“Lysander, Queen Hippolyta, and Puck,” I said, hoping I’d win brownie points for knowing the names off the top of my head.
“I suppose I can’t blame them.” She set the papers back down on the desk in a cluttered heap. “So few people can grasp the nuances of Shakespeare these days. Still, it’s depressing to think that every time I give a reading assignment, there’s a run on Cliff Notes somewhere.”
“I love Shakespeare.” I didn’t, but in a class where we were routinely asked to pretend to be people who never existed, I figured it was okay to stretch the truth. “I really wanted to be in Romeo and Juliet—a lot of kids did. A reader’s theater just won’t be the same.”
Mrs. Shale looked at the stack of papers and shook her head again. “I can just imagine how they’ve butchered the name Hermes.”
“So you should expose more kids to Shakespeare. You know, help us develop an appreciation for fine writing.”
She flipped through a couple of papers and sighed. “Maybe another year when money isn’t so tight. I need about a thousand dollars for a set, and the school doesn’t have it, because, heaven forbid, the guys on the football team would have to wear their old uniforms one more year.’”
“A thousand dollars isn’t so much,” I said. “I’m sure our fund-raiser would cover it.” And if not, I would personally buy a lifetime supply of gift wrap to make up the difference.
Mrs. Shale patted my hand. “That’s what I like about you, Jessica …your dedication to drama.” She lowered her voice, as though telling me a secret. “No one even comes close to your rendition of eating a lemon. But we just don’t have the resources.” She picked up her red marking pen and turned back to her papers as though this closed the matter. On the first page she drew large, loping circles around every misspelled word.
A lump of desperation tightened in my throat. “But I know the perfect guy for Romeo.”
Tonelessly, and without shifting her gaze from the stack of essays, she said, “Brendan might look the part, but I don’t think he could display the inner turmoil needed for the performance.”
“I don’t mean Brendan. I mean Christopher Hunter’s son.” I actually slapped my hand over my mouth after I said this. I hadn’t planned to say anything about Christopher Hunter. I had planned to say Jordan Hunter, and yet the whole Christopher Hunter’s son phrase popped out instead.
Mrs. Shale’s pen froze over the paper. Her glance rushed back to mine. “Christopher Hunter’s son? Where would we get him?”
If I were really a good actress, I would have laughed off my mistake. I would have said, “In a drama class with Harrison Ford’s and Tom Cruise’s kids.” But instead, I stood, hand still over my mouth, staring at Mrs. Shale. It was too late to take back my statement.
“I wasn’t supposed to tell anyone,” I whispered, “but he just moved here. I’ve already talked to him about it, and he wants to try out for the fall play. So we have to put on a fall play. I mean, Christopher Hunter will come to see it if his son is involved.”
My parents wonder why I want to be an actress. If they could have seen Mrs. Shale’s face at that moment, it would have answered all of their questions. Pure awe shone in her eyes.
“Well, yes,” she said, letting out a low breath. “That does merit consideration, doesn’t it? You say you’ve met him? Is he going to take my drama class? Is his father in Three Forks right now?”
“He couldn’t fit your class into his schedule.” Mrs. Shale didn’t need to know that this was because he didn’t like drama. “And his parents are divorced, so it’s just his mom who’s here; but his father will come down and visit if he’s in the play. Maybe he could even give the cast some acting pointers. Think of what a great opportunity it would be for us kids to meet a professional actor.”
“Yes,” she repeated. “A great opportunity for the kids.”
Only, I could tell by the faraway, dreamy look in her eyes that she was no longer thinking of the kids but of schmoozing with a handsome Hollywood hunk. You’d sort of expect more from a woman who’s in her forties and married, but hey, this is the effect movie stars have on people.
“Perhaps I could talk to the principal about getting some additional funding . . .” she said, imagining herself, I’m sure, at some intimate gathering Christopher Hunter was throwing for his son’s favorite teachers. Liam Neeson would no doubt be there, along with a few Rolling Stones members and a karaoke machine.
