Dramatic Pause, page 9
“Oh yeah,” I say. “And then that little kid goes back outside and makes a basket from across the . . .” Before I can finish the sentence, I realize that the little kid is Chuck. “That’s you!” I say.
“Yeah. It was a few years ago. That was my first commercial, and I totally booked it by accident.”
“How did you book it by accident?” I ask. We stop walking at the same exact time as the light turns from yellow to red. Chuck turns to look at me, and the slight smile on his lips makes me turn and look away. I liked it better when we were walking side by side, since I could steal glances at him without him knowing. At least, I think he didn’t know. The light changes back, and we join the other pedestrians and walk across the avenue.
Once we’re on the other side, Chuck continues. “I was just playing ball with my buddies outside school, and this woman came up to me and gave me her card. She said she was casting a commercial and to have my mom call her. So my mom did. I booked the commercial, and I’ve been doing it after school and during the summer ever since.”
“That’s cool.”
“It’s fun sometimes, but sometimes it’s not. The thing is, it helps my mom out a lot. My dad’s out of the picture.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. Chernique’s dad separated from her mom when Chernique was still a baby. She doesn’t even remember him. I admire Chuck for being able to be honest with someone he barely knows about why he’s doing commercials.
“It’s all cool. I didn’t really know him.” Chuck looks down at the sidewalk and stops talking for a second. “What about you? Have you been in a lot of commercials?” he asks, changing the focus of our conversation.
“Oh, no. No, no, no. This is only my second audition.”
“Really? You did a great job. I never would have guessed it.”
“Thanks. I’m actually a real actor,” I say. We are at a stoplight again, so Chuck turns to look at me, but this time I notice something in his expression like I’ve offended him a little.
“What do you mean, real actor?” he asks. The softness in his eyes that I glimpsed in my sideways glances is now gone. I suddenly realize how snotty I must sound. I don’t mean to be.
“Oh, I didn’t mean anything by that. It’s just that I’m training to be a serious actor, and commercials are, well, you know, silly things to help make some money so I can attend the New York Academy for Dramatic Arts next year.” I think back to the conversation I had with my parents during dinner the other night and wonder what they would say if they could hear me.
“I don’t think they’re silly,” he says, and stiffly shoves his hands in his pockets.
Me and my big mouth. Why did I have to go and call commercials silly? We walk in silence for a few more seconds, and then we arrive at Union Square Park. “No,” I say quickly, trying to repair the damage. “They’re not silly. I didn’t mean that. I mean . . .”
“I understand,” he says, but I can’t tell if he is blowing me off or if he really understands. “Well, I better hop on the train to get uptown. I’ll see you later, Isabel.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Nice seeing you again.” I try to sound as friendly as possible, even though I’m pretty sure he thinks I’m the most stuck-up kid in the world.
CHAPTER 23
By the end of the week, the first really cold day of October arrives, and the trees that line the street seem to have lost most of their leaves overnight. It’s hard to believe that a few weeks ago everything was a vibrant green and the city was still muggy and hot. Now suddenly fall is here, and everything is different. I guess life is like that sometimes. Things seem like they will never change and then, “Boom!” in a split second everything is different.
When I get home, my dad is in the kitchen, washing out some of his paintbrushes in the sink. “Hola, mija. I can’t believe the weekend is here. Your mom and I were thinking of making some popcorn with chili and lime and watching the Ken Burns documentary on jazz. Do you want to join us and see if Chernique can come? I know she’d like it if she hasn’t seen it already.”
“She has,” I tell him. “She watched all twenty hours of it online. For a month last year she couldn’t stop quoting it. But she has music rehearsal tonight, and I have to study.”
“Pero es viernes!”
“I know it’s Friday, but I have got to get these lines memorized by tomorrow or else,” I tell him as I open the cupboard to get a snack. I try to think of what Juliet would eat for a snack, but I can’t imagine organic gluten-free rice crackers would be on her menu. Still, they’re the only viable option I see that offers even limited appeal, so I grab them.
