The day after the Great Ammonium Sulfide Retaliation, Nihal and I jogged up the steps to find a giant fluorescent penis spray-painted on the red door to the Crow’s Nest. Nihal “borrowed” some red paint from the Visual Arts painting studio, and I helped him fix the graffiti. “My finest work,” Nihal said in a mournful drone, painting over one edge of the penis. “Penis on Red Door, mixed-media, 2016. Lost forever to revisionist history.”
I chuckled. I’d finally mastered that—a laugh fixed low enough in my register that it didn’t sound like a giggle. “You,” I said, “are so pretentious.”
“I will do what I must for My Art,” he droned. I cracked up.
The day after the penis attack, Isaac, Erik, and Jon Cox caught about six-dozen crickets and let them loose under the Minuets’ dorm room doors.
At the start of Thursday’s rehearsal, Trav asked everyone to sit down. I felt, all of a sudden, that incoming sense of doom of getting back a Chemistry test.
“So,” Trav said, perching on the piano bench. “The Minuets’ music director came up to me today and told me about eight different ways to go to hell.”
“What, Caskey doesn’t like his new friends?” Isaac said innocently. “His loud, six-legged friends?”
Mama and Jon Cox slapped hands.
“No,” Trav said, giving them a sharp look. “That’s not a high five. I don’t care what they do next. We’re not retaliating anymore.”
“But—” Isaac started, but Trav cut in.
“Not a discussion.” Trav looked around the room. Everyone avoided his eyes. Marcus shifted uncomfortably in his windowsill.
“It’s October 2nd,” Trav said quietly. “I know you think the competition is way off in the future, but nine weeks isn’t an eternity. These four arrangements are not easy. Besides, the Spirit Rally’s the 16th, so leading up to that, we’ll have to waste three rehearsals on learning the school songs. And we’ll lose a big chunk of time at the end of the month, since we have to prepare for Daylight Dance. Then there’s Thanksgiving, which—”
“Hey. Hey,” Isaac said, lifting his hands. “Trav, breathe, all right? We’re not pressed for time. We’re already almost half-done, and putting the Minuets in their place isn’t distracting anyone from learning the music.”
“Also, they deserve it,” I muttered, thinking of the giant penis. The persistence of dick graffiti made no sense to me, especially coming from straight guys. If they were thinking about sex all the time, shouldn’t they have been scrawling vaginas all over the place?
“I, um.” Marcus’s hand jerked into the air. Everyone looked at him, and his hand faltered. “I kind of think Trav’s right. Like, a couple of the new Minuets are in my Theory class, and it’s really awkward. I-I told them I didn’t do the cricket thing, but they didn’t believe me, so—”
“What, Xander and Gonzales?” Erik said, lip curling. “Those guys are morons. Why do you give a shit what they think?”
Marcus quavered, his voice shrinking. “Because I—it just doesn’t seem like it has a point.”
“Exactly,” Trav said. “It’s pointless. My having to fend off Connor Caskey is pointless, and this discussion is pointless, and we don’t need any more like it.”
“What?” Isaac said. “This so-called discussion was your idea.”
And with that, the whole room was talking all of a sudden, talking over each other, bubbling up and up until Trav snapped.
He shot to his feet. “Quiet,” he breathed. His hands were out in front of him and shaking. The half-dozen rings on his fingers glinted, polished pewter. “Quiet. Now.”
For a moment, I thought Trav was having some sort of attack. After a second, though, he lowered his hands, which came to fists. His piercing eyes scanned each of us in turn and stopped, fixing on Isaac. “We’re done here. That’s final. Unless you’ve thought up any other ways to waste my time.”
The air went cold and still.
My time, he’d said. Rehearsal time—all his, and never contested. The question had never floated so clearly to the surface. Who did we belong to? Trav, with his strangled intensity, the gorgeous music he wrote, the balletic precision that he brought to rehearsals? Or Isaac, with his easy charisma, welcoming and omnipresent, the force that held us together?
Isaac’s eyes were set alight. His lips were an arrow shaft leading to a sharp crease in his cheek. He looked ready to snarl. All fire to Trav’s ice.
Jon Cox and Mama traded a look. Nihal closed his eyes, lashes dark against his cheek.
Isaac shoved a loose lock of hair behind his ear and leaned back in his armchair. Relief, then discomfort, prickled over my skin.
“Circle up,” Trav said, snatching his folder from the piano bench.
That night, nobody stayed after rehearsal.
“All right,” Mr. Rollins said, as the clapping dispersed. “Take a seat.”
It was first period on a Friday. I was wrung out—I’d barely slept. My scene partner, Douglas, took the seat we’d been using in our scene, and I dropped to the Palmer stage, smoothing the long locks of my wig over my shoulders.
“Well, what’d you all think?” Rollins turned to address the rest of our Character and Humanity class, fifteen kids dotted among the front rows of blue-covered seats. “Don’t be shy,” Rollins said, folding his arms. The command boomed out, rippling like thunder into the corners of the Palmer house. Rollins had graying cheeks, scruffy silver hair, and the sort of gravelly, dramatic voice that usually got assigned to mythological creatures in movies, which, incidentally, he’d made his living on for twenty-odd years. Then Hollywood had found a new, more famous guy to voice their dragons, and Rollins had enjoyed a respectable stage career before retiring into teaching. “Speak up,” he urged. “Shy won’t help anyone.”
Finally, Lydia raised her hand. The silver charm bracelet on her forearm slid toward her elbow. Rollins pointed to her.
“So,” Lydia said, “I enjoyed the scene. But . . .” She looked to me. My heart clanged like a bell; my nerves reverberated. Nobody’s critiques were more accurate than Lydia’s. “Jordan, you’re supposed to be playing a refined lady, and I’m not quite seeing . . . that.”
Heads wagged up and down in the audience. Rollins snapped his fingers and pointed at her. “Good, Lydia. I’m glad you hit on that.” He faced me. “Jordan, to be honest, this wouldn’t be a part you’d land on, because part of the plot of The Duke revolves around Lady Calista being short enough to disguise herself as a twelve-year-old boy.” He raised his eyebrows at Douglas and me. “Which you both know, of course, because you read the entire play before performing this scene. Right?”