CHAPTER XIX (1)

- the performance -

CC had never been this scared in his entire life.

He'd gathered everyone who was working on organising the festival: the acts and the musical theatre people and the backstage crew, so he could give them his pep-talk as customary. He didn't like pep-talks, they felt like just saying what everybody knew already, and besides, the concept of pep itself was one that he still found greatly confusing. But Anthea insisted, and he couldn't argue with her.

But there'd been some problem with the sound equipment earlier, so they hadn't had time to do a proper run through like CC had planned, and now they barely had time for a decent sound check. And then there'd been a rumour going round – he'd heard it at least four of five times by now – that Ally and Jen and Diana were coming, because they were leaving this year and thought it'd be cute or something, and that had freaked him out, because they were at the top of the social paradigm and had never had any reason to come before. To him, it was highly suspicious. Why were they coming this year? To heckle? CC had never been heckled before, but he didn't like the sound of it at all.

He'd asked Anthea and she'd told him she hadn't heard anything about it. After a second she'd added that even if they were coming it wouldn't make a difference, with that pointed look of hers that made him think she knew more than she was telling him. He'd been half tempted to ask Eli for the list of people who'd bought tickets, but what if the rumours were true? Would that make him feel better, or worse? And then someone had come up to him, about half an hour ago, to tell him Eli was missing –

He'd gone backstage to check progress and there'd been no sign of her, and even after getting half the coordinators to look for her, nobody had seen her. It was getting dangerously close to the start time, and if there was nobody to do backstage...

"Well..." he coughed a little, took his glasses off his head and polished the lenses. "Today's the day, I guess. I mean...well. Tonight, that's the day. Night. Um...you all know what you're doing, so just...do it again, I suppose. And don't mess up, because, you know...cool people are coming..."

He trailed off. He was never good at being eloquent on the best of days, but he was a mess today. He saw people exchange bemused glances in the audience, and decided that if this pep-talk was having any effect it was certainly a detrimental one.

There was a movement in the crowd and he nearly died with relief when he saw Anthea making her way up to him. She gave his shoulder a little squeeze.

"Thank you, Clarence," she said, gently, and then turned to face the rest of the crowd. "What he's trying to say is that we've been with you guys for this whole time, and we've seen you work. We know there's been setbacks, problems. We've seen some of you learn an entire script's worth of music in less than a week; turn up to every rehearsal, other commitments be damned; and stay working behind the scenes almost every night. We know you know all your lines by heart, all your songs to the note. You've worked hard. Harder than we could have ever asked you to. And tonight is the only chance you'll get to prove it. So if, after all that, you still need an incentive to do your best tonight, do it not because we told you to, or because certain people are coming, but do it because after all the effort and time you've poured into this, it wouldn't be fair on you not to."

Typical Anthea: calm when he couldn't be, inexplicably strong while he fell apart. The people gathered in front of him nodded, looking relieved and uplifted. Someone started to clap from somewhere at the back, and the applause spread forwards in a wave, gathering in intensity. CC said something, a few words of thanks, hopefully, and then let them get back to work.

"Honest to God, Anthea, I don't know what I would do without you," CC mumbled.

Anthea put her hand on his shoulder and crouched down a little so they were the same height. "Clarence," she said, evenly, looking him straight in the eyes. "You've got nothing to worry about, but if you insist on worrying anyway, the others will, and then you really will direct a sub-standard performance. None of us want that. You need to be strong, for everyone."

He swallowed. "But..."

"No."

He frowned a little, and she shook her head. He took a deep breath instead.

"Okay."

She patted his shoulder and smiled. "Better. Come on, we've got work to do."

"Where's Eli? You know, don't you?"

"No idea. I'll get Esther to look for her."

Esther had been given the task of coordinating, along with a couple of kids from the year below her, which was a pretty sweet deal. Set up the chairs and things before the show, direct people to their seats, find empty seats for the latecomers without disrupting the others, set up the refreshments in the interval, that sort of thing. And for that you got to sit and watch the whole show for free, which was one of the highlights of Esther's year.

