Unanticipatedly [4]

(Malory)

Where is he? It’s past four in the afternoon and the drama teachers are fuming. Ron is filling in for him, rehearsing the first scene with me. We’re both on stage.

I act for the lead, “Valerie” while Ron acts for “Angus”.

In this scene, Valerie and Angus are both masked, and have not the slightest idea who each other is.

Valerie is French. She’s a young lady of noble blood. She has to inherit a portion of her family’s wealth and all the hiffy-jiffy baggage that comes with that. It’s a play that takes place in France during the 1800s.

It’s awesome. Masquerade balls and everything.

Valerie has to learn all the ways of the typical noble women in society. She has to learn to run the house and to order the maids, and she must be skilled and educated.

Except, our Valerie –as the story goes- wants to do none of that. Though society is saying that she needs to be a certain way, Valerie wants to travel the world and discover true freedom.

She wants a small, comfy home and a lifetime of adventures to talk about when she’s old. She doesn’t want to inherit the animals and all the land and have superiority over the workers of her household. She doesn’t want to learn skills she’ll never like. She just wants to live –to really, really live.

Her best friend, Beth, thinks she’s insane for wanting to live in such a dream world, though, and would gladly have the wealth, love life and education that she couldn’t care less about.

Valerie, in an attempt to experience some of the adventures she so desires to have, masks herself and wears a long, flowing cape. Her personal maid knows she sneaks out at night, but she keeps it a secret because they’re very close.

Valerie may be a noble lady during the day, but she’s someone else at night. She knows how to work a sharp dagger right through the heart of a body. She knows how to fight. She knows how to steal a horse and how to ride it –and not in the fancy side-saddled manner as that of the noble ladies.

When she and Angus first meet, it’s at a bar that she’s spying into from a crack in the wood of the roof.

Angus, whose face is hidden behind a mask as he sits at a table full of drunkards, intrigues her. She wonders why he’s wearing a mask. She wonders who he must be. She wonders if he’s a criminal… or perhaps someone just like her.

Valerie notices that Angus is about to be beaten up by the drunkards for not repaying debts that he apparently owes each of the men, and though she can see that he is fighting them off, he’s about to be stabbed in the back –literally. So she saves him and they run off.

At midnight, they both reach a barn where they stop to drink some water. It’s here that they have a proper conversation for the first time.

Now, Ron and I have reached this point of the scene where Valerie feels as though Angus has insulted her.

“How dare you call me a damsel like it’s a crime to be alone!?” I exclaim in an offended tone, turning to Ron... well... Angus.

“Surely it is that that you must be!” he replies confidently. “Were it not for your still-youthful tone, your petite frame, or your will to awaken such a daring adventure, I would have fancied you a Dame!”

Defensively, I reply. “And what of my courage? My temperament? Is the bluntness of a fading drunkenness wavering on your tongue all you can offer in gratitude to the woman who rescued you?”

I turn on my toes and take two steps away from him. He grabs my hand and pulls me back, my chest bumping into his, our eyes closing in on each other’s. I reach for a dagger –or should I say pretend to reach for one that’s supposed to be on my person when I’m in costume but we don’t have actual props yet- and I attempt to move away from him.

“Unhand me!” I command. I’m unable to move out of his grip.

“Mademoiselle,” he whispers flirtatiously as he nears my face, “if only I could know the name of my heroine, I could modestly offer my sincere gratitude.”

Just then, Kyle bursts through the doors at the back of the auditorium, slamming them behind him. Ron and I snap out of our scene. We turn to look at him. He spots us and stares blankly. I realise that I’m still within Ron’s grasp so I pull away, clearing my throat and fixing a few strands of my hair behind my ear.

Everyone –the teachers and the students- turn to Kyle and stare at him in silence. He doesn’t seem to care, and he doesn’t move from his position at the back.

“You’re late, Davidson,” says Mrs Cole. “You’d do well to hurry down here and get your act together. You’ve almost missed a third practice!”

