CHAPTER 76 – Hurt (2)

The room dissolved.

With herself in the scene, the effect was doubly as potent, for Derek’s body grew suddenly stiff, as if he had actually died. Eppie’s Lavinia dug into her husband’s body, then she rose with her wide-blue eyes misted over with disbelieving terror. Her Lavinia looked at her own hands in horror, at the invisible blood that was elbow deep—the precise place where Demetrius and Chiron would hew off her hands—and let out a guttural, bestial sob.

Grief, stark and sudden, rippled into the darkness.

Demetrius stepped up behind Eppie and, with one hand, took her by her glorious, glistening hair. He pulled, not too hard, for Eppie’s [Physicality] reacted to Joshua’s borrowed [Physicality], forcing her from the body of her husband.

DEMETRIUS
Stay, madam; here is more belongs to her;
First thrash the corn, then after burn the straw:

Her Lavinia’s grief turned to shock, her body grew rigid with fright, then she looked up upon her husband’s killer with incomprehension. On Valorie, the aesthetic was paradoxically pitiful yet seductive. On Eppie, with her petite frame, enormous eyes, and tiny face, the visual aesthetic was nothing short of criminal.

Then Chiron came in as a tour de force of pure, unmitigated villainy. Charles was a good-looking young man, and yet, he made the most punchable expression anyone had ever seen.

CHIRON
Drag hence her husband to some secret hole,
And make his dead trunk pillow to our lust.

With his shirt collar open, he knelt beside Eppie and ran a hand along her tear-stained cheek.

Her Lavinia finally understood, and the comprehension turned her grief to desperation. [Act Natural] [Vocality] and [Physicality] fired every cylinder. She looked to Tamora, her eyes brimming with hope, while knowing that her pleas were futile.

Tamora dared not meet Eppie’s eyes. “But when ye have the honey ye desire…”

Eppie pulled her hand from Joshua’s, leaving a few golden strands still clinging to his fingers. She half-dragged, half-crawled over to Elizabeth to hug her red dress. She pleaded with the Goth Queen, woman to woman, a mother to a daughter, her eyes equal parts disbelief and despair.

LAVINIA
O Tamora! thou bear’st a woman’s face—

Her cries were a whisper, but her [Vocality] filled the black box practice room as if they were on stage. Cooper’s vocal lessons were evidently paying dividends.

TAMORA
I will not hear her speak; away with her!

Elizabeth’s performance, that of a woman caught between primal revulsion, empathy for a fellow female, and her grief and vengeance, came out perfectly as well.

LAVINIA
Sweet lords, entreat her, hear me but a word.

Eppie crawled back to the boys, praying to them as they were the vengeful, cruel Gods of an uncaring Pantheon.

The boys mocked her pleas.
They circled her like wolves, their eyes licking her exposed neck.

She begged Elizabeth again, beseeching Tamora for a smidgen of humanity.

Elizabeth threw her dress so that it whipped Eppie’s face. “I know not what it means; away with her!”

Eppie exploded. Her tiny body seemed to, for a second, stand over the giantess that was Tamora as she delivered the final, FINAL lines she would ever speak from her own tongue.

LAVINIA
No grace? No womanhood?

At the designated line, [All the World’s a Stage] deactivated.

Eppie exhaled. The mist of [Sublimity] took a few more seconds to fade from her eyes. It would seem that her personal involvement made skill less costly—but it also meant—

Exeunt DEMETRIUS and CHIRON, dragging off LAVINIA

Chiron took her by the hair again—this time without the help of renting her [Physicality], and accidentally yanked her backwards so hard that Eppie genuinely fell. She let out a yelp—a moan—a scream, because she was still in character. Her naked feet, tiny and childlike, kicked the floor; the pain was bearable, but she was more worried about her newly acquired hair.

“AH—beastly creature!” Eppie tried to adjust her own [Physicality] to match the action—but before she could, Derek—AKA the corpse of Bassianus—leapt from the floor and socked Charles across the face.

“That’s my wife! You bastard!”

[All the World’s a Stage]’s mental fog lasted another half-second, then evaporated as a fading pageant.

