“Does she like it?” Cal asked. “Or is it necessary?”
“Same thing,” I said.
Cal tilted his head. “Is it?”
“For her,” I said. “She doesn’t have the time—or energy—to enjoy things for the sake of enjoying them. All that matters is survival.”
“Hmm.” He actually rubbed his chin as he leaned even farther back. “Hmmm.”
“What?” I asked.
It was sharper than I had intended, but I’d sensed some judgment in those “hmmms.” I didn’t like it.
“Nothing,” he said. “You just have an interesting perspective on her.”
“Interesting?” I repeated. “Or correct?”
“I don’t know if there is such a thing when it comes to character,” he said. “It’s all up for interpretation.”
That was incredibly not helpful. I wanted to be right. I was right.
“Why don’t we try going over some of her songs?” Cal asked. “See if we can infuse some of this information into your performance.”
We worked with the accompanist for an hour, stopping and starting, discussing lyrics, analyzing intent. How much of what Peggy said was honest and real, how much of it was a façade.
“She loves her double entendres,” Cal observed.
“Who doesn’t?”
“It makes her hard to pin down,” he said.
“Not if you ask nicely,” I purred.
He looked at me. I looked at him. The pianist let out a choking little laugh. I would have done the same, but the way Cal’s eyes had dropped to my lips silenced me.
I couldn’t help looking at his mouth too. His jaw. His throat.
I watched him swallow. Hard.
My legs felt a little wobbly.
“As Peggy would say,” I managed.
“Right,” Cal said. “Of course.”
The silence stretched out between us.
“I guess I walked right into that one,” he said.
“Mm-hmm.”
“Why don’t we take a break?” he asked.
“Sure,” I said.
Come on, Rosenberg, I thought. There has to be a way you can communicate with Cal that isn’t via passive-aggressive comments or suggestive replies.
I left the studio and walked around the block, trying to clear my head and calm my libido. There was something gratifying about Cal’s reaction, but I didn’t like how aggressively I was careening between feelings of complete resentment and knee-knocking lust. Neither was helpful, both simultaneously was even worse.
The accompanist was gone when I returned to the rehearsal space, and Mae was staring at her phone, her forehead furrowed with worry.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
She jumped. “Oh”—she put her phone away—“nothing. It’s fine.”
“What’s fine?” Cal appeared behind me.
Mae burst into tears, surprising all of us.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s nothing.”
“Obviously that’s not true,” I said.
I didn’t really expect Cal to do anything—in my experience, men were ill-equipped to deal with emotions of any kind, and they usually ran from weeping women as if a few stray tears might melt them.
My father, Ryan, and all other boyfriends had always responded to my emotions with a firm pat on the shoulder and a stilted “There, there,” while remaining focused on their phone or the TV or whatever else was more worthy of their attention.
But Cal immediately gave Mae a hug and made some comforting shhhh, shhhh sounds as she wiped her nose on her sleeve. Right. He had sisters.
“What’s wrong?” he asked when she’d calmed down some.
“She’s fine,” Mae said, “but my cousin fainted at work today. She’s a teacher in Washington Heights.”
“Oh my god,” I said.
“She’s at the hospital,” Mae said. “But she’s okay. They said she’ll be okay.”
“Let’s get you a cab,” Cal said. “You should go be with her.”
“But”—Mae gestured at the rehearsal space—“I have to take notes.”
“Don’t worry about that,” Cal said. “Your cousin is the priority right now.”
I could tell that Mae was torn, but she let Cal pack up her things and get her a ride to the hospital.
“Call me when you can,” he said as he walked her out. “But only to update me on how you’re doing—everything else can wait.”
I began to put away my own things.
“She’ll be okay,” Cal said, coming back into the space. “Are you leaving too?”
I paused. “I just thought…without Mae…”
The two of us alone will murder each other. Or…
“Yeah,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “Sure.”
“You wanted to work more?”
I wasn’t sure I trusted myself.
“I don’t know if we’ll be able to find another time to focus this much attention on Peggy,” he said. “But it’s been a long day.”
It hadn’t, not really. I was tired, but not drained.
I could stay. I could keep working. Just the two of us. Together. Alone.
It was fine. I was being dramatic. I was an adult. A professional. Cal was too.
I put my bag down. “Okay,” I said. “Let’s keep going.”
“Are you sure?” Cal asked.
I gave him a look.
“Okay,” he said. “Great. Thank you.”
“I should probably thank you,” I said, albeit reluctantly.
He raised an eyebrow.
“For caring this much about Peggy,” I said.
“I care about all my girls,” he said, clearly referencing the way our fully adult female characters were often categorized as “girls” within the show.
The rehearsal space, which had felt normal-sized and accommodating thus far, suddenly seemed to shrink. All I could smell was Cal’s cologne. Oranges everywhere, and yet, I still had the urge to put my face against his throat and really breathe in.