Sound Carries

16.

The party was a changed beast. In our absence, it had become louder, impossibly, rowdier, spilling out of the basement and migrating up into the entrance hall in anticipation of the casting. Oliver held my hand like he was afraid of letting go, his hair falling into his eyes, peering towards the front of the room. His eyes locked on the notice board: when he saw it was empty, he sighed in relief.

I was surprised that Audra wasn't there. Considering her anticipation and stress in the weeks leading up to the production, I'd thought that she would be among the first to wait, but there was no sign of her.

I tugged Oliver down closer to my level, speaking directly into his ear in order to be heard over the echoing crowd. The vaulted ceilings of the entrance hall did no favours to the atmosphere. "Do you see anyone?"

Oliver stretched onto the balls of his feet, peering with a hand over his eyes. For a moment, his eyes brightened in recognition, but then he frowned. "There's Colin."

I craned my neck, and saw him two steps up on the staircase across the room, but knew right away why Oliver had frowned. Colin looked unimaginably wound up, waiting, his jaw tensed, scanning the room, looking slightly ill.

"He looks like he's having a good night." I tried to keep my voice light, but I had a sliding downward sensation in the pit of my stomach.

Oliver waved to Colin, and when he saw us, his features relaxed into sharp relief. He bounded down the stairs towards us two at a time.

"I was starting to think that it was Armageddon." He spoke a little breathlessly as he was reaching us. Then his eyes flickered down to where our hands were clasped together. "Oh god damn it. I owe Cecily ten dollars." Colin looked slightly irked. "You couldn't have waited an hour?"

Oliver and I glanced at each other, slightly bemused. I had been expecting mixed reactions from the rest of the group – likely most of them had been waiting for it – though I had not known that it would be to this extreme.

"You had a bet?" I asked him. Oliver squeezed my fingers.

Colin peered over the crowd like he was waiting for bad news. "Of course we did." He said, a little absently. "Got to capitalize off of other people's happiness somehow."

Seeming to find no one else, he glanced back at the two of us. "Congratulations, or whatever is the least weird thing to say in this situation. Don't be idiots."

"Thanks, mom." Oliver rolled his eyes, but then smiled good naturedly. "Where's everyone else?"

"That's the thing." Colin slapped him on the shoulder, grasped his arm. "I'm not sure."

"You've been on your own this whole time, then?" I asked him.

Colin didn't look at me. He hadn't been looking before, but this felt changed suddenly, a very deliberate act of not looking, and didn't answer. He glanced at his watch and bounced on the balls of his feet, then craned his neck. "It's nearly midnight."

"How close?"

"Three minutes 'til."

I frowned. "That does seem odd."

I felt sleepy, disoriented in the large hall, the many voices blurring together to form a wall of blurry sound. It would die down, I knew, when the teachers entered the room, but at the moment it was loud enough that all I wanted to do was rest my head on Oliver's shoulder and close my eyes.

"You'd think they'd want to be the first to know, wouldn't they?" Oliver sounded confused.

It occurred to me that right then I didn't much care what role I got. I didn't even know what the next opera was going to be. "Did they announce what we'll be doing next term?"