Fifty-Six
Cary had only been inside the Omaha children’s theater once, in junior high, on a field trip. It was a majestic old movie
palace that had been refitted for live theater.
He was supposed to meet Shiloh here. She was going to show him around, and then he was going to take her to dinner. Mikey
had suggested a Persian restaurant in the Old Market.
Cary had dressed up. Sort of. He was wearing navy blue pants and a button-down shirt. Mikey hadn’t liked any of Cary’s shirts,
so he’d lent him one. It was a paisley pattern, and it was too tight—which Mikey said had been fashionable for years. “It’s fitted, Cary. That’s the thing now. It’s what they sell at the Gap.”
Cary walked into the theater. Shiloh was supposed to meet him in the lobby.
When he saw her at the far end, he almost started running.
Shiloh was talking to a man with red hair, waving her hands around. She was wearing a snug-fitting dress, and her hair was
down, parted on the side.
Cary broke into a trot. “Shiloh.”
She turned her head. Her face lit up. “Cary!” She rushed toward him.
He stopped when he got to her. He wasn’t sure what to do next. She wasn’t sure, either. She started laughing, raising her
palms in a nervous shrug.
Cary held out his arms.
“Okay, yeah,” Shiloh said, practically jumping into his arms.
She was hugging his neck—she smelled amazing. She felt amazing. He held on for dear life.
“I’m so happy to see you,” Shiloh said, right in his ear.
Her dress was sweater material. Her hair slid over his fingers, and her dress slid over her back. He wasn’t letting go. “Shiloh,” he whispered.
She pulled away a little, squeezing his neck, then his shoulders, pressing her hands into his shirt. “You look great. You
look unharmed.”
“I am unharmed.”
“I love you unharmed.” She laughed, and he was close enough to see her bottom teeth. He hugged her again, and this time when
it was over, she pulled away completely. “I want you to meet Tom,” she said. “He’s my only friend.”
“That’s not true...” the man behind her said, making an exaggerated sad face. He was a few inches shorter than Shiloh and
wearing a gingham shirt. He held out his hand and winked. “I’m not actually her friend.”
“I was going to say,” Cary joked, “I thought I was her only friend. It’s nice to meet you, Tom.”
Cary wanted his hands on Shiloh again. He couldn’t stop looking at her. He didn’t think he’d ever missed her this much. Not
even in boot camp. Not even after.
“I just tried to call you,” Shiloh said. She seemed worried.
“My phone’s in the car—is everything okay?”
“Well.” She grimaced. “There’s a play on the main stage tonight, and I’m directing—which is fine, I don’t have to be there.
But half the cast has norovirus. We could cancel, but the Boys and Girls Club is coming—and I can do the mushroom princess, I know all the lines. And Tom can do the
hedgehog and the wolf...”
“Tom must have range.”
“I do,” Tom said. “Thank you.”
Cary touched Shiloh’s upper arm. “It’s fine. We can go out after. Or tomorrow. Or both.”
She looked relieved—also disappointed. “Are you sure? I’m so sorry. Wild horses couldn’t have dragged me away from seeing
you tonight...”
“This isn’t wild horses. It’s work. I’ll stay and watch the show.”
She smiled. “Yeah? You don’t have to. There’s a good Thai place right next door. And a coffee shop.”
“I’ll stay,” he said. “I want to see the show.”
His hand was falling away from her. Shiloh grabbed his wrist. “ Cary. ”
“Yeah?”
Her eyebrows were high. She looked like she was going to say something crazy. “If you’re going to stay anyway, will you help?”
His voice dropped. “What kind of help?”
Cary was going to play the Old Oak Tree.
“It’s mostly just standing,” Shiloh had said. But then she’d handed him a script and two protein bars and left him alone at
her desk to learn his lines. He was eating one of the protein bars now. He hadn’t memorized lines in fifteen years... but
he’d memorized plenty of other stuff in the meantime.
Shiloh’s friend Tom had looked doubtful about her pressing Cary into stage duty. That made Cary want to say yes.
The Old Oak Tree really didn’t have many lines. He mostly did just stand. And watch. And occasionally groan in the wind. He was supposed to have a deep, bark-covered voice. The show was
for kids, but the cast was all adults. The script had Shiloh’s notes in the margins. Her familiar, disastrous handwriting.
Cary kept getting distracted by his own photo pinned up next to her computer. He hadn’t known how the photos would turn out
when he sent her the film. He looked nervous in the picture. To his own eyes, he looked hungry. Maybe Shiloh hadn’t noticed—she
must think he always looked that way.
Tom appeared, covered in brown felt and pipe-cleaner needles. “Ready to make your debut?”
“My Omaha children’s theater debut,” Cary specified.
“Oh, sure, I’ve heard you’ve treaded the boards of the Pacific Theater...”
Cary laughed.
“Come with me,” Tom said. “We’ll get you in costume.”
Cary stood up. “There’s a costume?”
“You’re a tree.”
“I thought it was a set piece.”
“It’s both.”
Cary followed Tom down halls and staircases. Everything was built like a warren around the stage and the lobby. Cary wished
he had more time to explore.
They ended up in a dressing room, where a woman was waiting with a bundle of branches. “This is Kate,” Tom said. “She’ll take
care of you from here.”
Kate was cute. Small. Short, blond hair. A pierced nose. “You’re Cary,” she said.
He held out his hand. “I am.”
She pursed her lips and nodded—he realized her hands were full. “I am not going to stick you with a pin,” she said.
