

  As the cast filled the room, Mr. Robbins looked from one actor to another, occasionally calling out instructions to the makeup people. “Can you give Lysander a little more color in his face?” he asked, and then, “Hermia needs more lip liner. Also, tone down the red cheeks.” He glanced at Jane, but she looked away too quickly for him to comment on her makeup.

  “Great!” he said, clapping his hands together once as he looked around the room. “I’ll keep it short since I already gave you my notes. You guys know this play. I’ve never worked with a more dedicated, talented, capable cast. It’s been an honor to direct you, and I know you’ll do me and yourselves proud tonight. I’m going to be watching from the booth, and I’ll be back here at intermission. Watch your pacing. Don’t just act, re-act.” There was a small group chuckle as he repeated the directions he’d uttered pretty much every day since they’d started rehearsing. “And what’s that other one?” He tapped the side of his head, pretending to have forgotten.

  “Have fun out there!” Fran shouted.

  Grinning, he snapped his fingers. “Right! Have fun out there. Okay, everybody, break a leg.” And with that, he was gone.

  “Ten minutes, everyone,” Wendy announced, and then, so quickly it seemed impossible for even a minute to have passed, Sharon walked through the room calling, “Places, everyone. Places for Act One, Scene One.”

  Jane’s stomach was in knots. She’d always thought people who got stage fright were stupid amateurs. You know why people get stage fright? she’d once said to her mom. Because they realize they suck.

  She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t do this.

  Everyone who was in the first scene filed out through the doors and into the wings, no one seeming to notice that Jane wasn’t with them.

  She was having trouble breathing.

  She was going to die. She couldn’t get enough oxygen. She sat down and put her head between her legs. Tears burned at the corners of her eyes. Why was this happening? How was this happening? It was too late for them to get her understudy, who was already in her fairy costume. The play wasn’t going to go on. She wouldn’t be known as the girl who made a pass at Mr. Robbins. She’d be known as the girl who ruined the production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

  In the midst of her panic, she heard a voice from the hallway. “I’m telling you, you can’t come backstage now. The play’s about to start.”

  “You don’t understand, you have to let us back there. It’s an emergency!” The voice was familiar, but Jane couldn’t place it through the roaring in her ears.

  “There’s no such thing as a theatrical emergency,” corrected the first voice. “Emergencies are about blood and death. And I don’t see any blood.”

  “Well, if you don’t get out of our way, you will,” said a third voice. And Jane lifted her head and stared at the door, which flew open a second later.

  Standing in front of it were Victoria and Natalya. They were each holding a bouquet of long-stemmed roses, Victoria’s white, Natalya’s pink.

  Jane got to her feet. She stared at her friends, and they stared at her. None of them said a word. It seemed to Jane that the entire building was holding its collective breath.

  And then, with no warning at all, Jane took a deep, shuddering breath.

  There was only one thing that could follow a breath like that.

  Tears.

  “Don’t cry!” Victoria yelled, crossing the distance between them and throwing her arm around Jane, not caring that her bouquet was being crushed by their hug. “You’l
l ruin your makeup.”

  Natalya raced over and put her arms around her friends. “Yes. Whatever you do, don’t cry,” she said, and then burst into tears.

  “Don’t you cry!” Jane protested, squeezing them both to her while blinking frantically. “Then I’ll cry!”

  “I’m so sorry,” Natalya whispered into Jane’s shoulder.

  “No, I’m so sorry,” Victoria said, pulling away to look at Jane and Natalya. “I’m so sorry. I totally let you down.” As she spoke, her eyes grew damp and tears began to run down her cheeks.

  “You guys, you have to stop.” Jane pressed her fingers to the corners of her eyes. “I’m serious. And if anyone’s sorry, it’s me, okay? I’m sorry. Now stop crying!”

  From the dressing room door, Wendy called, “Hippolyta, you need to get to your place.”

  Jane took a deep breath. “Oh god.” She put her hands out, and Natalya and Victoria each took one. They could feel how hard she was shaking. “Guys, I did such a stupid thing.”

  “What?” asked Victoria, eyes wide with concern.

