Fight at the Improv –

Taking a class in drama appealed to me no end. I so earnestly wanted to take it for over a year as my high school elective. So much so, that I even gave myself classes in it in preparation. Not one person knew I secretly burned to be an actress on a stage in front of an audience that included family and friends feeling totally free to pretend I was someone they never knew was really in me, but I wanted to be in front of them. Yet, I was too afraid to really let myself go in front of others anywhere else. I am very shy, sad to say.

Knowing that I wanted it so badly, I had learned from conversations around me prior to my going to high school that my future drama teacher, Mrs. Jenson, was simply the best. True, they said she was portly and very much overweight. And they mentioned she walked about with a cane and had long since passed her prime. Yet, from the love expressed about her, I wasn’t surprised when I took the class and found she had a smile and a way about her that made wanting to be in her class a genuine pleasure to anticipate every day.

The improvisational acting exercise we were doing today was simple enough. I had learned of it a year ago and had practiced it in my own way, which, I guess, doesn’t really count since I was the only one playing the game. Mrs. Jenson set up an improv scene where I would act with Sarah Matteson. I was to direct Sarah verbally to stand up and sit down. The goal, according to the improv skit, was to see how many times and ways I could find a legitimate reason to get her to sit down and stand up in the ten minutes allotted us.

I quickly perceived by the smirk on Sarah’s face that she wasn’t going to make it easy for me. She was intensely competitive. She didn’t flirt with boys like other girls who weren’t so shy might. Oh no, she traded barbs with the boys, joked with them, talked sports with them, and, I bet, even had tobacco spitting contests with them after school. She could tease with the best of them too. Truth is, I am jealous of her ability to be at ease with boys.

Oh, sure, she had her feminine moments. So, while she dressed like a girl, for the most part, though I never saw her in a dress, or even make up come to think of it, she presents as a girl. And, yet, for her minimalistic girl image, I still found her attractive because of how her sweet kind soul shown through. She wasn’t mean at all, mind you, just awfully competitive in a masculine sort of way. Not so surprisingly, it was clear by the look in her eye she was going to ignore Mrs. Jenson’s instructions which would mean my verbal entreaties to sit and stand would fall upon a brick wall of rebellion. I had to do something to stop her or this might end my chances to be in a school play as a lead. I wasn’t looking to hurt her though.

Turning away for a moment to collect my thoughts before our scene started, I hatched a plan out of desperation. I tapped into all those private improv acting sessions I had done in the woods behind my house over the last year preparing for this class while my parents thought I was at the mall shopping. I carefully selected my favorite role to play. The jilted girlfriend shaming her boyfriend. I used my character’s wounded voice, the one I had acted out with passion and fury to woodland creatures. And I put her on outside and inside for all to see. It was nice too. Sarah wasn’t as shy as I am which made me concerned inwardly as to how my character’s persona would be treated by her as the two met for the first time.

My body tensed with the rigidity of a deeply wounded girl barely in control at first. My arms bespoke of indignation as they were folded across my chest. And my voice cracked out a sobbing statement of emotional pain as I turned to her and said in my well practiced aristocratic lady like voice, “Johnny Tremain. How dare you come here after what you did. You are a faithless boyfriend, you! It was you who took Jennifer Aniston to the prom and left me at home wallowing in misery.” I choked out, “I was in my prom dress, the one I made myself, waiting for you all night to pick me up. And when you never showed, I was devastated and humiliated in front of my family too.”

After I heard a gasp from our audience of fellow students, I walked over to a chair on stage and played out my character’s quirks of neurotically smoothing out a dress to sit down, pressing my knees together nervously, and crossing my feet unsteadily. With my eyes cast past her, but fixed where I could still see her, my countenance languished in my pretend misery for the audience to see. I exhibited the portrait of a tinderbox of emotion about to explode which then quieted down until I eased into putting on an air of indignant pride with a touch of deep anger. I then turned my head to look between her and Mrs. Jenson sitting off the stage watching us along with the rest of the class. I tersely added, “I have nothing more to say to you. You should go.” The line had been draw. I was the jilted girlfriend and she was the lousy lover come to redeem himself. It was a beautiful setup that, I could tell, caught her by complete surprise. As well it should. This was my stage, not hers. I owned it.

Her look at Mrs. Jenson said it all. And Mrs. Jenson’s look back at her said even more. In fact,Mrs. Jenson motioned to her that she had to play the role. I gloated inside that now Sarah had to act the scene as I had constructed it instead of what she wanted to do with it. She was trapped. She couldn’t leave. Feeling smug with confidence now, I turned to look at the chair in front of me and remained silent. The ball, as it were, was now in “his” court.

Sarah hesitated for a moment more. Mrs. Jensen admonished her to play the role I had set before her with a “Keep Going.” So she meandered closer to me trying to regain control of the scene in a way that she thought would work. In as deep a voice mimicking a man as best she could master, she stated. “I-it w-was your fault. Yeah. You are the one who sent me the text saying I shouldn’t come.” She seemed pleased at her improvisational retort. I remained silent staring at the chair. Her attempt to be a weasel of a man was at work and it was so weak. I knew I owned her, well, him.