“Great,” I said. “I can hardly wait for tryouts.”
“Yes,” she said. But I’m not exactly sure what she was saying yes to—my comment or Christopher Hunter asking her if she’d like another shrimp kebab appetizer.
“Jordan doesn’t want everyone to know who he is right off, so could you keep that part a secret?”
“Yes,” she said again. And I didn’t even want to guess at what she was imagining.
Jordan and I met in the school library after school. We sat at a corner table by the drinking fountain with two copies of Romeo and Juliet propped in front of us. Mine was a thin and yellowing book containing only Romeo and Juliet. Jordan’s was a monstrously thick copy of Shakespeare’s entire works, with pages so pristine they looked like they’d never been turned. I flipped through my book until I found Romeo and Juliet’s first meeting. “All right. You’ve sneaked into a ball being thrown by your biggest enemy, my father, and meet me, Juliet. You are at once overwhelmed by my grace and beauty.”
“Yeah,” he said with a smirk. “That’s exactly how it was when I met you.”
“Read your line, and try to show the audience you’re overwhelmed.” I batted my eyelashes to add to the effect.
Jordan skimmed the page till he found the right place, then read:
If I profane with my unworthiest hand
This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this,
My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand
To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.
He laid the book down with a thud.
I picked it up and handed it back to him. “Now read it with feeling.”
“Feeling? I didn’t even understand what I said. How am I supposed to feel anything about it?”
Scooting my chair closer to his, I peered down at the book. “A lot of times you have to read Shakespeare two or three or a dozen times to understand what he’s saying. See Romeo takes Juliet’s hand and apologizes because his handshake isn’t soft enough. He compares her hand to a holy shrine and says his lips are two pilgrims waiting to smooth out his rough touch with a kiss. And because he’s Shakespeare and had all that practice writing sonnets and stuff, he rhymed the whole thing. That’s why English teachers love him.” I handed his book back to Jordan. “Now try to emote while you read it.”
Jordan’s eyebrow rose. “He’s comparing his lips to two pilgrims? That’s the lamest pickup line I’ve ever heard.”
I ignored him and read Juliet’s line.
Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,
Which mannerly devotion shows in this:
For saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch,
And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss.
Instead of being impressed with my reading, or at least noting how I’d done it, Jordan picked up his book and flipped through the pages. “I don’t believe this. Does this all rhyme? Is any of it understandable?”
I held my hand out for the book. “Jordan, you’re not paying attention to the play.”
“Yeah, well it’s hard to pay attention to, since it makes no sense.” With a flick of his wrist, he tossed the book back down on the table. “No high school student is going to pay money to watch this.”
Great. I’d just convinced Mrs. Shale to try and put the play on, and now Jordan was having second thoughts. Mrs. Shale was not going to forgive me if I made her beg for more funding from the principal, and then didn’t produce Jordan at tryouts. I suddenly saw my future as Juliet vanish, replaced by a future as assistant prop girl.
&nbs
p; I picked up his book and opened it again. “The guys in the play wear tights. Trust me, girls will come see this.”
He shook his head. “Two hours of listening to people speak a language that only vaguely resembles ours? Not even the girls will come.”
“Why do you think we go to high school football games? We don’t care which direction the ball goes. It’s the shoulder pads and tight pants that get us there.” I shrugged. “Besides, all the English teachers will make their classes go, as part of the Shakespeare unit.”
Jordan leaned back in his chair and surveyed me through skeptical eyes. “So you’re telling me the audience is made up of students who are forced to come and don’t understand what’s going on? I foresee a lot of audience distraction in the form of people talking during the performance, passing notes, maybe starting up a dodgeball game in the back of the room.”
I held the book out to him. “Remember, you’re doing this for your parents.”
Letting out a sigh, he took the book from my hands and fingered the pages. “You know, faking an illness might work. Amnesia is hard to disprove, isn’t it?”
