Chapter Text
It all started with a flyer. The colors popped out, gaudy yet oddly charming, portraying what looked like a set of cartoon dentures with googly eyes on one side of the text and a bubble with beady eyes and a sharp-toothed grin on the other. Pamina Park seldom paid attention to the corkboard above her apartment building’s mailboxes, especially after a particularly draining day at work, but on that dreary Thursday evening in particular, the young woman couldn’t help but look up as she cycled through the usual circulars.
Even with the sub-par lighting, Pamina read the text with ease: “ARE YOU LOOKING FOR NEW SKILLS? DO YOU ENJOY BEING IN THE SPOTLIGHT? COME STUDY STAGECRAFT WITH INDUSTRY VETERAN CEDRIC ABADI! FRIDAY NIGHTS AT THE BEARDED DRAGON REC CENTER! 8 PM SHARP, PLEASE CALL AHEAD TO RESERVE A SPOT!”
Pamina smirked at the flyer, oddly intrigued despite the bizarre presentation. There was something endearingly chaotic about it. She pulled down the flyer, carrying it into her apartment. If nothing else, it would make a decent distraction. Not like she could do karaoke this weekend anyway. Still, Pamina was always one to do her due diligence and took the time to look up this “Bearded Dragon Rec Center.” To her relief, it was real, so she bit the bullet and called the number. Not even halfway through the second ring, someone on the other end picked up…
“Good evening, Bea Whitmore speaking,” came an airy feminine voice with a sophisticated New England accent, “how can I help?”
“Uhh, h-hi, Bea,” Pamina stuttered, “I-I saw your flyer for the acting class…”
“Are you looking to sign up?” Bea asked. There was something about her voice that struck Pamina as uncannily composed, almost like a machine.
“Yes…?” the young woman lilted.
“Lovely!” Bea chirped. “What is your name?”
“Pamina Park?”
“Pom… Park…”
Pamina considered correcting Bea, but the words died in her throat. Too much time processing insurance claims behind a desk had made her timid.
“All right, Ms. Park,” Bea announced, “we have a spot open for you as soon as tomorrow. Hope to see you there!”
“Uh, w-wait!” Pamina blurted out.
“Something wrong, sweetie?” Bea inquired.
Pamina gulped and said, “I… I don’t see a rate for the class—”
“The first one’s always free,” Bea interrupted. “Then it’s a flat thirty per session if you come back for more. Is there anything else?”
Pamina thought it over. “Well… who’s Cedric Abadi?”
Bea cackled, catching the young woman off guard.
“You’ll see,” she chirped. Pamina didn’t remember saying goodbye, but next thing she knew, she was looking through her phone browser search engine, trying to find out who this “industry veteran” was. To her surprise, most of the results she found weren’t about movies or television shows he’d appeared in, but actors he’d coached.
“What’s a guy who trained A-listers doing teaching an acting class in Upstate New York?” Pamina muttered to herself. Just then, her stomach growled. She looked at the time, startled to see it was already past six o’clock. How long was she googling?! It was time to dig out the instant noodles, stat!
--
After one more soul-crushing day at work, Pamina rushed home to refresh herself. Sure, it wasn’t a ritzy affair, but she wanted to look presentable if she was going to be meeting new people. She showered like she was scrubbing years of grime off her skin, scarfed down another cheap dinner, and threw on a decent outfit. Pamina was sure she wouldn’t find the Bearded Dragon on her first try, so she left an hour early.
Sure enough, she missed her turn the first time and had to cycle all the way around, narrowly avoiding a reckless cyclist along the way. Really, who was riding a bicycle at this hour in October?! Pulling into the parking lot, Pamina took the first open spot she could see and hopped out. She walked up to the front door, finding a sign that read, “ACTING CLASS IN BASEMENT.”
The first thing Pamina noticed upon entry was that the place was in dire need of renovation. Peeled wall paint, stained floors, and flickering lights all greeted her as she descended the stairs to the basement. Now she was REALLY confused.
“What am I doing?” she muttered to herself. Despite everything telling her to go home and forget she ever found that flyer, Pamina was still heading into the unknown. To her relief and trepidation, however, she did hear voices coming from behind a set of theater doors, so if nothing else, this wasn’t a setup to lure her into danger. She opened the doors to find… a simple proscenium theater, a little worse for wear, but nothing out of the ordinary. And in that theater?
