DISCLAIMER: ~to the tune of "The Little Drummer Boy"~ I don't own this thing pa-rum-pa-pum-pum... And I can barely sing pa-rum-pa-pum-pum...
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Yes, yes, I KNOW it's after the holidays. But I'm having fun ~_~ And I want to finish this before Valentine's Day.
~is probably having a bit too MUCH fun with this story, hee hee hee~
Now, go read!
"We are going to be so sick of carolers before this holiday is over," Subaru commented as she, Soi, and Tamahome attempted to get the dust off Tasuki's robe. There had been no clothes brush in wardrobe (she'd seen some funky slipper-thing) but there HAD been a roll of good old-fashioned duck tape. So they wrapped it sticky side out around their hands and basically padded it off the robe. The robe refused to give it up easily, however, but while it was slow going it was better than no going at all.
Outside the make-up room Miaka and Chichiri barely winced as the carolers blasted in and out of the theatre. It was all expected after the soundboard crashed (as it tended to do once a week) and the booth people ran the usual tests. Only this time they had, instead of the usual Reel Big Fish burned CD, a bunch of juvenile carolers that seemed to be on a perkiness level with Nuriko and backed with psychotic xylophones. It was truly a painful combination. But with great fortitude (and a promise from Chichiri that afterwards he'd get Miaka something to eat) they withstood the awesome trial set before them by the Gods of Patience.
That is, to say, until Miaka fell flat on her face on the stage for no apparent reason.
Now this wasn't a very unusual occurrence, as it tended to happen at least once a week. But this time was different from most for two reasons.
One: she was in full Mrs. Cratchett costume.
Two: there actually WAS a reason.
"Mrow," went a tiny voice as the owner poked its head out from under Miaka's rather frilly skirt.
"Tama-neko! Tama, come back here! Oh no, they won't like it if you mess up rehearsal…" A small figure with light brown hair ran down the aisle, scrabbling frantically for the cat and nearly falling over a la Miaka. However, he had MUCH better balance and managed to stay on his feet, hopping up onto the stage and untangling the cat from Miaka's costume as she watched with a vacant expression on her face.
"Chiriko, there you are no da!" Chichiri offered Miaka a hand up, which she gratefully accepted (although she nearly tread on Chiriko's hand in the process). "Where've you been na no da?"
"At the vet's. Tama had an appointment and Mitsukake wanted to be here in case something blew up again."
Chichiri sighed. "That was very wise of him, but you shouldn't have skipped rehearsal no da!"
The very small boy put on his best Pitiful Face, making his eyes large and teary and turning out his bottom lip as if he was going to cry. He held Tama-neko up almost to Chichiri's face (he couldn't quite reach far enough to really get him to breathe fur). "I'm sorrrrry! It won't happen again! But would you have poor frightened Tama face that mean vet all alone?"
Chichiri jumped back as Miaka snickered helplessly, nearly losing her balance again. "Eh-heh… no na no da. Okay… get Tama-neko out of here and go get changed, Houki expected you AWHILE ago no da… and what music do you want played at your funeral na no da?"
"NOT THIS!" Chiriko shouted across the house at them, already running back to the car with Tama-neko.
Chichiri duly made a note as the vaguely familiar voice of faceless-nameless rose out of the darkness. "Okay, back to work for a few minutes you two… and Chichiri, I don't think every line ends with 'no da'…"
"Yes no da."
Once Tasuki was dust-free (it took roughly fifteen minutes even with four people splitting the work) he and Subaru left the make-up room, where Soi was now draping Tamahome artfully with spray-painted chains, hoping against hope that Houki would NEVER find out about the Graying of Uncle Scrooge. She had a way of knowing these sorts of things. But no one was willing to risk their own necks or the neck of the only guy who (at the moment) could keep their sound system working to tell her. It would be… a painful endeavor. To say the least. They nearly walked into Tomo, who, with Nuriko's help, had managed to get into the robe and was now standing in the near-darkness, a potential traffic hazard. But thankfully Nuriko was standing next to him, listening to the rehearsal onstage, and he could fairly clearly be seen. Or, more precisely, his Fred-scarf could: it was a rather blinding white.
He grinned at them as they attempted to blink and rub their eyes clear. "Suba-chan, you have awhile, he wants me and Scroogy next." Tasuki growled. Nuriko merely smacked him into a support pillar. "Tasuki-chan, you might wanna change, I don't think Scrooge goes to work in thaaaaat…" He deliberately drawled the last word, pointing at the nightshirt, robe, and slippers lazily.
