Tom Lake(2)

“?‘All the world’s a stage,’?” Veronica said, because Veronica could read my mind, “and all the men and women merely want to be players.”

I accepted a résumé and headshot from the father of my friend Marcia, which she pronounced Mar--see--a. I had sat at this man’s dinner table, ridden in the back seat of his station wagon when he took his family for ice cream, slept in the second twin bed of his daughter’s rose--pink bedroom. I pretended not to know him because I thought that was the kindest course of action.

“Laura,” he said, smiling with all his teeth. “Good morning! Some sort of crowd.”

I agreed that it was, then gave him his number and the sides and told him to go back out to the lobby to wait.

“Where’s the restroom?” he asked.

It was mortifying. Even the men wanted to know where the restroom was. They wanted to fluff up their hair that had been flattened by sock hats. They wanted to read their part aloud to themselves in the mirror to see how they looked. I told him the one by the Language Arts Center would be less crowded.

“You girls look busy,” my grandmother said. She came up from behind us just as Marcia’s father walked away.

“Do you want a part?” Veronica asked her. “I know people. I can make you a star.” Veronica loved my grandmother. Everyone did.

“I’m just here to take a look.” My grandmother glanced back to the table in front of the stage to indicate that she would be sitting with Mr. Martin and the theater people. My grandmother, who owned Stitch--It, the alterations shop in town, had volunteered to make the costumes, which meant that she’d volunteered me to make the costumes as well since I worked for her after school. She kissed the top of my head before crossing the long, empty stretch of the basketball court towards that faraway table.

Auditions were to have begun promptly at ten, but thanks to the clipboard situation it was past ten--thirty. Once everyone had been registered, Veronica said she would cull out small groups according to their numbers and the roles they had come for, then herd them down the hallway to wait. “I’ll be the sheepdog,” she said, getting up from our table. I would stay and silently register the stragglers. Mr. Martin and my grandmother took their seats with three other people at the table in front of the stage and just that fast the gym, which had been booming all morning, fell to silence. Veronica was to escort the would--be actors down the hall and up the stairs, through the backstage, and right to the edge of the stage when their names were called. The actors waiting to audition were not allowed to watch the other auditions, and the actors who had finished their auditions were instructed to leave unless specifically asked to stay. All the Stage Managers would go first (the Stage Manager being the biggest and most important part in the play) followed by all the Georges and Emilys, and then the other Webbs (Mister and Missus and Wally) and the other Gibbses (Doctor and Missus and Rebecca). The smaller roles would be awarded on a runner--up basis. No one leaves home hoping to land the part of Constable Warren, but if Constable Warren is what you are offered, you take it.

“Mr. Saxon,” Mr. Martin called out. “You’ll be reading the beginning of the second act.” All the Stage Managers would be reading the beginning of the second act.

That I could hear the light shuffle of Mr. Saxon’s footsteps crossing the stage surprised me. “I’m first?” Mr. Saxon had failed to consider that this would be the outcome of arriving at a high school gym half an hour before the doors opened.

“You, sir, are the first,” Mr. Martin said. “Please begin when you’re ready.”

And so Mr. Saxon cleared his throat and, after waiting a full minute longer than what would have been merely awkward, he began. “Three years have gone by,” he said. “Yes, the sun’s come up over a thousand times.”

I continued to face the lobby as I had all morning, though now those two sets of double doors were closed. Mr. Martin and my grandmother and the people sitting with them were far away, their backs to me, my back to them, and poor Mr. Saxon, who was dying a terrible death up there, was doubtlessly looking at the director and not the back of a high school girl. Still, as a courtesy, I did not turn around. He went all the way to the end of the page. “There! You can hear the 5:45 for Boston,” he said finally, his voice flooded with relief. The reading lasted two minutes and I wondered how anyone could have thought it wise to have picked such a long passage.

“Thank you very much,” Mr. Martin said, his voice devoid of encouragement.

Such a sadness welled in me. If Veronica had been there we would have played a silent game of hangman, adding a limb for every word Mr. Saxon hit too plaintively. We would have refused to look at each other for fear of laughing. But Veronica was in the hallway, and no one had come in late the way we’d been so sure they would. As it turned out, the auditioners had all had the same idea: arrive promptly, register, and stand in line as directed—-thus proving themselves to be good at taking direction. Mr. Martin called out for the second hopeful, Mr. Parks.

“Should I start at the top of the page where it’s marked?” Mr. Parks asked.

“That would be just fine,” Mr. Martin said.

“Three years have gone by,” Mr. Parks said, and then waited three years in order to underscore the point. “Yes.” He paused again. “The sun’s come up over a thousand times.”