Waking Rose: A Fairy Tale Retold

  “I was going to ask the same thing,” Nannette said, looking pleased but bewildered at the attention.

  “It means,” Alex said, helping Nannette down, “that if Cor can ever be of assistance to either of you when you are in distress, we will help you. In whatever way we can.” As usual, he spoke without a hint of sarcasm, as though it was the most ordinary thing in the world to offer a girl. He and Leroy bowed, and Rose felt it was only proper to curtsey in return. Nannette did as well, with her usual grace.

  “If you would do us the honor of accompanying us to dinner,” Alex said, wrapping up the banner, “we will escort you over.”

  “Most certainly,” Nannette said, adding to Rose, “Well! You said this would be unusual!”

  “And I picked far too mild an adjective,” Rose said.

  At dinner, she and Nanette sat with Alex and Tim, the proctor of Lumen Christi, who was most enthusiastic about having been so soundly beaten.

  “I have to hand it to you guys—you’re half our size and we can still take you on without feeling like we’re squashing a gnat,” he marveled, eating a hamburger.

  “Why, thank you,” Alex said with mock politeness. “We like to be prepared. Smaller numbers, but better trained, I hope.”

  “That martial arts stuff you do is really something.” Tim shook his head. “I still can’t figure out how you took me down.”

  “Simple shorinje kempo,” Alex said lightly. “And this time I was unarmed. Maybe you should take up sword-fighting,” Alex said. “That would add another dimension to dorm fights.”

  Tim laughed. “Football and basketball are enough for me.”

  “Each to his own,” Alex mused. “I have to say that we’ve gotten on far better with Lumen Christi since you took over as proctor.”

  Tim chuckled. “It’s all a matter of channeling energy in the proper direction. Other proctors try to stop the inter-dorm fights. I thought your idea of making it a formal thing was a better strategy.”

  “So—now that I’m ‘Lady Rose,’” Rose said to Alex, “do I still get to learn sword fighting?”

  “Now it’s practically required,” Alex said. “You and Nanette and Kate could be the Lady’s Sword Cor. She’s our other Lady, of course. Though she’s dating A.J. now,” he said reflectively. “That tends to happen to our ladies, somehow…”

  Nannette winked at Rose, who was suddenly interested in her hot chocolate. Alex was so nonchalant she couldn’t figure out if he was being breathtakingly forward or simply making an observation.

  HIS

  It’s just another hearing, he told himself as he stared at his planner. There’s no need for me to get overwrought about it.

  But now he either had to buy a plane ticket or plan for a long drive home. The plane trip would be quicker, but he knew that Rose had been hoping to go home sometime during the semester. After some debate, he supposed that he should check with her just in case she was able to make it home that weekend.

  Finally he picked up his phone. “Rose, I just wanted to let you know I’m going home Thursday night for the weekend and wanted to know if you wanted to catch a ride home with me?”

  “Sure!” she said suddenly buoyant. “It would be great to see Blanche and Bear again. And I can miss my Friday class, I think. When are you leaving?”

  “This Thursday after class and work.”

  “Oh—” she suddenly sounded despondent. “I—”

  “You have play practice, don’t you?”

  “Yes, and it doesn’t get out until ten. But I don’t have practice the rest of the weekend, fortunately.”

  “That’s fine. I might not get on campus until then. My night class ends at eight and I work till nine. I probably won’t be there until at least ten, if not ten thirty.”

  “That would work well then,” Rose said. “Thanks so much for asking me to come.”

  It would be good to see Rose again, he admitted to himself. On some level, he knew he was lonely at the university, a stranger among people he barely knew. On the days when he wasn’t teaching, he sometimes went an entire day without speaking to a soul except Dr. Anschlung. Also, he knew he was not looking forward to the hearing.

  Then his Thursday night class was cancelled. So he had time to go back to his apartment, get packed, and then go to work at Dr. Anschlung’s office sooner than usual. And she didn’t have much for him to do.

  “And all of the notes can wait until Monday. Why don’t you take the night off?” she urged him. “Go out someplace. You work too much, Ben.”

  “Actually I’m driving home to New York tonight,” he told her.

  “Excellent! Then you can get a head start. Have a safe trip!”

  Hence, he got to the campus an hour before he had expected to be there. After asking directions, he found the theatre building on the edge of the campus, where Rose had said the cast of King Lear was practicing.

  The entrance to the building led into the theatre itself, and he found himself in a tiny auditorium with seats slanting down towards a proscenium stage. Rehearsal was still in full throttle. He recognized the scene—it was one of the more grisly parts of the play, where the loyal Lord Gloucester was tied to a chair and tortured by the evil daughters Goneril and Regan. The scene ended with them putting his eyes out as a punishment for his loyalty to the king.

  Fish watched the play for a few moments. He recognized the tall blond girl as Goneril, and found her acting rather stiff. Regan was doing well.

  “Oh he that will think to live till he be old, give me some help!” cried the blinded Gloucester, writhing against the ropes that held him in his chair.

  “One side will mock the other—the other out too,” Regan’s voice dripped blood as she spoke to the actor playing her husband.

  “Out, vile jelly!” screamed the actor playing her husband, making a feint towards the actor playing Gloucester, which was supposed to be the gouging out of his second eye.

  Here the director stopped the scene and said in a stern voice, “That was good. Goneril, I told you to cut that out. Are you into this or not?”

  Fish hadn’t noticed she was doing anything. She said defensively, “I am.”

  “Good. Then act like it. Gloucester, that was good but...” and he began to give other notes. The cast on stage dropped their poses and started to listen intently to the director’s instructions, very much like soldiers going “at ease.”

  Fish noticed Rose sitting in one of the seats with a big script on her lap. She looked tired.

  “Hi there,” he said in a quiet voice, going over to her.

  She brightened. “You’re here early!”

  “My class got out early. So how much longer, do you think?”

  She wilted a bit. “At least forty-five minutes. Goneril—Donna—is giving the director a hard time. He’s been letting her get away with murder up till now, but tonight he’s not standing for it, which I’m glad. She asked me to run lines with her after practice, but I don’t have to if you want to go.”

  “No, that’s okay. There’s no rush. Are you studying your lines?”

  “Oh, the script? No, I’m the prompter. It’s a student work job—I get paid for it. It’s good because Cordelia actually isn’t in the play very much. I watch the script during rehearsals and run lines with people after rehearsal if they need it.”

  “Rose, first line!” the director said loudly, and Rose immediately said, “Ungrateful fox! Tis he!”

  Regan said, “Ungrateful fox! Tis he!” and the actors were all in their roles once more.

  Fish thought he would go. He didn’t have the patience to watch that rather odious scene thirteen more times in a row. “I’m going to take a walk. I’ll be back in a while.”

  Rose nodded, already completely enrapt in the scenario unfolding before her.

  It was a warm night for late October. He walked down the hill towards the center of campus, looking at the few stars that had made their way through the smog from local factories, which gave off emissions at
night. Pennsylvania still had its share of steel mills that kept the countryside from being completely country. Standing in the student commons, he sighed and glanced over at the chapel as someone came out the front door. The old wooden building was still open. He considered, and walked through the door.

  Inside there were only votive candles burning on the side altars, and one spotlight on the oversized crucifix in the sanctuary. A few pews were occupied—lone sitters or couples, mostly. A small nun in a blue habit prayed in front of the tabernacle. A boy and a girl were kneeling before the statue of the Virgin Mary, praying a rosary together. He could hear the faint echo of the boy’s deeper voice and the girl’s answering tremor saying the responses.

  He slid into a pew at the back and knelt down.

  There wasn’t a chapel this close to campus at the University of Pitt, and although he had started the semester with a strong intention to attend daily Mass, it was easy for him to get too busy to go. As a result, he had been going only sporadically. That wasn’t good, he told himself. Thanks to Father Raymond’s tutelage, he was conscious of the need to cultivate a prayer life, even if it consisted of merely outward acts like praying the rosary and going to Mass. He had acquired something of a devotion to the Blessed Mother when his mom had been dying, and occasionally found time to pray the rosary when he was alone in the car.

