Jack's heart went into overdrive as he stared at that envelope in his
sister's hands. He decided in that moment that ignorance was indeed bliss;
he had been so happy in those few hours that damn envelope had been out of
his mind. Now it had come back and what made it worse is that it was in the
hands of someone he cared for so much. That made it real, no matter what
had been in it, what the consequences of it were, what anyone had done to
him, he could have convinced himself it was just something he had dreamed,
some twisted nightmare. But if his sister and his friends seen what those
people, whoever they were (if it was in fact a they), had done to him the
fear and dread they had caused him simply by the contents of that envelope.
then it was real, it had happened. The silence that was hanging heavily in
the air, clinging tightly around the six friends was suffocating, and it
must have gone on for so long.
Andie broke that perpetual silence, "Jack?"
"It's nothing, Andie" he replied, with a twinge of anger in his voice that surprised even him!
"Whoa, Jack, take a pill!" warned Jen.
"Sorry, its nothing you don't need to worry about. Its just a few ideas that the guys on the football team had about the uniforms or something I was gonna have a long look at some point. We were gonna discuss them at practice."
"Cos that's what you guys do at practice, discuss the uniforms," joked Joey. To which everyone laughed. Jack forced himself to, and it sounded awkward, but it seemed to satisfy the others. The topic was soon forgotten, Jack breathed a mental sigh of relief as the envelope was lost once more to the depths of his backpack.
*****
Later came the auditions for the play. Jack was just happy it got him out of fifth period, but he decided he was going to enjoy himself. If he was lucky he would even get a part, but even if he didn't he would offer his help backstage as a grip or something. For extra credit who wouldn't?
All the people auditioning had to split into groups of six, so naturally, Dawson, Joey, Pacey, Jen, Jack and Andie were all together. Then Mr. Ames, who was apparently a new drama teacher, went out the groups and they got to pick a scene from a hat which they would have fifteen minutes to prepare before the scenes were filmed one by one. When Mr. Ames reached the gang's group Andie's hand quickly had the six friends having to perform the Rude Mechanicals' performance of Pyramus and Thisbe from A Midsummer's Night's Dream.
"Great," said Pacey "Ye Olde English!"
"We're seriously meant to be doing this in fifteen minutes?" questioned Andie.
"Yes, so you'd better get started." Mr. Ames said coldly.
"Great," said Jen "Plus they're all blokes."
"Well, there is Thisbe." Jack tried to be helpful.
"Who was a bloke dressed up as a woman!"
"Does that make it better or worse?" asked Dawson.
"God knows!"
"Fine, well I call 'Wall'" Pacey put in quickly. "I mean, how much can a pile of bricks have to do?"
"You'd be surprised! Anyway it was your idea to come in the first place!"
"What can I say? I'm a better re-actor than an actor!"
"Fine, then I'm moonshine" said Joey
"Kinda vain, Jo!" Jen replied, quick wits getting the better of plain sense.
"Well.. umm.. I do have a great witty response but I'm not gonna waste it!"
"Fine you two bicker, continue with the ever so witty repartée!" Andie said. "I guess I'll be the narrator!"
"What? Too lazy to act?" Said Dawson, smugly.
"Whatever Dawson"
"I get Lion," Jen said.
"You've got the hair for it"
"Thanks, I try," she said, pushing at her hair and grinning.
"Pyramus!" called Jack quickly, realising there was only two parts left.
Andie, making the same realisation as Jack, turned to Dawson, "That makes you the woman!"
"Hey, no fair guys! Jen, switch?"
"I guess I could."
"Thank you"
"Never said I would!"
"Jen, don't be cruel!" said Joey, trying hard not to laugh.
"Fine, but you'd better make it worth my while!"
"How's this?" Dawson surprised Jen by planting a large slobbery kiss on her forehead.
"That's gross! Fine you can have it, just don't ever do that again!" she said pushing him away.
