My Life After Now

32

The Sword of Damocles




I caught up with him backstage, where he was steadfastly laying out the swords on the prop table.

“Evan?” I said softly.

He flinched at the sound of my voice. “I don’t want to talk about it, Lucy,” he said, not looking up.

“Just let me explain, please. It’s not what you think,” I pleaded.

His hands froze. “You didn’t have sex with him?”

“That’s…not what I meant. I just—”

He looked at me then, his eyes scorching. “Then it is what I think. Like I said, I don’t want to talk about it.” He brushed past me and walked quickly away.

• • •

I was in a panic. Evan was obviously freaked out by what he thought he knew, and he wouldn’t let me get close enough to explain that Ty and I had used protection and that there wasn’t anything to worry about. Every time I tried to bring it up backstage during the dress rehearsal, either there wasn’t enough privacy or he would pretend to be terribly busy doing some mundane prop or costume thing.

Before I knew it, it was time for our fight.

I did a few stretches to loosen up, adjusted my corset, and entered the scene. But I quickly became more interested in Evan’s lines than my own.

I’d never seen him act like this. He was so…intense.

“Romeo,” he seethed at Ty like a man out for murder, “the love I bear thee can afford no better term than this: thou art a villain.”

“Tybalt,” Ty responded unsurely, apparently as surprised at Evan’s sudden passion as I was, “the reason that I have to love thee doth much excuse the appertaining rage to such a greeting. Villain am I none. Therefore farewell. I see thou knowest me not.”

“Boy, this shall not excuse the injuries that thou hast done me,” Evan shouted back in his face. “Therefore turn and draw!”

What was going on here? It seemed like Evan was using his lines to act out some sort of real-life resentment against Ty. But that didn’t make any sense. It was me he had a problem with, not Ty. In his mind, Ty was the victim, not the villain.

Our fight scene began, and immediately I noticed a change. We should have been rehearsing in costumes all along if that was the cure for Evan’s hang-ups. He was no longer hesitant. We fell into sync from the very moment our swords collided. Our eyes locked, and as we jousted and tumbled across the stage, it felt almost like therapy, like we were finally liberating ourselves of all our unaired baggage. Our respective inner turmoils manifested themselves through our characters’ rivalry.

The fight was everything it was supposed to be—fluid and freeing, angry and beautiful.

It was strange, considering the violent nature of the moment, but as Evan and I fought, I felt a warmth inside that grew larger and hotter the deeper his eyes blazed into mine. My brain didn’t understand, but my body seemed to know that, whatever was happening right now, it was good.

But then I was accosted by a tidal wave of dizziness. Out of nowhere, the world blurred and tilted, and I instantly knew it was from the pills. But I couldn’t do anything about it right then. It’s an unspoken rule of theater that you don’t interrupt a dress rehearsal unless you absolutely have to. Besides, I could handle it. I was stumbling and struggling to remain upright, my focus on Evan lost, but I forced myself to keep up with the fight choreography as best I could. Ty was already speaking his next lines, pleading our characters to stop our battle, so all I had to do was get fake-injured, and I could collapse onto the stage, in character, and wait for the dizzy spell to subside.

The blocking of the moment was simple: I was supposed to face sideways, so that when Evan jabbed the empty space next to me it would look to the audience like I was being stabbed. Easy.

But my balance faltered again. On cue, Evan thrust his sword out at me, but we were out of sync now—and instead of slicing the air, he slashed it across my bare upper arm.

Everyone on stage stopped dead in their tracks. I didn’t feel the cut in my arm, but I knew it was there. Adrenaline made sure that I had no sensation of anything except my legs turning to jelly and the crash of my butt against the wooden stage floor. People were shouting, and the floor pulsed as Andre pounded up the stage steps.

At last, the dizziness retreated, and I slowly turned my head and looked at the cut. It was more of a gaping gash, sliding up from just above my elbow to just under my shoulder. Blood was everywhere, streaming down my arm in bright red ribbons.

I turned back to find the world had devolved into chaos. Elyse had fainted, and Ty was tending to her. Max and Courtney were running toward me, and Andre was motionless, midway between me and Elyse, as if he didn’t know who to take care of first. But it was Evan that I was zeroed in on. He leapt over Elyse and cut off Max and Courtney.

He threw himself on top of me, knocking me backward, and remained there in a protective stance as he drew the sash from around his waist and tied it tightly around my arm.

“I’ll call for an ambulance!” Max yelled.

“No!” Evan shouted back firmly, holding up a palm. “Don’t call anyone!”

I stared in terror at Evan’s hands. They were covered in my blood.

“Evan,” I gasped. “Your hands.”

“Shhhh,” he whispered, and held up a red-stained finger.

“What are you talking about?” Max yelled, having reached us now. “I’m calling 911. She needs stitches!”

“I’ll take her to the hospital myself,” Evan insisted, picking me up. He brought me closer to Max and Courtney and spoke under his breath, so that only the four of us could hear. “Don’t let anyone near that,” he said, nodding at the puddle of blood on the floor. “Clean it up yourself. Use bleach, make sure you wear gloves, and throw everything away when you’re done. Understand?”

Max and Courtney nodded, speechless.

I cradled my arms around Evan’s neck as he carried me toward the exit.

“I’m so sorry, Lucy,” he whispered, as we left the bloody scene behind.