She didn’t need to ask if he was nervous. She could feel his excitement like a sunny day. She watched his legs swing lackadaisically, as if dangling off the edge of a dock.
“So about what we discussed,” he said offhandedly, and AJ’s blood froze. He was actually going to say it. “I’m thinking that after the last show, I’ll just head out, and that will be it.”
AJ looked up at his face. He appeared pleasant, disconnected—the way he used to seem whenever Risa commented on her engagement to Brian. His energy, however, had tanked. “I figure we’ll say our goodbyes onstage,” he continued. “Why make it harder than it needs to be?”
AJ blinked a few times. “Right,” she said, hearing her own voice distorted, as though through leaded glass. “How Marina Abramovic.”
She was referencing the great performance artist’s famous parting from her longtime lover, Ulay, in which both artists met in the middle of China’s Great Wall, then never saw each other again.
Noah frowned. “You think this is artificial, and you’re not wrong,” he said. “But it’s for the best. It is, AJ. It’ll hurt less…in the long run.”
AJ watched the overhead light play off the toe of his sneakers.
“Do you agree?” he prodded.
“I agree.”
“It is for the best,” Noah repeated. “I mean, we have a chance at a perfect ending—how many people can say that?”
“Not many,” said AJ, who was gratified to feel his mood leaden as he spouted this bullshit.
She heaved herself onto her feet, dusted off her hands, and offered one to Noah. Their eyes met as she helped him up, and he searched her for the resistance he knew she felt. AJ let him read her, let him see how, despite her heartbreak, she wasn’t putting up a fight.
Yet.
In the lead-up toopening night, Risa had issued a press release to dramatic effect; according to their house manager, all twelve performances would be standing-room only.
AJ had been happy about this in the abstract—it meant that Noah would get his money out of the show. But as the two of them waited in their shared dressing room on opening night, her nerves cinched with every crescendo of the crowd.
As the minutes crawled by, she stared catatonically at her own reflection, at the white of her shirt, at the way the stage makeup brought out her eyebrows, her cheekbones. Noah didn’t bother her. He sat nearby on the green leather couch reading his phone, Bud asleep on his lap. It was always cold backstage, but AJ was practically shivering.
It was the adrenaline. It was the waiting.
Their characters entered from opposite sides, so they parted ways as they left the dressing room.
“Hair dryer,” said Noah.
“Hair dryer,” said AJ.
As AJ stood in the wings, she could feel the audience’s expectations like a rising tide. These people had paid good money to see Noah Drew perform his esteemed uncle’s work with a complete rando. Well, not acompleterando, but a woman whose only real acting credit had been an accident, and who was considered, at most, a one-hit wonder. They must be so confused about what she was doing here.
But AJ knew what she was doing here. And as the lights came up and they walked on, the crowd lost their minds.
AJ and Noah waited, feeling the emotion of the room lap over them. AJ glanced beyond the stage and was somehow not at all surprised to see Otto and Oona in the front row. She smiled at them gratefully, then back at Noah, whose eyes flashed as the din died down.
Tonight, AJ had the first line. She watched Noah take a breath, watched the stage light gild his hair, his shoulders. She felt the audience’s energy lock in with theirs.
Then she began.
The scripted portion of the play unfurled like a pleasant drive on afamiliar road; the route was the same every time, but the experience was always a tiny bit different.
Noah got a big laugh on the first joke, which gave them both a boost. They paced themselves, feeling their way through each scene. W’s desperation built steadily as F reassured her he’d had a good life, until finally W’s grief drove her to create the sanctuary of their house.
“Time can’t touch us here,” AJ said.Time won’t touch us here,she thought.
There was no intermission or set change to signal the end of the scripted portion of the play, just a single light cue that transformed the feel of the stage, and the tint of AJ’s white shirt, from gold to rose. It was so simple, but the audience gasped when it happened.
Now the flight path shimmered to life before them. Now it was time to play.