Emboldened by my constant silence, as I knew she would be, Sarah came over and tried to raise my head by lifting my chin and trying to lay a kiss on me in order to break my control. I pushed “him” away keeping my eye on the empty chair in front of me not letting “him” play “his” game. Typical man! I kept in mind something my dad taught me about negotiating one on one. ‘The first person who speaks loses.’ he said. My eyes remained fixed on the empty chair like glue. My silence remained inviolate.

By this point, Sarah was stymied. Her body language changed and she was now acting more like a cowboy with her hands in her jeans than my boyfriend. But it showed me I was in control and she was accepting her new role whether she liked it or not. Her physical progression to acting like my boyfriend continued.

And, inside, I rejoiced that it was working better than I had hoped. He wandered over to the chair and sat down interrupting my gaze slipping into the role I had forced him into. My first victory. I inwardly smiled seeing her manspread too now being forced to play a man out properly to my jilted madame. She seemed good at it actually as if she had captured the soul of a man and had become one too. She had clearly accepted the fact that I had turned her into a him with incredible ease in the last minute as I watched her transformation. I wondered how far could I take it. I was going to see.

I looked “him” in the eyes and stated, “I asked you to leave.” I said with a lady like lilt. “I believe you have nothing to say.”

Still looking into Sarah’s eyes, I saw a man began to speak back to me. “I am sorry. But you started this …”

With that, I stood up and walked upstage and gazed out into the audience leaving him to discuss the reason by himself. Mrs. Jenson’s face was smiling. The rest of the class looked shocked but transfixed by what we were doing in the scene. I knew I had surprised Mrs. Jenson too who was eating it all up. Flustered, Johnny, or rather Sarah, awkwardly hurried to stand next to me to continue “his” explanation. “I am not the one who sent the text telling me to shove off.” Johnny was trying to take control of the scene. Ha!

“I don’t know what on earth you are talking about.” My voice was imperial and dignified. I abruptly turned and went back to my prior position and sat down fixing my gaze once again on the empty chair. Two sublime victories. The chess game continued. Johnny sat once again in the chair looking at me sternly. My third victory.

“You started this with your text!” Johnny then played the same game and cast his eyes elsewhere trying to show his indignation. He didn’t know what I had up my lovely sleeve.

“And how am I supposed to text you when you know I don’t have a cell phone?” I swung my legs around turning my back to him and didn’t wait for a response. “You know perfectly well we are Mennonites. None of us has phones here. And even though I am on a rumspringa, I still honor our traditions.” I used a religion and a phrase that was understood by our Pennsylvania classmates. The Amish and the Mennonite religion allows teenagers to run about in the world for a brief time before they commit to being in their religious community. They call it rumspringa. Those in the English world call it ‘sowing your wild oats.’

Johnny sat there with the wheels in his head churning. He looked confused for the first time being unfamiliar with how a lady can control a man. I had three victories and wanted more. I stood up and walked to stage right and pantomimed warming myself on a fire. “I don’t want a boyfriend who excuses his bad behavior by blaming me. I have been left cold enough as it is by you.” I reached to an imaginary table and grabbed something from it. “Especially by one who claims to love me and worship the ground I walk on in his love letters here. The ones I fell for. I ought to burn these right now!” I put them close to the imaginary fire as if I was going to burn them right now.

I looked back to him and in my mind, I saw Johnny now, not Sarah, react like a male lover should. She wasn’t a bad actress after all and was beginning to catch up to me. We clearly had a chemistry and our scene was now taking on a life of its own much to my delight. I felt her, or rather, his male energy fire up with masculine pride of ownership of me. Following my lead, he stood erect and motioned to me, “No, please don’t burn them! I didn’t realize you had no cell phone still. Here, look at the messages on my phone. Please, I beg you. I love you” I turned away. He got up and came to me.

“Listen, my love. I just want you to look at the texts.” he said anxiously holding out his hands as if he had a cell phone in them.

“I don’t know how to use a cell phone.” I said cautiously looking down into his empty hands. Sarah’s acting was fantastic. I totally felt she was a man in demeanor and in her aura. Had I released some truth about who she really was that was needing to come out? I put the thought aside. The scene was my everything now.

He began reading from the invisible screen. “Johnny, it’s me. Ruth. Got a phone for us to text. It is a pre-paid phone with not much talk time. So, text only.”

I stuttered. “I-i d-didn’t send that. I couldn’t have.” I let the pretend letters drop and then raced to the chair placing my head in my hands. I began to mimic a sob. I said tearfully, “Didn’t the statement in that text that I didn’t want to talk by cell phone tell you something? It must have been Jennifer! The trollop!” The scene was starting to take on an organic course as I heard the audience murmur in response. The goal of standing and sitting became unimportant.

