Bit Players, Has-Been Actors and Other Posers: A Must-Read for Fans of Glee, High School Musical and Twilight (12 page)

Alex and Jocelyn spent a lot of time with Lucey and Nigel, plus Kristina and her new boyfriend Carter. I walked through the halls of Crudup with my eyes down to avoid all of them. Lucey and Nigel found an inordinate amount of time to lean against the lockers snogging. On the other side of the hall, Jocelyn would be attacking Alex. At least he had better PDA manners than Nigel; I saw him rebuff her once from the corner of my eye. And at least my locker wasn’t in the same section as theirs, creating a buffer zone – small mercies.

Being Alex’s next-door neighbor, this campaign of nauseating togetherness invaded my home life. I pretended not to see from my bedroom window when any combination of Alex/Jocelyn/Nigel/Lucey arrived next door, and ignored the laughter and music leaking from the windows. I refused to go outside during these times for fear of running into them. I avoided playing the piano lest they eavesdrop on my heartbreaking ballads. I became a prisoner in my own home.

One of these nights, I lay on my bed in the baggy T-shirt I wore for pajamas, listening to my iPod loudly enough to cover up the music from the Holman’s house. I stared at the ceiling, feeling sorry for myself because I couldn’t get a boyfriend. Granted Crudup was small with a limited boyfriend pool, but other girls had no problem finding dates or steady boyfriends.

What was wrong with me? I raised my bare leg toward the ceiling and analyzed it. Slender, long, somewhat muscular, nothing really wrong with it – in fact, it could be considered an asset. Was the problem my toes, I wondered, wiggling them? The second toe on my left foot was longer than the big toe, something I’d always hated. But I was pretty sure boys weren’t discounting me as girlfriend material based on my toes.

I perused my body. Even though I wasn’t an athlete, I was pretty fit from frequent dog-walking and occasional dancing. My stomach was flat, my chest just big enough to count, my arms toned.

Then there was my hair. I grabbed a chunk and looked for split ends. Finding one, I bit it off. My hair’s bushiness and unruliness drove me crazy. But everyone else – meaning my friends, not just my parents, whose view on this wouldn’t count – told me my hair was gorgeous. Thick and wavy, it even broke into curls with the right encouragement, meaning extreme humidity or a curling iron. Or I could straighten it into a thick mane of gold with reddish and brown streaks. Adrienne professed constant jealousy of my hair because of its versatility. Her hair had two styles – straight and straighter. But evidently hair wasn’t the number-one draw for boys, or I wouldn’t be lying here suffering intense loneliness pangs.

Maybe my clothes were the problem. Maybe I needed to experiment with new looks again. Maybe I could find a trendy style in a fashion magazine that would make me stand out and be noticed.

Was I too smart? I was one of the smarter kids at Crudup, but Kristina was smart too and she had dates. Could my father teaching at the school be keeping guys away? I wouldn’t say no to a date with a boy if his father taught at Crudup, but maybe it was more intimidating the other way around.

My only other theory was that I was simply too theatrical. Maybe no one wanted to date a drama queen. But I wasn’t obnoxious about it. It’s not like I spun through the halls singing show tunes at the top of my lungs, or quoted Shakespeare incessantly in English class.

No, at the end of my analysis, the parts of me were all basically non-offensive, average bits. Which meant that the whole of my parts must add up to something unattractive to boys. It was all of me that no one wanted. And I couldn’t do anything about that.

My chest ached and my eyes stung with the unfairness of it. The thought of enduring two more years of high school boyfriend-less was agonizing. The brief flirtation with Nigel only made the pain worse. I knew what I was missing – someone to hold hands with, to kiss softly, to have put his arm around me protectively. And I knew deep inside that a boyfriend would make all the crap of high school easier to bear, from bitchy girls and disinterested teachers to embarrassing parents and – most of all -- bit parts.

As if the prospect of becoming an old maid while watching Alex and Nigel carry on with their love lives wasn’t appalling enough, I was of course still dateless for the Homecoming Dance. When you’re an underclassman, going to dances with a bunch of friends is normal, but by junior year, only the losers don’t have dates. Another milestone in my high school experience would pass me by, just like winning the lead in a play.

All this angst affected my schoolwork. During classes, my mind wandered constantly -- to Nigel, to Alex, to
Twilight
, and even to my parents. Every time I passed my father in the school hallway, he looked distracted. Before, he always gave me a sly wink, having learned freshman year to not actually speak to me. Now, he didn’t even notice me sometimes. I should have been happy about this – for three years, I’d wished for a father who couldn’t track my every move through teacher observations and student gossip. Now, I kind of wanted the old dad back.

Not even CDC saved me from this turmoil and gave me purpose. Mr. Lord got annoyed at the next meeting because no one had written any song lyrics. He promptly gave us an assignment in music class to write new lyrics for a song we already knew, tied to
Twilight
in some way. People groaned but I was grateful for the extra push. He gave us complete license. Pick a show tune, a popular song from the radio, anything at all, and re-write the words to fit the show.