Tasuki, however, went as white as his hair, then winced as the carolers blasted at full volume for three point two seconds and were cut off in the middle of a lyric. "Oh ****, NOW I gotta go change in five seconds…"
"What?" Tomo leaned over, cupping a hand to his ear.
"I said I gotta go-"
"I can't hear you Tasuki!" Subaru this time.
"Oh DAMNIT KOJI!" He yelled at the top of his lungs.
"Now that I heard," Nuriko piped up.
Tasuki groaned and made a "stay here" motion, then raced into the dressing room and began peeling off the robe and kicking off the slippers.
Houki and Yui, who was playing the Ghost of Christmas Past, looked at him, looked at each other, looked at him again, looked at each other once more, nodded in sync, stepped to either side of him, and grabbed an arm each, stopping his frenzy. "GAH! LEGGOA ME!"
"Tasuki, calm down! What's got you so insane?" Yui asked, a bit TOO calmly for his tastes.
He mentally noted that Tokaki would've liked to be there as he'd caught them right in the middle of Yui's fitting, but his own mind was a bit too preoccupied to think about that at the moment. "Look, faceless-nameless wants me and Nuriko next! I gotta change!"
"Gah!" Houki said in exasperation. "Does he freaking expect me to read his MIND over these costumes? Tasuki, go around the corner again, I'll bring you your clothes." Tasuki complied, a bit anxious. He wasn't worried that if the director found him not ready he'd take away the part (in fact if it would happen that way he'd deliberately never be ready). He was worried because if he wasn't ready he might make him do nothing BUT act. And once was MORE than enough for him.
"Here, put these on." Houki's hand and a bit of her hair appeared around the cement block divider between what had been christened the "corner" and the main part of the dressing room, two hangers dangling from her fingers. On one was a shirt and jacket, on the other the pants to match the jacket. They were of a style that hadn't been worn in a century, but Tasuki grabbed them and hurriedly stripped, preferring to be in old clothes rather than old nightclothes. Thankfully they fit fine, and after a brief inspection by Houki he was turned free, running out of the room and nearly over Chiriko, who was coming for his Tiny Tim costume.
Houki and Yui looked at each other again as he sped out and shook their heads together, in perfect sympathy with each other and Tasuki. They then proceeded with winding Yui in her sheet-like toga that would trail artfully behind her on stage. That is, if it didn't catch on any stray nails or screws…
Koji thought it was a great irony, that the guy running sound this time barely ever talked. However, the guy who usually ran sound (damnit Tamahome!) seemed to talk way too much. He was thinking of ways to meld them together to get the perfect medium when the door to the booth crashed open, spilling Suboshi into the room, the large stack of papers in his hands scattering every which way, one even landing in his hair. "Owwwww… remind me never to do that again…"
"Consider yourself reminded." Koji hauled the smaller boy to his feet as Mitsukake kept running tests on the soundboard, although at a non-earsplitting level this time. "What the hell is all this?" He grabbed the thick paper from Suboshi's hair and scanned it. "'Everyone come for a fun-filled…' What the ****?"
"Hey, it's the best I could do. Everything else I thought up wouldn't be approved by the administrators." He scrambled around, trying to claim every last piece of holly-green paper with red typing. "Where's Tasuki? I gotta get him to look at these."
Koji snickered helplessly and pointed out the booth window at the stage where Tasuki (now in full old-fashioned costume) and Tokaki were (seemingly soundlessly, although they were both in reality VERY LOUD) shouting at insignificant stagehands about how to change the furniture from the Cratchett house to Scrooge's office and not to bang any of it up because they had no replacements! Suboshi followed Koji's pointing and broke down in hysterical laughter, falling on the floor and scattering his papers again. "G… Good GOD! I NEVER thought I'd see the day! Never!" Mitsukake permitted himself another small smile.
Koji once again gave him a hand up when they'd muffled their laughter to manageable proportions and helped him re-re-gather the flyers that would be posted all around the school and in sympathetic businesses. When next they looked up Yui, now fit in her costume (which looked a lot like a sheet), had joined the boys onstage until the rehearsal with Nuriko began, talking easily but apparently not noticing the somewhat-pointed looks Tokaki was giving her.
Suboshi went as white as Tasuki's hair. "Wh-Wh-Wh-What's she wearing?!"
Koji looked up and shrugged, not seeing anything wrong with it. "Her costume, I guess. You do know what those are, don't ya?"