She was mid-way through setting up the chairs, in the middle of the action. People were running to and fro trying to locate performers who had popped out to buy some snacks and never returned, finalising last-minute decorations, badgering them to work faster. Robin and the other sound girl were shouting instructions from the booth to move the mics and for everyone else to quiet down a little so they could finish the sound check. Nobody had found Eli yet either, and it was getting pretty close to seven now. Esther couldn't understand it: after she'd put so much effort into getting everything ready for tonight, it didn't make sense that she would fail to appear.

"Anthea!" she heard someone shout, and glanced up to see Anthea picking her way deliberately through the rows of chairs towards them. "You must know where Eli is, right? She would have told you, wouldn't she? Backstage is a mess right now! I don't understand why she'd disappear right now, of all times..."

"Sorry," Anthea said quickly. "We're still looking. I'm sure she's around."

Esther frowned a little; there was something about the way she said it that rung insincere.

"Actually, I just came to get Esther," Anthea continued.

Esther glanced up. "Me?"

"I need a favour from you."

Esther stood up, and the girl managing the co-ordinators shook her head a little and sighed.

"Fine. But please keep an eye out for Eli, ok?"

"Of course," Anthea nodded, and gestured with a quick movement of her head for Esther to follow after her, the two of them marching briskly down the corridors.

"You know where Eli is, don't you," Esther said, after a few seconds.

Anthea looked over at her. "Yep."

She led Esther backstage, which was a bustle of activity. She stopped outside the door marked 'prop storage' and pushed it open gently, revealing Eli's figure curled up on a pile of costumes, fast asleep. Esther softened a little, remembering how tired she'd been for the past few days.

"She's had about three hours of sleep over the past two days," Anthea said, keeping her voice low so as not to wake her up. "I told her to get some rest before the show started or she'd just burn herself out. That's why I haven't told anyone she's here. They'd just wake her up."

"Why'd you show me?"

"Can you take over backstage for her?" Anthea said. "You've been doing it since the start of term, so it should be familiar to you."

Esther's heart sank inwardly: she'd helped out with backstage for the dress rehearsal and she'd solemnly promised herself never to do it again. Compared to co-ordinating it was hectic: you had to make sure people were there in time for their acts and help them get over last-minute stage fright and cue people's entrances and make sure their costume changes were ready the second they came off and wheel in and out the props and set changes...she'd been looking forward to a relatively quiet evening. But of the original backstage team, she was the only one left: Robin and one of the other girls were doing sound, Felice was on lights, and Eli...she'd worked harder than all of them for this. It was only fair she got some rest now.

She looked at Anthea and nodded. "Ok. I'll try."

Anthea smiled. "Thank you so much, Esther."

She left quickly, and Esther was left alone in the back. It seemed darker in there now, almost foreboding. The prop layouts and line-up that had been taped to the walls seemed impossibly long, convoluted. She couldn't do this, not all by herself, surely? And then she started to hear the dim sounds of voices from the stage behind her. People were walking in, taking their seats. She glanced at the clock on the wall: 7:00. Fifteen minutes until showtime, and she had no idea what to do.

She started to panic. What if she messed up? She'd heard nightmare stories of the mics getting mixed up, broken props, missing performers. She wasn't sure she could do this. Would anyone mind too much if she went and woke up Eli, asked her to help? She had so much more experience than Esther did...

But then, a new sound, still faint behind the curtain caught her attention: the opening notes of a song she recognised instantly. Prelude to a Slightly Longer Prelude. Unconsciously, she felt a smile creep over her face, her mind backtracking, away from the bustle and the stifling chaos. For a second, she was back with Robin, the two of them lying next to each other, with the stars and the city either side of them and the music all around...

The tension swept out of her almost immediately. "Can I get the first three acts ready to go on, please," she said, surprised at how level her voice was. She found a copy of the line-up that Eli had made: all the people performing in the first quarter, and how everything needed to be set up, and read it through a couple of times, familiarising herself with the names. By the time she heard Ezra's voice start to open the festival her nerves had calmed down, replaced with a quiet determination.

