Chapter 23
Four weeks until Opening Night
We open in a month, which means we need to crack down on publicity.
The shows usually do well between strong community support and summer visitors, many of whom make the trip to Tempest every summer.
Still, my mother is leaning hard into her additional role as producer and hands everyone a stack of posters to put up over the weekend.
I look around awkwardly, watching the pile of posters shrink, relieved when the last one is picked up.
“Sorry.” I shrug. “They’re all gone.”
My mother laughs. “You thought you’d get out of it!
Don’t worry.” She hands me a shopping bag filled to the brim with mini posters.
“These are for you!” I look at her in disbelief.
“It’s tradition. The guest actors always hand these out.
” She nods toward Nick, who holds up an identical bag and gives us an enthusiastic thumbs-up.
“You can pass them out at the farmers’ market on Saturday. ”
I sigh. “Together?”
“Yes, Miranda! Together!” Her voice is singsongy, which I know is one step before fully clipped.
“It’s exciting for the community to see our visiting actors.
It’s a wonderful opportunity for you to reconnect with people.
” My mother is famous for offering “wonderful opportunities,” which are almost exclusively things I do not want to do.
“Lovely.”
“Wear something nice!” she calls after me as I start off. “You’re representing the theater! And the family!” I hold up a hand in acknowledgment, grimacing.
The farmers’ market is a long row of stalls along the path by the lake, the same place I ran into Kelsie.
I look for her now, as though the waterfront itself could conjure her.
There is a sea of blond mothers with strollers, so I remain on alert.
Nick is late. I don’t want to do this with him, but even worse is the idea of approaching strangers alone, so I sip a lovely iced lavender coffee thing from a stall near the parking lot and wait.
The whole town is out, it seems; it’s a gorgeous, sunny Saturday in July in a lakeside town.
This is the place to be. When I used to think of North Lake, it was from the perspective of a much younger person: I wanted to get out of here.
There was nothing for me except working in my parents’ theater, nothing else this small town could offer me, so I left.
Over the years, a skewed narrative crept in that this town was outdated and simplistic, boarded over in my mind.
But the scene before me is vibrant. The booths are cool, and the kind of “wholesome, homespun” thing considered cool in the city is just organic here.
There are people everywhere. A local folk singer is performing in the small bandstand in the park, and her voice floats in and out of the sounds of voices and activity.
There’s a drag artist doing story time in the gazebo, storyteller and captive audience alike decked out in matching tiaras and fairy wings.
Way off down the park, I see an outdoor seniors’ yoga class.
I’m surprised by how much exists here, how much is happening. How much seems to have changed.
Where is Nick? If he bails on this, I’ll kill him. I can think of nothing worse than stopping people to advertise our play by myself. I imagine people pushing past me while I feebly call out, Shakespeare! Anyone? Come see some . . . theater? I check my phone yet again.
“Hey!” Nick trots toward me, golden and eager. He looks expectantly at my coffee. “Didn’t get one for me?”
“Nope.” I tilt my head. “The stall is back that way . . .”
“I brought you a coffee last time!” He pouts excessively for a grown man.
“The coffee you brought when you showed up at my house after your very bad behavior?” I don’t even bother reminding him that he has yet to ever get my coffee order correct.
“No worries. I just had a protein shake, so . . .”
“I bet you did.” I take one final gratuitous drag of my drink and toss it in the garbage.
“Okay, let’s get this over with.” I pull out a handful of flyers.
“I guess we just . . . talk to people?” I say, but Nick has already headed down the path and removed his sunglasses, revealing his identity, and thus is swarmed.
“And this here is Miranda Belmont!” he says, pulling me into the fray when I arrive. “Hometown hero!” I cringe at the phrase but am surprised by the beaming smiles.
“It’s so nice to have you back, dear!” a woman says to me. “I watch your show every week! The town is very proud of you!”
“Oh! Wow, um, thanks. Please, uh, come to our show!” She takes three flyers.
Nick and I make our way slowly down the path, handing out flyers, stopping for a chat with almost every person.
It’s weird. People are obviously excited to see Nick.
Before Listings, he had done a few action movies, a Netflix zombie miniseries.
