Stage Fright (Bit Parts)

by Scott, Michelle

  Andrew’s face grew paler with each message. When they finished playing, he shoved his phone at me. “Hide this again, will you?”

  With a sigh of relief, I put it back into the tampon box. Then, seeing the strain on Andrew’s face, I knew I couldn’t leave him alone. He’d either worry himself to death, or – God forbid – break down and call Caleb. Although, Vampire Victor might not be a better trade for a crazy, jilted lover, I hoped that the playwright wouldn’t steal a human’s shine without his permission.

  “Do you want to be Paula or Simon?” I asked.

  Andrew smiled, relieved. “Paula. Everyone loves her.”

  “Okay, but if I’m going to be Simon, I’ll need to practice my snarky British accent.”

  He grinned. “How about you do that while I’m in the shower? It will only take me fifteen minutes.”

  When he headed into the bathroom, I took off my coat and poured another cup of coffee. As I stood at the counter and drank it, I felt warm fingers massage the back of my neck.

  Surprised, I turned around. No one was there, but a pleasant pulse of energy caressed my cheek. Soothing whispers filled my ears. Tiny rainbows danced around the kitchen.

  What the hell?

  The crystal from the Bleak Street’s chandelier hung in the window above the sink, refracting the bright, morning sunlight. That explained the little rainbows, but where were the warm fingers and soft voices coming from? Drawn to the prism, I closed my fingers around it. The crystal was much warmer than it should have been, and it vibrated slightly.

  I tightened my grip. Energy from the crystal flowed into me, drawing fiery trails along my nerves. My thoughts whirled faster and faster, my neurons firing like pistons in a racecar. Every line from 16 Voices etched itself into my brain; I could have recited each part word for word. The random musings I’d had about editing suddenly gelled, and I knew exactly how to make the play work.

  The soothing whispers grew louder and louder, until they became the roar of applause. It was as if every person who had ever clapped their hands in the Bleak Street was now applauding me. It was the same kind of energy I’d channeled from the prop closet the day before, only much more powerful. The applause continued to intensify until everything came together in one, beautiful epiphany that resonated within me like a standing ovation to the hundredth power.

  “Cassie?”

  Andrew’s voice brought me back to the kitchen. I gasped and let go of the prism which had grown cold in my fingers.

  “You okay?”

  I smiled so brightly that he blinked. “I’m terrific!”

  He tilted his head. “Are you sure? You look flushed.”

  I grinned and wiped my sweating face. “I’m a thousand percent sure. Let’s go!”

  I nearly skipped out the front door, but on the porch, Andrew stopped dead in his tracks and stared. “Oh my God!”

  I’d forgotten all about the damage to my car. In the daylight, the Focus looked twice as bad as it had the night before. One of the headlights had been shattered, and the front bumper was crumpled. I worried that it was still road legal.

  “I got into a little accident yesterday night.” I hoped that he wouldn’t pester me for details.

  He pressed a hand to his heart. “Oh, thank God! I thought maybe Caleb had done something.” Approaching the car, he ran his fingers along the crumpled bumper, worry lines creasing his forehead. “Cassie, maybe I shouldn’t stay with you. I don’t want to put you in the middle of my drama.”

  “Stay,” I insisted. When he hesitated, I added, “Where else would you go?”

  “Good point.” He climbed into the passenger seat. “But if things get weird, I’m moving out. No arguments.”

  “You’re not going anywhere. Screw Caleb!” I sounded braver than I felt. Even with all the energy from the crystal flowing through me, I was worried. Andrew was right. If Caleb ever discovered where I lived, there would be trouble.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Despite its musical legacy, Mercury Hall was a disappointing building. Although I’d seen my share of concerts there, it was still easy to drive past it by mistake. Cigarette butts littered the sidewalk out front, and the marquee was missing several letters. Peeling layers of flyers proclaimed over a decade’s worth of artists who had appeared on its stage.

  Back in high school, when I’d been flashing a fake ID, I’d always gotten nervous walking into the Mercury. Today however, my pulse pounded for an entirely different reason. The place looked empty, and no one answered my tentative hello, but I wasn’t fooled. Vampires could be hiding in any shadowy corner or behind a closed door. Even though energy from the chandelier’s prism still spread fire through my veins, I was edgy.