"Hello, and welcome to our annual Music and Arts Festival! It's great to see so many of you here tonight, thanks for coming!" She looked down at the line-up. Act One: Caroline Wicker – Violin Solo [solo mic B keep it on stage after]. "This has been one of the oldest running Foxhill traditions, a showcase of talent across the whole spectrum of the music, art and drama department, and part of that tradition is that it is entirely student-run: everything from the acts to the stage management to the tech and music is all due to the hard work and dedication of the pupils here..."

"Got your music and stuff ready?" Esther asked to the small girl who'd appeared next to her, clutching her violin. The poor soul looked even more apprehensive than she did.

She nodded, holding up the sheet music. Esther smiled.

"Awesome. Go get 'em."

"So, for our first act of the evening – please give a huge round of applause for...Caroline!"

Next to her, Caroline gave Esther a nervous smile.

"Good luck," she mouthed, giving her an encouraging thumbs up, and held the door open for her as she stepped onto the stage, getting a glimpse of the packed auditorium before the door closed again.

Showtime.

The first quarter passed without event. Esther moved the mics when necessary and called people up, reassured them before they went on and congratulated them when they came off. She didn't get to see the acts, but if she left the backstage door open she could hear the performers in the background of the measured chaos – the poetry and the music, solos and duets and ensembles.

Listening to them, Esther was reminded of the real reason she loved this festival: not just listening to or watching the acts, but seeing a group of people come together. Most of the people who performed in the festival were the ones you'd expect – the music and drama clubs, people in Orchestra and Musical Theatre and Writing Club.

And then there were the oddities: a trio of girls in her Biology class who normally sat in the back and painted their nails instead of listening to the teacher and doing the practical performed an impressive mashup of Ex's and Oh's and Mama Do; one of Wyatt's friends, who collectively had more hours in detention than the rest of the school combined, did a couple of spoken word pieces that left Esther completely stunned afterwards.

It was a night of surprises, linked by one thing: their talent and their passion and their creativity, and, in one night, getting to experience that all. Talent, Esther had realised, came in many forms, and nights like these were the ones where she could experience that in all its glory.

Still, by the end of the first quarter she was getting a little worn out. She was grateful when the announcer came up on stage and told everyone there would be a quick ten minute break. Of course, that didn't mean a break for her. As soon as the intro of Blue Turtle (3) started to play, backstage erupted into movement: the Musical Theatre people streaming out of the woodwork and getting ready for the first scene. The second and third quarters of the festival were devoted to Small Steps, which meant for the next hour and a half Esther was going to be worked off her feet.

She felt her phone buzz in her pocket and pulled it open:

From: Diana

> Wow! I love this festival thing already! Everyone is sooo good :)

> not to mention the beautiful interval music i wonder who wrote it...

Esther smiled. In all the rush, she'd forgotten Diana was going to be here. She made a mental note to try and track her down during the longer interval. But that was in 45 minutes from now, and in that space, she still had a lot to do. She flipped open the script and ran through the stage directions one more time.

Scene one: "This Day is Ours" – Fiona (Mackenzie) and David (Jesse/Liam)

Notes: move mics before show starts (leave on onstage for CC to do the intro but tell him to bring it off with him!!) Jesse to wait in wings BEFORE song starts --

"Esther!" someone said, a little too loudly, jolting her out of her thoughts. "I thought Eli was doing backstage?"

Liam was everything she expected him to be right before he was due to come on: upbeat and full of confidence. Sometimes she wondered where he got it from; if it were her going on stage in front of all those people, she'd be scared to death.

"I'm filling in for her," Esther said. "She...had to do something."

Liam nodded. "Fair enough," he said, but just at that moment a commotion burst out in the corridor outside, and they both instinctively got up to see what was going on. It was a small crowd of musical theatre performers, brimming with frantic energy.

"- the hell is going on? Is everyone just going to bail today, is that the plan?" one of them, a tall, stocky girl called Eleanor was shouting.

"I'm sure he's on his way–"

"He's not answering his phone," someone else said.

"Well, listen, you two – look around again and find him, okay?" Eleanor glanced up and caught sight of Liam and Esther. "Hey, you two – have you seen CC?"

Liam shook his head; Esther frowned. "I haven't seen CC since he came in after school," Esther said.

