Forbidden Love (4 page)

The day wore on. Millie bought her extra
Snapples from the bookstore and did a load of her laundry, trying
to make up for her catastrophic matchmaking attempt. Trisha’s
mother called again, and told her about a special fine arts camp
they had discovered in Tupper Lake, New York for teenagers and
young adults “like Lucas.” He would absolutely flourish there, her
mother said. Trisha could hear the excitement dancing in her voice.
Lucas had always had a mind for math and logic, but was also a
naturally beautiful tenor, and liked to sketch graffiti art. Some
days, he would shut himself in his bedroom and draw for hours. Can
you imagine the connections he’d make, with other people just like
him? Trisha’s mother mused. How he’d feel valued for his talents?
How many social skills he’d learn? And, Trisha thought in response,
though she felt a tad guilty for doing so, you wouldn’t have to
concern yourself with figuring out what to do with him, because
other people would be taking care of that. But the camp was
practically cost prohibitive. Over sixteen thousand dollars for the
six-week program, in fact. Trisha’s mother and father were going to
apply for financial aid, but meanwhile try to figure out a way to
gather the money.

“Why don’t you do a fundraiser?” Trisha
said.

“But that’s so greedy,” her mother said. “I
don’t think we could ask our neighbors to give us money like that,
for something they’d think was frivolous. They’re working class,
like us. We’ll have to find some other way.”

After the conversation,
Trisha realized that her mother’s appeal to her to wait at
Making Waves
that summer
probably had less to do with their leaky roof than their desire to
send Lucas to this camp. Why hadn’t her mother just come
out
with that? Annoyance
crept up the back of Trisha’s neck like a rash, familiar but hotter
than the last time it had surfaced. She would have been more likely
to be willing to help out if her efforts benefited Lucas. God, her
mother drove her insane.

“Maybe she didn’t tell you because you’re
going to have student loans when you get out of this place,” Millie
said to her frankly later on at dinner. “They didn’t bend over
backwards to save you from that burden, did they?”

Trisha didn’t answer her. She chewed her
chicken and broccoli and passively let the weight of knowing the
unfairness of things descend on her shoulders. She wondered if
Rusty were thinking about her at all, or if he had gone back to his
daily routine with no memory of the compliments he had given her a
couple of nights before, and no conscience whatsoever that told him
what a prick he was.

On Tuesday, Trisha perked up a little bit at
the prospect of starting her Characterization class. Even though it
had not been her first choice—she had tried to get into the Acting
Methods II course, to get departmental permission to skip one of
the prerequisites for it—she was eager to get back to the culture
she loved after a month away. As she walked toward lower campus to
the performance arts complex for the one o’clock start, she tried
to pump herself up, to cast the bitter remnants of Rusty’s smell,
taste, and voice out of her system. But straining to exile him from
her thoughts only planted him there with more force. Where was he
now? At the gym, fortifying those muscles with endless reps on the
bench press? Fingering some other girl in his bed? Sleeping, with
no skeletons to disturb his slumber? By the time Trisha had pushed
through the glass double doors of the Bernstein Building, her eyes
were burning with furious tears. She had to stop in the ladies room
to breathe and to press paper towels doused in cold water on her
eyelids.

“Heeey,” Trisha heard from behind her and she
blinked the moisture away to see, in the mirror, one of her least
favorite people in the theatre department: Genevieve Chartrand.
Genevieve exuded sexuality and confidence, and never hesitated to
step in front of a fellow actor to gain attention or take on a
challenge first. She also had the most complete PINK wardrobe that
Trisha had ever seen. She didn’t know anyone except Genevieve who
would dare to wear the word SEXY in sequins across her ass.

“Hi, Gen,” Trisha said. She could muster only
a monotone.

“What, were you crying or something?” Gen
said, fluffing her obnoxiously long black hair. “Tough way to start
a semester. I think I’d rather die than walk into a class looking
like I just got ditched.” She reapplied her lip gloss. “Sorry, but
it’s pretty obvious.”

