Chapter Six

The first week of rehearsals was just sitting around the stage on folding chairs, reading aloud from the scripts. The following week, they’d begin blocking—and building the set. Truman wasn’t quite sure how that would work. How were they supposed to act with the stage crew hammering and hollering and moving things around?

Use your imagination. It’s an actor’s—and a director’s—job to fully immerse in the world they’re creating and rise above distractions.

But that first week, he couldn’t be too concerned with what was to follow. Now he needed to assert his leadership role, which was something new. In spite of the makeup and flamboyant clothes, Truman was shy, a victim of a paradox—he both wanted to be noticed and didn’t want people to look at him. He wondered if other people, famous people, in the spotlight could possibly also face this introvert paradox.

So, as a leader he expected pushback, ridicule maybe, people rolling their eyes if he dared to actually try to direct them. He didn’t have much confidence that people would listen to him, let alone respect him. Of all the nerve, he could hear them thinking, Truman Reid trying to tell me what to do. Not gonna happen! Thoughts like these made him quiver inside.

He was surprised to find, though, that most everyone in the cast laid their undivided attention at his feet with hope in their eyes. They actually wanted him to lead, to show and tell them what they might do to make their turns on stage the best they could be. They ascribed to him knowledge that they didn’t know he didn’t possess. But that was okay; what they didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him. If they wanted to assume he knew all about acting, diction, movement, and so on, so be it. Truman didn’t have to admit to them that he was doing his own acting as he sat next to Mr. Wolcott, earnestly listening as people read their parts aloud. Truman didn’t have to admit he was winging it and faking it until he made it.

And Mr. Wolcott was fully on board with letting him be an equal partner in directorial duties. In fact, he’d said that every Thursday night would be Truman’s turn to fully take the reins. Mr. Wolcott wouldn’t even be around on Thursdays.

Near the end of the latest rehearsal on Friday, Mr. Wolcott turned to Truman and asked, “So, Truman, after a week of reading the script aloud, how do you think we’re doing? Any notes?”

Truman had been largely silent during the rehearsals that first week, allowing Mr. Wolcott to take the lead while he scribbled madly in a leather-bound notebook upon which he’d pasted a black-and-white still of Jimmy Stewart as Elwood P. Dowd in the movie version. The notes he made, he dutifully turned over to him before homeroom every morning. It did Truman’s heart good to see Mr. Wolcott earnestly incorporating those notes during each subsequent rehearsal.

“Johnny, you need to speak up, project more. Aim for the last row in the theater,” Mr. Wolcott would say, for example, taking that “last row” comment from Truman’s own advice, advice Truman himself had stolen from the internet.

“Lori, be willing to take some chances. Loosen up. Don’t be afraid to be someone you’re not. Think about how you’ll look in one of those old-time nurse’s uniforms with the little cap. Be that nurse.”

“Amber, Veta Louise is a society matron, nose in the air. Go ahead, put on airs.”

And so on. So much so that Truman was beginning to feel he actually was directing the play, but from the back seat. He looked forward to when they started blocking in earnest and making the play real instead of sitting in this confounded circle. And he really anticipated Thursdays, when he could be in charge, if only for the night.

But back to Mr. Wolcott’s question. What overall thoughts did Truman have? This would be his first time truly speaking to the cast, although he had tossed out a bit of advice here, some snark there, a laugh after a certain line.

“Well, I think you’re all doing a really good job.” He forced himself to look at each of their expectant faces in turn. “I can see that some of you already are well on your way to having your parts memorized. And that’s impressive after only a week.” He eyed Kirk Nizer, who had been cast in the part Truman used for his audition, that of the pivotal cab driver, EJ Lofgren. Nizer had never lifted his head from the script, not once. And sometimes he even seemed to stumble over his lines, as though reading didn’t come easily to him. Why on earth had Mr. Wolcott cast him? Truman thought his own cabdriver had stood head and shoulders above this boy’s. He’d have to work extra hard with Kirk, which wasn’t such a daunting prospect because he was kind of cute, with red hair, freckles, and green eyes, which made him appear boyish, yet the worked-out, ripped bod and the six-foot-four height was all man.

Maybe, it suddenly occurred to Truman, Mr. Wolcott wasn’t so stupid in his casting choice of Kirk—he’d be eye candy. There was a reason Hollywood was filled with beautiful people, some of them vapid and talentless but famous nonetheless.

Anyway…

“One thing overall I don’t see you guys doing, though, is interacting. You’re all acting, or trying to, and that’s painfully obvious.” He looked at Mr. Wolcott and saw that maybe he’d crossed a line, at least this early in the process. Mr. Wolcott gave him a sort of wincing expression, which Truman interpreted to mean “Tone it down. Be more diplomatic.”

“I mean, I’m impressed at how you guys are going all out to be your characters.” Truman smiled. “But, as I said, what we need to see more of is interacting. Sometimes it’s not what’s said that makes an impact, but what’s left unsaid.”

“And by that you mean…?” Mr. Wolcott asked.

“I mean you guys need to relate to each other more. You need to listen and react. See, from where I sit, I see you all taking turns reading your parts. Dutifully. You wait patiently—and graciously—for each person before you to finish, and then you read your part.”

