Page 71 of Sawyer

I say a quick prayer, relaxing in my seat and enjoying the irony that Clark, who never cared a bit for my aunt and probably never cared much for me, might be the person who inadvertently saves her life.

Chapter 9

Sawyer

“No, no, no! Cut!”

Bruce heaves himself up from his seat in the middle of the theater and stalks down the aisle toward the stage, his index finger raised and fanning back and forth in disapproval.

“How many times do I need to remind you two that there might be children in the audience?”

Ivy, who’s lying on her death bed as Catherine, stifles a giggle. I try to remain stoic as Heathcliff, nudging her in the shoulder to stop laughing.

“Your fault,” I whisper.

“Thistime,” she answers back.

We’re supposed to kiss passionately, but without tongue. Every so often, however, one of us gets so into the moment, a tongue gets away from us and causes havoc. Then Bruce jumps up and starts yelling.

Bruce climbs the two steps and crosses over to us, looking annoyed. He stands over the death bed with his hands on his hips.

“You’re not fooling anyone, kids. I can see that you two are madly in love with each other,” he says, “and while I celebrate your love, and I can’t deny that it’s given your performances a magical oomph, I don’t want to be run out of town for staging softcore porn on the Fraternal Order of Eagles’ stage!” He eyeballs me, then Ivy. “Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir,” we answer in tandem, trying to look sorry.

“Do you want me to be run out of town?”

“No, sir.”We really don’t.

“Do you have the self-control to stop tongue fucking each other on this stage?”

No, sir. We really don’t.

Ivy’s eyes bulge out of her head, her cheeks go crimson, and she starts laughing again.

“I mean it, Miss Caswell. Don’t make me replace you with Vera, now.”

His nonsensical threat about replacing Ivy with a sixty-something-year-old woman makes Ivy’s shoulders rattle with mirth. Bruce turns around and struts off the stage like a moody rooster. I slide my eyes back to Ivy, who lies on her back in an old-fashioned nightgown, trying her best to stop. But once you get on a laughing jag, you can’t stop sometimes, and worse, that kind of laughter is contagious. After trying to swallow my own, it bursts from my lips, ringing through the theater with hers.

“Oh, fuck it!” yells Bruce, throwing up his hands and gathering his papers together. “Rehearsal’s over. Lock up on the way out.” He waggles his finger at us again. “And come back tomorrow ready to work. The show’s on Friday, for chrissakes!”

“Bruce, no! We’re sorry!” Ivy sits up, instantly remorseful. “We just got the giggles. We can do it properly.”

“Do it.Heh, heh,” I mutter under my breath, like Beavis from the old MTV show.

Ivy totally loses it, chortling as she falls back down on the bed. Meanwhile, Bruce marches out of the theater, slamming the door with gusto as he leaves.

“Oh, no,” says Ivy, her chest heaving as I lay down beside her. “He’s really mad.”

Joy suits my girl.

Freedom, too.

Over the last two weeks, we’ve spent every day together. Sometimes it’s a stolen hour in bed at my cabin, and sometimes it’s a bite to eat after she finishes work. I hold her hand aswe walk in the snowy woods before rehearsal and put my arm around her when we watch TV with her cousins. I love it all. I’m grateful for every moment I get to spend with her, and although we haven’t formally discussed “the future” yet, I’m hopeful that there’s a place in hers for me.

“Bruce? Aw. He’ll get over it.” I roll onto my side, facing her. “Hey, Ivy.”

“Hey, Sawyer,” she says, rolling onto her side and grinning at me.

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