“Yeah,” Trisha said. “Actually, I just got a
phone call that my grandfather died. But thanks for your
support.”

Gen looked at her, sticky
lips open slightly. Amused by her own lie, Trisha thought she could
see the processing in that pretty little brain:
I don’t care; I care kind of; no, wait—I actually
don’t.

“Well,” Gen said, and shrugged, “my
grandfather is eighty-nine, and he’s about ready to go. That’s
life, I guess.”

“My grandfather fell off a ladder taking down
Christmas lights,” Trisha said evenly. Sometimes, she was really
talented at channeling anger into a productive performance.

Gen released a little snort, not a mocking
one, really, but one of surprise. She grimaced at her own
reflection, avoiding Trisha’s eyes. “That’s…awful.”

Trisha cocked her head. “That’s life, I
guess.”

She followed Gen out of the bathroom. They
headed down the hallway in the same direction, in awkward silence.
As they approached Room 201, Trisha sighed loudly with resignation.
A whole new semester with Bitchy Chartrand.

She hadn’t had a class in this room before.
It was roomy and bright, with wood flooring, white walls, and rows
of windows that let in the fierce winter sun. Risers lined one
wall, and a new black piano dominated one corner. Students had
already sat down at desks that were arranged in a semi-circle in
the middle of the room. Trisha saw a few fellow theatre friends she
recognized and tried to distract herself by striking up some small
talk before claiming a desk at one of the tips of the
horseshoe.

“Good afternoon,” cheered a voice, and the
classroom door shut with a hollow sound. Conversation in the room
drifted into silence as everyone’s heads turned.

Trisha’s heart stopped.

Was she seeing things?

Her heart rate gunned into
rapid fire. Almost instantly, she could feel her face flare into a
full-blown blaze of embarrassment. Shit. She was watching Rusty
Quirke, grinning wildly, stroll in behind Professor Kastarellis.
First, his ravishing blue eyes, perfectly proportioned facial
features, and commanding frame struck her breathless. Then her
panic set in.
What the hell was he doing
here?
Trisha glanced around, wide-eyed, as
if to demand the question of her classmates. Did anyone else see
that there was something incredibly wrong about this? Did anyone
else know that the man who was walking into this room had seen her
exposed, said things to her and touched her in a way to make the
most sensitive parts of her body stand on end? And then—when she
was most vulnerable and entirely seduced—sneered at her and led her
to the door to trudge up the hill to campus, alone and freezing in
the darkness? She was dumbfounded. She clutched the sides of the
desktop with both hands and squeezed hard, as though she could
condense herself into an invisible ball and disappear. Oh my God.
Oh my God!

“This is T210: Characterization,” said
Professor Kastarellis as he set down his courier bag on the
classroom table. “So if you’re in the wrong room, now would be the
time to sneak out before I manipulate you into staying.” He nudged
up his wire-rimmed glasses and smirked.

Rusty placed his own bag on the table next to
the professor’s and looked out at the semi-circle. Trisha’s gaze
darted away. She focused on the piano in the corner. When her eyes
shifted back to Rusty, he wasn’t looking in her direction. But she
was sure he had spotted her. There were only fifteen students in
the class. She thought about taking Professor Kastarellis’
invitation to leave, to pretend that she was never meant to be here
in the first place, and to deal with the consequences later.

“I would like to introduce you to a graduate
student who is extremely talented,” Professor Kastarellis
continued, and held out his arm to Rusty, who was still beaming.
“He will be assisting me in teaching this course for the first four
weeks, and then, he’ll be taking over. I’ll still be around, of
course, but you will turn over your full attention and respect to
Mr. Quirke when it’s time. Is that clear?”

“I’ll give him my full attention, day and
night,” whispered Genevieve, two desks away. Trisha fought the
compulsion to leap across them and wrestle her to the floor.

