Now I could feel Mark’s eyes on me. ‘You see?’ he seemed to be saying.
It was Mark who clapped his hands this time, finishing up the discussion of Paul’s mother. “Alright, we have to whip this one into shape,” Mark said with a gesture toward me, “if she’s going to be on stage with us for her last hurrah.”
“Hopefully not a last hurrah,” Lisette said. “Hopefully she finds a Canadian to marry and moves here permanently. So that is one of your jobs,” she added, pointing between Paul and Mark. “Marry Abigail.”
“I’ll bring a justice of the peace to our next improv practice, and we can flip a coin,” I replied lightly. It was almost as hard for me to force cheer as it seemed to be for Paul. Kedar hadn’t sent me the update he promised, and I might have to leave within a few days. I could feel Paul’s warm gaze, like I was his port in the storm. When I sat next to him on the sofa, our knees brushed against each other and neither of us moved them away. He took my hand and squeezed it once, out of sight of Mark and Lisette. My heart sped up.
“So let’s jump in,” Lisette cried. “I made a pick-out-of-a-hat warm-up,” and she held up one of her knit caps with papers in it.
“What is this one?” I asked.
“It’s simple. Each of us takes a turn. Act out what you get.”
I glanced at Paul, and his affectionate look seemed to include everything: that we needed to talk, that we couldn’t talk, that we were doing silly games instead, and that it was still better than nothing.
Or maybe that was just what I was thinking.
“Come on, come on,” Lisette said, shaking her cap. “Paul, you first.”
Paul walked forward and reached into the hat. He handed a paper to Lisette, who read aloud to him the words: “A student who desperately has to use the toilet but is too shy to ask.”
“Alright,” Paul said. “Fair enough. I have a lot of material to draw from at work.” He pulled up one of his low armchairs and clutched the sides of the chair. He raised his hand and then shoved it down again, panting, and then raised it again.
He grabbed a book from a shelf and held it in front of his stomach, then twisted himself sideways, and tapped one foot desperately, higher and higher, his legs twisting across each other. The very picture of desperation to go. It was hilarious but oddly touching, too, his absolute commitment to a ten-year-old child who just couldn’t bring himself to say anything, until suddenly:
“Miss! Oh no,” he cried, “oh no…” And then he slumped down, with a mournful look of pure relief on his face. “Miss,” he said at last, his voice desperate, “can I get a mop?”
Lisette began applauding. Even Mark clapped, slowly, glancing between Paul and me.
All I could think was that this was the real Paul. The one who was silly, the one who could find joy no matter what kind of weekhe’d had. I wondered what version of Paul his mother saw. No wonder he had wanted to be an actor.
“Mark, you’re next,” Lisette said.
Mark stood up and took a slip of paper.
Lisette read out, “A person who has never eaten yogurt before and falls completely in love with it.”
Mark stepped up and pretended to open a refrigerator, poking around. He was also very funny, but in a darker way. His relationship with the yogurt container took on a sexual component.
“I said love,” Lisette cried. “You fall in love with yogurt! Love isn’t lust!”
“They are one and the same to me,” Mark replied, his tongue licking at an imaginary container.
“Alright, I’m calling time on Mark’s porno,” Lisette said. “Abby, you’re up!”
I stood up, fizzing with nerves that came from nowhere, and pulled a slip of paper from Lisette’s cap. Her handknit hat was warm and fuzzy inside, and I felt a strong pull of affection for her. I handed a paper to her, and she read aloud. “A social media influencer doing a paid post for the world’s worst hotel.”
I nodded, grabbed my cell phone, and pointed it at myself. “Hey guys,” I said, “so this week I got a complimentary stay at the hashtag paid post—Puffin Hut Hotel, right inside what used to be the bathroom stalls of this adorable club in downtown St. John’s, and it is so incredibly original here, like instead of beds, they have this glamping situation with mattresses on the floor, and porcelain flowerpots that used to be toilets. I’m seriously doing that at my wedding, I’m telling you.”
The weirdest part of my whole little speech was that I didn’t plan any of it. I was just picking something I knew would make Paul laugh, and when I caught his eye as I finished, he was giving me a look of adoration.
How was I supposed to live without him?
Lisette was up next, and she took a sheet of paper out for herself. “A cow that has found its way among a herd of deer.” She immediately got on all fours.
After we had run through all of Lisette’s hat ideas, Mark, Paul, Lisette and I wrote a few ideas and put them all into separate piles on the table. We were now going to practice the “storytelling improv” that I had seen them do at their first show.
The story we picked: “Someone tells their family they are leaving to go to acting school.” The genre: “Science fiction.” And off we went. I ended up playing an overly encouraging acting teacher, Lisette was the kid announcing her plans, Paul the spaceship captain, and Mark the disappointed father who wanted her to go to Space Academy.
