The Synopsis

“Alright,” Susan started the meeting, “ “Muslin,” she pointed, “Glue. Troughs. Someone run downsair and start filling some five gallon buckets with water. The rest of you get that tarp down, and start setting up.”

I caught wise to the idea. The lauan on the flats would absorb any paint we put on it wrong. Wood diffuses paint in a way that isn’t very attractive to the eye. I just ‘looks’ wrong. It’s why painters paint on gessoed canvas. Canvas also absorbs the paint differently, it’s more easily absorbed, and lays down smoother. So we were basically covering the flats in canvas, making them easier to paint and better looking at the same time.

Big Davey got to his feet, and I got to mine. As we left the rest were spliting up into teams and tearing muslin. I didn’t know what was going on, other than that it would be a mess. I was glad I was wearing clothes I didn’t much care for. I guess these are my painting clothes now. I was going to need to replace them. Will someone not my mom go shopping with me? Sarah looked like a shopper. She always looked great. Maybe invite Sarah to take me shopping? That would require more social graces. I could develop those. Being a girl made it seem easier.

Oh, we were at the sink. I put my two buckets next to Big Davey’s buckets at he put one in the floor sink and started filling it. A thought occured as I looked at the mop bucket next to the sink, “Why is the sink underneath the stage, where we have to carry the mop bucket up?”

“Because there’s no such thing as a perfectly designed stage,” Big Davey said.

I had only been down here to go to the bathroom, and I took the time to explore while the buckets filled. There were the dressing rooms. Three of them, actors, actresses, and other. There was the door to the costumes and props rooms. There was the mess that could never get organized. It was a mess that was doing the best it could, okay? Alright? It was trying.

There was the door to the orchestra pit, and the stack of not enough music stands. And there was the green room, with its wall covered in two and a half hundred lipstick prints. Over the years I would wonder again and again: why the lipstick prints. Was it an actor culture thing? A right of passage? When did they do it? Before the show? At the close? It seemed sweet, dickish, and inscrutiable all at the same time.

“This one is full,” Big Davey said. “Why don’t you take it up while I fill the rest?”

“I can take two.”

“Lift it out of the sink for me then.”

I had to use two hands, and barely made it over the lip. Fuck, as a guy, even a weak guy, that wouldn’t have been a problem. “I’ll take this one upstairs while you fill the others,” I told him.

With two hands on the handle, waddling, and leaning, I managed to get it up the stairs by the time Big Davey had filled the other three. When I came back down he was waiting for me to carry the last, while he one handed the 2 and 3.

“Jerk,” I scolded as I hoisted the bucket. This one was heavier with my exhausted muscles.

“You deserve it, tease.”

I cursed myself as I fluttered my eyelashes at him, and watched his dissapear as he left me in the dust carrying a bucket in either hand.

On the stage Sarah and Bree were up to their elbows in the cheap plastic troughs, mixing Elmer’s glue and water. There was a pile of torn muslin on the floor, and Susan was busy with Autumn measureing more over the flats. Who didn’t have a partner? My heart thrilled a little bit to see that Rachel and Alex were working together and Regular Dave was the odd man out, standing in front of a flat with his muslin and trough, and trying to work.

Without a word I came over to help him, dragging the muslin through the trough of glue. I got it all over my pants, and then all over the arms of my shirt, and on my nice new boots. Damn. Well it’s Elmer’s. The boots are still good. With his direction we pulled the muslin out over the lauan, held it taught while it dripped, and slowly lowered it onto the wood. We smoothed the bubbles, and I did that wrong.

“Push them toward the edges, don’t just spread them around,” Regular Dave showed me. I did that while I squatted over the floor, and found out that when you get a bubble to the edge, it burps a string of glue out onto your shoe.

That done, he stood across from me, and went from one edge to the other pulling it taught…er. And then from the other side. Until we’d done a full circle. Then we smeared the edges down to the side. I liked the feel of the slimy muslin under my fingers, as the frayed string clung to the side of the flat.

One flat done, and I’m a goopy mess. These clothes are the only ones I’m wearing to tech from now on.

After an hour and a half we had a row of flats against the wall drying and Susan called for a break. I guess she wasn’t taking off today. Who wants to get all stoned when you’re a gooey mess. “Twenty minutes,” she said.

We went down to the parking lot underneath the stage, and then went back in and found a bunch of chairs and took them outside.

Autumn sagged in a chair and lit up. Everyone sagged with her.

As we all cooled down the conversation went to Pokemon, and then circled around to the show. Everyone thought the play was hilarious, in the most darkly humorous way.

I sagged too. When I had time to think about it, I still felt like crap. Working it off had distracted me from the way my boobs ached. Autumn rubbed my back a little bit. “I don’t even know what the play is about.”