Liam nodded. "I saw him at the pep talk, but..."

"That's the last place anyone saw him. Where the hell is he? We're on any minute now and he needs to do the introduction."

"That's not too bad," Esther shrugged. "Anthea or someone else can do it instead, right?"

At that, the others feel into an uneasy silence.

"Well, I mean – she could..."

"It'd be kinda weird, wouldn't it?" someone muttered, and the others all agreed. "He always does the intro."

"He was acting a little funny this afternoon, though," Liam said.

The crowd descended into low chatter once again until Eleanor ushered them away, shouting: "Come on, don't just stand there and talk, go look for him! Esther, you're not busy right? Can you just..."

Esther didn't want to look for him at all, but Eleanor was one of the musical theatre veterans and even though she wasn't on committee her words held a strong undertone of authority. Besides, Esther needed to have some time to herself: backstage was starting to give her a bit of a headache, and the show hadn't even started yet. She figured she could check the balcony – it was unlikely he'd be in the music and arts centre seeing as the festival itself was held in the main hall on the ground floor, but that was where she always imagined him to be.

She took the stairs to the fifth floor, consoling herself with the thought that he probably wouldn't be up there, and even if he was he was a little more tolerable when he was focused on the show, so they might be able to have a civilised conversation for once. Wouldn't that be something, she thought wistfully, approaching the door to the balcony. She could see through the windows on the door that the lights were off and frowned a little. But seriously, what was he thinking? It was bad enough they had to manage without Eli, but now CC was going AWOL as well?

"Clancy?" she asked, pushing open the door, and then stopped dead still, looking around in shock. Esther had never seen the balcony this messy: pages of the script were lying around, scattered across the table and all over the floor with annotations scribbled on the margins in CC's neat writing and certain phrases underlined with "emphasis!!" or "look straight at audience" printed beneath. There was a half-empty jug of cold coffee on top of one of the pages of the script, and mugs, some empty, some not quite finished, dotted all over the table. One had been knocked over, its contents drying on the wooden surface.

Esther shook her head: when CC saw what a mess his workspace had become he'd go crazy. But a second later, she caught sight of him, slouched on his chair with another mug of coffee in his hands, staring very intently at its contents.

"How much coffee have you had?" she asked incredulously, before she could stop herself.

He glanced up sharply.

"Balcony," he said, shakily. "Off."

"You were here the whole time? Why aren't you answering your calls?"

"I'm gathering my composure," CC told her.

Esther rolled her eyes a little. "Come on, Clancy, get your shit together. You're a mess."

He sighed. "I suppose I am."

"Do you get like this before every show?"

"Esther, just...do me a favour and get off the balcony, would you?"

Esther looked him up and down.

"Alright, what's up?"

"Nothing's up. I feel fine."

"If you're so fine, then come down and stop stressing us all out."

He sighed again, long and loud. "Esther, honey, you don't even know the meaning of the word."

Esther scowled. "Fine. If you want me to leave you to wallow in your self-absorbed misery then–" be my guest, was what she had every intention of saying, before storming out and telling everyone with undisguised relish that CC couldn't make it and the show would have to go on regardless, shame.

But something held her back. CC's low mood seemed to envelop the whole balcony. She hadn't been quite able to place it at first, but she realised now she knew exactly what it was: an abject feeling of hopelessness, being so close to something you've always loved but suddenly not being able to connect with it. It was a feeling she knew – the feeling of not being able to write, and even though CC had been part of the reason she felt that way she still wouldn't wish that feeling on anyone, ever.

"Look, CC – I know you," she said, gentler this time, taking a step towards him. "There's never been a performance that's gone without a hitch, but no matter what happened you'd always be down there, telling us to suck it up and get on with it. 'Nobody remembers the people who give up; great performances are forged on a bed of tribulation,' et cetera." He had a ream of lofty sayings he could spin out at a moment's notice, so much that anyone who'd been around him long enough could recite them perfectly back to him. "This," she gestured to his hunched figure, "isn't like you at all, so something must be on your mind."

He shrugged. "I'm just not feeling up to it tonight."

