Nevermore-part 2

Lorraine leans against the wall in the girls’ dressing room, which doubles as a greenroom and is therefore double the disaster. “Shit,” she says. “I can’t believe our dress rehearsal’s next week.”

“Nervous?” asks Celia playfully. She chucks a little black eyeliner bottle at her.

“Only for scene three.” It’s her big kiss scene with Ryan, who has the curly black hair of some Greek god and is quite possibly the best kisser Lorraine has ever had the pleasure of acting with.

One of the guys, Peter, walks in with his brows furrowed. “Anyone seen my sword?” He looks up and realizes that around him stand six girls in only bras and underwear. “I put it in here after act two scene seven, but . . .”

Celia digs through a pile of clothes. “You know, some of us might actually care that you’re in here while we’re naked.”

Across the room one of the girls announces that she’s taking off her bra and nobody can look. Lorraine laughs and pushes Peter towards the door. “Man,” she says. “I love theater.”

~

Lorraine bikes home slowly. She doesn’t really want to hang out with Penny later; Penny’s a nerd and couldn’t possibly share most of Lorraine’s DNA. She keeps thinking about that kiss in scene three. It needs more feeling. After that scene, her character’s entire motivation comes from pleasing Claudius. If the kiss lacks feeling, the audience won’t believe her actions for the whole show.

She thinks about a lot of things at once, or maybe a lot of things in very quick succession, and before she knows it she’s come to the big hill that she’s taken as the halfway point between home and town. She dismounts the bike and walks up, not wanting to face the indignity of having to get off halfway up. She grins at the sight of three rottweilers playing by the side of the road.

Three rottweilers?

Lorraine recognizes them from town. They belong to Mrs. Ruth, who has a reputation for collecting stray dogs like some people collect baseball cards or old pennies. How did they get all the way out here? Lorraine whistles to them and they pause to look at her. “Come on, guys,” she calls. “Lets get you home.”

She doesn’t have much trouble getting them home, which is surprising to her because for her entire life dogs have devoted themselves to hating her with a passion. She walks beside her bike as woods turn into stands of trees between farmhouses and finally into the small town of Greenburgh. Lorraine leaves her bike lying in the sidewalk as she heads up to Mrs. Ruth’s door. The little old lady is sitting on her porch in a rocking chair.

“Oh, hello, you must be selling Girl Scout cookies. You look a little old, dear, I had no idea they lt you stay until you were thirteen.”

“I’m fifteen, Mrs. Ruth,” Lorraine says, insulted that anyone would see her as a thirteen-year-old. She looks sexy. “I’m not with Girl Scouts, either. I found three of your dogs way out on Long Road. I was just bringing them back.”

Mrs. Ruth’s wrinkled old face lights up. Lorraine notices that she’s wearing a fluffy pink bathrobe that doesn’t quite cover up a big white cast on her foot. She bends down at the waist to greet the three rotties that prance about on their hind legs, eager to lick Mrs. Ruth’s face. When they wag their tails their whole back end wags too. “Why thank you, sweetheart. You’re a doll.” She grins up at Lorraine through glasses that must be a half an inch thick, and she doesn’t seem to notice the awkward silence that’s crawling up from the ground to soak their ankles.

“Mrs. Ruth is there anything I can do to help you? With your leg?”

“Well, aren’t you a sweetie. I could use your help getting my extra paper towels down from the top shelf. I run out a couple’a days ago.” She leads Lorraine into a house that looks like it came straight out of the fifties. The living room is carpeted with a thick mustard monster that seems about ready to eat someone. An ancient TV and rabbit ears hunker down by the far wall, surrounded by corduroy-covered reclining chairs and footstools all in mustard-yellow or dirt brown. Mrs. Ruth talks continuously as she hobbles at a snail’s pace into the kitchen. “You’re Angela Harbors’ kid, right? The one with a twin? I always figured you two for nice girls. You remind me of my granddaughter, who’s off fighting in that war they got going on. Girls fighting. I’ll be. Anyway. My granddaughter Lisa named the three sweethearts you brought back to me.”

It takes Lorraine a moment to realize she’s talking about the dogs. “It was nothing, really.” She stands on tiptoe to grab a roll of paper towels off the top of a cabinet. “There you go, Mrs. Ruth. I’ll just show myself out.”

Mrs. Ruth doesn’t take the hint and follows Lorraine back into the living room. The three rottweilers are lying in the center of the triangle made of reclining chairs, looking for all the world like canine Sphynxes. “That one’s Nephew. He’s barely more than a puppy, really, such a lover. And that’s Wile E., he’ll steal the shirt off your back if you’re not watching it, and that one’s Blue. No reason for his name, any more than it’s a pretty color, all things considered.”

“Sure is. See you around, Mrs. Ruth.” Lorraine scoots out of there before the conversation can go on any longer. She has a long bike ride home.

Her mind turns to other things as she heads out of town. She thinks about that kiss in scene three, and how maybe she and Ryan should practice in real life. For the sake of the scene, of course. She gets most of the way home when she turns back to see three rottweilers trailing after her, their tails wagging.