I got a run down of Spring Awakening which, as you have not heard, I will now proceed to relate:

“We start with Wendla,” Rachel said, “She’s outgrown her dress, and her mom is pissed about it. She asks her mom where babies come from, figuring she’s old enough to know, and her mom blows her off. Then it’s over to Melchior and Dude Who isn’t Melchior, and they’re screwing around. Dude Who isn’t Melchior knows fuck-all about sex too, and he asks Melchior. Melchior is all, I’d tell you everything you want to know and then some. Dude Who isn’t Melchior says it’s too embarrassing, and says, ‘draw me some sexy-ass diagrams that’ll explain it to me.’ Then its…”

“All the kids,” Regular Dave took over, “They’re all hanging around, and Dude Who isn’t Melchior pops in to tell them that he probably won’t fail out, cause there’s some other dumb ass failing too. As long as he can beat the other guy, he’s in class next year.”

“No that’s the scene after,” Rachel said.

“Okay, then it’s the scene with Wendla and the basic bitches.”

“Lets not,” said Sarah.

“They’re the 19th century equivalent of basic bitches, and they’re going to be played by basic bitches here.”

“Yeah, okay. Continue.”

“Wendla and the bitches are hanging out, and Martha—who never shows up again—tells them all how her parents fiercely beat and molest here. And everyones like, ‘Huh. That’s nice.’”

“No,” Autumn said, “They’re all like, ‘that’s terrible.’”

“Yeah,” Bree ashed her cigarette and then spoke with it in her mouth, “But they do jack-shit about it.”

Rachel picked up the thread, “Then it’s the scene with Moritz—I remembered his name—not getting shit-canned. It gets really fucked up at this point. Wendla meets Melchior in the woods, and asks him to beat her.”

“No she doesn’t,” Autumn lit another cigarette, getting disgusted with everyone, “She feels guilty, because she’s never been beaten, but her friend gets jacked by her parents every night.”

“Don’t forget molested,” Bree seemed delighted in bringing that up again. Everyone seemed really into the way this play went.

“It’s never clear that Martha’s dad molests her,” Wee David said. “They just kind of gloss over that one line.”

“Her dad fucking ripped off her bra, and she took off out of the house with her titties out, what do you think that is, helicopter parenting?” Bree defended her interpretation. “She knew what was coming after the ripping, and fled the fuck out of there.”

“Anyway,” Regular Dave tried to get the synopsis back on track, “She asks Melchior to beat her.”

“Like,” Rachel said, “literally hands him a stick and tells him to go to town. He hits her and she’s like, ‘did I just feel a light breeze?’ So he smacks her again, ‘that tickled.’ And Melchior is all, ‘it’s on now bitch,’ throws the stick away and uses his fists.”

“Apparently he’s either her grandma,” Big Davey decided to make a contribution, “or Wendla comes back from the forest looking like seven kinds of hell, so often, her parents gave up asking questions about it.”

Autumn gave up her defense, “Either way, it never comes up again.”

“Then there’s act two scene one,” Regular Dave started ushering everyone inside, “—which is getting cut, everyone—because nothing happens.”

The ground now littered with cigarettes, the conversation moved inside. Susan was still working, I think to make everyone else feel like crap for taking a break. We all picked up the duchmaning while the explanation continued.

Rachel said, “Are we cutting scene two then?”

“Scene two of what?” Susan asked.

“Act two scene two? Nothing really goes on there either.”

“No,” Susan got up with the flat she’d been working on and laid it against the wall. She did it by herself and I couldn’t have told you how. “The girl playing Wendla needs more lines, because the play is basically all Melchior carrying it.”

Autumn worked on the next flat with me, “Act two scene two is the bit where Wendla has some aunt that just spawned, and she has no idea how. Wait, are we doing the scene where dude-face masturbates?”

“It’s a girl now,” Susan told her, “We have five guys who auditioned and over thirty girls.”

“But ‘she’ masturbates to that Venus painting.”

“She’s a lesbian now,” Bree told her. “We’re woke.”

Susan goes back to treating another flat by herself, “Hans is gay, in any case. Or maybe bi? What are you kids doing now?”

Autumn leans in close to me, “Everyone know that Susan is a lesbian, but she’s not out. Older generation and whatever. Don’t bring it up.” Then to Susan, “We’re having lipstick parties, and sticking vodka soaked tampons up our pussies. Haven’t you been on facebook?”

“I really want to hear about the rest of this play,” I said.

“Okay,” Autumn said, “So that girl masturbates, and it also has no effect on the story, but whatever we’re keeping it. Then Melchior rapes Wendla.”

“What?” I was rightly horrified.

“It’s not really clear that she’s raped,” Wee David said.

Bree threw a loaded piece of muslin, that hit him center chest with a splat, “Pig. She says no.”

“It could be, like, a James Bond thing. That’s how I read it.”

“James Bond, Dekkard, and the President are all rapists. Catch wise.”

Wee David pulled the Dutchman off his shirt, shrugged in a way that pissed me off, and got back to work.

“Yeah, Melchior rapes her in a hay loft. Annnnnnnnnnnnnd, scene,” Autumn seemed pissed about it too. I took some womanly solidarity out of that. Then tried not to.

“All the stuff with Melchior’s parents is cut,” Susan stacks another flat against the wall.

