MARCH 1993 #4
I turned the page of Do You Hear Me, Adeline?—I’d caved and asked Ivan if I could have it back the moment the audition ended and made him promise to take it again as soon as the roles were cast.
I liked the part a lot. She was a fascinating character—and there was plenty to unpack. But for once, something was more interesting, so I wasn’t really paying much attention.
———
I guess Harper tanked the audition, because when casting lists went up, she only had a bit part. Still, the Wilfred Allen Award had been bestowed upon plenty of actors in minor roles before. I couldn’t count her out.
I was the Bride. Zoe was probably just as livid as Harper, and it did feel a bit like we were indeed doing A Midsummer Night’s Dream because we were all swapping roles (except for Flora, who had been excluded entirely and cast in The Crucible instead).
But this is what it meant: I was supposed to be marrying Eric Mwangi’s Bridegroom but instead ran off with Leonardo, played by Lewis Stamper. And Harper played Leonardo’s jilted wife.
I slipped the straw of my smoothie between my lips and took a sip before smiling up at Lewis. “Well, this should be fun.”
Lewis smiled back. “History proves we bring out a good performance in each other.”
It was, actually, rather lackluster. But I was relieved I’d made a good impression. I was a good actress, at least.
“Well,” I took another quick sip, aware of Harper glowering from beside the board and watching my every move.
She probably saw my attempts at flirting as amateurish in comparison to her own finely honed performances.
But that’s fine, I’d get better with practice.
“Let me know if you ever want to get method.”
———
Rehearsals were taut. I wasn’t a complete monster: I’d slipped the necklace back in Harper’s bag during class. Let her think she’d just misplaced it.
Besides, the last thing I needed was her getting used to performing without it. I could always rely on taking it again in the future, especially if she decided to ever do something as reprehensible as plant drugs on me again.
Hopefully next time I wouldn’t be caught unaware.
Harper clung tighter to Lewis even though I hadn’t flirted with him again. Just that once to plant the seed. Let her convince herself she was imagining things, that she was overreacting—and let her run herself into ruin with doubt every time our characters kissed.
———
During our final rehearsal before our performance, Harper called everyone into a circle.
“I have gifts to say thank you and to wish us all luck.”
She passed out little velvet boxes tied up with red ribbon. I watched Zoe unwrap a CADS ring, embossed with the school’s logo. Eric opened an engraved CADS pen.
I pushed the ribbon off.
A necklace. Turquoise. A wiry silver chain.
I glanced up, seeing Harper watching me, her amber eyes sparkling with amusement. And her own necklace hung at her throat.
“Because you liked mine so much,” she said.
I remember flushing—and I think that angered me even more.
The embarrassment when she was the one who had started all of this.
How dare she accuse me in turn—and publicly at that.
I could hardly gift her a bag of cocaine back, so if this was her attempt to throw me before the final show, I determined to let it fuel me instead.
I wanted to give a performance so stellar that Harper—effortless, gravitational Harper—would be forgotten.
I retreated to the changing rooms before I could risk another word bringing that resolve toppling down.
Lewis followed me.
“I have a gift too,” he said, leaning close to my ear to whisper. “Fancy some method acting?”
“Oh, don’t tempt me, Leonardo,” I replied, breathy.
But I ran before he could make plans. This had to be it—some trap Harper planned to spring.
Drawing me somewhere the night before our performance to what?
Deprive me of sleep and make me ruin the show?
Shave off my eyebrows? Frame me for something, get me arrested, and force me to miss the show that way?
Dear god, this whole thing was making me paranoid.
I couldn’t wait for summer; I needed to escape CADS immediately.
So I spent the evening not running over my lines as I once might have but swept away in Adeline’s story—coming of age through horror, the parallel of womanhood and terror, the specific interrogation within the screenplay’s wider themes of woman as slate, as projection, as a person who can tell you exactly who she is and still have the male fantasy version of her superimposed.
I thought of someone else playing her and ached. But still. But still …
If I had that prize, I wouldn’t need to spend the summer working. If I won the Wilfred Allen Award, I could become Adeline.
———
I avoided Harper as much as I could in our shared dressing room. My preshow nerves had distilled into an anxiety that whatever this spat was it was detracting from our real performances.