Stacy piped up, “So?” Her eyebrows furrowed. “What are we supposed to do? Cut each other off?”

“No, no. Of course not, but remember that listening is equally as important as speaking. Sometimes you might do your best acting just by being silent.” Truman scratched at the top of his head, suddenly realizing everyone was not only staring at him but hanging on his every word. Heat rose to his cheeks. He was used to being the center of attention because he was the only boy in school who dared to wear a little makeup and, sometimes, clothes pulled from the women’s department, but he wasn’t used to being respected.

This was a new thing.

“Your reactions to each other are just as important as the actions you make and the words you speak,” Truman said quietly. He glanced at Stacy, who was taking notes in the margin of her script. “It’s really the opposite of cutting each other off, because when you cut each other off, you’re not paying attention. And what I want you to do is pay closer attention to what your scene partners are saying and doing.”

Mr. Wolcott clasped Truman’s shoulder, squeezed, and let go. “Truman’s right.” He stood up and stretched, signaling everyone else to do the same. “I think we’re about finished here for tonight. Everybody have a great weekend. We’ll hit it again on Monday.”

Truman stood next to Mr. Wolcott as he watched the cast file out. Maybe it wasn’t so bad—this student director gig. He was learning something and, wonder of wonders, establishing a place for himself in the high school hierarchy, even if he was only a minnow in a very small pond.

As he left the auditorium, Truman found himself actually looking forward to the long walk home. Autumn was in its last throes. The air, finally, had a real nip to it. Truman picked up on the scents of woodsmoke and moldering leaves on the breeze.

Ah! There was Stacy, just ahead. He thought to catch up with her. They’d walked home from rehearsal once before that week, and Truman was starting to like her. Before, he’d thought she was stuck-up, another popular kid, a cheerleader—someone who wouldn’t ever give Truman the time of day. Instead, he found someone who was warm, interested in him, and just as nervous about doing well as he was. And this was another thing he never would have expected: she came from similar financial circumstances. Unlike Truman, though, she didn’t even have a single parent to call her own. She lived with her great-aunt Sarah, whom she called Aunt Sus, the reasoning for which remained unclear to Truman. Aunt Sus was nearly eighty years old and was much more interested in reality TV and her Bible than she was in her great-niece.

Besides, he hoped especially to walk home with her tonight because he wanted to ask her about her cousin, Mike. He didn’t know what he wanted to ask, because really, what could he ask? What’s he like? How did he get to be so damn sexy? Was he a “friend of Dorothy”? Truman smiled. He knew he could never ask any of those questions of Stacy. For one, he didn’t have the nerve. And for another, asking such questions would probably nip their developing friendship in the bud.

“Stacy! Hey! Wait up.” The roar of a loud muffler, the deliberate kind and not like the one on his mom’s car that needed to be repaired, drowned him out. Truman was left waving his hand in the air ridiculously. With some exaggeration he tried to morph the unacknowledged wave into patting his hair into place, just in case anyone was looking.

He glanced behind him. No one was. In fact, Truman and the driver of the souped-up vintage Trans Am that had just pulled up in front of Stacy were the only people around this long after school had let out.

Truman stepped back into the shadows of a large maple tree as he watched Stacy approach the car idling at the curb. He didn’t quite know why, but he felt nervous about being seen. There was something illicit about what he was observing. Something secret. Truman could practically smell it in the chilly autumn air.

Stacy flicked her dark hair over her shoulder and leaned into the driver-side window. Truman could hear muffled laughter, flirtatious, coming out of her. And then a man’s voice—definitely not a boy’s—deep and raspy, as he talked to her. Truman couldn’t make out any words, but he caught the timbre and tone and could hear the persuasion being attempted.

Truman was about to step out into the light when Stacy turned and peered around her. Instead of stepping forward, he went back a little so he was more hidden. Stacy, he thought, looked guilty, as though she was checking to make sure she wasn’t being observed.

Truman thought he should let her know. What kind of stalkerish friend spied as he was doing? Before he had a chance to announce himself in some way, though, Stacy hurried around the front of the car to slide into the passenger seat. He heard the clunk of the door close. He tried to get a look at the man, but saw only the glow of a cigarette in the dark.

They roared off.

Truman stepped out from the shadows, feeling unaccountably shaken.

The whole scene simply looked wrong. There was a sense of guilt about Stacy as she peered around. The car, and the man—even though Truman couldn’t really see him—seemed too old for her. Plus, there was the weird fact that Truman felt a completely illogical stab of jealousy. Of course, he didn’t like Stacy in that way, but he was growing toward thinking of her as a friend. He was on the verge of asking her to come by his house some night after rehearsal, just to hang out.

But now he felt shaken, inexplicably a little nauseous. It seemed to Truman he’d witnessed someone doing a bad thing, something they didn’t want anyone else to see. Truman appreciated secrets, understood most people’s need to have them, but when he was forced to witness one—as he thought he was tonight—it just felt, well, weird.

Maybe he didn’t know Stacy as well as he thought.

