Begin ReadingTable of ContentsAbout the AuthorCopyright PageThank you for buying thisFlatiron Books ebook.To receive special offers, bonus content,and info on new releases and other great reads,sign up for our newsletters.Or visit us online atus.macmillan.com/newslettersignupFor email updates on the author, click here. The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you for yourpersonal use only. You may not make this e-book publicly available inany way. Copyright infringement is against the law. If you believe thecopy of this e-book you are reading infringes on the author’scopyright, please notify the publisher at:us.macmillanusa.com/piracy. For the many weird and wonderful thespians whom I have hadthe good fortune to call my friends. (I promise this is not aboutyou.) PROLOGUEI sit with my wrists cuffed to the table and I think, But that I am forbid /To tell the secrets of my prison-house, / I could a tale unfold whoselightest word / Would harrow up thy soul. The guard stands by the door,watching me, like he’s waiting for something to happen.Enter Joseph Colborne. He is a graying man now, almost fifty. It’s asurprise, every few weeks, to see how much he’s aged—and he’s aged alittle more, every few weeks, for ten years. He sits across from me, foldshis hands, and says, “Oliver.”“Joe.”“Heard the parole hearing went your way. Congratulations.”“I’d thank you if I thought you meant it.”“You know I don’t think you belong in here.”“That doesn’t mean you think I’m innocent.”“No.” He sighs, checks his watch—the same one he’s worn since wemet—as if I’m boring him.“So why are you here?” I ask. “Same fortnightly reason?”His eyebrows make a flat black line. “You would say fucking‘fortnight.’”“You can take the boy out of the theatre, or something like that.”He shakes his head, simultaneously amused and annoyed.“Well?” I say.“Well what?”“The gallows does well. But how does it well? It does well to thosethat do ill,” I reply, determined to deserve his annoyance. “Why are youhere? You should know by now I’m not going to tell you anything.”“Actually,” he says, “this time I think I might be able to change yourmind.”I sit up straighter in my chair. “How?” “I’m leaving the force. Sold out, took a job in private security. Gotmy kids’ education to think about.”For a moment I simply stare at him. Colborne, I always imagined,would have to be put down like a savage old dog before he’d leave thechief’s office.“How’s that supposed to persuade me?” I ask.“Anything you say will be strictly off the record.”“Then why bother?”He sighs again and all the lines on his face deepen. “Oliver, I don’tcare about doling out punishment, not anymore. Someone served thetime, and we rarely get that much satisfaction in our line of work. But Idon’t want to hang up my hat and waste the next ten years wonderingwhat really happened ten years ago.”I say nothing at first. I like the idea but don’t trust it. I glance aroundat the grim cinder blocks, the tiny black video cameras that peer downfrom every corner, the guard with his jutting underbite. I close my eyes,inhale deeply, and imagine the freshness of Illinois springtime, what itwill be like to step outside after gasping on stale prison air for a third ofmy life.When I exhale I open my eyes and Colborne is watching me closely.“I don’t know,” I say. “I’m getting out of here, one way or the other. Idon’t want to risk coming back. Seems safer to let sleeping dogs lie.”His fingers drum restlessly on the table. “Tell me something,” hesays. “Do you ever lie in your cell, staring up at the ceiling, wonderinghow you wound up in here, and you can’t sleep because you can’t stopthinking about that day?”“Every night,” I say, without sarcasm. “But here’s the difference, Joe.For you it was just one day, then business as usual. For us it was one day,and every single day that came after.” I lean forward on my elbows, somy face is only a few inches from his, so he hears every word when Ilower my voice. “It must eat you alive, not knowing. Not knowing who,not knowing how, not knowing why. But you didn’t know him.”He wears a strange, queasy expression now, as if I’ve becomeunspeakably ugly and awful to look at. “You’ve kept your secrets all thistime,” he says. “It would drive anyone else crazy. Why do it?” “I wanted to.”“Do you still?”My heart feels heavy in my chest. Secrets carry weight, like lead.I lean back. The guard watches impassively, as if we’re two strangerstalking in another language, our conversation distant and insignificant. Ithink of the others. Once upon a time, us. We did wicked things, but theywere necessary, too—or so it seemed. Looking back, years later, I’m notso sure they were, and now I wonder: Could I explain it all to Colborne,the little twists and turns and final exodos? I study his blank open face,the gray eyes winged now by crow’s-feet, but clear and bright as theyhave always been.“All right,” I say. “I’ll tell you a story. But you have to understand afew things.”Colborne is motionless. “I’m listening.”