After they'd been through it and then rehearsed it once, their fifteen minutes was almost up so they checked they were all happy and sat down and Mr. Ames walked onto the Auditorium stage.
"Any volunteers?"
Andie's hand automatically shot up.
"Great, up you come."
They all glared at Andie.
"What?" she asked, innocently "Isn't it good to get it done and out of the way? Besides, what's the point of rehearsing to be in a play if you don't want to act?"
"As much as I hate to say it, but the girl's got a point!" Jen offered to the other four as they climbed onto the stage.
Andie stayed centre-stage while the others took positions in the wings.
"Whenever you're ready, take it away," Mr. Ames called from behind the camera.
"Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show; but wonder on till truth make all things plain. This man is Pyramus, if you would know."
Jack stepped on stage, bowed and.
"Oh yeah so manly, look at that Band-Aid!" said a guy from the baseball team in the front row.
Jack ignored the comment and the laughs that followed as he stepped back into the wings. Mr. Ames called for silence.
Andie continued, "This beauteous lady Thisbe is certain."
Jen repeated the movements of Jack on the other side of the stage.
"this man with lime and rough cast, doth represent wall, that vile wall that did these lovers sunder."
Andie stepped aside as Pacey walked to centre stage draped in an old curtain and spread his arms to make a surprisingly convincing wall.
"This man with lantern, dog and bush of thorn, presenteth Moonshine."
Joey walked in and stood on a block with a crescent moon of cardboard stuck to her forehead.
"This grisly beast, which Lion hight by name."
Andie disappeared into the wings as Dawson emerged with messed up hair and a rope tail to growl and also disappear, leaving Joey and Pacey alone onstage.
Pacey began his lines: "In this same Interlude it doth befall
That I represent a wall.
And such a wall as I would have you think
That had in it a crannied hole or chink,
Through which the lovers, Pyramus and Thisbe,
Did often whisper, very secretly."
Jack approached Pacey at centre stage and started to speak: "Thou wall, O wall, O sweet and lovely wall, show me thy chink to blink through with mine eye." Pacey placed two fingers against his own chest in a 'v'-shape, which Jack then peered through.
"No Thisbe do I see! Cursed by thy stones for thus deceiving me!"
Jen then walked to stand the other side of Pacey. "O wall, full often hast thou heard my moans
For parting my fair Pyramus and me
My cherry lips have often kissed thy stones,
Thy stones with lime and hair knit up in thee."
Jack replied," I see a voice; now I will to the chink, to spy and I can hear my Thisbe's face. Thisbe!"
Jen acted like see was trying to see over a high wall instead of just Pacey as she called back "My Love!"
"Wilt thou at Ninny's tomb meet me straight away?"
"Tide life, tide death, I come without delay."
Jen and Jack acted as if they were kissing through Pacey. Jack was in front of Pacey at this point and his kiss was aimed at his chest, where Pacey's 'chink' was. Pacey put his hand over the spot and turned to the audience, other hand over his mouth, and somehow managed to blush on cue! This managed to get a loud guffaw from the entire audience.
During the distraction Andie placed a chair with a solid back on the stage as a grave and handed Joey a large twig and a lantern and leaving a stuffed toy dog at her feet. Then everyone left the stage leaving only Joey still on her block.
"All I have to say is to tell you that the lantern is the moon, I that man in the moon, this thorn bush my thorn bush an this dog my dog." she said, holding the twig high and gesturing at the dog at the appropriate line.
Jen walked back on stage.
"This is old Ninny's tomb. Where is my love?"
Dawson entered, growled at Jen, who gasped and the froze. Dawson turned to the audience.
"You ladies - you whose gentle hearts doth fear
The smallest monstrous mouse that creeps on floor -
May now, perchance, both quake and tremble here,
When Lion rough in wildest rage doth roar.
Then know that I as Snug the Joiner am
A lion fell, nor else no lion's dam,
For if I should as lion come to strife
Into this place, 'twere pity on my life."