Kyle strolls quietly down the aisle, unbothered by the thought of time.

“He actually showed up?” I whisper to Ron.

“I’m just as surprised as you are,” Ron says, blinking.

Suddenly I realise how close I’m going to have to be to Kyle for this play. It didn’t quite hit me before this rehearsal, but now that he’s present and I’m thinking about it...

I cough. I hit my chest and try to clear my throat.

Kyle finally makes it to the front, dropping his bag into a seat and shuffling through it for his script.

He finds it. He waves it at Mrs Cole.

“Now, get up there,” she scolds him. “We’ll start from the first scene between Angus and Valerie. Again. Thank you for your input, Ron, you can take a seat for now.”

Ron leaves the stage and sits beside Olivia at the front. I watch them as they whisper to each other. I wonder what they’re saying. I hear the light thumping of footsteps as Kyle Davidson makes his way on stage. I almost want to melt into the floor.

God, do I really have to do this?

It was going so well with Ron as the lead.

Why can’t Ron do it? He’s a great actor.

Kyle struggles towards me, dragging his feet with each step forward. He glares at me, so I glare back at him. I hear whispers coming from the students in the audience. I turn to them and sigh before looking at Kyle again. He shuffles through his script to find the scene between our characters, but he’s taking so long to do it that I’m certain my corpse will disintegrate in the grave before we get to the actual reading. My eye twitches as I look at him. I get tired of watching his struggle to skim through the lines. I step towards him and grip at the page to offer help.

“Just lemme do it,” I say.

He snatches the script, forcing it out of my grip. “No. I will find it myself.”

“Well, Turbo, if you haven’t realised, you’re already late and you’re taking forever to move,” I state.

He turns to Mrs Cole, completely ignoring my comment.

Asshole.

“What page is it?”

“It’s page five,” I tell him.

He turns to me, irritated. “Thank you, Mrs Cole.” He flips to page five and scans the contents. “Oh, this ridiculous thing?”

“Watch your tongue, Davidson,” Mrs Cole says. “How dare you call this ridiculous? Get started with the scene, both of you. I’m done waiting.”

Sighing, Kyle finally attempts to rehearse his lines.

The minute he opens his mouth to speak, however, I feel as though I want to shoot myself.

“Men! Such anger!” he says, his tone indifferent, “Laughs... nervously?” He turns to me. My face is bored.

I sigh.

This pathetic pile of poop.

I speak almost mechanically as I explain the stage directions to him. “You’re supposed to physically act out the lines in the brackets without reading them out loud, Kyle. The lines that aren’t in brackets are what you say as the characters. This is basic drama knowledge that even you should know. Do it again.”

Does he really not know anything about acting?

He rolls his eyes and starts again. “M... Men!” Students snicker in the audience, and I myself want to laugh. He looks out at them, obviously angry that they’re making fun of him, and he continues, “SUCH ANGER!” The snickering continues and Kyle turns to Mrs Cole. “Please tell them to shut it.”

I turn to Mrs Cole to find that she’s stifling a laugh, herself. “Do it properly and they won’t be laughing at you, Davidson,” she says.

He runs a hand down his face in frustration. He groans. “You’re no help.”

I get impatient. I get tired of seeing Kyle struggle. This isn’t the Kyle Davidson I’m used to, and even I find myself being upset that everyone else is laughing and making fun of him. I huff a breath. I tap my foot on the floor. I wait. I can feel my anxiety bubbling up.

“Get on with it!” I yell.

“Shut it, Lloyd!” he says, “It’s not like I’ve ever done this before! What –do you expect me to be a Broadway star on the first try? Jeez.”

“Hah! Maybe if you generated some of that petty anger into the work, you’d be a hundred times better than you are right now!” I accuse.

“Petty anger? What’s that even supposed to mean?”

I’d come to the conclusion that the only reason Kyle had gotten upset was because the new guy is getting along with everyone better than he ever could. Whatever the situation at home, Kyle always found a way to hide it, so in this instance none of his immature stupidity could possibly be because of his uncle.

