Nicky wandered to an open area, where a large, polished table was stacked with books about Shakespeare, surrounded by individual copies of his plays for purchase. Nicky picked up A Midsummer Night’s Dream. As he leafed through it, it brought back good memories of the Borellis.
Nicky took his time going through the stacks. He had a giddy sense of anticipation at all there was to learn, but he also wondered: At his age, why should he try? Was it too late for him? What would he do with the knowledge once he had acquired it? Nicky was desperate to act professionally onstage in New York. He had come close at several auditions, only to lose out to actors with more experience. Coming close kept Nicky in the game; it also led him to the shop, to look for a manual to help him do better at auditions.
Nicky did not have the benefits of an education; everything he learned was from observation and the practical knowledge he had gleaned from his work at Borelli’s. He was an eager student, though, and in Nicky’s favor, he had a natural acumen for Shakespeare, the language came easily to him. Sam Borelli said some people were like that; they read the verse, understood the intent, and it made sense to them.
Nicky discovered a low shelf behind the new releases:
Used Books for Young Thespians
He sat down on the floor and looked through the children’s books, thinking he might find something for the Palazzini kids, who were multiplying at a rate that rivaled the tomatoes on the roof of the Montrose Street house. There had been some changes, but the family remained close. Mabel and Gio still lived with Jo and Dom. They had a daughter, Giovanna, who was probably walking by now. Elsa and Dom’s son had started school, and they had a second baby, Joseph, who had just begun to crawl. Elsa sent a photograph of their new home two blocks down on Montrose. Lena and Nino still lived in the homestead, and were expecting their first baby.
Nicky was sorting through the spines of the children’s books when he recognized a title. He pulled the hardcover book from the shelf. The size and weight of the book were also familiar, as was the jacket art.
“You need help there?” the salesman asked.
“I don’t think so.”
“Good book,” the man said as he passed.
Nicky’s heart began to beat faster as he turned the pages of the book. Of late, when his heart raced, it was a result of anxiety, but not today. He remembered this book, and it brought him back to the beginning. The illustrations had not been forgotten but had simply been layered upon by time. They were there in his mind’s eye as clearly as the moment he first saw them. He had been told, as a young boy, that the pictures in this book were called plates. Between the plates were translucent sheets of sheer paper etched in gold to protect the artwork. He even remembered the flimsy paper!
At five years old, Nicky had been confused by the use of the word plates, knowing that was where food was placed, not art. He recalled being afraid of a character on the jacket art, which showed Elizabethan actors in a theatrical parade. All these years later, the face of the sinister court jester holding hands with a young man clutching a balloon still gave Nicky pause. How Nicky had wished he could jump into the picture and warn the boy about the jester with the face of the devil.
Nicky ran his hands through his hair, trying to remember more.
Tales from Shakespeare
Charles & Mary Lamb
Colour plates by A. E. Jackson
The touch of the sleek jacket paper, embossed in black, and silk-screened with velvet-rich tones of sapphire blue, ruby red, and harvest gold, sent him back in time. The endpapers were deepest maroon, and made Nicky feel that way, lost, yearning, marooned and longing for a time that had defined him.
This was the book his mother had read aloud to him night after night, before he went to sleep. She would curl her body around him as he lay in his bed, resting on his pillow. Nicola would hold this book open with both hands while her son, cradled in her arms, tucked under the blankets, followed the pictures as she read aloud. The renditions of Shakespeare’s plays were presented as simply as nursery rhymes and as dramatically as fairy tales. Shakespeare’s tales were the smooth stones that built the mosaic that became Nicky’s imagination as a man.
Nicky was bereft when he recalled the night his mother stopped reading aloud to him. So ill, she lost her voice and could no longer speak. The loss of that ritual from his life was as central to his present loneliness as was the loss of her. These stories, typeset in black ink, letter by letter, were imprinted on his heart. The plain font, offset by the scrolling of the Elizabethan calligraphy, with its arcs and swirls placed by hand on paper—they had not disappeared from his memory either.
The illustrations had shaped his romantic view of women. Every girl he ever lusted after looked like the drawing of Beatrice in the garden. She was painted as a mischievous brunette wearing a yellow taffeta gown and a knowing expression. He was compelled to Beatrice when he was a boy, and she struck his fancy now, echoes of her in the real women he had loved.
Nicky closed the book and held it, as though he had been reunited with his oldest friend on his darkest day. His knowledge of Shakespeare hadn’t come from his keen ability to decipher the text, it had come from his mother.
“This is an old one,” the cashier said over his reading glasses. “From England.”
“I read it as a boy.”
“You’re lucky,” the cashier said as he rang up the book.
Nicky nodded, but he disagreed with the fellow. How was Nicky Castone lucky? Nothing had panned out for him—at least none of the things he had set his heart upon. People just say things to fill the air, he thought.
“There are no reprints of this book that I know of,” the cashier offered. “Last copy I’ve seen in a while. Maybe they have it at the library.”
“Good to know.” Nicky pulled out his wallet to pay for the book.
“You shopped here before?”
“No. I’ve heard about it from other actors.”
“You’re an actor? I was too. A hundred years ago.” He grinned.
“That’s when they lit the stage with smudge pots.”
The cashier laughed. “That’s right.”
Nicky looked at the man. The city was filled with second-story shops tended by former actors, dancers, and singers who had moved to Manhattan for the same reasons he had with the same goals in mind. He felt a kinship with the man and the bookstore, so he asked, “Are you looking to hire anyone here?”
“You looking for work?”
“Something part-time. Something in the theater.”
“I don’t have anything right now. But there’s a board in the back with job listings.”
Nicky thanked him, tucked the bag under his arm, and headed to check out the job board. He took down names of theaters, a prop house, and an electrical supply company, and the telephone number of a well-known actress who needed her dog walked on matinee days. He was delighted to read the listings; they reminded him of his old second job at Borelli’s. Nicky moved closer to the board when he saw this advertisement: