Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
The gym hall consisted of a polished, pale, wooden floor and a dozen students sat around cross-legged, dressed in an assortment of jeans, T-shirts and leggings.
Memories of me struggling to leap over the pommel horse and getting whacked in the ankle by a hockey stick still haunted me.
‘Howdy, guys!’ chimed Josie.
She turned to me and indicated with one hand.
‘Now, we have a special guest with us this afternoon. This is Daisy Madden, a former pupil at this school and one of my former drama students. She’s trodden many theatre stages, and no doubt you will recognise her from her role as Tammy in the recent, excellent and gritty ITV series Sinister. ’
There were excited nods and murmurs and a burst of applause.
‘Daisy has kindly agreed to come and chat to you all today, so Daisy, over to you!’
I dumped my bag on a nearby chair and thanked Mrs Hazelwood for her introduction before giving a potted version of how I got started: the endless auditions, the chilly theatres I’d acted in and then my biggest role to date in Sinister.
‘How about some of you give me a performance of one of your favourite pieces, and then I’m more than happy to take any questions? ’
There was a sea of enthusiastic nods.
‘Right. Who’d like to go first?’ I asked.
There followed a procession of very good performances from the students; they each stood up and acted out a scene from one of their favourite movies or novels.
There were scenes performed from Of Mice and Men, To Kill a Mockingbird, West Side Story and Wuthering Heights.
Their range and maturity blew me away, and I clapped and encouraged them, advising a couple of them to throw themselves even more into the person they were pretending to be.
‘Don’t think about your audience,’ I suggested. ‘In fact, don’t think. Just be.’
I was revelling in the drama student’s enthusiasm and passion, but at the same time, bouts of melancholy hit, making me wonder when or even if I would ever act again myself.
My attention fell on a pretty, strawberry blonde-haired girl sitting close to the gym hall windows. She was appraising me with sea green eyes. She dropped her attention to her trainers when I smiled and nodded over at her. She was the only one who hadn’t got to her feet to perform.
Josie sidled up beside me. ‘That’s Cayla Sweeney,’ she whispered.
‘All my students are great, but she’s something else.
So, so talented. Just a pity she doesn’t believe it herself.
’ She nodded her head in the direction of the school’s entrance.
‘Cayla is Gillian’s daughter. The school receptionist you were chatting to this morning. ’
‘Ah. Right.’
‘Gillian’s one of my closest friends,’ added Josie, giving Cayla a smile.
The girl returned a nervous one back, before peering down steadfastly at her trainers again.
The other students noticed us looking over at her.
There was a hush.
‘Cayla, isn’t it?’ I asked.
She nodded her long, straight hair, making it tumble further over her face.
‘Would you like to perform something?’
She bit her bottom lip.
‘Do what you like; poem, scene from a book, an excerpt from a play.’
‘I don’t know,’ she murmured, avoiding eye contact.
‘You can do a scene from Pride and Prejudice,’ suggested Josie.
Cayla shook her head. ‘No, Miss.’
I searched around my mind for something to suggest next. ‘What about some Shakespeare?’
Cayla glanced up at me from under her straight fringe.
‘I love Twelfth Night,’ I said. ‘It’s my all-time favourite of his. I think it’s the first rom-com.’
Cayla’s eyes widened. ‘Seriously, Miss? I love it too.’
‘Well then,’ announced Josie, looking delighted.
Cayla stared around before slowly rising to her feet. Her glittery trainers squeaked on the shiny gym hall floor.
She knotted and unknotted her fingers in front of her. The pale blue hoodie she was wearing looked like it was ready to swallow her up at any moment.
‘Take your time,’ I told her. ‘When you feel ready.’
The afternoon May sunshine was tumbling through the gym windows making Cayla’s hair light up. She stole a deep breath, took another furtive glance around at her fellow drama students and then began to recite part of Olivia’s monologue from act one, scene five.
‘What is your parentage?’
Above my fortunes, yet my state is well.
I am a gentleman.’ I’ll be sworn thou art.
Thy tongue, thy face, thy limbs, actions, and spirit,
Do give thee five-fold blazon. Not too fast! Soft, soft!
I watched her possess each famous word, delivering it with clarity and conviction, as her contemporaries observed her with open admiration.
It was as if she’d morphed into Olivia herself, self-assured and regal, with an element of steel coursing through her.
When she finished, there was a stunned hush before we all broke into rapturous applause.
Cayla sank down again, cross-legged, on the floor. Her face was zinging pink under her curtain of hair.
