The Reece Malcolm List (11 page)

“What’s late?” I tuck the bills into my wallet. “Like midnight?”

“One? Sure.”

We walk downstairs together, where Travis and Sai are standing in the living room. Sai is at the bookshelves while Travis is in front of one of the paintings.

“Devvie, oh my God,” Travis says. A good greeting. “Your hair is amazing.”

My mother’s stylist was booked for a couple of weeks, but Kate called hers last night and got me in first thing in the morning. My hair now falls just below my chin with a bit of a swing, like I always have a wind machine on me, and instead of mouse brown it’s colored auburn. And I’m still just Devan, with a face that’s too round and eyes that are boring, but this is maybe the best I’ve ever looked.

“It looks good,” Sai says with a nod. From a straight guy that’s a solid hair compliment. “Man, your house is
awesome
.”

“Very posh.” Travis looks at my mother. “Are you Devan’s mom? Is this your posh house?”

“I am and it is,” she says. “Thanks, both of you.”

“We should go, if we have to pick up everyone else,” I say.

“Hang on.” Sai leans in closer to the bookshelf he’s examining. “Man, this is an awesome collection. I had to leave most of my books behind when I moved.”

Oh my God, such a nerd. Unfortunately that just makes him hotter.

“Were you in a hurry?” Travis asks. “Like, running from the law?”

“You’re so weird,” I say to Travis, which is the kind of thing I said all the time to Justine, and suddenly I miss Justine so much I could puke. She has only emailed to say things are
very very good
with The Tenor, though. It’s like we were gone from each other before it was even true.

“Nah, my dad just had limits on how much I could pack, said books take up too much room.” He shrugs like it isn’t a big deal, but I think maybe it is.

“Okay, you’ve looked at books enough, this isn’t a library,” Travis says. “’Bye, Devan’s Mom; it was nice to meet you.”

“You, too, guys.”

I follow Travis and Sai outside to Travis’s Beetle. Sai gets into the back so I take the front passenger seat. “Thanks for picking me up.”

“Really no prob,” Travis says. “So if you moved only a week ago, were you living with someone else then or whatever? Because your house looks way nicer than if you moved in a week ago.”

“Yeah, um, before I lived with my dad and stepmom,” I say. “In St. Louis.”

“With Sai!” he says all excitedly.

“Not exactly,” I say, because, okay, St. Louis isn’t as big as L.A. or anything, but it’s not like everyone there knows one another. People who were born in L.A. probably think all other cities are like teeny tiny towns.

“But you’re here for a while?” Travis asks. I wish he’d stop with the questions. I don’t want anyone to know how weird my whole situation is. “I mean, you’re not gonna, like, land a part in the fall show and then go back, are you?”

“No, I’m not going back.”

“I don’t blame you,” he says. “The Midwest, ugh. But won’t your dad mind?”

“He’s dead,” I say, “so probably not.”

“Oh my God, Devan, I’m sorry,” he says as Sai leans forward and touches my shoulder, saying, “Man, that sucks.”

I hope it isn’t a bad sign that he keeps calling me
man
.

“It’s okay,” I say. “My dad and I weren’t close or whatever.”

“Still,” they both say. A popular reaction.

“Still. I’m okay.” That much, I’m nearly positive, is starting to feel true.

“Did you want to stay there?” Travis asks. “Like, does it suck being here?”

I seriously wish he would stop asking me things.

“Man, Kennedy, leave her alone,” Sai says. His hand is still on my shoulder. It’s probably bad I’m taking a nice, comforting moment and enjoying the weight and warmth of his hand on me when we’re talking about my dad. “Would
you
wanna talk about it?”

We pick up Mira next. As she walks up to the car, Travis leans over and elbows me. “You need to get in the back. Mira’ll be all carsick unless she rides shotgun.”

I wonder if that’s true or if Travis just wants me to sit in the backseat next to Sai. Or maybe Mira doesn’t want to have to sit by Sai because she hates us both.

Honestly, I’m not complaining. And Mira barely says a word to us, but I’m determined not to let her ruin anything. Plus I’m
in the tiny backseat of a tiny car with Sai
. Travis and Mira are having a big discussion about the filmed production of
Into the Woods
, but I’m not listening very closely because Sai starts this game on his phone and keeps passing it to me to take a turn. If I forget Nicole exists, it feels like a moment out of a montage in a romantic comedy.