“Thank you.”
Kate had Cary change into a long-sleeved brown T-shirt, and then she taped and pinned leafy branches to his arms. They were
lighter than they looked.
“You stand inside the trunk,” she said. “It’s flexible. And there are places to rest your arms when you’re not moving.”
“That’s clever.”
“Well. Thanks. You’re a little taller than the usual actor, so you might have to hunch to see out.”
“Okay.”
She frowned up at him. “Have you put on stage makeup before?”
“Uh...”
“I’ve got it,” Shiloh said. She was standing in the door to the dressing room—all mushroomed up. She was wearing a short, full red skirt that looked like the cap of a mushroom, with white polka dots. The rest of the costume was a long-sleeved red leotard and white tights. Her face was painted white with red-circle cheeks. And she was wearing a cartoonish gold crown.
“That skirt is too short on you,” Kate said.
“It’s too small, too. I’ve got it pinned.”
“Let me see if I can find some bloomers.”
“I won’t bend over in the meantime.”
Kate squeezed past Shiloh out the door.
“Thanks!” Cary called after her.
Shiloh was grinning at him. “Look at you.” She poked his shoulder. “Did you learn your lines?”
“Some of them.”
“The makeup is simple. It’s mostly just eyebrows. You want me to do it?”
“Sure.”
Shiloh leaned past him to get a clean sponge. Her skirt pushed into his stomach. It was made of scratchy net with wire supports.
It would look good from a distance, though. “Sorry,” she said. “This is why we do makeup and then costumes.”
She hovered over his face with the sponge and some tan-colored base.
“You look adorable,” Cary said.
“You should see the real mushroom princess.” Shiloh leaned past her skirt and rubbed the sponge over his cheek.
Cary put his hands on her waist to steady her. He closed his eyes. “I’ve been working on my tree voice.”
“Let’s hear it.”
He let his voice drop and get gravelly. “ Something like this. ”
Shiloh giggled. “I like it.”
“But the Oak Tree’s supposed to be wise, right? So maybe more like...” Cary added an ounce of Jimmy Stewart waver. “ This is my faintly amused and world-weary tree voice. ”
Shiloh laughed. He squeezed her waist. “Even better,” she said. “Close your mouth.”
She was moving quickly, gently. After a second, he felt a cold, wet brush over his eye. “Your only important line,” Shiloh said, “is ‘ Not my favorite branch! ’ when Tom tries to break one off.” She switched to his other eyebrow. “Otherwise, you can just stand there. I’ll cover for
you if you miss a line.” The brush pulled away. “All done.”
He opened his eyes.
Shiloh was looking down at him, smiling. “It’s so good to see you,” she said.
Cary wrapped his arms around her waist. He knew that he looked ravenous—did she?
Cary hadn’t thought much about whether he missed theater. He didn’t think about high school journalism much, either. Or quiz
bowl. Or all the other things they’d kept busy with for four years.
But he had missed it...
The backstage whispering. The curtains. Everyone in costume, taking themselves seriously. Shiloh kept pushing him out of people’s
way. “Sorry it’s so tight back here,” she said.
“It’s roomy compared to my ship.”
Cary was onstage for the whole play. Tom helped him get situated in the tree costume before the curtain went up—it really
was ingenious.
The story was about a young mushroom princess who longs to wander the forest... but she’s stuck in the shade and under
the supervision of an old oak tree. Friends were made and lessons were learned. The hedgehog was a riot.
Cary kept his eyes on Shiloh, which was, fortunately, in character for the Old Oak Tree.
She was by turns heartbreaking and hilarious—and absolutely believable as an eight-year-old mushroom princess. She telegraphed
Cary’s cues by looking at him, or nudging him. He thought he was mostly hitting everything.
The first time he used his tree voice, Shiloh giggled. So he made it even louder and sillier and more like Jimmy Stewart.
Cary gave one significant line at the wrong time. Shiloh caught it and batted it back to him for a second try. He fixed it.
An hour into the play, he realized that someone else would be the Old Oak Tree tomorrow, and someone else would be the mushroom
princess—and he wouldn’t ever get to do this again with Shiloh. Under the lights. In front of an audience. It made him want
to wrap his branches around her and hold on.
When the curtain came down, Cary stayed onstage, attached to the set. The other actors—Tom, a woman who played a snake, a
man who played a bird—all praised him. “Good thing Craig wasn’t here to see this,” they said. Craig was the usual Old Oak
Tree.
The stage emptied out quickly. The tech people were resetting for the next day’s show.
“Cary!” Shiloh shouted from the wings. “I’m going to come help you out of that. Don’t move. Do you have to go to the bathroom?”
“No!” he called.
“You should! You’re probably dehydrated.”
She was back in a few more minutes with a bottle of water. “Sorry,” she said. “I should have had Tom free you.” She was unstrapping
and untying him. “You were so good, Cary. So funny. I wish I could keep you. Honestly, I probably could have gotten one of
the tech guys to play the tree—it’s what Tom wanted—but you were genius. I knew you would be. I hope someone got pictures.
You were perfect .”
Cary was loose enough to step out of the costume without breaking anything.
Shiloh went to work on his arms, untaping the branches. She was still in full costume. One of her red cheeks had smeared.
There was a hole in the neck of her leotard.
“You can keep me,” Cary said.
She pulled the last branch away from his right arm. She looked up at his face.
Cary dropped to one knee.