V.O.I.C.E

.Chapter Thirty Four.

Chapter Thirty Four                 Carter

“You ready?” asked Vic, she was standing beside me behind the curtains peeking out to see the sea of people all taking their seats.

“Nope, but I’m going to have to be in less than five minutes,” I whispered back, refusing to look at the people out there in the auditorium. I was actually a little nervous, as non-manly as that sounded.

“Places people!” Mr. Conner came around and called out softly as to not be heard by the audience.

“See you out there,” Vic winked as she walked a few feet away from me.  The lights dimmed in the auditorium and the red curtain went down and that was our cue. On practiced tip toes, we all rolled out a piece of the set and took our places. We had less than one minute to do this before the curtain went back up and the lights were on us and the play began.

As the screen went up, we all froze in place and once the curtain was up all the way the narrator of the story began singing. The narrator explained the plan very shortly as was done in Shakespeare’s time. As each character was introduced, they would begin to slowly move from the frozen pose.  And when the narrator finished, she introduced the character Puck. And as soon as Puck was introduced, everybody who had been moving slowly speed up to normal pace and the show began.

I watched from the sidelines as the opening of the play began. Isabella stood on stage and though she was in love with one boy while she was being forced to marry another. I had to sniffle my laughter. After the following months of her threats making me date her, this was the perfect roll for her to play.  

Speaking of Owen, he came over just then to stand beside me. We had another minute until it was my turn to go onstage. I didn’t bother to look at him. Eva came rushing over from the makeup area, fixing her costume and hair.

“I’m sorry about the other day,” Owen tried to say. Every day since he and Isabella had pulled me aside, anytime he was close enough and nobody else would hear, he was saying he was sorry to me or Eva. This time I wasn’t sure what he was saying sorry for; hurt Eva, or lying to me to get me to talk to Isabella.

“I’m sick of hearing it. Let’s just get this play over with and then I want you to never talk to me again,” I hissed as I turned towards the stage and walked on when cued, fixing my fake mustache as I went on. I stood across from guys who were in my troupe. I bounced around and started hanging off the other guys.

“Roar!” I bellowed out. “See I can play this as well, they will all love to see it, me the lion as well as the lover! “ I sang dancing around the prince.

“Enough Nick Bottom, you will play the lover, your roar will,” the troupe member giving out roles sang, and paused looking around to make sure nobody but the ’troupe’- and the rest of the audience- saw as he fluttered his eyes and faked a high pitched female voice, “scare all the ladies, they will have you beheaded if you scare them.”

I jumped as if scared and sang, “Well we can’t have that, the lover will be the only part I play, as too not scare the ladies.” Once the scene was done and I ran off the stage the lights dimmed and the music turned to a light quick tune.

I stood on the side and watched as Vic danced on stage, leaping and jumping, a huge smile on her face. She was loving this. I watched the interchange between Vic and the fairy who served the king. And then Eva walked on stage, Owen on the other, my grin widened. They were bickering and Eva’s character was mad at Owen’s, so it wasn’t hard to pretend that they hated each other.

I took a moment to think about how Vic really was a good Puck in real life as well as in the play, if it weren’t for her I wouldn’t be dating Eva now. Owen turned to Vic and instructed her to go grab the magic flower I grinned. This is the one part that was going to be amazing. This was the fugue that we had worked so hard on. The set we had planted was made to look like you were walking through the forest, stairs hidden behind panted grass and flowers Vic took off at a run for the flower.

We had worked hard on how we should make this fugue work so it made sense to the audience. As Vic climbed the stairs the audience watched as the four lovers ran around the forest.

“Tonight, in the light of the moon, I promise to love you,” sang Lysander character.

“Faster, before they catch us, I’ll be killed for running away with you, but I can’t marry a man I don’t love, my heart is yours” Hermia sang back holding his hand and then dragging him off stage as the other two chasing them appeared on the other side of the stage.

“Where are they, I must find my love and marry her, you said they would be here,” snapped Demetris.

“They mustn’t be far,” sang Isabella.

“For your sake we better find them before the rise of the sun, or so help me I will leave you to the wild beasts of this forest and you’ll become a slave to the fairies,” Demetris snapped as he ran away and off stage.

Following behind him at a run she said, “Why do you love her and not me.”

As soon as they stepped off stage you saw my troupe walking back the way they had just come, towards the kingdom, smiling and clapping hands.

“Soon they will know all know our names, we will be famous,” I sang.

“Just don’t forget your lines,” one of the troupe members sang.

“Yeah don’t forget your lines, “I repeated as we exited the stage.

The lights dimmed and at the top you could see as Evalyn laid herself to sleep in a pile of leaves. On the other side sitting on his throne was the King and Vic ran to him with a smile.

“The flower my king,” she said, “Here you are.”

“Thank you, I can always trust you Puck, tomorrow we shall set the plan in motion,” he said.

The lights dimmed until they couldn’t see anything, only the floor. The fairies left the curtains and danced in groups of twos and threes males on one side, girls on the other.

“Tomorrow shall be the day, that we put the plan in motion,” everybody sang.

“For love will find a way,” Sang the two lovers.

“For me to find her,”

“As long as he allows me to stay close to him, I will be happy,”

“Everybody will finally know us as actors,”

“Tomorrow is the day,” sang the fairies and the music died. There was a hush before everybody broke into applause.