When Emily emerged from her bedroom the next morning, wearing the nicest outfit she could salvage from the rapidly deteriorating environment, she wasn't expecting to see Charlie sitting on the counter, swinging her feet, and eating a bowl of oatmeal. She scanned the kitchen and glanced into the dining room, as well.
"Where's Eden?" Emily asked, running her hand along her empty food shelf, willing some food to miraculously materialize there.
"I'm the only one with a call for the morning rehearsal," Charlie said. "They're going to rig me up for the first time this morning!"
Emily hadn't considered it until now, but of course, as the Angel of America, Charlie would have to fly.
"I have to wear a harness," Charlie grinned. "Luckily, I'm familiar with that sort of equipment." She threw a thoroughly unnecessary wink at Emily.
"Did you just wink at me?"
"Did you like it?" Charlie asked, winking again and smiling broadly.
"You're an idiot," Emily laughed and shoved Charlie in the shoulder as she walked past her get a glass from the cupboard. She could at least have some of the communal orange juice in the fridge.
"You liked it," Charlie stated matter-of-factly. "I knew it."
Emily chugged the juice down quickly as she pulled her phone from her pocket and checked the time on her phone. "I've gotta get going. Have fun with your harness."
"Where are you going?" Charlie asked, her eyebrows arching with curiosity.
"I'm...you know, I've got class," Emily shrugged, trying to act normally. Judging by Charlie's face, though, she wasn't succeeding.
"Em, it's Saturday," Charlie informed her, eyebrows creased, eyes a bit concerned now.
"Well, it's not...class, but it's for class," Emily threw out. "I have to meet people."
"O-kay," Charlie responded, drawing out the O. She didn't sound like she believed Emily at all.
"Anyway, I'm gonna be late if I don't head out." Emily turned to go and was nearly at the door when Charlie called to her.
"Em!" she said, coming up behind her in the entryway.
"What?" Emily spat, losing her patience more quickly than she normally did. Charlie's questions were putting her on edge.
"It snowed overnight," Charlie said simply. "You'll want to put some boots on."
"Oh," Emily replied sheepishly. "Thanks."
Emily backtracked to the hall closet and rummaged through the hodgepodge of shoes she had thrown in the previous night. She grabbed the first matching pair of boots she came across. She was pretty sure they belonged to Eden. Quickly, she sat down on the floor, yanked off her own shoes and pulled on the boots.
As she left, Emily looked around for Charlie, but the other girl seemed to have disappeared, either upstairs or into the living room. Emily felt bad about snapping at her, but she couldn't do anything about it just then. She promised herself as she set off down the street that she would make it up to Charlie later.
The nice thing about the snow was that it made things seem a little warmer, even if wasn't really true. It was like it gave the cold focus, Emily thought. It gave the frigid temperatures reason, something to work toward, to point at and say, "There, I made that. Isn't it beautiful?"
Something about the snow made Emily want to eat citrus. If things had gone differently, she mused, and she wasn't so broke and spending every free moment trying to get a job, she would have called a cab and gone to one of the grocery stores a few miles from campus so she could buy a whole crate of clementines. She would have taken one or two to each of her poetry workshops and peeled it as they started to work and let the bright scent fill up the room. She would have brought extra to share and handed them out like tiny suns during those long hours after dark.
Trudging through the snow, Emily ached for a life she had been living only a month ago. One where the winter was still as cold as iron, but she had poetry, fruit, and a pretty girl to keep her warm. She couldn't help but think that, maybe, if Paige were there with her, if she went to Vallance, too, that this wouldn't be so hard. It would be easier to confide in her and tell her the truth of what had happened. She decided to blame the distance for her maddening need to keep this mess such a secret.
"What did I know, what did I know, of love's austere and lonely offices?" Emily mumbled under her breath, quoting the poem from the book safe she had made Paige for Christmas. She hoped Paige might take from it the same message she did; love requires sacrifice, that sometimes you have to wake up in the blue black morning to stoke the fire, but that love like that does exist and they had it and Emily would work to keep them both warm. Emily trudged and Emily hoped. She was in the snow, but not of it. She would tell Paige the truth, today. She would not put it off any longer.