“First, I’ll start talking after I get out of here, not before. Second, thiscan’t come back to me or anyone else—no double jeopardy. And last, it’snot an apology.”I wait for some response from him, a nod or a word, but he onlyblinks at me, silent and stoic as a sphinx.“Well, Joe?” I say. “Can you live with that?”He gives me a cold sliver of a smile. “Yes, I think I can.” SCENE 1The time: September 1997, my fourth and final year at DellecherClassical Conservatory. The place: Broadwater, Illinois, a small town ofalmost no consequence. It had been a warm autumn so far.Enter the players. There were seven of us then, seven bright youngthings with wide precious futures ahead of us, though we saw no fartherthan the books in front of our faces. We were always surrounded bybooks and words and poetry, all the fierce passions of the world bound inleather and vellum. (I blame this in part for what happened.) The Castlelibrary was an airy octagonal room, walled with bookshelves, crowdedwith sumptuous old furniture, and kept drowsily warm by a monumentalfireplace that burned almost constantly, regardless of the temperatureoutside. The clock on the mantel struck twelve, and we stirred, one byone, like seven statues coming to life.“’Tis now dead midnight,” Richard said. He sat in the largestarmchair like it was a throne, long legs outstretched, feet propped up onthe grate. Three years of playing kings and conquerors had taught him tosit that way in every chair, onstage or off-. “And by eight o’clocktomorrow we must be made immortal.” He closed his book with a snap.Meredith, curled like a cat on one end of the sofa (while I sprawledlike a dog on the other), toyed with one strand of her long auburn hair asshe asked, “Where are you going?”Richard: “Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed—”Filippa: “Spare us.”Richard: “Early morning and all that.”Alexander: “He says, as if he’s concerned.”Wren, sitting cross-legged on a cushion by the hearth and obliviousto the others’ bickering, said, “Have you all picked your pieces? I can’tdecide.” Me: “What about Isabella? Your Isabella’s excellent.”Meredith: “Measure’s a comedy, you fool. We’re auditioning forCaesar.”“I don’t know why we bother auditioning at all.” Alexander—slumped over the table, wallowing in the darkness at the back of theroom—reached for the bottle of Scotch at his elbow. He refilled hisglass, took one huge gulp, and grimaced at the rest of us. “I could castthe whole bastarding thing right now.”“How?” I asked. “I never know where I’ll end up.”“That’s because they always cast you last,” Richard said, “aswhatever happens to be left over.”“Tsk-tsk,” Meredith said. “Are we Richard tonight or are we Dick?”“Ignore him, Oliver,” James said. He sat by himself in the farthestcorner, loath to look up from his notebook. He had always been the mostserious student in our year, which (probably) explained why he was alsothe best actor and (certainly) why no one resented him for it.“There.” Alexander had unfolded a wad of ten-dollar bills from hispocket and was counting them out on the table. “That’s fifty dollars.”“For what?” Meredith said. “You want a lap dance?”“Why, are you practicing for after graduation?”“Bite me.”“Ask nicely.”“Fifty dollars for what?” I said, keen to interrupt. Meredith andAlexander had by far the foulest mouths among the seven of us, and tooka perverse kind of pride in out-cussing each other. If we let them, they’dgo at it all night.Alexander tapped the stack of tens with one long finger. “I bet fiftydollars I can call the cast list right now and not be wrong.”Five of us exchanged curious glances; Wren was still frowning intothe fireplace.“All right, let’s hear it,” Filippa said, with a wan little sigh, as thoughher curiosity had gotten the better of her.Alexander pushed his unruly black curls back from his face and said,“Well, obviously Richard will be Caesar.”“Because we all secretly want to kill him?” James asked. Richard arched one dark eyebrow. “Et tu, Bruté?”“Sic semper tyrannis,” James said, and drew the tip of his pen acrosshis throat like a dagger. Thus always to tyrants.Alexander gestured from one of them to the other. “Exactly,” he said.“James will be Brutus because he’s always the good guy, and I’ll beCassius because I’m always the bad guy. Richard and Wren can’t bemarried because that would be gross, so she’ll be Portia, Meredith willbe Calpurnia, and Pip, you’ll end up in drag again.”Filippa, more difficult to cast than Meredith (the femme fatale) orWren (the ingénue), was obliged to cross-dress whenever we ran out ofgood female parts—a common occurrence in the Shakespearean theatre.“Kill me,” she said.“Wait,” I said, effectively proving Richard’s hypothesis that I was apermanent leftover in the casting process, “where does that leave me?”Alexander studied me with narrowed eyes, running his tongue acrosshis teeth. “Probably as Octavius,” he decided. “They won’t make youAntony—no offense, but you’re just not conspicuous enough. It’ll be thatinsufferable third-year, what’s his name?”Filippa: “Richard the Second?”Richard: “Hilarious. No, Colin Hyland.”