“I see. Well, let me know if you want to me to run lines with you. I’ll be in my studio cleaning up a few things.”
“I will,” I say, and head to my bedroom.
I put the rice crackers on my dresser and take out my script from my backpack. I have all my lines highlighted in yellow. This makes it easier to see which ones are mine. I spend about twenty minutes reading through the whole scene a few times. Since I’m alone, I read all the parts out loud to get a sense of the entire scene. Once I have that down, I go to my desk drawer to get an index card. When I’m memorizing a script on my own, without someone else to read the other parts, I use an index card to go down the page and cover up my lines until I have each one down perfectly. As I’m searching for an index card in my desk drawer, my cell phone rings.
I look at the number and see that it’s Honey. I haven’t even thought about the CamPen callback all day. I put it out of my mind, but now with Honey calling me it all races back to my head. What if I booked the spot? I can’t believe it. Will this one spot be enough to pay for the academy? Then I think about how silly I had to act in the audition, staring at Chuck, and I cringe thinking about anyone actually seeing the commercial. Then I think, what if Chuck booked the spot too?
“Hello,” I say into the phone.
“Hey, doll. It’s Honey. I got the proverbial good news, bad news for ya.”
“Oh, no,” I say. “What’s the bad news?” I figure let’s just get that over with.
“Isabel, you didn’t book the CamPen commercial. The casting director said it was really close and they absolutely loved you, but they decided they wanted someone with shorter hair.”
“Oh,” I say. I guess I’m disappointed, but part of me is relieved also. “What’s the good news?”
“I have an audition for you for a huge, and I mean HUGE, international spot that’s scheduled to air in Japan and a few select Asian markets. It’s for a new energy drink. At least, I think it’s an energy drink. I’m not sure. It’s for something called HappyWow. Ever heard of it?”
“Never.”
“Well, everyone thinks it’s going to be the next Pepsi or Red Bull or bottled water. This thing is racing ahead. I know it’s a Saturday, but are you available tomorrow at one thirty at Double Doors Casting?”
I grab my calendar from my backpack and turn to the date. I have rehearsal in the morning, but after that I’m free. “I can make it.”
“Great. Now they have some very specific requirements for hair and wardrobe. They want your hair pulled back in a ponytail for the audition.”
“No problem,” I say, writing down the instructions.
“And they want you dressed from head to toe in yellow.”
“Yellow?” I ask.
“Yeah, that’s what they said.”
I think I have a yellow T-shirt somewhere, but yellow pants are going to be a challenge. I guess this means I’ll be making a stop at the thrift store tonight. “No problem,” I tell Honey. “I’ll find something that will work, but why yellow?”
“HappyWow is an energy drink made from recycled banana or something. You are going in for the role of the lead banana.”
“The lead banana?” I repeat. She must be kidding. I just spent the week with Mr. Tipton studying Shakespeare, for crying out loud. I am an actress. I’m a serious actress, not a . . . a . . . BANANA! Not to mention the fact that Patricia Banner would flip out if she saw me on TV playing a banana.
“And this will air in Japan?” I ask, just to make sure.
“Yeah, doll, they even flew everybody over from Japan for the auditions. Look, doll, the phones are ringing off the hook. Call me if something changes and you can’t make it, but remember—this is huge. See ya, kiddo.”
Honey hangs up, and I’m left staring at myself in the mirror. My mouth is hanging open. I can’t believe I’m going on an audition to play the part of a banana. At least she did say this would only air in Japan, so even if by some long shot I book the banana part, no one will ever see it.
I open the door to my closet and stare at the jumble of clothes in front of me, hoping something yellow will pop out. Nothing does, so I close the doors and try to decide whether I should keep studying my script or head to the thrift store on Houston Street. The thrift store closes in about an hour, so if I head down to Rafi’s Re-cycle-a-rama right now I can search through the five-dollar bins and be back with enough time to finish memorizing my script for tomorrow’s rehearsal.
I grab my jacket from the coatrack and tell my dad where I’m headed. My life is a ridiculous combination of Shakespeare and bananas.
