Chapter 22 #3
I said goodbye to the Timex Bros and followed Kathleen backstage for our first of five days of tech.
It was our first chance to run the show like an actual production, and while I knew from experience that it would be grueling, I felt a giddiness prickling from within, too.
This beautiful thing we’d all created together was practically real, and I inwardly dared the producers and investors to find a better group of people to bring it to life, here or anywhere else.
Kathleen and Ashlee shared a dressing room, while I had my own, but I wandered across the hallway anyway because actors were responsible for their own stage makeup and somehow I felt like the caked-on foundation and highly rouged cheeks of my Applewoods days weren’t going to fly here so I needed some guidance.
I was ready when Kevin called places, and beamed at my castmates as we gathered, all in costume together for the first time. It was almost impossible to believe that weeks ago I didn’t know any of them; at this moment it felt like we’d probably know each other forever.
I took my place onstage, ready to go as the curtain rose. “I can’t believe they’re all right outside this—”
“I don’t think that lighting cue ran on time,” someone called.
“Let’s start again,” Rebecca said, from her place out in the house. The curtain fell again, I shifted my stance, waited for the rise.
“I can’t believe they’re all—”
“It’s still not right.”
“While we’re working on it, I’m not sure about the gels.”
I waited while the team conferred, waited more while actual changes were made. This was exactly what this process was about, but it was off-putting, I remembered, to feel as if my performance was the least important aspect of the production.
We lurched through the show until our break, and the cast collapsed in what felt like one collective pile in the lounge.
Today’s process had been so emotionally and physically exhausting that I hadn’t even gotten a chance to worry that this morning’s Vindicators 4 announcement threatened to separate me from the cast further.
Further? Lately the truth was that I didn’t feel that separate, if at all. We were in this together.
After dinner we got back to it. The funny thing was how much it reminded me of being on set, waiting hours for an effect to be set up so I could film a ninety-second scene.
I’d gotten so good at that, but the last weeks had spoiled me.
Taking something big and fast and inching through it felt a bit like trying to run underwater.
The day ended late, and as the cast headed out, Kevin stepped gracefully into my path.
“Tess, if you have a moment, Rebecca would love to meet with you. Gertie and Leroy’s office. She’ll be there as soon as she can wrap up a couple of things.”
“Of course.” I hurried through the lobby to the elevator, deep into the building. The last time I’d been in this room, Rebecca had been a fantasy. Now she was—I supposed the truth was that she was still a fantasy, but for this brief blissful time she was my reality, too.
I was aware of the possibility that something had happened today regarding her future with the show, but I hoped that actually it had just been a very long day and even though we were complete professionals within the walls of this building, maybe we could steal a safe moment away together.
It took more than a few minutes for her to arrive, and when I saw the dark circles under her eyes and the slump to her shoulders, a zing of fear zapped through me.
“What happened?” I asked. “Is everything OK?”
She sat on the desk with a heavy sigh and looked down at me. “When did you find out you were doing Vindicators 4?”
“A couple weeks ago? Officially?” I shrugged. “Sorry. I thought you were going to say something even worse was coming out about—”
“So since we’ve been together,” Rebecca said. “And you didn’t think to tell me.”
I opened my mouth to defend myself, but then remembered that I didn’t have to. “I’m not sure why I would have? It starts filming after the show closes.”
“OK,” she said.
“You’re gone in like two or three weeks.”
Rebecca watched me for a moment. “What does that mean?”
I tried not to choke on the words. “Just … that this is almost over.”
“What are you talking about?” She covered her face with her hands. “Fuck. Last night I did everything to tell you what you meant to me, and it was like you weren’t even listening.”
“What?” I stared as it seemed like Rebecca was crumpling. “You’re going home. And I’m not—you’re—we both know that I’m not what you want so who cares if I’m going to New Mexico.”
Her gaze snapped back to me. “Why would you say something like that?”
“Because I’m not some tethered woman who’s going to fit your life,” I said, feeling the edge in my tone.
It had seemed possible that we could have gotten through this whole thing without needing to have this conversation, so it was bad enough a horrible but inevitable thing had to be discussed, but during tech?
“There’s no version of me that would work for you—even if I came out—and it’s really unfair to act like some part of this is news. ”
“Tethered woman?” Rebecca took off her glasses and massaged her temples with her fingertips. “What does that even mean?”
“When I asked about the future you wanted someday, you said you only could if someone was tethered enough to work around you,” I said. “You also said what we were doing was a terrible decision.”
“Yeah, and sometimes I say things. I didn’t know I was going to be quoted on it later.”
“Right,” I said. “Smoke and mirrors, Rebecca Frisch telling some big story about herself to everyone in her life. Including me. It must be inconvenient that people actually believe you’re the person you invented.”
We both pulled back from each other, and I felt the line I’d stepped over.
“I’m sorry,” I murmured.
“No, I’m glad you said it, I guess.” She wiped her eyes on her forearm.
“Gardner. I’m a fucking mess. At this point in my life, no matter what I want, someone who’s on the go as much as I am to build my name and pay the bills—I don’t know if I can be a good partner or a good wife.
I’m working my ass off to do the art that matters to me and hold space in my life and—and honestly I thought you understood all of that and still—and sometimes I just say things. ”
Now we were both crying.
“I wanted to find a way around all of it,” she said, finally.
“There’s no way around it. It was always doomed.” I stood up from the desk chair, suddenly didn’t know what to do with my body. I’d spent all day having theatre professionals tell me where to put it and how. “I should go.”
“OK,” Rebecca said.
“We’ll always have Applewoods,” I said, for some inane reason, but she laughed through her tears.
“I’ll see you tomorrow, Gardner.”
I drove home with my stereo up so loud I couldn’t think.
Rosie was at daycare until I was through tech, and my house had never felt emptier.
The pillow I didn’t sleep on still smelled like Rebecca—and, honestly, a little like Rosie—so I curled up in bed and tried to convince myself that it was better on the other side of the inevitable.