“Spectacular.” I looked down at the text of Pericles I was scanning,for what felt like the hundredth time. Only half as talented as any of therest of them, I seemed doomed to always play supporting roles insomeone else’s story. Far too many times I had asked myself whether artwas imitating life or if it was the other way around.Alexander: “Fifty bucks, on that exact casting. Any takers?”Meredith: “No.”Alexander: “Why not?”Filippa: “Because that’s precisely what’ll happen.”Richard chuckled and climbed out of his chair. “One can only hope.”He started toward the door and leaned over to pinch James’s cheek on hisway out. “Goodnight, sweet prince—”James smacked Richard’s hand away with his notebook, then made ashow of disappearing behind it again. Meredith echoed Richard’s laughand said, “Thou art as hot a Jack in thy mood as any in Italy!” “A plague o’ both your houses,” James muttered.Meredith stretched—with a small, suggestive groan—and pushedherself off the couch.“Coming to bed?” Richard asked.“Yes. Alexander’s made all this work seem rather pointless.” She lefther books scattered on the low table in front of the fire, her emptywineglass with them, a crescent of lipstick clinging to the rim.“Goodnight,” she said, to the room at large. “Godspeed.” Theydisappeared down the hall together.I rubbed my eyes, which were beginning to burn from the effort ofreading for hours on end. Wren tossed her book backward over her head,and I started as it landed beside me on the couch.Wren: “To hell with it.”Alexander: “That’s the spirit.”Wren: “I’ll just do Isabella.”Filippa: “Just go to bed.”Wren stood slowly, blinking the vestigial light of the fire out of hereyes. “I’ll probably lie awake all night reciting lines,” she said.“Want to come out for a smoke?” Alexander had finished hiswhiskey (again) and was rolling a spliff on the table. “Might help yourelax.”“No, thank you,” she said, drifting out into the hall. “Goodnight.”“Suit yourself.” Alexander pushed his chair back, spliff poking out ofone corner of his mouth. “Oliver?”“If I help you smoke that I’ll wake up with no voice tomorrow.”“Pip?”She nudged her glasses up into her hair and coughed softly, testingher throat. “God, you’re a terrible influence,” she said. “Fine.”He nodded, already halfway out of the room, hands buried deep inhis pockets. I watched them go, a little jealously, then slumped downagainst the arm of the couch. I struggled to focus on my text, which wasso aggressively annotated that it was barely legible anymore.PERICLES: Antioch, farewell! for wisdom sees those menBlush not in actions blacker than the nightWill ’schew no course to keep them from the light. One sin, I know, another doth provoke;Murder’s as near to lust as flame to smoke.I murmured the last two lines under my breath. I knew them by heart,had known them for months, but the fear that I would forget a word orphrase halfway through my audition gnawed at me anyway. I glancedacross the room at James and said, “Do you ever wonder if Shakespeareknew these speeches half as well as we do?”He withdrew from whatever verse he was reading, looked up, andsaid, “Constantly.”I cracked a smile, vindicated just enough. “Well, I give up. I’m notactually getting anything done.”He checked his watch. “No, I don’t think I am either.”I heaved myself off the sofa and followed James up the spiral stairsto the bedroom we shared—which was directly over the library, thehighest of three rooms in a little stone column commonly referred to asthe Tower. It had once been used only as an attic, but the cobwebs andclutter had been cleared away to make room for more students in the lateseventies. Twenty years later it housed James and me, two beds with blueDellecher bedspreads, two monstrous old wardrobes, and a pair ofmismatched bookshelves too ugly for the library.“Do you think it’ll fall out how Alexander says?” I asked.James pulled his shirt off, mussing his hair in the process. “If you askme, it’s too predictable.”“When have they ever surprised us?”“Frederick surprises me all the time,” he said. “But Gwendolyn willhave the final say, she always does.”“If it were up to her, Richard would play all of the men and half thewomen.”“Which would leave Meredith playing the other half.” He pressed theheels of his palms against his eyes. “When do you read tomorrow?”“Right after Richard. Filippa’s after me.”“And I’m after her. God, I feel bad for her.”“Yeah,” I said. “It’s a wonder she hasn’t dropped out.”James frowned thoughtfully as he wriggled out of his jeans. “Well,she’s a bit more resilient than the rest of us. Maybe that’s why Gwendolyn torments her.”“Just because she can take it?” I said, discarding my own clothes in apile on the floor. “That’s cruel.”He shrugged. “That’s Gwendolyn.”“If I had my way, I’d turn it all upside down,” I said. “MakeAlexander Caesar and have Richard play Cassius instead.”He folded his comforter back and asked, “Am I still Brutus?”