He’s legit famous. I’m just from here. Or so I thought. People keep saying things to me.
“I’ve been following your career since you got that Tide commercial! The town is so proud of you!”
“You went to high school with my daughter Tracy! Do you remember Tracy?” I do not. “She was so jealous of you!” Poor Tracy.
“I saw you and Theodore in that high school Peter Pan. I was his piano teacher! And even then, I could see there were budding stars onstage!” That one warms me quite a bit.
People ask for photographs, autographs. At first, I step aside, assuming they mean with Nick, but they pull me in, as though I am an equal draw.
In the city, sometimes people notice me.
I get the occasional free coffee at my local café, where one barista is a big fan of the show, but I am certainly not exciting enough to count as famous.
But here, I seem to have a celebrity status that I didn’t realize.
My parents have shown such disdain for my show that I kind of assumed that it was mildly embarrassing to my entire hometown, but it turns out people watch it.
It’s important for me to remember that not everyone is like my father, who reads the Greek theater canon every year just to “keep sharp.” Some people, lots of people, it turns out, enjoy salacious, murder-y, real estate prime-time dramas.
I just hadn’t had occasion to meet them until now.
My time in North Lake, I am realizing, has been so insular: the theater, the cidery, the lake .
. . I haven’t been out much among the people.
I might have done this sooner if I’d known I was famous.
Or not. I don’t know. It feels strange. A fun planet to visit, but who really wants to live there?
Nick Nolan does, of course. He’s a pro at this.
I know this is his favorite thing—the attention, the adoration, an abundance of people to worship him.
He’s good at it: He leans in, he asks them questions, he holds their babies, he smiles, laughs widely at their pedestrian jokes.
He is relaxed, but with an underlying mania that I know, for him, is adrenaline.
I’m more easily overwhelmed, but the attention grows on me.
People want to talk to me. People want to see our play.
Lots of people have already bought tickets!
People think I’m great on Listings! Except, of course, I’m not on it anymore.
“I think your character should be bigger!” says one man.
“You should tell the producers to give you more lines. You should post on the community Facebook group, see if they would start a petition. We love a petition!” I feel Nick watching me out of the corner of his eye.
I’m grateful that he doesn’t correct these compliments.
We stop for a break and a lemonade from a small booth run by little girls in unicorn headbands.
“Do you ladies have a permit?” Nick crosses his arms and glowers, and they giggle. He hands them a twenty, and their jaws drop and they give us each a sticky high five. I leave some flyers on their table.
“I’m sorry about the show,” Nick says when we are seated on a bench, away from the crowd. “It must be tough with everyone making such a big deal about it.” For a moment, I am confused, then realize he means Listings. Already, Midsummer’s has replaced “the show” in my mind.
“Oh. Yeah, well, it’s nice that people watched it anyway.” What else am I supposed to say?
“I was thinking.” Nick turns to me. “I should talk to Jay. We should get you back. I was angry . . . I was being an asshole.” He looks at me, and I nod.
“But I can talk to the team . . . You and I are good, right? We could work together? I could see if we could, yeah, you know, sweeten your role . . .”
I’m surprised that his words spark nothing in me.
A little validation, maybe, but my heart doesn’t leap at the thought of returning or a bigger role.
I shrug. “We’ll see,” I say. “Let’s just get through the play.
” The truth is, I don’t know if I could work with him again.
The truth is, I don’t know that I’d go back if given the choice.
“I’ll make a call,” says Nick.
“Sure,” I say. Might as well see what my options are. I stand. “Let’s finish these flyers.” I’m having a surprisingly nice day. I don’t need to talk about the past, or the future. Today, for once, I’m happy where I am.
We make our way farther down the path. The farmers’ market is winding down, and most of the people who want photos and autographs have seen us already.
Some wave as we pass by them again, like we are old friends now.
I take in a few of the booths: There’s a witchy-looking young woman with whimsical earrings selling essential oil blends.
There’s a booth with artisanal cheese (I pick some up for my parents), and another with wooden birdhouses painted in cheerful colors.
Between the booths and Nick and the flyers, I don’t even notice Will until we are almost face-to-face.
I look up and see the Twin Orchards logo above me.
