Fearless Read online

  “Yes, yes, go on!” Hudson said, pulling the phone toward him.

  “Sorry, your voice just got deeper. Am I talking to more than one of you?”

  April cleared her throat. “No, no, I apologize for that.”

  The security guard continued, “So I thought it was maybe someone’s dressing room, but I guess it was some sort of kitchen.”

  The kids looked at Hudson. A few days earlier he had transformed one of the empty dressing rooms into a kitchenette for a few episodes of a FoodTube show he was calling Broadway Sizzlers. It had become really popular with viewers. Artie thought it was great publicity.

  “And…”

  “And I opened the door and… no, no, I can’t.”

  “What was it?”

  “Rats, dozens of them, the size of cats!”

  “Oh no…” Hudson hit his forehead.

  “Worst part was, they didn’t run away. They just looked up at me with these beady red eyes and then went back to eating.”

  “Eating? What were they eating?”

  “Oh no,” Hudson repeated.

  “I dunno. Smelled like bacon.”

  “Oh no!” Hudson moaned. Three days ago, when Artie had called them to the stage for their emergency meeting about the front-page Hugh Lavender news, Hudson had been in the kitchenette he had created, showing his FoodTube followers how to crisp bacon using a waffle iron. “I completely forgot about it, with the headline about Hugh getting hurt, then the meeting with Amanda, and the power going out.… I just left the plate of bacon there.”

  “For three days?” they asked in unison.

  “So it was the rats that scared you away?” Relly asked into the phone.

  “No, no. I mean yes, but no. It was all that creepy stuff the others were doing late at night. The rats were just the final straw.”

  The kids were puzzled.

  “Well, good luck.” And he hung up.

  “Wait—what creepy stuff? Who are ‘the others’?” April demanded into a phone that was already disconnected. “What creepy stuff? Who are ‘the others’?” she repeated to the group.

  Relly flipped to a fresh page in his notebook and made a list: “So far: waterfall saga, two lead actors and an understudy all injured, a security guard goes running for his life, possible haunting in a locked bathroom, power outage, rat infestation, and now creepy stuff ‘the others’ do at night. Okay, so we’re fine!”

  Interlude

  “Superhero”

  Never expect the unexpected

  You’ll always be let down

  Remain calm and collected

  When other people are around

  Just pretend you knew what would happen in the game all along

  Even though, at times, it seems all wrong

  That’s just for you to know

  And they’ll never find out

  That you’re not that brave and you’re full of doubt

  There’s a superhero

  Just waiting to guide you

  That voice inside

  That sounds a lot like you

  Trust in yourself and where it’s telling you to go

  The one who’s been there the most

  You’re never alone

  Out there on your own

  After I polish my moves

  And I’m ready to go

  If I fall once or twice, they’ll never know

  ’Cause I laugh it off

  They’ll never see me cry

  They just see me at the end

  When I can fly

  There’s a superhero

  Just waiting to guide you

  That voice inside

  That sounds a lot like you

  Trust in yourself and where it’s telling you to go

  The one who’s been there the most

  You’re never alone

  Out there on your own

  Eight SUNDAY

  Nineteen days until opening night

  Miss Susan, the acting coach, walked into Studio A with beautiful long beaded cornrows, a flowing rainbow silk dress, and very straight posture. A grouping of gold bangles clinked together on one wrist as she moved. The four kids, who had been pink-eyed with sleepiness, suddenly perked up. “See how I just walked into the room?” Miss Susan said. “I took up space.” A sense of liveliness breathed brilliance into the otherwise dreary rehearsal room.

  “Today’s Sunday,” Miss Susan said, putting down her big, full purse. “I never work Sundays,” she said in a cross tone. Then she smiled. “Why am I working on a Sunday?”

  April raised her hand. “Because we need help?”

  “Because you need help!” Miss Susan said with a laugh. “You’ve had a tough time so far,” she continued. “But you’re not gonna care about that. I’m not gonna care about that. You know what I’m gonna care about?” She turned and looked at herself in the full-length mirror, striking a dramatic pose. “Being buttery.”

