•••••Cricket's Perspective
Beep-beep-beep-beep-beep.
Groaning, I rolled over and slapped my hand around on the surface of the nightstand, trying to feel for my phone so I could shut my alarm up.
At last, I located the source of the loud, shrill beeping and put a stop to it.
It was the fifth alarm that I'd snoozed that morning; I'd aimed to get up at seven forty-five, and it was currently eight-thirty.
I rolled over and stared up at the ceiling, letting my eyes adjust to the morning darkness as I tossed around the idea of falling back asleep.
My eyelids would've slid shut again, but my phone buzzed, giving me the motivation to sit up and look over at the screen and at the notifications it was reminding me of.
6 Missed Messages from Joshua
4 Missed Calls from Joshua
Sighing, I picked my phone up and read through the texts that I'd ignored last night.
Joshua Burrage
«Alex I'm so sorry are you okay?»
«Please let me explain»
«I know you really probably don't want to talk to me right now but please»
«At least let me apologize in person?»
«Alex?»
«Alex please I'm so sorry»
I quickly shut my phone off and threw it down on the bed.
But almost as soon as it hit the comforter, its screen lit up and it buzzed, alerting me of yet another notification.
1 Missed Message from Mr. Calhoun
Sighing once more, I again picked it up.
Mr. Calhoun
«Good morning, Miss Alexander. I just thought you should be made aware that I have scheduled a last-minute tech rehearsal today, starting at 10 a.m. There are some dance numbers that need to be completely reworked and I want the cast to have the full effect of the lights and sound system while they rehearse. I regret to have to send you all of this information directly, but since you refuse to join the cast and crew group chat, it must be done.»
«I refuse to join the group chat because I don't want my phone to blow up every time a lyric chain starts.»
«Valid reasoning, I suppose.»
«Anyway, I need you at the theater in an hour and a half. Fair warning, you will probably be here all the way up until showtime.»
I rolled my eyes. "Why don't you just go ahead and have us move in to the theater?"
But a nagging feeling in my stomach chased away my complaints.
I was going to have to get through an extensive tech rehearsal and a show, and somehow efficiently avoid Josh throughout both of them.
Surely, that wouldn't be too difficult? After all, I was really good at avoiding people.
Unfortunately, he usually wasn't.
•••••
By the time I'd gotten a shower, brushed my teeth, pulled my hair up, and thrown on a sweatshirt and a pair of leggings, it was about twenty minutes until ten.
That left me a little sliver of time to go find something to eat.
The hotel cafeteria was virtually empty, with roughly five minutes left before it closed for the morning.
I didn't have much of an appetite, per usual, but when I saw a single, neglected bagel sitting with the leftover pastry crumbs, I couldn't look the other way.
Deciding on taking it with me and possibly eating it later, I snatched it up and began wrapping in a napkin or two.
"Hey!" A voice over my shoulder chirped in my ear, startling me.
"Geez," I turned around, meeting Aiden's bewildered face. "You almost made me drop my bagel."
"Where were you last night?" She demanded, placing her hands on my shoulders. "I didn't see you at all after the show, and Josh said he hadn't seen you either—"
"I wasn't feeling great." I said. It wasn't a lie. "So I went back to my room and fell asleep."
She blinked. "Oh. Are you feeling okay now?"
I shrugged. "Not really."
"I hope you're not getting sick. A couple cast members have been getting this twenty-four hour fever," she pressed her hand to the back of my forehead, but I slapped her arm away.
"I don't have a fever. I'm fine."
"If you say so."
"I do."
She shook her head. "Whatever. Are you heading over to the theater?"
I nodded. "Yeah."
"Do you mind if I walk with you?"
"Why?" I wrinkled my nose. "Don't you need your boyfriend to hold your hand when you cross the street?"
"Very funny." She rolled her eyes. "Sky's busy this morning."
"Doing what?"
She tilted her head, puzzled. "I'm not sure, actually."
•••••Joshua's Perspective
"Where were you last night at approximately fifteen minutes til six o'clock?" The redhead demanded, shining the lamp in my eyes.
"At the theater!" I repeated, but he shoved the lamp closer to my face. "Sky, please!"
"That's what you said last time." He narrowed his eyes in suspicion. "And the time before that, and the time before that!"
"Whoa." I shot him a glare. "It is almost like I am telling the truth, or something."
"Aha!" He cried, setting the lamp back on the nightstand and grabbing my arms. "So you were are the theater!"
"I told you that!"
"What were you doing at the theater?"
My cheeks colored. "I was...dancing..."
He frowned. "Dancing?"
I nodded. "Y-yeah."
"That's all?"
I nodded again. "Yeah, that—"
"Liar!" He declared, picking the lamp up again.
"No! No, please, not the lamp!" I recoiled, shielding my eyes. "Can we please be done with the lamp?"
"Only if you tell me why you're acting so weird."
I scoffed nervously, crossing my arms. "Pssh, I am not acting weird."
Sky stared at me. "Yes you are."
"No I am not."
"You're a twenty-one year old and you haven't used a single contraction during this entire interrogation; yes, you are acting very weird!"
"My lack of contractions does not imply untruthfulness!"
He blinked and shook his head slowly, letting out a breath. "You're such a terrible liar."
"I just don't understand what you want me to say." I said. "There, I used a contraction."
"Look," he held up his hands, "you've been acting like this since last night's show."
"It was probably just your imagination."
"No, I know what I saw. Your muscles were tense, there was no conviction in your singing, and your dancing was sloppy—"
"Ouch?"
"And then before Aiden went to bed, she asked me if I'd seen Cricket, because she couldn't find her anywhere. What do you know about that?"
