Simultaneously luckily and unluckily, there was an upcoming musical happening at the community theater.
As Penny spent the rest of the week giving me the almost-silent treatment, (you know, responding to questions when they're asked, but never saying anything else and even then giving one-to-two-word answers), I spent the week learning a monologue about computer keys turning into lips and a song that I could be described as sounding "fine" on.
When I told my mom I was auditioning, she was ecstatic. "I used to act in all the school plays when I was in high school. I was rubbish, of course. I haven't the slightest idea why Mr. Fernando let me in to any of those plays, but it was very fun." Considering the fact that Fernando was a Mr., I think I have a pretty good idea why he let my mother into the plays. But I didn't say anything. My mom helped me run my lines, and though I had to almost-constantly ask her not to use an accent, (she seems to honestly believe that she was meant to have been born in England, although her accent is as rubbish as that idea is,) she was helpful.
When I walked into the community theater on Saturday morning, I took one look around and yelled at myself internally for putting myself in this situation. There was a girl on stage reading lines from a page which she held with a shaky hand, and I rose an eyebrow. If I'd known we were allowed to read from the page, I would have practiced a lot less.
It seemed that all the auditonees were sitting in the audience, so I walked down the right aisle and found an empty seat one row behind all the occupied seats. A woman sitting squarely in the middle of the front row was writing notes furiously on a clipboard she held, but other than her, everyone seemed to be around my age. I was glad. At least "community" theater didn't mean "all ages welcome". I don't know what I'd do if I had to hang out with a bunch of middle-aged strangers for two months.
"Thank you," the woman with the clipboard said to the girl on stage, "Now do you think you could perform that scene for us again, without the script?" I cringed in pity for the girl as she put the script down and shakily stood again, sputtering and wavering as she flusteredly attempted to recite the lines again. "Hey," a voice whispered, and I turned my head to see a girl, one row in front of me and two seats to the left, facing me. "You go to Winston, don't you?" she whispered, and I nodded, taking in the bones which poked out of her pale, exhausted-looking face like broken pipes protruding from soil. She was incredibly thin, even by my standards. I suspected anorexia. "What are you doing here?" she asked, putting such emphasis on the last word that she made it sound like I was Angelina Jolie hanging out with the junkies behind the dumpsters. "I'm auditioning," I whispered back, my eyes wandering around the seats and taking a head count. "Why?" she asked, repulsion coating the word as she pushed a lock of hair behind her ear with one skeletal-looking hand, the nails of which were painted blue; though what shade, I couldn't tell, because of the dim lighting. I shook my head and scratched the knuckle of my left hand as I held the seat in front of me, "It's kind of a long story."
"Vera King?" The woman glanced up from her clipboard momentarily and cast a gaze upon the theater seats, and I stood and whispered to the stick-figure girl, "That's my cue, I guess."
© 2012
No comments:
Post a Comment