  The kids laughed.

  “What do I mean by that? I mean I’m going to be smooth with my body language, with my voice, with my presence onstage. My confidence. You won’t be able to take your eyes off me.”

  It occurred to Monica that maybe they could talk frankly with Miss Susan about the problems at the Ethel Merman. Miss Susan swayed from side to side as she studied the kids. She didn’t ask about Monica being new to the group. She didn’t do small talk. She was very easygoing.

  “Let’s start with an improv exercise to warm up.”

  She pulled out a newspaper from her purse and, pointing to Relly and Hudson, said, “Why don’t you two begin. One of you will sell this newspaper and the other will buy it. Act out the scene.”

  Relly took the newspaper and looked at Miss Susan. “I don’t get it.”

  Realizing right away he had never taken an acting class before, she explained the exercise in greater detail. “Imagine the setting. Create your characters. Buying a newspaper can be boring. Focus on drawing us in. Be careful not to overact. I’ll give you ten seconds to talk about your approach, then a minute to act it out.”

  Relly and Hudson picked up on the exercise right away. Hudson would be the buyer, Relly the seller. In seconds they had the group laughing. A tug-of-war took place over the newspaper, and the boys flew through the air, chasing the paper and the money down the street. It was brilliant.

  “Bravo!” Miss Susan applauded vigorously. “Perfect in-the-moment improv. Comedic timing, spot-on!”

  Monica waited quietly, cross-legged on the floor, until Miss Susan’s eyes landed on her. The truth was, Monica could get by on her acting skills, but she’d never in her life done an acting class, much less improv.

  “Girls, your turn. Same scene.”

  April was already up and ready to tell Monica her idea for the scene. She had done these exercises a million times in acting class.

  “Think about your props,” Miss Susan said.

  All they had for a prop was the newspaper, Monica thought. April whispered something to Monica and they giggled.

  “We’re ready.” April said.

  “Hello, ma’am. How much for the paper?” April said to Monica, with a twist in her voice and a goofy look on her face.

  “It’s your lucky day. Only twelve dollars for you!” Monica replied.

  The others laughed.

  Their bodies as props, they used their height difference as comic relief.

  Monica passed the newspaper over April’s head. April dramatically tried to jump and reach for the newspaper as Monica acted as if nothing was wrong. Then April went higher and Monica squatted and passed it through her legs.

  “Wonderful! Embrace your differences!” Miss Susan clapped.

  By the end of the skit, everyone was in stitches. It was the first time Monica had laughed a good laugh since she’d been inside the Ethel Merman.

  After a few more improvs, Miss Susan gave each actor notes of things to work on.

  “My final message to you is: Learn from each other. Trust each other
,” Miss Susan said, packing up her things. “You as an actor might be very talented, but you are only as good as the actors around you. So remember to trust each other. Fail, fall, and lift each other up.” With that, Miss Susan had them go through a series of trust falls. Everyone had each other’s backs, just like they would onstage.

  April was giddy after rehearsal that day. “Tomorrow is Halloween, and it’s my favorite holiday of all the holidays on Broadway!” she said. Monica hadn’t thought much about Halloween. She figured they’d be too busy rehearsing to go trick-or-treating. But before she could ask, April explained that on Broadway, all the theater people go trick-or-treating at the other Broadway theaters.

  “The stage doormen hand out the candy, and they get really into it,” April said.

  “I already have it mapped out.” Relly pulled out a piece of paper from his pocket.

  “We’ll start with the Broadway Theatre on Fifty-Third and make our way down to the New Amsterdam Theatre on Forty-Second,” he said, pointing to dots on the page.

  “We have to hit the Gershwin early because they hand out huge candy bars!” April commented. “And some of them we can skip because they hand out pencils.”

  “Okay, the Gershwin first.” Relly nodded, still studying the paper.