She blanked out during Professor Kastarellis’
overview of the course and how it fit into the rest of the
requirements for the theatre major. Rusty leaned against the table
with his hands in his pockets and his ankles crossed, every now and
then inserting his own commentary. The rest of the class was
riveted by his God-like looks and easygoing manner. The girls
couldn’t tear their eyes away. Even some of the guys couldn’t tear
their eyes away. He hadn’t so much as blinked in Trisha’s direction
to acknowledge her. She was boiling with frustration.

“I’m going to allow Rusty to lead us in our
first drill of the semester,” said Professor Kastarellis. “Go with
it. It’s an ice-breaker sort of thing, so be prepared to get
personal.”

Trisha could not believe that out of all of
the people in that room, the one individual who knew her most
intimately was one of the instructors. It was bizarre, really.
Actually, ridiculous. She suddenly had the urge to crack up
laughing. This guy had sucked on her tits and now she would have to
answer to him. Hell—he’d be grading her, determining her rank in
the department.

Rusty stepped into the space at the top of
the horseshoe. A waft of that smell, that musk of forest and spice,
made her lightheaded. He still avoided her eyes. Trisha stared down
at her hands. Death come quickly, she thought.

“I want to thank you in advance for opening
yourselves to this exercise,” he said. “And when I say ‘this
exercise,’ I don’t mean just this activity I’m about to put you
through. I’m talking about the exercise of cutting life open and
flipping it inside out, of amplifying it so we can learn from it
and cry about it and celebrate it, by being actors.” He was
clenching his hands. “I’m committed to dragging the best out of
you, even if it means you’re lying on the floor in pieces
afterwards.”

Genevieve sighed dreamily, audibly. The girl
next to her slugged her in the arm.

Rusty smiled at Gen. “Okay, Gen. If you’re
ready, you can start things off for me.”

“Me?” Gen pressed her black fingernails
against her chest in mock awe.

Did he know her name because he had memorized
the online roster that came with students’ ID photos? Or did he
know her personally? What was up with that? Trisha fidgeted with
the fringe on her scarf, twisting it and braiding it.

“Here’s the assignment.” Rusty rubbed his
palms together. “I’m going to give you five minutes to brainstorm a
soliloquy. You can jot down notes, and bring up the notes with you,
as long as you use them only for brief reference.”

Trisha was beginning to understand the
gravity of this semester-long scenario. Her realization was taking
the shape of an anchor in her gut.

“You are going to tell your birth story.”

She glanced up and grimaced. Now she wished
she could catch his eye and pelt him with telepathic daggers. Was
this part of his act with everyone? Rusty and his damn birth
story.

“But, you are going to tell your birth story
from the point-of-view of someone else in your life. It doesn’t
even have to be a person who was around for your debut into the
world. But it should be someone who has come to know you fairly
well, and someone you’ve had an impact on, negative, neutral, or
positive. You’re going to show us how you see yourself through that
person’s experience of you.”

Within a minute, all heads were bent over
notebooks. Trisha knew, without hesitation, who would tell her
story.

Genevieve delivered an overdramatic tribute
to herself from the perspective of her childhood dance teacher,
complete with hip undulations and hair-tossing. Trisha couldn’t
help but notice that Rusty appreciated every moment of it. His
eyebrows jumped every now and then as he watched Gen, the way they
had when Trisha had thrown her arms around his neck at The Open
Call. The corners of his mouth trembled as though restraining a
lascivious grin. Trisha shook her head in disgust and folded her
arms across her chest. She’d go next. She’d blow him the hell away,
the asshole. And he’d finally be forced to look her in the eye.

“Be my guest,” he said to her when she raised
her hand. His expression betrayed no admission that he knew her
beyond the limits of the classroom.

Standing in front of her classmates, Trisha
took a few moments to breathe, to calm what felt like thousands of
tiny spiders climbing through her nervous system. Then she began
her monologue, mentally picturing the audience in front of her as a
tableau and letting her vision blur. She was in the zone.