The Art Of Pretending

Chapter 1

"Go, go!" I was shoved to the very end of the wings by my giggling best friend Cora. The music designated for bows sped up and I knew it was my cue. I emerged from the heavy drapes and was met with thunderous applause from the audience. The whistles and cheers got impossibly louder as I bent at the waist in the traditional theater bow. I let the stage lights blind me and the feeling of accomplishment rose inside my chest. The bow music faded out and took the cacophonious clapping with it. The lights went out as the curtain closed and I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to stay in that moment, the moment where everything was perfect.

Suddenly, the stage was flooded with light and behind the curtain everyone became themselves again. "Oh my God Harmony! You did so well! You rocked that stage!"
"Harm that was sooooo good!"
"You sounded so good during your solo, you made the audience cry!"
"Did you hear the applause? They LOVED you!"

The praise of the cast washed over me and I felt an unnecessary blush creep onto my cheeks. Thankfully, before my excessive modesty kicked in, Cora rushed over and pulled me into a tight hug. She pushed her techie headset away from her ear and gave me one of her contagious smiles. As student backstage manager, Cora has been at every rehearsal and has been with me through this entire play, so she knows just how hard I worked for this moment. "Harmony you were AMAZING! And I'm not just saying that because I'm your best friend."she jokes.

"Well I can't believe its actually over! After all this time and after all the effort..."
"Oh don't think like that! Not now at least, you have praises to receive and glory to bask in."
"Thanks Cora," I laugh, "I will come back after I go talk to the people in the audience."
"No problem, go get em' tiger!" she says.
I walk over to the exit, but before I go down into the house I look around at the set, and all the people I've spent the last couple months rehearsing with. "It's almost beautiful, how everything comes together only to be over so soon." I thought. Things like acting force you to live in the moment, to enjoy every last second of a feeling...but it's all fake. Acting is the art of becoming someone else, of pretending to be something you're not. One in a million moments are perfect, but all the rest are simply ordinary. Like me, ordinary, plain Harmony. No one understands that when I'm not a character, I'm nobody. That's why I pretend. Pretend that everything is fine, pretend that I'm okay with everything, pretend I'm not scared of anything...pretend that EVERY moment is perfect. Acting is the art of pretending, and acting is the only thing I'm good at.