This, And A Terror
“If you don’t audition for this play, I’m never speaking to you again,” Justine practically screeched. She knew I wasn’t really considering not auditioning and I knew she wasn’t really considering never speaking to me again. It wouldn’t work very well anyway, given that we were sharing a room.
We might have our occasional arguments and over dramatics, but we’ve always been best friends. For our weirdnesses and differences, we compliment each other. We’re both artistic, but she prefers to stay behind the canvas, while I’m at center stage. When we were younger, I wrote these elaborate plays and she drew the action in crayon in the margins. I guess that’s just how we are. I’m the author and she’s the illustrator. I have the words and she has the pictures that make it all real, make it make sense.
I scowled, but she knew the face was just an act, like so much of me usually is. “Of course I’m auditioning. It’s just intimidating, you know? What if I don’t get a good part?”
Justine shrugged, talking over her shoulder as she shuffled closer toward the coffee shop’s counter. “It’s Hamlet. Isn’t every part good?”
“You might be onto something there,” I replied, standing on my tip-toes to see the front of the line. It looked like the entire Starbucks was being manned by two guys who both looked more than a little frazzled. As the customers in front of us shuffled off to the side, I was able to get a better view of the cashier. He was tall and thin, with blond hair tied back in a sloppy ponytail and a frustrated expression on his face. Justine stepped up to place her order.
“Welcome to order, can I take your Starbucks– no, wait,” the boy rattled off, his expression fading from frustration to confusion and back, finally landing somewhere in between the two.
Justine giggled – softly at first and then louder, unable to contain herself. I’ll admit, I cracked a smile too. Classes had been in session for almost a week and the entire campus seemed to be constantly in motion; I couldn’t fault the poor guy for being more than a little overwhelmed by it all.
“I – you know what I meant, right? I don’t think I can repeat it,” he continued, frowning at Justine’s reaction.
I gently shoved Justine to the side and stepped up to the register. “I don’t know about her, but I’ll have a green tea latte.”
“Yeah, I’ll have the same,” Justine added, struggling to regain her composure.
“Alright, that’ll be $2.75 each. Step down there to pick up them. It might be a while since half our staff apparently quit yesterday,” the cashier replied, ringing up our orders one at a time and taking the cash we offered him. He rushed by the other worker, who struggled to balance three steaming cups, and began preparing our drinks himself.
Following Justine to end of the counter, I continued our earlier conversation. “Look, all I know is that I want to make a good impression starting out. I am majoring in theatre, you know. I want to do a good job with my first play here.”
“Yeah, Toria. We all know how much of a perfectionist you are,” Justine replied, rolling her eyes.
The cashier came running toward us, nearly sending our drinks skidding clear across the counter. “Oops, sorry. Two green tea lattes.”
“Taylor! Ass over here!” the other worker called out and Taylor jogged over to the register, silly grin still plastered on his face.
“Well, that was strange,” I remarked as we walked away with our drinks and headed for a small table near the window.
Justine riffled through her messenger bag and pulled out a small notebook. She always kept one on hand to sketch and make little notes for herself all throughout the day. It was kind of an illustrated day planner. I hadn’t had many assignments yet in my classes, aside from some reading about the history of theatre and a few silly quizzes in the University 101 class that both Justine and I were in. Her art classes, however, were a bit more intense. For the moment, I was content just to sit in silence and watch her draw. It was a nice break from the comedies of Aristophanes.
After a few minutes, I noticed a figure approaching our table. Given how small and crowded the room was, I wasn’t certain he was headed for us at first, but when he paused in front of Justine and cleared his throat, all doubt was removed. I couldn’t explain it, but he had the look of a freshman like us; wide eyed and just a little disheveled. His hair was shaggy, with random curls and pieces that jutted out at odd angles. It was the perfect image of sex hair, I thought. I knew guys who would spend hours perfecting that look. His shirt claimed to be his “Official Bowling Shirt,” so I could tell he had a bit more personality than his nervous stance in front our table was revealing. I was pretty sure I had met him during one of the countless orientations and shared a few classes with him, but I couldn’t remember his name.
