A Room With A View

Chapter Nineteen - Madeline

September 15th, Friday

Madeline had bombed her audition. Seeing Nicole Devlin in the room had completely thrown her groove. But that was last week. Tonight was a totally new start.

     Madeline pulled the Lean Cuisine macaroni from the microwave and brushed away the steam. It had been a splurge, but the picture on the front of the box had looked too good to resist. Madeline peeled back the plastic covering, and frowned.

     It was smaller than the picture. There looked to be maybe ten elbow macaronis, with a slathering of something vaguely resembling cheddar. Madeline sighed, a strand of hair bobbing against her nose. She still had leftover breadsticks from Olive Garden. Those would go great with macaroni.

     "It's just carbo-loading. I need it for my audition," she reasoned aloud. Madeline carefully placed the hot macaroni dish on a tray, artfully arranging the breadsticks next to it. She had a tiny posy in a vase that she kept on the windowsill, and she added this to the tray completing the look.

     "There," she said, nudging the posy to the side. "A good luck meal."

     She had three hours until she needed to be downtown for the audition. It was being held in a converted warehouse in the meatpacking district—some avant-garde thing—but Madeline thought it could showcase her range.

     She'd appeared in a couple minor comedies, and one NYU student romance film, but she hadn't yet done anything experimental. Or dramatic, despite the fact that she practiced her crying face in the shower. The water really enhanced the tears.

     Madeline placed the tray on her coffee table and sat down on the couch. There was a new episode of the fantasy show loved on tonight. Her parents and brothers had always given her a rough time about it ("That's a kids show, Mads"), but she had watched it just the same. It had interweaving time lines and heavily contrived plots, but there was something about the characters that Madeline found truly compelling.

     "I should call Ezra," Madeline said aloud. She reached for her phone, but the opening music of her tv show started, so she sat back to watch. She could just imagine Ezra rolling his eyes at her.

     Ezra was two years older than Madeline. Then there was Colin, who was a year and a half older than Ezra, and then Tim, who was three years older than Colin. Madeline had been so flustered with work and acting and this apartment business, that she hadn't given her brothers a second thought. They were all off living their own lives anyway. Tim was married now, Colin was sailing around Australia, and Ezra was...well Ezra was just being Ezra. Last they spoke his band had really taken off in Ohio. They had grown up in Cleveland, and apparently his indie music was really popular there. He had sent her a picture a few weeks ago of one of their shows. Ezra had been in the front with their dad's battered guitar, practically eating the microphone, and he had been wearing a horrendous black beanie his girlfriend had crocheted for him. The girlfriend wasn't horrendous, just the beanie. Chloe was actually rather nice.

Madeline was struck with a sudden, overwhelming feeling of homesickness. She hadn't been home since last Christmas, and already it was late August. Her parents had bought her a ticket home for this Christmas, but December still seemed so very far away.

Madeline took a big bite of the macaroni, the scalding heat cutting through her thoughts. She focused back on the tv. Cinderella was racing through a dark and ominous forest, her blue dress in tatters.

     "Cue Peter Pan," Madeline whispered, waving her breadstick like a conductor's baton.

     Sure enough, Peter Pan flew in stage left, sweeping Cinderella out of mortal danger. She looked up at him with simpering, grateful eyes. It was terribly cheesy, but Madeline couldn't help but sigh. How lovely it would be to have her soul mate soar in just like that, taking her away on a magical adventure.

     Madeline sat up straighter, and felt her back crunch against something. She reached behind and pulled out a crumpled yellow bag. She had completely forgotten about the book.

     Madeline craned her neck and glanced up at 12F. The room was dark. Alina had said she might be seeing a show with her brother tonight. Madeline would have to follow up with her about it tomorrow.

The lights of 17F were also dark. Madeline wondered where these people all were on a Friday night. She hoped Mr. and Mrs. 17F had gone out to a lovely dinner.

The theme song played again, and Madeline turned back to the tv, Sunset at the Cove still in her lap. She gasped. Peter had dropped Cinderella. He had actually dropped her. She was spinning end over end through the air, her face a silent scream.

     "No!" Madeline leapt from her chair, Sunset at the Cove falling to the floor. "Catch her!"

     Madeline waited, her heart pounding. And then, at the last possible moment, Cinderella landed safely in Peter's arms.

     Madeline smiled. She slowly sat back down, pretending that she hadn't been able to see the wires allowing Peter to "fly".  It was a truly terrible show, Madeline would be the first to admit that. But here, in the comfort of her own home, she could cheer and laugh and cry along with the characters, as if they were friends of hers from a different life.

     The show ended, and Madeline cleared her things. She placed the posy back on the windowsill and dropped the macaroni tin in the trash. It had been a delightfully dish-free dinner, so there was nothing that needed cleaning.

     Madeline packed an extra headshot into her bag and grabbed her keys. She was trying out a new monologue tonight. It was something a bit out of character for her, but she hoped it would be lucky.

     "Peter Piper picked a peck of—" she began, and stopped. She had forgotten, once again, to look up how many pickled peppers would fit in a peck. She'd look it up when she came back home tonight. Or at the warehouse, if they had wifi.

     Madeline stepped outside and locked the door. She turned in the direction of the service elevator by habit, but heard the ding of the regular elevator as it clipped past her floor. Phineas had installed this system where the elevator would ding if it was on the floor above or below. He thought it would help if people were rushing to get to the elevator. They would know whether or not it was near, so they could quickly grab it on its way up or down. Phineas had claimed that it would shave time off someone's day—they wouldn't have to wait the extra two minutes to call the elevator.

     Personally, Madeline thought it was a waste of her rent money. But since the system was in place, she could knew the regular elevator was a floor above, so she rushed to catch it.

     The doors opened on a shockingly tall woman with long, slender limbs. The man next to her was equally tall and so pale Madeline wondered if he'd ever seen the sun. She felt rather awkward tucking into the elevator next to them. The woman could have rested her chin on Madeline's head. Of course, Madeline was on the shorter side by normal measures (Len called her "fun-sized"), but this woman made Madeline feel like she had taken a sip of Alice's magic "drink me" potion.

     "Hello," she said politely. The elevator shuddered upwards. Madeline cringed. She had meant to go down. At least she had time before the audition. Her eyes flicked to the floor list. The light next to 15 was lit up.

     There was an odd tension in the air. The man started saying something about tamales, but Madeline tuned him out. She was running through her new monologue in her head, feeling the weight of the words on her tongue.

They reached the fifteenth floor. The man got out first, followed by the woman. She turned to face Madeline, her hand stopping the doors from closing.

     "I know I've seen you around," she said, her voice lower than Madeline would have expected, "but what's your name?"

     Madeline smiled. "Madeline. And yours?"

     "Elena."

     They shook hands, and Elena let the doors close, sending Madeline down to the lobby alone. Madeline didn't mind. She felt warm and happy. There was someone she knew in the building besides Phineas. And Brian. Though she didn't really know Brian.

     A new acquaintance, a new monologue, and a new romance for Cinderella. Maybe today would be Madeline's lucky day.