Dawson turned back to Jen and chased her up and down and round the stage. When at last they stopped he growled at her and she squealed. Then he roared, Jen screamed and ran off stage, dropping her cloak. Dawson then made a show of savaging her cloak and leaving it draped over the 'grave' as he exited. Jack came back onto the stage and, seeing the cloak, picked it up and held it close.
"What dreadful dole is here? Eyes do you see? How can it be? O dainty duck, O dear! Thy mantle good - What stained in blood? O Fates, come, come! Cone tears confound! Out sword and wound the pap of Pyramus; cry that left pap where heart doth hop."
Jack removed a rod from his jeans' belt hoop and, holding it like a sword, prepared to 'kill' himself.
"Thus I die, thus, thus, thus," he stabbed himself on each 'thus', "Now I am dead, now I am fled; my soul is in the sky. Moon take thy flight."
Joey, collecting up her lantern, twig and dog walked offstage.
"Now die, die, die ,die, die!" again he stabbed himself with each 'die'. The audience gave a small applause as Jack finally hit the ground. Jen finally ran back onstage, pretending to be out of breath as if she has been running from Dawson all this time.
"Asleep my love? What dead my dove? O Pyramus arise. Speak, speak! Quite dumb? Dead, dead? Come, trusty sword, come blade, my breast embrue." Jen pried the rod Jacks hand and stabbed herself. "Thus Thisbe ends - Adieu, adieu, adieu!" She collapsed, ending up lying next to Jack.
The crowd went mad. There was cheering and clapping and whistling. After Mr. Ames had finally gotten silence he congratulated the group but quickly moved on claiming there wasn't much time to get all the scenes done. All six of the gang sat in the stalls to watch everyone else but none quite received the same ovation as they did.
When all the groups were done. Mr Ames walked onstage, holding the video of the auditions in his hand, and congratulated everyone on their performances. "It's going to be extremely hard to decide who will get into the play, but I assure you that I will try to get as many of you in as possible. I will post the name of the play and the cast listings on the board outside my classroom by the end of the week."
*****
It was the end of the school day, not only had the auditions taken up all of fifth period but most of sixth as well. They still had to go along to apologise and pick up any assignments but Jack was glad, after a summer of no school and getting up at 6am he just wanted to sit and do nothing for a while. Although out of the six friends he was the only one for who this wasn't an option; he had football practice straight after school. It was annoying, but Jack loved his football, it was like escapism, when he was on the field it was like the only thing that mattered was playing his best, and hopefully winning, and all his problems just fell away.
When he arrived, ten minutes late (he was making a habit of tardiness, he'd better not keep it up!), the coach explained that he was starting practice on the first day so he could get as many sessions in as possible before it was getting dark too early to practice after school. The team was all already changed, so they went out to the field and Jack was ordered to join them as soon as he was changed. When the locker room was empty he remembered his books in his locker and decided to grab them while he remembered. He ran down the corridor, the door taking ages to shut as always. He was round the corner and past the nurse's office before he heard the 'thud' as it shut.
When he got back to the locker room he dumped his books in his locker and pulled his football kit out of its bag. He pulled his shirt off, over his head and left it on top of his books in the locker and then he heard it. That laugh, the one he'd heard that morning. It was loud enough for Jack to know it was coming from somewhere in the locker room. And he realised that, even though the door takes a long time to close, he shouldn't have been able to get as far as he did before the door shut; someone else had entered when he'd left and so the door took longer to shut.
"Hello?" he called as he made his way towards the noise, "who's there?"
He heard another noise, from behind him. He spun round quickly and automatically put himself in a fighting stance. Then he saw his shirt on the floor and realised that had been the noise so he relaxed, but only slightly; he still wasn't alone.
He started to turn back around when something connected with his head. Something solid and heavy and swung with force. Jack fell flat, similarly to how Dawson had that morning, but he knew he had no one to help him to the nurse's office and that it wasn't going to be as simple as a twisted ankle.