There was a possibility neither of us would get the award, and that somehow felt worse. Harper was the only person I could conceive of losing to—as bitter and agonizing a thought as that was. It would be humiliating. But it might be the only sort of loss I could stomach.
Still, despite all that, I couldn’t resist the opportunity to snatch one last pointed dig.
So I wore the necklace, allowing it to settle between my cleavage, much of which was on show in the white dress that was horrendously cliché for the Bride.
Harper noticed it immediately, her head whipping round as I fastened its chain. “That’s fake, by the way.”
“Yes, maybe that’s why it reminds me of someone. Still lucky though.”
“Well, the costume looks dreadful. They’d have been better off putting you in a burlap sack.”
“I’d outperform you in even that.”
Harper arched a brow. “Are your parents in the audience?”
I swallowed, hopefully the only indication that she’d touched a nerve. I’d invited them, as I always did. But no, my parents were not in the audience.
I couldn’t remember the last play they’d come to, but I liked to think I wasn’t still a child only in acting due to some deep desire for attention.
Wrong, of course. I loved theater. Film was my passion. And acting made me feel alive.
But the things I would do for attention? Well, we’ll get to that.
“Couldn’t get the time off work. But you are work for your mother, right? So I assume she’s here.”
Harper’s jaw hitched, just the slightest clench, and I felt a thrill to be its cause. “Break a leg, darling.”
Harper went back to makeup, insisting on powder touch-ups.
“Let’s not give my model mother more reasons to be disappointed in me, shall we?” I heard her say.
It baffled me for a moment—because Harper was undeniably beautiful.
As I’ve said, we all were. But Harper more than most, her onyx hair hanging in a sleek curtain down to her waist, her nose pin straight, her lips curt and evocative, like even if she wasn’t pouting you might wonder what they’d feel like between your teeth.
But what confused me more was this—the way Harper overshared, not just with me but with everyone, tossing hints and indications of trauma out like they had sharpened edges capable of wounding someone else rather than her.
I wondered if they were lies, her own desperate hunt for attention.
But I don’t think they were. I think Harper was all too aware of her issues.
And I think she wanted the world to know about them too.
To the point that she’d given me the key to hurting her: more reasons for her mother to be disappointed in her. A lousy performance seemed a good place to start.
I hesitated, just a moment. I was supposed to be ignoring this. To be rising above it at this last moment.
But the heat of our confrontation blazed without an outlet. Harper herself was an itch, something that dug beneath my skin.
I needed to pry her out.
———
Harper’s depiction of Leonardo’s Wife was a vicious, desperate thing.
Powerful and vindictive, even while the character was supposedly innocent and prudent.
Her lines were full of praise for her husband and cousin who were so clearly in love, as though oblivious to the whole affair.
But Harper delivered them with edges, with subtext not written, with a desperate cling to an illusion.
It was a daring take on the character. The sort that would either have her immediately overlooked for the Wilfred Allen Award or holding it within her grasp.
I wanted to bet on the former. I wanted to take away the nuance.
I wanted to push her into caricature, into pure rage. I wanted to make it real.
So I found Lewis, lingering behind the curtain as the Techies did their final checks.
“I missed you last night,” I said.
“You were the one who bailed on me,” he retorted with an almost teasing manner.
They’d put him in a white shirt left unbuttoned at the collar, and I noticed his chest was newly waxed.
I wondered if it was for the show or for him or if, maybe, this was Harper’s preference.
I wanted to reach out and feel it for myself, but I stilled myself and met his eyes with all that want lingering in my gaze.
“You think I’d take a risk like that the night before the show?”
“I think you love risks, Nadine.”
“Well, what’s one more?”
I’d mastered this smile by that point, the one that challenged, that dared, that made you want to prove something. On boys like Lewis, it rarely failed. His lips closed on me almost ravenously.
I had to keep it going for an irritatingly long period of time—moaning every time I thought he was trying to pull away or else letting my tongue dart against his. This was ridiculous.
We stumbled back, hitting the curtain, and my hand reached out and yanked hard.
It shouldn’t have worked like that, but the black curtain blocking out backstage was notoriously weak. It fell, a shocked and startled gasp sounded, and Lewis jolted away.
“You bastard!”
She was a blur, fists pummeling into Lewis, insults hurled too quickly to make them out.
Not Harper. Zoe.
Zoe?