CHAPTER 24
Rafi’s Re-cycle-a-rama is in a neighborhood between Soho and Chinatown that’s only a fifteen-minute walk from our apartment. The store is known for the huge bins of used clothes that you can buy by the piece or even by the pound. When I was little, my parents would take me here and buy me a few pounds of clothes that I would use as “costumes” for the “plays” I would put on in our living room. I would develop a whole character around whatever piece of clothing I found. Once I found the top of a majorette’s uniform, and I used it to play a talking spaceship that runs out of star juice before reaching its home planet. I’m sure the shows were dreadful, but my parents always encouraged me to play creatively and keep acting out stories, and that’s how I decided I wanted to be an actress.
Rafi’s used to be a supermarket in the seventies, so the space is absolutely cavernous, and the owners have done very little to renovate it from its earlier function. There are still big signs on the walls that say things like PRODUCE and FRESH MEATS. The front of the store has all the high-end vintage like Pucci dresses and Dior suits, which cost almost as much now as they did when they appeared on the runway. I walk past the gorgeous couture and head toward the back of the store, where the cheaper clothes and the clothing they sell in bulk is located.
I spot the bins labeled FIVE-DOLLAR PANTS and head toward them. They are huge Dumpster-like objects that the store has painted in a variety of neon colors. I start with the one painted bright neon green and hope that something yellow will stand out quickly. I see a lot of pairs of old blue jeans and even a number of very interesting pants that must have been used in the military or something, since they have all these gold buttons and blue braid decorating them. My hand makes its way to the bottom of the bin without finding anything that will work, so I decide to head to the next bin, but I see some boy is already searching through it. He is bent over so I can’t see his face, but he’s looking very carefully, so it might be a while until I get a chance to do my search. Since he’s being so careful, I tap him on the shoulder and say, “If you see anything bright yellow, let me know.” Before he can turn around to see me I add, “It’s for a costume.” I don’t want him to think some weirdo freak of fashion is harassing him for yellow pants.
The guy stops, pulls his head out of the bin, and stands up straight. It’s Chuck. “You aren’t about to play the role of a banana, are you?”
“Chuck!” I say with total surprise. “What are you doing here?”
“Well, HappyWow is not only made with bananas, it also uses limes. I’m looking for green pants.” He rolls his eyes and shrugs.
I look at him, and it takes me only a second to remember how he made me feel the other day, because as soon as I look into his eyes I feel it again. Chuck has a certain something. There is no doubt that he is cute. His dark-brown eyes and his open smile are charms any girl would find compelling, but it’s more than just his physical features. It’s something else. He always seems to be having a good time, even when he’s scavenging through a bin of old clothes, looking for a pair of lime-green pants. One look at his face and I can tell he has forgiven me for my last outburst about “acting,” or at least he’s forgotten it.
“Do you really see me as a lime?” he asks.
“Please, do you really see me as a banana?”
He squints his eyes and looks at me. “Turn around,” he says, making a circle in the air with his finger. I bat my eyes and turn around like I’m in some sort of silly beauty pageant.
“Hmm,” he says. “Well, I see you more as a pineapple or a stalk of fresh asparagus.”
“Asparagus?” I say. At first I’m a little insulted. Who wants to be asparagus? But then I realize that both of the things he picked are actually quite visually interesting, so maybe he’s even paying me a compliment.
“Oh, wait, come with me,” he says, and quickly grabs my hand. He does it so fast there isn’t really any time to think, so I follow him as he snakes his way past racks of old topcoats and stands of artfully arranged Easter bonnets.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
“Just wait,” he says as we whip past a bin full of old varsity jackets to arrive in front of two mannequins, who look like they last saw a store window sometime in the fifties. He lets go of my hand, and at the moment all I can think is that we are no longer holding hands. Not that we were actually holding hands. We weren’t. I mean we were, but we weren’t. Actually, I don’t know what I mean, and I’m not sure why he dragged me to the other side of the store.
