The Truth About Fragile Things (32 page)

I shook my head, not able to let the words in. It’s not fair to accept credit for a bringing a bandage when you cut out somebody’s heart.

The door opened and Charlotte leaned into the room, gripping the door jamb for balance. “Everybody done saying sappy things?” she asked. “Because I have math homework that Megan needs to do.”

“What sappy things?” Melissa fired back. “We were discussing inflation, right Megan?” She sent a fast wink over Charlotte’s head.

“Gross national product,” I added. “And I’m not doing your homework tonight.”

“Do you do it other nights?” Melissa asked, appalled.

Charlotte and I both shrugged, too guilty to deny it. “Maybe we can talk about inflation some other time,” I told Melissa and handed Charlotte my uneaten ice cream. “I have to get home and finish my own homework.”

“But Callie told you to get fatter,” she protested, following me to the front door.

“And your math teacher told you to get smarter. We’re just a couple of rebels, aren’t we?”

“S
top blinking,”
Mackenzie ordered Phillip while her assistant did my eyeliner.

“You poked me in the eye,” he argued, squirming away from the mascara. There are few things he hates more than stage makeup.

“I haven’t touched you.” She cupped his chin in her hand, her fingers dug into his skin and went in for another attempt.

“Megan, she is poking me in the eye.”

“Shut up, Phillip.” I didn’t have strength for any other words. Crowds were already filling the foyer outside the theater and the buzz of hundreds of conversations filtered through Schatz’s thick door. I fingered the material of my skirt, smoothed out a wrinkle in my tights.

“Thank you,” Mackenzie cried. “We only have ten minutes before circle.”

“Megan knows how to do it,” Phillip said, dodging the black wand again. “Please.”

“She’s not finished with her makeup yet,” Mackenzie pointed out, her voice growing more desperate. “If they can’t see your eyes, they can’t see your expressions. What good is a great actor if no one can see him?”

“Give it to me.” Charlotte’s low voice came softly over my shoulder. Mackenzie looked up to her and hesitated. “He’ll let me do it,” Charlotte promised. “Won’t you, Phil?”

He cocked his head backward to look at her. She had braided her hair into a long side ponytail that swept over her shoulder and at the very end was a fresh flower. “What mood are you in?” he asked with raised eyebrows.

Charlotte rolled her eyes and took the mascara from Mackenzie. “I’m in a mood to see a show that doesn’t star your understudy because you only have one eyeball.”

“Sold,” Phillip announced. “That’s the mood I’m in.”

I tried not to shift too much because my makeup girl had moved on to lip liner but my eyes cut sideways as Charlotte knelt in front of Phillip, her stomach pushed against his knees. I could smell her shampoo as she leaned close and studied his eyes.

“Careful,” Mackenzie said, but she wasn’t talking to Charlotte. She gently took the lip liner from my girl’s hand and knelt down in front of me. “Megan’s lips point at the top. You have to get it just so.” My warm breath hit her fingers as she gently drew the liner across my lips. “Megan, you have the prettiest lips,” she told me. I couldn’t smile or talk so I hope my eyes conveyed my thanks. But when I looked back to Charlotte all I could think was
my lips aren’t as pretty as hers
. Charlotte’s were full, pink with gloss, and slightly parted in concentration. Phillip held perfectly still as she swept the mascara over his long, dark lashes.

“What the freak, Phil?” Mackenzie squeaked. “That is exactly how I was doing it.”

Charlotte smiled without pausing her careful strokes and when she smiled so did Phillip. She finished his eyes, but neither of them moved for a minute until he reached up and took her braid in his hand, fingering the daisy at the end. “Megan doesn’t like daisies,” he said absently.

“I don’t like roses,” Charlotte countered. “Do you want me to finish his face?” Charlotte asked Mackenzie as she put down the mascara.

Mackenzie studied him and must have decided that she didn’t need any more Phil. “Make it look good. We have five minutes,” she ordered and left with her assistant to inspect the rest of the cast.

“You both look really good,” Charlotte said when we were alone. Phillip was about to answer when she slid her finger up his cheekbone, blending the blush. He decided against words. “I decided on my thing for the list,” she whispered as she turned his head with her hand, studying it in the light. His rich color was hard to get right. His cheeks yielded against her small fingers.

“What is it?” I asked, resisting the urge to help her with his powder. She was doing a fine job without me.

“I don’t mean this to sound rude, but I can’t tell you yet. I will. Soon. But I just wanted you to know I figured it out.”

“I hate it when people do that. Why do girls always do that?” Phillip asked, his voice indignant as he tried not to move beneath her working hands.

“I think I have mine, too,” I admitted. “I don’t know if it’s really good or not.”

“Spill it,” Phillip ordered.

I lifted a mirror from the table and checked my hair, digging a bobby pin in a little deeper. “I want to go to a cathedral. A real one. An old one.”

Phillip didn’t move. “Oh, you’re done? That’s the whole thing? What do you want to do there—steal a relic?”

“Pray.”

Charlotte’s hands stopped navigating his face, grew still and suspended. “
Pray
?” she repeated as if she’d heard me wrong.

“Pray. I want to go somewhere where people went hundreds of years ago with all their problems and I want to do what they did when they didn’t know the answer. I want to pray.”

Phillip’s eyes shifted from side to side. He likes to talk about religion as much as he loves to discuss death. “Is this some awkward conversion moment?”