Charles let Eppie go.
Eppie fell butt-first on the floor with a thud.
Charles stared at the dead man in the Italian uniform.
Derek suddenly snapped back to reality with a look of disbelief.

Shit. I really should have waited another five seconds… Eppie nursed her bony buttocks.

No one saw who started laughing first, but the whole room was on their belly and beside themselves while Derek bowed to Charles with a face full of apologies. Joshua was in shock as well, but rolled with the punch because he was still horrified from hurting Eppie.

Eppie sat in the middle of the black box room, rubbing her buttocks and looking over to see how Cooper thought about that performance.

Her instructor was equal parts relieved and surprised.

Then—there was scattered applause, followed by louder applause.
Game recognises game. The Seniors were impressed. They were not expressly impressed by how well Lavinia acted—but how flawlessly she fitted into the script, how she had made everyone else so much more vivid. How Elizabeth Moore loomed over the morality of the scene, how Joshua and Charles seemed oblivious to their mother’s own conflict. Even Derek, the corpse, had “come to life.”

Now THIS is theatre! Their hands seem to say. We get it now! That’s how you play the roles!

Cooper looked worried, probably for her lost hair.
The boys knelt to apologise. They helped her up. She gave them both a hug and told them not to worry. Elizabeth came and hugged her so hard that Eppie was lifted from the floor.

Susana Typer sighed, perhaps thinking of the futility of it all, and wrote notes into her notebook.

“QUIET!” Cooper calmed the class down. “That was the best performance yet, from our Tamora, Demetrius and Chiron. Bassianus—not you. Well done. Eppie, you can change out of the dress now. We need the original for the second costume change reference.”

Eppie nodded and returned to her place.

“Also, as amazing as that was,” Cooper said drily to the boys. “Tone down the hair pulling. You might get our compilation banned in Ohio.”

The class burst into laughter again, all the misery and tension dissolving completely.

As for Eppie, she had returned to her Valorie Observation mode—except now, she was seeing Valorie’s inner demon come to life.

Valorie did not laugh with the rest of the class.
She felt no delight in Derek’s punch, no humour in hearing Eppie’s yelp.
She looked like a girl in a trance, like a bomb squad veteran reliving some PTSD event.

“I am not feeling well,” she said to no one, then sat back down while staring into the middle distance.

Eppie’s [Script Analysis] activated while the Seniors praised her like a gang of feline enthusiasts patting down a Best-in-Show blue-eyed Ragdoll. Was Val having Vietnam Flashbacks? Or… Mio flashbacks?

The realisation came to her at once.
THE SAME THING MUST HAVE HAPPENED BEFORE! WITH MIO!

For an observer rich in [Wisdom] and steeped in context, Valorie’s mental absentia was self-evident. The unfocused eyes, the quivering fingers, the vacant smile—Val was in disbelief. She was unable to reconcile with the idea that someone could outdo her by a whole magnitude.

But it wasn’t about out-acting Valorie.
It was the Ensemble’s reaction as well.

Dr Costello had made this absolutely self-evident in her Sophomore classes. Her [Memorisation] recalled it perfectly.

In a Company, WE ARE ALL EQUAL. Woe unto the diva who thinks herself capable of performing alone! As a Company, we are unibody… the cast is infinitely replaceable. No matter how compelling, pretty, or gripping you may be…

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And Valorie, with all her talent and all her gifts, had forgotten Acting 0201.

And now she sat between her friends, smiling at everything and everyone, trying to control her face. Bruised jealousy? Insecurity? Incomprehensible manic depression? Eppie was shocked that her [Emotional Intelligence] failed to deliver even a clue.

Cooper gave each of the kids private advice to do well, and Eppie could see in their eyes that—this time—they understood. This time, they had acted also—rather than just (re)acting to Valorie.

The clock chimed.
Cooper gave her another pat on the shoulder, left some words for Valorie to “self-reflect”, then walked off with Tyker behind him, giving Eppie her seal of approval.

Valorie’s friends invited her to this and that, but she simply shook her head and said that she wanted to practice some more.

By 7:15, only Valorie was left.