“Well, the costume looks dreadful. They’d have been better off putting you in a burlap sack.”
“I’d outperform you in even that.”
Harper arched a brow. “Are your parents in the audience?”
I swallowed, hopefully the only indication that she’d touched a nerve. I’d invited them, as I always did. But no, my parents were not in the audience.
I couldn’t remember the last play they’d come to, but I liked to think I wasn’t still a child only in acting due to some deep desire for attention.
Wrong, of course. I loved theater. Film was my passion. And acting made me feel alive.
But the things I would do for attention? Well, we’ll get to that.
“Couldn’t get the time off work. But youarework for your mother, right? So I assume she’s here.”
Harper’s jaw hitched, just the slightest clench, and I felt a thrill to be its cause. “Break a leg, darling.”
Harper went back to makeup, insisting on powder touch-ups.
“Let’s not give my model mother more reasons to be disappointed in me, shall we?” I heard her say.
It baffled me for a moment—because Harper was undeniably beautiful. As I’ve said, we all were. But Harper more than most, her onyx hair hanging in a sleek curtain down to her waist, her nose pin straight, her lips curt and evocative, like even if she wasn’t pouting you might wonder what they’d feel like between your teeth.
But what confused me more was this—the way Harper overshared, not just with me but with everyone, tossing hints and indications of trauma out like they had sharpened edges capable of wounding someone else rather than her. I wondered if they were lies, her own desperate hunt for attention. But I don’t think they were. I think Harper was all too aware of her issues. And I think she wanted the world to know about them too.
To the point that she’d given me the key to hurting her:more reasons for her mother to be disappointed in her.A lousy performance seemed a good place to start.
I hesitated, just a moment. I was supposed to be ignoring this. To be rising above it at this last moment.
But the heat of our confrontation blazed without an outlet. Harper herself was an itch, something that dug beneath my skin.
I needed to pry her out.
———
Harper’s depiction of Leonardo’s Wife was a vicious, desperate thing. Powerful and vindictive, even while the character was supposedly innocent and prudent. Her lines were full of praise for her husband and cousin who were so clearly in love, as though oblivious to the whole affair. But Harper delivered them with edges, with subtext not written, with a desperate cling to an illusion. It was a daring take on the character. The sort that would either have her immediately overlooked for the Wilfred Allen Award or holding it within her grasp.
I wanted to bet on the former. I wanted to take away the nuance.
I wanted to push her into caricature, into pure rage. I wanted to make it real.
So I found Lewis, lingering behind the curtain as the Techies did their final checks.
“I missed you last night,” I said.
“You were the one who bailed on me,” he retorted with an almost teasing manner. They’d put him in a white shirt leftunbuttoned at the collar, and I noticed his chest was newly waxed. I wondered if it was for the show or for him or if, maybe, this was Harper’s preference. I wanted to reach out and feel it for myself, but I stilled myself and met his eyes with all that want lingering in my gaze.
“You think I’d take a risk like that the night before the show?”
“I think you love risks, Nadine.”
“Well, what’s one more?”
I’d mastered this smile by that point, the one that challenged, that dared, that made you want to prove something. On boys like Lewis, it rarely failed. His lips closed on me almost ravenously.
I had to keep it going for an irritatingly long period of time—moaning every time I thought he was trying to pull away or else letting my tongue dart against his. This was ridiculous.
We stumbled back, hitting the curtain, and my hand reached out and yanked hard.