  Andrew, on the other hand, seemed bored. He shoved his hands into his pockets and looked around the lobby. “How about if I get us some coffee? I saw a place up the street.”

  It was the perfect excuse to get him out of harm’s way until I could check the building. “Definitely! I’ll take the usual.”

  “Double espresso with cinnamon on the foam? Aye, aye, Madame Stage Manager.” He threw me a sloppy salute before leaving.

  I slipped from the lobby and into the house. As always, the place was a dump. Small, round tables with mismatched chairs provided cabaret seating. Flaking graffiti covered the walls, and the dim lighting was a blessing because no one wanted to look too closely at the floor. After attending my first concert there, I vowed never to use the bathrooms again.

  As I prowled through the theater, my phone rang. This time, it was Perry.

  “If you’re trying to talk me out of going to the Mercury, it’s too late. I’m already here.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it. If you’re willing to risk your neck, then I’m in.”

  I wished he’d chosen a different figure of speech. I felt for Andrew’s silver cross, breathing a little easier when my fingers found it.

  “Thanks to you, I was able to dig up some information on Hedda,” he continued. “See, I couldn’t find much when I was searching for Hedda Widderstrom, but when I tried Hedda Peabody, things got interesting.”

  “Do tell.” I tried a door marked PRIVATE, but it was locked. A peek behind the bar turned up nothing but liquor bottles and stemware.

  “You were right. Hedda was married to Bertrand Peabody who’s been the head of the Peabody grieve for over a hundred-fifty years. He and Hedda divorced in 1920. Apparently it was very scandalous because Hedda immediately remarried someone else in Boston. The gossip columnist was sketchy with the details.”

  So Hedda and Bertrand had gone through an ugly divorce. Interesting, but not exactly helpful. “What else?”

  “Of course, there’s no public information about the Peabody grieve, but there’s plenty about the Peabody financial empire. They’re not as powerful as the Stuyvesants, but they own their share of banks and overseas manufacturing firms. One thing I have learned is that vampires are greedy as hell. I’m pretty sure terms like ‘predatory lending’ and ‘hostile takeovers’ were invented because of them.”

  I cracked the backstage door and peeked through. The only light came from the Exit sign at the end of the hall. I let the door fall shut again. I wasn’t about to explore the shadowy recesses of a vampire-ridden theater without some backup.

  “Anyway,” Perry said, “I looked up the Peabodys’ annual financial statements. Which is how I found out that, over the years, they’ve donated large sums of money to the Widderstrom Foundation for the Arts.”

  “In other words, the Bleak Street, the Muse, and Mercury Hall.”

  “You got it. I’ve always wondered how Hedda could keep the Bleak’s doors open, considering her ticket sales. What’s interesting, though, is that the Peabodys suddenly stopped donating to Hedda about a year ago. They cut her off without a cent.”

  “Were they having financial trouble?” Even someone like me, who didn’t keep up with politics, knew that Wall Street had been taking a serious hit.

  “I don’t thin
k money was an issue since they still donate to plenty of other charities. My hunch is that she pissed Bertrand off in some way.”

  “So her ex-husband stopped paying her alimony?”

  “Exactly.” His voice fell. “Unfortunately, I have no idea what she did to make him angry.”

  “You’ll figure it out. You have impressive sleuthing skills, Frank Hardy,” I said.

  He laughed. “Thanks, Nancy Drew. I also took a chance and looked up Victor Stuyvesant. Guess what I found?”

  “Another play?”

  “Nope. A job title. He’s listed in the yearly report as the chairman of the board of directors for Stuyvesant Enterprises.”

  After what Charles had said, that didn’t surprise me.

  “His curriculum vitae is as long as my arm. Princeton education, business major, Rhoades Scholar. Yadda, yadda, yadda.”

  I tried to imagine that nightmare wardrobe wandering the ivy-covered buildings at Princeton. “So why is Victor putting on a play in Detroit?”

  “No idea.”

  “Maybe he’s a closet writer,” I said.

  “Yeah, and maybe I really am Frank Hardy.”

  Holding my nose, I checked the bathrooms. Both were empty. So far, the Mercury had turned up nothing but a few crushed plastic cups, and what I sincerely hoped was not a used condom in the corner of the men’s room. If there were secrets hidden in the music hall, I wasn’t finding them. “Well, I’ll keep an eye out for anything that might be useful, but so far I’ve got nothing.”

  “Just be careful.” Perry lowered his voice. “The Mercury is Marcella’s territory, and she can be, well, unpredictable.”

  I swallowed, remembering how she’d tried to corner me at the Muse before Isaiah had intercepted her. “How unpredictable?”

  “She likes to play with her food, if you know what I mean, and she can play pretty rough. If you don’t believe me, ask Isaiah.”

  I stopped walking. “Are you telling me that Marcella is the one who injured his leg?”

  “She was on a feeding frenzy on the night she attacked him,” Perry said grimly. “After she stole his shine, she purposely severed his Achilles tendon in order to end his baseball career. Spiteful, little bitch.”

  So Marcella was the one who had put the misery in Isaiah’s beautiful eyes. Forget being careful around her. She needed to be careful around me! I wondered where I could get my hands on a wooden stake.

  As if guessing my thoughts, Perry said, “Marcella is Hedda’s favorite. If you hurt her, Hedda will send the entire Widderstrom grieve after you, code of ethics or no code of ethics.”

  Point taken. Still, Marcella better watch herself.

  “One last thing,” Perry said, sounding sheepish. “Would you scatter a bag of dried beans in front of Victor?”

  “What?”

  “Vampires are rumored to have arithmomania.”

  “Arithmo – whatia?”

  “Arithmomania. It’s this obsessive-compulsive quirk. Supposedly, if you scatter dried beans near a vampire, he’ll stop everything to count them.”

  I laughed. “Where did you hear this?”

  There was an embarrassed pause. “An episode of The X Files.” Before I could comment, he quickly continued, “If it’s true, it would be one more weapon against the vamps. It might get us out of a tough situation.”

  I tried to picture Isaiah carrying around a pocket full of dried beans in the event that he was trapped by a bloodthirsty vampire. “I think Isaiah would prefer to knock their heads off with his bat,” I said.

  “It’s you and me I’m thinking about,” Perry said. “We sidekicks need our weapons, too. Not everyone can be a beefed-up superhero.”

  I laughed again. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  “Great! And, seriously, stay safe. You should be fine, but it pays to be careful.” He lowered his voice. “The Outfielder has been an especially cranky pain in my ass all morning, and I know it’s because he’s worried about you.” Another embarrassed pause. “And so am I.”

  So Isaiah was worried about me. All I had to do was picture those amber eyes, and I felt like a jack-o-lantern: all enormous grin and inner glow.

  Since the theater didn’t appear to be threatening, I shrugged off my coat and sat at a table near one of the giant, blow-out-your-eardrums speakers flanking the stage. As my anxiety ebbed, the energy I’d collected from the chandelier’s prism surged, powering me more than the double espresso would have. Unable to sit still, I tapped my hands against my thighs as I organized my notes and sorted through the headshots.

  The theater doors opened, and Charles walked in. To my relief, he looked better than he had in weeks. The shirt he wore under his tweed coat had been pressed. He’d even shaved and put on cologne.

  Unfortunately, his mood wasn’t as good as his appearance. “Hard at work already?” His tone was light, but there was an undercurrent of reproach, as if he was disappointed to see me, but determined to make the best of it.

  He looked over my shoulder at a headshot of a bald-headed man whom I’d picked as a possible for V7. “Some of these actors have moved on. Apparently Hedda didn’t realize that this man’s now in Toronto, working at the Pantages.”

  One reject out of the dozen or so possibilities wasn’t a worry. “Thanks for saving me a phone call,” I said.

  Charles took the seat next to me, and I caught a whiff of something that wasn’t aftershave. Apparently, he hadn’t taken my sobriety rule seriously. When Charles drank, he didn’t stumble around like I did, nor did he slur his words. Instead, alcohol amplified his already loud personality into something even bigger and bolder. It was rumored that both Charles’s most brilliant and most disastrous performances had come after he’d been drinking.

