Inevitable and Only(8)

Staring straight ahead. With big glassy eyes that kept fluttering shut.

I took my headphones off and put an arm around him. He looked at me, startled.

“I didn’t sleep much last night,” I said quietly, so Mom wouldn’t overhear. “Did you?”

He hesitated, then shook his head. After another moment, he leaned against my shoulder.

I hate crying. So I didn’t do it. But some tears might have fallen on Josh’s hair, from somewhere.

When we got to school, Mom dropped us off by the front door before going to park in the faculty lot. As we got out of the car, she jumped out and gave us each a quick hug and kiss.

“Have a good day, kiddos,” she said, too brightly, then hesitated. “I know this is—a strange day. Remember, I’m up in the front office if you need anything. Anytime.”

In my head, I grudgingly gave her a few points. She looked ten times worse than me—I was sure she hadn’t slept at all—and she hardly ever said things like, “Have a good day, kiddos.”

Josh and I parted ways inside the front doors. I turned right, toward the high school lockers, and he went left, to his fifth-grade classroom. I stumbled through classes all day, avoiding anyone I knew (which takes serious skill, when your whole grade has only eighty-nine kids), and tried my best not to think about Dad. Impossible, of course. I ducked into the bathroom between class periods, brushing my hair or messing with eyeliner until the bell rang. Twice during the day, I convinced myself it had all been a bad dream. Then I’d remember the note on the breakfast table, and the Pop-Tart would rumble unhappily in my stomach. No one had remembered to pack lunches, and I didn’t have any money, so I went to the bathroom during my lunch period and spent even more time on my eyeliner. I hoped Josh had a friend who would share a sandwich with him.

The only thing that remotely redeemed the day was drama class, which was in a separate building behind the school. We called it the Shed, even though it was big enough to hold a theater. There was a tiny classroom, but it didn’t look like we were ever going to use it. Mr. Goodfellow—I mean, Robin (he told us to call him by his first name, which made the whole class fall in love with him immediately)—said we may as well get used to being on stage.

Even though school had started the week before, Robin had been in New York for the final week of a play he’d directed, so this was our first class with him. We sat in the audience seats and he passed out an FAQ sheet, then perched on the edge of the stage and shuffled papers while we read it and filled it out.

Five facts about me:

1. Yes, my name really is Robin Goodfellow, like Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. I changed it legally when I was eighteen. Do not try this at home.

2. I believe in the One Bard, William Shakespeare, poet and playwright and actor supreme, hallowed be His name—and when you are in my theater, you will respect my beliefs. Do not take the Bard’s name in vain.

3. My dream come true would be playing Hedwig in Hedwig and the Angry Inch. As I cannot sing worth beans, however, I am resigned to a life of Hamlets, Algernon Moncrieffs, and Septimus Hodges.

4. If you don’t know who those people are, you’ll soon learn. Actually, if you don’t know who Hamlet is, I don’t know what you’re doing in my class. But welcome all the same!

5. That last one wasn’t really a fact about me, so here are three more for good measure: I grew up in Idaho, I have four younger sisters, and my favorite disgusting food is scrambled eggs with ketchup and mustard.

Now, tell me five facts about yourself:

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

I stared at those five blank spaces. Then I wrote:

1. I was named after Acadia National Park in Maine.

I started to write “My dad owns a bookshop” on the next line, but I got as far as “My dad,” then crossed it out. Instead, I wrote, “My brother plays the cello.” Lame. These were supposed to be facts about me, not about my family. I crossed that out, too. Now there wasn’t much room left on line 2, so I thought for a few minutes before squeezing in, “I also love Shakespeare.”

Robin clapped his hands. “Aaaand that’s time, people! You can take these home and finish them for tomorrow, if you’re not done yet.”

He gathered us on the stage and had us sit cross-legged in a circle. We began by “centering” ourselves with five minutes of meditation, which was possibly the longest five minutes in the history of the universe. My feet fell asleep, then my hands. Even my lower back fell asleep. Finally Robin rang a little bell to signal that we were all centered, and announced that we were going to start with something called Meisner repetitions.

“This exercise was developed to help the actor get out of his or her own head,” he said, pacing at the front of the stage and slapping the sides of his head.

Perfect, I thought, and the dark cloud over my own head lifted slightly in anticipation.

Robin had short, spiky gray hair, but he didn’t look old enough for gray hair—I wondered if he dyed it to try to appear older. He had the kind of sculpted face you see on Hollywood actors and his skin looked like leather, as if he’d spent too much time out in the sun. He was extremely thin, with ropy muscles that stood out starkly on his arms and even his hands, which he gestured with constantly. He smoked out in the parking lot between classes—you could smell it on him as soon as you stepped into the room. And he was wearing three little silver hoops in both ears, tight black jeans, a tight black turtleneck, and Doc Martens.