My Backstage Boyfriend | teen fiction

act 1, scene 13 - facing christian

It was Thursday when Jessie finally came back to school. We had Skyped the night before and she had started to cry. She was terrified of coming back to school. They had suspended her for two days for underage drinking, but it wasn't going on her permanent record.

Mckenzie wouldn't be back for three weeks, and then she had a week of in-school-suspension on top of that.

I assured Jessie, Mckenzie's bite was much less worse than her bark. It stung for a while, but would eventually fade. I was tough to her vindictive ways. She was a cold hearted bitch and not worth a second thought. I told Jessie all of this, but she still seemed anxious.

When Emmy and I saw her in the hall that morning, we rushed to give her a hug. She grinned genuinely and things seemed to be steady. Okay. Normal.

The day went off without a hitch. Jessie said goodbye at the end as she scurried off to her shift at the pretzel shop. Emmy, who would normally go to rehearsal, had to rush home to emergency babysit after her mom got caught up at work and Celia had cheerleading.

It was just me called that day. Thanksgiving break was the following week and soon we wouldn't have these actor-focused rehearsals. Everyone would be called and be getting rough tech in up through the show. Costumes, additional choreography, transitions... I shuddered as I thought of the dreaded tech week.

But hey, we weren't there yet.

I shoved open the doors to the auditorium a called out a little, "Hello?" to no avail. I walked in a little further and tried again. "Hellooo?"

"Penelope, hey, is that you?"

I knit my brows, "Christian? Where are you?"

"I'm up in the costume shop, talking to you through a vent. Listine and Phelps aren't in today, both had some kind of emergency. Where's Emmy?"

"She had an emergency too." There was a beat of silence.

"Welp, that's unfortunate. Why don't you come on up?"

I followed his voice and made my way up onto the stage, schlepping my backpack off to the side. Up the metal stairs backstage, I found my way up into the spacious attic we used to store decades of costumes. It smelled like dust and sweat, but it was one of the coolest places in the whole school.

Meandering back through the racks, I found Christian in a ridiculous ensemble. On his head he sported a pink bonnet, then a leopard print vest, with lime green capris and silver cowboy boots. I bust out laughing the second I saw him.

"Don't you think I look pretty?" He said in a high-pitched, sing-song voice.

"Yeah, pretty awful," I giggled. "What shows were these even for?"

"Honestly," He looked himself over. "I have no clue." He rested a sombrero on top of my head. "But now you can be pretty too!"

I hadn't seen this side of him before and it was honestly a little thrilling. He always seemed like that stoic, tortured artist type to me. Now he just seemed like a regular teenage boy.

Soon, he was helping me into an outfit of my own overtop my clothes. I wound up in a fuchsia 80s prom dress and oversized red pumps in addition to the sombrero. We topped off the looks with a feather boa each, cracking up as we picked the craziest items for each other to try.

I sat on the ground, triumphant after coaxing him into trying one a white, Marilyn Monroe style dress. He actually had to take off his jeans and tee to put it on, so he had ducked behind one of the other loaded racks.

"Do you think we should try to rehearse something?" I finally spat out. I didn't really want to, but at the same time the responsible voice in my brain was nagging me.