“Hey!” I do a double take. “Wait, you have a booth?” I can feel my face light up. Do we hug? I want to. “I’m so happy to see you!” I burst out. I’m not being very cool. Ugh. I look around the spread before me, his whole line of summer ciders. It’s impressive.
His smile is thin. “Yeah, Jenny’s sick, I had to cover.” I rack my brain for Jenny, instantly jealous, before I remember his bartender Mark, whose lovely wife is also an employee. There’s a coldness to Will . . . why? I search his face, but the answer comes sidling up beside me.
“Hey, man,” Nick says, raising his hand for a fist bump, which Will doesn’t return. I push Nick’s arm down.
“I think you two have had enough fisticuffs for one summer,” I say. Will doesn’t smile. “Nick, the yoga class just let out. You should go see if they want some flyers.” He narrows his eyes at Will, looking between us, but one of the yogis has caught his eye and is waving him over.
“You coming?”
“In a minute,” I say. “I want to talk to Will.” Nick snorts lightly but shrugs and saunters off.
“We’re doing flyers,” I say lamely, offering him one.
He doesn’t take it. He looks down at his table, straightening some bottles.
“Will. What?” It’s been, what, four days since our paddle?
It felt like we had gotten closer. It felt like something was really brewing between us.
Now I’m not sure. “Are you upset with me or something?”
He looks up, eyes flashing. “I’m pretty surprised to see you with that guy.
Considering last time we were all together, I was pulling him off you.
” There’s something else in his face that I can’t place.
Disdain, maybe? I open my mouth to defend myself.
“It’s fine, I have no claim on who you hang out with. ”
“This”—I gesture around the market—“is my mother. She made me do this. With him.” I try to catch his eye, but he’s avoidant.
“I have no desire at all to hang out with Nick Nolan. My parents don’t know anything about .
. . anything. It was easier to just do this.
” Will shrugs, but I can see him relax a bit.
“Anyway. It turns out that I have a lot of fans in North Lake. Can you believe it?”
“I believe it.” He still doesn’t smile.
“We are just supposed to be handing out flyers, but we ended up doing all these autographs and, like, people wanted pictures. It was really weird but also kind of nice?” I smile at him hopefully, trying to find whatever thread pulled us together just days ago.
“That’s nice, Mira. You deserve that.” He smiles a tight half smile that means nothing.
I try again. “Do you want my autograph?” I all but bat my eyelashes, hoping he’ll laugh.
But he looks at me, he locks in, and there he is. “No, Mira, I don’t want your damn autograph.”
“What? Jeez, I was joking.” I feel stung.
He leans in. “I don’t need an autograph to know that I met you. I don’t care about all that stuff. I don’t care that you’re kind of famous.”
“You don’t.” I have felt genuinely famous for all of an hour, and Will is rapidly pulling the wind from my sails.
“I’m sort of surprised that you do,” he says. “I don’t really believe in autographs. It’s a weird thing to want from someone.” I drop my eyes to the cider on the table. I straighten a bottle that he missed. I don’t know what to say. I swallow hard, chastened.
“You seem mad at me.”
He shakes his head a little in disbelief. “I mean, Mira, it’s just a lot of mixed signals. I don’t know what you want from me.”
“That’s fair.” I don’t know what else to say.
“Hey.” He reaches across the table and catches my wrist very gently, finally looking right at me. “It’s just, I don’t want anything from you if it belongs to everyone else. I don’t want anything from you but . . .”
“But what?” booms Nick, beside me suddenly. He slings his arm around my shoulders, which I shrug off and, in doing so, also shrug Will off.
“Nothing. Go away,” I say, and Nick laughs, not moving, and whatever spell that was is broken. “I think I’m done for the day,” I say to Nick.
“Go team!” He tries to high-five me, but I duck away. He still doesn’t leave.
“I’ll see you around?” I ask Will. He smiles.
He nods. Nick stiffens. I can see Nick won’t leave until I do, and I’m not in the mood for another showdown between them.
I wonder what Will was going to say? “Okay, well, Nick, thanks, see you at rehearsal. Will . . .” I’m not sure what else to say, so I wave lamely and set off in the opposite direction from both of them.