The Calico Cat was only about two blocks away from the train station. It was one of a few stores along that particular street that were what Emily thought of as touristy. They were cuter and more upscale than the rest of the establishments in town. In the immediate vicinity, there was a bakery; a long, narrow bookshop; the town's two nicest restaurants; a vast antique store which took up almost half a block by itself; and a hole in the wall bar that held a sort of warm and thrilling energy that reminded Emily of one particular evening that she'd spent in downtown San Francisco with her parents while on vacation as a child. This was the street that everyone hoped to work on, Emily thought, as she finally turned the corner, away from the Dollar General, the tractor supply store, and the pet shop on whose front window was scrawled the words "We have Hamster," and onto the picturesque, two blocks. Even the street itself was nicer here, paved in an evenly regimented pattern of bricks.
With her destination in view, Emily hurried along wanting to get in out of the cold. It was easier to do now, because the sidewalks along this strip had been shoveled and salted already, unlike the less cultured streets Emily had traversed to get there. She pushed opened the door of The Calico Cat and registered the light tinkling of a brass bell signaling her entrance. As soon as Emily unwound the scarf from her face, an aroma of lavender engulfed her senses. No, it was eucalyptus, Emily thought. No, vanilla, no...Emily turned side to side and seemed to catch a different scent each time she moved. She scanned the room and saw that it was dotted with low burning candles. There was also a table dedicated to handmade soaps nearby the front window on her left, and, she noticed as she made her way over to the counter where a grey-haired woman was calling out a greeting, there was a display of artisanal lotion and body butter arranged on an old, dark wood bookshelf. It was far too many smells for one establishment.
"What can I do for you?" the woman asked jovially. She was a black woman, probably in her mid-sixties, with a broad smile that fit her face like a well-worn sweater. Emily felt immediately at ease with her as the woman smiled warmly at her.
"Are you Shonda?"
"Sure am," Shonda replied, "what can I do for you?"
"I'm uh-the," Emily stuttered sheepishly, letting out a sigh laced chuckle. "I'm the girl who fell asleep in the Dairy Queen."
Shonda let out a roar of laughter and held out her hand.
"I'm Emily Fields," Emily introduced herself as she shook Shonda's hand. "And I'm not usually so sleepy."
"Come on back to my office and we'll see if we can't get you a job." Shonda motioned for Emily to follow her back around the counter and through a bead-covered doorway.
"Have a seat, take your coat off," Shonda instructed as she took a seat behind a desk that took up most of the small room.
Emily did so and, once settled, looked up to find Shonda looking at her appraisingly.
"So," the older woman invited, "what's your story?"
An hour later, Emily was standing behind the jewelry counter in the middle of The Calico Cat, tying a forest green smock embroidered with the silhouette of a white cat on its pocket around her waist. As she greeted her first customer, she felt that maybe, just maybe she would be able to get her feet back under her by the time the term ended.
The store closed at 6 pm that night and Emily trudged back home to the Log, finding herself truly looking forward to hanging out with her friends. It was Saturday night after all. She was sure that they would think of something fun or stupid to do, probably invite Tuck over to join them, probably all end up getting pleasantly drunk and nursing their hangovers together the next day over pancakes and coffee. Emily needed a night like that. She needed to blow off some steam. The relief inside of her at finally getting a job made her feel like a tea kettle, bubbling with steam, moments away from singing.
The house was dark when she let herself in. Emily was sure that the other girls were just having some dinner on campus at the cafeteria and that they'd be home soon and the merriment, whatever it would be that night, would begin.
She'd stopped at the Dollar General on her way home and bought a loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter, and some grape jelly. She preferred blackberry or raspberry, but grape was cheap, and Dollar General didn't exactly have a great selection. Now, standing in the red-walled kitchen, she contented herself with making two sandwiches and tearing into them. Emily hadn't realized until she started eating just how hungry she was. She hadn't eaten anything all day. She'd only had that glass of juice in the morning and then she'd spent her lunch break filling out paperwork so that Shonda could get her entered into "the system" and make her an official employee so that she could get paid as soon as possible.
When the sandwiches were gone, she looked around the kitchen for something else she could eat, something that the other girls wouldn't miss from their own cupboards. Emily pushed the cans and bags and packages around until she found a sad bag of mostly eaten in-shell peanuts that Charlie had bought early in the fall so she could teach them all how to crack them open by smacking them against their foreheads. The foursome had spent a memorable evening up on the roof, smacking themselves and each other on nearly every part of their bodies to crack open the shells, tossing peanuts into one another's mouths, dropping as many as they caught. They hadn't come in that night until Charlie started shooting the shelled nuts out of her nostrils causing Eden to laugh so hard she almost fell off the roof. For a month afterward, anytime the wind caught across the roof just right, peanut shells would rain down across the front yard, skitter across the sidewalk, and into the street.