“No,” I insisted. “It’s just a human thing to do and…”

“You want to pretend you’re human?” Charlotte finished with a smile. “I’m kidding. I think I like it. I don’t know if I’ll
pray
,” she said it like I’d suggested drinking cod liver oil, “but I’ll go. Don’t we have to fly to France or something?”

“Surely there’s an old church somewhere in America that could at least hold us over. Something good enough to count.” I tried to ignore Phillip as he sighed and slumped in his chair. “Don’t even start with me, Phil,” I warned him. “You want me to watch you throw balls across a gym. This is definitely better than that.”

“So we could do anything we wanted and we ended up with basketball and a prayer,” Charlotte summed up as she straightened Phillip’s face so she could trace his forehead lines with a brown pencil. “We’re just too awesome to live, aren’t we?”

“Well, you haven’t told us your grand plan,” Phillip reminded her.

“Because…it’s not…ready.” Charlotte spoke in time with her hand, pausing when her pencil paused. “You both need to be in character in five minutes so we can finish this later. Does that look good?” Charlotte leaned back, assessing her work.

I wrinkled my nose at Phillip’s plastered face. “Stage makeup never looks good, but you did it as well as anyone can,” I assured her. “Now we have to get to the band room and turn into a bickering, married couple.”

“Oh, I just totally figured out why she cast you both. You don’t even have to try.” Charlotte narrowed her eyes but smiled. The daisy bobbed as she cocked her head to the side.

“Circle time,” one of the cast members called out. I swallowed, aware again of the buzz and press of bodies swarming outside the door. Phillip didn’t speak as we marched quietly to the band room where the entire theater department was gathering in various states of panic.

Two loud claps called us to attention and Schatz thundered out, “Circle up, people. This is it.”

Phillip had meandered away from me accepting scattered wishes to break a leg. When Schatz made her announcement he looked up, his eyes passed over me and didn’t pause. It was when he found Charlotte that he crossed the room and took her small hand, engulfing it in his. She bowed her head, her dark lashes fanning over her cheekbones, her smile small, almost demure. He’d tamed the wild Charlotte with the touch of his fingers. I wasn’t sure I liked her domesticated.

I held out my hand, not looking to see who would grab it, knowing the hand wouldn’t fit right, wouldn’t be big enough to hold the nerves jumping through my palm. It was a loose grip that found me, tentative like a freshman afraid to touch me. When I glanced sideways trying to hide my disappointment, Braden’s grin met me and he tightened his grip. I imagined I could feel his pulse in the press of our palms. His fingers were strong. Like fingers that could coax music from steel strings. A girl from the prop crew took my other side, pressing her lips into a nervous smile before Schatz started speaking.

“A circle of trust. A circle of work. A circle of dependency.” She closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. “Tonight, when one succeeds, we all succeed. If one is in trouble, we all rescue. Whatever relationship you have outside this circle, inside this circle it is mended and strengthened.” One of Braden’s fingers moved and I felt the shift like it was a chasm under my feet instead of a twitch against my hand. Schatz opened her eyes, intentionally ran them along our faces, stopping to meet each person’s eyes. “We wish the best for one another. We applaud one another. We embrace one another. Tonight we all give everything to bring magic and laughter into the lives of those who have come to support us. Tonight we all believe that anything is possible if we do it together. Tonight there are no feuds. There are only friends. From the sound techs to the costumes, to the lights and props and actors, we all play our role. Tonight we all shine.” She raised her arms, still gripping the hands of her neighbors.

“Tonight we all shine,” we repeated together, our hands raised in unison, the sound rang against the walls and bounced back from the high, slanted ceiling. As hands slowly released and the circle morphed into milling bodies, Braden held on.

“Good luck,” he said as he released me, but didn’t step away.

I tried for something breezy. If only Lauren was there to help me be breezy. “You just cursed me. You’re supposed to tell me to break a leg. What kind of friend are you?” He only answered a steady smile and I didn’t know what to do with the silence so I tried again. “Are you going to light it up tonight?”

He laughed. “You know it. I have to go turn down the houselights. We have five minutes,” he said, consulting his watch. He watched me fumble with a gold bracelet too big for my wrist. “Megan, when the spotlight hits you, that’s me.”

He walked away too quickly to know he had left me without words.

“Your fans await,” Charlotte’s hand pressed against my back, guided me to the door. We made it to the dark backstage where people started to lower their voices to whispers. More hands clipped my microphone into place, tugging it to test that it was secure. Callie straightened my blouse, faces appeared and melted away in the darkness. “I know you’ve done this before, but tonight it counts for the list. This one is for him,” Charlotte reminded me when we passed final inspections and were able to join Phillip in the wings.

I’d never felt so off balance sixty seconds before the curtains lifted. Bright music started to march across the auditorium, pushing the audience into their seats, quieting the hum of conversation. Sophie tiptoed to the tacky sofa at the center of the stage, crossed her legs in the darkness and smoothed down her skirt, looking for the right expression as she pushed fear and self-consciousness and excitement from her face. The curtains swung with the first pull of the ropes, parted like oceans, and left her alone to begin our play. I went to grab Phillip’s hand but inches away from my goal realized it was occupied with Charlotte’s fingers. Her arm was pressed against his, like two trees that can’t fall as long as they prop up one another.

“Here we go,” he whispered as Sophie cleared her throat theatrically and her microphone buzzed to life. “Hey Megan, if you’re into praying these days, you might want to start one now. It is standing room only out there.” Phillip sucked in a breath and closed his eyes. His butterflies are always worse on the nights he acts the best.