“Jordan.”
“This is going to be a bad play, and it will be even worse if I’m in it.”
“Romeo and Juliet is one of the most famous plays ever written. If it were bad, someone would have noticed before now. Besides”—I waved one hand over the book as though I was brushing away his concerns—“once you get onstage, you’ll see why we all love drama.”
He didn’t answer.
“Let’s just work on the acting portion right now. I want you to act like you really like me.”
He raised an eyebrow.
“You know, pretend we just met at a party, and you think I’m pretty. What do you say to me? What is your body language?”
He stared back at me in the same way Andre stares at Mrs. Shale when she asks us to pretend we’re inanimate objects, like chairs or vegetables.
“Come on, Jordan, what would you say?”
He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “I can’t do this. We’re sitting in the library.”
“No, we’re not. We’re in someone’s living room, the music is blaring, the lights are down low, and you’ve just eaten half a bowl of potato chips. Now what do you say to me?”
He waved one hand at me. Slightly. “Hey.” Then nothing.
I waited for more. “Hey?” I asked him.
“Hey, is there some soda around here? I’m dying of thirst after eating half a bowl of potato chips.”
I grunted and tapped my fingers against the table. “Have you ever even had a girlfriend?”
“Yes, I’ve had a girlfriend.”
“Well, you didn’t use that body language to impress her.”
He looked down at himself, alarmed. “What body language?”
“Exactly my point. You should look in my eyes and lean toward me with one hand draped across the table as though you want to touch me. Now, what pickup lines do you usually use when you want to date a girl?”
He put one arm across the table, but it looked more like he was challenging me to an arm wrestling match than reaching out to touch me. “I don’t have pickup lines,” he said. “I say whatever is on my mind. I’m a genuine type of person.”
“All guys have pickup lines.”
“Fine then, you tell me some. Apparently you’ve heard them all.”
“Okay, now your body language is becoming rigid. Do you notice how you’re clamping your jaws together?”
He glared at me. “No, I’m too busy gritting my teeth to notice what my jaws are doing.”
“Try relaxing. Take a few cleansing breaths.”
He pushed his chair away from the table and ran one hand through his hair. “There’s no way I’ll ever make it past tryouts.”
“Yes you will. We’re a small school, and we always have more guy parts than guys. It’s just a matter of what part you’ll get.”
Besides, the drama teacher is already planning which of her black outfits she’ll wear when she meets your father.
“But do you think I can get a decent part?”
“As long as we keep working on the dialogue.” I tilted my head at him. “And your body language problem.”
“I don’t have a body language problem.”
“Of course not,” I said. “Now try repeating your part without clenching your fists.”
He looked down at his hands, surprised, and unclenched them. “My dad makes this look so easy.” He stretched out his fingers and rested them back on his jeans. After a quick glance around the library, he lowered his voice and leaned toward me. “At least no one knows who I am, so I don’t have to worry about living up to everyone’s expectations. That’s been the only good thing about moving here. I can be me instead of the movie star’s kid.”
“Right,” I said. Only Mrs. Shale knew about Jordan’s father, and I’d told her to keep it a secret. Momentarily I considered telling Jordan I’d accidentally let his secret slip, but only momentarily.
Mrs. Shale was bound to choose him for a main role and spend lots of time fussing over how wonderful he was. I wanted Jordan to think the attention was for him, not for his father. That’s what his acting really needed: a boost of confidence—a drama coach who adored him.
Still, it would be obvious to everyone, including Jordan, that something was amiss if he totally stunk at the auditions and got a huge part anyway. I had to at least get Jordan to a functional acting level. “We can work on this as long as you want to,” I said. “I mean, it’s good practice for me too, since I’m trying out for Juliet.”
He fingered the pages of the book, then shut it. “That’s all right. I’ll go over it a few times by myself to see if I can get a feel for the language.” Standing up, he tucked the book under his arm. “And if I can’t, maybe I can convince my dad to come up for some cross-country meets. At least I know I can do those without having to speak in rhyme.
