Chapter 15
Selena
Aisha waited for me outside the drama department. She jumped up from a bench when I rounded the corner, a flurry of nervous energy.
“Oh my God, I was starting to think you bailed on me.”
“I’m not promising to try anything myself, but I’m here for you. You’re going to be amazing.”
“You’ve never seen me act! Maybe I’m awful,” she laughed.
We walked into the building.
I shrugged. “Yeah, okay, then you’re awful… but you won’t have any regrets.”
We entered the main room and stopped.
“Wow, I had no idea it would be this… crowded,” Aisha trailed off.
The room was huge, but so was the number of people who had assembled.
“I guess HHU productions are pretty prestigious,” I mumbled, doubling down inside myself that I wasn’t going to audition. This was a nightmare.
Aisha nodded, going a little pale.
I grabbed her arm before she could chicken out and ushered her to the small check-in desk beside the door.
“She’s registering to audition,” I told them.
“And so is she,” Aisha said quickly.
I turned an exasperated look at her.
“I’m serious, you wanted to and you’re here now, you might as well. You can always back out at the last second, but you might not, so you need to register.”
She started to fill in her information on a card and shoved a pen at me.
“Hurry, you’re holding up the line,” she muttered.
“Geez, you’re persistent.”
“I come from a long line of persistent Indian mothers… ‘no’ doesn’t exist in my vocab. Do or do not, remember?”
“Wasn’t that Yoda?”
“He stole it from my grandmother,” Aisha muttered and waited for me to finish before taking both our cards and handing them in.
“Okay, now what?” I wondered, nervously chewing my nail.
It was noisy, with people practicing their monologues and doing vocal warm-up exercises. I felt like the most inexperienced person out of everyone.
“Now, we wait.” Aisha found a space on the floor, sank down, and tugged me with her.
“Okay, we wait,” I agreed, resigned to seeing this through, for the sake of Aisha’s persistent Indian mother if no one else.
An hour later, we were called up.
“I’m so glad they’re calling us in groups.” Aisha looped her arm through mine.
We followed others down a long hall and into a much smaller room. There, we lined up to wait to be called into another small room.
Nerves had made my palms slick. I felt overheated, and my face was definitely burning. Why had I agreed to this?
We waited at the back of the line. I could vaguely hear the auditions happening inside, since the door was open. After a while, it was Aisha’s turn. She gripped my hand hard.
“Oh God, this was a mistake.”
“You’ll be fine. Go for it. No regrets, remember?”
She nodded, took a deep breath, and then walked in. I was left alone, gripping my copy of the play and listening to bits and pieces of Aisha’s audition.
After ten minutes, she walked out, her face elated.
“How did it go?” I whispered.
“Terrible, but I did it!” She grinned at me.
“Is there anyone left out there?” a voice called from inside the room.
I looked at Aisha, trying to warn her with my eyes. It was only me left, and I’d already decided not to do it in the time I’d been waiting for her.
“Yes! One more,” Aisha said and then danced away from me before my swat could reach her.
“You’re dead,” I hissed at her.
She just laughed. “No regrets, remember!”
I turned to the open doorway, my whole body hot and cold all at once.
“Come in,” the voice inside the room urged.
I couldn’t just run away now, when people were waiting.
So, I stepped into the room.
A long trestle table had been set up, with four people behind it. A video camera sat at one end, trained on a chair set up in the middle of the room.
“Come in. You are…?”
“Selena, Selena Carmichael,” I said slowly. I hadn’t changed my name to Sinclair, and I had no plans to.
“Come on in, Selena, and sit down. Let’s have a quick chat to get to know each other. Do you have any acting experience?”
I shook my head. “I… no. No more than any other woman does, I mean.”
The main interviewer was the head of the drama department. I’d seen her around before. She introduced herself as Director Cho. There was a guy who looked like a student, another teacher, and an older man. I looked down the line of them, reading their names but not really taking them in.
“No more than any other woman? Can you elaborate on that? It sounds interesting,” the other teacher asked.
I nodded. Crap, why had I babbled away? Now I had to justify my words or sound like a flake.
“I just mean, everyone is used to acting to a certain extent; men, too, probably.”
The panel watched me, waiting for me to continue.
“I said woman, because that’s what I can relate to. I’m sure men have their own things that they act about every day… maybe not to care about a bad grade,” I rambled. Brody’s face flashed through my head. “Or maybe that their dreams are the same as their parents’.”
“And women?” Director Cho prompted.
I shrugged. “Acting like they’re okay, or that they feel safe. That the world isn’t scary. I think everyone knows how to act at least that much every single day.”
Silence fell when I finished. Director Cho considered me and then nodded to an assistant standing behind her.
“Give her script one, please.”
The assistant walked over and handed me a small bunch of papers, stapled in one corner.
I looked down at it.
Handmaiden No. 3.
I nearly laughed. It wasn’t quite a background role, like I’d imagined, but it was close enough.
“Should I just read it?”
“You should act it,” the older man interjected, seeming irritated by my inexperience.
“Take your time to understand it first, read it, absorb it,” the younger guy said.
I nodded and scanned over the words, taking my time to read it well.
Then I raised my head and started.
Time flew by. One second I was nervous, the next I was talking, and then, it was over.
“Thank you, Selena,” Director Cho said with a smile. “Can I ask you to read one more time?”
“Um, okay,” I muttered, the nerves that I’d forgotten when I was speaking, suddenly rushing back.
“Scene four, please.”
I flipped through the papers and found the scene. I took my time to read it and then started.