"But that's… that's… that's so WRONG! NO ONE SHOULD SEE HER LIKE THAT! NO ONE SHOULD SEE MY YUI-SAMA LIKE THAT EXCEPT ME!" He was so busy raging he hadn't noticed Koji's new smirk or the flick of the "on" button he gave the booth's mic system, making every word uttered inside the booth broadcast material in the rest of the theatre. "ONLY MEEEEE!"
"Yui, I think your boyfriend's ticked about your costume," he said in quite a casual tone, snickering to himself as Suboshi turned a new color: sickly green. "You might want to explain a few things to him." He quickly turned on the stage mic.
"SUBOSHI! ARE YOU GOING AROUND TELLING PEOPLE YOU'RE MY BOYFRIEND?!"
"Well, there goes people saying the stage mic never picks anything up…" Mitsukake muttered.
"Y-Y-Y-Yui-s-sama, I-I… I… I…"
"GET DOWN HERE!"
He meekly slunk out of the booth as Koji whooped with laughter.
Nuriko joined the other three onstage once the furniture movers were out of sight, watching amusedly as Suboshi crawled his way up to Yui's feet, kowtowed properly, and begged forgiveness, joining in Tasuki's and Tokaki's laughter. She bent down and grabbed his ear, dragging him (literally) out of the theatre into the lobby, his screeching about carpet burn on his face not seeming to reach her ears.
"And next in tonight's dinner, masterfully prepared by Yui-chan, Roast Suboshi with a side of green beans and put-back potatoes," he said in his best cheesy cooking show voice, which was a good one because of his feminine register. "Who would like that instead of our other contestant's entry?"
"All right, back to work, we have a lot to do." Hotohori was hovering around the end of the stage, script in hand, preparing to feed them lines if they got screwed up, which was inevitable in Tasuki's case. Tokaki saluted and skipped off, the black of his clothing blending in easily with the darkness in the wings but his hair standing out conspicuously. Well, that's what hats were for. The house lights were still out but the stage lights were on, throwing Hotohori's form in half-shadow. And of course, in Nuriko's eyes, that made him look even better.
Aaaaahhhhhhhhh, Hotohori-samaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!! Ohmygodohmygodohmygod I sound like a demented fangirl but I do not careohmygooooooood!
Something clunked him in the head and he rubbed the clunked spot. "Stop droolin'," Tasuki muttered to him. "Ya gotta be straight in this play."
Nuriko wound up.
SMASH CRASH CLANG THUD THWACK.
"TASUKI! I'm gonna KILL ya if any of that's broken!" Tokaki ran out of the wings to inspect his beloved furniture and set, which Nuriko had just clobbered Tasuki into.
"Myyyyyyyy heeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad," Tasuki moaned, absently trying to catch one of the little birdies flying around his skull. "Don't blame me, blame gay-boy over there!" He tried to point at Nuriko, but three were now glaring at him. He tilted his head in confusion. "Which 'uns real?"
"Idiot," Nuriko muttered.
Hotohori sighed heavily. "Just help him up, set up the things again, and let's get going, all right?" The mutely obeyed his directions, knowing they couldn't try and strangle each other if their hands were occupied with heavy furniture (most of which they left to Nuriko to set up again). Fortunately nothing had been broken, only one table was scratched, and Tokaki decided he could paint over the blemish and no one would be the wiser. He once again (mostly) vanished into the wings, watching for any more mishaps, and keeping a drill ready if anything short of Tasuki fell apart. But there he ran into Subaru, and… well, no need to go there. Let's just say his mind was not on the rehearsal.
Much like Nuriko's. Tasuki wasn't helping much, he clearly hadn't studied his lines for awhile and Hotohori kept having to correct him. He actually wasn't that far off, but his mistakes were of the… Tasuki variety, and he needed to be broken of the habit. And of course, every time Hotohori would speak up, Nuriko would just gaze and gaze and gaze at the beautiful stage manager, his love, the most wonderful person in the world…
"OI! NURIKO!"
He stuttered back to reality and said his lines, which (of course, he wasn't Fangy) he knew easily and off the top of his head. Then Tasuki would say his next line, and more often than not Hotohori would have to correct him with a "Stop the swearing, Tasuki" or a "Please try to use a British accent" and Nuriko would just stare and stare and stare at this superb example of humanity, lovelier than any man or woman he knew (except himself, probably), with an excellent sense of humor, and…
"OI! NURIKO!"
Mind. Grip. Draaaaaaaaaaag… Speak. Wait. Hear.
Oh, Hotohori-sama…
"OI! NURIKO!"
