Chapter Text
Dan was pretty sure his priorities were fucked to hell. He figured this because he hadn’t spent all yesterday evening doing Geometry problem sets or writing an essay on the French Revolution or even getting a good night’s rest. Instead, he’d spent the night memorizing Shakespeare.
It didn’t take him all night, of course. Technically, he wasn’t even required to have it memorized. He knew this because he’d read over the audition notice approximately two hundred and twenty-six times, searching for fine print that didn’t actually exist. Nevertheless, he’d memorized a monologue and two of the more memorable scenes in the second act. He wanted to be prepared. He wanted to impress them.
But as soon as he’d decided that bed was probably a good idea his mind started going around in circles about whether impressing them was possible in the slightest and who was he even kidding himself and what if everything went bad again. Needless to say, he hadn’t slept much.
Or he hadn’t slept much in his bed. His body had been perfectly willing to fall asleep on his desk during periods one through three, and on a music room piano bench during lunch break. Dan had set a phone alarm, he was sure of it. He definitely had, since his audition was scheduled for the ten-minute gap between lunch and his next class. It was only when students starting filing into the music room, giggling and giving him side-eye, that he realized his mistake. He had jolted up and was now dashing full-speed toward the auditorium, throwing out curses in a trail behind him. Dan really wished his full-speed were faster.
“Last call!” The shouting came from just around the corner. “Last call for drama auditions!”
“Wait!” Dan rasped out, skidding to a stop in front of the open auditorium doors. He braced his hands on his knees, nearly doubled over in his body’s frantic search for breath. From this angle, he was staring at a woman’s maroon velvet pumps. More of the woman was revealed to him as he slowly came to standing – her knobby knees under the hem of a flowing skirt, a colorful sweater over a neat button-down blouse, crossed arms and ginger hair in a twist and one raised, penciled-in eyebrow. Dan knew Ms. Alexis, the drama teacher and resident theatre director, but she didn’t know him.
“Auditioning for Midsummer?”
“Yes!” he exclaimed, still huffing, “Yes – sorry I’m late.”
Ms. Alexis shifted on her heels, burrowing deeper into her heavy sweater. Feeling her gaze steady on him, Dan took the moment to be embarrassed about his too-loose tie and the shirttails hanging out the back of his trousers.
“Right, well, you nearly missed me, but – seeing as you’re here now, I think we can hold the auditorium for just a few minutes longer.” She gave him a tight smile. “You’ll be my last for the day, mister–?”
“Howell,” he answered shortly. “Dan. And thank you. I really appreciate it.”
Ms. Alexis nodded. “Well, come in then, Dan. Just close the door behind you and you can step up on the stage and read. You’ll find a selection of sides on the table. Did you have any particular roles in mind?”
Dan had dumped his messenger bag on one of the front row chairs, and was pulling out his marked-up copy of the play. “Um…” He hesitated. What right had he to answer that question honestly? His ego had been beaten into submission by the fact that he was only a year ten, auditioning for his new school’s play after a year’s worth of being too scared to take the chance again. Personal hang-ups aside, he wasn’t about to forget that your average drama kid was a pack animal with a particular sensitivity to hierarchy. They were a unique breed of human that equally terrified and intrigued him. Never mind that he was probably one of them. “Not really. I’ll go for whatever. I mean – I’m just happy to get involved.”
“Why don’t you read for Lysander?” Ms. Alexis’s smile had grown kinder. “Act two, scene two, top of the page.”
As he mounted the stairs to the stage, flipping through his book, Dan was quietly pleased. He’d practiced this bit.
“Ah – I see you have a copy already.”
“Right, yeah,” Dan laughed a little nervously, lifting up his battered edition as if to wave. “It’s, uh, probably one of my favorites.”
“That’s wonderful,” said Ms. Alexis. She gestured at him with a bangle-jingling wrist. “Whenever you’re ready.”
Dan nodded, closed his eyes, and took a breath.
“Oh, take the sense – sweet – of my innocence…”
His heart had been fluttering in his chest, his stomach jumping, for all of the five minutes prior to this moment. “Love takes the meaning in love’s conference.” But he was okay now. His limbs were electric; his voice carried through the room. “I mean, that my heart unto yours is knit, so that but one heart we can make of it.” The play in his hand was open to the proper page, just in case, but he didn’t need to look. He knew this. “Two bosoms…interchained with an oath.” God, he’d missed this.