“No.” I tossed a sock at him. “You’re Antony. For once I get to be thelead.”“Your time will come to be the tragic hero. Just wait for spring.”I glanced up from the drawer I was pawing through. “Has Frederickbeen telling you secrets again?”He lay down and folded his hands behind his head. “He may havementioned Troilus and Cressida. He has this fantastic idea to do it as abattle of the sexes. All the Trojans men, all the Greeks women.”“That’s insane.”“Why? That play is as much about sex as it is about war,” he said.“Gwendolyn will want Richard to be Hector, of course, but that makesyou Troilus.”“Why on earth wouldn’t you be Troilus?”He shifted, arched his back. “I may have mentioned that I’d like tohave a little more variety on my résumé.”I stared at him, unsure if I should be insulted.“Don’t look at me like that,” he said, a low note of reproach in hisvoice. “He agreed we all need to break out of our boxes. I’m tired ofplaying fools in love like Troilus, and I’m sure you’re tired of alwaysplaying the sidekick.”I flopped on my bed on my back. “Yeah, you’re probably right.” Fora moment I let my thoughts wander, and then I breathed out a laugh.“Something funny?” James asked, as he reached over to turn out thelight.“You’ll have to be Cressida,” I told him. “You’re the only one of uspretty enough.”We lay there laughing in the dark until we dropped off to sleep, andslept deeply, with no way of knowing that the curtain was about to rise on a drama of our own invention. SCENE 2Dellecher Classical Conservatory occupied twenty or so acres of land onthe eastern edge of Broadwater, and the borders of the two so oftenoverlapped that it was difficult to tell where campus ended and townbegan. The first-years were housed in a cluster of brick buildings intown, while the second- and third-years were crowded together at theHall, and the handful of fourth-years were tucked away in odd isolatedcorners of campus or left to fend for themselves. We, the fourth-yeartheatre students, lived on the far side of the lake in what was whimsicallycalled the Castle (not really a castle, but a small stone building thathappened to have one turret, originally the groundskeepers’ quarters).Dellecher Hall, a sprawling red brick mansion, looked down a steephill to the dark flat water of the lake. Dormitories and the ballroom wereon the fourth and fifth floors, classrooms and offices on the second andthird, while the ground floor was divided into refectory, music hall,library, and conservatory. A chapel jutted off the west end of thebuilding, and sometime in the 1960s, the Archibald Dellecher Fine ArtsBuilding (generally referred to as the FAB, for more than one reason)was erected on the east side of the Hall, a small courtyard andhoneycomb of corbeled walkways wedged between them. The FAB washome to the Archibald Dellecher Theatre and the rehearsal hall and, ergo,was where we spent most of our time. At eight in the morning on the firstday of classes, it was exceptionally quiet.Richard and I walked from the Castle together, though I wasn’t dueto audition for another half hour.“How do you feel?” he asked, as we climbed the steep hill to thelawn.“Nervous, like I always am.” The number of auditions under my beltdidn’t matter; the anxiety never really left me. “No need to be,” he said. “You’re never as dreadful as you think youare. Just don’t shift your weight too much. You’re most interesting whenyou stand still.”I frowned at him. “How do you mean?”“I mean when you forget you’re onstage and forget to be nervous.You really listen to other actors, really hear the words like it’s the firsttime you’ve heard them. It’s wonderful to work with and marvelous towatch.” He shook his head at the look of consternation on my face. “Ishouldn’t have told you. Don’t get self-conscious.” He clapped one hugehand on my shoulder, and I was so distracted I pitched forward, myfingertips brushing the dewy grass. Richard’s booming laugh echoed inthe morning air, and he grabbed my arm to help me find my balance.“See?” he said. “Keep your feet planted and you’ll be fine.”“You suck,” I said, but with a grudging smirk. (Richard had thateffect on people.)As soon as we reached the FAB, he gave me another cheery smackon the back and disappeared into the rehearsal hall. I paced back andforth along the crossover, puzzling over what he had said and repeatingPericles to myself like I was saying a string of Hail Marys.Our first semester auditions determined which parts we would play inour fall production. That year, Julius Caesar. Tragedies and historieswere reserved for the fourth-years, while the third-years were relegatedto romance and comedy and all the bit parts were played by the second-years. First-years were left to work backstage, slog through generaleducation, and wonder what the hell they’d gotten themselves into. (Eachyear, students whose performance was deemed unsatisfactory were cutfrom the program—often