  “What about Halloween costumes?” Monica asked before realizing that was a silly question.

  They all smiled at each other and headed to the wardrobe room. There were rows and rows of colorful costumes from past productions. The rest of Sunday afternoon was spent trying on outfits, most of which fit adults. Hudson transformed into a cowboy, April became a chimney sweep, Relly found the perfect 1960s go-go dancing costume, and Monica became a butterfly.

  After rehearsal the next day, they headed out with empty pillowcases, intending to hit most of the forty-one theaters on Broadway. At the Gershwin, the stage doorman was ready with a basket of huge candy bars.

  “Amazing!” Relly said, wide-eyed.

  “You the kids from the Ethel Merman?” the doorman said in a New York accent similar to Jimmy Onions’s, handing April the candy.

  “We certainly are! How did you know?” April asked, studying the length of the candy bar.

  “We doormen know everything that goes on on Broadway.”

  He gave a candy bar to Relly and Hudson, who quickly moved away toward April to discuss the quickest way to their next stop.

  “You Monica?” the doorman asked.

  “Yes,” Monica said with surprise.

  The doorman gave her a wide smile, then got serious, handed her a candy bar, and whispered, “Find it.”

  Before she could make sense of it, another group of trick-or-treaters was moving in, and her group was moving out.

  “Come on,” Relly said. “We’ve got to hurry, before shows go up.”

  Find it, she thought. The same thing Jimmy Onions had whispered to her.

  At the Broadway Theatre, the doorman there offered her a different message. “We believe in you, Monica.” At the Neil Simon Theatre, the doorman said, “We’re counting on you, kid.” At the Richard Rogers Theatre, she got, “You can do it.” And it went like that all evening. The other kids didn’t pick up on it. Relly was too busy mapping their next hit, April was focused on counting candy, and Hudson was too busy eating it.

  As Monica made her way home that evening, still in her butterfly costume, she paced her steps, thinking, Find it. Find it. Find what?

  Fourteen days until opening night

  That Friday, Hudson came to the theater with bags under his eyes. “I’ve been up baking since three a.m. Anybody else not sleep last night?” he said sluggishly, balancing a large platter of steaming pizza pretzels. “Worrying about my dance moves kept me awake.”

  He passed behind Relly, who yawned as he stretched his body upward. “I don’t know if it’s the curse or what, but I feel like my moves look like I’m dancing underwater.” He did a simple kick–ball change, which fell flat.

  Monica had spent her night wide awake too, in the pitch-black of her hotel room, wondering about the unrelenting power of curses, and the cryptic and encouraging words from the stage doormen. She thought about the conversation she had overheard Artie having with the man in the gray suit, and the mysterious key. And who “the others” were, and what they were doing late at night in the theater. And maybe April was right about the Ethel Merman. Maybe it did suck up superpowers. It hadn’t gone unnoticed that April was having trouble remembering her lines, Relly wasn’t as crisp with his dance moves, Hudson was forgetful with just about everything, and Monica’s voice was not her own.

  “All right everyone, stand on the poop. Clap, clap,” Maria said, entering the stage with a great deal of seriousness.

  “What’s the poop?” Monica asked

  Hudson leaned over to Monica. “The poop is the deck of a ship. Comes from the French: la poupe for ‘the stern,’ the back of the ship.” Hudson scratched his ear. “I think.”

  There wasn’t actually a deck or even a ship yet; the set designers were having trouble building the set, because the curse seemed to take a special interest in hiding or breaking power tools. So Maria used two sawhorses and a stepladder as substitutes. The kids were the only ones who seemed worried about the set not coming together.

  “We’re going to push through this scene, get through your songs, then end things a little early today,” she said.

  The kids looked at one another. They had noticed over the last week Maria was not herself either. Usually, she pushed them with harder, longer rehearsals when their technique was lazy or their moves were off. But that had faded into almost… joviality when things didn’t go right. “Even Maria’s thrown in the towel on this production,” April would whisper.

