“I guess I do,” Calla grumbled.
“You got fired too?” Nicky asked Bonnie.
“I sure did.”
“This is no way to run an arts organization,” Nicky huffed.
“You’re telling me,” Bonnie agreed.
“Can you two wait to rip me to shreds until the show’s over?” Calla ordered. “Everybody turn around.”
“You’re going to play Olivia?” Tony asked.
“Who else we got?” Calla reached back to unzip her dress.
The men’s necks snapped in unison in Calla’s direction, anticipating the fall of the cotton piqué.
“Don’t look,” she barked.
They looked away.
As Calla stepped out of her dress and handed it to Bonnie, Nicky peeked. Calla’s tawny skin shimmered in the low golden cross-beams of the backstage special lights, revealing her lovely shape. For a simple girl who wasn’t prone to fussing, primping, and evidently wearing a girdle, he observed that, out of her clothes, Calla was anything but ordinary. Her neck was long, and her arms were graceful. Her breasts were exquisite, but he didn’t want to miss the rest of her in the short amount of time he had, so he took in her small waist, the curve of her hips, the derrière a little more ample than it appeared in clothes, and, most exciting of all, the pale pink garter snapped onto silver mist stockings, which banded around her thighs like ribbons on a package. The stocking color was familiar—his cousin-in-law Lena hand-washed and line-dried hers in his bathroom every Saturday night in preparation for Sunday mass.
Bonnie formed a circle on the floor with Cathy’s velvet gown, as Calla stepped into it. It was as if the Birth of Venus had sprung to life before them as Bonnie slowly lifted the bodice of a pink velvet gown off the ground like a clamshell and higher around those full breasts before slipping Calla’s arms into the mutton sleeves. The gown was too big for Calla, but it didn’t matter how the costume hid her assets now that Nicky had seen what was underneath.
Calla caught Nicky looking at her, and glared at him. “Really?” she admonished him.
Nicky looked off quickly, directly into the lights, which temporarily blinded him.
Bonnie zipped Calla into the gown as she moved toward the stage, following Enzo the priest. Nicky moved to join them.
“You peeked!”
“It was an accident,” Nicky said apologetically.
“Like driving a cab into a brick wall in broad daylight,” Calla shot back.
“Yeah, something like that.” Nicky was glad he’d seen her almost naked body if she was going to be such a hatpin about it.
“Maybe you’ll rethink my job?” Bonnie whispered to Calla as she flounced the skirt of the gown.
“Not now, Bonnie,” Calla snapped.
Calla pushed Nicky onto the stage and shoved him into position before slipping behind a flat and joining Enzo.
Nicky knew the blocking because he had not missed a rehearsal. He knew the lines because he knew everyone’s lines—the truth was, he could play Olivia or Viola if he had to.
Still, even with all that knowledge, he didn’t have the experience to understudy the role. He could hardly count his performance as a shepherd in a nativity play at Saint Rita’s when he was a boy or his stint as an animal-sound maker in a radio play at WPEN when he was a teenager as theatrical experience. Nicky was about to be in the glare of the spotlight, his skills, however meager, on the line. He had to act the part of Sebastian, but his body was in revolt. He was a tunic full of nerves. His knees began to shake so violently that when he looked down, he could not see his feet, just waves of wool where his joints shook under the costume. His throat closed, his mouth went dry, and his left eyelid began to twitch like a Morse Code key. Calla had shoved him onstage into the dark, and for the first time since he was a boy, he felt unmoored, abandoned, and frightened, his definition of what it meant to be an orphan.
Sebastian had the first speech of the scene in Olivia’s garden, so there was no way to ease into this job. Nicky had to grab the role by the neck and throttle it, squeezing any meaning he could out of what he did not yet understand.
With nothing to lose, he reached deep into his own well of memory and thought of how he felt one night in France, in the town of Tours during the war, when he and two of his fellow infantrymen, separated from their platoon, couldn’t find their way out of the woods. He remembered looking up into the black night sky and finding a slice of white light in a shard of a quarter moon. Taking it as a sign, he followed it, trusting it was the path to safety.
