Anderson finally swallows, smiling grandly up at her. “Once Upon a Mattress.”
“Oh, no way!” Mom presses both palms to her chest. “I was in that at camp. I played Winnifred!”
Anderson’s eyes widen. “Shut up.”
“For real.” Mom beams. “One of my favorite roles ever.”
So here’s the thing: I can kind of sing. But Mom can really sing. When she was my age, she was the lead in every single play she tried out for. Not just the school plays—she did community theater at the rec center, too. And of course, she was basically famous at Camp Wolf Lake in the summers. I think she pretty much ran their whole theater program from fourth grade on.
“Once Upon a Mattress. How exciting! I’ll have to tell Ellen. Katy, you remember my friend Ellen, right?” Mom says. And just like that, she’s off and running. “ . . . grew up together, and we were absolute best friends at camp, but we fell out of touch for—oy. Twenty-five years?” Mom shakes her head sadly. “We had one of those ridiculous fights, you know? She was seeing this terrible boy, and you know me. I’m not going to hold my tongue. What a schmuck. Thank God that finally ended. Ellen’s an absolute doll, though. You remember.”
“Yup. Ellen from camp who dated a schmuckboy.”
“Even worse, she married that schmuckboy,” Mom says. “Oy gevalt. Thankfully, the divorce is almost finalized, and she’s back in Roswell . . .”
My mind starts to drift. I love my mom, but she’s a Talker, capital T. She can keep herself going for hours. When we were younger, Ryan and I used to quietly time her. Of course, Andy’s nodding along politely like the perfect boychick he is.
“Shabbat dinner,” Mom concludes. “Anyway, look at me keeping you here, when I bet you guys are dying to sneak off and listen to that soundtrack.”
“Oh no—” Andy starts to say, but I cut him off.
“Yup. YUP. Gotta go work on the play. Thanks, Mom. You’re the best.”
Listen. When my mom shows you an escape hatch, you take it.
Scene 6
Unfortunately, AP US History is already putting a serious damper on my daydream schedule. I just think it’s disrespectful of teachers to expect us to focus on Puritans when we’re eight days out from auditions.
There are so many things I need to think about by then. Things like audition songs and breath support and how much Zhao’s going to cast based on seniority this year. Every few years, Ms. Zhao gets it in her head that all the good parts should go to seniors. Which would be an excellent mindset down the line—like, Zhao, feel free to lean right the fuck into that next year. But if Ms. Zhao goes the seniority route this time, I don’t even have a shot.
The thing is, I kind of have my hopes up again. Classic me, dreaming of spotlights. My name at the top of the cast list. My voice, soaring on the wings of a wireless microphone. Standing ovations. Booming applause. Every year I get entranced all over again by the idea of it.
Every year I fall short.
It’s such a stupid thing to want. A leading role. A singing part. I’ve barely even had a speaking part before. I don’t even think I could pull it off. Who cares if I sound good when I’m alone in my room. Everyone knows I’m a mess under pressure.
Everyone knows.
But I can’t seem to turn off the daydreams. Every time I close my eyes, I can picture it. Me as Princess Winnifred the Woebegone. Me, center stage, in an artfully bedraggled medieval dress, singing about swamps. Me perched on top of a stack of mattresses, the rest of the cast fanning out around me.
Me, standing in the shoes of giants. Carol Burnett. Sarah Jessica Parker. Tracey Ullman. My mom. It’s the kind of daydream I love to live in.
Inconveniently, Mr. Edelman wants to spend AP US History learning AP US History, and today, that’s worksheet packets. You can tell a lot about a teacher’s desperation level from how quickly he resorts to worksheets.
It’s the third day of school.
At least he’s got us in groups. But the groups aren’t great. I’ve got Brandie, but instead of Raina and Anderson, we’ve got this random f-boy, Jack Randall. Needless to say, the worksheets aren’t going so well. Partially because Jack’s a douchebag and Puritans are insanely boring, but also because Brandie and I are lost to our research.
“How do we know if it’s the original version or the revival?” asks Brandie.
“I’ll revive you,” Jack says. Because vaguely sexual nonsense is the native language of all fuckboys. Brandie doesn’t look up from her phone. He leans closer, dramatically inhaling. “Brandie Reyes. That hair perfume. Me likey.”
Okay, anyone who says “me likey”? Should be punched in the balls. That is my hill to fucking die on.
“It’s called shampoo,” says Brandie.
Out of all of us in the squad, Brandie’s the most patient with f-boys, as evidenced by the fact that she did not, in fact, punch Jack in the balls. Raina’s the opposite, of course—at this point, she really just has to glance at an f-boy, and the ball-punch is implied. It’s pretty funny to watch it happen in the wild. There’s just something about the sight of Raina and Brandie together that appeals to fuckboys on some sort of chemical level—my theory is that it’s because they’re both really cute, but in completely different ways. Raina’s got one of those poreless cheekbone faces, and she basically looks like the sensible younger sister of every white brunette actress on the CW. Whereas with Brandie, it’s the unpretentious girl-next-door energy and the dreamy boho wardrobe. Plus Brandie’s pretty much oblivious to all flirting, in a way that’s completely irresistible to a certain kind of fuckboy. Which is how we’ve arrived at this blissful scene of Jack doggedly inquiring about Brandie’s hair routine. And absolutely none of us have cracked open the worksheet packet.
Jack peers over my shoulder. “Are you looking at porn?”
“Excuse me?”
“Upon a mattress. Daaaaaamn.”
“It’s a musical.” I start digging in my backpack for my headphones. Something tells me I’ll need a little help making Jack’s voice disappear.
“A porn musical?” he asks, totally unfazed. I hear Anderson snicker.
“You don’t think I’m funny, Garfield?” Jack tilts his head, grinning. “Your boyfriend thinks I’m funny.”
He means Andy, of course—though he doesn’t actually think Andy’s my boyfriend. At this point, Anderson’s out to everyone at school. Except, the funny thing is, Anderson and I did date once, in seventh grade. He realized he was gay after our second kiss.
It kind of bugs me, though, the way people get weird about our closeness. If we were a couple, no one would even blink. But people are always saying that if they didn’t know Andy was gay, they’d never believe we were just friends.
It’s such bullshit. First of all, we’re best friends.
Second of all, there’s no just. Friendship isn’t a just. Yes, Andy’s gay. No, we’re not a couple. But Anderson Walker is the most important person in my life, hands down.
“Once Upon a Mattress.” Jack grins. “That can’t be a real musical.”
I shove my earbuds in and scroll through my music library. Better be Lizzo. She’s the only one who could drown out this level of fuckitude.