Flaming

Zakary smirks privately, watching Hudson cower under the director’s scrutinizing words. And as Oliver hops onto the stage to coach him with a more hands-on approach, Zakary imagines himself in Hudson’s shoes, playing the lead role, uttering the playwright’s exquisite words, feeling the emotion of the mysterious, multifaceted character. He understands him more than he does himself. He lives and breathes every line that character speaks.

But Zakary is just a stagehand. He’ll never stand in front of an audience. He’ll never enjoy that final moment in the end, when the story has been finished, and the cast gathers in front of a roaring audience for the curtain call. He’ll only ever watch and listen from the wings, hidden behind curtains and black clothing, unseen.

Except perhaps for his flaming red hair.

“Tisdale!” hisses a voice from behind. Zakary nearly jumps out of his skin as he spins around. It’s Becky again, with her headset on and a frighteningly thick and busy clipboard pressed to her busty chest. “While we’re stopped, I need your signature really quick on a card. It’s an opening night congrats sort of thing for the playwright, and you’re one of the only signatures left. He’s a big deal. We need to kiss his ass. You know how it is.”

The playwright. The bright-eyed and handsome mastermind behind it all.

Zakary bites his lip, thinking of Jonatho. He’s one of the only ones who didn’t comment on Zakary’s Never Have I Ever post. Did he even see it? Of course not. He doesn’t seem like the type who’d pay attention to some silly online forum—or be aware of its existence at all.

“Tisdale?”

He flinches. “Of course, yeah, I’ll … I’ll sign it.”

“What’s going on with you?” Becky frowns suspiciously at him. “You dye your hair red like a crazy person, you’re staring off daydreaming during dress rehearsal, and now you’re not answering me.”

“What? Oh, I-I’m just—” He shakes his head and laughs it off. “Sorry. I’m just … anxious about opening night.”

Becky smirks, considering him. “Well, I can’t afford an anxious stagehand. I already have anxious actors, an anxious director, and a whole list of to-dos that still have to happen before tomorrow.”

“Sorry. I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me.”

“And don’t you worry about opening night,” she whispers. “Hudson will still suck as much as he does now, and the audience will be too nice to tell him—though I doubt that niceness will reflect in his first review in the Dallas Observer. Look, the card is in the greenroom. Sign it before you—”

“Hey, you! Come out here!”

Zakary and Becky both glance through the break in the curtains, where Oliver is eyeing them. Were they whispering too loud? Did they get in trouble?

Oh. Actually, the director’s only eyeing Zakary. “M-Me?”

“Don’t pee your pants,” says Oliver. “I just need a body. Come out here. I’m giving my actors a little demonstration. Hurry, come on, come on.”

After a flush-faced glance at Becky, which almost looks like a cry for help, Zakary leaves the safety of the wings and enters the stage. Near-blinding stage light pours over him with its dry, assaulting heat. He could imagine his flaming red hair bursting into literal flames. Or perhaps that’s his cheeks, as he feels the eyes of the lighting and sound board operators staring down at him from the lighting booth, and the eyes of Hudson and Emilio upon him, as well as the director himself, who guides him to the front of an onstage table. He dreamed of being onstage, but not like this.

“Just stand there like a cute coatrack and say nothing,” says Oliver. “Yes, just like that.” Then he proceeds to sensitively school Hudson and Emilio on the varying nuances of speaking to a longtime lover who is breaking up with you.

Zakary’s eyes wander to the house full of empty seats, imagining them being filled with bodies on opening night. What a feeling that’d be, he wonders, equally amazed and terrified at the thought, to be standing on this stage in front of so many watching faces. Why is it that he’s only confident enough to do such a thing in his dreams? Why does he freeze up so easily in real life?

“I’ll play your role,” Oliver tells Hudson, “and this stagehand here will represent you, Emilio. Are you two paying attention? Pay attention to my stance, Hudson, to the tension in my body. You won’t see me release even a tiny bit of it as I speak.” The director faces Zakary, takes a second to get into his character, then recites his line. “Is this really how it ends? Are you … Are you ending things with me? Just because I asked you to my sister’s wedding? How deep does your fear of commitment go?”

Perhaps it’s the empty audience, or the fact that Zakary suddenly feels like a part of the show—or a stroke of random courage that comes from his fiery new hair color—but at once the next line slips from his lips without his permission: “This ended a long time ago.”