“Actually, I’m not on the roster until after lunch,” Jules said. “I think Kari wanted to focus on some of the group numbers first. I may come in early to watch, though.”
“Nah, sleep in while you can,” Sophie said.
“We’ll see. I guess you could say I’m overzealous, but I’ve always loved trying to absorb every bit of a production that I can.”
“Nothing wrong with that. Night, Jules.” With a wave, Sophie crossed the street, headed toward her apartment. Exhaustion crept in as she walked those last blocks. It had been alongday. She was excited about the production, though, despite her conflicted feelings for Jules. They’d shared an insightful walk home together.
Hopefully, the inconvenient attraction would pass, since it was obviously one-sided. On that note, Sophie pulled up her Tinder app as she walked and started swiping through photos. She didn’t have time or space in her life for a relationship at the moment, but a one-night stand to reset her system? Yeah, she could fit that in. In fact, it had just become a priority.
4
Jules sat about ten rows back from the stage, watching the ensemble rehearse. Every director had their own style, and Kari seemed to prefer to get the choreography down first. Jules wasn’t part of the first musical number, so she didn’t have to be here this morning, but there was always something to learn by observing. That wisdom had been drilled into her in high school, and she’d never forgotten it.
It’s in Her Kisswasn’t a dance show at heart. It was more about the music and the drama, but even so, there was a fair amount of choreography involved. Jules loved watching Simon, the choreographer, as he worked, the way he tirelessly adjusted the actors to get the results he wanted. Occasionally, Kari jumped in with her own input, while Andrew, the stage manager, made notes on his tablet and moved stage props for the performers.
Jules had studied every aspect of theater in college, from set design to directing, and she was fascinated by all of it. Basically, the theater was her happy place, and she couldn’t see herself ever working anywhere else.
After a few minutes, though, her focus shifted to one dancer in particular. Sophie was magnetic that way. Jules’s attention always seemed drawn to her when she was in the room, and she hadn’t liked it a bit when Sophie pulled away from her yesterday. Hopefully, they’d sorted things out last night, because Jules really hoped they would be friends, at least untilIt’s in Her Kisswrapped.
When the group on stage broke for lunch, Jules stood, gathering her purse and jacket, so she could join them.
“Miss Vega?”
She turned to see an employee of the theater standing in the aisle. “Yes?”
“I’m Sarah,” she said brightly. “And I wanted to let you know your dressing room is ready for you.”
“Really?” Jules couldn’t fight the grin she felt spreading across her face. Andrew had apologized yesterday that the theater was in the process of being repainted as part of its ongoing renovations and the dressing rooms had been inaccessible. But the part Jules couldn’t quite wrap her head around was that she would have her own dressing room.
That had never happened before. And it was so friggin’ exciting.
She followed Sarah down a flight of stairs into one of the theater’s basement levels, where the dressing rooms were located, tucked away beneath the stage. Sarah showed her to a room at the end of the hall. A white piece of paper had been taped to the door with JULIA VEGA printed in big block letters across it. And she was totally going to geek out and take silly selfies in front of it as soon as she was alone.
“See this stairwell?” Sarah asked, gesturing to the door across from Jules’s dressing room.
She nodded.
“If you go up those stairs, you’ll be in the hallway to stage left. Would you like me to show you?”
“No, that’s okay,” Jules told her. “I’ll go back up that way and see where it comes out.”
Sarah opened the door to the dressing room, indicating for Jules to follow her inside. It wasn’t one of the fanciest dressing rooms Jules had ever seen. This was a smaller theater, after all, and nothing about it was particularly fancy. But to her, it was perfection. There was a large sofa to her right and the dressing table to her left, facing a mirror ringed with bulbs where she’d sit each night to do her makeup.
“The bathroom is through there.” Sarah pointed to a door on the far wall. “And you have a mini fridge and a microwave here.” She pointed again. “It’s stocked with water and a few basic snacks, but if there’s anything in particular you’d like, let us know, and we’ll do our best to accommodate you.”
“I’m sure whatever’s in there is fine,” Jules said, nearly overcome with the urge to jump around and completely lose her cool, because…bucket list!
“Okay. Just let me know if you need anything,” Sarah said as she backed out of the room.
“Thanks so much, Sarah.” Jules stood there for a moment, taking it all in. She whisper-squealed her excitement, and then she snapped a quick selfie to send her mom. Almost immediately, her phone rang.
“Tell me all about it,” Paula said in lieu of hello.
“Wait. Let me FaceTime you instead, and then I can show it to you,” Jules told her mom. “Hang on.” She ended the call and dialed her through FaceTime, smiling when her mom’s face appeared on the screen. “Hey.”
“Oh! I see your makeup table,” her mom said, peering intently at the screen.
“Can you believe it?” Jules panned her phone around the dressing room, letting her mom see the whole space. “Oh, and they said there were snacks in the fridge. Let’s see what I’ve got.” She crouched, opening the door to the mini fridge. Inside, she found a sampling of fruit, yogurt cups, and crackers, although she wasn’t sure why those were in the fridge.
