“That’s the one. I broke up with her, and I felt horrible. I was a big, hot mess.”
“Yeah, but didn’t you break up with her because she was gay and about to break up with you anyway to date that other girl in your class?”
“Scarlett,” Spencer said, drawing himself up, “I am trying to teach you a lesson.”
“Sorry.”
“Lola’s way too calm.”
“Lola’s always calm,” Scarlett replied.
“Lola isn’t always calm.”
He said it like he knew what he was talking about, but Scarlett couldn’t figure out what he was referring to.
“You only look that calm when you feel relief,” he went on. “When you didn’t care in the first place.”
This was punctuated by a slamming door and heavy footfalls down the hallway. Marlene came tearing into the Orchid Suite and made right for Lola’s bed, clawing at the sheets and pulling them off the bed, then knocking things off the dresser. It was a very uncoordinated effort, one that screamed of a general frustration. Spencer caught her around the waist and hoisted her up. She flailed at him, but the blows were ineffective.
“Marlene,” he said, “you must chill a little, okay?”
He kept her dangling there until she gave up and went limp. Lola rejoined them and looked at Marlene sadly.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “Marlene, I really am.”
Marlene wasn’t interested. She wiggled her way out of Spencer’s grasp and stalked out of the room.
“Why is she more upset than you?” Scarlett asked.
“I think she sees Chip as an older brother.”
“She has an older brother,” Spencer said. “I’m her older brother.”
“Her older brother with a boat and a driver,” Lola clarified. “She got attached to him. She’ll be all right. I’ll talk to her when she calms down. Don’t let her break anything, okay?”
Lola went off again, and Spencer just shook his head in amazement.
“That’s enough drama for tonight,” he said, peeling off his shirt. Even he was struck by the powerful odor that had been caused by the long day in the church. He held it at arm’s length. “I’m done. I’m going to go to bed and read important books about theater.”
“It would be easier if you just said porn,” Scarlett said.
“No idea what you’re talking about. But knock first if you need me.”
When he had gone off, and the room was quiet at last, Scarlett went over and picked up the black dress and held it up to herself. It was hers now. And she had Eric. And Lola was single.
She went to the window and pulled it open. The windows of the Hopewell were old, made of thin glass, and largely uncared for wood frames that coughed up paint and pigeon feathers when you touched them. But the night air was warm and sweet, and didn’t smell too heavily of garbage from the alley below. There was a white full moon hanging over Naked Lady’s building.
She read the message on her phone again.
You’ve made a country boy very happy, city girl.
She was the city girl. This was her city. And for the first time that summer, maybe ever, Scarlett felt so full of contentment that she would even have been happy to see Naked Lady and wish her well.
CELEBRATION
The cast was fading in the heat the next day. They lounged on one another across the big, empty floor, treating each other like pieces of furniture. Scarlett had always noticed, when dealing with her brother’s friends, that actors were touchy. She now appreciated this fact completely. She smiled benevolently as she watched Ophelia share her bottle of water with Spencer.
She didn’t sit next to Eric. It was too soon for that. She took her place over by the wall, next to where Mrs. Amberson had planted herself during the actors’ warm-ups. She had now taken the low stage.
“Trevor and I have been talking,” she announced to the group. “And we think…”
Unless she was seriously imagining things, and she might have been, Scarlett detected a very slight, very fake British accent creeping into Mrs. Amberson’s voice. It wasn’t constant—it would just twang Scarlett’s ear from time to time, sharp as a flick of the finger. No one else seemed to register it. Or, if they did, they weren’t letting on. They were a bunch of actors, so they could have been acting like they didn’t hear it.
“…that we need to push the dramatic stakes a bit. We need to give this performance a real sense of style, so we’re going to take what you’ve been doing and extend it a bit. Think classic film. Think silent movie. Hamlet and Ophelia, you’re going to be like classic screen legends. Think Bogart and Bacall. Valentino and Garbo. Spencer and Eric, you’ll be our Keystone Cops, our Marx Brothers.”
There was a warm reception to this idea.
“I have one other piece of news,” she said. “Tonight, to celebrate all the work we’ve done, I want to have a little party.”
This was a surprise to Scarlett. She glanced over to Eric, who beamed widely at her.