  Still, it wasn’t enough. Maybe for others, it would be, but for him, there were too many issues in his life that he had shelved and stuffed down, whole episodes of pain and sin and wounding he had just thrust out of his mind. Someday, he told himself, he would deal with them. But not now. Maybe at a stable time in his life, he would find a good priest, and start digging into the mess, but he didn’t want to touch it anytime soon.

  His awareness of it only surfaced during times like these—when he was sitting in front of the Blessed Sacrament, without structured prayer. Or when he was around someone who knew him well enough to figure out that something was bothering him—like Bear. Rose didn’t know him well enough—not yet.

  How long am I going to put you off, Lord? He doubted he was sinning by delaying this foundational self-examination, but all the same, he felt God preferred that he do it sooner, rather than later, because God expected more of him.

  Just like Rose, he thought ironically. Expecting more from me than I can give. Or at any rate, she had expected more in the past. He had a sense she had moved on.

  Hers

  “Are you leaving, Rose?”

  Donna’s voice cut into Rose’s thoughts as she packed up her books in her knapsack, and she jumped.

  “I thought it was your job to run lines with those of us who needed it,” the blond girl said again, and her voice was slightly accusing, but she smiled, as though she were making a joke.

  “Of course—I haven’t forgotten,” Rose said, looking around. “Who wants to run lines?” Dr. Morris was talking with several of the students in the corner of the theatre and the stage manager was putting away the props and scenery that had been used in rehearsal, but most of the student actors were packing up and leaving to go home for the night. Only Donna and Tara stood in front of her.

  “We do,” Tara said. “Why don’t we start with our scene, Rose? I’m not quite off book for that one yet.”

  “All right,” Rose said, pulling out her script. She knew the scene by heart, but she was willing to go over it again. “I’ll do everyone else’s lines as well, all right?”

  “Right. Let’s go backstage so it’s not so loud,” Donna said, casting a disdainful glance at the remaining talkers.

  Rose picked up her book bag and followed the two girls to the back of the theatre. There was a lot of scenery stacked up, and lumber, and tools scattered about, not leaving much room for working in.

  “Do you want to work on blocking too?” Rose said doubtfully, looking at the cramped quarters. “There’s not much room to work back here.”

  “Maybe later,” Donna said, with an odd smile at Tara. “Right now, let’s just focus on lines. Run the whole scene.”

  Rose found the place in her script and began. The other two girls worked without scripts, and they seemed to know their lines well. First, following Donna’s assertion that “This was how we always did it in our local theatre,” they ran through the lines rapidly, without intonation, just to get the words perfectly. Then they began the scene again at the proper pace.

  It was a good practice, and Rose, engrossed in her character, didn’t notice until they stopped that the theatre was unusually quiet. Remembering that Fish would be waiting, she said, “Can we stop now?”

  “We need to do the Gloucester scene,” Donna said. “Dr. Morris said I have to be off book by next rehearsal.”

  “Oh,” Rose said, a bit surprised. She hadn’t heard Dr. Morris say that, but then again, the director had talked to Donna privately at several points during the evening. She turned to the correct pages. “I’ll read all the other parts,” she said. “Shall I start?”

  Tara cocked her head, listening. “I think the stage is cleared,” she said. “Let’s go back out.”

  “But we need the chair,” Donna reminded them as they worked their way out of the back quarters. “Oh, there it is.”

  Rose looked, and saw that Gloucester’s chair had been dragged backstage by the stage manager. “Well, let’s just do it over there,” she said. It was a bit less cramped than the space they had been using.

  She crossed over to the chair and set down her book on the wide arm of the throne. “All right. I’ll be Cornwall.”

  She began the scene: “Post speedily to my lord your husband; show him this letter: the army of France is landed. Seek out the villain Gloucester.”

  Tara spat, “Hang him instantly,” and Donna added with a sinister smile, “Pluck out his eyes.”