The theatre is a tiny building off a dark street, and I hope it isn’t just my Midwestern naïveté or whatever telling me we aren’t in a great part of town. But people swarm into the little theatre, and seeing the showcards on the walls and the ushers holding programs, I feel like I’m home.

I saw my first musical as a fluke. In seventh grade, our choir class went as a field trip to see the high school’s spring show. It was just this average production of
Grease
but watching those kids onstage, something in me shifted. This need surged from my heart, and all I could think was that I wanted it to be me. I wanted to be up there. I needed to be part of this.

Choir is great because I get to sing, and show choir is better because it has a lot in common with musical theatre. But they’re just placeholders and ways to get better, until theatre is in my life all the time. I’m not sure I could go on if I didn’t believe eventually I’ll have it there constantly.

Which means that this tiny theatre is exactly where I need to be tonight.

During the show I sit between Travis and Sai, which is good for obvious reasons, but also because I’m pretty sure it isn’t just my paranoid imagination that Mira is still glaring at me. Also—probably more likely my imagination—Sai has plenty of space in his seat but he’s leaned in nice and close to me and I can pretend for at least the sake of the rest of the crowd that we’re here
together
together.

The show isn’t the most amazing production ever or anything, but I still get wrapped right into it as soon as the curtain goes up, and I feel the pull between the stage and myself. And, even more amazingly, I feel it from everyone else I’m sitting with, too.

Afterward Travis drives into Hollywood to a diner located under the freeway, and we crowd into a booth while Travis tries to spot celebrities (no luck but it doesn’t stop him). Sai and Mira both have their phones out, texting, I assume, with Nicole and Lissa, respectively.

Weirdly enough, though, I don’t feel left out, or out of place, or any of what I would have worried about. It’s enough just sitting here, listening to everyone else, chiming in occasionally.

It’s such a great night I don’t even freak out when I let myself into the house and walk in on my mother and Brad making out. (Okay, in my head of
course
I freak out. In person I pretend to laugh along with them before making a quick escape to my room.) And I feel—well, actually
happy
as I change into my pajamas and get into bed.

“Hey.” My mother leans into the room. “
So sorry.
We lost track of time and— You don’t want to hear this. How was the show?”

“Fun,” I say because she definitely does not want to hear a bunch of my thoughts about Stephen Sondheim and musical theatre, so I’ll leave it at that. “How was the event?”

She walks into the room and sits down on the edge of my bed. I think about the billion times I had trouble falling asleep as a kid and wished my mother were there to read me a story or say the right comforting thing. “It wasn’t too boring and no one ordered a drink from me. I’m calling it a victory.”

“What did Brad’s ex-girlfriend wear?” I ask, because I want to know, but then I realize I’ve asked something insanely intrusive and I want to disappear. “I’m sorry, that’s totally none of my business.”

“Oh, please, I brought it up yesterday. Something red and sparkly. She looked beautiful; I looked like me.” She shrugs. “But I don’t mind looking like me.”

I can’t explain why but it makes me so happy she feels like that.

“I’ll let you get some sleep,” she says. “Good night, kid.”

Chapter Eight

Things I know about Reece Malcolm:

21. She has no idea how to dress for anything.

22. She actually is insecure about things, like Brad’s ex-girlfriend, despite all opposing evidence.

Next week we have official notice of auditions on Thursday. You can feel this sense of terror and stress in my choir classes and in the hallways of the Music Building, but for me it’s like everything is finally happening. This is what I live for. A million things about life might scare me but this will never be one of them.

By lunch on Wednesday all anyone is talking about is tomorrow’s auditions. Sai’s not at our table today—it’s a popular table day for him—and so that means I feel a lot like the odd person out, because everyone else has been through this before, specifically at this school. Also Mira just has this magical way of directing conversation around but not including me. It’s fine, because I’m getting used to it, and it’s basically being invisible, which, again, I’m great at.

A foot taps my shin, and I assume it’s a mistake until it happens again,
taptap
this time. I glance up and Elijah grins at me with a sideways look to Mira like she’s nuts. I don’t mean to but I laugh aloud.

“What?” Mira turns to look at me, then Elijah. “What’s funny?”

