And This Is Laura Read online

  “The principal said it on the PA before you got here. He said Jean was at Southside General if anyone wanted to send cards or call or anything.”

  “What about the parents?”

  “He didn’t say. I guess they’re all right. I really don’t know.”

  The first period bell rang. Reluctantly I got up to walk to the door. I wanted to find out more, as much as I could, about the accident and I really felt too stunned to sit through Science just then.

  Jamie yanked at my sleeve. “I was thinking,” she whispered, following me out the door, “about what you saw in Steve’s reading, and you know what? That must have been a stretcher, not a coffin. And they must have been carrying him on the stretcher to a hospital room. That would explain everything.”

  It made sense. The only part that wasn’t right was the sheet pulled up over his face, but I didn’t think it had to be exact. After all, Jamie didn’t really have a mark on her temple, either. It was just something you had to figure out.

  “I’ll bet you’re right,” I agreed. “That must have been what I saw.”

  “It’s terrible about Jean,” she said as we scrambled down the hall, “but I can’t help thinking what a terrific psychic you are.”

  Halfway through Science it hit me.

  Beth was Jean’s stand-in.

  Beth was going to be the star of the play. Everything I had predicted was coming true.

  Beth was waiting outside Mr. Kane’s room before our English class started. When she spotted me coming down the hall she ran to meet me, jostling her way through the stream of kids moving in the opposite direction.

  “Laura, I can’t believe it! Isn’t that the most awful thing about Jean? Remember when I said that about her breaking a leg, and then I’d be the star of the play and your prediction would come true after all? Oh, Laura, it was a joke. I never meant I really wanted anything to happen to Jean—”

  I stopped dead in the middle of the hallway, oblivious to the onrushing students shoving past me on all sides. Why had it taken me so long to realize? All through first period I had been so preoccupied with the terrible news of the accident, and the way in which my predictions had come true, that I had failed to give the least bit of thought to what else would result from all this.

  And now the rest of it hit me, like that old ton of bricks.

  Beth was Jean’s understudy.

  I was Beth’s understudy.

  I would have to do the second biggest part in the play.

  “Mr. Kane!” Beth stopped him at the door. “What are we going to do? Did you hear about Jean?”

  The look of distress on his face made it plain that he had.

  “We’ll meet this afternoon,” he said. “I’ll have an announcement on the PA during homeroom.”

  “I can’t,” Beth wailed. “I have an orchestra rehearsal this afternoon.”

  “You’ll have to get out of it,” he said sharply. “If the show does go on, we can’t very well do it without Eloise.”

  I couldn’t play Beth’s part. I just couldn’t. I would be awful. You can’t have a rotten actress in the second lead of a play; I would ruin the whole thing. Even if I were not too scared to open my mouth and say my lines, the simple truth was I could not act. I was not Jill. I was not Beth. I was Laura.

  And I was scared to death.

  Beth was late to lunch because she had to see Mr. Schwartz about missing the rehearsal. She was convinced she’d be tossed out of the orchestra on her ear, but when she got into the lunchroom and settled into the seat I’d saved for her, she was relieved.

  “He was annoyed,” she reported, “but I explained what the problem was and that after this week I wouldn’t miss practice no matter what. Our concert is only a week from Friday—at least I’m not a soloist or anything.”

  I nodded, not really able to worry too much about Beth’s scheduling conflicts. She went to get her lunch. By the time she returned I had finished mine, and was staring blankly off into space, not seeing anything at all.

  “Do you think we’re going to do the play anyway?” she asked.

  I just shrugged. How could I say, “I hope not,” when I knew she must think this was her big chance?

  She dug into a small mound of chow mein. “What’s the matter with you? You’re so quiet.”

  I turned to look at her. “Don’t you realize what this means?”

  “What what means? The play?”

  “Yes, the play. If you’re Eloise, who do you think will play Phyllis?”

  “You, of course.” Unconcerned, she sipped at her milk.

  “And that doesn’t worry you?”

