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When I walk on stage, Sophie is in just a sports bra and leggings while one of the costume designers measures her tiny waist with a long tape measure. I close my eyes and take a breath. Today is testing me on a level I’m not prepared for.
***
By the end of the week, we’re finished with dress rehearsals. We’ve run the show in full half a dozen times on stage, and twice in costume. I’ve kissed Sophie a dozen more times, and never once did it become robotic. Each time, I felt that same pull in my core. Each time, I wished it would last longer.
The middle of next week we start previews. By the weekend, opening night will be here. It’s hard to believe we’ve come this far.
After we wrap our last rehearsal of the day, the five of us—Nick included—lounge on the sofas in the wardrobe room studying our lines. There are a select few racks that hold our costumes, and dozens of others holding on-hand backup pieces owned by the theater. It’s one of the only places in the building that has an abundance of comfortable seating because it’s often used by the wardrobe team to sit and discuss costume choices and conduct try-ons and fittings with the actors.
Maureen sits next to me on the sofa; the full length of her leg pressed against mine. She leans in to look at my script and lets her long brown curls rest gently on my shoulder. “Do you want to run lines together?” She smells like strawberries and roses; sickeningly sweet, but enticing, nonetheless.
I keep my gaze on the paper, shaking my head. “No, it’s better if I just work through them in my head.”
She sighs, sending her warm breath across my neck, and then she rests her chin on my shoulder silently.
I freeze, pretending to read my lines, but not really seeing them at all. Maureen is often forward, but she’s never this forward. Well, not until this week.
I peer at Sophie, Brent, and Nick. None of them seem to notice Maureen’s obvious display of affection. They’re all buried in their own work.
I turn my head toward her slightly. “Is there something you need?”
She looks up at me with her insistent eyes, impossibly close to my own. There’s a slight upturn of her lips. “I think we should run lines together…” And then in a barely audible voice, so that no one else can hear, she shifts so her lips are close to my ear. “…I’ll be alone in my room tonight.”
An eager chill runs down my spine, but before I can respond, she has already stood up and is walking down the aisles of clothes, running her fingers gently over the array of fabrics.
“God, some of these are so beautiful,” she breathes, studying the sparkle on an extravagant red ballgown.
“Give us a fashion show, Maureen.” Nick uncrosses his legs, stands up, and strides toward her.
She giggles. “I’d get in so much trouble.”
I clench my script tightly as I watch her hips sway.
Sophie lifts her gaze from her own pages. “Maureen, there’s no need to ogle those dresses. The one you’re wearing is absolutely gorgeous as it is.”
Maureen steps back out from the racks and looks down at her full chest, which is heaving enthusiastically over the top of the impossibly tight turquoise dress she wears. It’s a costume she’s been fitted for; Daria’s dress. Very 1940’s. With thin straps across her bare shoulders and a bodice that’s cinched closely around her waist, it looks like she can barely breathe.
“It is beautiful, isn’t it?” She spins in a circle, letting the full skirt billow out around her. Momentarily, I’m reminded of my dream before the Christmas party, when Heather spun in front of me just as happily.
Maureen’s eyes land on mine briefly. She knows I’ve been staring at her, so I tear them away and focus on my script again.
Nick, who’s been looking through the racks himself, steps up behind her quickly and pulls a black blindfold over her eyes; one that could easily be used to block out light for a character’s sleep or as a prop for a kinky roleplay.
She squeals at her newfound loss of sight, reaching behind her in an attempt to find Nick, but he’s already slipped away and is sitting down next to Sophie again.
“Now what?” Maureen giggles, spinning around in confusion, but opting not to remove the blindfold.
“Show us some more of those twirls, sweetheart.” Nick grins, leaning back and resting his hands behind his head.
She places a hand on her hip and faces the sound of his voice with a smirk. It’s like I can see through her blindfold, right to the seductive look she’s probably giving him, but she can’t see me at all, so I let my eyes travel down her neck to the swell of her full breasts, rising and falling heavily upon her otherwise thin frame. I’m not often granted the opportunity to admire her when she isn’t already watching me with a lust of her own. She’s always ready to pull my attention in her direction at any chance. But in this moment, she can’t see me, so I indulge.
She’s quite beautiful. She has the type of figure that usually catches my interest. Her exaggerated curves are hard to miss, and I trail my eyes across them without restraint, wondering how soft her skin would feel beneath my fingers. The almost perpetual arousal that’s been sitting on the back burner of my mind for the last few days causes every sway of a hip or bit of exposed skin from any of the women on set to turn up the heat inside me just a bit more. The six months I’ve been without the company of a woman are starting to do strange things to me. As if I’ve turned back time, I’m now at the mercy of the mind of a sixteen-year-old Kai.
“I think maybe you like what you see.” She replies to Nick, but as she pulls the blindfold off, she meets my gaze first. Her words were aimed at me.
He replies, unaware. “You’re stunning in that dress.”
She doesn’t respond, and I hold her gaze until she looks away first and twirls in a circle again.
