Stealing Cinder (No Not Cinderella!) (BOYXBOY)

Chapter 15: Curtains Up

Crispin POV
    “Why is Micah wearing makeup?”
I cursed under my breath and reluctantly dropped my backpack beside the front door.
    “He’s in the play,” I muttered. Robert raised his eyebrows at me and Micah,
    “Playing who?” he asked. I sighed heavily,
    “He’s Sally okay,” I snapped. Micah looked at me nervously. We weren’t prepared to let them know about this yet. Robert nodded,
    “Alright, have a good performance,” he said. I was thankful he’d never seen The Nightmare Before Christmas. I was even more thankful that Megan wasn’t home to hear that. She was still angry. I dragged Micah out to my car and we piled in.
    “So he’s all good with this?” Micah asked while buckling up. I shrugged,
    “He doesn’t know what the play’s about,” I replied. Micah nodded in acceptance and went through my cds before putting one in. He skipped to the third track before letting it play, Sally’s Song started seranading my cars atmosphere.
    “Nervous much?” I questioned with a chuckle as he sang along.
    “I haven’t had as long as you have to prepare,” he snipped.
    “You’ll be perfect,” I whispered. He smiled at me and I had to smile back. He’s relaxed so much over the weekend even if he was freaking out over this performance the whole time and begged me to rehearse with him every night.
                    *********
    School was blucky as it is always is on mondays. Micah and I received death glare after death glare as the story from last week spread throughout the school. Drama students gathered in the auditorium at the beginning of third period. Everybody was already in their costumes and makeup since it was required that we come to school in it. Something about pride in ourselves I guess. Now all we had to do was wait for our peers to gather in their seats. Kalea grabbed my arm and smiled,
    “You guys are going to do great!” she gushed. I gave her a nervous smile,
    “Christ I hope so,” I answered. She rolled her eyes and her demeanor became frightened. She knew how my stage fright was, as did everybody else. It was completely reasonable that I may ruin the whole thing. Micah came up beside her and raised an eyebrow.
    “Is e-everything okay-ay?” he stuttered. He was nervous too.
    “Just fine Cinder, Crispin has a tad bit of stage fright but everything will go beautifully,” Kalea replied giving us both a small hug before disappearing to her position on stage. I could hear people beginning to enter and my palms started to sweat.
    “Calm down Crispin. You’re great it’s go-going to b-be okay,” Micah whispered. I nodded as he scurried off to his position. I let out a deep breath and turned to go climb in the cauldron to make my grand appearance.

Micah POV
    The curtains drifted apart and a large amount of applause smacked our faces as the opening number began. I started wandering through the singing people dressed as monsters as I was instructed to do. Looking behind me every so often as if I was being followed. I ended up next to a couple of soloist as sang,
    “Say it once say it twice take a chance and roll the dice, ride with the moon in the dead of night-”
    I jumped away from them and the spotlight on me followed. I bumped into the boy with the tear away clown face and jumped back again. The voices kept pushing me forward towards that large black bowl in the middle of stage where Crispin was beginning to rise as the song ended. His face shown in confidence. The first scene went through without a hitch. My scene was pretty good too, I guess. I mean my arm fell off before it was supposed to but oh well. Crispin didn’t seem nervous anymore. He was absolutely wonderful...until the final scene. We were having a moment, our characters were, on stage. His face held pride since he hadn’t messed up anything. Then it happened,
    “My childhood is ruined!” Somebody screamed. I looked out into the audience and saw the unmistakable asshole of the year covering his eyes in horror in the front row. Crispin’s words faltered as he looked too.
    “Faggots are playing two famous characters! That’s fucking disgusting!” He yelped. Crispin smiled hard.
    “Dude that’s a guy up there!?” Some else yelled. I blushed slightly. They thought I was a girl. Crispin grabbed my arm, off cue. His eyes were wide and he was shaking, staring out at the crowd. He must not’ve looked out during the whole play because now he was frozen.
    “I-I...”
    He’d lost his line.
    “Is it over yet?” Jason questioned. Now he looked bored instead of disgusted and he nodded his head at someone. Something flew through the air towards Crispin who was still frozen in fear. I pushed him aside and the tomato hit the set behind us. Crispin stayed on the ground where he’d fallen and a few terrified tears leaked from his eyes. For the first time in a long time I wasn’t scared, or upset, I was mad. I turned around to face the audience.
    “Was that necassary?” I said. My voice was calm, a calm that drew everyone’s attention. “ Is there any reason to crucify him for this? Are you telling everyone, by trying to shame Jack, that you’re not equal to the rest of us? Are you some higher being?”
    People shifted nervously in their seats.
    “It’s okay for people to mess up. It’s even okay for people to be afraid. I’m afraid right now, speaking when it’s not my thing, speaking to people so ignorant. You’re afraid too don’t deny it,”
    I watched Jason glare at me. I turned around and grabbed Crispin’s hand to pull him to his feet.
    “Ignore him Jack. Focus on me and tell me what you need to say,” I whispered. I don’t know why I whispered since there was a microphone pinned to my shirt. Crispin breathed shakily and his line came out rushed. The ending music played and we walked, hand in hand, to our positions and leaned against each other to watch the cardboard moon as the lights dimmed and curtain closed. Surprisingly the room burst into a roar of applause and whoops of approval. The rest of the cast joined us and we lined up for our bow. Curtains opened, we bowed and Crispin stepped forward to the microphone.
    “I wish to thank you all for the time you shared with us in our story. It was a pleasure to perform for our peers and for a special final note-” he beckoned me forward and I waltzed to his side- “you may be able to hurt me, cut me down until I feel like nothing, but I’ll never let you hurt my boyfriend,”
    He kissed me lovingly on stage and I smiled into it with trembling lips. There were no sounds of disgust or approval as the curtains closed again. Then again I wouldn’t have heard the anyway.
    Kalea’s arms wrapped around us and we separated. She was crying and smiling and blubbering as was a lot of others. Even boys. No one said anything. No congratulations or critiques. Just laughing, crying, and smiling. Until Crispin whispered in my ear,
    “Date night tonight,”
I smiled. What’s it like to be on a date?

Yes epically short but the next chapter will be longer because it's a full out DATE CHAPTER might as well be a little lovey before everything goes to hell in a handbasket :D. Hahahahaha love you guys C: happy reading Bahvie and Neko