“Oh Zac, hey!” Justine smiled, finally looking up from her notebook and noticing his presence. “Toria, this is Zac. He’s in our Uni 101 class and he’s an art major, too. So I basically have every class with him.”
He took this as his cue to make himself welcome, and grabbed an unoccupied chair from a nearby table. He plopped down unceremoniously into the chair and slung his backpack into the floor under our table. “Nice to meet you, Toria.”
“Nice to meet you, too,” I replied. I could tell by the look on his face that he was contemplating my name. “Toria is just a nickname. It’s short for Victoria.”
Zac laughed. “Oh, that’s cool. I’m just Zac or–”
“Zachary Walker Hanson!” I recognized the voice calling that out. It was the frazzled cashier from earlier.
He ducked his head down toward our table, as though that might help him hide. It didn’t.
The cashier bounded over to our table and came to a stop over Zac’s chair, hands on his hips. “You used my washer and dryer, you asshole.”
Zac looked up wide-eyed at the other boy. “Isn’t that why you gave me the extra key, Tay?”
“Not so you could make a mess and use all my detergent!”
“Sorry about that,” Zac grimaced. “But all the washers in the dorm were full and I needed to do laundry. And I forgot to bring my own detergent.”
“Well, don’t do it again. Or I’ll cram you in the dryer again like I did when mom tried to teach us how to wash our clothes.”
“I was five! I don’t think I’ll fit now.”
“You assume you’ll be in one piece at the time,” Taylor warned, wagging a finger in Zac’s face before turning on his heel and striding back to the counter.
Zac must have noticed the confusion on our faces, because he answered the question I hadn’t asked yet. “That’s my brother Taylor. You’re allowed to have the initial reaction of wanting to punch him in the face. Trust me, everyone does.”
Since Zac mentioned it, I did see the resemblance between the two, although where Taylor was wiry and almost feminine, Zac still bore a bit of baby fat mixed with just a hint of muscle. I smirked at the way he introduced his brother and replied, “We met him earlier in the line. He seems… special.”
“That’s the nicest way to describe him,” Zac said, chuckling softly to himself. He turned to Justine and continued, “Listen I was wondering if I could come by later and borrow that book on figure drawing that you were talking about in class?”
“Sure, no prob. We’re in room 517, just stop by later this evening,” Justine replied, idly sketching my hand clutching the coffee cup.
“Sounds great. I’m just one floor below you, so I shouldn’t get lost,” Zac replied, smiling. His smile was crooked and a little goofy but absolutely infectious.
“Are you sure you don’t want to go out for pizza?” Justine asked for approximately the three hundredth time. That was a gross exaggeration, but not entirely outside the realm of possibility for her.
I shook my head. “Nope, too busy. If I’m gonna audition for Hamlet, I need to read through it again. Get in the right mindset, you know?”
Justine nodded. “Alright, but if you’re hungry later…”
“I’ll eat the breadsticks you’re gonna bring back for me,” I finished her sentence and smiled.
“Right.” She turned and walked out of the room, leaving me alone with the collected works of Shakespeare. I settled into my bed, the bottom bunk because I had a tendency to flail into the floor during particularly vivid dreams, and flipped the book open to the first act of Hamlet. By the time Hamlet had made his first soliloquy, I was wishing I had joined Justine and her friends from art class for that pizza. Then, a knock came on the door. I imagined the melancholy Dane would have been annoyed by the distraction, but I was just confused.
I tip-toed to see through the peep hole and found myself staring at Zac’s big brown eyes. Usually I wasn’t as forgetful at Justine, but this time we had both forgotten about the plans she had made with Zac that morning. I swung the door open and gave him a little smile.