Emily was reminiscing happily, crunching on the few remaining peanuts, when her computer, out in the living room, started ringing with the unmistakable tones of an incoming Skype call. She took off after it, skipping every few steps from how light she felt, swooping the computer into her arms as she entered the room and answering the call.
"Hi!" she chimed as Paige's face appeared on her screen.
"Hey, gorgeous," Paige answered, grinning. "You sure seem happier than you have the past few days."
"I am," Emily sighed. "I feel so much better."
She walked back into the kitchen, the laptop held aloft in front of her. She was still hungry.
"The girls home?" Paige asked. "I wanted to see if Jo had any more TV recommendations. I mean, I really like Battlestar, but I feel like if I get too into right now, I'll fail all my classes."
Emily chuckled. "Fair point. She's not here at the moment, though. No one is, actually."
"Really? You're all usually together on Saturday night."
"Yeah, I don't know where they are," Emily shrugged. "Rep Term is kind of eating them alive. I hope they come home soon, though. I want to do...something."
"Well, when you see Jo next, tell her I need a more mediocre show."
"Will do," Emily said, snatching a neglected can of deviled ham from the corner of Eden's shelf.
Paige watched, slightly amused, as Emily tore the paper off the can, pried it open, and sniffed the meat cautiously.
"What is that?" Paige asked, leaning forward to try to get a better look at the can through her computer screen.
"It's...ham. Of a sort," Emily replied, adding, "It smells okay."
She trotted over to the utensil drawer and grabbed a fork, returning to grab her computer and retire to the dining room so she could sit down while she talked to her girlfriend. As soon as she was seated, Emily dug into the ground up ham, humming appraisingly.
"So did something happen to put you in such a good mood?" Paige inquired, leaning back in her chair. "Or was it a general cloud clearing?"
"Well," Emily said carefully, remembering that what she had promised herself that morning. She needed to come clean to Paige about what was going on with her. She took a deep breath and went on. "I got a job today."
Emily finished the canned meat and set it and her fork aside so she could look properly at Paige, who was cocking her head adorably, looking bemused.
"You already have a job, though," she said. "Did something happen at the fitness center? Did you quit?"
"I...not exactly," Emily replied. Her stomach was starting to churn uncomfortably. It may or may not have been from the questionable mix of foods she'd just consumed.
"Did they fire you?"
"That wasn't really what happened either," Emily stalled. "I just had to, sort of, put that job on pause."
"Emily, what are you talking about?" Paige was starting to get impatient.
Just rip the Band-aid off, Emily told herself and braced for the sting of truth she was about to deliver.
"I'm not technically a student at Vallance right now, which means that I'm not permitted to have an on-campus job."
Paige looked flabbergasted. "Wha-" she started and then closed her mouth again, narrowing her eyes as she stared at Emily. "What do you mean?"
"You remember I was waiting to hear back about that loan I applied for when I was staying with you?"
"Yeah," Paige answered tersely. She looked unamused, to say the least.
"Well, I didn't get it. It was denied," Emily explained, the bitter taste of embarrassment creeping into her mouth. "I couldn't pay my tuition."
"So what happened?" Paige coaxed, wishing Emily would just talk until the whole thing was explained.
"I had a meeting with the Dean and she basically told me I had to take a leave of absence until I could pay my tuition...which means I can't use any of the school services or have an on-campus job."
Emily couldn't maintain eye contact with Paige as she said all this. She felt ashamed, like she had been excommunicated, or expelled for cheating. She felt caught and trapped and she rubbed nervously at her arms as she waited for Paige to say something. But the seconds ticked by and Paige just ran her hands over her face and sighed deeply.
The silence was making Emily feel cagey, and she heard herself speaking again without even deciding to do so. "I guess I'm lucky, though. That I live here, I mean. If I was still in one of the dorms I would've been homeless, too." She let out a dry chuckle.
"That isn't funny," Paige finally spoke quietly.
"Just looking for the bright side."
"Are you okay?" Paige asked, but there was an edge to her voice. It wasn't the tone of concern Emily had heard from her girlfriend so many times before.
"Not really," Emily said matter-of-factly.
Paige sighed again. "When did this happen?"
"The day after I got back." Emily forced herself to admit, knowing that this was the betrayal.
