The Summer Set Read online

  “It’s the next Hamilton,” Harlow oozed at Sierra, as though she didn’t know.

  “—the highly anticipated musical about Abigail Adams’s role shaping our nation. But first...” Nicholas quieted them down again. “In the spirit of crawling before you can walk, let’s tour this place. Crawl out to the lobby and I’ll meet you there.”

  They all rose to their feet and walked to the aisles, but Nicholas interrupted again. “I thought you guys were actors?” He smiled. “Let’s see your best crawl.” With that everyone dropped to all fours and made their way out. Some—like Alex, who shot by doing a quick crabwalk—more agile than others. Sierra instantly regretted wearing a jean skirt. She just hadn’t anticipated much physicality today. Mind racing for a way to avoid flashing her peers, she got it: mimicking the swim stroke instead, she coursed ahead of the pack and was first out the door.

  * * *

  Afternoon sun blinding her, Sierra stood at the edge of the crowded football field, hand shielding her eyes in search of friendly faces. Her luck had run out. She had successfully made it through the game where the entire extended apprentice class (over one hundred in all, including her acting peers plus the directing, writing, backstage and front-of-house apprentices) organized themselves alphabetically by state (she was one of three people from Oregon, which seemed like solid representation) and a tug-of-war pitting Shakespeare tragedy lovers against comedy fans that had left her with rope burn.

  Now Professor Tom Bradford, serious, joyless and wearing a tie, everything Nicholas Blunt was not, had ordered them all to pair up. It seemed a mathematical impossibility that Sierra should end up the odd one out. She had lost Harlow on the way over. Weren’t there an even number of them? Yet everyone had instantly attached themselves like at every party she had ever gone to.

  Snaking her way through the duos, she stopped near the southwest corner of the field, one last full slow spin before giving up. But when she completed this rotation, like a planet locked in its axis, she suddenly found the sun.

  His name was Robert, according to his preprinted name tag.

  “Thank you,” she said in relief. He had walked up while her back was turned. Professor Bradford barked something in the background.

  “Ohhh no, what’s goin’ on here? This on the schedule?” Robert said to her, glancing over her head to assess the situation. Tall with dirty blond hair, he had a drawl she didn’t expect. Some sort of tattoo peeked out below his T-shirt sleeve. She would’ve pegged him for set construction, anything demanding a requisite level of brawn, had she not remembered seeing him at the back of the auditorium when she “swam” out to the lobby. Plus, beneath his name it read “Acting.”

  “Yes,” she answered, appreciating that he seemed nervous too. “It was under the euphemism ‘All Apprentice Meet-Up.’”

  He smiled, opened his mouth to speak, but Professor Bradford’s voice boomed:

  “Siiilence! Is golden! Look into your partner’s eyes and tell them your story, why you’re here, without a single word. Using ONLY movements! NO voices! Your partner will copy your actions. Take your time, allow them to keep pace, to understand your journey.”

  A hush quickly fell. Sierra gestured for Robert to go first. She had led a simplistic version of this mirror image game at the kids’ theater project she launched last year with a couple drama-major friends, but doing this with peers set her nerves trembling.

  Robert closed his eyes, opened them again, shook out his limbs and, as though remembering something, held up his index finger to wait. He peeled the name tag from his shirt, tore off the part that said Robert, crumpled it and tossed it over his shoulder, sticking back on the part with just his last name: Summit.

  Was she supposed to follow? It felt bold and dramatic, so probably. She pulled hers off too, and he smiled, so she smiled.

  4

  WE’RE SUPPOSED TO LIKE IMPROV

  Ethan hadn’t meant for her to shred her name tag too (and before he had even read it; now he only had her last name: Suarez). It just frustrated him that his tag had his given name—Robert—and not the name he wanted to go by here—Ethan, his middle name—which he had clearly designated on his apprentice application as the name he preferred. It would be his stage name, mark the start of this new life. When they were allowed to talk again, he would explain this to this girl staring at him with kind eyes. Maybe he could make a joke about her “commitment” to the role in destroying her own name tag.

