Page 82 of Playworld

“You don’t have a choice,” Damiano said.

“What if I have detention this weekend?”

“Come afterward,” he said. “We’ll roll out the red carpet.”

From his back pocket, Damiano produced a paperback copy and flapped it at me, which to my disgust was warm to the touch.

“Don’t worry,” he said, “it’s a small part. A couple of scenes in the first act. Important role, though. Charles. The wrestler.” When he registered my displeasure, he smiled and added, tauntingly, “A little typecasting.”

That afternoon, I had ninth period free. I was sitting on one of the front hall pews and feeling sorry for myself about my lost Saturdays. Rob Dolinski, a senior, sat across from me. He had his arms stretched out on the pew’s back crest, over the shoulders of his usual sidekicks, or girlfriends, Andrea Oppenheimer and Sophie Evans. Sophie was freckled and broad-mouthed, and she almost always wore pants—she so rarely donned a skirt with her blazer it was practically an event. Andrea, a beauty in a black turtleneck, wore her chestnut hair parted down the middle, half veiling her large eyes, the ends cut so that they appeared sharp and nearly pinched together, like a staple remover’s teeth. Earlier, they’d come in from the sublevel carport across the street, “under the stairs” where everyone went to smoke cigarettes.

Mr. McElmore, who ran marathons, came into their line of sight. Runners in general, and their outfits in particular, were outlandish back then, especially since they were on the continuum of nearly naked. McElmore wore super-short shorts, shiny as silk, and a nylon tank top. He had on what looked like a cycling cap, with its tiny brim turned backward, beneath which he’d stuffed his curls. His skinny, shaved legs were as taut and muscular as a Thoroughbred’s, and above his ankle socks each cord in his calf caught the hallway’s light. He stopped to talk to a passing student.

Dolinski whispered something to Andrea, who bent double. She laughed so hard, but also silently, having blown all the air from her lungs. When Andrea, leaning over Rob’s lap, cupped her hand to Sophie’s ear and shared, Sophie said to Rob, flatly, “I dare you.” At which point he stood and, tiptoeing right up behind McElmore, delicately pincered his shorts at the hems and then yanked them to his ankles.

For a moment, McElmore didn’t react, just stood like the vase on a tablecloth the magician rips away. Because his shorts had built-in lining and he was now butt naked. The stubby shaft of McElmore’s penis rested atop his nuts; it was so squat and fat it pointed straight forward. It lookedlike a cannon from the Revolutionary War—the barrel dwarfed by its wheels. I had never seen one like it. Clearly Dolinski hadn’t either—or had expected briefs and not the head of admissions’ bare ass and strange dick—since he stepped back, covering his mouth. Andrea and Sophie had also covered their mouths. McElmore bent to pull up his shorts, and when he finally did speak, it was without anger, although his port-wine birthmark had flushed a deep purple.

“Dolinski,” he said, “youasshole. Report to Saturday detention until you graduate.”

Which meant that I’d at least have some company this weekend.

—

As if God were also punishing me, it rained all the next morning. The weather put the film crew in a bad mood, since it threatened to scotch the schedule and slowed setup for our exterior shots. It sank me into despair, because today was when Amanda was supposed to visit. At the town house, after makeup, and in between bouts of woe, I passed the time studying my lines—not for my upcoming scene, since I had those down, but rather fromAs You Like It.

Oliver:Good Monsieur Charles, what’s the new news at the new court?

Charles:There’s no news at the court, sir, but the old news; that is, the old duke is banished by his younger brother the new duke; and three or four loving lords have put themselves into voluntary exile with him, whose lands and revenues enrich the new duke; therefore he gives them good leave to wander.

Thiswas why Damiano said I was an important character: I filled in crucial backstory. On Freytag’s Pyramid I was Mr. Exposition. In this scene, I was preparing to wrestle Oliver’s brother Orlando. My line in the next scene, right before the wrestling match, was a great one: “Come, where is this young gallant that is so desirous to lie with his mother earth!” But apparently Orlando wins (“Shout,” the stage directions read, “CHARLES is thrown”). Which meant, I learned as I read on, that I was also the Inciting Incident. It wasn’t too much to memorize, although once again the thought of a month of Saturdays spent at Boyd made mewant to bash in my skull. Worse, there was no telling when I might see Amanda next. Until the sun, blued by the window gels, kissed my paperback’s page, and I looked up to see that the sky had cleared.

It was one of those April days in New York when the warmer breezes carried on them the estuarial tang of the city’s surrounding rivers. Parked cars sparkled with beads of rainwater, and the puddles, like mirror shards, reflected pieces of skyline before being splashed to bits by traffic. Outside now, waiting on my mark as the crew tweaked the reflectors and spots and held up a light meter to my face, I watched the asphalt dry and then brighten. At the end of the block, like a Seurat in progress, Central Park was dotted with greens and browns and stony grays. A crowd had already formed at the police barrier. The camera crane rose high above the street, its four outrigger floats like a plesiosaur’s flippers shuddering under its weight, and with the cinemaphotographer, Willis, and Hornbeam both in the basket, and the long lens protuberant between them, the machine looked like a three-headed monster fromThe 4:30 Movie.

After being deposited back on earth, Hornbeam said, “Run through, please,” and, taking his mark beside me, called out,“Action.”We began to stroll down the block, the cued extras walking past us. In the scene, Konig and I had just come back from having a catch in Central Park. I was still wearing my mitt and throwing the ball into its web, while Konig, in cords and a blazer, had his tucked under his arm. I was heartsick over Diane Lane and doing my subtle best to get some guidance from the one person least equipped to offer it:

Bernie

How’d you know you’d fallen in love with Mom?

Konig

Because after we met, she was all I thought about. Kind of like a cancer diagnosis.

Bernie

Did she feel the same way about you?

Konig

She said that as long as she was acting in my movie, she wouldn’t date me. So I fired her on the spot.

Bernieglares atKonig,shocked.

Bernie

Then what?

Konig