“Hey, Zac. Sorry Justine isn’t here. She’s a little scatter-brained and ran out for pizza with some girls from down the hall.”
“It’s no problem. Do you mind if I come in and maybe you can find the book for me?” He asked, scratching his head and standing awkwardly on the threshold of the room.
“No, come on in. It’s cramped, but I guess you’re used to that if you live in Johnson too,” I replied, moving out of his way to let him enter the room. I couldn’t help but notice his shirt, and before I had a chance to think better of it, I remarked, “Mini-van, mega-fun?”
He sat down on my bed without even asking, and looked down at his own shirt as though he had forgotten what he was wearing. “Yeah… I had a little run-in with a cappuccino and I had to change.”
“Do I want to know how you managed that?” I asked, moving my purse and backpack from my desk chair so he would have a place to sit.
“Well, Taylor was on the other end of the cappuccino, and apparently he wasn’t over the whole laundry thing.”
“Say no more,” I replied, slapping a hand over my mouth to contain my amusement. The gesture was altogether a resounding failure and I nearly collapsed onto my bed in the ensuing fit of laughter. Zac was a picture of not amused, so I struggled to pull myself back together.
Finally able to speak again, I said, “Sorry. So why don’t you live with Taylor?”
“We shared a room for sixteen years. I like going to the same college as him now, but I’m perfectly content to never step on his dirty underwear again,” Zac answered, with a seriousness to his voice that kept me from laughing again.
“Fair enough,” I replied. Now let’s see if I can find that book. What was it again?”
Zac cocked his head to the side and bit his lip. “Umm, something on figure drawing? She mentioned it after class yesterday. Drawing Life or Drawing The Figure or something like that.”
I plopped down in front of our bookshelf and began digging through Justine’s row. We had each brought so many books and movies that they were stacked two and three deep in places just to make it all fit. “How about Drawing The Living Figure?”
“I think that’s it!” Zac exclaimed, his face once again overtaken by that crooked smile. I handed the book over to him and watched his eyes grow wide as he flipped through it.
“So you’re an art nerd like Justine, huh?” I teased, sitting down next to him on my bed.
He was curled up into something like a yoga position, his shaggy head buried in the book. His head popped up and he grinned like the Cheshire cat. “Yup. I mean, I mostly draw comics and funny stuff. Like I did a whole series of these goofy comic strips for my high school newspaper. But I like serious art too, I just feel like I don’t know enough about it to make it through this program.”
“Well, Justine can definitely help you there. Practically every book she has is about art. Her mom runs a little shop making folk art and doing paintings for people. Art is pretty much her life,” I said. It sounded like I was trying to sell him on her, when obviously they had already formed some sort of friendship. I had only truly met the guy today.
“So you’re in the Artists Colony too, right?” Zac asked, studying a page on hands, one honey-colored strand of hair hiding his eyes from me. He was referring to the way the college liked to group together students in similar majors. It was how I had ended up in a dorm full of other arts students. “What do you do? Theatre? Music?”
“Theatre. I’ve been acting for as long as I can remember,” I answered. “I guess it’s a natural progression for pushy parents who realize their kid talks too much. Stick them on a stage and give them something to recite. Worked great for me. Turns out I’m pretty good at pretending to be other people.”
Zac glanced up from his reading. “I know exactly what you mean. Our parents were the same way, but I think it was mostly because they homeschooled us until middle school. So we had to do every possible activity when we were younger – music lessons, karate, soccer, baseball, football, you name it. Taylor even did ballet, but don’t tell him I told you that. I have a feel next time he’ll aim a little lower with the hot coffee.”
I laughed out loud. The mental image of Taylor Hanson in a tutu was just too much for me to handle. I collapsed backwards on the bed, clutching at my stuffed kitten Pierre as though he could do anything to stop my giggle fit. It felt like I hadn’t stopped laughing since Zac arrived at my door, but at least this one wasn’t at his expense.