  Jane didn’t say a word. She just stood there, feeling her friends’ warm hands transferring their strength to her. She squeezed their fingers so hard it hurt.

  “I’ll tell you after,” she whispered finally.

  “Hippolyta, we need you onstage now. Curtain going up in two.” Wendy beckoned Jane over frantically.

  “Okay,” said Jane, but she spoke to Natalya and Victoria, not Wendy. “Okay.” She nodded firmly. “I can do this.”

  Abruptly, she released their hands. “Hold my roses for me, okay?”

  They nodded, and she took a few steps in Wendy’s direction, then suddenly spun around.

  “Can I just tell you guys one thing?”

  “Sure,” said Victoria.

  “It’s like this…” She thought for a second, trying to find the words for what she’d recently discovered. “Sometimes…you’re afraid to do something for a reason. Let’s keep that in mind, darlings, okay?”

  “Sure,” agreed Victoria, grinning.

  “Okay,” echoed Natalya.

  Smiling at the wisdom of her insight, Jane gave Victoria and Natalya a tiny curtsy, then turned to follow Wendy through the dressing rooms and into the wings, ready to take her place onstage.

  GA GA NOODLE WAS PACKED.

  Jane, Natalya, and Victoria stared at each other in amazement, then looked back at the three long tables crowded with diners. The unfamiliar group took up more than half the room and was talking and laughing loudly enough for twice as many people as were actually there.

  It was like the girls had walked into the wrong restaurant or something.

  “Hello! Hello!” Tom rushed toward them carrying menus, then hustled them over to a small table they’d never sat at before. His cheeks were red and his forehead was coated with a thin sheen of sweat. “The usual?”

  “Um…” Jane began, but before she could answer, another waiter yelped out a command, and Tom nodded briefly before racing toward the kitchen.

  “What the…” asked Victoria. The girls studied the noisy group gathered in the restaurant they’d always considered their own. A chair with its back to them had balloons tied to it. HAPPY BIRTHDAY read one of them.

  “Mystery solved,” said Victoria, pointing at the Mylar bouquet. She turned back to her friends, grinning at Jane’s still heavily made-up face. “It’s too bad the party at the Met wasn’t tonight. You could have been an Amazon warrior and just gone straight from the show.”

  “I could have floated from the show.” Jane shook her head as she thought back to the play she’d just been in. Was it possible it was the same production they had stumbled through at Saturday’s dress rehearsal? “It was perfect, wasn’t it?”

  “It really was,” agreed Natalya. Her hands were still sore from clapping, and her ears rang from the standing ovation the actors had received.

  Victoria had never seen Jane perform so well or be in such a professional production. “That was like Broadway. I can’t wait for the next one.”

  Jane’s face fell. “Guys, I don’t know if there’ll be a next one. I did…I did something pretty dumb.” She toyed with the red paper wrapping on her chopsticks, then tore it off.

  “What?” asked Victoria, concerned. “What are you talking about?”

  Jane looked across the table at Natalya. “You were right. You remember, about chess?”

  Natalya’s eyes popped open. “Oh my god, did you two…?”

  “Wait, what?” demanded Victoria. She turned her head from Jane to Natalya. “What are you talking about?”

  Jane gave a bitter half-laugh and ripped her chopsticks apart. “First of all, there’s no ‘you two.’ There’s just me. Being. A total. Idiot.”

  “Will someone please tell me what happened!” wailed Victoria.

  Natalya reached over and put her hand on Jane’s. Then she turned to Victoria to explain. “Jane likes—”

  “Liked,” Jane corrected.

  “Liked,” Natalya repeated. “Her director. Mr. Robbins.”

  “Oh my god!” Victoria’s eyes opened as wide as Natalya’s.

  “And I think—” Natalya continued slowly, glancing toward Jane and trying to guess what might have happened.

  Jane finished for her. “Mr. Robbins does not like Jane. Which Jane discovered when she asked him out for a drink—”

  Victoria gasped.

  “And he rejected her.” Pressing her lips together, Jane clapped her hands and folded them in front of her at the conclusion of her sentence.

