Chapter 16
Girl Monsters
We went off-book in rehearsal. In school and at Apple-woods, I’d loved this part. I was sharp at memorizing and took pride in looking less and less at my script in my hands until I stopped holding it entirely. I’d been a show-off, sure, but the theatre was in fact a safe space for show-offs.
Film, though, had made me rusty. Shooting a few pages at a time, sometimes less.
Scripts at the edges of the shot, someone always there to feed you the line that slipped your memory with the eventual audience none the wiser.
Even though as of last week I’d felt the words in me, my brain holding the story, without the pages in my hand that no longer felt true.
“Sorry,” I said, for at least the fifth time as we ran a scene early in the first act, dense with character backstory via rapid dialogue that kept the story moving.
Michael sighed heavily. “Tess, I know this isn’t—”
“Yes, Michael,” Rebecca said, “I’m sure you’re about to make a clever Vindicators reference for us all, but let’s keep things moving.”
“Here’s your line,” Kevin said, walking a script over to me. “Want to hold on to this for a bit?”
I didn’t but I said yes because I’d rather look like an unqualified idiot than continue to hold everyone else back.
Today the design team drifted in and out, making notes, asking us to hold props here and there, and I couldn’t imagine what they thought of me, the lone cast member clutching her script like a security blanket.
Back at Applewoods I’d learned there was no better feeling than to have the larger team approve of your performance, to make them laugh or elicit an audible murmur of sympathy at the right moment.
I was back to feeling the impossibility of this task.
When we broke for lunch, Kathleen and Ashlee followed me into the lounge, close on my heels.
“I know,” I said, sitting down with my salad. “I’m making things hard on everyone today. I used to be so good at—anyway. I really am sorry.”
“Oh my god, why are you apologizing to us?” Kathleen asked, sitting down next to me as Ashlee sat across from us.
“Yeah, I just wanted to make sure you were OK,” Ashlee said. “This used to happen to me all the time. I’d mess up one line and then panic and then it was all over for me. Especially if you felt like anyone was waiting for it to happen.”
“Especially then,” Kathleen said with an eye roll. “You’re doing fine, honey. Better than fine, you know what I mean. This shit’s hard. It’s why we’re all drawn to it. And theatre is a great leveler—there’s no bullshit here.”
Ashlee made a face, and Kathleen and I both laughed.
“Darlin’, you know what I mean,” Kathleen continued.
“It’s a trust exercise. You go out with five, ten—four, in this case—people onstage and you’re so exposed.
It doesn’t matter where you come from and what you’ve done, just if you have the goods and you don’t drop the ball. It wipes the rest of it away.”
That would have resonated more if I was certain that I had the goods and the balls.
“It’s weird we’re comforting you,” Ashlee said, and then laughed. “Sorry, am I allowed to say that?”
“You can say it.” I smiled and speared a radish with my fork. “But you’re all so amazing. I still walk in a lot of days feeling like a fraud.”
“Yeah, that’s called being an actor,” Kathleen said. “Sorry to be the one to inform you. OK, Ashlee, distract us with the latest updates on your—what did you call it? Your situationship?”
“Again, Kathleen, I didn’t come up with that term,” Ashlee said. “And it’s still a mess. Do you really want me to rant about this indie film boy while you’re eating?”
“Yes,” Kathleen and I said together, and laughed, and other folks drifted in, and by the time we headed back into the rehearsal space, my head had stopped pounding with the same intense level of panic.
Occasionally I glanced to Kathleen and Ashlee, because as kind as they’d been, it was tough not looking out for traps.
It couldn’t be so simple as leaning on my co-stars this way when I felt asea.
Even though, once upon a time, before Princess Platinum and way back before All Green Lights, it had been that way.
This space where it felt free to mess up hadn’t been on my mind when I thought of the reasons I wanted to get back to the theatre; was it unwise and na?ve to want that now?
At the end of the day, Kathleen and Ashlee plus Henry asked if I wanted to grab a drink somewhere as chill as you need it to be and I opened my mouth to automatically say no, but I reminded myself how an invitation could be filled with kindness, and started to say yes, except then the thing I’d had to forget to function at all sprang back to mind: Rebecca was due at my place for dinner in two hours.
“I can’t,” I said. “Sorry—tomorrow? I have something tonight and—”
Somehow instead of casually slipping my bag over my shoulder I accidentally tossed it halfway across the room.
“Oh my god,” Ashlee said, as a wide grin took over her face. “I can’t believe you let me talk about my dumb thing all lunch long when you have something tonight.”