as many as half. To survive until fourth yearwas proof of either talent or dumb luck. In my case, the latter.) Classphotos from the past fifty years hung in two neat rows along the wall inthe crossover. Ours was the last and certainly the sexiest, a publicityphoto from the previous year’s production of A Midsummer Night’sDream. We looked younger.It was Frederick’s idea to do Midsummer as a pajama party. Jamesand I (Lysander and Demetrius, respectively) wore striped boxers andwhite undershirts and stood glaring at each other, with Wren (Hermia, in a short pink nightgown) trapped between us. Filippa stood on my left inHelena’s longer blue nightdress, clutching the pillow she and Wren hadwalloped each other with in Act III. In the middle of the photo,Alexander and Meredith were wrapped around each other like a pair ofsnakes—he a sinister and seductive Oberon in slinky silk bathrobe, she avoluptuous Titania in revealing black lace. But Richard was the mostarresting, standing among the other rude mechanicals in clownish flannelpajamas, enormous donkey ears protruding from his thick black hair. HisNick Bottom was aggressive, unpredictable, and totally deranged. Heterrorized the fairies, tormented the other players, scared the hell out ofthe audience, and—as always—stole the show.The seven of us had survived three yearly “purges” because we wereeach somehow indispensable to the playing company. In the course offour years we were transformed from a rabble of bit players to a small,meticulously trained dramatic troupe. Some of our theatrical assets wereobvious: Richard was pure power, six foot three and carved fromconcrete, with sharp black eyes and a thrilling bass voice that flattenedevery other sound in a room. He played warlords and despots and anyoneelse the audience needed to be impressed by or afraid of. Meredith wasuniquely designed for seduction, a walking daydream of supple curvesand skin like satin. But there was something merciless about her sexappeal—you watched her when she moved, whatever else washappening, and whether you wanted to or not. (She and Richard had been“together” in every typical sense of the word since the spring semester ofour second year.) Wren—Richard’s cousin, though you never would haveguessed it by looking at them—was the ingénue, the girl next door, awaifish thing with corn silk hair and round china doll eyes. Alexanderwas our resident villain, thin and wiry, with long dark curls and sharpcanine teeth that made him look like a vampire when he smiled.Filippa and I were more difficult to categorize. She was tall, olive-skinned, vaguely boyish. There was something cool and chameleonicabout her that made her equally convincing as Horatio or Emilia. I, onthe other hand, was average in every imaginable way: not especiallyhandsome, not especially talented, not especially good at anything butjust good enough at everything that I could pick up whatever slack the others left. I was convinced I had survived the third-year purge becauseJames would have been moody and sullen without me.Fate had dealt us a good hand in our first year, when he and I foundourselves squashed together in a tiny room on the top floor of thedormitories. When I’d first opened our door, he looked up from the baghe was unpacking, held out his hand, and said, “Here comes Sir Oliver!You are well met, I hope.” He was the sort of actor everyone fell in lovewith as soon as he stepped onstage, and I was no exception. Even in ourearly days at Dellecher, I was protective and even possessive of himwhen other friends came too close and threatened to usurp my place as“best”—an event as rare as a meteor shower. Some people saw me asGwendolyn always cast me: simply the loyal sidekick. James was soquintessentially a hero that this didn’t bother me. He was the handsomestof us (Meredith once compared him to a Disney prince), but morecharming than that was his childlike depth of feeling, onstage and off-.For three years I enjoyed the overflow of his popularity and admired himintensely, without jealousy, even though he was Frederick’s obviousfavorite in much the same way that Richard was Gwendolyn’s. Ofcourse, James did not have Richard’s ego or temper and was liked byeveryone, while Richard was hated and loved with equal ferocity.It was customary for us to watch whichever audition followed ourown (performing unobserved was compensation for performing first),and I paced restlessly along the crossover, wishing that James could havebeen my audience. Even when he didn’t mean to be, Richard was anintimidating onlooker. I could hear his voice from the rehearsal hall,ringing off the walls.Richard: “Therefore take heed how you impawn our person,How you awake our sleeping sword of war:We charge you, in the name of God, take heed.For never two such kingdoms did contendWithout much fall of blood; whose guiltless dropsAre every one a woe, a sore complaint,’Gainst him whose wrongs give edge unto the swordsThat make such waste in brief mortality.”