"I saw you at lunch!" he heard his attacker say, their voice blurred and vague through the blood in his ears. "I saw you show that envelope to everyone! This'll teach you to listen to what I tell you in the future!"
Jack winced as he thought he was to be hit again, but a baseball bat clattered into his line of sight and he knew that wasn't the case. He tried to look up and identify his attacker but the pain was too much and everything faded to black as he passed out.
To Be Continued.
"It's nothing, Andie" he replied, with a twinge of anger in his voice that surprised even him!
"Whoa, Jack, take a pill!" warned Jen.
"Sorry, its nothing you don't need to worry about. Its just a few ideas that the guys on the football team had about the uniforms or something I was gonna have a long look at some point. We were gonna discuss them at practice."
"Cos that's what you guys do at practice, discuss the uniforms," joked Joey. To which everyone laughed. Jack forced himself to, and it sounded awkward, but it seemed to satisfy the others. The topic was soon forgotten, Jack breathed a mental sigh of relief as the envelope was lost once more to the depths of his backpack.
*****
Later came the auditions for the play. Jack was just happy it got him out of fifth period, but he decided he was going to enjoy himself. If he was lucky he would even get a part, but even if he didn't he would offer his help backstage as a grip or something. For extra credit who wouldn't?
All the people auditioning had to split into groups of six, so naturally, Dawson, Joey, Pacey, Jen, Jack and Andie were all together. Then Mr. Ames, who was apparently a new drama teacher, went out the groups and they got to pick a scene from a hat which they would have fifteen minutes to prepare before the scenes were filmed one by one. When Mr. Ames reached the gang's group Andie's hand quickly had the six friends having to perform the Rude Mechanicals' performance of Pyramus and Thisbe from A Midsummer's Night's Dream.
"Great," said Pacey "Ye Olde English!"
"We're seriously meant to be doing this in fifteen minutes?" questioned Andie.
"Yes, so you'd better get started." Mr. Ames said coldly.
"Great," said Jen "Plus they're all blokes."
"Well, there is Thisbe." Jack tried to be helpful.
"Who was a bloke dressed up as a woman!"
"Does that make it better or worse?" asked Dawson.
"God knows!"
"Fine, well I call 'Wall'" Pacey put in quickly. "I mean, how much can a pile of bricks have to do?"
"You'd be surprised! Anyway it was your idea to come in the first place!"
"What can I say? I'm a better re-actor than an actor!"
"Fine, then I'm moonshine" said Joey
"Kinda vain, Jo!" Jen replied, quick wits getting the better of plain sense.
"Well.. umm.. I do have a great witty response but I'm not gonna waste it!"
"Fine you two bicker, continue with the ever so witty repartée!" Andie said. "I guess I'll be the narrator!"
"What? Too lazy to act?" Said Dawson, smugly.
"Whatever Dawson"
"I get Lion," Jen said.
"You've got the hair for it"
"Thanks, I try," she said, pushing at her hair and grinning.
"Pyramus!" called Jack quickly, realising there was only two parts left.
Andie, making the same realisation as Jack, turned to Dawson, "That makes you the woman!"
"Hey, no fair guys! Jen, switch?"
"I guess I could."
"Thank you"
"Never said I would!"
"Jen, don't be cruel!" said Joey, trying hard not to laugh.
"Fine, but you'd better make it worth my while!"
"How's this?" Dawson surprised Jen by planting a large slobbery kiss on her forehead.
"That's gross! Fine you can have it, just don't ever do that again!" she said pushing him away.
After they'd been through it and then rehearsed it once, their fifteen minutes was almost up so they checked they were all happy and sat down and Mr. Ames walked onto the Auditorium stage.
"Any volunteers?"
Andie's hand automatically shot up.
"Great, up you come."
They all glared at Andie.
"What?" she asked, innocently "Isn't it good to get it done and out of the way? Besides, what's the point of rehearsing to be in a play if you don't want to act?"
