FicWad

The auditions were starting right when we got to the theater, and I think we both felt like getting in and getting out as quickly as possible.

“You don’t have to come in, you know,” I said as he parked.

“No, it’s fine,” he said.

I rolled my eyes as I got out of the car. “Are you scared of her? Because, you know, that’s my job.”

He groaned as he got out and slammed his door. “Of course not.”

I just blinked at him.

“Okay, maybe a little.”

I grinned as we started to walk up to the building. “Well, at least we finally got out of there.”

“We’d still be there if it weren’t for your cat.”

“I know. Thank God for her.”

We climbed the theater’s front steps, and stopped at a table that had been set up just inside the front doors.

“Hello!” said a cheerful, tiny old woman. “Are you here to audition?”

“Well, I am,” I said.

She beamed at me. “Aren’t you the cutest thing. Okay, well, here’s your number, honey.” She put a sticker right under my collarbone. “You’re number 45.” She turned to Gerard. “And you’re number 46, dear.” She put a sticker on him, too.

I noticed that she gave his chest an extra pat, and I couldn’t help the snicker that escaped me.

“I’m not auditioning,” Gerard said.

“Of course you are, honey!” said she. “You can’t let the nerves get a hold of you. Everyone who works here is real nice. See? Your sister isn’t nervous.”

“She‘s not my sister,” he said.

“Oh, I’m sorry . . . You two just look so much alike.”

Gerard and I looked at each other.

“Your girlfriend, then.”

“I’m not his girlfriend,” I said.

“Pity,” she said, looking incredibly disappointed. “You two are just so cute together.”

I sucked my lips in, trying not to burst out laughing. I heard a muffled snort from Gerard and knew he was trying not to laugh, too. I focused on the woman so I wouldn’t catch his gaze and lose it completely.

“Okay, dears, now, you take these here” --- she handed a form to Gerard and one to me --- “and go fill them out. Make sure you hold onto them and give them to the director when you're called in, okay? You also need to have your picture taken. You two just get in that line over there.” She pointed across the room to where a woman with a camera was standing people against a wall and taking headshots. “Okay?”

“Okay,” I said. “Thanks.”

“Not a problem.”

Gerard and I walked away from the table and got in the line for pictures.

“Since when do we look enough alike to be mistaken for brother and sister?” Gerard said.

“I know, right?” Brother and sister. That was an all-time first. “Maybe it’s the hair.”

That was the only real resemblance I could see between us, since we both had black hair. Well, we were both pale, too, but other than that, I didn’t see how we looked alike.

“And us, dating?” Gerard rolled his eyes.

“Well, now, that I can understand, in a way,” I said. “I mean, we’re always together. People are bound to think something’s up.”

He shook his head. “Why can’t a guy and a girl just be friends without people thinking they’re together? If it’s two guys or two girls, people don’t think anything’s up.”

“Can’t argue with that.” I shrugged. “People are just stupid.”

“As a native of Earth, I simply can’t allow you extraterrestrials to go on thinking that we Earthlings have low intelligence.”

Gerard and I turned around. Evie stood there, grinning.

“Hey, guys,” she said. “Gerard, what are you doing here?”

“He’s . . . auditioning?” I said. I don’t know why it came out sounding like a question.

Evie twisted her eyebrows. “Since when are you into theater?” she asked him.

“I’m not.”

“O-kay.” Evie pursed her lips.

Gerard and I shuffled forward in the line, and a tall guy with spiky brown hair came up to Evie.

“Oh, hey, Zeke,” Evie said. “You remember my friend, Alixz.”

“Oh, yeah,” he said, shaking my hand. “Hey.”

I’d seen Evie’s brother around a few times, since I’ve been to her house and all, but I’d never been this close to him before. I was kind of surprised at the shade of his green eyes, and I wondered if he was wearing colored contacts. His were an intense minty green, while Evie’s were lighter, somewhere between lime green and olive green.

“Hi,” I said.

Evie grinned at me.

It took me a second to remember that Gerard was there. “Oh,” I said, “this is my friend Gerard.”

“Hey, man,” Zeke said.

“Hey,” Gerard said dully, shaking Zeke’s hand.

“Well, we’re just gonna go sit over here,” Evie said. “See you around.” She walked off with her brother.

“Isn’t she trying to set you up with him?” Gerard said.

“Yup.” I moved forward.

“His eyes look fake.” Gerard moved up behind me.

I turned around. “I know, right? That was the first thing I thought.”

“It’s just not a natural color.”

I felt kind of bad that Gerard was still here, since I knew he really didn’t want to be. “You don’t have to stay here, you know.”

“It’s fine.”

“No, I know you don’t want to be here.”

“I don’t have anything better to do.”

“You could always work on my portrait for me,” I said. “Just be sure to kind of mess it up so Ms. H doesn’t think I got you to do it for me.”

He rolled his eyes. “I wouldn’t have to. You’d freak out and tear it up because you’d be too afraid of getting caught.”

“You make me sound like such a wuss.”

“You are when it comes to that sort of thing,” he said simply.

I glared at him, even though I knew he was right.

Someone tapped me on the shoulder, and I turned around. It was the woman with the camera.

“Hi there,” she said, chewing a wad of gum. “You just stand right against this wall and smile, okay?”

I stood against the wall and tried to smile casually, so I wouldn’t look too cheesy or stilted in the picture. And then I caught sight of Gerard making faces behind the photographer, and I burst out laughing right as she snapped the photo.

“I might have to --- whoa,” she said, and looked at the camera. “Great shot. Okay,” she said to Gerard, “come up here please.”

I watched him walk up to the wall and casually look into the lens. I don’t know how he always manages to look great in pictures, no matter what he’s doing . . . I once told him he should consider modeling instead of art. All he did was give me a weird glare.

And then I thought that the glare would look really good immortalized on film.

He walked away from the photographer and we found a couple of seats together against a wall.