He went fairly easy on me about the script not being done, mainly because I lied and said it was half written. I promised to have the script by next week, when auditions were scheduled.

Through all this crap, Adrienne was my rock – an unfailing friend in the storm. The night of the Homecoming Dance, we watched movies and ate popcorn, and pretended it was a regular night.

*

I
N A SMALL SCHOOL LIKE CRUDUP, it was a given that the same kids were in most of your classes. Normally, my goal was to have as few classes as possible with Jocelyn, Kristina and Lucey, but I was glad they were in my music class, along with a bunch of other CDC members, because it let us turn the class into mini-CDC sessions. Mr. Lord let us wander way off topic, gabbing about CDC plans, or shows he’d been in, instead of reviewing the differences between Bach and Beethoven, which I don’t think he knew much about anyway.

 Tuesday after the Columbus Day holiday, he brought up
Twilight
before we did. The first batch of
Twilight
lyrics had been submitted, and he was not impressed.

“Everybody here knows ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star’ I presume?” We nodded while he handed out sheets of paper with lyrics handwritten on them, the name at the top crossed out. “Then let’s sing together in this truly inspiring rendition.” His sarcasm made me cringe for the anonymous lyricist.

We sang the
Twilight
words to the nursery rhyme as if singing a lullaby, a few snickers escaping the group at various points in the song.

When we finished, the giggling petered out and silence prevailed. Finally, Mr. Lord spoke. “What do you think of that? Anybody?”

I defended the unfortunate classmate being decimated by Lord, who probably couldn’t write lyrics either. “I think they’re pretty good words, and they fit the story.”

“Hah!” He slammed his hand on the desk, making us jump. “They may fit the story, but do they fit our play? Is this tune good enough for our production? An ode to skin? I think not.” We watched, wide-eyed, never having seen his impersonation of an angry teacher before.

“We want to create something special, people! Something inspirational. Not pablum from a nursery school!” I didn’t realize Lord knew words like “pablum” but tried to stay focused on his point. “How stupid would you feel standing on stage singing a nursery rhyme?” He answered for us. “Pretty stupid, I know. We must do better.”

He stretched up to his full height of about five-foot-nine and told us to turn over the papers in our hands. While we did, I scanned the room quickly and noticed tears in Lucey’s eyes, identifying her as the lyricist in question. For a millisecond only, I sympathized with her. Then I realized Lord was right; the song was lame.

“Let’s see our next stellar submission. The song is called ‘The Cullen Family’ and goes to the tune of
The Addams Family
theme song, written by the great Vic Mizzy. That, for those who don’t watch TV Land, is an old show about a family of monsters. Not a bad premise for a musical about vampires, but—well, let’s just take a look.”

Lindsay and Foster were laughing nervously, making me wonder if one of them authored the piece.

Mr. Lord noticed too. “Lindsay, since you’re probably one of the few who knows the tune, why don’t you solo for us on this one?”

Never afraid of the spotlight, Lindsay obliged, standing up on the chorus riser. He crossed his arms for most of the song, uncrossing them only to snap in key spots.

Lindsay sat down, smiling widely at his performance.

Mr. Lord, evidently tired of the angry teacher role, assumed a depressed stance – chin and eyes down, shoulders slumped. Issuing a huge sigh and walking closer to the risers, he asked, “Who can tell me what’s wrong with Lindsay’s lyrics? Anyone?”

Foster slowly raised his hand and waited to be noticed. “I’ve seen the TV show before, and I’m not sure but it sounds to me like those words at the beginning are a lot like the original.” Foster glanced at Lindsay. “Sorry, Lin-Lin,” he said in a stage whisper. Lindsay cringed, probably at the nickname, not Foster’s criticism.

“Correct! Point to Foster. The first few verses are copied directly from the original song, showing no creativity whatsoever. What else?”

No one else wanted to dump on Lindsay so Mr. Lord filled in his own blank. “The use of ‘psycho’ is incorrect. Alice is not a psycho, now is she? No, she’s psychic. Please try to be accurate, people.” He combed his hair with his hand, licked his lips and returned to his desk.

“I thought it was kind of cute,” Kristina said, in defense of Lindsay.

“Cute is not enough, Kristina. Cute will not win us—well, cute is beneath you. You all are capable of more than cute. Fortunately, this next one, which happens to be yours, shows some promise.” He motioned for her to come to the front of the classroom.

“Mr. Lord, can I set up the song for everyone?” Kristina asked. He nodded. “The idea is that Bella is torn between Edward and Jacob, and she has to decide which one to date – that’s the central conflict in the entire saga. ‘Hot & Cold’ by Katy Perry is the perfect song because, as you know, Edward is ice-cold and Jake is super-hot. In the song, Bella picks Edward, sending Jacob away.”

She plugged her iPod into the iPod speaker on Mr. Lord’s desk – another way he scored cool points with the students – and scrolled through to the song. She sang her lyrics over Katy Perry’s voice, and people joined in along the way. But her lyrics didn’t match up exactly so she paused the music a few times to sing her extra verses.