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“Do you mind if I sit here?” She turns to look at him. Linus, impeccably dressed as usual. Always sharp, always clean. Which makes him all the more fascinating to Fanny. Tempting, even. Like the cigarettes she’s supposed to quit.
“Suit yourself.”
She slightly budges to give him room, before turning back to her cigarette. The backstage can get so unbearably cold during this time of the year.
“I thought you were going to…” Fanny trails off. “Never mind.”
Linus raises one eyebrow. “What?”
“I don’t know.” She shrugs. “Hang out with the gents. Thurston, perhaps. Or Edgar.”
“Why do you think that?” His lips curl into a bemused grin.
She keeps silent, not bothering to entertain him. Surely he knows what she’s talking about. Before his injury, Thurston was more familiar with pigskins than props; this production would be his first appearance on stage. Edgar, cursed with a face and body that betray his natural effeteness, has been mostly playing nameless lumbering goons. The implication is clear. She’s a professional, and he, like the other two, is nothing more than a walking walk-on.
“The two of them are already getting on just fine,” he continues. “I’d hate to intrude.”
“True.” Fanny scoffs. “Too fine, if you ask me.”
“That’s their business, not yours.”
“It’s not that. God knows I have better things to do than worry about who’s ‘getting on’ with who.”
“Like having a smoke on your own in the corner?”
“You know, Linus, you’re one of the only guys here that haven’t exhausted my patience,” Fanny says, “and believe me, you’d want to stay that way.”
“If you say so. Would it hurt to ask for a cig, though?”
Fanny gives him a sour look. She procures a pack out of her purse, from which he takes one. When he leans in so she can light his cigarette, she can better smell his cologne. There’s hints of aromatic wood, hidden beneath the fresh fruits. A knot briefly forms in her stomach.
After several puffs have been let out in silence, Fanny feels her shoulders relaxing.
“You know, I’ve seen your Hamlet.”
She coughs.
“When was that? ‘28? ‘29?”
“1928, yes.”
“There was that critic who said that you were the ‘finest actress to play the Dane since Bernhardt’. I had to come and see for myself.”
“Huh.”
“He was wrong. You were the finest actress, period.” Linus chuckles. “Well, obviously I’ve never seen Bernhardt. Even if I could, I don’t think I want to.”
Fanny scrunches up her nose. Her jaw starts to tighten. “Thank you.”
He’s rubbing her the wrong way. She continues to pretend getting lost in the haze of her own smoke as it permeates the air, intertwining itself with silence. She couldn’t care less what he thinks. Never mind that her heartbeat has wildly accelerated since he brought up her Hamlet. Never mind that she still keeps the clipping of what that particular critic said in her wallet, despite having torn it to pieces in a fit of desolate rage one drunken night only to tape it back together again the morning after.
She’s on the verge of literally biting her tongue. There’s no way she’d ask him why he thinks that. That’s just sad. Like she’s begging for him to shower her with praises. She’s not that desperate, for crying out loud.
She’s a professional, isn’t she?
“Oh, I think that’s our cue,” Linus says. She leaves her stub at the ashtray and stares at the ashes for slightly too long.
On the next cigarette break, she’d rather go to the diner across the street if it means not having to see him.