Page 190 of The Silent Appeal

I said it would. Where are you staying?

3:20 p.m. Trina wrote:

Near the airport. Feel dead.

3:24 p.m. Nicky-Rose wrote:

I’m getting a friend to meet you with the documents sometime in the week.

3:24 p.m. Trina wrote:

What shall I do before then?

3:25 p.m. Nicky-Rose wrote:

Stay in your room. Go sightseeing. Whatever. I’ll let you know when we’re ready.

Undated page from a decorative journal belonging to Isabel Beck:

Today BIG SUNDAY AS IT HAPPENS

Big Sunday is soooo exciting! I can’t wait for it to start. I’m early and outside the hall in the sunshine, sitting on the wall with my legs hanging over into the haunted lane. This is where Fran and Father Josh meet during tea break at every rehearsal. Will they still meet up on play nights, I wonder?

Nicky-Rose keeps saying we shouldn’t tell Kevin about Fran, but surely as director he should know. What if someone locks the kit cupboard while she’s out there with Father Josh? She’d be stuck outside, would miss her cue to go onstage, and the entire play would grind to a halt! That would be terrible, especially if I was onstage at the time. We have several scenes together so I have a vested interest.

I keep running through my lines. Is it possible to know them too well? Nicky-Rose says yes and that in the professional theater, actors see over-familiarity as a bad thing because if you focus too much on the words you cut off the emotional root beneath them. If there’s no feeling, you become like a robot. Some actors are like robots anyway. Luckily Mark and Lucas only have small roles.

The NADA awards have categories for actors in leading and supporting roles. Gerda is more a supporting role, but I wonder if the judge might consider it a leading role if it’s played really, really well?

I remember these feelings from Blithe Spirit. Excitement, nerves, and sadness. When you’ve been in plays before you know that afterward there’s a kind of grief that something you worked so hard on for months is over. I wish every play could be my first play, so I didn’t know in advance that however well it goes, it will only end in sadness. This journal shouldn’t be depressing though! I’ve got some stickers left over from Denise’s daughter’s craft bag. They are wedding bells but that doesn’t matter—they’ll still cheer the page up, look:

Reasons I hate Emma’s statue of me:

It looks like a space hopper

Its horns are uneven

The tentacles

Why is it green?

There was a long silence when she unveiled it. Then everyone burst out laughing. I felt horrible.

Message exchange between Isabel Beck and Nicky-Rose Dearing on June 1, 2025:

4:20 p.m. Issy wrote:

I’m so upset

4:20 p.m. Nicky-Rose wrote:

Why?

4:21 p.m. Issy wrote:

That statue is meant to be me!

4:21 p.m. Nicky-Rose wrote: