“Is this what you’ve been working toward?” she asks.
“Wow. Honestly, I didn’t really know what I was headed toward. Once I got into it, I worked hard. It all fell into place from there.”
She nods to herself. “Do you regret taking the job?”
I breathe in. Another tough one.
If she had asked me this a month ago—or even just two weeks ago—my first instinct would’ve been to immediately say no. To express how great challenges are and that I’m better off for them. I haven’t been better off for them, though. It’s like I’m paralyzed with fear and don’t want to ruin anything else. It’s made me useless around the theater. I can’t even give my crew decent answers for simple questions.
“I regret not having a better handle on things,” I admit, toeing blocking tape with my shoe. Most days, I’ve wondered if it was too much too soon. The way things are going, this is going to be my first and last show as head carpenter. Maybe it should be. I can hand off my work to someone who knows what they’re doing—who can’t curse this place with their bad luck. I make a mental note to figure out how to make that happen.
“What about managing people? Do you like that?” Hazel asks.
“I do, actually,” I say. “I love talking to people, getting to know them. Problem-solving together. Helping them work through their shit. There’s more politics with my new job, though. That part’s been trickier to navigate.”
Hazel nudges me. “You want to keep everyone happy?”
“Something like that,” I say with a shrug of one shoulder. “Have you heard back about the job yet?”
“Team interviews were this morning. So any day now,” she says flatly, crossing her arms low over her stomach. It’s a gesture I’ve noticed she does when she seems to be working through something.
“How are you doing?” I ask, lowering my voice a bit. “Do you want to talk?”
On the drive back, she filled me in on what had happened with her dad and brother, but she was mostly quiet. After everything Hazel has done for them—that she continues to do for them—and this is how they treat her. They don’t deserve her.
“That’s how it always is. How he always is,” she says with a shake of her head. “I’d pay off his debts, always wipe their slates clean. In these moments, I always thought I was helping. But maybe I haven’t actually been. I’ve taken away any potential consequences. I always caved, and there’d be no lessons learned.”
“So you’ve been here before.”
“I don’t even think real consequences would make a difference at this point. The addiction’s too strong. They need to get real help.”
I can tell she’s trying to keep her voice steady, trying to numb any bad feelings. Battling the emotions that pop up, keeping them all in a neutral state, it’s got to be exhausting.
“Have you ever talked to them about that?” I ask.
“So many times,” Hazel says. “Those conversations were worse, and you know how the last one went. They just become better at hiding their problems. Became scrappier at figuring out how to borrow money. Got more creative with excuses…” Her voice trails off as she works through it. “But what about the house?”
I angle myself toward her. “You either help your dad and enable him to keep the house that you love, or you don’t help and lose the house that you love. What a shitty situation.”
“At least I don’t have to worry about them finding out about the lottery anymore,” Hazel says in an attempt to spin the situation.
“Now you sound like me.”
Hazel releases a tight breath mixed with a chuckle. “Anyway, I want to focus on this. On helping you.”
An-Ming’s busy capturing dimensions with her tape measure.
“Come with me,” I say to Hazel, taking her by the hand.
I lead her around to the resort’s dance hall set that we shockingly haven’t had any issues with. It has exposed ceiling beams and large windows overlooking a lake that’s been repainted on a backdrop. We climb the staircase built along the rear of the set that leads to theroof of the dance hall, where the lead actors sneak up to look out over the lake together just before intermission.
“Another roof?” Hazel asks. “You sure you want to risk it with your last good wrist?”
“For this view?” I say teasingly, gesturing to the rows and rows of empty seats. “Definitely.”
We sit on the slanted roof in the hidden seats built for the actors’ safety. Hazel looks up at the tiered levels, her head tilting all the way back as she studies the intricate detailing of the theater’s decorative molding and the paintings on the walls above us.
“It’s so nice in here,” she says. “You know, I’ve never seen a show? Until I met you, I had never actually been inside a theater.”