“So then two bosoms and a single troth.” This feeling of connection through language, of taking an amalgamation of symbols on paper and breathing through it with voice and body until it came to life. “Then by your side no bed-room me deny.” He’d done theater all through secondary school, up until he’d transferred. It was all small-scale, kiddie stuff, but it was enough to spark the drive and the love that he figured was invaluable to any performer. Auditions were terrible, as a rule, but this he didn’t mind. This was worth the sleeplessness and the anxiousness and the teetering probability of failure. In this moment, Dan was glad he’d swallowed the fear.
“…for lying so, Hermia, I do not lie.”
At the best of times, the end of a performance brought applause. This time, the last period of Dan’s monologue was followed by silence, apart from the furious scratching of pen on paper. His nervousness returned as quick as it had left.
“Very well. Let’s carry on to act three, scene two – if you wouldn’t mind terribly, dear.”
**
If anything were worse than auditions, it was cast list day. Callbacks were better than the both of them, thought not by much, and those had happened two days ago.
Dan had been one of three potential Lysanders reading with three potential Hermias, two Helenas, and four Demetriuses. He knew it was pointless to start with the opinions at this stage, but he couldn’t help hoping that it would be Analise who snagged Hermia.
She was shy; she stumbled on her lines more than Brigit and she certainly wasn’t drama kid royalty like Carrie, a year twelve who’d played the lead in every show Dan had seen in his year there. But Analise had pretty green-gray eyes and sat next to him in English. She laughed at his jokes on those rare occasions he found the courage to make them, and when he’d forgotten his copy of Moby Dick last Tuesday, she’d let him share hers. He’d clicked with Analise at callbacks more than any of the others. They fed off of each other, quickly building up banter, and Dan had finished their read feeling pleasantly buzzed.
Then again, Carrie had been starring opposite Chris –another Lysander contender – for two years running, and Ms. Alexis had been wiping away tears of laughter after their read. Chris was one of the first people Dan had befriended at the school. To be honest, he was a sizable chunk of the reason Dan had decided to try out. A few weeks into their friendship, Dan had made the mistake of telling him about that time he’d gone to put his arm around Sandy in their cardboard convertible and accidently punched her in the face. Chris, a drama kid who perked up at the smell of new blood, hadn’t stopped propositioning him ever since.
The cast list was supposed to be posted during lunch, and this was the single longest day of Dan’s life. His stomach had been turning too much to bother eating, though his best friend Louise probably would’ve forced a sandwich into him if he hadn’t bolted straight for the auditorium. He was lurking. He knew he was lurking, and standing hunched just around the corner from where the list would be posted probably wasn’t doing him any good. It certainly wasn’t making the minutes tick by any faster.
He saw the double doors rattling, and quickly ducked back behind the corner so Ms. Alexie wouldn’t catch his pathetic self. But the instant he heard the creaking of a hinge and the doors swinging shut, Dan rushed from his hiding place. His eyes scanned the freshly printed page, eager to latch onto a target.
And there it was. Dan’s heart leaped into his larynx. Somehow, he’d actually done it. A stunned laugh escaped his lips. Analise had gotten it too; he would be playing Lysander opposite her as Hermia. Carrie and Chris, the official Helena and Demetrius, hadn’t exactly relinquished their supremacy, but two year tens in main roles was nothing to scoff at. Dan could feel pride bubbling over beneath his skin. He cheered out a loud “yes!” that he was only self-conscious of in retrospect, after he heard giggling from behind him.
“Sorry, d’ya mind if I look?”
Dan spun around to meet startlingly blue eyes and a smile that was amused but hardly mocking.
“Right. Yeah, sorry – go ahead.” He shuffled aside, shooting a parting glance at his name near the top of the list. Cast list day tended to be an emotional one. Success meant cheering and occasionally tears and disappointment almost definitely meant tears. He looked back at the blue-eyed boy, curious to see which reactionary category he’d fall into.
Neither, it seemed. The boy’s pointer finger trailed down the list as he calmly skimmed from line to line. Settling near the middle, he blinked his bright eyes.
A small smile lit across his face.
“So, um, what’d you get?” Dan couldn’t help but ask, from a few paces away. He could’ve smacked himself.
“I’m, uh –“ The boy glanced back at the list. “Robin Goodfellow?”
Dan’s mind almost hit a stumbling block on the name before he realized.
“Wait, so you’re playing Puck, then?”
“Right – Puck!” The boy exclaimed, nodding in recognition. “That’s the character I got asked to read lines for, anyway. He’s a pretty funny bloke, huh?”
Somewhere, a bell rang, and more people were pushing and shoving, trying to get to lunch and classes and the list.
“I better be off,” said Phil. He had to speak a bit louder over the din of the hallway. “It was nice meeting you!”
“Yeah, you too.” Whoever he was, the blue-eyed boy had already disappeared into the crowd.