He sighed. He had to concentrate. They were just a bit over two weeks away from opening day, eleven rehearsals in all (unless there was a Saturday rehearsal called, which he wouldn't say there wasn't the possibility of), and while he knew his lines he wasn't perfect. He wanted to be perfect. He wanted to do good and get even better roles after this. Maybe something angsty… now that would be a challenge for him, but he could do it. And maybe Hotohori-sama could stage manage that one as well…
Mind. Grip. Draaaaaaaaaaag…
Hotohori was getting concerned. Something seemed to be making Nuriko always look at the house, where he sat virtually alone (except for faceless-nameless), but twist around as he might he couldn't see anything that would draw Nuriko's attention. Maybe the other boy had a muscle spasm or something… his mouth twisted into a frown. First that unusual flushing, now strange movements. If he had to be sick, better be sick now and get it over with. He'd take Nuriko straight home himself after rehearsal had ended and make sure he was put in bed, maybe with some hot soup.
And if Nuriko had known Hotohori's plans…
Tasuki rolled his eyes impatiently. Was Nuriko gonna behave like this every damn day? Yeah he'd known Nuriko was flipping over Hotohori for years now, but he'd always been able to control it, DAMNIT!
"OK, let's try going through the scene once, from Fred's entrance to his exit. Aaaaaannnd… Go."
Nuriko had been given a plastic wreath by the prop guys which he was supposed to use to "spread holiday cheer in Scrooge's office," so he skipped his merry way in through the door in the wall-o'-flats, the end of his braid whipping around almost lethally, spread his arms and cried "A merry Christmas, Uncle!"
"Bah!" Tasuki yelled, pretending to write in a big book (a ledger, the script called it, but it was still big and still a book). "Humbug!"
Nuriko rolled his eyes. At least Tasuki'd gotten cast as someone close to his temperament, if not the same colorful vocabulary… "Christmas a humbug, uncle! You don't mean that, I am sure."
"I do. What *******-"
"Tasuki…"
"What right have you to be merry? What reason have you to be merry? You're poor enough."
"Come then. What right have you to be dismal? What right have you to be morose? You're rich enough." Nuriko was having fun with his accent.
"Bah!" Pause. "Humbug!" Tasuki was not. ****, he thought. God or whatever's up there, get me out of this and I won't swear ever again!
Yeah right, like THAT would ******* happen…
"Don't be cross, uncle!"
CRASH.
Nuriko yelped and jumped back into the wall (which fortunately didn't fall over on the poor stagehands behind it).
One of the ellipsoidal lights had snapped out of its moorings at last.
"KOJI!" Tasuki yelled, climbing over the desk instead of going around it like a sensible person, knocking over the chair on his way. "GET DOWN HERE!"
"I'm comin'," the sound system replied.
"My god, are you all right?!" Hotohori jumped onstage, having thrown his script away to who-knows-where when the thing had gone CRASH. The light had landed two feet from Nuriko, who was leaning against the wall, trembling, white as Yui's sheet-thing. Hotohori quickly ran to him and began inspecting him for injury, pulling a few shards of glass off his golf-cappish looking hat and somewhat-ratty jacket. "You're not hurt, are you?"
"****, that was the one we were gonna take down tomorrow." Koji appeared onstage, carrying the broom and dustpan, the former of which he tossed to Tasuki. The two began to quickly sweep up glass and metal shards that had scattered across the brand-new hardwood stage floor, yelling at people to stay back until they were done.
Nuriko squeaked and ran at Hotohori, throwing himself on the much taller, very startled boy and clinging to him as if he was a scared child. "Tha… That… That was so close! It almost hit me! I could be dead now!"
Hotohori quickly hugged him tightly, reassuring him. "It's all right, it didn't hit you, and it won't happen again, I'll make sure of it."
Nuriko grinned impishly into Hotohori's sweatshirt. I'll get him yet! Oh. My. GOD! He's HOLDING meeeee!!! I'll get him yet!
Tasuki looked at his watch that he'd kept on under his costume and groaned. They still had an hour of torture left.
AUTHOR'S NOTES II: I wonder how Tokaki ended up getting my job. I'm a set con/stage crew person, although I direct and stage manage when I can. And having Tokaki take my duty... strange.
One serious note is that I'm not working with a copy of the play. I'm working with a copy of the original book, and it's been a few years since I've seen the play, so I'm trying to get everything as close to right as I can, but sorry if some things are off! ~_~
Fun fact: duck tape (or duct tape, as it's more popularly known) really IS a great dust remover. I've used it on multiple occasions myself for that purpose. It's wonderful... ~hugs her duck tape to her with starry eyes~
~skips off to find her script and resume her new stage manager duties for the Thespian Showcase~