"That was weeks ago!" Paige blurted out, unable to control her volume as her emotions boiled to the surface. She paused for a moment, though, and breathed deeply, obviously working to regain her composure before she went on. "You've been lying to me for weeks. I thought you were taking classes and everything was fine."
"I never actually said I was taking classes," Emily spoke sheepishly, immediately regretting it. She knew she had been dishonest. She had lied by omission.
"You let me think that you were, Emily!"
"I know! I know, I know," Emily retorted, shrinking with each admittance. "I'm sorry, Paige, I was just…"
"Just what?"
"I was embarrassed. I felt so...worthless," Emily tried to explain how miserable the whole situation had made her feel, how desperate and scared and shaky she still felt. "Aren't you even...worried about me? I mean, you saw how I was feeling. Do you even care?"
"Of course I care!" Paige was up now, pacing in front of her computer. "But that doesn't excuse the fact that you lied to me! I mean…" Paige quieted down considerably as she went on, "we're together, we're supposed to tell each other things like this."
"I am telling you," Emily said. "Now."
Paige shook her head. "I don't understand. Did you think I was going to- to judge you or make fun of you or something?"
"No, I was just embarrassed, like I said."
"Why?" Paige repeated her sentiment.
"You don't know what it's like, okay? Not having money, not having enough money, it's just really hard. I didn't want you or anyone else to think I didn't belong here...or that I couldn't afford to be here. And I just wanted to keep it to myself until I had it figured out." Emily tried to articulate the feeling of shame that accompanied not being able to afford something, but it was hard to put in words.
The conversation seemed to disappear into thin air. The two of them were sat, so many miles away from each other, physically and in understanding, staring at one another. But it was as if a sheet had dropped between them and, try as they might, they could not see each other clearly. All they were left with were the still, unmoving shadows of one another.
"I'm sorry," Emily muttered, trying to push the sheet aside.
"I think I need some time to cool off," Paige replied, pinching the bridge of her nose. "I'll call you tomorrow, okay?"
"Alright," Emily said.
Paige ended the call before Emily even had a chance to say goodbye.
"Where the fuck are my friends?!" Emily yelled into the empty house, her head falling back against the chair.
She felt like crying. Instead, Emily stood up and went over to the fridge and pulled out the first item containing alcohol she could find, which happened to be a six-pack of Bacardi Ice. It wasn't hard. Even when there was no food in the house, there always seemed to be a full supply of alcohol.
Emily set up camp in the living room. She put The Adventures of Winnie the Pooh on the TV, set it to mute, and then put the rap playlist on her laptop on shuffle and plopped down on the couch. Soon, Pooh was doing calisthenics to Sexy Can I? and Emily was finishing her second Bacardi, showing no signs of stopping. It was only 7:30, but she didn't care. The faster she could drink, the faster she'd stop feeling so awful about her fight with Paige.
An hour later Emily had plowed through all 6 of the Bacardi's and she was well past buzzed. Not all of the alcohol had hit her yet and she was getting impatient. She had her notebook out in front of her, chasing the muse. She'd been inspired by the movie to write a poem about bees and flash floods. It was terrible, but Emily wouldn't know that until Eden did a dramatic reading of it the next night. At the moment, it was a beautiful eulogy for the state of the world, weaving together imagery from Emily's life with a scene where Noah tossed the animals which would one day go extinct over the side of the Ark and into the churning waters covering the earth. She'd just decided to title it, You Never Can Tell with Bs, when she heard a key scraping into the lock on the front door and the handle being turned.
"Finally!" Emily huffed, flinging her notebook and pen on the coffee table and hauling herself off the sofa. She was feeling warm and good now, the swimming sensation of the alcohol washing over her making Emily sway on her feet as she stood up danced her way into the hall.
Emily stood and danced in front of Liz, who was standing in the dark hallway for a full 30 seconds before pulling her hands up from her hips in the form of two finger guns and declaring, in a Western accent, "Howdy, partner. I'm not sure what you're doing in these here parts at this hour, but I do know that there's not room in this town for the both of us."
Liz looked utterly perplexed at the scene Emily was putting on in front of her. Eden would have gone full pantomime and challenged Emily to a duel right there in the hall, then she would have lost on purpose so that she could have a long, drawn-out death scene. Charlie would have told her not to move, run upstairs and returned moments later with fully loaded Nerf super soakers. Jo would have told her she was too drunk, thrown her over one of her shoulders, carried her back into the living room, and made Emily watch a John Wayne movie with her. Liz just edged sideways away from the front door and made her way over to the stairs. "Jo asked me if I could stop by and grab an old shirt for her to paint in. We're pulling a late night in the scene shop tonight."