  “Why should it?”

  “Because I’ll be awful! Don’t you care that I’ll ruin the play you’re the star of?”

  She smiled. “Sure I’d worry if I thought you’d ruin the play. But you won’t. You’re nowhere near as untalented as you think. You just never had a chance to do a good part.”

  “Oh, Beth. You’re a very loyal friend and I know you don’t want to hurt my feelings, but I know perfectly well how un-talented I am. I wanted a little, teeny part. The more we rehearsed, the gladder I was I had a little, teeny part, and now this has to happen.”

  “Wait and see what happens,” Beth said. “We’re not even sure yet whether we’ll do the play. If we do, I’ll rehearse with you every day this week and we’ll help each other. It’s a new part for me too, you know.”

  “Oh, sure,” I retorted, “but it’s the part you wanted. I never wanted to be Phyllis.”

  “You’ll rise to the occasion,” Beth assured me. “Some are born to greatness and others have greatness thrust upon them. That’s a famous quotation,” she added.

  “I’m not ready for greatness!”

  Beth shrugged. “That’s the whole point. Greatness doesn’t always ask if you’re ready.”

  10

  THE CAST OF THE play met in Mr. Kane’s room since the orchestra had the auditorium for that afternoon. The situation was discussed and all the pros and cons were weighed. There were about twelve variations on the theme “The show must go on.”

  I thought I would scream if I heard one more “The show must go on.”

  Why must the show go on?

  “We’ve worked so hard.”

  “So many people will be disappointed.”

  (Not me.)

  “We owe it to the audience.”

  (What audience?)

  Finally we took a vote. “All those in favor of doing the play as scheduled, with the understudies, raise their hands.” I was surrounded by a forest of waving arms.

  “All those opposed.”

  Every tree in the forest fell. Frankly, I was too chicken to raise my hand to cast the only “No” vote, so I just looked around with pretended nonchalance, as if checking the votes. I hoped no one would notice I hadn’t voted.

  We moved all the desks to one side of the room clearing an area to serve as a stage. Mr. Kane said we would just do a run-through of the play today, to make sure the understudies knew their new parts.

  Rita, who hadn’t been in the cast, was given my old part of Nancy, so there wouldn’t have to be any more shifting of roles. She had to use a script for the rehearsal, but she was sure she’d have the lines memorized in no time. It was hardly a demanding role.

  As well as Beth and I knew the play, we stumbled over a few lines, mostly because we forgot what our cues were. I went through the whole rehearsal practically numb with fear; I kept thinking about doing this on a stage, in front of an audience. That made it hard to keep my mind on rehearsing.

  Even though it was only supposed to be a walk-through, Mr. Kane made suggestions. Especially to me.

  “You look a little stiff, Phyllis. Try and relax.”

  Hah!

  “Put the stress on ‘were,’ not ‘you.’ ‘You were the best team.’ ”

  “Phyllis, don’t stop talking before Nancy interrupts you. And Nancy, be sure and cut in before she finishes her line. Start your
line just before Phyllis says, ‘think.’”

  By the time we were done, I was exhausted. It was the strain of learning to do a new part, and the nervousness that didn’t get better but worse as I realized that even though I knew the lines pretty well, I didn’t know Phyllis’s movements and was not at all sure of where I was supposed to stand or move to, or what I was supposed to pick up or put down.

  “That wasn’t bad,” Mr. Kane said. “We’ll have the stage tomorrow and that will make things a lot easier for you. Eloise and Phyllis, you’d better work on your cues a bit tonight. You’re not entirely sure of them.”

  Beth and I walked to my house together. It was still bitter cold and icy, but the weather was the least of my worries.

  “You were fine,” Beth insisted. “It was only a walk-through.”

  “What walk-through?” I said sarcastically. “I was acting. Couldn’t you tell?”

  “We’ll work on it tonight. We can really help each other out. And if Jill is home I’ll bet she’ll give us some tips.”

  “You don’t need any tips,” I said.