"What the hell does that mean? This is your last show at Foxhill and you want it to end like this? Crying in the dark?"

"I don't need to be there at all. It's just an intro," CC said flatly. "Just a bunch of words. I can't do it again. It doesn't matter who gives the talk." He sighed, and added: "It's just a formality. Nobody really wants me there anyway."

She spluttered. "That's what you're worrying about? Now?"

He glanced up at her. "You know, Esther. It's funny, I was actually just thinking how this was my last play that I'd be involved in at Foxhill. It made me think about this one time someone told me I'd never be a good director because no matter what I did nobody would ever respect me, and if your cast don't respect you they'll never want to put on a good show for you."

Esther frowned. "Still?"

He smiled thinly.

"Oh, you remember it, too?"

Esther felt her blood spike with anger. "You want me to be sorry for you, is that it?" she snapped. "You say shit like that about me all the time. I had to deal with years of your crap."

She didn't remember exactly what she'd said to him that night, but definitely something in line with what he'd just said. But CC was never fazed by what people said about him, so she was surprised he remembered that at all. She'd been pissed off at him for whatever reason and had snapped the first thing she could to try and make him feel the same; something petty and spiteful. But he'd been as composed as ever, made some airy response; she honestly had no idea that he'd dwelled on her words for more than a second at most.

She didn't want to apologise; if she didn't remember what she said that night, she did remember the years after: all the hassle and grief he'd given her, the teasing, the taunting. She remembered all the times she'd gone home after he'd said something particularly cutting and wondered if he was right, if nobody really wanted to listen to the music she'd poured her heart and soul into and they were just saying things to be polite; if she was done and washed up and this was it for her. Maybe she was at fault; but she wasn't about to go feeling sorry for him now.

CC looked back at his coffee, his voice heavy. "I saw it, today. I tried to give them a pep talk earlier and I messed it up. I didn't know what to tell them to encourage them. I never have, that's why I've never given them a decent pep talk in my life. And I could see what they were thinking about me, their disappointment, annoyance, maybe. You were right all along, and I just noticed now. If I go out there and talk again I'll just make it worse."

Esther couldn't believe what she was hearing. "Listen up, Clancy, because I'm only gonna say this once. There's been all those times you told me my music was shit, threatened to cut my sets, said I was wasting my time doing this. There have been days I seriously thought about giving up entirely because for a second I believed all the stuff you said to me. But I didn't. I kept writing, because I love writing and I love music and nothing you say is gonna change that. And yeah, maybe I said something like that to you once, but you still kept on directing anyway because even if there was a chance nobody respected you, you felt the same about musical theatre and you wanted to make it work no matter what."

She paused for breath, and continued: "And the others, they all know that. I was wrong about you back then; you can be a prick sometimes but everyone in musical theatre respects you. Because they know you're never gonna give up on them, so they won't give up on you. That's why they want you to do this so badly, why they want you to be there. They've been working for so long – you've been working for so long, and now they want to show you the result of all that work. This is their way of saying thanks to you, for guiding them and puling everything all together even with all the setbacks. So if you stay here and don't support them when they need you too, then what you're really saying is that you don't care. You don't care about any of this, and you don't care about them."

She let her words hang in the air between them.

"And we both know that's not true."

CC frowned, fingering the edge of one of the script pages thoughtfully. He looked like he was about to say something, but at that moment, her pocket buzzed and she glanced down to check it. It was a text from an unknown number:

> Esther, we've got Jason to cover for CC for now. Might as well head back to backstage, we're overrunning. Eleanor.

When Esther glanced up, CC had gone back to staring at his coffee, apparently lost in thought again. Esther had no idea if she'd gotten through to him, or her words were just sliding off him, meaningless, but she didn't have time to find out.

"Look, I have to go, Clancy," she said abruptly. "Think about it."

---

a/n: 

so THIS explains why CC is being such a douche all the time (he's actually a douche 100% of the time + this had nothing to do with it)

i really like CC, like...as a concept. i think this may also be the time to confess I don't know anything about theatre or how it works lol

song at the top is Theatre - Icon For Hire, because I really like Icon for Hire and the song is sorta relevant? Kinda?