  Rose continued as Cornwall and the other characters until Gloucester’s entrance. Then she stepped into the part of the captured lord. “What mean your graces? Good my friends, consider. You are my guests: do me no foul play, friends.” And added Cornwall’s harsh command, “Bind him, I say.”

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Tara holding the rope that had been used in the rehearsal. Apparently she had taken the part of the servants.

  Donna breathed, “Hard, hard. O filthy traitor!” and pushed Rose onto the chair, as the blocking commanded.

  “Unmerciful lady as you are, I'm none,” Rose as Gloucester said, a bit indignantly, adjusting the book on her lap. She found Cornwall’s line. “To this chair, bind him. Villain, thou shalt find–”

  She cut herself off in a surprise that was unacted as Donna and Tara pulled the heavy ropes around her. A fragment of a memory chilled her, and she struggled as they tied the knots. But Gloucester was supposed to struggle, she remembered, and went on as they continued their work. “By the kind gods, 'tis most ignobly done!...”

  The script slid off her lap, and, her hands being pinned to the arms of the chair, she couldn’t retrieve it. It flopped onto the floor, and there was silence except for the movements of the two girls working on the ropes.

  She couldn’t remember what line came next. She needed the text. Now she pulled against the ropes insistently but they didn’t budge. No one picked up the fallen script. She became aware that Donna had not said her next line, and that she and Tara had finished, and were standing next to her, strange smiles on their faces.

  7

  ...It was the last fairy, who came uninvited, full of wrath and seeking to punish the king for his impudence…

  HIS

  Something about the atmosphere of the church slipped him into timelessness and, caught up in the stillness and his own thoughts, he didn’t notice how long he actually stayed there. When he finally came to himself and looked at his watch, he saw it was over an hour since he had left the theatre.

  Rubbing his eyes, he quickly got up, crossed himself before the tabernacle, and hurried out.

  A small figure was moving along the back of the church and met him
in the vestibule. The little nun in the blue habit. He saw that she must be about sixty, but she moved as lightly as a ballet dancer. Her blue eyes shining, she gave him a sweet smile.

  “You know Rose Brier,” she said to him.

  He paused, surprised. How could she have known that?

  “Yes, actually, I do. How did you know that, Sister?” he asked respectfully. Father Raymond had told him one always addresses a nun by her title, even if you don’t know her name.

  “I saw you at her sister’s wedding,” the nun nodded at him. “You greatly resemble the man her sister married.”

  “Oh!” (He did?) “—Yes, I’m his brother.”

  She bobbed her head again. “It was a lovely wedding. I saw you dancing with Rose. You care about her, don’t you?”

  “Well, yes,” he was puzzled, and a bit wary. Of course he cared for Rose. But what did this mean? Was this nun Rose’s confidant?

  Disconcertingly, the nun took his arm and spoke fervently. “You must guard her. She has every need of your care. There is a shadow of evil over her family. A serpent lies in the grass. You must not let it harm her.”

  Now completely thrown, Fish was about to reply when the nun released him and smiled her innocent smile again, and nodded. “We are praying for you both,” and walked away.

  Part of him wanted to go after the nun and demand an explanation. But he was late to pick up Rose. And the nun reminded him of some of the odd ducks one met on the streets in New York City, self-proclaimed prophets with deep sayings for every passerby, little grounded in reality. All the same, the nun’s words gave him a peculiar feeling as he strode back up the hill towards the theatre. The night had turned dark, except for the glare of the spotlights on the walkway. He traveled from one pool of bright light through another patch of inky darkness, into light, into dark, and as he walked, a strange anxiety took hold of him.

  If he hadn’t already been late, he would have ignored the uncanny sense, but since he was, he started to run. As he ran, the feeling of urgency grew stronger. By the time he reached the theatre doors, he was racing so fast he had to slow himself to go inside. There was a light on in the vestibule, but the theatre building was dark, and silent. Panting, he looked in through the glass windows in the doors leading to the theatre itself and saw nothing but inky blackness. There was no sound but his breathing.