  “I sure need practice, though.” Beth actually sounded a little worried.

  Douglas was at the piano as we let ourselves into the house. We went straight into the kitchen, where my parents and Jill greeted us as if we had hitchhiked down from the North Pole.

  “You must be frozen!” my mother cried. “Why didn’t you call? We could have picked you up. I’ll make some cocoa.”

  Dennis was under the kitchen table with a swarm of Matchbox cars.

  “Hi, Beth. Want to see my traffic jam?”

  Beth looked down. “It’s a pretty good traffic jam,” she said.

  “It’s the best one I ever did. Everybody crashes up.”

  “Which reminds me,” I began. “Wait’ll you hear this.”

  “Dammit dammit dammit!” Dennis piped. “You stupid Sunday driver. Dammit yourself, meathead!”

  My mother rolled her eyes. “Ignore him,” she mouthed at us.

  “That won’t be easy,” I sighed, as Dennis erupted with a long string of curses.

  “He really must meet my brother,” whispered Beth. “Roger would love him.”

  “It’s a p-h-a-s-e,” Jill told her. “It just started fifteen minutes ago, out of the clear blue sky.”

  My mother placed the cocoa cups on the table. “We’re hoping for the shortest phase in history.”

  My father interrupted Dennis’s next stream of choice words by asking, “How about a game of Go Fish, Den?”

  “That’s great psychology,” muttered Jill, “rewarding the kid for having a dirty mouth.”

  Dennis emerged from under the table. “Yeah,” he said eagerly.

  They went off in search of the cards.

  “It’s called distraction,” my mother told Jill. “Which is what he will drive me to,” she added.

  “Do you think,” I said, my voice cold, “that I might get a few words in edgewise now?”

  “I’m sorry, dear. What is it? What’s happened?”

  Beth and I told them about the accident, and the play, and how I would have to replace Beth in the second lead.

  Jill’s first reaction was, “Laura was right! Beth is going to be the star!”

  “I was right about more than that,” I said casually.

  Then I had to explain to them about the reading I’d done on Steve, because they had never heard about it before. Now that I knew he was going to be all right, I got a certain amount of satisfaction in telling them of my prediction and seeing expressions of amazement.

  At first Beth was a little annoyed that I hadn’t told her when Jamie had known all about it. My mother kept gazing at me, shaking her head and saying, “How incredible—it’s awful—to think you predicted that!”

  “At least,” said Jill, “this will finally give Laura the chance to find out she’s not such a bad actress.”

  “Will you help us?” asked Beth. “We really could use some coaching.”

  “ ‘We’ meaning me,” I said, “not her.”

  “ ‘We’ meaning both of us,” Beth corrected.

  “Of course, I’ll be glad to.” Jill looked as if she’d enjoy it. “Give me a copy of the script and let me read it first.”

  Beth pulled her battered script out of her loose-leaf and gave it to Jill, who went off to her room to go over it. Beth and I started setting the table. Dinner would be in a little while, since it was already pretty late.

  I was placing the forks beside the napkins when suddenly the china and silver disappeared and in their place I saw a photograph album. I don’t think I stopped to realize I was having another vision; I was just into it, before I knew what was happening.

  My mother was turning the pages of the album very slowly. There seemed to be only one picture on each of the black pages. They looked like old-fashioned portraits, with oval frames around the faces.

  A page turned, and there was a picture of Douglas. Underneath the picture, in old-fashioned, flowery script, was written “Douglas.”

  Another page turned. I saw a photo of Jill, with her name beneath in the same handwriting.

  My mother turned the page again. There I was, looking out from the oval frame, my name on the page like the others.

  Very slowly now the last page was turned. “Dennis” was written under the photograph, just as all the other names had been. But in the oval frame, where Dennis’s face should be, there was nothing but a blank, white space.

  “Laura!” Beth was shaking my shoulder. Confused, I looked around. I was in the kitchen and I was standing there with a bunch of silverware in my hand. My mother was staring at me.