“You’re not the comedy police,” Travis says, then goes back to whatever he was saying about him being suited for both leads equally. It’s funny how I can tell we all think he’s crazy for saying that but no one—not even Mira—corrects him.

When the bell rings, I trail everyone inside, but today Elijah does the same. I sort of expect he’ll say something about not worrying too much about Mira. But he doesn’t say anything, just grins at me.

“You got me in trouble,” I say.

“That’s me,” he says. “Trouble-getter.”

“Trouble
maker
,” I correct.

He laughs. “Both, really.”

We have show choir rehearsal after school that day. A lot of people would obviously rather take a night off to get ready for auditions, but I’m happy to be here. Working to perfect vocals and choreography is probably the best thing we could be doing the day before anyway. Plus I love rehearsal, especially because this is by far the best show choir I’ve ever been in. Not only is everyone a totally high-caliber singer, but Mr. Deans is smart about picking show tunes the whole world hasn’t already sung to death (like we’re currently working on “New Music” from
Ragtime
, which isn’t super well-known but a really beautiful song) and mixing them up with standards and random stuff, like pop songs from the eighties and nineties.

After rehearsal, even though I’m still not nervous about the imminent auditions, I just kind of want to get out of school and shut myself in my room alone with my sheet music. If I’m totally prepared, I’ll have no reason to get nervous even in the moment. And the moment is what matters most. But someone stops me on my way outside. The good news is that it’s Sai.

“Hey.” He rests his hand on my arm as we walk outside. Too much to hope he’s about to declare his love for me? “How are you doing with your monologue for Acting?” Uh, yes. “I’ve gotta read mine tomorrow and I was gonna see if you wanted to work on it with me. Kinda worried that with auditions and all I won’t focus on it enough otherwise.”

“Um, totally, yeah.” I nod toward the curb in front of the school, where my mother’s BMW is parked. “Like, now? My mom’s here to pick me up.”

“We could go to your house, if that’s okay,” he says. “Mine sucks anyway, since we just moved in and all.”

“Yeah, um, let me ask.” I walk up to the car and open the passenger door. “Hey, so, um, Sai and I were going to work on our monologues for acting class; he said he could come over, is that okay? If not it’s totally fine, I just—”

“Of course it’s fine,” she says. “Hey, Sai.”

“Hey, Ms. Malcolm,” he says. “Can you wait so I can just follow you?” He points across the parking lot, where a blue Audi is parked. “I’m right there.”

“I can handle that,” my mother says. “Devan, go with him in case he gets cut off from me so he won’t be lost.”

Considering we only live five minutes away, I’m pretty sure my mother is just trying to get me alone in a car with Sai. Is that a normal mom thing to do? (Okay, who cares if it’s a normal mom thing to do? It’s an amazing mom thing to do.)

“Your car’s really nice,” I say, because it is, but also because I figure guys who drive cars like this want to hear it.

“It’s blackmail, but it’s fine,” he says as he opens the passenger door for me. I must look kind of shocked at that, so he laughs really quickly—but in this obviously fake tone. “Just kidding.”

I don’t say anything to that, just buckle in as he squeals out of his parking space to pull up behind the BMW. Even if it took weird meddling from my mother, it’s a highlight of my life to be speeding down Ventura Boulevard in a hot boy’s car.

Sai pulls into our driveway. “Your mom seems cool.”

“Sure,” I say. I still haven’t figured out how to talk about her without saying everything. Saying nothing is much safer.

“How was school?” my mother asks as the three of us walk into the house together. As if it’s normal to have Sai along with us.

“Fine,” I say. “Show choir was mostly for the guys today, but it was still fun.”

Sometimes I honestly kind of forget about my classes besides choir and acting when I’m thinking about my day.

“Deans is really good,” Sai says. “Ten times better than my last director.”

“Oh, you’re in the Nation, too?” My mother looks more than a little surprised.
Yeah
, I want to say,
you’re not wrong. He’s way too hot for show choir.

“Yeah, it’s awesome,” he says.

In my head I say,
Show choir is many things, but it’s not awesome
, but I’m so bad at trying to be snarky or whatever that I stay silent.

“I’ll leave you guys to your monologues,” my mother says. And then she sits down in the living room with her computer, which I guess means I’m supposed to take Sai up to my room. So even though that feels wrong for a million reasons? I totally do.