Or maybe he did. Truman thought back to once upon a time when he’d carried around his own secret life—there was a boy who used to meet him on the banks of the Ohio, a popular boy with whom Truman thought he was in love. Truman had mistaken being used as a come receptacle as being loved. It had been a very rude awakening. Thankfully, he now had enough distance from that experience to see that it had taught him a life lesson, even though the result of that lesson had been a broken heart. He’d thought it would never mend—but it did.

Truman wanted to hurry home, be in his little house with Patsy, where he felt safe.

He started down the hill toward his East End neighborhood.

To keep himself company during the long, dark walk by the side of Parkway Road, he fished his cell out of his pocket and called Alicia.

She picked up on the first ring. “Oh, so you finally called? I thought you were getting too big in your britches for the likes of li’l ole me, motherfucker. Mr. Student Director!”

They both laughed. It was good to hear her voice. They had no classes together this year, and somehow they were always missing each other in the mornings. Alicia could just as easily walk to school from her house, so she wasn’t often at the bus stop. Hers was the last stop before Summitville High’s front doors.

Plus, Truman knew how tough it was for her to get ready in the morning—she had to share a single bathroom with a mom, dad, and two little sisters, all of whom needed to get out before 8:00 a.m.

“Oh hush,” Truman said as a pair of headlights rose up behind him, as though he were being spotlighted. He heard the familiar bass thrum of a muffler.

“Do you know Stacy Timmons?” Truman asked.

“White bitch? From the rich part of town?”

Truman laughed. “That’s what I thought too. Come to find out she lives just down the street from me in East End. She’s poor white trash—like me.”

Alicia snorted. “Well, she could have fooled me. Why you askin’ about her?”

“I don’t know. She’s in Harvey—plays the young ingénue part. I just saw her go by.”

“Where you at?”

“Walking home from rehearsal. On Parkway.”

“You be careful. There’s no sidewalk on that road, and folks go way too fast.”

The mention of folks going way too fast reminded Truman of the Trans Am. What he was about to say wasn’t provable or maybe even true, but he blurted his supposition out to Alicia, who loved gossip more than anyone he knew. “I saw her go by in a Trans Am with some older man.” He frosted the cake with even more made-up details. “Much older. Like, thirty. It just didn’t seem like the girl I was getting to know. You know?”

“I don’t know, Tru. I don’t know the bitch.” Alicia paused, and he could hear the crunch of something, maybe potato chips, as she chewed. “What do you care if she has a daddy figure in her life? I know you ain’t jealous.” Alicia let loose a high-pitched twitter.

Truman explained how he saw her get in the car with the guy—how she looked guilty.

“Well, we all have our little secrets, don’t we?”

Long ago, Truman had confided in Alicia about his “boyfriend,” Kirk Samson, the quarterback at Summitville High, a young man so deep in the closet he probably would have committed suicide if his secret got out. This was all before Truman had met—and begun a relationship that lasted through the spring of freshman year and the summer following—with Alicia’s brother, Darrell. What a pair they’d made, truly the long and short of any romance!

“I guess,” Truman said. “Although neither of us seem to have any lately.”

“Are you asking?”

“No. It’s none of my business.”

“You’re right. We’ve both become kind of boring. I keep waiting for senior year to heat up so I can have some secrets, like a rich white boyfriend.”

“You and me both, sister!”

They laughed.

Alicia continued, “What’s also none of your business is what this Stacy girl is up to on her own time.”

“Are you telling me to keep my nose out of other people’s business? Queen of Gossip at Summitville High?”

“Honey, you the only queen I know at our school.”

“Hush, girl.”

They teased each other for a while more, long enough for Truman to get near his own house. They eventually hung up, with Alicia promising to meet Truman in the morning for breakfast at the Elite Diner. Part of the diner’s charm, for both of them, was that their breakfasts there would be free, compliments of Patsy.

“Oh…and Alicia?”

“Yes?”

“Give Darrell my love.”

Alicia chuckled. “I will, but I hate to break it to you. He’s got a boyfriend, another B-baller. Irish guy from the south side of Chicago named Keith. He’s hot.”

“Oh, I know all about Mr. Keith,” Truman said. “Girl, the guy is all over your brother’s Facebook page. I’m happy for him.”

“Sure you are. Listen, I gotta run. See you in the morning!”

Truman stepped up onto his front porch. Odd Thomas must have heard him because he began scratching at the front door. Truman opened it and let the dog out into the front yard. Truman sat on the stoop as Odd made a circuit of the yard, sniffing the front hedge, nose to the ground by the gravel driveway, and finally squatting to pee almost out of view. He called the dog back, and the two of them went inside.

As he made himself a sandwich, he thought of Alicia’s comment, “Sure you are.”

He knew Alicia supposed Truman was simply pining away for Darrell.

In truth, Truman thought, settling down on the couch with his chipped-ham sandwich and Fresca, he was pining for a boy—just not Darrell.

He closed his eyes for a moment, envisioning the ice-blue eyes, jet-black curls, and broad shoulders of Mike Stewart.

Then Odd Thomas jumped onto the couch beside him and snatched the sandwich right off the paper plate in his lap.