“Face it, Kyle. You’re just upset because the new guy has more friends than you do. That’s it. And that’s petty.”

He scoffs and blinks at me in disbelief. “You think that’s why I’m upset? Clearly you know nothing about me, Lloyd. That pathetic brainless prick can disappear.”

“Why do you hate him? What did he do?”

“I don’t hate him. I don’t care enough about him to hate him.”

He says it with such an expressionless tone I almost believe him.

“Something happened, though... Didn’t it?” I say, and somehow it’s in less of an infuriated tone and more of a concerned one.

He turns to the audience.

Turns out we really don’t even need lines to put on a show.

“No. No it didn’t.” He says.

I know he’s being dishonest. I can sense his inner panic. His breathing pattern changes. He blinks a few times even though there’s nothing in his eyes. He’s trying to make them focus. I know. I know what that’s like. I know.

And yet I press on. “You’re lying!”

And suddenly Kyle is staring right at me, his expression dark and intimidating. His eyes are angled in a way I hadn’t ever seen them before. His tone drops too –to something unusually commanding. “Drop it, Lloyd.”

I almost get the Goosebumps… or the chills.

I can’t even think to speak.

Kyle jumps off stage and drops his script into the seat where he rested his bag, storming out of the auditorium. I watch him leave. I watch him pull the doors open. I watch them shut behind him.

“Well, Malory,” Mrs Cole then says, “you’re both getting written down for a lack of cooperation, and he’s getting written down for being late and storming out. Make him aware of this whenever he decides to calm down, won’t you?”

Great.

Just great.

I breathe out heavily and then take a deep breath in. This pattern continues for half a minute before I decide to move. The look in Kyle’s strange, angry eyes… his tone of voice… they leave an imprint in my mind. I step down from the stage slowly, and the pick up the pace as I walk, until eventually I’m running out of the auditorium –running after him.

I look left and right before spotting him as he makes his way across the field.

“Kyle!” I shout. He doesn’t reply. I continue running after him. “Kyle!” He quickens his own steps. He starts running. I force myself to speed up. I’m out of breath. I can feel my chest hurting. I can feel my lungs about to deflate entirely. “Wait!” I say, gaining on him.

He finally slows his pace before stopping to catch a breath. He bends over and groans in frustration. He turns to me.

I know that I should be trying to catch my breath instead of talking, but I can’t help it. I need to try my best with him. Despite everything. “Please!” I gasp for air. “Just... tell me what’s... wrong...”

My stomach begins to ache. I drop to the ground and my butt stings in the grass for a second.

I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe.

He looks down at me, annoyed. “He saw it.”

“W...What?”

“What else, Lloyd?”

I put the pieces together.

Adrien saw the bruise?

My eyes go wide. “WHAT?!” I struggle to my feet. It’s already hard to breathe, but if I wasn’t panicking before, now I am. I start wheezing. “H-he...” I collapse to the ground again, dragging my knees to my chest and hugging them. I rock back and forth.

Breathe, Malory.

Breathe.

Breathe.

Breathe.

The world becomes blurry.

“H-He saw...”

And suddenly it’s all flashing across my mind. The times Adrien sat with us and didn’t say anything. Kyle’s bruise.

Everything.

Everything.

Everything.

“Lloyd.”

I’m still rocking back and forth, and I struggle to look up at Kyle. He doesn’t appear angry anymore.I grimace, uncomfortable in my own body. I start wheezing. I can feel myself about to give up. He steps towards me, slowly.

Don’t, Kyle.

Please don’t come near me.

I don’t deserve your help.

Please just let me die.

“Malory?” he says. His tone softens.

The world around me darkens at the corners of my eyes. The light dims and then eventually blackens. I struggle to look up at Kyle one last time –his face is slowly becoming a blurry silhouette… fading… fading… fading into nothing.

“Mal...”