"Oh," Emily chirped. So that's where her friends were hiding. Emily had no intention of spending the night alone. She needed to be with her friends. So, as soon as Liz started up the stairs, Emily went to the closet and put on her coat and boots. Then she found the flask she'd gotten Jo for her birthday and filled it with some whiskey.
When Liz came back down the stairs, shoving a couple of items of clothing into her backpack, Emily was waiting for her at the door.
"I'm ready to go," Emily said, smiling.
"Um," Liz stopped on the last stair, looking a bit uncomfortable. "This is kind of a Rep Term only thing, Em."
"I don't care," Emily stated simply.
"Okay then," Liz shrugged. "Are you going to turn off that music?"
"Oh, yeah."
Emily went back into the living room and shut her computer. The music stopped immediately, throwing the house into an almost violent silence. It made Emily think of an old man she'd once seen choking in a restaurant. He had been coughing, trying to get whatever was in his throat out, and all of a sudden the coughing had just stopped - his mouth was open, his hands were helplessly pawing at his throat, unable to make a sound.
"Are you okay?" Liz asked from the doorway.
Emily was standing with the TV remote in her hand, just pointing it at the TV. Liz's words snapped her back to reality, though, and she switched the television off.
"I was just thinking about this guy I saw choking at a restaurant, once," Emily replied truthfully.
"That sounds scary. Did he die?" Liz asked.
"Not that day," Emily answered wistfully.
Then she opened the door and walked out into the frigid night.
Thankfully, it was too cold to talk on the way to the theater building. Emily was in a very weird, drunken mood and she probably would've creeped Liz out if she had continued voicing aloud her rather morbid musings. When she was sad-drunk, she had a bad habit of getting caught up in the more macabre side of life and while Jo, Charlie, and Eden knew to snap her out of this mood before she really got into it, Liz wasn't nearly familiar enough with Emily to know what was happening.
It wasn't a long walk, really, but it seemed long when it was so cold out. Finally, after 10 minutes of silence, the theatre building came into view and in another 5 minutes, the two had made their way to the side of the building where there was a direct entrance to the scene shop through the loading dock.
When they entered the scene shop, the first person they saw was Eden, her hair pulled up on the top of her head in two little balls that always reminded Emily of Mickey Mouse ears. She was wearing a tank top and pair of jean overalls. Her arms were already covered in paint. She looked up when the two came in through the door and threw her arms up in the air.
"Em! What are you doing here?" she squealed.
"I was seven when my grandma died," Emily sighed, pulling out the flask and taking a nip off of it before giving Eden a tight hug. "I still remember how my mother leaned over and kissed the corpse on the forehead. I was too scared to even really look at her. Grandma was the first dead body I'd ever seen and the absence of her true self was absolutely glaring. It felt like a black hole, trying to pull the rest of us in. I was sure my mother was going to die from kissing her."
"Oh, sweetie," Eden cooed, cocking her head to the side in concern. "What happened?"
"Paige and I had a fight," Emily responded.
"It's okay, you're here now. We'll take care of you."
"So this isn't what she's always like when she's drunk?" Liz asked, taking off her coat and throwing it onto a pile nearby with a bunch of others.
"No, not always," Eden replied. "Only when she's down in the dumps."
"Ah, I see," Liz looked relieved. "I was a little worried."
"Edie! Did you find that turquoise paint?" Charlie had just wandered in from another door, clearly wondering what was taking her girlfriend so long. "Jo and I finished everything else."
Upon seeing Emily, Charlie walked up to her, helped herself to a drink from the flask, grimaced a bit, and then began to unzip Emily's coat and help her out of it.
"I told you she'd find us," Charlie mused over her shoulder to Eden, while she pulled off the flannel she was wearing over a faded t-shirt. Then she handed the flannel to Emily, who pulled it on without asking why and swayed slightly while Charlie buttoned it up over the nice blouse that Emily was still wearing from her interview that morning.
"You want to wear my pants, too?" Charlie asked, looking down at Emily's nicest slacks. "Those are not going to clean easily if you get paint on them."
"I don't think your pants would fit me," Emily said. "You're skinnier than me."
