When I finally dusted myself and walked into the bar, it was empty except for the cast and crew. Empty wasn't really the right word since we took up roughly three quarters of the tables, but there wasn't anybody outside of our group. The bartender looked bored; clearly he was used to scads of weird looking people coming in on a slow night. I made my way to the bar, and squished in between two of the elves.
“What do you want?” He ignored the two elves – sometimes it pays to be female. And human.
“Rum and Coke.” I wasn't about to piss anyone of by ordering something more complicated, at least not until the crush died down.
“Starting a tab, or pay now?”
I handed him my card. “Keep it open.” I took my drink and headed towards the largest table. Coop was there listening to Prixus expound on some bit of choreography, and how it represents something-or-other in context of the show. In other words, shop talk. I listened for about two minutes before getting really bored. So I turned to Coop.
“Do we have to talk about the show?”
He laughed. If Coop had one flaw, and I wasn't about to admit that he did, his laugh was not sexy at all. It was short and high-pitched. Not cute. “I know. You can take the actors out of the theater, but you can't take the theater out of the actor. Especially us.”
“Why's that?”
“Because we're in the middle of nowhere. There's nothing to do except shows, so it's all we can talk about.”
“Why are you at Darkwoods? I mean everything is so... weird.”
“You know James? The fairy? We went to school together and his family has been involved with Darkwoods for years. I auditioned, and apparently they liked what I could do. I've been working here ever since. This is my first lead though.”
“Is it? That's fantastic!” I leaned in closer, or at least I was about to when Minnie cut in. One of her snakes hissed at me so I backed off a couple of feet.
“Hey Coop, what are you drinking?” She leaned an elbow on the table and coyly twirled her hair. The snake didn't seem to mind, only occasionally nipping her finger. Coop cocked his head towards her. Suddenly I felt like an intruder, so I wandered off to find Marta. She was sitting in a corner with James the cat person, and Theo.
“Hey Sophie! How's it going?” I shrugged. “Enjoyed your first week at Darkwoods?”
“It's been interesting.” An understatement, to be sure.
James laughed and took a sip of his cream-based drink. “I told you Marta, you should've stuck with one of the local kids. Sophie here looks like she's going to walk out and never come back.”
“Yeah, but do you know how hard it is to find a decent assistant from among you weirdos? There's not a supe or myth in the world with the skills to stage manage. And I can't run this asylum by myself.” Marta waved her arms, indicating the who bar. James took another sip, and looked pointedly at me.
“So kiddo, you gonna quit?”
“Yep. I just came over here to tell you just that.” I managed a straight face for about five seconds before Marta's shocked expression was too much for me. The others joined in slowly, even Marta, although her laughter was definitely tinged with nerves. “No, I think I'll stick it out. I mean, how bad could it get?” Their faces seemed to indicate that it could get very bad.
No comments:
Post a Comment