“Then the next scene is great,” Autumn and I finished off the last of our flat. There were three more to do. “Moritz is hanging around, and Ilse shows up. She’s been hanging around at some German kind of carnival thing. She was having fun and sucking everyone off, or maybe dancing? It’s a little ambiguous. She models for painters, and talks about how great that is, unless she’s just a slut. Then she tells Moritz that she got held captive by this one painter for fourteen days. He made her walk around in a maid costume, so you know how far that fetish goes back.”

“Which?” I asked, “Sex slavery or maid costumes?”

“Sex slavery is older than the bible,” Rachel said. “Maid costumes less so.”

“Ilse escaped, and wants Moritz to walk her home, as you might imagine an escaped sex slave would with a guy she actually knows. What with the way her rapist is still out there. He refuses and commits suicide instead.”

This play just got better and better. I really couldn’t wait to see it.

Rachel finished her flat and all the flats were taken, so she came over to help Autumn and me. “Then it’s act three, and all of the school masters are expelling Melchior. I don’t know how we’re going to do that with three actors. That’s for them to figure out. They found his description of sex things in Moritz stuff, and because students all over are committing suicide—”

“Which I guess was a thing in Victorian Germany?” Autumn said.

“Guess so. They decide to blame ‘obscenity’ on his suicide.”

“Yeah,” I said, “I’ve known about sex since I was eight, and I killed myself too. Sounds like it would hold up.”

“Meantime Moritz is getting buried, and absolutely no one is upset about it, except the girls. Wait, we were wrong, ‘cause Martha shows up again. She says she’ll dig up her families roses, to plant on his grave, and get the shit beat out of her for it. Again, no one bats an eye.”

“And Ilse is there,” Autumn winked at me, “She’s my favorite. She hid the gun he blew his brains out with, for basically no reason.”

Regular Dave came in to finish the last flat, so that flat was gonna be the most well done flat we made. “There’s a dumb scene that will get shortened a lot, where Melchior’s parents decide to send him to prison. I guess you can just decide to do that with your kids?”

“Sure, sounds likely,” Autumn said.

“Do we keep the circle jerk scene?” Rachel asked him.

“Yup. Melchior is in prison planning his escape, while the other inmates have a circle jerk to see who gets a penny.”

“I’ve always wondered,” I said, “The last guy to finish in a circle jerk… does he get applause?”

Everyone laughed until Regular Dave fell down, and the last flat was done.

“Saturday at noon,” Susan told us. “We’re painting the platforms, finishing them on Monday. Autumn you have until Monday to turn in designs, or I’m pissed.”

“They’re done. I just have to use the printer in the design lab.”

“Email them to me, I’ll make notes, and tell you what you need to redo. Then we start construction.”

We all left, or at least went outside to hang out some more. It was after seven on a Friday night, and no one was going home just then.

Besides, they had to finish this multi-perspective, spoken essay.

Everyone filled up the bathrooms washing the glue off, and the basin sink where we cleaned the paint brushes.

Outside Sarah hadn’t said anything for awhile, and she continued to say nothing because Wee David had his tongue in her mouth. Autumn was smoking and Regular Dave had a cheroot, and we decided to go up the street to the pokestop.

As we walked Autumn put her hand in mine, and then Sarah came along side me and put her hand in my other. Everyone was wearing shirts and pants in various states of glue hardness.

“Third from the last scene is a doctor seeing Wendla because she’s preggers,” Regular Dave talked from behind me, wafting the aromatic smoke into us. “Her mom refuses to tell her why she’s pregnant, and she still has no clue. She kind of figures it was the whole rape thing, but she still isn’t sure. She thinks that you get pregnant by loving someone, and she doesn’t tell her mom what’s happened.”

“Then,” Autumn squeezed my hand and grinned at me, “There’s a couple having gay sex in a vineyard.”

“They just kiss,” Wee David said.

“Yeah. After they’ve clearly just had sex. One of the guys says something along the lines of, ‘are you ready to go again, already?’ I’m a hundred percent positive it’s because the other guy is rock hard and stroking it. There are basically no stage directions in the whole play.”

“He’s talking about the grapes they’ve been eating all day.”

“Read the subtext. I’m trying to perv out with Aisling right now. You’re getting a lesbian masturbation scene. Why can’t you stand me being happy.”

“It doesn’t actually matter to the plot in any case,” Wee David said.

“Don’t be a prude, I’ve seen what you’ve done.”

Wee David blushed, and shut up.

“So Melchior has escaped from prison, and he gets to a graveyard where Moritz ghost shows up. He’s carrying his own head, so firearms were far more effective in those days. He tells Melchior how great death is, and keeps telling him to take his hand. Death is basically a communicable disease, you know. Death shows up, or maybe it’s not and it’s god, or an angel? Not clear. He says Moritz is lying and Moritz cops that being dead blows. Melchior sees Wendla’s grave, and Death (or whoever) says she died of a botched abortion. It’s a really happy play. Then Melchior fucks of with the specter and Moritz cries. Fin.”