I shrugged, fiddling with my hands. "She was probably just tired and wanted to go to bed. She gets tired a lot."
Sky watched my face carefully. "Is something wrong with Cricket?"
"No." I lied, squirming in my seat.
"What happened with you and Cricket, Joshua?"
"Nothing!"
He rolled his eyes. "Josh, it's hilariously obvious that you're lying, so why don't you save your breath and just tell me?"
I sighed, looking down at my feet. "I don't know if she's okay with me telling anybody."
"What does that mean?"
I didn't say anything.
He frowned. "What could've happened that she wouldn't want you to tell anybody about?"
Again, I gave no answer.
"The only thing Aiden ever got weird about was when we..." he stopped, and I could practically hear the wheels and gears spinning inside of his head.
Then his eyes grew wide and his gaze snapped back up to me. "You didn't kiss her, did you?"
"Yeah," I admitted, unable to hold it back any longer. "Yeah, I did."
He slowly brought his hands up to cover his mouth. "Holy mother Hubbard."
"Sky, please." I groaned. "This is no time for Shrek references."
"Sorry, sorry, but," he let out a low whistle, "wow."
"Yeah."
"And she didn't strangle you to death on the spot?"
I shook my head. "No, she kissed me back. That's what's so weird about it."
"How...do you feel about that?"
I gave him a look. "I think you know how I feel about it."
He rolled his eyes. "Well, duh, yeah. Okay, how does she feel about it?"
"I don't know." I shrugged. "I texted her a few times, and I tried to call her, but she hasn't answered me."
"What did you say?"
"I told her I was sorry, and that I wanted to explain myself, or at least apologize."
He furrowed his brow in confusion. "But you said she kissed you back."
"Yeah, she did, but then she stopped and ran away."
"Oh, my." He bit his lip. "This is a strange predicament, isn't it?"
I sighed, nodding. "How did it work with you and Aiden?"
"Hands down, it was ten times easier than this." He said, raising his hands in surrender. "She kissed me again within three hours."
"Yeah, it's clearly not going that way for me."
He reached over and set his hand on my shoulder. "Hey, maybe it will. You just gotta make a point of talking to her."
I shook my head. "She doesn't want to talk to me."
"Try anyway." He shrugged. "Aiden and I didn't try to pretend that it didn't happen, and everything turned out fine."
"Cricket and Aiden are very different.
The redhead winced. "Yeah, I'm not gonna lie, you've got your work cut out for you."
•••••Cricket's Perspective
I set my headset on top of the lighting console and sighed loudly, rubbing my eyes.
We had been tech rehearsing for six hours now—we'd started at ten in the morning, and it was now three in the afternoon.
"I really hate this job sometimes." I murmured, frowning at Siegfried, who sat next to my lighting cue book.
Someone rapped their knuckles against the tech booth's doorframe.
"Hello, again." Aiden's voice greeted me for the second time that day.
"Hi." I spun around in my roller chair to face her. "What do you..." my sentence trailed off.
The expression that she wore was one of the fiercest scowls that I'd ever seen. She only donned a scowl like that when she was actively considering murder.
"Something is really wrong with Josh." She stated, crossing her arms. "And I have a feeling that you have something to do with it."
My stomach fluttered, but I remained blank-faced. "What do you mean?"
"He's been looking glum all day long, so I finally asked him how he was doing. He said that he was fine, but had a lot on his mind."
I blinked. "Okay, and?"
She shrugged, bouncing on her heels as the intensity in her voice rose. "And I decided to ask, just out of total curiosity, if he'd seen you before you left the show last night, or if he at least knew why."
"I told you where I went." I shook my head. "Where are you going with this story?"
"He said he hadn't seen you, and then he asked me if you were doing okay, because he'd tried to get ahold of you for three hours last night, and you didn't answer him!" She pointed an accusing finger at me. "You didn't tell me everything, did you?"
I held my hands up. "Hang on—"
She interrupted me, stamping her foot on the ground. "So I asked him when the last time he saw you was, what you guys were doing, and if there was any indication that you weren't okay, and he—"
"Oh, boy." I mumbled.
"—turned beet red and wouldn't even look at me! What happened?"
"Maybe he's sick with that twenty-four hour fever you were talking about."
She gave me a look, popping her hip out and crossing her arms again. "Oh, really? Sick? That's your explanation?"
I shrugged. "What other explanation do you want me to give?"
"Why don't you start with an explanation for why he tried to get ahold of you for three hours last night?"
"My phone must've died."
"What?"
I groaned. "Look, I really don't know why you're making such a big deal about it."
She gave me a pleading look. "Because I'm worried about you two."
"Yeah? Well, don't be." I sat back against my roller chair. "Everything's fine. You're blowing it completely out of proportion."
"Really?" She asked, sighing. "Promise?"
I swallowed. "I promise."
She dropped her hands to her sides in defeat. "Fine. Are you hungry?"
I rolled my eyes and shook my head. "It's already three o'clock. I might as well just skip lunch."
"You know Josh doesn't like it when you do that."
"I don't care what Josh thinks!" I retorted suddenly, jumping up from my chair.
Aiden took a step back. "I'm sorry, I—"
"Alex?" Josh called cautiously, meekly sticking his head into the room.
I met his eyes; dark, chocolate-colored eyes.
They were sad. But he put up a smile and stepped into the room, hiding his hands in his pockets. "I...I was just wondering if I could talk to you for a minute?"
Aiden glanced at me, her gaze stern. "Should I step out?"
Josh bit his lip, taking in a deep breath as he waited for my answer.
A small voice inside of my head was telling me that I should talk to him. That I needed to talk to him.
And I agreed.
But instead, I pushed past him, mumbling, "I'm busy", and quickly left the room.
He didn't follow me.