  He ran his hand through his hair, tried to figure out what was worth sharing about himself. Oh, wait, but now she was running her hand through her hair—long and shiny, reflective, hickory hued. The gesture looked better when she did it. Her hands hid in her pockets now. Because he had put his hands back in his pockets, without realizing.

  Tell her his story. He placed his hand on the top of his head, as though there was a wide-brimmed hat there, made a motion of taking it off, bowing in greeting. She did the same. He held his hand out horizontally, pointing to the bottom center of his palm—his best approximation of Texas—and then put his hand to his chest. This is where I’m from for better or worse. He had slowed his actions and she followed closely enough that it seemed they were, in fact, making these movements at the same time.

  He swept his arm out, looking into the field now, then shook his head, shrugged in self-doubt. She did this along with him and he felt understood—which was the purpose of the exercise, but still, it rocked him.

  And here was something else: it was a strange thing, Ethan discovered, to gaze steadily into someone’s eyes, in complete silence, for this duration of time. To stare into these eyes, which were lighter than her hair—hazel, maybe?—for this long, it seemed impossible to not feel something. Maybe that made him a bad actor? Or maybe that made him a method actor? Method, sure, that sounded better. Or maybe it wasn’t about him and was more about her. Which was something he thought he shouldn’t think about because then he would forget to actually move. He forced his eyes away for a moment, to reset his “motivation,” and found that the others seemed less mired in these concerns.

  Over her right shoulder, several pairs were leading their partners through what appeared to be cardio work: running, jumping, spinning and finally bowing. Ethan was out of his league here.

  Soft fingertips tapped his forearm, bringing him back: she looked at him gently, like waking him from a dream, as Bradford barked at them all to switch roles.

  Ethan smiled, relinquishing control. Accepting it, she waved her greeting and showed where she was from on the map of her hand. (It looked to be roughly the Pacific Northwest.) She gestured across the field as he had before but then knelt on the turf, arms over her head like those photos of schoolkids during air-raid drills in the 1950s. After a beat, she sat upright again and shook her head, as though laughing at her fears. He did the same, and felt flattered and entranced by how her story echoed his.

  * * *

  “I’m Sierra,” she said, as soon as Bradford wrapped the exercise with a classic “Annnnd scene.”

  “Ethan,” he managed to tell her, shaking her hand, before the professor interrupted again. Sierra looked confused—understandably—glancing once more at the remaining half of his name tag, but follow-up questions would have to wait.

  “Now! The main event!” Bradford stood on the bleachers. “I call it ‘Man Walks into a Room.’” Ethan had been subjected to a version of this exercise enough times to be wary: someone is a host, others join the party, playing roles the crowd shouts out along with an object they’re bringing. Sierra exhaled, as one might before scaling a rock wall. So Ethan felt emboldened.

  “I know we’re supposed to be people who like improv, because we’re here,” he said. All around them people were already shouting (“Iguana!” “Taser!” “Genius Bar... Genius... Guy!” “Avocado toast!” “Beyoncé!”). “And we’re supposedly ‘actors.’” He made quotes around the word. “But, I mean
—”

  “Yeah, it’s not my thing either,” she said, sounding relieved to admit this.

  Ethan preferred studying a role, slowly absorbing it into his bloodstream. He watched, supportive as so many others threw themselves wildly into the fire. He wished he had that unbridled confidence. Maybe this summer would change him.

  “My roommate seems to enjoy it though.” Sierra pointed to a blonde hopping onto the bleachers who was instantly anointed “Marilyn Monroe with a chainsaw” by someone in the crowd.

  “Sleep with one eye open,” Ethan said sarcastically.

  The game finally ended with twenty apprentices on the bleachers—none of them him or Sierra—all frozen in various states of zaniness.

  * * *

  “So before we go on, I need to know the truth. Who...is...Robert...Summit?” Sierra asked pseudo-dramatically, as they walked back en masse from the field, the sun a golden haze beyond the mountains.

  “He’s still figuring that out,” Ethan said, speaking in third person. “But he goes by his middle name, Ethan. At least, when it comes to this kind of thing—acting.” He felt a wave of shyness at the admission: he didn’t quite feel he had enough theater credits to warrant this. But he had to start somewhere.

