The Last Phone Booth in Manhattan(45)
I surveyed the street. Benny’s Bagels and Bialys (ooh, catchy and alliterative) stood on the corner, a short line weaving out the door and out of sight. A few other nondescript small businesses—an old camera store, a nail salon, a lighting boutique, and a typical New York City bodega—bespeckled the block. Stretching my neck in the direction from where I’d run, I tried to figure out how far I’d run during my mad pursuit of the hot dog vendor, and that’s when I saw it, standing there in all its well-worn and dilapidated glory.
“Oh. My. God,” I exclaimed.
“What now?” Lyla reeled around, searching for something to clue her in to what the hell was going on.
“That’s it!” I cried and pointed toward the opposite side of the street.
Lyla swiveled her head, trying to follow my ranting, but was clearly still lost. “That’s what? What are we looking at?”
“The phone booth. The magical phone booth I told you guys about last night,” I exclaimed, still not quite believing it myself.
Lyla glanced over to the graffiti-covered, rusty eyesore with the sad string of Christmas lights still somehow dangling from its roof almost two months after the holiday.
“That’s the magical phone booth?” Lyla said, unable to disguise the confusion in her voice. “It looks um . . . a little less than magical, if you ask me.”
I shook my head and muttered, “How do I keep ending up here? And more importantly, why?”
Lyla raised her eyebrows and smirked. “Guess there’s only one way to find out, right?” Her eyes twinkled with excitement as she grabbed the other soda from my tight grip and nudged me toward the accordion door.
The booth stood before me like some strange and fantastical monument in the middle of the city, the bright beams of the afternoon sun reflecting off its metal frame, almost creating a halo around it. Without waiting for the light to change, we crossed the street, dodging a few speeding cars as we scurried over to it. After a supportive nod from Lyla, I stepped inside, a warmth engulfing me like a hug from an old friend, and I couldn’t keep my hand from trembling as I reached for the phone.
I picked up the receiver, dialed the number the ghost guard gave me on Christmas, a phone number forever etched in my brain, as my heartbeat sped up like a racehorse just before the starting shot. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, listened for the two rings, and waited for the sound of the familiar click.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Lyla almost decided to skip her Bumble date to accompany me to the mystery address, but I insisted she go ahead and told her I’d be okay to do some digging on my own. According to my phone’s GPS, the address the phone booth gave, 27 Barrow Street, wasn’t far, but it also didn’t give me any indication of what kind of building I was being directed to.
I rounded the corner looking down at my phone and almost caused a domino effect when I practically rear-ended a young woman who was waiting in a verrrrrrry long line snaking up the block.
“Whoa! ’Scuse me,” I blurted out, maneuvering around her.
The young woman pulled a pair of AirPods from her ears. “Sorry, what?”
“Oh, never mind,” I said, continuing down the street. But with each step closer to 27 Barrow, I realized the line was queuing to enter that very address. I surveyed the people who were waiting like a line of ants at a picnic, a mix of men and women of all colors, shapes, and sizes, carrying headshots, listening to music, and muttering to themselves.
Curiosity getting the better of me, I searched for someone on the line without headphones. After zeroing in on a young guy in a long-sleeve waffle shirt, puffer jacket, and jeans, I tapped him squarely on his shoulder. He was scanning a piece of paper, putting it down and reciting passages from it to himself as I approached.
“Excuse me? Um . . . what’s this for?” I asked, motioning to the people waiting behind him.
Startled by the interruption, he took a second to respond. “It’s a line to the Greenwich House Theater. There’s an open call today.”
My ears perked up at open call. Open-call auditions usually meant that non-equity actors would be seen along with equity ones, and since I was still trying to get my equity card, it was currently the only type of audition I could go on.
I glanced up and down the line again, and asked, “Do you know who they’re auditioning?”
“It’s apparently a very open ‘open call’ for a new show coming in from the West End called Marley Is Dead. Do you know it?” He didn’t wait for my response before continuing, “With the director’s modern take and the show’s twist on traditional roles, not to mention the rave reviews coming out of London, I think half of the New York theater scene is here today . . . hence, the long line,” he grumbled as he gestured to the queue behind him.
Marley Is Dead?! The show I was supposed to see with Adam in London on New Year’s? Was this a coincidence, or had the phone booth sent me here so I could audition? The excitement of the latter, the possibility that this audition could be something as special as my encounter with Gabe turned out to be, made my heart pound against my rib cage and my legs tingle with anticipation.
“Do you know what they’re looking for?” I asked the guy now struggling to get his jacket hood back over his ears, probably in an attempt to return to his warm-up preparations.