"Here, you can wear my overalls," Eden offered, unsnapping the straps. "I've got boxers on under. They're basically shorts."
Liz looked on in awe as Emily, Charlie, and Eden swapped clothing back and forth until they were each suitably clothed for painting. If any of the other girls had been watching her, they might have noticed that she looked oddly touched by the whole scene.
"We have to go finish something up. It'll probably take like a half hour," Charlie told Emily as she folded up the girl's dress slacks and tucked them safely beneath Emily's coat with the others, far away from the paint. "Why don't you help Liz with some of these background pieces and when we're done we'll join you."
Eden stuck a brush into Emily's non-flask hand and Emily nodded.
"Aye-aye, Captain," she said, giving Charlie a faltering, two-finger salute and a hiccup.
Liz handed Jo's clothes and keys to Eden, asking them to deliver them for her and then the pair headed off.
Watching Eden and Charlie walk away together, Emily couldn't help but noticed that she felt much happier already. Or maybe, she thought, pulling apart her emotions with the bold, messy recognition of her drunkenness, she just felt more calm and relaxed. Emily couldn't help but feel safe when she knew her closest friends were nearby. They made even the direst situations seem not only approachable but conquerable.
"Alright, well, let's get to work, I guess," Liz said.
She looked a bit put-out, which Emily wasn't so drunk that she didn't pick up on.
"You don't need to babysit me, y'know," Emily announced. "I work in the scene shop all the time. And I'm not that drunk." She took another swig from her flask to prove her point.
"What are you even drinking?" Liz asked.
"Whiskey," Emily answered. "Want some?"
"Sure," Liz acquiesced and took a drink from the flask.
Emily couldn't help but be a bit impressed when Liz drank it down like it was nothing more than water.
"I'm more of a vodka drinker," Liz told her. "I think it's more versatile."
"Ah, so you're a switch," Emily commented, mostly to see how Liz would react.
She gave Emily a side eye frown as she dipped her brush into a small can of red paint and consulted the diagram pinned above their workstation, showing what they were to paint.
"You're fighting with your girlfriend?" she asked, sidestepping the sex comment.
Emily was a bit disappointed at Liz's unwillingness to talk sex with her or even joke around, but it didn't matter. Not everyone was as comfortable talking about sex as she and the girls were. Emily decided to return the same look to Liz in response to the question about her fight with Paige. Two could play at this game.
"So why aren't you doing Rep Term?" Liz asked instead. "I see you around in the theater all the time."
"I mean, I help out in the scene shop and build sets and shit, but that's about it," Emily shrugged. "I don't act and I don't stage manage and I haven't taken any of the theatre classes."
"You just hang out in the scene shop for the lesbian cred, huh?" Liz guessed.
"Not really. I just needed to get involved in something when I was a freshman, and I thought it would be cool to learn how to build stuff. I met Jo on my first day. We were both volunteering."
"Gotcha."
"What part did you get?" Emily asked. She hadn't heard from Jo who Liz would be playing.
"I'm Harper in Part 2," Liz said, but she didn't sound too happy about it.
"That's a huge part," Emily commented. "I mean, you get that great monologue at the end when she's on the plane." Emily was referencing the TV version of the show that HBO had done, but she was sure Liz would know what she was talking about. "Aren't you happy?"
Liz shrugged. "I think it's kind of a soft part. I wanted to play Mother Pitt, but...Eden got that role."
Emily's hackles raised at the tone that Liz used when she said Eden's name. She'd been about to take another drink from the flask, but she set it aside and pulled the bucket of black paint toward her instead.
"You don't think Eden can handle the part?" Emily asked, brushing the bristles of her brush along the piece of wood laid in front of her, leaving a long black streak in its wake.
"No, of course not," Liz answered, "Eden is an amazing actress. Everyone knows that."
Emily relaxed a little hearing that. She could tell Liz was being honest. She'd said it as if she were stating that the sky was blue. It was simply a fact that Eden was incredibly talented.
"I just don't think the casting makes much sense, you know, racially," Liz added nonchalantly.
Emily's brush stopped moving immediately. Her body felt tense. She could feel the effects of the alcohol being quelled by this comment.
"What do you mean?" Emily asked. She needed clarification here, even though she was afraid of the answer that was going to follow. This was Jo's girlfriend, after all. She had to give Liz every opportunity to explain what she meant because she was very much hoping that it wasn't how it sounded.