Johnny came over and sat next to me. Then he stood up and pulled the chair next to me and began rubbing my back. It felt well, strange. “Please stop. It hurts.” I said. I stood up, walked away a few steps, and faced away downstage from the audience and folded my arms. I let long painful sobs erupt from me by thinking of finding my pet cat dead in the road. It happened last year just after I turned thirteen. I flooded my mind with the memory of having to bury my best little fury friend. It brought back the heartfelt sobs and pain that was necessary for this scene. The audience watching my back just saw my shoulders heave and quake in rhythm to my sobs believing it was for real.

Johnny, or rather, Sarah was getting into this too. Maybe too much, because, like a good boyfriend ought to do, he came up to me and put his arm around me. I resisted pulling away. He did it again and I let him finding myself melting at his touch. Carefully, he turned me around. I hadn’t realized that she was wearing wedges until that moment, because she was a good four inches taller than I. That made what happened next all the more convincing. Johnny cradled me in his arms. And where I should have felt strong muscles, I felt her soft bosom. It almost startled me out of my staying in character, but, I focused in on the memory of burying my cat and what that felt like as I buried my face this time in “his” shoulder.

Then, almost as if some unseen force moved the two of us, I looked up into Johnny’s eyes. I don’t know how, but there was love there. Love of a man towards his woman. We tilted our heads awkwardly at first, but we came in for a kiss. The class began to applaud. And, as we were still kissing passionately, the bell rang. The class was over just like that.

Mrs. Jenson announced, “We will dissect what we saw just now tomorrow class.” She turned to us and added, “Excellent scene, should I say, lady and gentleman.”

The two of us released from the kiss and I looked back into Johnny’s eyes. He faded away and then Sarah returned. She blushed. So did I. It was lunchtime and we slowly walked off stage to grab our stuff. For a second, she reached out her hand to take mine and then took it back. It was if she was still lost in the scene we both had created out of nothing. Gathering our stuff, we were the last to leave the class and head to the lunchroom.

“You really did play a boy awfully well. I found it very believable. Sorry for having put you on the spot like that.” I said meekly returning to my shy nature.

“Thanks. You played a hurt girlfriend perfectly. I really felt her emotional pain. And you were so lady like and presented such a powerful lady that you completely controlled the whole scene. Even you voice was perfect. Refined and elegant. I had no chance to fight you at all as a man. None at all.”

“So, you thought my aristocratic lady voice accent was perfect?” I asked plaintively.

“Extraordinary is all I can say. I was taken back when that sophisticated of a voice came out of you. It’s clearly not your normal voice.” she giggled.

“Thank you. I like to do impressions of famous people. A few years back, I worked on that voice for hours. I watched Grace Kelly again and again until I could imitate her voice in the movie High Society and To Catch a Thief. She was such an aristocrat in high Philadelphia society. I was surprised I could still pull it off.”

I looked at Sarah and realized that I must return the favor in some fashion. I didn’t want to be rude. “And, your male voice wasn’t bad either. You ought to work on it. An actor or actress does well to have a broad range of voices for the role they are playing, don’t you think? I hope it wasn’t too rough for you to do out of the blue like that?”

It was then that she grimaced and looked down. “Yeah, but I wonder what it will do to my reputation with the other girls. I am really not seen as being much of a girly girl or part of any accepted group. And, it could create misunderstanding about who I really am.”

“Is that why you hang out with the boys so much? Sorry, I mean …” I stopped from saying anything further for fear of hurting her pride or sticking my foot anymore in it.

She gave me a long look which started making me feel guilty of potentially outing her. She said, “Yeah, I know what you mean. Look, I have four brothers and no mother. I guess I like hanging out with them. I don’t know how to hang out with girls, really. I am just used to relating to guys.”

If I wondered if something about our little scene revealed something about her she didn’t want known about her too, I was wondering even more now. And I was starting to see that I could have my answer now if I approached it the right way. I apologized. “I hope I didn’t embarrass you by treating you as a man out of the blue? It was just an improv scene.”

Sarah said, “Well, in your case, the quiet and notoriously shy one may have some explaining to do also about where that scene came from.” I giggled.

“Well, I could tell your competitive side was going to control the scene and I had to do something drastic to get you to go along with my verbal commands.”

She sighed, “Yeah, you got me there. But ...”

We both stopped in front of the girls room. She looked up at the sign on the door that said “Girls” and sighed again.

“Look, I have to go now.” she said looking back at me, adding with a tease, “Ruth.”

I thought maybe I had gone too far. She was asking for space. I responded diplomatically, “I know. I do too.”

“No, I mean, I really have to go now.” She giggled, winked at me, and headed into the girls bathroom. I watched the door close behind her. I stood there for a moment debating if I should leave it alone or pursue it further with her. Then my own nature’s call decided it for me. I turned around and headed into the boys room wondering if some truth about me was revealed to the world too in my performance as well.

Copyright © 2019 by AuP reviner