Always Never Yours(89)

The curtain goes up. I peer into the audience, and even though it’s dark, I feel my breath catch at the sheer number of people I can see. But I keep looking until I find them. Randall, Mom, Dad, and Rose sitting in the second row. Dad holds Rose’s hand, but he leans into Mom’s shoulder to whisper in her ear. I watch her smile at whatever he said while Courtney, the narrator, finds her mark.

“Two households, both alike in dignity . . .” I hear her begin.



* * *





I go on for my first scene with Romeo and realize it’s the first time I’ve spoken to Tyler since Friday night. We exchange amorous glances across the Capulet Manor set, and I linger downstage before he strides to me and takes my hand. Waiting under the lights, I feel none of the revulsion I do for Tyler himself.

Because I’m not watching Tyler right now. I’m watching Romeo, and I’m Juliet.

He kisses my hand, and I snatch it away, playing the hard-to-get Juliet I’ve come to love. I exchange hushed dialogue with Nurse Jenna before I exit stage left for the end of Act I. Anthony’s by the curtain, his eyes fixed on his mark, his lips moving imperceptibly. I put a hand on his shoulder and whisper, “Juilliard’s going to love you.” I catch his slight smile in the uneven backstage lighting.

In the wings, I watch a couple of freshmen diligently organizing the prop table. There’s the dagger, the apothecary’s bottles of poison, Owen’s prayer book. The stage crew silently wheels the balcony set into position behind the curtains, and I catch a glimpse of Andrew Mehta and Bridget Molloy standing next to each other watching the narrator on stage, their hands inconspicuously entwined. I smile to myself. I guess Romeo and Juliet gets to everyone.

I turn and find Owen, who’s helping Jenna with a quick-change from nurse to noblewoman near the wings stage right. And because I’m flushed from the Capulet Manor scene, because he’s my boyfriend, because I’m ridiculously happy about that, because it’s borderline pathetic how much I want to kiss him right now, I can’t keep my eyes off him. He looks up, and he returns an unabashedly huge grin. We’re worse than Romeo and Juliet.

Not taking my eyes off him, I walk backward, knowing I only have a minute to climb the stairs to the top of the balcony set. Mercutio and Benvolio are nearing the final lines of their scene on stage—

There’s an enormous crash.

I whirl, restraining myself in the middle of the show from yelling at whoever’s fault it was. I find Tyler in a heap on the floor, the wooden trellis in splinters surrounding him. Everyone’s frozen, every head turned in our direction. Tyler begins to brush himself off, looking dazed if unhurt, when Bridget rushes over, her face ashen.

“Are—are you okay?” she stutters, clearly fearing the lead has just broken his leg. “What happened?”

“I was practicing the jump, and it just . . . collapsed.” Tyler gestures to the trellis. His eyes clear, and a sudden fury fills them. He rounds on the stagehand nearest to him. “What the hell?” he hisses in the loudest whisper he can.

“It wasn’t secured properly,” Andrew Mehta offers weakly.

“Yeah, no shit.” Tyler fixes his glare on Andrew in the dark. “What I want to know is whose fault it was.”

“Tyler,” I say sharply, stepping in to shield Andrew. “We don’t have time for this. Anthony’s on the final lines of the scene.”

“If we don’t have the trellis, we don’t have the scene. I have to stop the show until we can fix it,” Bridget murmurs in exasperation. She glances over her shoulder. “Where’s Will? He’s our only carpenter.”

Nobody says anything. It’s Andrew who finally speaks up. “He, um, left. He said he had to call Alyssa.”

Bridget lets out a frustrated groan and begins muttering feverishly into her headset. It’s exactly like Will, I realize. I don’t know if he’s trying to make the production, and by extension me, look bad because he’s pissed I got the Juliet role back from Alyssa, or if he just doesn’t care about the play anymore. Either way, he’s screwed us over.

If we pause the play, it wouldn’t be the worst thing ever. It’d just pull the audience out of the story, look unprofessional, reflect poorly on the Stillmont drama program—okay, it’d be the worst thing ever. But without Romeo climbing the trellis and kissing Juliet, I’ve never been able to pull off the scene. Owen walks up then, and his eyes meet mine.

And just like that, I know.

“However long it takes!” I hear Bridget say. “We need to drop the curtain, and tell the audience we’re having technical difficulties—”

“Don’t,” I cut in. “We’ll do the scene without the trellis.” I give Tyler a quick look. “Just play it like it’s written.” He gives a short nod. Anthony comes off stage, and I turn to the stagehands while Bridget hurriedly calls off the curtain. “Roll the balcony on,” I tell them as I step onto the set. I climb the staircase, the wooden boards creaking beneath my feet like they have in countless rehearsals.

I’m briefly blinded when the lights come up, and I watch Tyler from where I’m hidden on the set. Once again I’m impressed by how flawlessly he delivers his lines, this time because I know he’s tempering his anger from hardly a minute ago.

When it’s my cue, I walk onto the balcony and begin Juliet’s monologue. Instead of waiting for Romeo to kiss me, I try to coax the love from Juliet’s fearful heart. I find myself glancing at my family out of the corner of my eye. I remember Owen’s steady heartbeat under my cheek while we drifted off to sleep. The way my dad held me this morning. With every line, I feel Juliet coming to life. I know what it is to love and to be loved.