The Fairest Stars

Chapter Twenty Nine: 'Deny thy father.'

‘Alright?’ she asked softly, wondering what could be the matter… but then she remembered. ‘Ah. Your parents are here, then?’

Kael nodded. ‘Yeah. I… well, I’m a bit nervous about them seeing it. They haven’t ever seen me act before.’

Isis rubbed his arm. ‘They’re in for a nice surprise, then,’ she told him. ‘Where are they?’

He pointed to the middle of the audience, where his mother and father were sat, sticking out like sore thumbs. Isis recognised his mother, who looked pretty disgusted with the hall she was sat in, but his father she hadn’t met before. Effortlessly groomed to perfection, he looked immaculate, rather unlike his tousled haired son, but Isis could see the similarity in the strong, handsome features both father and son shared. He, likewise, didn’t look very impressed with his surroundings, but was sat on his plastic chair as if it was a throne.

‘You’re going to make them so proud,’ Isis told him, still rubbing his arm soothingly.

Kael smiled at her. ‘I hope so.’ He looked at her, his gaze frank and honest. ‘I… I don’t think I’ve ever made them proud before.’

‘You must have done!’ Isis said, before thinking about it. ‘Surely they must have been proud of something.’

Kael briefly thought back over his life. ‘My mum says she’s proud sometimes, but she doesn’t really care,’ he said, truthfully. ‘My dad… well, he only cares about things in terms of business. My achievements haven’t really reached that level.’

Isis suddenly felt overwhelmingly sorry for Kael. Despite the fact that his family seemed to have no problems, especially when you compared it to hers, it seemed that they lacked one vital thing: love. Or at least they lacked the ability to show love, and that was pitiful enough.

She grinned at Kael. ‘Well, we’ll have to make this a performance to make them extremely proud, then, won’t we?’

Kael smiled. ‘I guess we will.’

The curtain rose, and, getting ready for their cues, Kael gave Isis one last, toe curlingly wonderful kiss, and they vanished into the wings.

The play was just as wonderful as the other two nights. Kael gave his all, performing from the heart, especially as he bent over Isis’s ‘dead’ body, stroking her hair back from her face and letting out the tortured sobs which had become his speciality.

Isis lit up the stage too, her innocent love for Romeo seeming actually real, despite the fact that she was secretly lusting after Paris. She wondered what it would be like if Kael had played Romeo, but she cast that thought away. Kael was far too good at Mercutio and Paris to be anyone else, he just wasn’t the soppy type of Romeo that Callum did so well.

The play flew past. Before it even seemed vaguely possible, the final words were being said. Isis had been playing dead for quite some time now, having uttered the words ‘let me die’ and stabbed herself in the chest, and her nose itched dreadfully, but she lay still, knowing it was all ending, and not wanting to think about the fact that she’d never perform this bit again.

‘Montague! Give me your hand!’ the boy playing Capulet said. ‘In memory of my daughter.’

‘I’ll raise a gold statue of your daughter,’ the boy playing Montague answered. ‘That way, everyone will have a fine example of who should be their role model: true and faithful Juliet.’

Isis wasn’t sure true was a good word for someone who had faked their own death. But ah well.

‘So will Romeo!’ announced Capulet. ‘He’ll lie beside his lady; sacrifices of our enmity.’