  “What was it, Laura?” Beth demanded. “Did you see something?”

  I was scared again, just as I had been the first time I had seen my mother with the dolls. The silver began to clank in my hand, which suddenly felt shaky. I hastily resumed setting the table to cover up my fright. My mother’s anxious face was enough to persuade me not to tell her what I had seen.

  “No, I was just daydreaming,” I replied finally, to Beth’s repeated questions.

  “Are you sure?” asked my mother.

  “Yeah, I’m sure.”

  “Well, all right. But you looked so . . .”

  “You really did,” Beth agreed.

  “I’m starved,” I announced loudly. “Aren’t you, Beth? When do we eat?”

  “About five minutes,” my mother replied. Beth gave me a funny look, as if she saw right through my attempt to change the subject, but my mother was stirring something on the stove and her back was to me. If she thought I sounded a little unnatural, she didn’t press it.

  “I’ll go tell Jill. Come on, Beth.”

  Beth followed me up the stairs.

  “You did see something,” she whispered. “I knew it.”

  “Wait till we get Jill,” I said. “I’ll tell you about it.”

  We knocked on Jill’s door and went into her room. She was sprawled out on the bed, script in her hand.

  “This isn’t a bad play. Shakespeare it isn’t, but for Junior High it could be worse.”

  “Listen, Jill, we’re going to eat in five minutes and I have to make this quick. I want to tell you about something.”

  First I told her about my mother and the three dolls. Beth waited patiently till I was finished, though I knew she was dying to hear what the latest was.

  “Now, just a minute ago I had another. See if this doesn’t sound like it means practically the same thing to you.”

  I told them about the photograph album and the empty frame.

  Jill looked shaken. Beth nodded slowly as if she could see the connection between the two episodes.

  “What do you think?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” Jill replied. “Did you tell Mom about this?”

  “No. I was afraid it would worry her.”

  “It sure would. It worries me. Whatever it means, Laura, it can’t be good. I’m really frightened.”
r />   “Yeah, me too. I’m going to keep waiting for something to happen and I don’t know what it is.”

  “I know. But it has to mean something is going to happen to Dennis.”

  “Not necessarily something bad.” Beth tried to sound comforting.

  “That’s what Jamie said,” I added, “but still . . .”

  Jill sighed heavily and pulled herself off the bed.

  “Maybe not.” But you could tell she didn’t believe that for an instant. Neither did I, not anymore. And neither did Beth.

  Jill helped us read through the play after dinner, but our hearts weren’t in it. We kept stopping to go over my predictions again, to try and make something less frightening out of them.

  Finally Jill said, “Look, we’re not helping anyone this way. Let’s concentrate on the play. We’ll just keep an eye on Dennis from now on and that’s all we can do.”

  “Maybe you ought to tell your mother,” said Beth. “She’s the one who’s with him most of the time. Maybe she ought to know so she can be extra careful.”

  “But if it’s a prediction,” Jill argued, “and it’s going to happen, there’s nothing she can do to prevent it. What’s the use of giving her even more grief before it happens?”

  We didn’t have any answers for that.

  “Remember how you felt when you thought Steve was going to die? You just got finished telling us how you were a nervous wreck all that week from worrying about him. Do you want Mom to go through that?”

  “No, but—”

  “Besides, she can’t stay with him in school every day, so for most of the time she’s not with him anyway. I don’t see that it would do any good to tell her. We’ll just do the best we can at watching him and leave it at that. In the meanwhile, you people have a play to rehearse.”

  11

  JILL WAS A big help to us. (Me, really. Just as I thought, Beth didn’t need much help at all.) She worked with us for the next two evenings after our regular rehearsals, showing me how to move more naturally and how to “get into” the part of Phyllis, rather than just reciting her lines.

  “See, you’re really very capable of doing this part,” she told me on Wednesday night, when I was acting better than I’d ever dreamed I could. “All you needed was a little coaching. And everyone needs that.”