  “Stage name, sure, I get it,” she said, as they walked past restaurants and coffee shops filled with university summer students. “I have kind of an alter ego too. I’m really...an environmental science major.” She said it in the lowered tone others might reserve for vocations like assassin.

  “No, it’s too much,” he joked, putting his hands up. “We just met.”

  “I know,” she said, cringing. “It’s just, this is what I’d love to do.” She gestured toward the theater ahead—the historic white-painted brick playhouse evoking a long-ago era with its stately columns and pointed pediment. “But it seems not necessarily, practical? I might not be good enough. So while I figure that out, I’ll also be charting the return of an endangered plant. Don’t suppose you heard about the rare chaffseed found in Cape Cod a couple years ago? Hadn’t been seen in fifty years?” She laughed at herself.

  “Uhhh, no.” He smiled slowly. “No, I did not.”

  “Yeah, anyway,” she said, sheepish now. “I’m writing my senior thesis on it—”

  “Wellesley?” He pointed to the “esley” remaining on her name tag.

  She nodded. “So you’ll find me roaming Hopkins Forest in my free time and at the end of the summer I have to go to the Cape to check it out. Not exactly soul-awakening stuff...”

  “I wouldn’t say that...”

  She gave him a skeptical look and they both smiled. “But it’s the only way I got funded to come here,” she said. “So it’s for my parents, you know, sensible—”

  “That I can understand. This place is my escape from the family business—” he started, infusing the words with a hint of terror.

  “That sounds very Sopranos,” she said.

  “Nothing criminal, promise,” he explained. “Dangerous but not criminal.” They crossed Stratford, their group arriving at the lush gardens of the Quad, set with long tables bearing the necessary barbecue staples—burgers, hot dogs, corn on the cob—expertly arranged, a “Welcome Chamberlain Theater Apprentices!” banner strung between a pair of oak trees. “So, I’m a business major—”

  “Harvard?” She glanced at his torn name tag as they reached the buffet line, the volume on the conversations around them dialing up now that the group had compressed.

  “I’m a transfer student, so a misfit by definition,” he said, self-deprecatingly. He handed her a plate as they made their way down the line. “But my family owns a rodeo. So the bull-riding aspect—”

  “Wow, yeah, that qualifies as danger—”

  “There you are!” Marilyn Monroe with a chainsaw appeared before them. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you!” She didn’t let Sierra speak: “Harlow. Hunter,” she introduced herself, grabbing his arm aggressively enough that he nearly fumbled his plate. “You’re rooming with one of my dearest friends, Alex Xing?” she said. “We have a table over here, come!”

  As Harlow pulled him away, Ethan caught Sierra’s eye and jokingly grimaced.

  5

  NO SPOILERS

  June came too soon, as Charlie knew it would. Though sleep remained elusive, she remained unmedicated but busy enough to avoid thinking about her Chamberlain sentence: so much work to do in order to leave her precious art house behind for two months. She had hired extra staff for the summer to aid Miles—though he seemed more concerned with her. How do you and Nick Blunt plan to coexist for sixty days without murdering each other? he’d asked her daily. No spoilers, she’d always reply, since she didn’t actually know. Her relationship with Nick predated her friendship with Miles, but Miles had attended the infamous premiere, so Charlie imagined he had filled in the blanks with a cocktail of tasty gossip and fuzzy facts.

  By the time Miles saw Charlie off at South Station though, he had settled into a forced optimism. (There’s no reason you can’t enjoy the theater part of this. It’s like going back to your roots, he had encouraged, adding completely unsarcastically, You have a lot to give.)

  As the bus pulled away, Charlie paged through her tattered copy of Romeo and Juliet. Nick had emailed, all business: Charlie, first up is Romeo and Juliet. I trust you’re familiar. And then, Your accommodations... followed by an address. He signed it simply, Nicholas, which she found mildly obnoxious. He had worked hard to get Nicholas to stick. It was how he had introduced himself all those years ago, as a directing fellow at Chamberlain: Nicholas. She had looked him in the eye as she shook his hand firmly. Really? I think you’re a “Nick,” she had told him. You’ll figure it out soon enough. She was nineteen, he was twenty-five and speechless. From then on, she called him Nick.

