It was only a dream, I told myself, a natural one to have after seeing the place where Liza had died. But the blue light… Please, not again, I thought.
When I was a child I had horrible nightmares, dreams as strange as they were frightening, about people and things I couldn't remember seeing in real life. All of the dreams had a strange blue cast. Waking up from them terrified, I would tell Liza, and she would put her arms around me, holding me tight.
Sometimes she would tell me she had had the same dream. As I grew older I didn't believe her; still it had helped me not to feel alone. "Sweet dreams," Liza would always say, soothing me, tucking me back in bed, "sweet dreams only for you and me." Eventually the nightmares stopped.
Now I scrunched down under the sheet, sweating and shivering, missing Liza more than ever, and wondering why the dreams had come back.
We gathered in the seats of Stoddard Theater at eight-thirty the next morning. Walker came up the back steps, strode across the stage, then stopped, scanning us slowly, like a shopper carefully eyeing apples before reaching into the pile. Our nervous chatter died.
"Oh, don't be bashful," he said.
Maggie called roll. Next to Mike, two rows in front of me, sat a guy who answered to Paul McCrae, but all I could see of him was brown hair hanging thick and wavy down the back of his neck. Maggie handed out adhesive name tags, which we were to stick below our left shoulder. Anyone who put it on his or her right was corrected. Brian gave out the books.
"Put your names in them immediately/' Maggie instructed. "Katie, no more free replacements of lost scripts.'' "She doesn't forget anything," the girl named Katie hissed to Shawna.
Walker continued to study us. "Okay, people," he said, putting on his half-moon glasses. "I am assuming you are all intimately familiar with A Midsummer Night's Dream and are fully prepared and eager to impress me with your auditions. Let's begin."
"Excuse me, Walker."
His eyes rolled up over his glasses. "Maggie."
"I think we should review the plot."
His smile was a tiny bow. "You have my permission to think whatever you like. Meanwhile, I'm starting the auditions."
"And is that because you prefer to review the story halfway through, once it becomes obvious that everyone is confused-as we did last year, and the year before that, and the year before that?"
"I told you she doesn't forget," Katie whispered.
Walker sighed, then eyed us. "I believe in learning from my mistakes," he said, "but I keep making Maggie assistant director."
There were muffled laughs. I glanced at Maggie, but she didn't seem to care, perhaps because she knew what he would do next-exactly what she had suggested.
"As you all no doubt already know," Walker boomed, "there are four lovers in this play. The two guys, Lysander and Demetrius, are both in love with Hermia. Hermia is in love with Lysander, but Hermia's father has chosen Demetrius to be her husband. Meanwhile, we have poor Helena, Hermia's friend, who is hopelessly in love with Demetrius. Got it?"
We nodded.
"Like all good star-crossed lovers, Hermia and Lysander plan to run away. Helena thinks she can score some points with Demetrius by telling him of Hermia and Lysander's departure. So, what do we have? Hermia and Lysander running off to the forest, Demetrius running after Hermia, and Helena after Demetrius. We have four lovers wandering around the Athenian woods on Midsummer Night."
Walker strode back and forth across the stage as he spoke, gesturing with the script. He held our attention as if he were Shakespeare himself.
"Enter the fairies: Oberon the fairy king and Titania, the queen. They're married and they're quarreling. Oberon has a jealous, vengeful streak in him. He also has a very mischievous fairy working for him, Puck, and, with Puck's help, he plans to spread a magic flower ointment on his wife's eyes while she is sleeping. The first person, beast, or thing Titania sees when she awakens, she'll fall madly in love with."
A couple kids giggled, as if just now figuring out what would happen, which told me they hadn't read the play, at least not too well. Maggie knew what she was doing.
"Now, there are some interesting candidates for Titania to fall in love with that night," Walker continued. "A group whom we refer to as 'the rustics,' six bumbling guys, are rehearsing a play in the woods to present to the Duke of Athens at his wedding. The Duke's wedding frames the entire play. Puck has some fun and transforms one of the rustics so that he has an ass's head instead of a human one, and it is he whom Titania sees first when she awakens.
"As for the lovers, Oberon gives Puck instructions to use the flower ointment to work out their problem, that is, to make Demetrius fall in love with Helena, so the four are neatly paired up. Unfortunately, Puck gets the guys confused, and we end up with a wonderful reversal, with Demetrius and Lysander now in love with Helena and chasing her, while Hermia is left out in the cold. Got it?"
We all nodded again and Walker hopped down from the stage steps, surprisingly light on his feet.
"Now, Maggie, may we begin?"
"I'm waiting," she said with a smile.
Walker started by assigning the parts of the lovers, trying different combinations for the two guys and two girls. Watching Mike read, I was amazed at his skill. I had imagined that he had just enough talent, or more accurately, the good looks to earn a small high school part. I was wrong-or perhaps the part of a lover came quite naturally to him. I glanced around: I wasn't the only girl who had trouble taking her eyes off him.
"Jenny Baird."
I didn't respond; it wasn't the name for which I was used to snapping to.
"Miss Baird." Walker's voice could roll low like thunder. Shawna nudged me.
"Walker," Brian said in a quiet voice, "I spoke to you about Jenny, remember?"
Walker turned to Brian very slowly, demonstrating for all of us how an actor can make an audience wait for a line. "I remember. Get up there, Miss Baird."
I walked to the stage steps carrying my book.
"I can try out," I told Walker, "but I get terrible stage fright when it comes time for performance."
"Act Two, Scene Two, after Puck has exited," Walker replied, as if he hadn't heard a word I'd said.
Brian stared at him and shook his head.
"Helena," Walker said to me when I was on stage, "you've just come upon Lysander, who is sleeping. What you don't know is that Puck has put the magic ointment on his eyelids, and the first person Lysander sees-you, not his beloved Hermia-he will now be madly in love with. Not knowing what has happened, you think he's making fun of you. Pick it up on 'But who is here?'" We positioned ourselves, Mike on the stage floor and me bending over him. I began: "But who is here? Lysander! on the ground?
Dead or asleep? I see no blood, no wound.
Lysander, if you live, good sir, awake."
Mike opened his eyes, then pulled himself up quickly, responding fervently: " 'And run through fire I will for thy sweet sake.' " I blinked and drew back. The incredible blue of his eyes and the intensity with which he zeroed in on me made my heart jolt, made me feel as if I were on an elevator that had suddenly dropped from beneath me. All I could do was stare at him, surprised. Of course, the character of Helena would have reacted the same way. I wasn't acting, but I looked like I was.
" 'Transparent Helena,' " Mike began softly, kneeling now, his eyes, his whole person focused on me, the way a lover's would be. My heart did strange flip-floppy things. I struggled to make sense of the instinctive way I responded to Mike; in the play, Helena struggled to make sense of Lysander.
I dutifully told Lysander why he should be happy with his Hermia.