“Wow, you guys actually showed up,” Melissa said, walking toward us as we entered the theater. She was appropriately dressed in a gray knit turtleneck, wearing those black glasses that I really wanted to make fun of her for. We made our way through the rows of seats and met her in the middle.

“Todd, this is Melissa, Melissa, Todd,” I dismissively introduced them to eachother and checked my phone again. No texts from Aleah.

“Hi it’s um…nice to meet you,” Audrey said. Her voice was a little shaky. She wasn’t good around new people.

“It’s nice to meet you too,” Melissa smiled at her. “What do you want me to call you, sweetie?”

Audrey looked at me, her eyes wide.

“She knows,” I said matter of factly as I continued scrolling through my phone.

“It’s okay,” Melissa smiled and brushed some of her long black hair from the side of her face. “Your friend has a big mouth, but I don’t. Your secret is safe with me.”

“I um…Todd…is okay,” She said, glancing at me occasionally as she struggled to find the words. I think she wanted to kill me. She’d have to get in line.

“Okay, great!” Melissa said. “Well, as you know, you’re going to be Extra #11, and Tiffany is going to be Eponine.”

Audrey snapped her neck around and stared at me.

“Wow,” She said. “That’s fitting.”

I looked up from my phone and stared, trying to figure out what she was talking about, but Melissa had already started walking toward the stage where the other students were milling around, some dressed in ridiculous Victorian looking costumes and others wearing their regular clothes.

“We’ll be in full costume for the play, obviously,” Melissa said. “But for right now you can just wear your clothes.”

“How exciting,” I said, trying to sound at least somewhat interested. I reached into my bag and pulled out the envelope she’d handed me earlier in the week. I hadn’t even looked at it before, but as I opened it up, I noticed it was a script. Throughout, my sections were highlighted in yellow. That was helpful.

“Alright, make way for Eponine, bitches!” I announced as I climbed onto the stage. Audrey simply walked to the end and used the stairs.
“Okay, the uh…scene is…Page, 54, Gorbeau Tenement, let’s get into positions people,” Melissa stood on the floor of the auditorium, just in front of the stage. I watched Audrey walk confidently to a random part of the stage, but it was like she actually knew where to go. Why did she know, and I didn’t? I noticed there was a mattress on the floor, and one of the actors was seated on it. I glanced at my script, page 54. Yep. This was all me. I stepped up to the end of the mattress and read off the script.

“Hey there, Monsieur, what’s new—” I started, but Melissa interrupted me.

“That is SO not how you pronounce that,” She said.

“What do you mean?” I demanded. “It’s right there, on the paper!”

“It’s MISS-sieur, not Mon-sewer.”

“Right, okay,” I said. “Hey there, MISS-sieur, what’s new with you? Planning to change the world? Plotting to overthrow the—”

“You missed a line,” The guy on the mattress said. I looked down at the script again.

“Yeah, sorry, Marius,” I said. He was kind of cute, for a theater nerd.

“Alright, again from the top!” Melissa clapped her hands. “We’re going to get this right, even if it kills us, and it probably will.”

It would probably kill me, yeah.

We must have repeated that scene ten times before they absolutely gave up and moved on to the next. Hopefully they would just find someone else to do the part, but I doubted it. I wouldn’t be here if they had anyone else. I watched from the side, my arms crossed and clutching the script. I could see Audrey across the stage fitting in perfectly with the others. How could she even be that happy doing this? Why couldn’t I be that happy? More importantly, why did she know the script to this stupid play? Didn’t matter I guess.

I reached into my phone and pulled my purse out to check my messages; there was one from Aleah asking ‘what happened?????’, talking about the massive bruise on my wrist. I looked down and saw it turning a few different shades of black, blue, and brown. Mike had grabbed me hard. It broke me down, in a way. I was supposed to be the tough one, that’s how they’d always seen me, but this guy, he’d actually made me afraid. I was still afraid, in the back of my mind I guess. It wouldn’t be long before I was talking to Julia Stenson, our contact at the Woodcrest police department. She had a particular interest in Gamma, but only because she was an alumni. Her family had been a part of GAT since the Woodcrest chapter was just a colony. That’s a long time.

“I hate that you’re happier than me,” I spoke in Audrey’s direction, but quietly, mostly under my breath. “Despite everything that’s happening to you, you’re still happier than me.”

She was happier than me, I could sense that. I wondered for a moment if she would stay happy. I’d seen so many trans people like her…well…maybe not like her. She had a lot ahead of her, and for a moment, I wished there was something I could do, anything to make it easier. I could give her all the advice in the world, I could coddle her, I could tell her it was going to be okay, but in the end, I couldn’t protect her from herself. Yeah. It was better for me to keep my distance, at least as much as I could.

I watched them congregate on the stage, and then come together to practice a song. Something about ‘looking down’. It wasn’t a bad song; kind of catchy really. I glanced at my phone screen as they finished up; it was a little past 5 PM. Probably about time to head home soon, and I couldn’t really leave Audrey by herself, could I? I tapped my foot and waited for them to finish, kind of wondering why Audrey knew the lyrics to this stupid song. She wasn’t even holding a music sheet. Was she some kind of music robot from outer space? They finally wrapped it up and a few moments later, Melissa walked up to me holding a DVD.

“It’s the movie,” She said. “Watch it, learn it, don’t mess it up next time.”

“Wait,” I said. “There’s a movie? Is it like a real movie or are there songs…and stuff?”

“Well it’s the musical version so yeah, there are songs, and stuff. The part you did tonight isn’t in here, I don’t think, but this should give you a better idea of what we’re going for, okay?”

I shrugged

“Alright, I’ll watch it.”

“Good,” She nodded. “Oh, and your girl over there? She’s really good. She should be in this class.”

“Uh…yeah,” I said. “I don’t know why she knows all of this…stuff.”

“Good taste, probably.”

“I heard something last week,” Melissa said. “About someone being beaten up in that bathroom, up on the trail. Your friend looks a little worse for wear, I think. It was her, right?”

I stared at her. It was obvious that she knew, but I didn’t really want to say it. She couldn’t know everything, and Aleah was definitely right about it looking bad for Gamma house. Maybe Gamma didn’t mean the world to me, per se, but I cared about my scholarship. The whole thing wasn’t technically our fault, but would anyone care? People just wanted someone to blame, and we were right at the center of this crap. She stared back at me and nodded.

“I don’t know what’s going on, but you need to keep her safe. If you can’t, then I will.”

I stood there in silence for a moment, trying to comprehend what she was saying.

“I’m working on it,” I said quietly. She nodded again.

“Make sure you watch the movie.”

“I will.”