  “I’m really sorry, Jane,” Natalya whispered.

  Victoria didn’t speak.

  “So basically, it’s over for me,” Jane explained, rubbing at an eyebrow with her finger and streaking her forehead with thick black paint. “I’m done at the Academy.”

  “Oh Jane, that’s horrible,” said Nat, shaking her head slowly and sadly.

  There was a long silence, then suddenly Victoria spoke. “Oh, please,” she snorted.

  It was such an un-Victoria thing to say that Jane and Natalya just stared at her, too shocked to respond.

  “I’m sorry, did you not hear what I just said?” asked Jane.

  Victoria waved Jane’s question away. “I heard you. But you’re not done. No one as talented as you are is just done.”

  “I made a pass at my director.”

  Victoria shrugged and rolled her eyes. “Big deal. I was on the cover of a major newspaper. Holding a banana wearing a condom.” At the word condom, she burst into laughter.

  Jane stared at her friend. “I think ...” She looked at Natalya, who was also studying Victoria, a bewildered expression on her face. Jane turned back to Victoria. “Have you maybe gone a little crazy?”

  Victoria stopped laughing long enough to consider Jane’s question. “You know something? I think maybe I have.”

  “Me too,” Natalya informed them. She turned to Jane. “I think wanting to be friends with Morgan made me a little crazy.”

  Jane shook her head. “Don’t talk to me about how wanting something can make a person crazy, okay? Because I could like, write a book about it.”

  “You should write a play,” suggested Victoria.

  “Maybe I will,” said Jane. She smiled at the idea. “Maybe I’ll write a play and star in it.”

  “I’ll come!” promised Victoria.

  “Me too,” agreed Natalya.

  “By the way, Mr. Robbins will not be directing it,” Jane told them.

  “That’s probably for the best,” agreed Victoria. As soon as she said it, she started to laugh. So did Jane and Natalya. They laughed so hard their sides ached, and just when they had almost caught their breath, Jane squealed, “Oh my god! I think I just peed!” and they laughed until they cried. They’d been laughing together for longer than any of them could remember. It should have felt totally normal. But tonight it felt miraculous.

  “Anyway,” said Natalya, finally wiping her eyes and putting
her hand near Jane’s, “I just want to say I’m sorry I let Morgan ignore you.”

  Jane squeezed Natalya’s hand. Hard. “I’m sorry I gave you such a hard time for wanting to be her friend.”

  As she returned Jane’s squeeze, Natalya thought about the apology she’d e-mailed Colin. It wasn’t exactly a surprise that he hadn’t responded.

  Old friends forgave you.

  But Colin wasn’t an old friend.

  Suddenly Tom appeared, carrying a tray of piña coladas that they hadn’t ordered. He practically tossed them on the table and sped away. “I’ll be back for your orders,” he called over his shoulder.

  Jane looked around the table at her friends, then pointed at their drinks. “Who remembers the last time we had these?”

  All three of them thought back to their Labor Day lunch. Had it really been less than two months ago? Impossible.

  “You guys,” Victoria reminded them. “It’s still October.” She dropped her head down and banged her forehead lightly on the table. “We still have to get through the election next week!”

  “I can’t take much more of this,” Natalya said, grabbing her hair. “My head hurts just thinking about it.”

  “Hey!” Suddenly Victoria looked up and shot an accusatory glance at her friends. “I just remembered something. You lied to me!”

  “What?” asked Natalya. “What are you talking about?”

  “Who lied to you?” asked Jane.

  Tom and another waiter emerged from the kitchen carrying a cake laden with sparklers as the diners at the other table began to sing “Happy Birthday.”

  Victoria ignored the noise and looked off into the middle distance, as if a memory were playing on a screen somewhere between their table and the birthday party. Suddenly she swung her head around and pointed a finger at Natalya. “It was you!”

  “Me?! What did I do?” asked Natalya.

  “You promised nothing would change!” Victoria cried.

  No one said anything as Natalya and Jane tried to remember the conversation Victoria was referring to. It all felt so long ago. Had Natalya really said that?