“Yeah, let us know how that something works out for you,” Kathleen said with a cackle.
“Tomorrow’s fine,” Henry told me, as Michael walked my tote bag over to me with a look of exhaustion. “Drinks tomorrow night? Somewhere chill?”
“Sure,” Michael said. “There’s that place in Little Tokyo with shitty cocktails but a good sake menu and that patio I don’t hate.”
“Can someone please find out the actual name before tomorrow?” I asked.
“Yes, go,” Ashlee said with a serious expression. “Don’t leave your something waiting.”
“It’s not like that,” I said, glancing over Rebecca’s way, relieved she was deep in conversation with Kevin and Hannah and hopefully had heard none of this. “Just making dinner for an old friend.”
Somehow that sounded like even more of a euphemism, but I still managed to extricate myself and head to my car without making it even worse than I already had.
I zipped through rush-hour traffic the best I could without being a complete asshole, and was relieved to see Andy pulling in ahead of me when I drove past my gate.
“Hi, baby,” I greeted Rosie as she dashed out of Andy’s car to my side. “Thanks for taking her today.”
“It’s fine, everyone at the office loves her,” he said. “How’re you doing?”
“Good, why?” I asked, letting myself into the house as Rosie bounced alongside me. “Do I not seem good?”
“You seem … like if you were a different person I’d wonder if you had a coke problem,” he said, and I burst into shocked laughter.
“Just a bit of a rough day, and now a busy night,” I said, walking straight to the kitchen. “Having someone over for dinner. A lot to get ready. Though if you want to stay for a while—”
“No, I have plans,” he said, and while I wanted to demand more intel, he hadn’t even raised an eyebrow at having someone over for dinner, which would have absolutely set off my costars, so I decided not to press my luck. “Dodgers Sunday?”
“Yes, for sure,” I said, nodding emphatically. “Thank you again and I’ll text you on Saturday?”
“Sounds good. And, uh—I know it’s none of my business—” Uh-oh.
“—but things are cool with you and Aisha, yeah?”
I was so relieved he hadn’t sniffed out anything weird about my evening that it took a moment for a different panic to shoot through me. “I mean … cool-ish, I’d say. Why?”
“I don’t know,” he said, leaning over to pet Rosie. “Just feels like they’re not, and maybe like that’s on you. Maybe try to work on it.”
He let himself out before I could ask him anything else.
I grabbed my phone to text Aisha, but then I didn’t know what to say, because I thought we were OK.
But also I’d be lying to say I’d felt great about everything, so instead of dashing off something thoughtless I decided to think it over while starting dinner.
By the time the broth was simmering, I had no further ideas, so I focused on cleaning mussels and then making my favorite homemade salad dressing, a riff on Mom’s classic vinaigrette.
By the time my phone dinged at 7:59, everything was exactly on time.
How exactly do I get into your complex?
I decided to walk out to let her in—friendlier, I thought, than texting a string of numbers—and had definitely not thought ahead how it would feel to see Rebecca standing in front of my home.
She’d changed since rehearsal; she was in a black cashmere sweater over faded jeans and a pair of Nikes. A staying-in look.
“Hi,” I greeted her.
“Hey. Look at your cute apron,” she said, walking up to me and pulling on the ruffled straps. “Is this vintage?”
“Yeah, it was my mom’s,” I said, trying not to react to her hands so close to my—my everything, really. “I think it’s the girliest thing I own. Come on in.”
She followed me past the gate and then into the house. “Gardner, this is gorgeous. You must get so much light during the day.”
Rosie ran over to sniff Rebecca’s legs.
“This is Rosie,” I said. “Rosie, this is Rebecca.”
“Oh my god, it’s so good to meet you, Rosie.” Rebecca immediately sat down on the floor to pet her, and she laughed as she scratched Rosie’s head. “Sorry, she just makes the craziest little sounds. It’s like you have a baby monster.”
“I know, right? It’s my favorite thing about her. Well, one of my ten thousand favorite things about her. I wish women were encouraged to be baby monsters.”
“Ah, you said it,” Rebecca said. “Sorry, I’ve neglected to say that it smells amazing in here.”
“Thank you,” I said. “I should check on everything. But you can just hang out here with Rosie, if you want.”
“I want to hang out with both of you,” she said, getting up and doing her best to brush off the massive covering of tan pug hair that had already clung to her sweater. “If Rosie’s allowed in the kitchen.”
“Rosie’s allowed everywhere,” I said. “Come on.”