  “Why are we ending early?” Relly asked.

  “Well, Mr. Morton. Good question. We are ending early because all of you are perfectly ready for opening night, so I’ve decided no more practice needed!” Then she looked squarely at everyone and said in a deep voice, “No, I’m kidding.”

  She pointed at Relly’s feet, at his ballet shoes worn down to the toes. “I can’t make proper stars out of you in those old dance slippers. A dancer’s language starts in the feet. Lucky for you, the four of you are going to visit my good friend Gino.”

  * * *

  Gino Bilcco’s modest shoe-making shop was three blocks from the Ethel Merman Theater, wedged between a laundromat and a pizza parlor.

  “I can be bossy about shoes,” Gino was saying over the phone, with a laugh, when the four kids arrived. “You can’t do the perfect grand jeté eight performances a week in basic loafers.”

  He raised a finger, signaling to them he’d be off the phone in a moment.

  Gino Bilcco’s shop was like something out of a fairy tale. It smelled like leather and wood and moss. Not old Broadway, Monica thought. Ancient Broadway. April pulled out her phone and took a quick group shot. #newshoesbyGino

  “Ah, now,” Gino said, hanging up the phone. “You must be the kids from Our Time. I was expecting you a week ago, but Maria said there have been some issues with the production? Hmmmm. Maria’s the only person on this planet I’d do a rush job for.” He tapped his fingers together, then went around and shook everyone’s hands.

  “So,” he began, putting on an apron and picking up sheets of green pattern paper for tracing their feet, “everyone, remove your footwear! We have important sizing to do. Who’d like to go first?”

  They all pointed to Relly, who eagerly took off his shoes and placed his left foot down on the green paper to be traced. Gino’s sharp pencil moved smoothly around his foot. Then he scribbled down the measurements, and did the same with Relly’s right foot.

  On the walls were autographed photos of some of the biggest stars on Broadway.

  “You’ve made shoes for all these people?” Hudson asked.

  Gino nodded. “But don’t be too impressed. Famous people have bunions and smelly feet just like everyone else.”

  Aft
er he’d measured everyone’s feet, he asked the group to do a dance routine so that he could better understand the level of gymnastics the kids would be performing.

  “We must make sure that the shoes look simple, but beautiful, of course, and still do their job of giving you the right kind of support,” he said. Then he brought out a dance slipper and pointed to parts of the shoe. “We attach the heel to the sole with screws, so not like your average shoe, you know?” Broadway shoes ran the gamut of styles, and it looked like the squad was going to see all of them. “Two straps. One here, the T-strap, and one here, the Mary Jane.” They could have a metal bar under the sole, for what was called a fully shanked shoe, or a half shank. Most shoes also had a stublike toe, not a pointed toe, because onstage the foot needed to look normal, not like a chic fashion statement.

  “Okay, so now show me part of one of your numbers. Don’t mind if I take some notes, please.”

  The kids pushed the stools aside and agreed to perform the scene where they were leaving the suburbs and heading off to save the Tilt arcade. There was plenty of leaping, and it was one of the more physical routines. As they began, Monica was instantly off, so they started over. Then Relly was off and they started to laugh in embarrassment.

  “Sorry, I think we’re still learning this one,” April said, blushing. They started over and over and over, but they couldn’t get it right. “Come on. Together. Together,” April repeated, with a redder hue to her face each time.

  Gino rubbed his chin. “Maybe try a different scene.”

  They decided on the opening scene. It was the number they had rehearsed the most. Again, they were off. Gino’s original cheerfulness had shifted to a mix of annoyance and pity. Monica wasn’t sure which was worse.

  “You know what, I think I got what I need. So you say you only have three weeks left until opening night?”

  “Two weeks,” Hudson said.

  “Huh.” Gino rubbed his chin again.

  April was so frustrated, she picked up her shoes and ran out the shop door onto the busy sidewalk.

  The other kids followed shortly after, with their shoes also in their hands.