“Look!” he says, pointing to the mannequins.
I examine them for a second. They are both dressed in vintage clothing from the seventies. One is wearing a tie-dyed rainbow top and pair of bell-bottom jeans. The other is wearing a lacy white top with daisies sewn all over it and . . .
“Yellow pants. You found them!”
“I knew I saw them somewhere, and here they are.”
“Chuck, thank you. This has saved me so much time. I have so much to do tonight. You have no idea.”
“Dang. You already have plans. I was hoping my reward would be going to a movie with me and some of my friends tonight.”
I don’t say anything. Movie. Chuck. His friends. I don’t own the rule book on boy-girl dating, but if I did, I’m sure it would define this as an official “group date.” At least I think it would. Why is it that I’m never sure of anything when I’m with boys?
“Sorry,” I say, grateful for the fact that I don’t have to explain my complicated situation with Preston. “But these pants are great.” The size is right, and the price tag fits within my budget. “Even if they do look like they belong on a clown escaping from the Sunshine Circus,” I say.
“They are pretty horrible, but they’ll work for the audition.”
“True. The only problem is, how are we going to get them off the mannequin?” I say.
“Well,” Chuck says, “I can’t do it. Can you see the headlines in tomorrow’s paper? ‘Young Boy from the Bronx Arrested for Mannequin Manhandling.’” He uses his hand to gesture with each word.
“We can’t have that, now can we? I’ll tell you what. You play lookout and make sure no one thinks we’re doing anything weird, and I’ll wrestle these pants off Matilda,” I say.
“Who?”
“Matilda. Well, geesh. If I’m gonna take her pants off in the middle of the store, I had better know her name.” Chuck laughs. “And grab me that,” I say, pointing to a denim wraparound skirt that will be pretty easy to put on the mannequin quickly. Chuck hands it to me and then turns around to do the lookout. I quickly take off her pants and then even more quickly put the wrap skirt on her. “Thanks,” I say. “All done.”
“Don’t mention it,” Chuck says. “No, really. Don’t mention it. I don’t want people to know I go around disrespecting store mannequins.”
“Technically, I was doing the disrespecting, but you were definitely an accomplice, so I’ll keep it quiet. Hey, can I help you find your lime-green pants?”
“That’s okay. I got some time to kill before I have to head over to the movie, and I know you’ve got plans so . . .”
“No way. You found me the world’s most hideous yellow pants. The least I can do is return the favor. How do you think you might look in bright-green paisley?”
“Like I escaped from a commune in California.”
“Great. So we’ll both look like we escaped from something. Let’s head back to the bins.”
I start walking over to the bins, and Chuck follows me. I know I should go home and study my lines, but for just this once I can choose fun over work.
CHAPTER 25
By the time rehearsal arrives on Saturday morning, I have all my lines completely memorized. Of course, after running into Chuck it was difficult to really concentrate, but I did my best for as long as I could. Then I got up extra early to make sure I knew every line.
I ran through them with my dad during breakfast. “Mija,” he says, “I don’t know how you memorize all these words and in English. Ay! I would never be able to do it. Nunca, I tell you.”
“But Dad, English is your second language. It’s my first.”
My mom, who has been listening to us rehearse the lines, says, “I’m impressed too, dragi. Your English is wonderful.”
“Mom, you only say that because English is your fourth language,” I remind her. Besides speaking the language of her homeland, Croatian, my mom also speaks French and Spanish. In fact, she met my dad when they both enrolled in an English class at the Lower East Side artists’ collective.
“Well, still you work very hard, and we are both very proud of you.”
“Thanks,” I say, “but I better get going. I don’t want to be late for rehearsal.” I grab my backpack from the couch and unzip it quickly to make sure I have everything. My script, bottle of water, and usual supplies like pencils, lip balm, and chewing gum are right next to my neatly folded yellow T-shirt and bright yellow pants. Mr. Tipton always ends rehearsal on time, so I should have no problem changing before my audition. The last thing I want to do is meet Preston looking like I’m an Easter egg.