“So was he the Sugar Plum Fairy or the Nutcracker?” I choked out between giggles.
“Fairy. Definitely the fairy.” At that, Zac collapsed onto the bed next to me, overcome by his own laughter. It was a high pitched giggle that I thought didn’t leave him much room to mock his brother’s masculinity, but I wasn’t going to point that out.
While Zac and I were still laughing maniacally about the thought of his lovely brother in a tutu, I heard the door swing open but couldn’t lift myself to see who it was.
“Umm… breadstick delivery?” Justine’s voice rang out.
I propped myself up on my elbows, stifling my laughs, and saw Justine hovering over the bed with a large styrofoam box. Behind her stood a tall, thin girl I recognized from my theatre classes.
“Hey guys… we were just. Umm…. Well, it was funny. Thanks for the breadsticks!” I managed to choke out, stumbling over my own words as a few stray laughs managed to escape. Justine held out the box of food and I snatched it out of her hands.
Zac kicked his feet in the air, his laughs now coming in soft wheezes. He swung his feet down to the floor and sat up. “Hey, Justine. Hey… umm, have we met?”
“Hey, Zac. Sorry I was gone. See you guys found the book, though,” she replied, looking down at the book that now lay open in the floor.
The other girl stepped around Justine and took a seat at my desk. “I’m Whitley, by the way. I guess you’re Zac?”
“Yup, I guess I am,” Zac replied, that signature goofy grin back on his face.
Whitley sipped on her milkshake and then looked up at Zac again. “Hey, isn’t that your brother who works at the Starbucks down on Cary?”
Zac nodded. “The one and only. Well, one of three brothers I have, actually. But yeah, that’s Taylor.”
“Three?” I exclaimed.
Justine giggled, and I glared at her, sitting in the floor cross-legged with her skirt bunched up around her knees. “Toria’s an only child. But wow, three brothers? I couldn’t handle that.”
“How about three sisters, too?” Zac asked.
Whitley nearly choked on her milkshake. “Damn, how do you remember all their names?”
“Lots of practice, I guess,” Zac replied, laughing. “There’s Isaac, Taylor, me, Jessica, Avery, Mackie and Zoe. That adds up to seven, right?”
“I think so. You’re in a room full of arts students and you just asked us to do math? Silly boy,” I answered.
Zac looked as though he were in deep thought for a moment, then grinned and poked me in the side gently. “Good point. That’s why we keep Isaac around, he was the nerdy accounting major. Or business. Whatever, all I know is it’s boring stuff with lots of math.”
“Eww, math,” I replied, shuddering in exaggerated mock disgust. “Sounds boring.”
“Hey you,” Zac said, poking me in the side again.
I raised an eyebrow. “Yes, dear? Is that how you flirt?”
“Nope, I’m a much worse flirt than that,” Zac replied, “I was just wondering if I could try to draw you.”
“Sure. I’ve already got a ton of self-portraits a la Justine, I could use one from a different artist,” I answered.
Before I had even finished my thought, he was digging through his backpack, which he had flung onto the bed with him. He pulled out a worn notebook and a pencil pouch with a Led Zeppelin sticker on the side. I laughed when he began pulling crayons out of the pouch.
“Well that’s new,” I remarked, smirking at him.
Zac looked up and feigned annoyance, but his big brown eyes sparkled in spite of the act. “Shut up. Raw umber or sepia hair?”
“Raw umber. Definitely,” I replied, smoothing down my hair and hoping I looked presentable.
As I settled in to have my portrait drawn, I couldn’t help smiling to myself. Justine and Whitley carried on a conversation in the background, something about the newest Joss Whedon show, but I couldn’t focus on it. The bigger picture was more important to me. This was college. This was a home away from… well, everything. I liked it. It felt comfortable. Making new friends had never been my strong suit – I tended to collect vague acquaintances and ex-boyfriends, but not much else in the way of friends. With one crayon portrait, I was starting in the right direction.