Harry and I (ON HOLD)

Chapter Two: Appreciating A Positive Feedback

When I woke up, there was this still feeling of lightness and tranquility. The birds were chirping, the sound of the wind blowing through my open window—like it’s beckoning me that I’ll have a perfect day ahead of me. Until I realized it was the calm before the storm because five minutes into my worldly profound feeling of peacefulness, my mobile phone rang into life and I hurriedly answered it. I wish I didn’t because then, my serenity would have still been intact for a little more while.

When I was in college, I, being a playwriting major, was required to have at least one performing arts class. That was when I got caught up in the web that is the theater. The brainstorming of the motif, the feel of the stage, lights, casting is the most difficult part because you wanted to get everything right but the most exciting part of theater is the hustling and bustling backstage right before show time! (I should probably insert jazz hands here for more emphasis)  When everyone’s running around trying to make the cardboard mountains stay up, or actors running lines with one another or stage managers yelling cues—that’s when I come alive. Unfortunately now, in this case, when I am the one who wrote and running the whole fucking show, I am somehow, figuratively dying. My lead actor doesn’t even know all his lines! For god’s sake! Is it too late to cancel the show?

It probably was.

Now, if you ask me, I have imagined my first play a little (a lot) different than this. First, it would have been in a little but popular theater in Manhattan. Second, my mountains or whatever are not made out of cardboards—plaster of Paris, more preferably. And last, my actors, if at all possible, would be a little less annoying and a little more talented. Yes, my actors are lacking in the talent department. How is that possible, you ask? Nobody wanted to audition for a low-budget play by a 26-year old newbie so we had to get the first few ones that had.

“Thirty minutes to show time, people! Again, thirty minutes to show time!” my stage manager, Bethy yelled in her faux New York accent. Bethy is another story. When we first went looking for a crew, we met up with a lot of people but most of them did not end up working with us because they are either a) too expensive for our budget or b) did not believe in our project. We were exhausted by the time we walked back to Angela’s block.  Before we retire to her apartment, we decided to grab a sandwich for dinner from the deli near her place. That is how we met Bethy, an eighteen year old high school dropout who had a passion for telling stories. Like I do—in a non-succinct and unintelligible way. I’m not saying she’s dumb but she could use a dictionary. Anyway, she started telling this story about how her mother got addicted to heroin when she was 7 years old and the only way she could get out of the house is to tell her mom she has a performance to do at her school. While she does the talking, she was also making our sandwich. So Angela and I were stuck there facing her back, listening her blab away. When she finally handed our food to us across the counter and we handed our payment, Anj and I offered her the stage manager spot which she eagerly accepted.

“Twenty-seven minutes to show time, people! Twenty-seven minutes to show time!” Bethy yelled again.

“Bethy! We get it! You don’t have to remind us every minute!” I told her.

“Jeez, Charlie! What got your panties in a bunch?” She animatedly asked me then rolled her eyes and walked away. I pay you! I wanted to scream at her.

“Yeah, Charlie! What got your granny panties in a bunch?” Angela said as she strides into the spot next to me on the closed-curtain stage, mocking Bethy’s accent. “I’m sure it’s a not a guy,” she smirked.

“Ha, hilarious, Angela. Just hilarious.” I scoffed.

“Honey, you need to chill. Here, have some mocha iced coffee,” She pushed the tray she was carrying to me. “You’re welcome.” I rolled my eyes. “So is everything going great?”