  It would be another four years until they made the film that would make them both. (It had been her idea to include his name in the title—Who do I think I am? he had asked.) Their actual romantic relationship would take up such a small sliver of her life—just about a year—a little longer if she counted the months he drifted away, lost in his work, distant in miles and in emotion just before their breakup, on a film set of all places. Still, their time together would leave a disproportionately deep mark. She stopped short of calling it a scar because too much of it had been...good.

  * * *

  When she finished reading, the bus had just reached those steep, curvy mountain roads she recalled from so long ago. Her thoughts took similar twists and turns to arrive at a place she didn’t want to be: on the edge of fear. She had done enough Shakespeare to know what it required of a person. But she hadn’t acted, at all, in years: What if it just wasn’t there? What if it had atrophied like any muscle left unchallenged for too long?

  Her breathing too rapid now, she closed her eyes, refocusing. She had played Juliet a thousand times all over London—the West End, the Globe. And on Broadway, and off Broadway and off-off Broadway. She exhaled.

  Just as fast a more horrific thought shook her: What if Nick didn’t want her for Juliet, but for...Juliet’s mother? She could technically be Juliet’s mother. But it’s not like Juliet was ever really played by a thirteen-year-old, she told herself. This was theater—you just had to act young enough. Plus, she looked far younger than her thirty-nine years. She could do wide-eyed when necessary. But, no, even worse: What if she was supposed to be Juliet’s nurse? How humiliating was this community service exercise supposed to be? She pulled her Red Sox cap down farther and closed her eyes, tried to will herself to sleep. She had been up all night. Again. Packing. Reading. Sketching. Streaming the latest season of the only show she binged, Terminal Earth ICU. Distracting herself. Trying to.

  On-screen you give the impression of this work being effortless, like something you could accomplish in your sleep. Or perhaps more akin to breathing: something vital and natural. Most
of us drama students, I can safely say, will never ascend to that level. Which is why I have to ask: Please return to acting? Could you look past what reasons you might have had for leaving it? You’re needed.

  That letter, from a drama student named Robert, drifted into her thoughts. Somehow asking the same questions that had kept her up at night for years. Her eyes flickered open again.

  They were nearing their destination, anyway. She could tell by her favorite sign at the end of a gravel pit on the side of the road: RUNAWAY TRUCK RAMP. She had asked her mother back then, two decades ago, seated beside her in the back of the sedan that had been sent to collect them from the airport, what the sign meant. That’s a device to aid trucks if they’re having difficulty braking as they descend from the mountain, her mother had said in her perfectly posh inflection, eyes not leaving her newspaper. Then added, If only we had something like that for you.

  Another turn and the bus rattled into the town at last, home of Chamberlain College and the Chamberlain Shakespeare Summer Theater. It was all there still, nestled in this pocket surrounded by mountains: the gothic ivy-covered buildings, the charming Victorian houses, the lively main street, even that sweet little historic log cabin harkening back to the town’s first settlers. The one she had broken into with Nick...

  This had been a bad idea. On so many levels.

  Sixty days. She just had to get through sixty days.

  The bus slowed to a stop in front of the old inn. She pulled up her email from Nick, checking the unfamiliar address of her accommodations again. Mapping it on her phone, she followed the route past the inn, along Stratford Road onward through the campus’s main quad, still not sure where she was being led.

  6

  YOU’VE DISTRACTED MS. SUAREZ

  Sierra gazed into the harsh fluorescent-lit restroom mirror. She placed the fedora on her head with great care, tucked her chestnut tendrils up into it. Studied her reflection. Then she took the hat off again and chucked it at the wall. She did not belong here. And in a few minutes, everyone else would know that too. Why did she feel this way before every audition? This was why she was an environmental science major. She was unequivocally good at that. Didn’t the world need more women who were good at science, anyway?