  “What happened to our agreement about you not being drunk on the job?” I asked.

  He ignored the question and reached for another headshot. “This woman moved to L.A. a few weeks ago.”

  “Charles?”

  He pointed to a third picture. “And this man is now teaching at NYU.”

  “Charles!”

  He exploded. “So I had a drink! What of it?” His bloodshot eyes blazed.

  “I thought we’d agreed.”

  “You have more problems than me taking a morning nip, Cassandra. We only have three weeks to do this god-awful wreck of a play!”

  “Like I said, it’s actually pretty good.”

  “Bah! I’d rather be directing children’s theater!” He swept his arm across the table, scattering headshots onto the floor. “Victor Stuyvesant couldn’t write a car commercial!”

  I frowned and picked up the scattered pictures. “What happened? When you and Victor left the Bleak Street last night, you seemed all buddy-buddy.”

  His lips twisted. “Apparently, I’m not good enough for the almighty New York Stuyvesants. They’re a pathetic bunch of snobs, anyway.”

  Not only was Charles dissing Victor’s grieve, he was using his loudest onstage voice to do it. I glanced at the door, worried who might be listening in. “Why don’t we get some coffee?” I asked, half rising.

  “I don’t want any damn coffee!”

  “If you keep knocking Victor’s play, you’ll make him angry.” I touched my throat, hoping Charles would take the hint. “You don’t want to risk your neck over the play. Do you?”

  At first he looked confused, then a sly smile crept over his face. “Am I to assume that you know the Bleak Street’s little secret?”

  There was no point in denying it. In fact, it was a relief to confess. I nodded.

  “When did you figure this out?”

  Not wanting to drag Isaiah’s name into it, I shrugged. “I’ve known for a while.”

  Charles put a finger to his lips, considering. “It was Hedda’s enforcer, wasn’t it? Geoffrey said he saw the two of you being cozy at the Muse.”

  I squirmed. There were more prying eyes in Hedda’s grieve than in my own, extensive, family. Before Charles could ask any more question
s, I switched to his favorite topic: himself. “What about you? When did you find out their secret?”

  “Hedda told me herself.” He patted down his pockets for his cigarettes and lit one, unmindful of the public smoking law. “It was in 1977. Stratford, Ontario. We met at an afterglow party following Richard III. God, she was stunning.” He closed his eyes, smiling at the memory. Smoke trickled from his nostrils. “I was in love from the minute I saw her. Hedda and I kept in correspondence after Stratford. That fall, I invited her to a production of mine, a one-man show in a little off-Broadway theater. Afterwards, she made me an offer.”

  He leaned closer. “Ordinarily, Hedda would get an artist to trade his shine for a ‘big break’.” The glowing end of his cigarette bobbed as he made air quotes. “Then, after she took a portion of his soul, she would erase his memory of the transaction. All the actor would know is that he’d suddenly gotten lucky.”

  I was horrified. It was bad enough that the actors lost some of their souls, but adding amnesia into the mix was cruel. “That’s terrible!”

  Charles shrugged, unconcerned. “It happens all the time. The world is full of desperate artists willing to do anything to make a piece of their dream come true. All of those so called ‘one-hit wonders’ you hear on the radio? Those are the result of vampires.”

  “What makes Hedda hold to the agreement?” I asked. “I mean, if the artist’s memory is erased, he’d never remember making a deal, let alone whether or not the vampire backed out of it.”

  Charles jabbed his cigarette in my direction, making me flinch. “Hedda is not that kind of woman! Her word is as good as gold. She’d never swindle an actor or musician out of their soul.”

  Yeah, right. It took everything I had not to roll my eyes. Isaiah and Charles could lecture all they wanted about Hedda’s sense of honor, but I’d never be convinced. As far as I was concerned, vampires were cunning, vile, predators. Not creatures to be trusted or admired.

  Charles resettled himself and took another long drag on his cigarette. “Anyway, Hedda knew I could keep my mouth shut, so she left my memory intact and offered me a lifetime of service in exchange for the privilege of running my own theater.”