Misfit Theater Company (Wattys Winner 2018)

33. Grant O'Reilly

"Why?" she asks again with the same judgmental tone.

I gesture for her to move closer, and she does. Then I whisper, "I'm sneaking back into my group's one act, and I can't have Mr. Buford noticing I'm not here again after the assembly."

Layla laughs, but it isn't a genuine sort of laugh. It's the kind of laugh villains in movies use once they've lured the hero into their trap.

"You're an idiot for telling me that," she says once she's done throwing her head back with laughter. "You better come back for your binder now. If you don't, I'm for sure letting Mr. Buford know where you are. Nothing is getting between me and Grant O'Reilly's show today." She turns away from me and starts toward the group lining up at the door.

I'm not sure what I thought the outcome of that interaction would be, but considering she hadn't been completely heinous lately, I thought maybe there was some hope. But now there isn't any. None at all.

"Let's go, Ms. Myers, we don't have all day," Mr. Buford says as I start to panic seeing that I'm the last student to join the line. I search the immediate vicinity for any sort of solution to my problem, when I see a gap in the textbooks lined up in the bookshelf under Mr. Buford's window. As quickly, quietly, and stealthily as I possibly can, I stuff my binder into the slot so that it blends in. Maybe that will buy me some time, I think. After assemblies, sometimes all the students get back to the rooms at different times, so maybe Layla could think I had come to get my binder already. Whatever, it's my best option. I run across the room to join the line.

"Finally," Mr. Buford says, turning off the lights. "Janie, close the door behind you."

Layla moves to the back of the line with me. "Allow me," she says to me, "so I can make sure you don't try to pull anything. This is my day."

"You're right, Layla. My bad," I say.

She smiles. "Funny, Janie. Now c'mon, let's go," she says, herding me out of the room. We follow the crowd down the hall, past the office, down the long corridor toward the auditorium, and finally in to our seats.

Layla will not leave me alone, not even in the auditorium. She insists on sitting next to me to "keep an eye on" me. I'd hate her if I didn't sort of take it as a compliment. Here is a girl who is one of the most popular people in the whole school, who has outer beauty beyond what any 16-year-old person should have, and who is legitimately very talented. And she is nervous because a girl who has only been in theater class for seven weeks and has dyslexia wants to perform in a rival one act. That must mean Patti, Thatcher, and Moth are killing their rehearsals in class. It could also mean that she thinks I have talent. I allow the thought to settle in my brain: Layla Monroe thinks I'm talented, so she is intimidated by me.

But it's also annoying that she won't leave me alone. Not to mention, plan-ruining.

Once all the classes have filed into the auditorium and taken their seats, the lights dim, and a spot light shines on the right side of the stage, stage left. Out from the red, velvet curtains steps a man, six foot tall and clothed in a tightly fitted Blue Devils blue suit with a white button up shirt and black tie. He looks so... real, for lack of a better term. He's just a person in real life, not some bigger than life entity like he is in my mind, but my goodness, he is just as handsome as he is on TV. His dirty blond hair is styled in a tossed sort of look on the top of his head, but the sides of his hair are neatly trimmed. His jawline is heart-shaped, and his big lips stretch into a grin on his face. Even from here, in the center of the auditorium, I can see his sky blue eyes gleam in the light, and his skin looks sun-kissed from all of his time out in Hollywood.

"Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Grant O'Reilly to the stage," Dr. Howard announces from the other side of the stage. I didn't even notice him join Grant O'Reilly up there.