"I mean, Alex Carson is playing Joe, her son, and he's white. So why would his mother be black? It doesn't make sense." She said it like it was no big deal, like there wasn't anything wrong with her thinking.
"That's fucking racist, Liz," Emily stated, turning towards the other girl. She set her paintbrush down carefully, being sure to keep it off the board that they were painting.
Liz looked shocked by this accusation. "What?! No- I don't mean it like that. I just think that story-wise it isn't very responsible casting. I mean, this family is Mormon. Their struggle with religion just isn't going to be as believable with Eden playing this part. I've never met a black Mormon."
"Charlie plays a mother fucking ANGEL. With WINGS. And you don't think that the audience is going to be able to deal with a black person playing a Mormon?" Emily's voice was very near a shout at this point. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. Vallance was a liberal arts college. How were there students here who still thought that whitewashing a cast, or not giving someone a part because of their skin color, was okay?
"Look, Emily, you're blowing this way out of proportion, okay? I just think that there are other roles in this play that it would make more sense for a black person to play, like the nurse or the homeless person that Hannah meets when she first gets to-"
But Liz did not get to finish her statement. Emily had heard enough. She grabbed the bucket of black paint from the workbench and threw the contents directly at Liz's chest where it collided with a wet thud, splattering up onto her face and cascading down her stomach and onto her legs and feet.
"Fuck you," Emily said. "Eden is ten times the actress you'll ever be and she deserves whatever part in any play that she is talented enough to land, no matter what the color of her skin is."
If the scene these women were currently standing in had been one from a play, the stage directions would have called for a beat of silence here. They would have noted that Liz's fists clenched, that her eyes widened in shock, that her body coiled with the electricity of an approaching cyclone. And perhaps, if the playwright was a rather poetic soul, they might have noted that Emily looked as sure and cool and ready for impact as a veteran storm chaser.
"WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?!" Liz screamed as her fury touched down and began to churn.
"What the fuck is wrong with you, racist bitch?" Emily countered, the alcohol may have been playing it's part still, as she didn't usually throw curse words around quite so often. If there was ever an appropriate time for profanity, however, this was it.
What followed was a veritable hailstorm of yelling and screaming, both girls tearing into one another simultaneously so that it was difficult to make out what either of them was saying. The group of students, led by Jo, Charlie, and Eden, that ran into the room about a minute later certainly couldn't tell what was happening.
They came in just in time to see Liz charge at Emily with her paint-covered body and send them both crashing onto the floor.
Jo looked horrified. That was the only thing that Emily registered as Jo pulled a struggling Liz off of Emily before she had a chance to do any real damage.
"What the hell is going on?" Jo asked in a strained voice.
"Your friend threw an entire bucket of paint on me!" Liz yelled, pointing furiously, though unnecessarily, at Emily.
Jo turned and looked at Emily, her eyes begging for an answer or explanation.
"She's racist, Jo," Emily said simply. "She was saying horrible things."
"What?" was all that Jo could manage as she turned back to her girlfriend.
"That's not true!" Liz retorted, the fury of her own convictions still fueling her rage. "I'm not racist! I was just talking about how I wanted to get the role of Hannah. Emily took it totally the wrong way because she's drunk off her ass!"
Emily saw Jo looking at the flask on the workbench, saw her look over at Emily and then back at Liz again.
"Jo, you have to believe me," Emily said. "I might be drunk but I know what she said!"
Jo considered the scene surrounding her, then moved to pick up the flask. She looked at it and then up at Emily, holding her eyes for a long moment before speaking.
"I think you should go home, Emily," Jo told her, handing the flask back to her.
"Jo-" Emily said, disbelief dripping from her mouth. Surely, she couldn't be siding with Liz.
"You shouldn't be here, Em," Jo stated, cutting her off.
Emily couldn't move. She could only stare blankly at Jo as the girl turned away from her and began talking to Liz, began leading her away with a hand on her back towards the door that led to the greenroom and the nearest bathroom.
Eden and Charlie had come up on either side of Emily and they were gently coaxing her back towards the pile of coats. Tuck, too, had emerged from the crowd of onlookers and Emily felt his warm hand on her back.
"I'm proud of you, Em," he said quietly. "Let's go back to the Log and talk there, alright? Theatre kids are terrible gossips. We don't want to fuel their fire."
Eden had taken Emily's hand and she squeezed it reassuringly before they all started putting on their coats. Soon they were walking back outside and it felt even colder after what had just happened.
