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Private Message History with O.G.

O.G.: Your days in Winslow's Drama Club are numbered.
O.G.: Charlotte Daaé will be singing on your behalf from now on.
[O.G. Has Been Blocked. You will no longer be able to send or receive messages from them.]

It was a tradition for the Winslow Drama Club's cast and crew to celebrate after our closing night at Fugly Bob's, and Saturday night after Hannibal had closed was no exception.

I had been in the process of changing out of my costume and into my street clothes when I head a knock on my dressing room door.

"Just a minute!" I shouted, throwing a top on over the corset I had worn with my costume.

I cracked open the door to my dressing room and there was a familiar boy my age I could have sworn I'd seen before.

"Can I help you?" I asked.

"Yes, I just wanted to know if you still had that scarf." He said. I was caught off-guard by his non-sequitur about a scarf. The only person I could think of who'd ask me about a scarf was...

"Forrest?!" I asked, shocked.

"Surprise!" He said, smiling.

"What are you even doing here?" I asked. Forrest Chagny was an old friend of mine growing up, back when we had lived in Boston before dad passed away. When we were kids, I had lost my favorite scarf at the beach when it had blown into the ocean. Forrest, in the infinite wisdom of an 8 year old, dove into the waves to retrieve it. In November. He had caught a cold from that, but I'll never forget that look of triumph on his face when he had emerged from the sea like Botticelli's Venus, holding the scarf.

"Well I was in the neighborhood and I recognized your name in the playbill, so I bought a ticket." Forrest explained. "You did an amazing job on stage tonight."

"Awww you're so sweet." I said. "Listen, everyone in the cast is going out to Fugly Bob's in a little bit. Do you wanna come with me to that?"

"Are you kidding?" He replied. "I'd love that!"

"Great! Just give me like 2 seconds to get out of this corset and finish changing and we can head over there." I replied.

I closed the door and left Forrest outside while I finished changing.

"Charlotte..." came a voice from the walls. It wasn't Forrest's voice. It was that voice.

"Charlotte..." the voice said. "He will only hold you back."

"How can you talk like that, when I sing only for you!" I shouted.

"Are you tired my angel?" said the voice.

"Tonight I gave you my soul and I am dead on my feet." I said.

"Your soul is a beautiful thing, Charlotte," it said. "and I thank you. No emperor has ever received so fair a gift. The angels wept tonight."

"Angel please." I said.

"Shhhhh my sweet." the voice said. "Someone else is listening."

That hit me in the gut, someone else had been listening in on my conversation. But the only person I could think of would have been Forrest. I quickly finished changing out of my costume and into my street clothes in silence.

Opening the door to my dressing room, I found Forrest standing there, looking guiltily like he hadn't just been trying to listen in on my conversation.

"Hey Forrest, I'm feeling kinda wiped out tonight. Can I take a rain check on dinner." I said. "Tomorrow night maybe?"

As I watched the smile on his face fade into nothing in front me, I felt a pang of guilt stab at my heart.

Leaning in, I gave him a peck on the cheek. "See you tomorrow." I said.

—

As Forrest watched Charlotte hurry out the door to the cast party, he realized that the dressing room door had been left open, and yet no other person had left through that door. As if to satiate his curiosity, he went inside, hoping to find that mysterious person Charlotte had been speaking with.

The inside of the room was dark, the lights having been turned off when Charlotte left.

"I know you're in here!" Forrest shouted. "What are you hiding for?"

The dressing room was dark and silent, with the only sound being Forrest's breathing.

"I'm not letting this drop until you show yourself!" he exclaimed. "If not, then you are a mere coward."

He turned on the flashlight app on his phone. The electronic light barely made a dent in lighting up the pitch black room. Using his phone's flashlight, he looked around for the light switch. Finding it, Forrest flipped on the lights, blazing the dressing room with its incandescent illumination.

The room was empty.

Forrest went through the closet, opening up the cupboards, and felt around the walls, looking for the hidden doors.

Nothing.

He began to wonder if he was going insane. He had heard Charlotte talking to someone in this very room. A room that he had only seen Charlotte leave from, and that had a single exit.

Turning the lights back off, he closed and locked the door. He'd ask Charlotte about it tomorrow.

—

As it was after any show, Fugly Bob's was packed with theater students.

A full half of the booths were taken up by theater kids from Winslow, all of them celebrating the success of Hannibal. Crowded into one of the booths was Charlotte, Megan, Laura, and Cecily.

"Where's Emma?" I asked. As much as she was a bitch to me, I didn't want to leave her out, she was just as much of this production, even if she hadn't ended up making it to the stage because of her ankle.

"She didn't feel like coming." Laura explained. "I heard her over in the nurses office last week after she sprained her ankle. Blackwell was all like 'it was simply an accident Miss Barnes, these things happen in the theater.'"

"Her dad was so pissed about that." Laura continued. "Saying like 'well stop these things from happening.'"

"That'll be the day." snorted Megan. "I don't think I've ever had a show here where nothing went wrong. You hear anything else?"

"Just Blackwell saying something about a settlement being the reason that they don't have money for anything." said Laura.

"So Charlotte, I gotta ask," said Megan. "Where'd you learn to sing like that?"

"Back before he died, my dad used to tell me stories of an angel of music." I explained. "And eventually I would dream of them as well."

"This angel wouldn't happen to be 15 feet tall and screamy, would she?" asked Cecily.

"They're not that kind of angel Jamie." I explained. "It's just like, whenever I would practice singing, they'd harmonize with me and help me hit the right notes."

"Charlotte, you must have been dreaming." Megan said. "Things like that don't happen outside of books."

"Then believe I've got a really good vocal coach. But that's how I learned to sing as well as I have Megan." I said.

The conversation died down then as everyone's food started arriving.

Dear Ms. Blackwell,

Just a brief reminder that my settlement for this month has yet to be paid. Please send it to me as soon as possible or else dire action will have to be taken.

O.G.

P.S. No one likes a debtor so it's better if my orders are obeyed