The nerves disappeared again, as did I. For that moment, I wasn’t Selena, damaged goods, former mean girl and deserving victim. I was whoever I was reading in the script. I was someone else, and God, it felt good. I fell into that feeling, letting it absorb me.
“Prove you that any man with me conversed
At hours unmeet, or that I yesternight
Maintained the change of words with any creature,
Refuse me, hate me, torture me to death!”
I finished the final line softly, my voice full of aching despair and disappointment, instead of anger and frustration, feeling in that moment Hero’s heart ache.
Silence fell again in the absence of my voice. I watched the panel, embarrassed.
Director Cho looked at her colleagues and then smiled at me again. “Thank you, Selena, I think that’s all.”
I nodded and stood awkwardly. The walk to the door was excruciating. I felt all of their eyes on me, judging me, weighing my worth. I escaped into the other room with a shudder, and Aisha was there.
“Did they get you to read twice? That’s huge!”
“Is it? I’m sure the first time was just so bad, they gave me another chance,” I demurred.
Aisha narrowed her eyes at me. “You don’t know anything. You’ll see. They really liked you. I can’t believe I’m friends with one of the stars of the show!”
“Very funny,” I muttered, but Aisha’s enthusiasm was infectious. I couldn’t deny there was a high from having done something so scary.
It felt good, I realized, as we stepped out into the bright Saturday sunshine. Really good.
The day only managed to get better when I got a message later. I’d gone for lunch with Aisha, and then she had to go. I’d decided not to go back to my bully’s domain and instead wandered around the bookstores on Main Street.
Then I got the message.
Bellend: What the fuck did you put in my smoothie?
Me: Whatever do you mean? I have no idea, I’m sure, though it’s probably best to hang out in a bathroom for the rest of the day.
Bellend: You’re playing with fire, little heathen. I guess you don’t like your independence as much as I thought you did. I’ll remedy that shortly.
Me: Once you’re done in the bathroom?
My cackle startled the couple walking behind me. I tucked my phone away, not looking as I was walking, and immediately paid the price by bouncing off someone.
“Oh God, I’m sorry,” I said immediately, flinching away as hands came up to steady me. My hindbrain clocked the height of the person in front of me, the big hands, and overall energy and knew it was a man. I was jumping back before his hands could make contact with me.
“My fault,” a deep voice said.
I peered up and took him in. Uniform and all. He was a cop. A familiar cop.
“No, it was mine. It’s you,” I pointed out dumbly.
The guy who had come around to the house on an errand, for the Sinclairs’ security logistics. I’d learned from Arthur that houses that big and impressive sometimes coordinated their security details with the local cops.
He smiled down at me. He was big. I itched to leave.
“No problem. And I got that info from your dad, so don’t worry.”
“He’s not my dad,” I heard myself saying instinctively, and then cringed. That sounded lame. Why did I care what this man thought? I didn’t.
“Right, he’s your stepdad, yes?” the cop was saying.
I nodded tightly and went to walk around him.
Then he touched my arm, stopping me, and that familiar freezing sensation descended over me.
“You know, it was plaguing me the other day… where I’d seen you before,” he said.
I fought my panic and forced myself to look at him. “We’d never met before you came to the house.”
“I said where I’d seen you before. I know we hadn’t met,” he said slowly. “I just couldn’t place it… then I remembered the video I saw a while back. Well, more than a year ago now, I guess.”
“A video?” I repeated. My heart was beating so fast, it hurt.
He nodded. His vest had his name stitched on. Preston.
“Mm-hmm, it was right before my partner was killed in the line of duty. Well, it wasn’t really in the line of duty, but the sergeant thought it was. He was caught up in senseless gang violence, apparently, after hours. That was the official line, but not really what happened.”
I stared at him, unsure where he was going with this.
“It was at this place, up north. You’ve been there… it’s where the video was filmed.”
Yep, it was official. I was having a heart attack.
Cold sweat broke out on my face.
“Don’t worry. Only the investigating officers saw the footage,” he continued, like that was some kind of comfort. He seemed like he was waiting for me to confirm that I remembered what he was talking about.
“The place was called The Cove? Well, it was before the Harbor Hounds MC decided to burn it to the ground. My partner died that night.”
“I-I don’t understand what you’re saying, I mean, it has nothing to do with me,” I managed to get out.
The cop frowned at my panic, appearing concerned as I started to hyperventilate.
I felt like I was going to be sick. I swayed, and he caught me.
I stumbled back, trying to get away. Everything inside me was screaming to run away. I banged into another person passing by, spilling their takeout coffee.
“Hey!” the girl exclaimed.
“I’m sorry,” I panted, panic closing in. “I’m so sorry.”
The cop watched me with a worried expression as I turned and stumbled away.
I made it up Main Street to the bookstore I’d just come out of.
I went in and staggered down a quiet aisle, going to the farthest corner I could find, before sinking to the floor.
Like a puppet whose strings had been cut, I had no control over my limbs.
I couldn’t control my breath; it rasped in and out of my chest. I couldn’t even see properly. Everything was hazy.
A video had survived the purge the MC had done of The Cove, the members’ club with dark, dark secrets, up near the Canadian border. The place where my life had changed. There was a video, and people had seen it.
It felt excruciating. Forget all my efforts to take back control. What did any of it matter, when someone could see that video?
What did anything matter?
I rolled myself into a ball, holding myself together through sheer force of will. I rocked back and forth and tried to breathe.
I had to breathe.
Breathe.