“Alright, fresh meat!” a masculine voice called out. Its owner was a lanky young man who looked to be of Asian descent, like Pamina.
“Um, h-hi,” the young woman squeaked. “I’m here for the acting class?”
The young man was about to say something else, but another person, a red-haired older woman in a vibrant blue satin blouse, beat him to the punch.
“You’re in the right place, honey,” she greeted Pamina. “Come on in, Cedric’s running a little late tonight.”
Clasping her hands, Pamina ventured further into the theater, taking note of the other present students: a shy-looking African-American young woman in a waitress uniform, an androgynous individual with sharp features and a brace on one foot, and a tall, bearded middle-aged man in a purple henley who was tapping on his seat’s armrest.
“Feel free to settle in, we don’t bite,” said the brace wearer.
“Speak for yourself, Zoobs,” the youth chuckled, snapping his teeth like a dog. “Rar! Rrrar!”
“Shut up, Jax,” the one called Zoobs shot back before turning their attention back to Pamina. “Yeah, you can just grab a seat anywhere.”
Pamina didn’t want to overthink it, so she took the nearest seat, right next to the redhead in blue satin. The older woman had the kind of gentle smile one might expect from an experienced kindergarten teacher.
“Welcome to the party, new stuff,” she said. “I’m Raina. And you are?”
“P-Pamina,” came Pamina’s soft reply. Raina cocked her head in a coaxing manner, so the younger woman repeated herself, slightly louder. “Pamina.”
A loud and melodramatic gasp came from Jax, who shouted, “She speaks! And here I thought I was gonna have to do the heavy lifting!”
“Jax, don’t be rude!” Raina chided the young man. She turned back to Pamina and said, “Don’t mind Jackson, his bark is worse than his bite.”
Pamina glanced over at Jackson, who grinned and shrugged his shoulders at her like a mischievous rubber-hose cartoon character. She gave an awkward half-smirk back.
“I’m Zoe, but in most art community circles I go by Zoob,” the person with the foot brace cut in, keeping the introductions going. “You wanna go next, hun?”
They directed these words to their seatmate, the shy-looking black woman in the Cheescake Factory server’s uniform. Giving a gentle wave, the young woman said, “Hi, Pamina! Uh, s-sorry, was that too loud? Um, I’m Gabby.”
“Sheesh, Gabs, no need to tell her your life story,” Jackson snarked. “So, that leaves crazy old Kinger over there.”
“He is not crazy, Jax,” Raina protested, “and his name is Kingsley.”
The sound of his name startled Kingsley out of his torpor with a yelp before asking in a strange accent, “Somebody need me?”
Pamina felt her initial trepidation fade away as the introductions unfolded. Sure, these people were a little eccentric, but none of them gave off any serious red flags. Even Jax (or was it Jackson?) seemed more playful than outright malicious in his teasing. But that didn’t shed any more light on the real man of the hour, who hadn’t—
“GOOD EVENING, MY BEAUTIFUL BUCOLIC BUTTERCUPS!” hollered a new voice, leaving Pamina completely discombobulated. She looked around, trying to locate the speaker, before her gaze settled on the stage. Standing on those boards, clad in a magician’s tailcoat and sleek black trousers, was the man himself. Cedric Abadi looked younger than the age of forty-five that Pamina had seen in her Google searches on him, with only a bit of grey around the temples and the edge of his mustache to telegraph that he was past his thirties. Standing beside him was an elegantly coiffed blonde woman in a sensible blue pantsuit.
‘That must be Bea,’ Pamina thought to herself.
“Sorry for the delay, friends, traffic was a right mess,” Cedric declared, “but I’m quite chuffed to see a new face tonight! Welcome, er…”
He leaned ever so slightly towards Bea, who muttered, “Pom Park.”
“Pomni Park!” Cedric shouted with theatrical approval, gesturing out towards Pamina. Normally, the young Korean American would have objected to such a haphazard butchering of her given name, but in the moment, she had only one thought running through her mind as she observed the grinning Englishman before her.
‘Why does he have to be so hot?’