Zara’s audition piece ends, and she’s still onstage. All she can see is the bright, cutting circle of the spotlight. Zara doesn’t want to leave, but the longer she stands here and hopes, the worse it will be when Leopold Henneman sends her back to Pennsylvania.
And then —
A voice in the dark.
“Indulge me,” it says.
Zara knew the director must be out there, watching her, but it’s one thing to imagine it and another thing to have evidence. Leopold Henneman is talking to her — that has to be a good sign, right? His voice is low but not smooth. It crackles and curls. When it says Indulge me, everything in Zara’s body leaps to say Of course.
“Miss Evans? Are you still with us?” he asks.
Leopold Henneman is the world’s most-famous living theater director, a fact that Zara finds as distracting as an itch between her shoulder blades. There’s also the matter of the visions. When most directors use that word, they mean some vague and dreamy idea of what a play should be.
Leopold Henneman claims to have actual visions.
Zara has to focus, to fight her way back into the story. Echo and Ariston. Love and death.
“What would you like me to do?” Zara asks. “The casting director said to bring one monologue —”
“I would prefer something else,” the director says. “A game.” His voice has grown hard, the tight bounce of a rubber ball. She wonders how many of the other girls have been invited to play.
“Who do you love most?” Leopold Henneman asks.
Zara has no idea what he wants her to say. The question takes on a new life inside her head. It seeks out memories, possible answers. The words ring and rattle. She can’t stop hearing them.
Who do you love most?
Her boyfriend? He has soft brown eyes and soft brown freckles. They spent most of the summer at the movies, sharing oversalted popcorn. They kissed in the sun at the lake, wrapped in towels, beaded with water. Zara likes him. But the distance between like and love suddenly seems like the distance between Earth and the sun.
Who do you love most?
The first person she kissed? That was a girl from summer stage. She was playing Wendy in Peter Pan, and Zara was one of the Lost Boys. It happened at one of those theater parties where everyone kisses everyone. The kiss itself was nice. But then the blankness set in. Besides, that couldn’t have been love because they’ve barely talked since.
Who do you love most?
Her parents? She loves them, of course. But it’s the of course that rules them out.
Who do you love most?
The Ariston to her Echo. How can she describe a person she’s never met? Her thoughts grow frantic and fast and hot to the touch. “I . . . I guess . . .”
“Don’t guess,” Leopold says. The weight of his voice tells Zara that she’s running out of time. “Show me.”
She stares out into the blank brightness of the theater. The director’s words thrash around inside her. Who do you love most? It’s a trick question. There’s no love wide enough to measure against Echo and Ariston. They’re legendary — Romeo and Juliet, but better. Less hormonal, more epic and defiant. Zara craves that kind of love, but she hasn’t found it. The closest she’s ever gotten is standing onstage.
Then — Zara looks down. She’s standing on a skin of black paint, a thousand layers of story beneath her.
“Who do I love most right now?” Zara asks.
Leopold Henneman’s voice takes on a hard crust of boredom. “Are you so fickle that the answer will change by tomorrow?”
Zara shakes her head, trying to chase off embarrassment and get back to a clearheaded feeling. Neutral, her drama teacher calls it. But that word always sounded too calm to Zara. She feels it like the moment on a diving board, right before jumping. She lines up her toes. Takes a deep breath.
And then she starts to change.
It happens to her body first — shoulders pinning back, chin exploring a higher tilt. Her palms float upward. Before she opens her mouth, she imagines what her voice should be: plush as a red velvet chair, tall and reaching as the fly space above. “You should know that I’m very pale,” Zara says. “Pale, and dressed in gold.”
There is no answer from the audience. But Leopold Henneman hasn’t told her to leave. Not yet.
It’s a stay of execution.
Zara twirls her fingers with a stolen grace. “I’ve given people so many reasons to love me. Death of a Salesman. The Misanthrope. Mourning Becomes Electra.” Zara is listing the plays that have been performed on this stage. She feels the need to touch every bit of the theater like it belongs to her — no, like it’s part of her. She rushes from the thick pelt of the curtains to the lip of the stage, where it tumbles into the orchestra pit. She stretches her arms up, toward the streaming lights. “Twelfth Night. The Trojan Women.” She works backward in time, excavating story after story.
Who do you love most?
Leopold Henneman gave Zara a trick question, so she gave him a trick answer.
“Interesting,” he says, a new lightness at his edges. “Very interesting.”
Satisfaction floods Zara, brighter than the lights. The director is playing along. And for one sharply outlined moment, Zara sees that she would do anything to keep this place. This feeling.
“And who is this charming creature?” Leopold asks.
Zara curtsies so deeply that one knee kisses the stage. “Aurelia.”