I dropped the phone, letting it fall out of my hand, pull the cord taut with a jerk, and swing like a dead man on the end of a rope. As I listened to the tinny voice droning from the phone, the distant sounds of dismay and agitation from upstairs, all I could think was, why? Why the drugs, why the overdose, what has he done what has he done what has he done? I couldn’t go back up, but I couldn’t stay where I was, terrified of what I might say when the police or paramedics wanted answers. I left the phone dangling and threw the door open, without taking my coat, scarf, gloves, anything.
I gained momentum as I walked down the driveway, the gravel like little chunks of ice under my socks. By the time I hit the dirt—buried under a muddled blanket of old snow and pine needles—I was running full tilt. My heart pumped hard against the cold, and blood slammed through my veins, thundered and roared in my ears until the dam in my sinus cavity burst and it came streaming out of my nose again. I ran straight into the trees, where branches and thorns tore at my face and arms and legs, but I barely felt them, tiny pricks of pain lost in the tumult and snarl of panic. I turned off the path and plunged deeper into the woods, so deep I didn’t know if I’d be able to find my way back, deep enough that no one would hear me. When I thought my heart or my lungs would burst, I fell on my hands and knees in the icy leaves and howled into the trees until something in my throat broke.
SCENE 9
There were only four of us in class on Tuesday morning: James, Filippa, Meredith, and me. Alexander hadn’t yet come back from Broadwater’s emergency clinic—though he was stable by then, or so we’d been told. The rest of us were pulled from class one by one on Monday to undergo psychiatric evaluation. The school shrink and a doctor from Broadwater took turns asking us invasive questions about ourselves, one another, and our collectively bad track record with substance abuse. (We each left with a pamphlet on the dangers of drug use and a stern reminder that attendance of the upcoming alcohol awareness seminar was mandatory.) Beyond the obvious problems of stress and exhaustion, both James and Wren, from what I’d overheard outside Holinshed’s office on my way to the bathroom, were exhibiting symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. She’d taken an additional day off class to rest, but when I suggested that James do the same, he said, “If I’m shut up in the Castle by myself all day, I’ll lose my mind.” I didn’t argue with that, but as it turned out, he wasn’t much better off in Studio Five.
“Well,” Gwendolyn said as soon as we sat down, “I don’t think anyone’s up for new material today, and besides there aren’t enough of you. I’d be teaching the same lesson tomorrow.” Her solution was to work problem scenes from Lear that couldn’t be more thoroughly dissected during rehearsal for the sake of time.
James and I watched for an hour while Gwendolyn dug her nails into Meredith and Filippa, searching for sparks of real-life sibling rivalry to fan into a flame for the stage. She had her work cut out for her; Meredith barely knew her own brothers, and Filippa claimed not to have any siblings. (I still don’t know whether this is true.) Gwendolyn startled me out of a stupor by asking about my sisters, a subject I was not then—nor ever had been—fond of. She stopped just short of outing me as the Castle’s new custodian and mercifully moved on. When she’d hassled the girls to distraction, she gave us a five-minute water break and instructed James and Meredith to come back prepared for Act IV, Scene 2.
When we returned, Gwendolyn opened the scene work with a lecture on the last week’s lackluster performance. “I mean, really,” she said. “This is one of the most passionate moments of the play, between two of the most powerful people in it. The stakes are as high as they can be, so I don’t want to feel like I’m watching a bad pickup at the bar.” Meredith and James listened without comment and, when she finished, took their places without so much as acknowledging each other. (After James had broken my nose, Meredith’s attitude toward him went from lukewarm to icy, which undoubtedly contributed to their complete lack of chemistry onstage.)
Filippa fed them a cue line—it wasn’t hers, but Gwendolyn couldn’t be bothered—and they went through the motions with a woodenness that made me cringe. Their words fell flat; their touches were forced and awkward. Beside me, Filippa watched the scene collapse with a grim, pained expression, like she was being tortured.
“Stop, stop, stop,” Gwendolyn said, waving one hand at James and Meredith. “Stop.” They moved gratefully apart, like magnets with the same polarity. Meredith folded her arms; James scowled at the floor. Gwendolyn glanced from one of them to the other and said, “What on earth is the matter with you two?” Meredith stiffened. James sensed it and tensed to match but didn’t look at her. Gwendolyn put her hands on her hips and studied them shrewdly. “I’ll get to the bottom of it, whatever it is,” she said, “but let’s talk about the scene first. What’s happening here? Meredith?”
“Goneril needs Edmund’s help, so she bribes him the only way she knows how.” She sounded utterly bored by it.
“Sure,” Gwendolyn said. “That’s a fine answer, if you’re dead from the neck down. James? Let’s hear from you. What’s happening with Edmund?”
“He sees another way to get what he wants and he plays the hand she gives him,” he said, in a toneless, automatic sort of way.
“That’s interesting. It’s also bullshit,” Gwendolyn said, and I looked up from my knees in surprise. “Something huge is missing from this scene, and it’s staring you in the face,” she went on. “Goneril’s not going to kill her husband just so she can have a new captain in the field, and Edmund’s not going to risk losing Regan’s title unless there’s a more compelling offer on the table. So why do they do this?”
Nobody spoke. Gwendolyn whirled around and said, “Oh, for God’s sake—Oliver!” so loudly that I jumped. “I know you know—Murder’s as near to what as flame to smoke?”