I followed Jordan up to the checkout counter, hating crosscountry. I mean, what was the point of it? You ran places. How was that a valuable life skill?
As the librarian scanned his book I tried to erase thoughts of running from his mind. “Let’s get together and go over the parts tomorrow after school. We can go to my house . . .” As soon as I offered the invitation I thought of Nicki IM-ing the entire freshman class with every phrase, nuance, and expression exchanged during our practice. “Or we can go to your house.”
He took the book from the librarian and tucked it under his arm. “My house is fine. Where’s your locker? We can meet there first.”
“I have drama class sixth period. Can you meet me there?”
Because once Mrs. Shale started fawning all over him, he’d forget all about cross-country.
Well, I hoped.
Four
Kate thinks I live a charmed life. If pressed for examples to support her claim, she points out I eat whatever I want without gaining weight, my teachers all like me, and guys occasionally smile in my direction. She also brings up—like it was some sort of sign from God—the time when I was thirteen and wanted an iPod but hadn’t quite saved enough money to buy one. The next day I found a fifty-dollar bill blowing down Main Street. There was no way to locate its owner. I had to keep it—or rather spend it buying an iPod. Kate still glares at my iPod as though it’s treated her unfairly.
She didn’t even change her charmed-life theory when Brendan dumped me. Half the girls in the junior class felt sorry for me, but not my best friend. “You’re better off without him,” she told me every time I let out a tormented sigh in her presence. “He’s a jerk. Besides, he plays football.”
Those two things, apparently, are synonymous in her mind.
She called me when I got home from school to see if I wanted to go shopping with her on Tuesday. As soon as I told her my answer, I could tell it was the iPod discussion happening all over again. “You saw Jordan today, and you’re seeing him tomorrow too? One boyfriend dumps you, so another guy
automatically moves in to take his place?”
“He’s not a boyfriend. I’m just helping him run lines for Romeo and Juliet.”
“The school isn’t doing Romeo and Juliet.”
“Yes, we are. I talked to Mrs. Shale about it and . . . well . . .”
Kate let out a huff. “She decided to do the play just because you wanted it?”
“Not just because I wanted it. I mean, Shakespeare is like eating your vegetables. It’s good for you. The school needs it. In fact, you should try out for the play.”
Kate ignored my suggestion. The last time I convinced her to try out with me, I got the lead in Our Town and she got to be one of the dead people who sit around at the cemetery waxing nostalgic about when they were alive. “So this cute new guy moves here,” Kate said, “and he just coincidentally wants to be in the play with you?”
In other words, Romeo just blew down Main Street.
I couldn’t tell her the truth. I couldn’t tell her Jordan was plotting to get his parents back together. That would mean I’d have to tell her about Jordan’s father being an actor. Besides, she’d think Jordan’s attempts were foolish, and then I’d have to hear countless lectures about how I shouldn’t encourage Jordan’s unrealistic expectations, or how manipulating people wasn’t ethical, or whatever other moral vignettes Kate could draw out of this situation. No one stands on a soapbox like Kate. It’s like she has too much time on her hands, so she has become a freelance commentator on all that’s wrong in the world.
The girl seriously needed a hobby.
Or at least a boyfriend to take her mind off of her lack of hobbies.
As I sat there with the phone in my hand I realized Jordan hadn’t blown down Main Street for me. He’d blown down it for her. They had everything in common. Kate’s dad had left her family. Jordan’s dad had left his. Kate hated contact sports. Jordan ran cross-country. Kate hated guys who were insincere. Jordan said he didn’t use pickup lines. Kate was a liberal. Jordan just moved from L.A. Okay, this didn’t necessarily guarantee his liberalism, but for some reason that has never been clear to me but is apparent during every presidential election, people who live in big cities tend to be liberal. So probably Jordan would just nod his head and agree with her when she went off on some tangent about how capitalism was unfair to Third World countries.