Roll With It Short Stories

Day Nineteen

Word Count 17: 1200

Prompt 8: You are finally getting the lead roles but your up and coming director has you die in really gruesome ways at the end of each play. The scenes are getting a little too dangerous and you suspect he may be upset with you.

'You always told yourself that you'd do anything for your acting,' Olivia reminded herself of years of dedication. She looked out into the audience and delivered her line, "If the fires of hell cannot cleanse me, then I will remain unburned. Witness one who is beyond salvation." Olivia threw Anais, her character, through the flaming gate props, closing her eyes and covering her face with her arms. She dropped her flaming cloak and dress behind her, leaving her in only a fire resistant leotard that covered everything except her head and hand, it was flesh colored and made her look bare against the red glow. She had to quickly recover and stand to deliver her next line. She felt the heat on her skin and the rash building beneath her suit from repeat performances. Every time she went on stage her heart and stomach felt sick knowing she would have to crash through the flames all over again. Each time she had to focus to remove her excess clothing and manage to act like she wasn't scared that her tightly wound hair would catch fire. Even after the scene was over her pulse would drown out the lines of the other actors so she had to rely on stage directions to make her cues. Before she could recover her nerves it would be time for the final scene that portrayed her death, when her counterpart would drown her. Upon Jack's request for authenticity, they used real water and her face was forced into a bucket where she barely had to pretend to struggle. As soon as she went limp the lights would go off and once released she'd gasp for air, listening to the constant apologies of her costar. She was lucky terror and stress were a justifiable emotion for Anais to display, but then again they were the typical themes for one of Jack Creel's plays.

She had made it through another night unscathed with the crowd in an uproar. Olivia stumbled as soon as the curtains closed, her stage mate catching her, "Hey, hey, easy there."

"I'm fine," Olivia brushed her off and moved quickly to her dressing room, avoiding the eye of the man in the wings. In front of her vanity she craned her neck to confirm the large scorch mark around the lip of her leotard reaching up into her hairline. She used makeup wipes on the angry, puckered skin. The alcohol burned bad enough to blur her vision, she gripped the table and tried to focus. She was so tired, and the heavy bags waiting underneath her makeup were testament to that.

"You got to do something kid, Jack's got it out for you." Olivia jumped seeing her agent appear in the doorway's reflection.

"What am I supposed to do? Jack's 'it' right now, if I stick it out there's no way I won't make Broadway."

"If you live to see it. In the last play he made you hang yourself with that rig, if anyone thing had gone even slightly wrong you would have died. Now you have to jump through literal rings of fire and nearly drown yourself. I'm not sure the applause is worth it not to mention it's wearing on Adam's nerves too. This is clearly harassment and probably illegal."

"If I give up the role, someone else will only take my place. No one's gotten so much attention for a stage show in decades, Jack's going to make it big. He's made me the lead in all his plays, even if he does hate me, there's no way this won't get me attention."

"I'm just saying if we casually drop the word lawsuit around he might back off a bit. If he wants you bad enough he'll tone it down, and if not well maybe that's not so bad."

"No. I'm fine."

"Olivia, you're falling over. You're tired and exhausted, you can't be sleeping well. These are stressful situations even if it's staged."

"Paula I'm fine. Drop it." Paula sighed and Olivia watched her disappear from the mirror. She was anxious that Paula might say something and ruin this for her, but she was too tired to chase after her.

Only days after the troupe's final performance, Olivia received a text informing her that there was a new play to be performed.Her heart sank as she read that the auditions were only days away. She laid on her couch, watching her phone buzz and light up with confirmations that people would be there. 'If I don't go someone else will.' She told herself but she could only think of her nightmares. She didn't always remember them but most were filled with her being chased and cornered. A single tear ran down her cheek, she already knew she would get the lead role.

Reading the script only seemed to confirm her fears, the lead female was to be stalked and then beheaded. The script and characters were compelling as always and she would have the most lines out of anyone. If not for the diagram of the complicated, fake guillotine she wouldn't have thought it as dangerous as his other plays. Revisiting her anxiety she thought perhaps she would let someone else take the lead, at least for this show. She auditioned for secondary female lead, she had fewer lines but was not destined to lose her head. After seeing her name on the cast list she felt hollow, she was the lead again.

Olivia was on time for dress rehearsal, word had got around that Jack's plays were being scouted, and apparently the pressure was on because Jack had far more direction than normal. He was walking around as they performed, watching them from every angle. He had been temperamental in the past, but now he could not be pleased. He never seemed to focus on her, for which Olivia was grateful, and she was beginning to think his obsession with brutal death and her casting were coincidental. Perhaps she was just better for the part after all.

She laid her neck against the wooden groove, she couldn't look at the large blade above her, so instead let her head hang down to see the hint of the audience beyond the glare of the stage lights. She gripped the sides of her dress waiting for the heavy thunk of the blade and wood falling to give the appearance of cutting off her head. Fake blood would pool around her neck and then she would slip out in a brief flicker of darkness, and a false replica of her head would earn the applause of the audience. She could began to make out the face of someone before her, feeling the sweat run into her hair, she saw Jack. Sitting in the audience instead of in the wing. She shouldn't have been able to see him but there he was, fingers together, smiling cartoonishly. She screamed as the heavy blade fell and the audience cheered for the evil queen was dead and her blood spray across the stage.