August 3rd 2022

Chapter 215
Our Dreams For Production

They realized how it could all sound to someone outside of their family and extended circle of friends. Here was Maya, with her band who had been maintaining success and demand for over seventeen years, more than half her life, which had led her to be signed as a songwriter and had essentially been a side career to her for the past decade, with her songs appearing in film and television and on the radio, taking her on tour that one summer… And it was a side career, because that top spot was and would forever be held by her post as an art teacher. Meanwhile, her mother was a long failed actress who had, after many years away, found herself so much so that she'd gone and done theater and in time found her way into a successful television career, enough that she was now on the third season of a series she had helped produce, right at home in Austin. And if that wasn't enough, there was her little acrobatic sister and her movie this year, and her husband and the book of ranch stories that he had published, and her college friends and their now two children's storybooks, and her brother's new graphic novel, and… And very recently the start of production was secured on the musical that she and her brother and sister had created together.

She still had trouble processing that one, which might have been a whole other level of strangeness to anyone who didn't know her. It didn't seem real, it all felt… like a dream. That was what it had been for so long, hadn't it? For all that she had done over the years, the idea still made her feel like a little girl, like this was just not possible. Was it because this was Broadway? New York? The place where she had been small and a little hopeless?

Whatever it was, the shock of it would wear off in the end, it would. This was amazing… amazing, and still so far from actually happening, she knew. They were far from doing any kind of previews, of premiering, which had to go a long way in suspending her belief. There was next to nothing for her to see, to feel… yet. But it was going to happen, she knew that much.

It couldn't all happen from a distance. The best way they knew to start and make things happen was to be out there, in New York. Those very first feelers had been put out for them over the summer, courtesy of Katy Hunter. She had been instrumental in getting them to this point. She'd learned from Gemma McCarthy and now she'd taught them, helped make it so that they could face this endeavor and not look like they had absolutely no idea what they were doing. After that, there had been a few trips back and forth, with Sam and Cara alternating turns. Maya would have gone, too, and technically it might have been that she was the logical choice among them, with the success she already carried with her, but her siblings had asked to be the ones to go. For one thing, she had four small girls and a baby to think about, and for another, well… They wanted to do this, wanted to let it show that they could fight for this project as well as she would, that they could make it work.

So, they had taken up the charge. Very quickly, it had felt very clear to them that, once they did start, they just couldn't stop. The whole history of the three of them and this musical was a lot of starts and stops, and that was fine when it was just about them, but this was stepping outside of themselves, and if they let this new momentum decelerate into nothing, then it might never restart again. They had to give it all they had, make it work. Did they all know that there could come a point where they had no choice but to tell themselves 'this won't work, no one wants this,' and actually give it up? If they did, then it was way at the back of their minds. They weren't going to go and start thinking of giving up when they were barely starting.

From the moment Katy had gotten them started back in August, it had not been so long, had it? From zero to this, in three months? If that wasn't a sign for them to be hopeful and to keep pushing forward, then they didn't know what was.

They had a man on the ground, back in New York… Joey Garcia. Asher's twin brother sometimes felt unrecognizable from the shy boy they'd grown up with, but then that was when he was on stage, or talking in public. In his private life, he was in many ways still their Joey, great successes, and great failures all together. He'd been making it work out there for years now, and he was as well placed as they could ask for in keeping that ball rolling while the rest of them were in Austin. He was more than happy to assist them in any way he could, but that wasn't going to be a total solution, would it? If they were going to make this work, then they had to be involved directly. Maya, Sam, Cara… for their MuSiCal… They'd have to be out there, sometimes for extended periods of time, which had been the first big question for them to work through.

"We'll go," Cara announced when she arrived for Thanksgiving that day. "Mateo and I, with Felix… We'll go out there. It makes the most sense. Maya, you've got Lucas and the girls, and your school, and Sam, you would either have to be out there on your own for a while, which would suck, or you'd have to take Dora and Francesca, and she's got preschool and everything. And Lucas and Dora have their jobs, too. Felix is still little, he's with us either way. Mateo's got family out there, they can already get us both some work for while we're in New York and not dealing with the musical."

"What about your job here?" Sam asked.

