I slink into the venue, which is still dark and empty at this point. I remember that the dressing room is right at the back, but I feel like I need a few minutes alone before I have to do any more actual interacting, so I duck into the little toilet behind the lighting rig.
I should really have been expecting it, but seeing my reflection in the mirror makes me genuinely jump. If Harv’s been inflated, then I’ve been whittled down. It’s the face I saw in the programme last night. I push my bony nineteen-year-old cheeks right up to the glass to find soft patches of nearly-stubble in place of wrinkles, and no sign yet of a widow’s peak retreat in my thick dark brown hairline.
I splash my face with cold water and as soon as I come out of the toilet, I hear a voice behind me.
‘Marek is going to KILL you!’
Alice is right there, smirking up at me. She looks … To be honest, she looks almost exactly the same as when I saw her at the wedding. Which is to say that she looks a bit like a blonde Phoebe Cates in Gremlins, except she’s now sporting more of an Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction haircut. She looks good.
‘Come on, the audience will be in any minute.’ She beckons me through to the dressing room, which is stuffed with bodies: people wriggling into shiny suit jackets, having their faces frantically powdered, yelling out lines at random across the uproar. I spot Marek – who hasn’t changed much either; same beard, glasses, wild hair – in the corner, muttering into his phone. He sees me, mimes throttling someone (presumably me) but doesn’t break off the call.
‘He’s found somebody to do the props, I think,’ Alice tells me. ‘Some mate of Jamila’s. He’s just speaking to her now.’
I nod as I feel the beginnings of a thin film of sweat on my brow. Because I suddenly know where all this is heading. I know that I’ll see her in – what will it be – ten minutes? And then it’ll be much, much harder to pretend this is all happening to someone else.
‘Audience is coming in!’ somebody hisses, and suddenly the noise level in the room sinks to a nervy murmur.
The next few minutes are a total blur. I’m helped into my costume – a cheap black Reservoir Dogs-type suit – and then slapped about gently by a girl with a powder brush.
The play has started by now – I can hear Marek on stage, hamming it up – and its finer details begin to tumble back into place in my mind.
The Carol Revisited. ‘Dickens meets Tarantino’ is how Marek pitched it to us at the first rehearsal. Six months from now, he will be openly dismissing it as ‘crude and underdeveloped’, but at the moment, I can hear him giving it his absolute all as he bellows, ‘Humbug, motherfucker!’ at the presumably bewildered audience.
Marek was – is – Drama Soc chairman, and therefore also was – is – a massive show-off. Not content with writing and directing, he’s also playing the main part: Vinny Scrooge (seriously), a meth dealer who is near-fatally shot by a hitman and then guided through his past experiences by a mysterious ghost.
I’m playing the hitman, I remember that much. And the ghost—
‘Ben, dude, they want us backstage.’
I turn around to see a stark-naked man standing in front of me, a stoner’s grin smeared across his face.
Bloody hell. Clem Matthews. Third-year, I think. Not what you’d call a natural actor, but apparently the only student on campus willing to get his knob out in public. I suddenly wonder what he’s doing nowadays. Porn, presumably.
Quite why Marek insisted on the ghost being fully nude, I can’t remember now. Something to do with spiritual realism and shocking the ‘boring old farts’ in the drama department, I think.
‘Come on, let’s go,’ Clem says.
The costume girl stops me. ‘Hang on, are you keeping that watch on? You weren’t wearing it in rehearsals.’
I stare down at my watch, still stuck firmly at a minute to twelve. I forgot I had it on. Why do I have it on? How the hell is it still here when everything else has disappeared?
‘It’s fine,’ Clem breezes. ‘Hitmen obviously wear watches. They don’t want to be late for their murders, do they?’
He grabs my arm, and I follow his bare arse cheeks out behind the wobbly set. We both stand in silence, waiting to go on.
‘How you feeling?’ he whispers. ‘Nervous?’
I suddenly recall how awkward this always was in rehearsals, having to make small talk as I tried very hard to ignore Clem’s dangling penis.
‘Bit nervous, yeah,’ I whisper.
He shrugs. ‘You’ve only got, like, three lines. You’ll nail it.’
Three lines. Why is everyone so obsessed with this three-lines thing? Then it hits me: I have no idea what these three lines are. It’s been fifteen years since I looked at this script. I’m about to walk out on stage with no clue what to say when I get there.
I’ve just decided to make a run for it when I feel a light tap on my shoulder.
‘Hey, are you Ben? This is yours, right?’
Daphne smiles brightly as she holds out a plastic fake revolver.
Chapter Eight
I was expecting to see her, but still.
For a second, I am caught so completely off guard that I can’t even move. Daphne has to lift my hand up and press the gun into it.
‘They told me: “Ben’s the one who’s not naked”,’ she whispers. ‘So I’m guessing that’s you?’
I nod, dumbly. I can’t believe it’s really her. My heart feels like it’s trying to punch its way out of my chest.
Even in the almost pitch darkness I can tell her smile is on full beam. Her curly hair is pulled back into a ponytail that drapes halfway down her shoulder and she’s dressed in the regulation backstage outfit of tight black top and black leggings; a combination that makes her look a bit like a ballerina or a strangely sexy cat burglar.
I’m vaguely aware that I am just staring openly at her, which is probably coming across as more than a little creepy. But I can’t help it.
When this moment first happened, fifteen years ago, I’d be lying if I said it was a fireworks-in-the-sky, love-at-first-sight revelation. As she handed me the gun, I’m pretty sure all I thought was: ‘Huh, the new props girl is quite hot.’
But now – somehow – I’m standing here looking at the girl who’ll become the woman who’ll become my wife. I’ve spent the past fifteen years with her. I know her inside and out. Or at least I think I do. Either way, I have no idea how to treat her like a total stranger.
This weird, silent trance is shattered by the sensation of Clem’s penis bopping me gently on the thigh as he leans across to introduce himself.
‘I’m Clem,’ he whispers, offering his hand. ‘I’m the one who is naked.’
Daphne nods and shakes it. ‘OK: naked, not naked,’ she says, pointing at him, then me. ‘I think I’ve got it. And I’m Daphne, by the way.’
Clearly, both of them are now finding my slack-jawed gawping slightly awkward, because Daphne dials her smile down and looks away, and Clem starts massaging my shoulders.
‘Ben’s a bit nervous,’ he mouths at her. ‘Even though he’s only got three lines.’