"As much as I hate to say it, but the girl's got a point!" Jen offered to the other four as they climbed onto the stage.
Andie stayed centre-stage while the others took positions in the wings.
"Whenever you're ready, take it away," Mr. Ames called from behind the camera.
"Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show; but wonder on till truth make all things plain. This man is Pyramus, if you would know."
Jack stepped on stage, bowed and.
"Oh yeah so manly, look at that Band-Aid!" said a guy from the baseball team in the front row.
Jack ignored the comment and the laughs that followed as he stepped back into the wings. Mr. Ames called for silence.
Andie continued, "This beauteous lady Thisbe is certain."
Jen repeated the movements of Jack on the other side of the stage.
"this man with lime and rough cast, doth represent wall, that vile wall that did these lovers sunder."
Andie stepped aside as Pacey walked to centre stage draped in an old curtain and spread his arms to make a surprisingly convincing wall.
"This man with lantern, dog and bush of thorn, presenteth Moonshine."
Joey walked in and stood on a block with a crescent moon of cardboard stuck to her forehead.
"This grisly beast, which Lion hight by name."
Andie disappeared into the wings as Dawson emerged with messed up hair and a rope tail to growl and also disappear, leaving Joey and Pacey alone onstage.
Pacey began his lines: "In this same Interlude it doth befall
That I represent a wall.
And such a wall as I would have you think
That had in it a crannied hole or chink,
Through which the lovers, Pyramus and Thisbe,
Did often whisper, very secretly."
Jack approached Pacey at centre stage and started to speak: "Thou wall, O wall, O sweet and lovely wall, show me thy chink to blink through with mine eye." Pacey placed two fingers against his own chest in a 'v'-shape, which Jack then peered through.
"No Thisbe do I see! Cursed by thy stones for thus deceiving me!"
Jen then walked to stand the other side of Pacey. "O wall, full often hast thou heard my moans
For parting my fair Pyramus and me
My cherry lips have often kissed thy stones,
Thy stones with lime and hair knit up in thee."
Jack replied," I see a voice; now I will to the chink, to spy and I can hear my Thisbe's face. Thisbe!"
Jen acted like see was trying to see over a high wall instead of just Pacey as she called back "My Love!"
"Wilt thou at Ninny's tomb meet me straight away?"
"Tide life, tide death, I come without delay."
Jen and Jack acted as if they were kissing through Pacey. Jack was in front of Pacey at this point and his kiss was aimed at his chest, where Pacey's 'chink' was. Pacey put his hand over the spot and turned to the audience, other hand over his mouth, and somehow managed to blush on cue! This managed to get a loud guffaw from the entire audience.
During the distraction Andie placed a chair with a solid back on the stage as a grave and handed Joey a large twig and a lantern and leaving a stuffed toy dog at her feet. Then everyone left the stage leaving only Joey still on her block.
"All I have to say is to tell you that the lantern is the moon, I that man in the moon, this thorn bush my thorn bush an this dog my dog." she said, holding the twig high and gesturing at the dog at the appropriate line.
Jen walked back on stage.
"This is old Ninny's tomb. Where is my love?"
Dawson entered, growled at Jen, who gasped and the froze. Dawson turned to the audience.
"You ladies - you whose gentle hearts doth fear
The smallest monstrous mouse that creeps on floor -
May now, perchance, both quake and tremble here,
When Lion rough in wildest rage doth roar.
Then know that I as Snug the Joiner am
A lion fell, nor else no lion's dam,
For if I should as lion come to strife
Into this place, 'twere pity on my life."
Dawson turned back to Jen and chased her up and down and round the stage. When at last they stopped he growled at her and she squealed. Then he roared, Jen screamed and ran off stage, dropping her cloak. Dawson then made a show of savaging her cloak and leaving it draped over the 'grave' as he exited. Jack came back onto the stage and, seeing the cloak, picked it up and held it close.