In this moment, Nicky stood in different darkness, this time on the stage, but just as he had claimed the ground beneath him as his own in the forest that night, he planted himself on the stage floor with all the confidence he could muster. There was something in the physical act of raising his eyes upward to the heavens as he had that night that motivated him. He allowed his body to hold him up, to lead his spirit. His spine fell straight and caused his shoulders to square, opening his chest, which expanded his lungs, which provided the oxygen to give him the breath to fuel his racing heart.
The stage lights pulled on slowly.
Peachy, thumbing through the program in her seat, looked up. She spotted Nicky onstage, but at first she didn’t trust her eyes, having left her glasses in her desk at the office. But she would have known the shape of her fiancé’s head and the line of his lean physique anywhere. She squinted, bewildered; she confirmed it! It was Nicky! She couldn’t imagine her future husband getting up and talking in front of a small group, let alone a large audience. He hadn’t exhibited the nerve. What was he doing up there?
Nicky stood in position, heard the rapture of chimes, followed by the fluttering of newspaper, which the crew used offstage to imitate the flapping of bird wings in the garden.
Nicky looked out into the theater. Light from the stage spilled out into the house and onto the audience. From Nicky’s perspective onstage, the dark pit of seats ruffled by the gray ripple of heads in shadow resembled a turbulent night sky. A few patrons wore eyeglasses. Their lenses caught the stage lights like small mirrors, giving the illusion of the occasional sparkle of a star peeking through the dark.
“This is the air, that is the glorious sun,” Nicky began, as he turned and looked up to the grid of lighting instruments attached to the balcony in a cluster of black metal boxes, bulbs, and wires.
The theatrical sun pulled on in a special spotlight, covered in a gel the color of the pulp of a pink grapefruit. The circle of light was resplendent as it illuminated Nicky before falling into a filmy shadow.
A woman in the audience sighed at the beauty of the tableau, a sound that motivated Nicky to press on, so he directed the line that followed in her direction. “This pearl she gave me, I do feel ’t and see ’t; And though ’tis wonder that enwraps me thus, Yet ’tis not madness. Where’s Antonio, then?”
“Right here, buddy,” he heard Hambone whisper from backstage.
Nicky resumed the speech with confidence.
I could not find him at the Elephant;
Yet there he was; and there I found this credit,
That he did range the town to seek me out.
Nicky flailed his arms, caught himself, and pulled in his performance before it went straight to Hamville. He lowered his voice to a whiskey timber and continued.
His counsel now might do me golden service;
For though my soul disputes well with my sense
That this may be some error, but no madness,
Yet doth this accident and flood of fortune
So far exceed all instance, all discourse,
That I am ready to distrust mine eyes
And wrangle with my reason, that persuades me
To any other trust but that I am mad.
Nicky slowed the cadence of his delivery and stepped forward, engaging the audience.
Or else the lady’s mad; yet if ’twere so,
She could not sway her house, command her followers,
> Take and give back affairs and their dispatch
With such a smooth, discreet and stable bearing
As I perceive she does; there’s something in ’t
That is deceivable. But here comes the lady.
Nicky turned upstage. Calla playing Olivia emerged from behind the flat, followed by Enzo, playing the priest. In the haze of pink light, her skin glistened, her cheeks dewy. The gown of soft coral velvet took on a silvery patina, as though she’d emerged from the sea.
As she moved toward Nicky, opening her hands, imploring him, a thick lock of her hair fell forward into her eyes, as naturally as it might in life. When she reached Nicky, he instinctively brushed the hair away.
The intimate gesture caught her off guard. She blushed, or maybe she burned with rage. Nicky couldn’t tell. It didn’t matter. He was in the moment.