‘That was incredible,’ I assured her. ‘Mesmerising.’
We then held a question-and-answer session, where I was asked everything from who my favourite playwright was and which actor I envied, to what role I dreamt of and which theatre had the best atmosphere. It was so heart-warming to be able to share everything I loved about my craft.
The class soon came to a close, and the students thanked me as they filed past to go home, clutching their bags and folders.
Cayla was the last one to leave.
‘You were wonderful,’ I assured her. ‘You’re very talented.’
She hooked some hair behind one ear. ‘Thank you, Ms Madden.’
She scurried out of the gym with her straw bag clutched to her side and her head down.
‘School bullies,’ said Josie, breaking through my thoughts.
‘Sorry?’
‘Cayla had a hard time recently with being bullied. It’s knocked her confidence. Made her think she isn’t good enough. That’s why she’s so reluctant to perform.’
My own experience of bullying at this very same school echoed in my head. ‘I’ve been there. I know what that’s like and what effect it can have on you.’
Josie examined me as she zipped up her bag. ‘You were bullied? I never knew that.’
‘It didn’t go on indefinitely, thanks to my grandpa getting a couple of the local farm hands to have a quiet word with the ring leader.’
Josie grinned. ‘Now that I can believe.’
‘But I can appreciate what it must be like for Cayla. What’s happening with the situation now?’
‘The girl in question got excluded, and quite right too, but Cayla is still carrying the after-effects.’ Josie slipped on her denim jacket.
‘Gillian keeps asking me to try and have another word with Cayla; talk her round and make her realise how amazing she is and what potential she has, but I think she thinks I’m only telling her what her mother wants her to hear. ’
Josie studied me. ‘Hold on. What about you?’
‘Me?’
‘She probably thinks I’m some old luvvie fart, whereas you seemed to hit it off with her, especially with the Twelfth Night love-in.’
I blinked at her. ‘You think I might have more luck?’
Josie shrugged as we strolled together out of the empty gym hall. ‘Worth a try. Would you at least give it a go? See if Cayla might listen to you?’
I conjured up images of her performances of Olivia.
I remembered getting sneered at myself by that nasty piece of work Gideon Turner and his cohort who didn’t understand my love of drama.
They used to say I thought I was better than everyone else just because I wanted to pursue acting.
The truth of it was that I knew what I wanted to do from an early age, and nothing would dissuade me.
I thought again about Cayla. ‘Ok. I can’t promise I’ll succeed, but yes, I’ll chat with her.’
Josie gave my arm a squeeze. ‘Let’s go and tell Gillian. She’ll be delighted! And thank you!’
* * *
I pulled up outside number 12, The Grove in Forrest Bank just before five o’clock that afternoon.
Gillian had said Cayla would be home by then, but she wouldn’t tell her I was coming. I didn’t know in hindsight whether that might be a good idea or not.
Maybe it was. If she thought I was coming to deliver a pep talk, she might decide to go straight back out again before I arrived.
The house was a spotless, white, pebble-dashed, detached affair with a cheery, bright red front door and a small but well-tended front lawn, fringed with flower beds bursting with pops of spring blooms.
I parked Marlene in the street and clambered out.
The late afternoon air was languid and peaceful, tinged with lazy sunshine.
No sooner had I locked my car and started to make my way up the brick path than Gillian yanked the front door open and hauled me inside.
The air smelled of apple air freshener. ‘Thank you so much again, Daisy. I can’t tell you what it means to me and Morris, my husband.
’ She gestured around. ‘He’s at work at the moment.
He works in IT.’ She stopped and let out a nervous giggle.
‘Sorry. I’m babbling. It’s not every day I have a famous actor in my house. ’
I let out a snort. ‘That’s really sweet of you to say that, Gillian, but like I said before, I’m not famous.’ And I never would be, if the likes of bloody Fox had their way and the lack of acting roles continued.
I refocused on Gillian and her daughter.
The hallway consisted of a polished, pale, wooden floor, with an ornate, heavy, cherrywood sideboard and a couple of vases of fresh flowers. Family photographs lined the walls.
‘Cayla’s up in her room,’ said Gillian in a hush. ‘Come on. This way.’
Gillian swept up the carpeted staircase, and I followed. I wasn’t quite sure what Gillian wanted me to say to Cayla, but I’d already decided to just wing it and hope that I could reignite some of her acting spark.
Gillian had changed out of her businesslike blouse and skirt from the morning. She was now dressed in a loose, denim shirt and Capri pants.