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IseeCoriolanus. I also seeHamlet, Othello, Macbethand evenKing John.
An entire day is spent watching back-to-back productions of all theHenrys. By the time the bloodthirsty series is finished, my mind is as numb as my backside, but I’m buoyed by a strange kind of paranoid high, like the world is nothing more than some mad Shakespearean plot that I have to navigate out alive.
Rory considers taking me toTitus Andronicusbut for some reason, after giving me a critical once-over, decides that that’s where he draws the line.
“I am so tired,” I declare in private to Finlay one evening, wondering whether I’m speaking in pentameter. “I am so ti-red,” I amend, brainwashed into feeling like this is somehow the more natural way to talk.
A smile appears across Finlay’s mouth. He gazes at me as I slump, collapsed, across the back of Danny’s abandoned chair, my hands outstretched as though begging.
“Ye ken some folk would dream o’ being in your position, aye?” he asks mildly, consulting the article he’s been absorbed in all evening. Something to do with client journalism, whatever that is. “Daily jaunts tae the theater, free shows,ravishin’company…”
“I know,” I say, highly aware that I’m basically whining about my good fortune. But there’s an expectation, in some way, that these free theater shows are not without their ties. That the more of them I see, the more I’m expected to live up to Rory’s idea of the perfect, cultured wife.
I don’t tell Finlay this, because it sounds crazy even in my own head. But I must look utterly pathetic, because instead he takes some kind of pity on me.
“Understand that this is all Rory’s idea o’ leadership training,” he says briskly, like it hasn’t already been drummed into me a hundred times before. “It’s all very well drowning in the arts but people actually have taelikeyou if ye want tae be a good leader. You need tae be personable. Charismatic. Relatable to the masses. It just makes life easier. But it’s always the part the Munros conveniently forget. Even the worst dictators are charismatic bastards wi’ devoted followings, and devoted followings dinnae spring fae nothing.”
With a tilt of my head, I regard Finlay blankly.
“Starting from noo, every week ye complete without complainin’ about this… onslaught o’ culture,” he says with a kind of frank reassurance, “I’ll treat ye tae something special. Something ye might actually enjoy, something that’s hard-wired intae ye that ye didnae have tae pretend tae like. Wi’ a big special somethin’ at the end.”
I’m skeptical about what exactly thesespecial somethingsare. And my suspicions are almost confirmed for my first week, when Finlay treats me to a performance ofA Midsummer Night’s Dream.
At first I think he’s joking, because I’m sick to the back teeth of William freakin’ Shakespeare. There’s only so muchthou-ing andthy-ing I can take, you know? But it turns out to be a ballet. The performers, lithe and beautiful, speak only with their bodies, and it’s one of the most enjoyable Shakespeare productions I’ve ever experienced.
Danny and Luke are also invited, and although it takes Danny and the chiefs a full day’s effort to persuade Luke to step outside the front door, assuring him that he won’t be handcuffed on sight and frogmarched to the nearest Antiro protest for them to tear strips off him, Luke eventually concedes. Danny buzzes Luke’s hair as short as possible without going completely bald. In public, Luke ducks his head low and says very little, as though out of fear of having his distinctive bass voice recognized. When I try to take his hand in mine, he gives me a quick, pained look and shakes his head. I understand but it hurts.
“We take the back roads,” Luke murmurs with an undertone of panic as he gazes out into the wild throng of people cavorting on the Royal Mile. He’d been restless and fearless indoors, but now, confronted by the crammed streets, there’s something about his jumpiness that resembles prey. “We need to hide from every single person in the city.”
It turns out that this is easier said than done in Edinburgh during peak festival time. The city’s mobbed with tourists, performers, and protesters alike. And although it’d be a safer bet, there’s no point in hiring a taxi because of all the road closures.
We pass jugglers on stilts, knife-throwers and fire-swallowers, magicians and escapologists. People singing, people telling jokes, choirs and public speakers on elevated platforms. Protesters — large, informal groups of them, bracketing each side of the street, and welcomed by the chaos. And always, always, there’s the constant offer of leaflets.New show – five stars - limited time only! Up and down the cobbled length of the street, everyone uses their voice or their bodies to tell a story to an obligingly gathered crowd.
“Come on,” Rory murmurs, standing as defensively beside Luke as a bodyguard. Danny flanks his other side, looking much less like a bodyguard and more like a concerned companion. “Right now, this is the perfect place to hide. There are too many people and no one will care.”
Tightening his black paisley bandana around his head, Luke strides by the clusters of protesters. After the first few times, when no one points at him in alarm, when no one’s narrow gaze tracks him down the street, Luke seems to take a reckless relish in not being identified, and marches past every group of protesters he can, even at some points going out his way just to do so.
The only time anyone personally notices Luke is when an eager woman flashes him a grin and says, “Heya, handsome! Fancy comin’ to see our show?Pygmalionby St. Camford’s Drama Group. Rave reviews!” Rory quickly guides Luke away.
At the top of the street, some Englishman on a wooden box shouts through a megaphone a kind of weepy, emotional plea for Scotland not to become independent. Finlay gives a gleeful hoot of laughter and promises to come back later in the day, when Luke’s not with him, to systematically demolish the man’s arguments.
With all the wildness of the outside world, the theater is a place of actual, civil solace. We pass diligent workmen on tall ladders, plucking out lightbulbs from theTHEATRE ROYALsign. But even with its stupid new moniker, it’s peaceful and calm and de-Antiro’ed inside. No one shouts. No one demands. I can finally hear myself think.
Luke sits beside me and strokes my thigh, his warm hand sliding up my dress cautiously. During the interval, he whispers to me with a glint in his eye, as though high on his own anonymity, “That was so risky. Anyone could have seen us. I bet you’ve never done that in a theater before. Ibetcha.”
I bite my lip to stifle my laughter. If only he knew… But it’s fun watching Luke interact with the outside world again. It’s as though weeks of tension have been shaved off him, and joy floods out his system.
The ballet reminds me of how little I’ve been able to dance this summer. I focus avidly on the dancers and their graceful forms, from the female dancers with their floaty dresses and elegant moves, to the half-naked men with their thick muscles and strong bodies, acting out convoluted cases of mistaken identity in a magical-looking forest. And then there’s Puck, who reclines in silvery trees and twirls acrobatically around branches, blowing shots of glittering love-dust down onto the scene below.
I wonder if I look as elegant whenever I dance in the dark for Rory. I wonder if my body is as elastic, as gymnastic, as the dancers’.
When I glance at Luke during the beautiful, love-soaked finale, tears are glimmering in his eyes. He looks so happy that my heart sings for him, that I want him always to be free.
Around my cultural awareness teachings, my linguistics lessons with Luke don’t cease. We encourage each other, him to talk less formal and me to talk more. I read complex poetry, soliloquies from classical plays. All this training will be worth it, Luke says, because, according to him, “The fact is, no one wants to be eager to listen to an important speech, only to hear them go, ‘Hey, y’all, what a heckin’ good time y’all folks got in store for y’all today, y’all. Awesome! Woo!’”
I shoot him a withering look for that, but I can’t deny his informal voice has grown leaps and bounds since we each began our equal — and very opposite — speech therapy.