The audience was still, except for Peachy, whose coat rustled underneath her as she shifted and craned to see what was happening between her fiancé and the strange princess with the uncombed hair in the big dress. Two deep furrows like matchsticks formed between Peachy’s eyebrows as she observed the sparks between Nicky, wearing a bulky mustard-colored tunic and shrunken pants, and the woman with the kooky haircut. Where in Shakespeare’s England did anyone have that kind of hair? In an instant, what Peachy had assumed to be a surprise from her fiancé turned into something else entirely. Was this a setup to tell her something he couldn’t say in person? Was Nicky breaking up with her and this was his artful way of giving her the brush-off? Peachy began to perspire. She fanned herself with the program.
Enzo stepped back as Calla took a step forward. Calla remembered her blocking well, but now that she was center stage, she realized she should be farther downstage for the speech. Her thoughts were tumbling over one another. Why was Nicky looking at her so intently? Why was Enzo slightly nodding, as if to prod her? She began to speak.
Blame not this haste of mine. If you mean well,
Now go with me and with this holy man
Into the chantry by: there, before him,
And underneath that consecrated roof,
Plight me the full assurance of your faith;
That my most jealous and too doubtful soul
Peachy coughed at the mention of jealousy and doubt. The patron sitting in front of her turned around and glared at her as Calla pressed on, repeating the line:
That my most jealous and too doubtful soul
May live at peace. He shall conceal it
Whilst you are willing it shall come to note,
What time we will our celebration keep
According to my birth. What do you say?
Nicky looked at her. He turned away and took a few steps as if to distance himself from the decision, but then returned to Calla’s side. “I’ll follow this good man, and go with you . . .” he announced.
There was a collective sigh in the audience looking forward to a happy ending.
Nicky, squeezing the moment dry like a sponge in the rinse bucket at the garage when he washed the cars, looked down at his hands, almost as a reflex, and in so doing, realized they were empty, therefore Sebastian knew he had nothing to offer Olivia, so using all his breath, and all the emotional power he could summon, he delivered the line that offered the greatest gift a man could give a woman, the promise of a faithful heart.
“. . . And, having sworn truth, ever will be true.”
The diehard Shakespeare fan sitting in front of Peachy applauded with one clap as the rest of the audience cooed.
Enzo had thought the scene was dying, but now he knew from the reaction that it was very much alive. Calla’s eyes filled with tears, but Nicky wasn’t sure if they were from relief that the play had been saved, or the emotions of the scene that had been conjured with authenticity. Whatever the truth, Calla couldn’t look at Nicky, nor at Enzo. Out of the corner of his eye, Nicky could see Josie in the wings trying to feed Calla her next line. But their director was lost.
Enzo twirled in front of them in his cassock with his back to the audience, prompted her, whispering her line, “Then lead the way . . .”
A look of recognition crossed Calla’s face. She took Nicky’s hand and said to Enzo, “Then lead the way, good father, and Heavens so shine, That they may fairly note this act of mine.”
Calla and Nicky exited hand in hand stage left. When they reached the dark pool of the wings, Calla released his hand and went to the prop table.
“Good work, Nick,” Tony said before he rushed onstage for placement in the blackout between scenes.
Nicky was tingling from head to toe, and it wasn’t from the pilling of cheap wool of the tunic. He was enraptured, electrified from within. Nicky had a sense of being in his body, but he wasn’t; for the first time in his life, he felt his spirit take precedence over his physical state. He brought himself back into the present by gripping the lectern, afraid that if he didn’t hold on to something, he would float away. The play continued onstage but Nicky was numb to it.
Norma pushed past him to enter the scene, followed by Josie, who mumbled something, but he did not hear them. His senses were shot. It was as if he were underwater, and they spoke to him from the surface. All Nicky heard was the movement of his own blood in his body; every nerve ending pulsed.
Calla said something to him and he nodded, agreed to it, whatever it was. She rushed behind the scrim, on her way to her Act 5 entrance.
In the wings, the fanfare of the finale and curtain call chaos erupted as props were grabbed, wigs yanked, girdles snapped, cigarettes were extinguished, and actors rushed past and into place. Onstage, the errant set piece was rolled into proper position before the final scene—and while Nicky observed the action, he was somewhere else entirely, in another place and time, in the chancery of a good priest by the side of his true love, as Sebastian in Twelfth Night, in a state he would know as bliss.
* * *
Nicky splashed water on his face at the sink in the men’s dressing room.
“That was some scene,” Hambone commented as he hung his costume on the rolling rack.
“Thanks.” Nicky fixed his tie, smoothed his hair, and checked his teeth.
“You weren’t scared to death?”
“At first, terrified.”
“Acting is like kissing a girl for the first time. The idea of attempting it panics you, but once you do it, you never want to stop.”
“Very astute of you.” Nicky pulled on his jacket. It would take him a long time to try to explain to Peachy what he was feeling. He felt deeply content. At long last he owned the quiet confidence that comes from mastering a challenge after taking a risk.
Peachy was waiting for him outside the dressing room in the hallway. She leaned against the wall like a wilted daisy until she saw Nicky and revived. “Wow!” Peachy threw her arms around him and kissed him. “Wow. Wow.”
“I was a last-minute replacement.”
“It took me until the end of the play to get it. There was another guy in your part in the beginning, and then you were there and the pants were definitely not made for you. On you they were medieval clam diggers.” Peachy was talking fast, which either meant she was nervous, uncomfortable, or horrified.
“There wasn’t any time to find a costume that fit.”
“The slacks were fine. No one noticed. I think it’s sweet that you came up with a way to surprise me after seven years together. Some girls get a bouquet of flowers, or a box of candy, but who wants that stuff from her fiancé; one dies and the other gets eaten which means neither of them lasts. But me? I got something to hang on to. I got a memory. I got a wedding scene in an actual play by William Shakespeare performed by my future husband. Who gets that?”
Before Nicky could explain his role, Calla emerged from the women’s dressing room, pulling on short white gloves to go with her dress.
“You’re the actress.” Peachy turned to Nicky and pointed at him, then at Calla, and back at Nicky again. “From your scene.”
r /> Nicky stepped forward. “Calla, I’d like you to meet my fiancée, Peachy DePino.”
“We had a little crisis, and Nicky and I had to fill in. But I’m actually the director of the play.” Calla smiled at Peachy warmly.
Peachy and Nicky felt awkward with Calla for different reasons.
“Calla takes care of her dad,” Nicky blurted. “Sam Borelli. This is his theater. Or was. When he ran it.”
“That’s nice.” Peachy’s mind was elsewhere. She began to hatch scenarios of Calla—such a strange name—with Nicky onstage, beyond the footlights. She couldn’t tell in the big dress, but now she could see that Calla had a nice shape. Her nose wasn’t too long, and she had soft brown eyes. No myopia. If Peachy saw her in Wanamaker’s going through the racks, she’d think Calla Borelli was a beauty. Peachy felt her gut churn with envy.
“Calla!” Frank Arrigo walked down the hallway towards them, almost filling it with the span of his broad shoulders and height. Frank was a robust Italian, in the pugilistic bent. He had the look of the hardworking men of the heel of the boot of Italy. His small nose had been broken a couple of times, but he had a winning smile and a gregarious manner, and there was, of course, the attractive element of his height. In any nationality, that was a plus.
“You were a knockout,” Frank said, kissing Calla on the cheek. “I guess you have to be able to act if you direct.”
“Only in an emergency. And tonight was an emergency. Right, Nicky?”
“Strictly a five-alarm theatrical situation,” Nicky agreed. “The show must go on.”
“Whether the pants fit or not,” Peachy joked.
No one laughed, so Peachy covered with a low whistle.
“I thought you were going for Elizabethan knickers,” Frank offered.
“No, they were supposed to hit my ankle.”
“Well, they didn’t and it doesn’t matter now because you did such a swell job no one was looking below the tunic.” Peachy clapped her hands together. Relieved that Nicky and she were almost free of this stilted small talk, in this strange situation she had been forced into, unannounced and without explanation, she unsnapped her purse, reached in for a handkerchief, and delicately dabbed the perspiration off her face. “And what do you do, Frank?”