Losing it

“As you should be. Your audition…” He stepped closer, and as always, his presence stripped away the embarrassment and any other emotion, and replaced it with heat, with desire. “Your audition was fantastic. There was no competition.”

I swallowed, but the lump in my throat remained. My thank you came out as a whisper.

“But Friday night…“

“Oh, God—“

“As ridiculously cute as you were, please don’t get that drunk again. Eric will need you to be at your absolute best for this role.”

“Of course,” I nodded, petrified. “Absolutely. I promise.”

“And… I was worried about you, too.”

“Oh.”

His eyes flicked around my face, darting from my no doubt crazy hair to my eyes to my lips, then quickly down to my leg, where the burn had healed and left a dark pink scar. “I don’t like being worried about you.”

My heart felt like it was going to make a jailbreak from my ribcage if I didn’t do something soon. This was dangerous territory. There were things rearing up inside me, things beyond attraction, beyond an obsession with his looks and his body and his accent—dangerous things. His fingers touched a curl near my cheek, and the proximity of his skin made me feel like I was on the verge of explosion.

I smiled and tried to lighten the situation. “You should probably worry about yourself. Calling me ‘cute’ again is bound to get you injured, possibly maimed for life.”

He took a step closer to me, and the world felt like it was shrinking around the two of us. The hand in my hair swayed closer, his knuckles brushing my cheek. He lowered his voice and said, “Since I can’t very well call you the alternative here, cute will have to do for now.” My mind flashed back to the first time he’d called me ridiculously cute. I’d had my pants trapped around my knees. He’d then called me ridiculously sexy and helped me take them off.

Clearly, I needed to learn to stop saying the first thing that popped into my mind. But I couldn’t think about that at this moment, because my mind was stuck on his last two words… for now, for now, for now.

He cleared his throat, and stepped back, dropping the curl he’d had trapped between his fingers. “Why don’t you go take a seat for class?”

I nodded, slipping past him and through the curtains.

There was a seat saved for me between Kelsey and Cade, both of whom were wearing identically huge grins. I smiled, shaking off the encounter with Garrick to bask once more in my joy. Kelsey leaned in to hug me when I took my seat, and whispered in my ear, “I guess being hot for teacher really did help you get into character. I’m so proud of you, honey.”

I glared half-heartedly, but nodded my thanks. And then turned to Cade.

We’d held hands earlier, and hugged when I found out, but I wasn’t sure what the protocol was now. Living in the world of maybe was… complicated.

Before, Cade and I were effortless. Being with him was just as low pressure as being alone. And now suddenly there was this intensity to everything we did and everything we said. Like my life had been italicized.

When we were touching, I noticed. When we weren’t touching I noticed. And suddenly I could find no in between. No maybe.

So I froze.

We were both waiting, stuck in that area between action and refusal. We were nothing. We were inaction. Then Garrick called the class to order, and the awkwardness was postponed for a bit longer.

I knew… I knew eventually we’d have to get over this… figure out some way to co-exist again. You could only postpone so long before shit hit the fan. But surely I could wait a little longer. Today was an exciting day, no reason to rain on my own parade.

When class ended, Eric was waiting for me outside.

“Good morning, Bliss. Can I speak to you for a moment?”

I blinked, caught off guard.

“Of course.”

He opened the theatre door, and gestured for me to re-enter. I followed him through the curtains, and he waved me toward a seat directly beside Garrick. I perched on the seat carefully and glanced between them, unsure of what was happening. Then it dawned on me.

He’d found out.

Why else would he want to speak to Garrick and I?

Oh my God. What was going to happen to me?

Would they kick me out of the department? Out of the school? At the very least, I’d probably lose my scholarship. How would I pay tuition then?

There was a roaring in my ears, and the pull of gravity felt so heavy that I felt like I would sink right through the floor. Garrick would probably lose his job. What would he do then? He’d go back to Philadelphia or London or somewhere and I’d never see him again.

I turned to him, trying to convey my remorse with a look, but he was… smiling?

“Bliss,” Eric said, “I have to admit I’m surprised.”

Air left my lungs in a rush. “S-sir, I’m so—“

“You’ve certainly done well in your time here over the past few years, but I had no idea you were capable of the kind of performance you gave in auditions.”

I was still clenching my teeth and holding my breath against the coming shame, so it took me a moment to realize it wasn’t coming after all.

“You’ve always been a bit too in your head, I suppose. Controlled. Careful. Mechanical, might be the best word for it. But in those auditions—you were living in the moment. You were feeling instead of thinking. I saw shades of emotion in you—strength and vulnerability, desire and disgust, hope and shame—that were quite simply captivating. I don’t know what you’re doing or what you’ve done, but please do continue. You’re much better when you make bold choices.”

Unbidden, my eyes locked with Garrick’s. Did he know? Had he guessed that it was him? That this thing between us had me feeling things I’d never felt and taking risks I would have balked at not long ago. My night with him was possibly the only impulsive thing I’d ever done.

“Thank you, sir.”

“You’re quite, welcome. I’m very much looking forward to working with you. Speaking of which, I’d like you to come to callbacks on Wednesday. We’d like you to read some scenes with Hippolytus, so that we can get a good idea of chemistry and look on stage.”

“Of course, I’ll be there.”

“Great, Garrick will be there to answer any questions for you, as well. He’s going to be assistant directing this production, so if you need anything you can come to either of us.”

He patted me lightly on the shoulder, and took off. Then I was alone with Garrick. My heart was still thudding impatiently, either because of the fear that we’d been caught or just because I was sitting beside the one guy I wanted but couldn’t have.

“I can’t remember if I mentioned it, but I’m really proud of you,” Garrick said.

“Thank you. I think I’m still in shock.” I was still in shock from all of this.

“Well, get used to it. From what I’ve seen, I don’t think you’d have to worry about Stage Managing unless you just wanted to. You’re an actor, Bliss, whether you believe it or not. ”

I nodded, filing that thought away.

“Have you thought more about that? What you’d like to do after graduation?”

I picked at the frayed threads on the knee of my jeans.

“Not really…”

“Well, if you want to talk about it, you know you can always come to me.”

I raised an eyebrow at him, unable to quite put into words how preposterous that idea was.

He said, “I’m serious. You act like we couldn’t possibly be friends.”

If possible, my eyebrow arched even more. The thought of being friends with him… it was beyond