"What dreadful dole is here? Eyes do you see? How can it be? O dainty duck, O dear! Thy mantle good - What stained in blood? O Fates, come, come! Cone tears confound! Out sword and wound the pap of Pyramus; cry that left pap where heart doth hop."
Jack removed a rod from his jeans' belt hoop and, holding it like a sword, prepared to 'kill' himself.
"Thus I die, thus, thus, thus," he stabbed himself on each 'thus', "Now I am dead, now I am fled; my soul is in the sky. Moon take thy flight."
Joey, collecting up her lantern, twig and dog walked offstage.
"Now die, die, die ,die, die!" again he stabbed himself with each 'die'. The audience gave a small applause as Jack finally hit the ground. Jen finally ran back onstage, pretending to be out of breath as if she has been running from Dawson all this time.
"Asleep my love? What dead my dove? O Pyramus arise. Speak, speak! Quite dumb? Dead, dead? Come, trusty sword, come blade, my breast embrue." Jen pried the rod Jacks hand and stabbed herself. "Thus Thisbe ends - Adieu, adieu, adieu!" She collapsed, ending up lying next to Jack.
The crowd went mad. There was cheering and clapping and whistling. After Mr. Ames had finally gotten silence he congratulated the group but quickly moved on claiming there wasn't much time to get all the scenes done. All six of the gang sat in the stalls to watch everyone else but none quite received the same ovation as they did.
When all the groups were done. Mr Ames walked onstage, holding the video of the auditions in his hand, and congratulated everyone on their performances. "It's going to be extremely hard to decide who will get into the play, but I assure you that I will try to get as many of you in as possible. I will post the name of the play and the cast listings on the board outside my classroom by the end of the week."
*****
It was the end of the school day, not only had the auditions taken up all of fifth period but most of sixth as well. They still had to go along to apologise and pick up any assignments but Jack was glad, after a summer of no school and getting up at 6am he just wanted to sit and do nothing for a while. Although out of the six friends he was the only one for who this wasn't an option; he had football practice straight after school. It was annoying, but Jack loved his football, it was like escapism, when he was on the field it was like the only thing that mattered was playing his best, and hopefully winning, and all his problems just fell away.
When he arrived, ten minutes late (he was making a habit of tardiness, he'd better not keep it up!), the coach explained that he was starting practice on the first day so he could get as many sessions in as possible before it was getting dark too early to practice after school. The team was all already changed, so they went out to the field and Jack was ordered to join them as soon as he was changed. When the locker room was empty he remembered his books in his locker and decided to grab them while he remembered. He ran down the corridor, the door taking ages to shut as always. He was round the corner and past the nurse's office before he heard the 'thud' as it shut.
When he got back to the locker room he dumped his books in his locker and pulled his football kit out of its bag. He pulled his shirt off, over his head and left it on top of his books in the locker and then he heard it. That laugh, the one he'd heard that morning. It was loud enough for Jack to know it was coming from somewhere in the locker room. And he realised that, even though the door takes a long time to close, he shouldn't have been able to get as far as he did before the door shut; someone else had entered when he'd left and so the door took longer to shut.
"Hello?" he called as he made his way towards the noise, "who's there?"
He heard another noise, from behind him. He spun round quickly and automatically put himself in a fighting stance. Then he saw his shirt on the floor and realised that had been the noise so he relaxed, but only slightly; he still wasn't alone.
He started to turn back around when something connected with his head. Something solid and heavy and swung with force. Jack fell flat, similarly to how Dawson had that morning, but he knew he had no one to help him to the nurse's office and that it wasn't going to be as simple as a twisted ankle.
"I saw you at lunch!" he heard his attacker say, their voice blurred and vague through the blood in his ears. "I saw you show that envelope to everyone! This'll teach you to listen to what I tell you in the future!"
Jack winced as he thought he was to be hit again, but a baseball bat clattered into his line of sight and he knew that wasn't the case. He tried to look up and identify his attacker but the pain was too much and everything faded to black as he passed out.
To Be Continued.