"They were really bad about my leave after the baby, and about other things, frankly, so… I quit," Cara admitted. "Look, I'll be fine. We'll go out there, take care of things for however long it takes, and when we get back, then I'll figure something out." She didn't even have to say she promised; they could believe her. This was the kind of thing Cara would thrive on.

"What about the band?" Maya asked, not in the least thinking about her own need of a sub, in a few months' time. If Cara was still in New York by then, they had Olivia, and unless another one of their members became indisposed for whatever reason, they'd be good to go. But Cara had her own band now, and maybe it could seem so small in the grand scheme of things when there was a Broadway musical on the line, but if that were the case, then they would not have the success that they had, she was certain of it.

"I've been thinking about that," Cara assured her. "The way I see it, as far as recording, we can work out some long-distance thing, like you used to with TXNY when Isadora was still in New York. And with shows, they could work it out fine with just the four of them on stage… Or they could recruit someone else to take my place." Maya and Sam exchanged a look.

"You would leave the band?" Maya asked her sister.

"No, no… Well, not exactly, but I could do it part time, I guess… Look, it's not that I don't want to stay with them and I'm not having fun, but I'm thinking about them, alright? Our songwriter and two of our members are high school seniors, and the other two are high school juniors. Meanwhile, I've been done with college for almost two and a half years, I have a husband and a son… I kind of stick out, you know? It'd make more sense if they found someone that was closer to their age for a fifth member, but they might not even need it, so, we'll see…"

Maya couldn't speak for Sam, although she imagined he was thinking what she'd been thinking as far as him and his wife and daughter. For herself, Cara had definitely shown why it would be difficult, near on impossible for her to get away in the near future for any extended period of time. And she doesn't even know about the baby yet, which wouldn't entirely count me out, but still… It was the logical solution; it didn't mean she had to like the idea. Cara had been living in or near her house for the past six years already, long enough that it felt strange to imagine her away again, as though they hadn't been this far apart for years before. And Felix… Her little nephew was already nine months old, crawling around and facing the world like he planned to get control of his feet and run and run as soon as possible. Oh, it was going to be an ache not to have him right there with them as he approached his first birthday…

That was just going to have to be the way, wasn't it? If they wanted their musical to become a reality, they would have to do what it'd take to make things work, and Cara going out there was really the easiest way it was going to happen. So, Maya and Sam would back her up.

"When would you go?" Sam asked.

"In a couple of weeks, I think. It'll give us time to get everything set for us to go… and it'll make it so that we're not gone yet by the night of the thirtieth," she whispered this last part, and Maya would gladly blame the roll of emotions on the pregnancy, because of course her little sister would not forget how that night was important.

"Sounds good," she nodded, and Cara hugged her, seeing her emotions if not the whole cause of them.

When Cara got to receive her own copy of Sam's graphic novel, she had a reaction not unlike Marianne's in that she wanted to read it right away, Thanksgiving or not. She was convinced, same as her niece, to hold on to it for later. Still, it made her grin over to her older brother.

"You know what you should do?"

"No, but I'm sure I'm about to," Sam hesitated.

"You should do one of these but for the musical, to go along with it, you know? A… graphic novelization," she smiled. "You could do more than one, explore the characters…"

"I mean that's the opposite of a bad idea," Maya chimed in, getting a bright smile from her sister for her support.

"Well, if I do that, then you two have to do it with me, like the musical. Art by Calahart and Friar, text by Calahart, Friar, and Arroyo…" he pointed from himself to his sisters in turn.

"Hey, I can draw," Cara insisted. "I might not be on you guys' level, but I don't suck. I could do some of it," she nodded, and Maya and Sam chuckled, not at her suggestion but her indignation.

"Alright, look, we'll figure this out another day, okay? I promise we won't count you out," Maya told her, and Cara squinted as she nodded. Good, better not.

Dinner drew on a lot faster than they could have imagined, but then that was the company and chaos of a family gathering, wasn't it? Maya felt plenty of fluttering, and none of it came from the baby. Lucas had those, too. Very soon they'd get to share their secret with these people they loved, and they couldn't wait much longer…

TO BE CONTINUED


See you tomorrow! - mooners